Sam and Dean Winchester are the property of Kripke Enterprises, Inc. and the CW. I use them for my own amusement and no money is made from this story

A/N: This is the third story in a sequence that started with "Sons of the Morning". In that story Sam learns to turn into a Sphinx and Dean learns how to glow.

Hunter's Moon

Chapter 1

Meeting Sam by Moonlight

First Verse

The ash grove how graceful, how plainly 'tis speaking

The harp through its playing has language for me.

Whenever the light through its branches is breaking,

A host of kind faces is gazing on me.

The friends from my childhood again are before me

Each step wakes a memory as freely I roam.

With soft whispers laden the leaves rustle o'er me

The ash grove, the ash grove, alone is my home.

The Ash Grove (Welsh Llwyn Onn) traditional Welsh folk song

First Published 1862

English lyrics by John Oxenford

I had stood on the bank of the Wabash River, west of Lafayette, Indiana and watched the sun lose its battle with the night. I had been stationed here by my hunting partner, Ed Gainer. It was his hunt and I was so flattered that he had picked me out of all the available hunters at the bar to go him on that chill October night.

Later I would find out that he picked me because I was young and stupid and I didn't know him or his reputation. He couldn't get anyone else to go with him; he had a knack for getting his partners killed. But he had offered actual cash. That should have set off alarm bells, but like I said, I was young and stupid.

Since I survived, I suppose that I'm not as stupid as I was before the hunt. I know two new things now, one, don't trust Ed Gainer, and two, if they offer money it's because they expect you to die so they don't have to pay.

My name is Silas, yes, Silas. If I live long enough to know anyone else I'll ask them to call me Sy but for right now, I'm stuck with Silas. I'd been hanging around the edges of the Hunter community for the past year hoping to pick up enough knowledge to keep me from getting killed.

I was raised in a small town southwest of Pittsburg and lived there my whole life. A couple of years ago strange things started happening in the family home. Stuff moved on its own, cabinet doors swung open suddenly and hit you in the face, glass jars started exploding inside the refrigerator, all this creepy stuff.

It got worse and worse and the house was so alive that something new happened constantly. I and my older brother and my mom were getting hurt one way or another almost every day. Then came the day that my brother was thrown through his bedroom room window; he hit the driveway two stories down and was hurt bad.

The ambulance driver told me that he thought there was a poltergeist in the house and if I wanted, he knew someone who could take care of it for us. I thought at first he was scamming us for money but as we were standing there going back and forth about it a heavy silver bowl flew right at him and opened up a gash on his head. He stood there, looking at me, holding on his forehead with the blood gushing over his fingers and said "If you value your mother's life, get her out of here."

After that we followed his lead. His name was Ronnie. We got out and stayed at a motel and Ronnie's friend Zack came to clean out the 'giest. I followed that man around like a puppy and did everything I could to be useful. After it was over, and the house was more or less wrecked but clean, my mother and brother came back but I left with Zack. I guess that was my first hunt.

Zack got killed in a cave in western Kentucky. Something ate him and I heard him die screaming. He had told me that most hunters died on the job and I guess he proved it to me too. I waited for dawn, went in the cave and gathered up the pieces I could find and burned him with salt, like he told me to do. Then I got in his car and started driving.

I ended up in a bar in West Lafayette, Indiana, near the Tippecanoe Battlefield, washing glasses and flapping my ears. Hunters gravitated to West Lafayette because of a Yearly Festival of the Hunter's Moon.

I guess it started as a joke The regular inhabitants were memorializing an old annual fall gathering of Native Americans and the French that took place in the mid-1700's. They had no idea that Hunters of the supernatural were starting to regard their festival as the Hunter's holiday festival. It was a good deal for the locals because the presence of so many Hunters made sure that the whole area was free of any kind of supernatural threat.

So back to why I was standing there in the October chill dampness with my hands going numb. Ed told me that we were going to get paid to shoot these guys called the Winchesters. I said I didn't kill humans and Ed said that the Winchesters weren't humans; they were monsters, so it was OK. They were fair game.

I still wasn't real happy about it but I had heard a little bit about these Winchesters already and the fact that they didn't seem to be able to stay dead, so I let it slide. Like I said, young and stupid. You don't go up against legends with a fool like Ed Gainer as a guide.

There was someone else with us in those woods but I never saw his face. He hung with Ed. I think he was the one who was paying for the hunt. The guy whose money we were going to get. Why he wanted to pay us to kill the supposedly un-killable Winchesters I didn't know; especially when they wouldn't stay dead. I guess that's the kind of information they call "above my pay-grade."

Ed said the guy wanted their bodies for some ritual; sounded witchy to me. Another sign I was too stupid to see.

Ed told me to hang back. I was going to be the fall back position for Ed and the other guy. I was supposed to watch this ridge line to the West because Ed said there was going to be a werewolf coming over that hill after moonrise.

"Look, Silas, this is what's going to happen," Ed told me. "There is a closer ridge in front of the one the wolf is going to come down. The Winchesters are almost ninety percent certain to wait there until they see it and then they're going to kill it. They'll be on that hill 'cause it's downwind from the higher ridge and the wolf won't be able to catch their scent. "

"That's why we are going to wait here. This place is downwind from where the Winchesters should pop up and they won't know we're here. We're going to wait for them to take out the wolf and then we're going to get them. Tom wants their bodies bad. When he has them we'll both get paid."

So there I stood, watching the moon climb slowly up over the ridge line. The Hunter's Moon is the first full moon after the Fall Equinox and got its' name from hunters who tracked and killed their prey by autumn moonlight, stockpiling for the winter ahead.

The moon I watched was huge and orange and looked like a giant wheel resting on the ridge line; the naked trees were outlined against it like a skeleton's fingers.

Just as Ed said would happen, a shambling dog-like creature appeared and trotted over the crest. Throwing its head up to scent the air, the moonlight glinted in its eyes. Even at a distance it did not look normal. It was too long, too large; there was something wrong with the length of the legs and back.

All three of us went on alert, breathing as softly as possible and freezing in place. Only our eyes moved, trying to separate the wind from other movement, knowing that the Winchesters were hunters themselves and would use the wind to mask their own movements.

Momentarily a head bobbed at the closest ridge line and disappeared. Another followed and disappeared as quickly as the first. Then the same rapid motion of the almost not there forms happened again. There was a quickness to the movements, like the movements of birds.

I heard Ed's voice "They're taking snap peeks at the wolf. Be still. Let them work."

The other man , Tom, I guess, said "What are they doing? Why don't they shoot? They have a clear line."

"At this point I think this might be Sam Winchester's kill." Ed replied. "Dean would have shot already; it's well within his range. Sam likes to get up close and personal and use his knives."

"Once, I heard, he had a wolf girlfriend. Evidently he likes to bang monsters. Just one more reason to make sure the Winchesters go down."

As I watched two figures appeared on the closer ridge line. I figured that was the Winchesters. Ed had been right about everything so far. The wolf had come down the face of the further ridge far enough to have disappeared into a little valley between the two ridges. The two figures separated. One went toward the wolf and the other disappeared off to the left. Still no gun shots.

I was about ten feet behind Ed, just close enough to hear his voice. There was a sudden burst of light from the valley behind the ridge but still no sound. It looked like silent fireworks going off. Ed barked "What the hell?" and he and Tom took off running toward the light.

Right at that moment something grabbed me by the collar of my coat and lifted me straight up into the tree I was under. Something else knocked my rifle away. I could swear it was a tail.

A second later I was deposited on a thick tree branch about ten feet up and I was looking at a giant cat.

"Hi," said the cat. "I'm Sam. Who are you?"

I started to shake so bad I almost fell off the branch. It put out a paw, I guess. I didn't think you could call it a hand but I think I was close to passing out so who knew?

"Calm down," it said. "Deep breaths. Be quiet or I'll kill you. Got it?"

"Got it," I pushed out. What, I'm going to tell it no? Breathing helped though and the ringing in my ears calmed down. My eyesight also expanded and the black curtain that had been beginning to fall pulled back up. I took a good look at the creature in front of me.

It was huge and it definitely was a cat. Covered in reddish colored fur it lounged comfortably along a thick tree branch with its back pushed up against the trunk of the tree. There was a tail. I could see it flicking up and back behind it. The creature was long and thin and had that loose jointed cat like smoothness to it.

"You have a name, I assume?" The damn cat 'assumed' I had a name. For some reason it struck me funny and I snorted.

"Yeah, I have a name. It's Silas." I answered. "You said you're Sam. Is that Sam Winchester? And what the hell are you?"

"OK, now you're getting spunky. Done trying to pass out?" the cat shifted his body and wings appeared. He used them to balance himself as he changed position. I had that passing out feeling again. It was the wings.

"Yes, I'm Sam Winchester." He looked up in the tree. "And here comes my brother Dean."

A body slid down out of the tree and over the cat's body. The cat crooked a knee and created a kind of cradle out of his legs. The new guy parked himself in the leg cradle and looked as comfortable as if he was in a hammock.

"Dean," the cat said. "This is Silas. For some reason he was hunting us with that ass Ed Gainer."

The cat looked back at me. "Right? You did this voluntarily? Ed didn't threaten you or hold your family hostage or promise to cut your girlfriend's throat or any of the other stuff that Ed has been known to pull? Oh, since you asked, I'm a Sphinx but you can just call me Sam for now."

Dean laughed.

"Silas, I recommend you get yourself a better class of friends. They just left you here. They've run away and abandon you. I guess they think we'll kill you and you won't need a ride home. Why the hell are you hunting us?"

"They offered to pay me. That other guy with Ed, I don't know him. His name is Tom and he offered Ed money to track you down. Ed said that Tom wanted your bodies for some kind of ritual."

Sam growled. He growled like a lion. It scared the crap out of me.

Dean smiled and put his hand out to me. I noticed that it seemed to be glowing with a soft looking gold light. I felt a lot better and my heart beat slowed back down to normal. I really liked Dean. His brother was freaking scary but I liked Dean. I knew he wouldn't let Sam hurt me.

Dean grasped my hand. "Come on, Silas. We'll drive you back to the bar." He swung me back down to the ground. Sam took Dean's hands and helped him drop to the ground beside me. Sam just stepped off the branch and used his wings to glide down to the ground.

Dean put a hand on my shoulder. "Come on, the car's this way. Just think of all the points you going to get when people find out that you're still alive and you drove back with the Winchesters." He started to laugh again.