Work Text:
The light from the moon (waning gibbous, past its most potent time but still large in the sky and bright enough to make the hair on Derek’s arms want to stand on end) streaming through the window bleaches Stiles’ skin to a milky white against the smoke grey sheets, throws the angles of his face and the lines of his wiry muscles and long limbs into even starker contrast than usual, and illuminates the spark of humor, affection, and a touch of wonder in his eyes as they flutter open on a breathy laugh and re-focus on Derek propped up on his arms above him.
Derek watches Stiles, drinks in every enticing inch of him, and tells himself slow, slow, no need to rush. They have time tonight. He wants to use all of it and enjoy even the little things like the taste of Stiles’ mouth lingering on his lips or the perfect slope of Stiles’ nose in the cool light.
“I’m going to get my homework done every day if it means you’ll stay for more than glowering and a goodnight kiss when you stop in through my window,” Stiles says to him, sliding those big hands of his up Derek’s bare sides. They’re both naked, they’re both hard, but they’re both holding back, like maybe Stiles wants something more than a frantic fuck between crises, too, as hot as that can be.
“You’re supposed to be getting your homework done, anyway,” Derek replies with more than a hint of disapproval, but he’s not really worried, because Stiles is the smartest of them all and seems to be able to excel in his classes even without sleep.
Derek wants him to get more sleep. Derek tries to ask for a lot less from him than he wants to because he’s so aware of how thin the line between fine and freaked out Stiles is skirting most of the time, but Stiles is still overextended. They don’t get breaks often. That’s part of the reason he’s taking advantage of this one the way he is.
“Tell that to the hunters, alpha pack, and beasties of the week,” Stiles says. He rolls his head on the pillow, wiggles a little underneath him, and fakes a sigh. “Bad guys these days. They have no respect for school nights.”
“Mmm,” Derek says, distracted by the way Stiles’ fingers are tracing along his ribs. Goosebumps rise on his skin, making his heart thump and his senses prickle, and he can hear the way his next breath shuddering into his lungs makes Stiles’ pulse skitter and speed up. He loves that, loves making Stiles excited just from the way he unconsciously reacts to him.
Stiles’ voice is a little lower and rougher when he speaks, though his tone is still flippant. “Maybe we could put a sign up at the town line. ‘Sorry, no trouble allowed tonight. Chem test.’ It could work.”
“Maybe,” Derek replies. He wants to kiss Stiles again - and again and again and again - but instead he lowers his head to press the tip of his nose against Stiles’ jaw, breathing in slowly. Stiles smells like sweat and arousal and musty books. He smells like sunshine and fallen leaves and popcorn and soap. He smells like safety and home and laughter. He smells like things that Derek so desperately misses, like things that he wants and maybe can have. He smells like Stiles.
Stiles used to tease him about the way Derek liked to take in his scent - or “sniff him” as Stiles would call it with an exaggerated flare of his nostrils - but he’s comfortable enough with it now that he just lifts his chin a little, gets his hands on Derek’s back to pull him in, and makes a soft, encouraging sound.
Derek nuzzles in closer, breathing deeply, and listens to the rush of Stiles’ blood through his veins, the tap dance of his heart, and the whisper-light susurration of Stiles’ skin against his as Stiles rubs his thumbs slowly along the ridge of Derek’s spine. Derek kisses Stiles’ pulse point as softly as he can and lives in the moment for the span of a few breaths.
The comfort in it makes a part of him want to close his eyes and stay there forever.
But then he lifts his head to look at Stiles’ face, which is open and trusting now but is just as familiar flushed with anger or frozen with fear and determination, and Derek can’t resist kissing him properly again - hard and hungrily, not the only way he knows how to kiss, but the way that comes most naturally - because Stiles is breathtaking all of the time, even when he’s talking a mile a minute or lit up by humor or especially when his body, like now, is bare and Derek’s and glowing in the pale, pure light of the moon.
Stiles huffs out a breath that sounds awfully close to a laugh, but he wraps his arms around Derek’s shoulders and surges up to kiss him right back. No matter how Derek’s heart feels liquid in his chest some days when he thinks of everything Stiles means to him, right now when they’re together like this it’s as natural as shifting forms is to lose himself in Stiles while he can.
The moonlight has its more sinister side, though; it also turns the scars that cross Stiles’ body, usually hidden by clothing or faded to blend into the surrounding skin, into ribbons and patches of shining silver, bright and impossible to overlook. Not that Derek ever overlooks them. He can’t. He knows exactly where each one came from.
And when he dips his head down to Stiles’ chin, he has to mouth along the fine line that runs along it, nearly invisible even in the moonlight. That one came from a whip-crack of a branch, snapping back against Stiles as they fled through the night, and it’s so mild and fresh that Derek thinks it will disappear altogether in another month or two.
When Stiles urges him closer with restless hands and the helpless roll of his hips, Derek rubs his lips over the thin ridge of a scar over Stiles’ collarbone, the memory of a quick but nasty fight with a surprisingly fast omega rising in Derek’s memory.
There’s a deeper, wider scar on Stiles’ bicep that makes Derek’s stomach churn, but he kisses its length just the same. While Deaton had stitched him up in his office, Stiles had joked - white as a sheet with the pain but his eyes desperate and hard with determination not to show it - that it was like the single stripe of a military insignia. It made him a private in the Derek Hale Army for Werewolves and Rejects, and he’d need to get a few more well-placed wounds to move up in the ranks.
Derek hadn’t liked the joke then, and he doesn’t like it any better now, because Stiles got the slice from a rogue hunter’s arrow because Derek hadn’t moved fast enough, and he knows if he’d been even half a second slower it might have done some real damage, the kind that Derek would heal in minutes and that would linger in Stiles forever, tearing the muscle and weakening his arm for good.
Derek closes his eyes as Stiles rubs his fingers through Derek’s hair with a low exhalation, and he opens his mouth and licks along the scar, grateful that it’s not more than it is but hating that it’s there at all when he could have prevented it. Just a second faster, a half second, and it wouldn’t be there at all.
“That shouldn’t be so hot,” Stiles tells him with a shaky laugh and arches a little beneath him at the journey of Derek’s mouth. “Your tongue should not be so hot.”
“It’s my body temperature, Stiles,” Derek replies, just to annoy him, because of course he understands, it’s so arousing to him, too, and he lifts Stiles’ arm so he can nuzzle against the soft skin of his inner bicep, so warm and lush with Stiles’ scent.
“Shut up,” Stiles gasps and tugs on Derek’s hair. “You know what I mean.” It feels incredible, that little jolt of pain, that little bit of demanding guidance as he tries to get Derek to move his mouth somewhere else, but Derek doesn’t go, just enjoying that tender, unmarked skin for a moment, the way all of Stiles skin should have been.
Still, there’s much more of Stiles to explore, and desire for him as well as guilt drives Derek on. There’s a bruise on Stiles’ stomach that deserves attention, left behind by an overzealous Jackson at the last lacrosse scrimmage. There’s a jagged slice across Stiles’ hip from a bit of rusty wire fencing he didn’t quite manage to scale cleanly a few months ago when breaking into an office building he and Scott had thought held answers to the whereabouts of the alpha pack. There’s a knot of a scar tissue by his wrist where his manacle had been clamped too tight when he’d been kidnapped by those witches trying to get Derek to work for them.
Derek can still remember how Stiles had gone white with relief when Derek had burst through the door instead of it being the witches coming back to exact their promised revenge.
So many of the scars are Derek’s fault, even the pain Jackson has caused, because Derek is the one who gave him his supernatural strength, and he hates that. He hates that he didn’t prevent them. He hates that he’s brought any pain to Stiles at all, to this bright, clever boy who should be laughing under the sun instead of fighting in the moonlight, even as much as he also hates that if Stiles hadn’t been there to get most of those scars things would have gone a lot worse for Derek. He hates in his selfish gratitude for him that he doesn’t completely hate the reasons that Stiles has them.
Derek kisses the scars that mark him, one by one, and all of Stiles between them. He’s careful but not gentle, he feels too much to be gentle, but Stiles doesn’t seem to mind. His pulse races faster with each inch further Derek’s mouth travels on him, and he slides against Derek in stuttering, helpless movements, touching back where he can. He feels wonderful, every glide of his fingers or rub of his cock against Derek’s body a sybaritic delight.
But he doesn’t stop Derek. He doesn’t beg or babble. He doesn’t try to draw Derek closer or tease him to lose control. Instead he gasps for breath and watches Derek with sharp, understanding eyes gone dark in the cool light of the moon.
“Derek,” he sighs every once in a while, but it’s not much of a plea or a demand, mostly a simple thread of connection between them.
Derek seeks out with hands and lips the line of three claw marks on Stiles’ calf from one of the alphas, the slight bend in his little toe where he broke it falling down a rocky hillside in bare feet to avoid being mauled by that beast Derek still isn’t sure they killed or just drove off, the swelling in Stiles’ knee where he wrenched it yesterday stumbling down the steps of Derek’s house with too many demonology books in his arms to be able to see his footing.
Derek kisses them all, maps them out with lips and tongue as Stiles’ heartbeat thunders under his skin, and feels the weight of them settle on his chest even as his arousal grows and grows, as alive and impatient as the wolf inside of him. But Derek knows how to control the wolf, and he knows how to hold back his need for Stiles, too, until this sweet penance is done, until he’s paid tribute to each time Derek failed to protect him but Stiles lived and saved Derek, anyway.
He can’t make up for Stiles getting hurt, just like he can’t make up for what happened to his family, but he can remember. He always remembers.
“Derek,” Stiles says again in a strangled voice while Derek sucks at the knob of his hip and makes himself edge downwards again without touching his cock.
There’s a smooth patch on the side of Stiles’ knee that Derek likes best of all of the scars, because he can’t blame himself for it. It comes from a childhood skateboarding accident, a huge wipeout on a treacherous hill, to hear Scott and Stiles tell the story, though the relatively small size of the scar tells a different story. Derek doesn’t know if the tale is bigger when they tell it because they’re trying to seem brave or because it was such a terrifying moment as children that it looms larger than life in their heads.
Either way, it’s the scar of Stiles’ that Derek likes the most, because the only guilt he feels is that both boys were robbed of more childhood adventures by having to take on the responsibilities of the pack, and, okay, he feels some guilt, too, that he doesn’t feel more guilty about that, because having them both makes Derek stronger and safer. It makes all of them that way. He can’t help but like that.
“Still stupidly hot,” Stiles breathes shakily, his fingers twisting in the sheets as Derek mouths over his knee, soothing the smooth scar and licking the sweat off of his skin. “Hot, hot, too hot, oh my god, you’re seriously going to kill me, and not in the terrifying, ripping my throat out way.”
Nosing against the skin of Stiles’ calf, Derek says, “I can stop.” He doesn’t want to, as much as he’s ready to get to having Stiles wild against him, but he will give up his journey for Stiles if it’s too much.
“Don’t,” Stiles assures him, looking at him way too seriously down his flushed chest and past his straining erection. He’s panting, but his eyes are filled with something like understanding.
Derek watches him for a long moment, feels how desperately he just wants to grab him and make him come, but then he nods and rolls Stiles onto his stomach - a blessing and a curse, because the temptation of Stiles’ cock is hidden but his ass is right there, begging to be touched - and works his way back upwards. There’s the slice so close to his Achilles tendon from when that witch had whipped out a sword. There’s the site of a cracked rib when he’d been tossed into a stone wall. There’s the muscle in his back Stiles pulled last week frantically pulling Scott out of that enchanted net and is still favoring. There’s the sharp semi-circular scar, gleaming from the moon, on his shoulder blade from a wound Derek doesn’t even remember because he’d been so crazed from being poisoned by wolfsbane he’d been locked away across town for his own good.
Derek kisses them all, one by one across Stiles’ lean and gorgeous body, until he’s half-draped on Stiles’ back, his nose in the fine hair at the nape of Stiles’ neck - covering a small nick from a flying rock from the same fall as the broken toe - and his dick hard where it rests in the cleft of Stiles’ ass. They’re both breathing hard, covered in sweat, and Stiles is making soft, choked noises, his face pressed against his crossed arms as he trembles with the effort of remaining still.
Being still isn’t one of Stiles’ strengths, and that he’s trying so hard to give Derek what he needs makes Derek’s heart ache even more with how much he wishes nothing of his life had ever touched Stiles and how unendingly grateful he is that it did.
There’s one scar left, not Derek’s favorite, no, but the best way to end things when he’s in this sort of mood, and he nudges against Stiles’ cheek until Stiles turns far enough that their mouths can meet, and Derek kisses the faint divot left in Stiles’ lip by Gerard’s fist. He kisses him tenderly, slowly, with as much care as he can manage when all he wants to do is take and touch and thrust and have until he feels so good he can’t feel the hurts in his heart anymore.
Stiles’ voice is tense and soft when Derek pulls away. “Are you done with your werewolf guilt trip thing over my manly scars? Or is there more?”
“I’m done,” Derek tells him, just as soft, and the next kiss is simply a kiss, not penance or remembering, just Derek kissing Stiles because he wants to.
It’s almost chaste for a second, and then Stiles kisses him back like his life depends on it, all of the energy he’s been holding back bursting out of him as he twists beneath Derek, gets his hands in Derek’s hair, and just fucking devours his mouth, driving the breath out of Derek’s lungs and the thoughts out of his head.
Derek makes a sound of surprise, but it’s not like he’s unhappy about it; he chases after Stiles’ mouth when Stiles pulls back again a minute later.
“Can we do this now?” Stiles asks with desperate hope, his hands twitching in Derek’s hair and down over his shoulders. “Are we doing this now? Please tell me we’re doing this now.”
“What?” Derek asks, his brain shutting down and his body ready to take over. He doesn’t know what Stiles is asking. He doesn’t know why they’re stopping.
“I mean, I’m all for the ‘let’s take our time and have fun and touch Stiles in weird places that shouldn’t be sexy but actually are’ thing, but can we stop that part and just do this?” Stiles shifts a little under Derek, obviously trying and failing to control the urges of his body. “Because I think I honestly could have a heart attack or something if we don’t. Not that I want to pressure you or anything, I’m so not that guy, I know all the lectures about personal boundaries and respect, but there is definitely some heart palpitation action happening, so if we’re not going to, you know - “ He waves a vague hand, but the erection pressing so insistently against Derek’s hip is clear enough. “ - then maybe we should take a breather or something so I can go have the worst case of blue balls ever but not actually end up in the morgue no matter what it’ll feel like.”
Derek can’t help the smile that grows across his face. He probably should try to hold it back, but he can’t. Even when Stiles is driving him insane, Derek is impossibly fond of him, and the way Stiles’ babbles his way toward sex always eases a long-held ache in Derek’s heart, because there’s no possibility of Stiles lying to him. There’s no possibility of him trying to manipulate him or twist things to his own selfish gain. He might be talking faster than the human ear can translate, but it’s all from his heart.
And Stiles’ heart sounds just fine to Derek’s ears, no palpitations at all.
“Thanks. That’s great. Nice to see that the possibility of my imminent demise is so funny to you,” Stiles says with a roll of his eyes and a poke of a finger to Derek’s chest.
“You know it isn’t,” Derek tells him softly, and after a blink Stiles’ smile goes crooked and almost painfully genuine. Derek doesn’t let him respond, though, because he’s had enough of scars for one night and instead goes back to kissing Stiles breathless. He figures it’s answer enough to Stiles’ questions.
Stiles makes a muffled sound of approval against Derek’s lips and gives as good as he gets. He’s eager and hungry, touching Derek everywhere he can. They’re both wound up after so long getting to this point, and it’s barely any time at all before they’re groaning and straining desperately against each other, Derek grinding down hard against him and Stiles’ hands scrabbling to pull him closer as they pant into each other’s mouths.
“No, no, you’re so - oh my god - you’re the most - shit - Derek - I can’t just - I really need to - “ Stiles’ words don’t make any sense, but Derek understands by now the tone beneath them, and he isn’t concerned when Stiles’ hands on his chest push him away, because as soon as Derek’s on his side Stiles is crowding up into him, his mouth on Derek’s jaw and his hand fisting his cock. “Yeah. Yeah. So much better. Come on.”
Derek knows that he should be feeling unpleasantly vulnerable with his throat bared and his body reacting helplessly to this person so much weaker than he is, but it’s Stiles. It’s not that Derek isn’t vulnerable to him; it’s that it doesn’t bother him. All Derek feels is the need for more, more touching, more kissing, more of everything Stiles is giving him, and Derek knows without a doubt it’s actually about him for Stiles, not anything else. All he can smell is Stiles’ sweat, his arousal, the pre-come from his dick slicking Derek’s hip. All he can feel is Stiles hot and hard and happy against him, so welcome, so welcoming. All he can hear is Stiles thundering heartbeat and rasping breath and -
“You’re unfairly hot,” Stiles gasps against him, watching his hand working Derek’s erection so perfectly. “I don’t know how you walk around without people jumping you. It’s probably the glower. No, it’s definitely the glower. And maybe your choice of living arrangements, although I don’t think that many people would care about that once you took off your shirt, because like I said you’re unfairly - “
With each sharp stroke, Derek can feel his toes curling in Stiles’ sheets, his body coiling into a tight spring of arousal ready to burst in release, and he cups the back of Stiles’ head with one hand and holds onto his shoulder with the other, careful not to forget himself and hurt him, and grits out, “Stiles, do you have to narrate everything?”
Stiles lets out a husky laugh that makes Derek want to whimper and says like it’s easy as his hand moves quickly on him, “It’s either that or embarrass myself by coming all over you before you even mmph -” His answer is cut off by Derek using his supernatural strength and pulling him up for a biting kiss, not actually biting, though he can feel the wolf inside of him right beneath his skin, ready to come out and have this, too.
Derek doesn’t let it. That’s not what’s driving him. He just wants more, more, more, more of all of this, of Stiles’ open affection, of his heart, of his acceptance, of Stiles. And Stiles just goes with it and gives it to him, finding his balance and diving into the kiss like he’s happy enough doing whatever Derek wants, like it’s so simple for him. Caught up in it, in him, Derek ruts against Stiles helplessly, needing to, needing it all, and chokes back a cry as his control finally slips and he comes all in messy spurts over them both.
The scent of his release on Stiles’ skin has him moving before he’s even remembered how to breathe again. Shaking and dizzy from pleasure, he slides down and takes Stiles’ cock in his mouth, licking off the amazing combination of his own taste mixed with Stiles’. It’s both of them together, but it’s not enough. He sucks him in dirty and deep, losing himself in the salty-bitterness of him as Stiles can’t stop himself from jerking his hips off the bed, cursing and groaning.
“Shit, shit - god - yes - “ Stiles gasps and flails against the mattress.
Derek holds him down with a firm hand on his stomach and feels nothing but satisfied at the way Stiles smells and tastes and feels all the way into his throat.
“Fuck, Derek, you - ” Stiles chokes out, his dick throbbing and swelling against Derek’s eager tongue, and he thrashes again and comes almost immediately.
Derek’s eyes slip closed as his senses are overwhelmed. He’s aware of everything, of the faint whimpers deep in Stiles’ throat, of the taste of him flooding Derek’s mouth, of the little twitches of Stiles’ leg beneath Derek’s hand. Everything is Stiles and sex, everything is the combined smells of them both, just for that moment. It makes him more content, more sure of himself than he could have imagined. It means something more than just the release he could get with anyone, and it’s not confusing like his time with Kate had been. It feels good. It feels important. It feels safe, almost like a home, if home could be an instant and a person instead of a place.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Stiles says, the heels of his hands tight over his eyes as his body quakes with the aftershocks.
“Next time,” Derek says with a grin as he licks Stiles clean with the flat of his tongue and crawls up him to collapse on the mattress beside him, worn out and ready to let go.
“Nggh,” Stiles agrees muzzily and just barely tilts his head to rest against Derek’s on the pillow as they both drift off into the haze of pleasure.
The thing about Stiles, though, is that he might crash hard in post-orgasmic bliss or much-needed sleep, but it never lasts long. He’s not good at being still. When he wakes up again, his brain is immediately back working at its usual frenetic pace, and so Derek floats slowly up from his doze and isn’t surprised to find Stiles lying with his arms propped on Derek’s stomach, his chin on one hand while the other gently traces the muscles of Derek’s abdomen. His face is all angles in the moonlight, making his contemplative expression look more mature than his years.
It’s not completely the moon, Derek reminds himself.
Stiles presses his fingertips to a spot below Derek’s ribs, the exact location where Derek had been shot with a hunter’s arrow two weeks ago. If he had been human, it would have killed him. As it was, the mark was gone in less than an hour.
And yet Stiles still knows precisely where it was.
With sated slowness, Derek reaches up to cup Stiles’ face, thumbing over that fine line Gerard had left in Stiles’ lip.
“If you don’t watch out, your scar fetish could make a guy self-conscious that he doesn’t have a perfect, super-healing body like yours,” Stiles says, looking up into his eyes. The words are flippant, but his tone is serious.
“It’s not a fetish,” Derek tells him. It isn’t. It’s the opposite, really. He wants fewer of them on Stiles’ body. He wants them not to be there, not because he’s healed them away like Derek does. He wants them not to have existed at all. He wants Stiles never to get hurt, but that’s not an option, since Derek can’t always protect him and he can’t stop needing Stiles to be in danger. “And you shouldn’t be self-conscious.”
“I’m always going to be self-conscious,” Stiles says with a roll of his eyes and a wave of his fingers toward his own face. “Hello, have you met me?”
Derek’s mouth quirks up into a little bit of a smile, and he drops his hand down to Stiles’ shoulder.
“But not about them,” Stiles continues. “I mean, yeah, it’d be nice for them to disappear like yours do so I don’t have to make up stories for them in the locker room or the swimming pool, and I wish more of them were from doing impressive heroic things instead of tripping over my own feet, but I’m not sorry I was there to get them.”
“I know,” Derek says, and he wishes he were sorry Stiles had been there, but he just isn’t. He can’t be. He wishes he carried the hurts half as well as Stiles did, though, because Stiles’ skin might heal, his bones might knit, but looking at the slice on Stiles’ arm Derek feels the guilt of not having kept him from it as strongly as he did the moment it happened. It’s his fault. It can’t be Stiles’; he’s human in a werewolf’s world. It’s Derek who wasn’t fast enough. He and the rest of the pack weren’t strong enough to be there without Stiles’ help. And he’s going to put Stiles in harm’s way again and again, because he’s too weak and selfish not to, because he has to if he’s going to keep his pack and his home at all.
Stiles curls his hand with deliberation over Derek’s ribs; a month ago his side had been ripped open to the bone, and it had been Stiles who had driven him to Deaton’s office to get the wound cleaned out before he healed over the detritus of the forest floor. It had been Stiles who had taken charge when Derek was down for the count. It had been Stiles who had turned the tide in their favor, who had gotten them through the fight.
It’s clear they both remember.
They look into each other’s eyes. Stiles’ are pensive and washed out into silver and black in the pale light of the moon, and Derek knows his own are more haunted than he would like.
“Are you sorry I was there to get them?” Stiles finally asks him, quiet. He’s unusually still, like he’s waiting for a rejection or a list of his weaknesses.
“No,” Derek says simply. He traces his thumb along the smooth silver line across Stiles’ bicep and sighs with the truth of the word. “I’m not sorry.”
Stiles’ body loosens some. “Good.” He lets Derek pull him down to nestle against him, his head on Derek’s shoulder. “You’d better not be,” he says. “Because I am seriously awesome at saving your furry ass. Not that your ass is furry right now or most of the time, really, and not that I pay that much attention to your ass when it is furry because usually there’s imminent danger and stuff around, I mean, I’m sure it’s great, but bestiality isn’t really my thing, not that I don’t accept all of you for who-slash-what you are, but in general - ”
“Stiles,” Derek interrupts in exasperation, because he knows Stiles isn’t actually trying to tell him anything but has just gotten caught in a loop of mortification and babbling. “Stop.”
Stiles turns his forehead against Derek’s chest and goes limp with relief. “Thank you. I was thinking I might try out the whole monastic vow of silence thing. You know, as an alternative to putting my foot in my mouth at least once a day.”
Derek snorts. “You wouldn’t last five minutes.”
“Sure, but still. Five whole awesome minutes without the possibility of putting my foot in my mouth.”
“And then you’d explode from all of the things you needed to say.”
Stiles hesitates but then nods against him and breathes out softly when Derek rubs his hand over Stiles’ hair. “And then I’d explode from all of the things I needed to say,” Stiles agrees.
“Mmm.” Derek pulls him closer, closes his eyes, and doesn’t let himself think about what will happen if one day he isn’t fast enough and that voice isn’t there at all to chatter away at him. He doesn’t think about how it probably isn’t an if but a when. He can’t think about it, because if he doesn’t believe in Stiles, in his pack, in himself as much as he can, he can’t do any of this at all.
Instead he smooths his fingers over that shining semi-circle on Stiles’ shoulder blade that he wasn’t even there to prevent and reminds himself that Stiles is smart. He’s quick. He’s a survivor. He’s already beaten the odds, and if what he’s suffered weighs on him it isn’t stopping him.
The scars are badges of honor to Stiles, not signs of failure. They’re signs of triumph.
But they’re more complicated to Derek, because his own skin might heal back like it had never been wounded at all, but when it comes to Stiles his heart does not. It just can’t.
Love hurts, and it’s his fault he has lost it too many times in his life already. He craves it, but it isn’t a simple joy for him, not most of the time, not when he knows what it means to have it go up in smoke.
“Fetish,” Stiles murmurs against Derek’s chest, his palm still pressed over Derek’s ribs as Derek strokes over the imperfect but whole skin of Stiles’ shoulder again and again. “Seriously, Derek, maybe we should get you an appointment with a therapist or something.”
Derek sighs with the combination of annoyance and amusement that means Stiles to him and says, “About this vow of silence...”
“Shut up. You love me.”
“I do,” Derek says with soft honesty. He does, and even if it should terrify him it doesn’t.
Love might hurt, but Stiles knows that, too. Stiles knows about loss almost as well as he does, and that makes it easier for Derek to let the fear go and enjoy the moment as much as he can. Stiles might be young, but he feels the importance of what they have just as much.
Derek holds him close and tries to think of nothing but the smell of sex around them and the way Stiles looks in the moonlight, because that’s what’s important right now.
“I love you, too,” Stiles says, just as soft, and curls around him a little more tightly.
And that’s enough for Derek, enough for tonight.