Chapter Text
The gold was gone by the time Stiles bolted upright in the thin ranch bed, heart hammering against his ribs. He sat there, shivering, watching the faintest grey light bleed through the cabin window. Gold eyes. It wasn’t a dream, wasn’t fatigue, and it certainly wasn’t Stiles projecting. Whatever Ryan was, he wasn't just a physical duplicate.
He found Chris brewing coffee in the kitchenette, looking tired.
“Did you sleep?” Stiles asked, his voice rough.
Chris didn’t look up, stirring sugar into his mug. “Enough to know that lightning flash was probably a reflection off the barn roof, and that I drove a thousand miles to look at hoof prints, not to join your emotional breakdown.”
“You’re dismissing the gold eyes?” Stiles stepped closer, dropping his voice. “Chris, I saw them. The exact shade. They were his.”
Chris took a slow sip of coffee. “I believe you believe you saw them. But even if the man has gold eyes—which I find highly unlikely in a non-Shapeshifter—that doesn’t make him Peter Hale. It makes him a supernatural creature. A different one. We already knew weird things happen out here.”
“No,” Stiles insisted, leaning against the counter. “If it were a random Werewolf, he’d smell like one. The raw power. Ryan smells like—like old smoke and horses. But his eyes…”
“Stiles,” Chris cut in, his tone firm. “I’m not saying we ignore him. I’m saying we proceed with caution and logic. Our job here is cattle rustling. That’s the cover. We use the job to observe him. You watch Ryan. I’ll look at the north pasture. If Ryan is involved with the missing cattle, that’s our angle.”
“So I’m back to being the guy who stalks the brooding, impossibly attractive werewolf,” Stiles muttered.
“It’s your specialty,” Chris deadpanned.
Stiles spent the mid-morning hovering near the stable, armed with a clipboard and the flimsy excuse that he needed to record traffic patterns for "ranch efficiency." Ryan was shoeing a large bay gelding, his concentration absolute. The grace in his movements was unnerving—it was the coiled energy Peter always possessed, refined now, smoother. Like a great predator who’d forgotten the taste of blood.
Stiles approached cautiously. “Hey, Ryan, mind if I watch for a second? Just logging foot traffic.”
Ryan glanced up, his impossible blue eyes meeting Stiles’s. There was no recognition, only mild curiosity. “Sure. Just don’t get clipped.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Stiles said, making a non-existent note. He had to push. “I was just thinking about that guy I mentioned yesterday. Peter. He was obsessed with horses, too. Said he found them…honest.”
Ryan tapped the hoof with a file. “They are. They don’t lie about fear or trust. That’s the only honesty you can count on.”
Stiles swallowed. That was so Peter. Peter had always valued honesty in others because he was utterly incapable of it himself.
Stiles tried a stronger trigger. “You know, my friend had a terrible aunt. Talia. She was the one who ran the pack. Absolute psycho, but great baker. Ring any bells?”
Ryan paused, holding the horse’s leg steady. He frowned slightly, not at the mention of the name, but at the non sequitur. “No. I don’t follow. Were you logging that?”
“Just…context,” Stiles mumbled, defeated. He tried one last thing, a shot in the dark, something only Peter would remember. “So, are we feeling ‘True Alpha’ today, or are we sticking to ‘Beta-with-a-death-wish’?”
Ryan lowered the horse’s hoof, standing up straight. He looked genuinely confused and slightly wary now. “Look, man, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I grew up in Bozeman. My life is pretty boring. You want to talk efficiency, talk to Rip.” He turned back to his work.
Stiles retreated, his mind reeling. Peter’s mannerisms, Peter’s voice, Peter’s eyes, Peter’s preference for horses. But zero memory, zero malice, and zero scent.
Chris called Stiles on the ranch radio near dusk.
“I’m at the northern edge, near the creek bed,” Chris’s voice was clipped. “Get here. Now.”
Stiles drove Chris’s old SUV across the rugged terrain, finding him crouched beside a muddy patch of grass. The air was colder here, smelling heavily of pine and something metallic.
“Look,” Chris said, pointing to a patch of ground where the mud was thickest.
There was a clear impression—a perfect hoof print. But right next to it was a set of tracks that didn’t belong.
“Too big to be a dog, too light to be a bear,” Stiles observed, tracing the claw marks with his finger. “And four toes. Definitely canine.”
“Look closer at the center of the print,” Chris instructed.
Stiles got on his knees, moving some damp earth aside. He noticed a faint, almost invisible, residue. It was a fine, black ash.
“The kills were clean, right?” Chris whispered. “Rip said they were drained, almost bloodless. He thought it was a vampire or maybe a more exotic Fae creature.”
“No,” Stiles breathed, looking from the four-toed print to the strange residue. He recognized the pattern, the signature of a creature he thought was extinct. “That’s a Hellhound print, Chris. The black stuff…it’s residue from the ash they burn. They don’t drain blood, they drain life force and leave the body intact. It’s what Parrish was, but maybe…untamed.”
Chris stood up, pulling out his phone to take pictures. “If it’s a Hellhound, why is it killing livestock?”
Stiles looked out across the darkening hills. “Maybe it’s not the Hellhound doing the stealing. Maybe the Hellhound is the guard dog. Or maybe it’s a distraction.”
He looked back toward the faint trail of prints, leading directly back toward the main ranch house.
“We need to check the cabin,” Stiles said.
“Ryan’s?”
“No,” Stiles shook his head, looking down at his own coat. “Parrish always smelled like a faint trace of gasoline and burnt wood, even when he wasn’t flaming. If Ryan is Peter, and if Peter died in that spell that removed his alpha spark…maybe that ‘gold flash’ wasn’t Peter coming back, but something else slipping in. Something that burns.”
They drove back, headlights cutting through the growing fog. The Yellowstone Ranch felt different now—not a safe harbor, but a trap.
They found Ryan alone at the workbench near the main stables, whittling wood.
“Ryan,” Stiles said, approaching him slowly. “Could you do me a favor? I need to check something quick. Have you been near the north pasture today?”
“No, Argent and Rip told me to stay here and repair this bridle,” Ryan replied, holding up the leather. “Why? More efficiency work?”
“Something like that,” Stiles lied smoothly. He stopped a foot away from Ryan and simply inhaled, deep and slow, ignoring Chris’s warning glance.
Horses. Pine. Sawdust. And underneath it, a trace of something hot, metallic, and old.
Stiles’s eyes widened. It wasn’t the scent of gasoline or burnt wood that Parrish had. It was a scent Stiles hadn’t smelled since the night the Nemeton first called the supernatural back to Beacon Hills.
The scent of mountain ash. But mountain ash that had been burned and mixed with salt. A protective barrier, but one that was deliberately broken.
“You’re clean,” Stiles said abruptly, stepping back.
“Good to know,” Ryan said, giving him a confused, faint smile. “You okay, Stilinski? You look like you’re ready to run a marathon.”
“I’m fine,” Stiles said, trying to steady his breathing. He realized the source of the faint smell of smoke and heat wasn’t the ranch. It was Ryan. The man wasn't just wearing Peter Hale's face. He was radiating a faint, residual heat signature—the sign of a creature that had crossed a hellish threshold.
Stiles knew then he was right. Peter wasn’t here for the cattle. The cattle rustling was a diversion. Peter was here hiding, or maybe worse—he was here because he was now bound to the land, an elemental, and his presence was attracting the creatures the ranch hand, Ryan, was meant to keep out.
“Chris, we need to talk,” Stiles said, turning away from Ryan.
As they walked back to their cabin, Stiles looked over his shoulder. Ryan was still whittling, his head tilted slightly, but his blue eyes were now fixed on Stiles’s retreating back—and the faint smile was gone, replaced by an expression of cold, assessing focus.