Burning Light
By Tango Dancer

The third instalment of my 'Light on the Horizon' series! This takes place after Fading Light.

A few warnings before you start reading:

#I'm French: English is NOT my first language, so please point out any mistakes I might have missed after proof-reading myself and be indulgent.
#This is a girl!Dean story and a oneshot. Severe AU and OOC-ness.
#No flames. Critiques are welcomed as they will help me improve, but no gratuitous criticism, thank you!
#Pairing is Dean/Castiel.

Enjoy! (And review please?)

She's on the side of a road in backwater Montana, a beer in hand as she absently looks at the river flowing by when she gets the call.

It's been three years since she left them. Three years of hunting, of loneliness and of cold sheets at night. She shouldn't, but sometimes, she misses them, misses him. Gabriel's tricks and laughter, Balthazar's sarcasm, Rachel's gentleness and Anna's kind heart. Michael, his unwavering support and golden hair, his warmth and strength, his knowledge. Michael knew, and never told anyone. He respected her decisions, helped her keep hunting, patched her up sometimes, gave her a place to call home.

And Castiel. Castiel and his gravelly voice, Castiel and his eyes blue like the summer sky, Castiel and his tender embrace on her broken body. Castiel, who's changed so much after meeting her, for her sake. Castiel, whom she left behind after a year.

She tips her head back and takes a long swallow, closes her eyes. Three years since she left, and she's always made sure to bury those questions to the back of her mind when she could feel them creep up on her. Today is somehow different. Today is the anniversary, and it's like the memories are trying to overwhelm her.

Maybe she could have stayed. Maybe they were still safe. Maybe she could have told them the truth, and maybe they would have listened, and heard. Maybe they would have believed her. There was no way she would have taken them with her on a hunt to make a point, it was far too dangerous, but maybe they'd have taken her word for it. Maybe.

Or maybe not.

It's not like she'll ever know either way.

She finishes her beer and fishes her buzzing phone out of her pocket, dumps the empty bottle in the backseat and presses the green button.

"Yeah."

"Hi baby girl."

"Caleb. You okay?"

"Yeah, I think I might've a case for you."

†††

The idea's never crossed her mind that she would come back here one day, and yet, even as she drives in, memories assault her and she struggles briefly not to let herself get overwhelmed. She can't, won't be anything but professional about this, and there is no way she will even stop by the house for a quick look. Or to check up on the people who used to live there. The house where she spent a single year of her life, but where she has her fondest memories of happiness and care.

Maybe she'll just call Michael, tell him she's in town, so they can meet without them in the vicinity. She nods to herself, turns the volume down a little. Yes, she'll do it. But first, she has a werewolf to catch.

†††

They're sitting in their favorite diner for their monthly reunion when Rachel gasps, immediately catching their attention. They look up, alarmed, but she's staring out the window, looking at something on the parking lot. Slowly, they follow her line of sight and can't help but gasp as well. A car is moving up with an all too familiar rumble, the hood a gleaming black as it parks in one slick maneuver. Castiel feels his breath catch in his throat, his heart thud in his ears painfully as he waits for the driver to get out of the car. His siblings are tense with anticipation in the booth, all staring expectantly out the window, waiting and anxious, though they can't even think of anybody else having such a well-cared '67 Chevy other than– The car door swings open, and the driver steps out.

Castiel forgets to breathe.

Her hair is dark blonde and short, spiking out on the sides and at the back of her head, swinging gently with every movement she makes, and she's wearing dark sunglasses that cover the eyes he knows to be the deepest shade of green he's ever seen. She shuts the door, one hand trailing gently over the hood as she locks the car.

He closes his eyes for a minute.

She's wearing dark jeans with leather boots, a tank top and a leather jacket, and she's even more gorgeous than he remembered. Her skin is sun-kissed and her hair lighter than he remembers, maybe because of the sun she's apparently been in a lot. She turns to look around and something on her chest catches the sun. It's the amulet she's never taken off in all the time he's known her. She never said where it came from and why she valued it so much. Just that it was precious to her, and that had been enough. Castiel had never asked again, as there had been a shadow in her eyes when he'd mentioned it that he hadn't liked. It sounded too painful to her.

She starts moving towards the diner and maybe it's because it's been years, but he can't help but be shocked by the graceful, almost predatory way she moves. She leaves his sight for a second as she comes closer to the door, and he shares a glance with his siblings, suddenly very grateful that their table is hidden in the far corner and shadowed just so that no one can see their faces from the outside but they can see everything from where they sit.

The bell above the door jingles, and in she steps. Her eyes dart from side to side immediately as she stops for a second to take off her sunglasses.

It's like Castiel's been punched in the gut.

Four years, and her eyes are still the same grassy green he loved so much, maybe a shade darker. She walks over to the counter and orders a coffee, takes a stool. It isn't long before a guy comes over and starts flirting. To their utter stupefaction – she was always extremely closed off when she lived with them – she flirts back, smile and all, though it doesn't reach her eyes. When the waitress brings her coffee, Dean smiles at the guy, hands the girl a bill and disappears out the door.

They're up in a matter of seconds and following her without even needing to think about it. It's been three years since she walked out of their lives, three years since Castiel held her, heard her, saw her, and it's almost painful to finally see her again after all this time, wondering what she's been up to, where she's gone, who she's met. Does she have a new boyfriend? Did she find someone to help her heal? Or did she not tell him of her past?

But she's alone as she heads back over to her car, runs a loving hand over the hood, then drives down the street, Styrofoam cup in hand, sunglasses hiding her eyes as her hair sways and shines golden in the bright sunlight. Men and women turn as she passes them, but she doesn't stop, doesn't look, just keeps driving with her head up.

They're careful to keep their distance, remembering how she always seemed to know when she was followed. They doubt she's lost that keen sixth sense.

†††

She stops at the local library, leaves with a few sheets of paper, eats lunch at a diner while studying them before booting up her laptop. Anna, Castiel, Rachel, Gabriel and Balthazar watch her from a distance because they don't have anything better to do and they're not about to let her disappear again anyway. Dean literally vanished three years ago, and when they finally got that she wasn't coming back and tried to track her down, it was to no avail, almost like Dean Winchester had never existed before and after they met her.

When she leaves the diner, she goes to a dreary motel at the edge of town and stays there until nightfall. Once the sky is dark except for the moon, she sets out, pausing briefly at the door to glance up. It soon becomes obvious that she doesn't have any precise destination in mind as she keeps just walking around. Maybe she's just enjoying the rainless night, but Castiel doubts it. There's something too tense in the line of her shoulders, something too purposeful in her steps, and Anna and Rachel agree.

Dean never does anything without a reason, after all. They should know.

†††

It doesn't take her long to find the werewolf. The thing has been quite obvious in its pattern, and she knows it'll kill someone else tonight. She only needs to be at the right place at the right time to stop it, and then it'll be over and she can move on. Werewolves are nothing to her. She's the one who took out three werewolves all by herself at the tender age of sixteen, after all. Now, she's twenty-three and stronger than ever, more experienced, more heavily armed. Physically better since she doesn't have an abusive father to handicap her anymore.

She walks down the streets under the cold light of the full moon. The temperature is warm for April, and the rain stopped a few hours ago. She tilts her head back slightly, enjoying the feel of the breeze in her short hair. It would be a nice night to enjoy if she weren't hunting.

But there's a woman out there with a death sentence over her head, and she doesn't plan on letting the were get its victim tonight. She keeps walking, slowly, her gun a reassuring weight against her hip, silver knives safely tucked in their holsters. She patrols for an hour or so before a scream tears through the air and she's instantly in battle mode, gun in hand, safety off and all senses in alert as she hurries towards the source of the cry. The girl who comes running the other way almost runs into her, eyeliner running in dirty tracks on her tear-soaked cheeks, hair disheveled, dress askew. The clicking of her heels against the pavement does little to hide the guttural growl coming from the darkness.

"Help! Please, help me!"

She runs by Dean seemingly without noticing her – and if that isn't blind panic, Dean doesn't know what is – but Dean doesn't bother with her, concentrating on the fast approaching threat. It lunges from the shadows, a dark blur of fur, claws and blazing eyes, teeth gleaming briefly in the moonlight as it lungs towards her only to get a bullet in the shoulder. Dean quickly fires again and again and again, and the beast howls and jerks in agony, whimpers as it slumps, falls still with one last twitch. She keeps her gun steadily aimed at it for an entire minute, wary it might be playing dead, then cautiously walks over to it and nudges it with the tip of her boot before stepping back with a sigh as it morphs back.

The man is naked, eyes wide open in death, a growing pool of blood spreading under his body. She holsters her gun, closes his eyes, then steps back and turns around, only to freeze.

There are people standing there, looking straight at her. Five people, people she knows. Their faces range from confusion to anger to fear to a variety of emotions she can't identify, and honestly suddenly feels far too tired to bother with. Pursing her lips, she turns back to the corpse and drags it into a nearby alley. She needs to go fetch her car if she wants to burn the body somewhere safe, and dragging it to her parking spot is not an option: she doesn't plan on leaving body parts on the road to later serve as an anchor to a vengeful spirit.

They don't follow after her as she walks away and she catches herself briefly wondering if that is because they're too stunned or because they're still debating whether to call the cops or not. In the end, they're still in the same spot when she comes back, and watch in silence as she wraps up the body and heaves it into the trunk before facing them again.

"So? You coming or what?" She says, her voice carefully neutral.

They stare at her blankly for a second and then, Castiel springs into action and climbs in the passenger seat with Gabriel, while Balthazar, Rachel and Anna pile into the backseat. Castiel's body is warm against her as she drives down the street and towards an isolated place where she can burn the body without anyone noticing, and though she can feel the stares in the cramped space she doesn't acknowledge them, just turns on the radio and finds herself drumming her fingers on the steering wheel with a nervousness she won't allow herself to betray any other way.

The Novaks weren't supposed to be there, and yet here they are, and they're all on their merry way to get rid of a corpse. There's very little chance they didn't see the gun or what she did with it, pretty much no chance they didn't see the beast change back into a naked human body, and absolutely no chance they don't know she's dangerous. She just shot a thing, a man three times over, after all. And knowing them as she does, she knows they have noticed how calm she is about all this, and how well she handled her weapon. She holds back yet another sigh.

This is going to be messy.

†††

They watch in stunned silence as she stops in a deserted place. Castiel shivers uneasily as the thought crosses his mind that nobody would hear them scream, and he knows that the others have realized it as well when they tense and start looking shifty, but Dean doesn't look at them, paying attention only to the body she's currently dragging out of the trunk and onto the ground as if it's completely natural for her to do so. Then, she pulls open a hidden compartment in the trunk, drags out a couple canisters and sprays something white which looks like salt over the body, followed by lighter fluid.

Castiel comes to stand by her side as they watch the body burn.

"Who was he?" he asks.

She doesn't answer immediately but when she does, she turns to him briefly then back to the fire. "Who he was doesn't matter."

Castiel can see the flames reflected in her dark eyes. She only moves once the corpse's ashes are being brushed away by the wind. He looks at Gabriel, who nods at him. Somehow, they feel Dean is paying her respects in her own, special way.

†††

They go to the house. She looks around and it only now strikes them how soldier-like her behavior is as her eyes sweep over the place, taking in potential exits, dangers and weapons. The only thing there, though, is Michael, who looks up and then down, and then up again, eyes wide and mouth ajar. They look at each other silently for an endless, very short moment, and she gives a small, nervous smile, looking shifty with her shoulders tense.

"Hi."

Then he's across the room with his arms wrapped around her and she closes her eyes, melts into the embrace, clings back to him like he were her anchor, and her anchor he is. She buries her face in his chest, inhales his reassuring scent and lets herself feel completely safe for the first time in three years. Twenty-four and still so dependent on the people she loves. John would have called it weakness. Michael's taught her differently.

When they – reluctantly – let go of each other, he needs but a glance at his siblings of choice to know what happened but she confirms it anyway.

"They know."

And so they sit down and Dean explains. She says her mother was killed when she was only four years old, by a demon with yellow eyes. Her father managed to escape along with her and her little brother, Sammy, but John got obsessed with killing the thing which had murdered his wife. He became a hunter and raised both his children as soldiers. Sammy ran away when he turned nine, and she was left alone to endure her father's growing madness. She's a hunter too, though she's brilliant with cars, and all those times she was gone when she lived with them, she was actually hunting down some monster to stop it from killing more people.

Michael knows. Michael, who's actually an archangel. Why he's on Earth, and taking care of them? He doesn't say, even after he's proven his supernatural nature to them with a quick trick. She doesn't care anyway, just tells them Michael has been of immeasurable help and support ever since she met him, and she's grateful.

It's all quite hard to swallow but there's not a hint of madness or deceit in their eyes as they speak, and they're two of the most level-headed people the siblings know. There's no way they would just go off their rocker at once and have the same delusions, not forgetting that Castiel and the others remember, the rabid wolf whose corpse turned back into a human in death. The supernatural exists. This is fact, and they can chose to ignore it and go back to how things were before, or face it and learn to protect themselves.

Dean stays deathly calm through the entire confrontation, exposing facts in a level tone and laying out their options quietly. You don't have to be hunters, she says. But it's important that you know who to call in case you notice something strange, and what to do if you're ever attacked or see someone being attacked. She hands them a piece of paper with several numbers on them.

Caleb. Bobby. Jim. Ellen and Jo. Hunters, she says, who also have a life on the side. When they ask why she doesn't, she shrugs. Shadows are suddenly lurking in her eyes and Castiel remembers how she used to before they pushed her away.

"It's all I know, and all I want to do. Saving people, hunting things." She smiles then, a hint of something in her eyes that speaks of a joke understood by her only, a brief flash of genuine amusement. "It's what I'm good at."

She stands. Her hand brushes Castiel's shoulder in a light caress, a silent question, but she doesn't look any of them in the eye when she announces that she'll be at the motel, room 514, and she's not leaving town until morning the day after tomorrow. It's a subtle way of telling them how long they have to make a decision, and they can only be grateful for it. But as she makes to leave, Castiel stops her impulsively, a hand on her shoulder. She stiffens but doesn't pull away, and he tightens his grip minutely.

"Stay."

She looks at him, at them all in turn, shakes her head.

"It's best if I don't," she says softly. "You need your time."

Then, she stands on her tiptoes to press a chaste kiss to his lips and smiles.

"Goodnight."

The impala's engine rumbles away into the night.

†††

She's sat at the kitchen table when they wake up the next day. Michael is there too, the paper lying folded next to his elbow, though he's leaning forward over his cup of coffee, listening intently to what she's saying. She's talking about a pack of 'skinwalkers', whatever those are, about rifles, silver bullets and special knives, and he's nodding along, commenting here and there, and there's only appreciation in his voice and approval in his eyes as he compliments her on her strategy.

"They planted them as pets in families and made them change the kids," she says, shakes her head, lip curled up in disgust before taking a sip of coffee. "I couldn't believe it."

"But you let him go." Michael says softly.

She shrugs. "He genuinely loved them, I think. And you know how they work. Alpha rules and all that. He didn't have much of a choice once the alpha found him."

There's a pause. Her shoulders are tense in preparation for a rebuttal but she has her chin raised in defiance, ready to defend her choice.

"You did well," Michael simply says, and she relaxes immediately, earning herself a smile from the blonde.

They make their presence known at that moment, walk into the kitchen and help themselves to the food and coffee before sitting at the table. Castiel ends up on Dean's right, Gabriel on her left. She looks up uncertainly at him and he makes sure to smile at her to show her he doesn't think she's a crazy psycho. Her lips quirk up at the corners, her features soften ever so slightly, her shoulders slump a little.

"So, where are you going next?" Michael asks after a few minutes.

She shrugs again, fork moving her food around.

"I don't know. Bobby said there've been omens in Washington but I think someone's already on it, and Caleb was on to something in South Carolina… Maybe Ellen will have something for me."

"Don't you ever take a vacation?" Rachel asks hesitantly.

Dean looks briefly surprised that one of them actually speaks to her but she quickly recovers.

"Not really. If I'm wounded enough that I can't hunt, I go crash at Bobby's, but if not, then I head over to Ellen's and help her out a day or two before taking a job and leaving. She owns a hunters bar," she explains.

"A hunters bar?" Balthazar repeats, a mischievous glint in his eyes. "Wicked!"

She raises an eyebrow. "You don't want to mess with hunters. They're kinda… twitchy," she says nonchalantly. Michael chuckles, but says nothing.

"Can't you take us there?"

"Maybe one day." She looks amused at the thought but doesn't elaborate.

"So, you have a gun."

That's, unsurprisingly, Gabriel.

"Guns, actually, but none of you are allowed within ten feet of them."

He and Balthazar pout, while the girls look mildly intrigued. Castiel doesn't really care. He doubts he could ever become good enough with a gun to actually be efficient against a supernatural opponent. He'd much rather leave the work to professionals and be sure it's done once and for all.

"Those things are dangerous, and my tools of work. One of them not working could cost me my life. Or a limb. Either way, it's goodbye to my hunting carrier. I'm not ready to risk that."

Her tone is grave as she says it and they believe her with everything they have. This is no laughing matter, and Castiel's breath catches in his throat as he starts to realize just how much hunting means to her. Why she does it, he doesn't really know, but he guesses he can respect her wishes. He missed her too much to make the same mistake twice, especially now that he knows why she was so secretive. She wanted to protect him, to protect them, and they just rejected her. Worse, she accepted it. Still would if they decided they can't live with her knowing what she does. That would be kind of hypocritical of them, he thinks, given that their guardian is actually an archangel. He snorts at the thought.

Talk about a guardian angel.

His eyes catch an ocean of green, and he smiles. Strong fingers slip around a slim, calloused palm under the table and squeeze. Her hand remains slack for a handful of seconds, and he fears he went too fast. But then, her fingers curl back around his, and she holds on. Their gazes meet, lock, part, but it's enough for a silent promise.

†††

Castiel tosses and turns that night but can't find sleep. He gives up at two a.m., gets up and heads downstairs, only to start at the sight of a thin silhouette standing in the open doorway. A hint of blonde shines in the moonlight, and he moves closer. She glances at him before going back to the sky.

"Couldn't sleep?" she whispers at last. Her tone is understanding, knowing, accepting. Obviously, it's not the first time she breaks the news about the supernatural. She knows what to expect.

"How do people react? When you tell them?"

She takes her time before answering. When she does, it's slow, like she's trying to measure her words before letting them slip out.

"I don't usually have to. Being a hunter, it's all about becoming one with the shadows. My father – John – used to say 'we do what we do, and we shut up about it'. People don't want to know what's out there, Cas. But they can't make it any less real by just sticking their head into the sand, so we deal with the fuglies, save as many lives as we can, and do our best not to be seen."

"But you have to sometimes."

"Sometimes. Yeah. Some people are different. They actually believe us, go into hunting, or just learn to protect themselves and keep our number so they can contact us in case something else happens. Others, though…" she pauses, her features hard. "Most think we're crazy and call the cops on us. Or the men in white." She laughs humorlessly. "That's also why we try to keep unnoticed. Being on the cops' radar makes it all the harder to do the job."

She falls silent. He watches her as she looks at the moon. The white light gives her an ethereal aura and gives her an edge he hadn't noticed at first, enraptured as he was by the truth and stunned by her sudden reappearance in his life. She looks rougher than she did three years ago, hardened by the obstacles she's had to overcome to reach this point.

He remembers her hands, calloused by years of training and hunting and monster-killing and gun-handling. He wonders how it feels, to save lives almost every day, risking her own and never expecting gratitude. Wonders how it feels to always be alone.

Three years ago, they had a chance. Maybe, he thinks, looking at her profile, maybe…

She turns, and he drowns in those deep pools of emerald. She told him once that his eyes were hypnotic to her, that she could lose herself in their depths. He never got to say how it was true the other way around and he could stare into hers for hours without getting bored. His hand is cupping her cheek before he notices and then he's leaning forward and her lips taste exactly the same as they did three years ago, soft and delicate and perfect, and when he deepens the kiss with a sigh, she's kissing back with the same fervor, her arms around his neck and his fingers in her hair.

They pull away only when they need air but lean their foreheads together, breaths mingling in the quiet of the night.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs against her lips.

She says nothing, but he knows she understands what he's talking about. She says nothing and he doesn't expect her to, because even if she's willing to take him back, he still hurt her, broke the implicit promise between them, the trust she'd bestowed upon him after months of healing, and it will take time to mend their broken bond.

Still, she's willing to take him back and it says more than words could ever express, so he doesn't ask for more, just wraps his arms around her and runs his hand down her back soothingly as she buries her face in his shirt. The moon smiles at them from the sky. Balthazar retreats from his perch mid-stairs, smiling. He has good news to share with the others, though he's not sure he won't let them work for it first, see if they notice. See if Michael does, too. It should be fun.

He'd got up for a snack, unable to fall asleep after all those revelations, but finds what he saw more satisfying than any meal. It's two lonely souls who finally found each other again, and when he drifts into sleep, it's with a smile on his lips.

THE END

So, did you like it? For those who did, there will most likely other stories in this 'verse. See you!