A/N: Yet more pub!verse (I think I may have an obsession), but a two-parter this time. See the link on my profile for more details - this is sort of a followup to Three Spoons of Sugar, but you don't really have to read it to get this one. Warnings for blood and implied sex.
This is his Body
Gabriel's not quite sure what happened. There were demons, he's fairly clear on this – more than was expected, that was why he'd ended up with Sam's desperate prayers echoing in his head, begging him to come help them, but they'd been dealing – and there had been something sharp, something dripping red, and then there had been pain. Pain, the real kind, the human kind that he hadn't felt since the moment his brother had killed him. And then there had been surprise, and not much else for a while.
He wakes up lying on a cold floor after what is probably only a few minutes. There's a face hovering over him, blurry and wavering, and when he tries to reach up to stop it from wobbling his arm doesn't listen to him. Stop moving, he thinks, and tries to say so, but the sound gets hijacked somewhere between his brain and his lips and comes out as a low, strangled whine.
"Shit," mutters a voice above him, presumably belonging to the face. He becomes aware that his left shoulder burns, a throbbing sort of drumbeat, and when he tries to say that, the same noise comes out, a little louder. "Shit. Sammy! I think- he's hurt."
Of course I am, thinks Gabriel frustratedly, my shoulder, and he tries to push himself upright to show the ridiculously stupid floating face exactly where it hurts.
Things go a bit hazy for a while.
When he wakes up again he's on a bed. It's not very comfy, and smells vaguely like an old cat lady's living room, but his shoulder doesn't hurt quite so much, so he supposes it can't be all bad. His arm hurts now, though, the same throbbing feeling – not exactly a hurt, more like his veins are too tight. It's spread down to his elbow and halfway across his chest, tightening around his neck.
He'd probably be quite comfortable, if the stupid voices would just shut up. They're coming from somewhere over by his right, saying things like injury and call Cas and the fuck can dothat to an archangel and won't stop bleeding. He shushes them, loudly, and they fall silent. He feels quite proud for a moment, and there's another floating face.
"Gabriel?" it says, a hand touching his cheek, oh so gently. "Gabriel, can you hear me? It's Sam. You're hurt, you're not healing, and it won't stop bleeding. We need you to tell us what happened."
"Demons," he says, because it's obvious, and the word comes out slurred and distorted. He wonders vaguely what it is with his vessel and not listening to him today. Because really. It's terribly rude.
When he tries to say as much, it comes out as a jumbled mess of syllables that sound something like a groan, and the voice from the other side of the room announces it's calling Cas.
"Here, Cassy Cassy," sings Gabriel, voice high and loopy, and he grins, stretching out the first syllables of the words as long as he can. "Here!" There's a flutter of wings and a sharply indrawn breath, and then people are arguing, but he's not listening. He's busy laughing at his own joke, because he called Cas, and Cas came, which is funny.
"He needs- oh god, can you make him stop that?" asks the nice voice, the one that'd stroked his cheek and wanted to help. "Please." Gabriel feels guilty, closing his mouth and biting his lip, but then Cas is standing over him – he doesn't need a face to know it's his brother – and is pressing two fingers to his forehead.
"Sleep, brother," he commands solemnly, and Gabriel does.
When he wakes again, his head is clearer, and the pain is stronger, and the voices are still arguing. He tries to sit up, on instinct, and then freezes at the wave of sick, hot throbbing that washes throughout his arm and torso. He lets out a quiet, strangled noise from the back of his throat as he slips back down onto the bed, and the voices stop.
"What- what happened?" he asks, running his tongue over unbearably dry lips. It's not just his veins that feel too tight now, it's his whole skin, his internal organs, everything seems hot and dry and too tight. "I'm... what am I doing here?"
"Dying," says a no-nonsense voice, and Gabriel feels a sudden rush of irrational gratitude towards Dean for not mincing about with his words. That's right, man, say it like it is.
"I've already done that," he points out. "S'not new. Or very exciting, either."
"Gabriel, this is no time for jokes!" snaps Castiel, anger that Gabriel recognises as worry laced through his voice. "You are in grave danger." Why his little brother insists on talking like something out of a bad period romance novel, Gabriel will never know. "You were pierced by a blade dipped in demon blood. It has tainted your vessel. You are... will be dying, unless we find a cure."
"We already have!" snaps another voice, the glare that goes with the words almost audible. Sam. Poor, eager-puppy Sam, the boy with demon blood who knows exactly how Gabriel is feeling right now, knows from the days spent lock in a room to detox. "The ritual-"
"And I already said you are not running around taking risks like that when it might not even work!" retorts Dean. This is apparently what they've been arguing about, some kind of ritual, a possible cure.
"The manuscript said it was a ritual of purification, which-"
"If the manuscript said that you should take off all your clothes and dance naked under a full moon to make unicorns appear, would you believe it?" growls Dean, and Gabriel grins despite himself. Some things never change.
"...No, Mom," sighs Sam, voice practically dripping with sarcasm.
"Good." Dean either doesn't care about or doesn't hear the derision. "We keep looking, then, and find something that doesn't involve massive blood loss and won't probably kill us."
"Great plan," says Gabriel, ignoring the way it's getting harder to breathe, the way that no matter how much he licks his lips they stay dry and burning.
He rolls his head to one side, surprised at the effort it takes, and asks Castiel in Enochian, "How long do I have?"
The phrase Castiel replies with is one of the many that doesn't translate well into English, or any human language. It comes out as something like, "Long enough. But not enough to say a true goodbye."
He lets out a long, slow breath, ignoring the curious eyes he can feel focused on them. "Don't tell them. Let them have hope."
"You mean, let Sam have hope." It's not a question, doesn't need an answer.
"What's he saying?" demands Sam, all eagerness and worry and irritated, twitchy helplessness. "Gabriel?"
"Tell them I asked you to let me sleep," offers Gabriel, when Cas looks lost. Of all the human things his brother has picked up from the Winchesters, the ability to lie on the spot is not one of them.
"He wishes to sleep whilst we are searching. He is too... affected to be of any use, anyway." Castiel sounds like he's picking his every word with a pair of chopsticks, stilted and unnatural, but if the Winchesters notice anything odd, they don't mention it. Gabriel's grateful.
"We'll keep looking, Gabe, we promise. I'm not going to let you-"
"I know, kiddo," says Gabriel softly, pulling a smile onto his face as Castiel's fingers touch his forehead. "I'm sure you won't."
When he sinks down into the darkness this time, he fully expects Sam Winchester's face to be the last thing he ever sees.
So, naturally, when he opens his eyes a while later and sees again, he's fairly surprised. Even more so by the fact that the thing in front of his eyes appears to be the inside of a car roof – the Impala, to be exact. He's lying sprawled across the back seats of it, apparently, head cushioned by a jacket.
He's less surprised by the head off ridiculously long and floppy hair he can see protruding above the top of the driver's seat headrest.
"Your brother's going to kill you," he points out, in a conversational sort of tone, trying to ignore the fact he's now hot enough that he's shaking, and his voice is barely more than a rasp, throat too dry to swallow. He licks his lips again, and the feel of his own dry tongue over them is alien and strange.
Sam smiles – Gabriel sees it in the rearview mirror, just a flash of teeth for less than a second, but there – and then nods. "Might not need to," he says, quietly enough that Gabriel knows he wasn't supposed to hear it, but he does. There's a knife on the passenger seat, he can see it, and an old book, and his stomach twists.
"Samuel, what're you-" he starts, and then the car jolts over a pothole, and his shoulder is pushed against the seat, and he screams. But no sound comes out, only a desperate, breathy, whimpering noise out of his moistureless throat, and his vision fades out to the car swerving violently to a halt and Sam twisting in the seat, yelling at him to stay awake.
The next time he comes to, he's propped up against a tree, and Sam is shrugging out of his shirt.
Ordinarily, Gabriel wouldn't be complaining about this – he'd be admiring the view, maybe taking pictures, definitely teasing – but, ordinarily, Sam wouldn't be holding a sharp, serrated knife in one hand and looking down at his chest as if he's trying to work out the best angle to approach it from.
"Sa-" he manages, and then coughs, the word sticking in his throat. "Samuel, no." Sam ignores him, abandoning his chest in favour of nicking his earlobes, the tip of his nose, his lower lip and then, very carefully, his eyelids. Usually, Gabriel knows, this is the kind of ritual that would require more than one person – Sam should technically be tied to an altar with someone else making the cuts, but magic like this is not fussy. Blood is blood, regardless of who draws it.
Somewhere, somehow, Gabriel finds the strength to push himself to his feet. His skin feels six sizes too small, and he can feel every pulse of his vessel's heart across his skin as a shiver of tension, as too-hot blood forces itself through contracted veins. "Sam," he repeats, desperately, leaning against the tree for support, fighting to breathe through the cracked dryness in his throat. "Please. Don't do this. I am not worth your life, you're being-"
"Shut up." Sam's voice is loud and firm as he twists the knife until it's pointing directly at his chest, and draws a thin line just above his heart, blood beading around the cut. It's the kind of voice that brooks no argument. "I'm not letting you die."
Gabriel has no argument to that because, well, he doesn't particularly want to die either. He watches silently as Sam kneels at the foot of the- well, it's not really an altar. It's just a large, flat-ish stone in the middle of a field, but blood magic is not fussy. It will work, Gabriel knows it, can already feel the low thrum of power even over the painful beat of his own heart. This place has history, an old magic that will make whatever Sam is trying to achieve easier.
He's facing towards Gabriel, on his knees, back flat against the side of the stone. His eyes are closed, a thin line of concentration between them as he shakes the hair out of his face and begins to chant. Gabriel watches, entranced – it's been so long since anyone gave anything to him, other than the most empty of prayers, and he can't remember the last time he had a blood sacrifice.
Something crawls over his skin like shiver of electricity, and he doesn't know if it's the demon blood, or the magic, or something darker.
His eyes slip closed as he swallows, listening to the wind, head tilting back to rest against the tree. Though his condition is no longer deteriorating, he's not getting better, and he can only hope Sam has something a bit stronger up his sleeve.
It's only when the chant rises to a wild cry that his eyes snap open and he jerks forward on wobbly legs, ignoring the waves of pain running through his shoulder because he knows this ritual, knows now the book that Sam must have gotten it from, knows how it ends. "Sam, no!" he yells, but it's too late. The stupid,stupid boy drags the knife across his wrist, splitting the skin-
And for a second, everything freezes, and the air reverberates with a low echo of power.
"Samuel," murmurs Gabriel, trembling, but no longer from the demon blood. He's mere feet from the kneeling figure, as Sam cups his hands together and raises them above his head. "You have no idea what you've done."
The blood doesn't run down Sam's arms, as gravity would dictate, but instead runs up, up and over his wrists to pool in his palms, until there's a small sea of crimson held there, glittering. As Gabriel watches, hypnotised, it overflows; thin lines of red run over Sam's curved fingers, over his knuckles, dripping in sparkling droplets to the grass below.
"I offer myself as sacrifice," intones Sam lowly, tilting his head to the sky. His eyes are wide, pupils blown until barely a strip of iris remains, voice loud in the absolute silence that fills the field.
"No," whispers Gabriel, shaking his head. "I won't accept." But he can't step backwards, can't bring himself to, and his skin is crawling now. Sparks of power are gathering beneath it in clusters and burning at the demon blood, purifying him, and it feels so good he can hardly think straight. "I refuse."
"I offer myself as a sacrifice," repeats Sam, lips parting slightly as he licks a drop of blood off his lower lip, where it's swollen out of the cut. It sparkles dark red in the scant light of dusk, and Sam's tongue glistens with moisture, and Gabriel's mouth is so very dry...
"I refuse," he repeats, closing his eyes and forcing the words out through gritted teeth. Three times. He only needs to refuse once more, only once, and then Sam will be safe and he, Gabriel, will be-
Dead.
But Sam will be safe, and Dean won't kill him, and they're the important things. Those things, not the way Sam looks, on his knees, the long line of his throat exposed. Not the way the power Gabriel needs, craves, is twining itself around him and slowly erasing the pain. Not the way that the all-consuming heatis dragging itself across his skin and making him itch with want.
"Gabriel, I offer myself to you as a sacrifice," says Sam, and this time his voice is a low, rough growl. "I would beg of you that you accept my offering."
And fuck it all, there's no way Gabriel's saying no to that.
"Yes," he hisses, the word out of his mouth before he's made a conscious decision to say it. "I accept you, Samuel Winchester, and your sacrifice, and I thank you for it." He steps forward, legs no longer shaking with weakness, and presses a palm against Sam's forehead. The hunter lets out a long, relieved breath, eyes slipping closed at the touch, and Gabriel smiles.
The lines are drawn quickly, twisting shapes done in sticky crimson taken from Sam's cupped hands. Gabriel smears the blood across the stone, across Sam's chest and neck and forehead, down his own arms and over his injured shoulder, and the air crackles with power. He heals Sam's cut with a brush of his thumb, cleans his hands with a thought, and then twines a hand in the kneeling hunter's hair to pull his mouth up into a bruising kiss.
"Too late to back out now," he mutters in Sam's ear, breath coming in sharp gasps, the power now running through him like an adrenaline hit, a drug. "Too late, you shouldn't have done this-"
"Shut up," growls Sam back, letting Gabriel pull him onto to the stone, letting Gabriel press his shoulders down against it and bite marks across his neck as he swings a leg over Sam's hips and straddles him, and damn if the kid isn't the bossiest sacrifice he's ever had. "Knew what I was doing. Know what I'm doing."
"Sam," he manages, in between pressing open-mouthed kisses along his collarbones and lapping at the sigil painted in the hollow of his throat. "Sam, tell me this is okay. Please." He's not sure if he'd be able to stop at this point, even if Sam said no, because the ritual is overwhelming. He feels drunk on it, it's been so long since he felt the rush of a sacrifice splayed out before him. But he has to ask, has to try.
"It's okay," promises Sam, looking up at Gabriel with understanding in his eyes. "It's okay."
"Samuel Winchester, do you offer yourself, body and soul, to complete this sacrifice?" asks Gabriel again, because he has to be sure, needs confirmation even as he sucks a bruise into the skin where Sam's shoulder meets his neck – and then says more quietly, "Do you offer yourself to me?"
"For fuck's sake Gabriel, just- yes, yes, of course!" Sam sounds frustrated as he arches up into Gabriel's mouth – the archangel is not the only one being affected by the magic now thrumming through the place – hands coming up to grip the archangel's shoulders, and Gabriel hisses when his fingers touch the not-quite healed wound there. "Give myself to you, everything to you, always, just- please- I need-"
Gabriel presses a hand over his lips pinning his hands above his head against their makeshift altar and then smothers his mouth with a kiss . Because talking is interesting and all, but really not relevant right now – because if the ritual isn't completed, then the purification won't be either.
And, more importantly, because right now everything feels too sharp and close and hot, and Gabriel needs… and Sam's said yes.