✓ | battle wounds, scott m.

chapter eighteen.

Ella tapped her pen against her wooden desk, blowing a loose bang out of her face. Her blue eyes looked around the room, trying to find something to avert her thoughts away from the brown haired boy in front of her. If there was one fact about Ella and Scott's friendship, it was that there had never been any tension or anything complicated; they were best friends, always have been, always will be. Ella didn't know what was going to happen between them. She didn't know if their relationship was going to go further or if things would just get incredibly awkward to the point that they quit talking. Ella hoped the first thing would happen. "More than once. Idioms, analogies, metaphors, and similes, all tools the writer uses to tell their story. Lydia, I wasn't aware you had so many hidden talents."

Ella turned her head to see Lydia had been drawing the same tree she had drew when they were looking for Deaton, the same exact tree. "You and every guy I've ever dated," Lydia smiled. Ella smiled small, looking away and resting her head in her arms, glasses rising a tiny bit. "Oh, um, well, that was an idiom, by the way. Idioms are something of a secret to the people who know the language or the culture. They're phrases that only make sense if you know key words. Saying 'jump the gun' is meaningful only if you know about the starting gun in a race, or a phrase like 'seeing the whole board'," Miss Blake informed the class. "Like chess," Stiles muttered. "That's right, Stiles. Do you play?" Miss Blake asked. "Uh, no. My father does," Stiles replied. "Now, when does an idiom become a cliche?" Miss Blake turned away from the class.

"I think I can get to Ethan. I'm pretty sure I can make him talk," Ella overheard Scott say. So he does speak. "What do you want to do that for?" Stiles asked. "The druids are emissaries, right? So what if the Darach was an emissary to the alphas?" Scott asked. "Okay, first of all, I cannot believe that we've gotten to the point where a sentence like 'what if the Darach was an emissary to the alphas?' Actually makes sense to me. Second of all, we're gonna have a huge problem getting to Ethan," Stiles stated. "What's that?" Scott asked. "Going through Aiden," Ella spoke from behind Scott, both him and Stiles turning to look at the younger Stilinski. "Ever since he's been back at school, they're always together. How are you gonna separate them again?" Ella asked. Both boys shared a look before their eyes widened and they turned to Lydia. Lydia looked up, sighing, "What now?"

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Ella leaned against the wall beside her brother, both teens with their arms crossed against their chest. "Why are you even talking to me? I helped kill your friend. How do you know I'm not gonna kill another one?" Ethan asked, looking at Stiles. Stiles noticed, "Is he looking at me? Are you threatening me?" " You know what I'm gonna do if you even touch my brother?" Ella asked, "I'm going to break off an extra large branch of Mountain ash, wrap it in wolfsbane, roll it in mistletoe, and shove it up your freaking a—" Stiles clamped a hand down on Ella's mouth, "Daniella. We get it."

"We're talking to you because I know that you didn't want to kill Boyd. And I think that if something like that happened now, you wouldn't do it again," Scott told Ethan. "You don't know what we owe them, especially Deucalion. We weren't like Kali and Ennis when we met him. We weren't alphas," Ethan shook his head. "What were you?" Scott asked. "Omegas. In actual wolf packs, omegas are the scapegoat, the last to eat, the one who has to take the abuse from the rest of the pack," Ethan explained.

"So you and your brother were, like, the bitches of the pack?" Stiles asked. "Something like that," Ethan nodded. "What happened?" Scott asked. "They were killers. I mean, people talk about us as monsters. Well, they were the ones who gave us the reputation. And our Alpha was the worst of them," Ethan stated. "Why didn't you guys just fight back?" Ella asked. "Form voltron wolf, you know? Kick everyone's asses?" Stiles asked. "We couldn't, we didn't know how to control it back then," Ethan replied. "Deucalion taught you," Scott figured. "And then, we fought. We took down the whole pack, one-by-one. And by the time we got to our Alpha, he was begging for his life. And we tore him apart. Literally," Ethan said.