Sam worked steadily on, even when his hands bled from the magic or from the swans pecking him. They seemed to dislike him even more now that Loki had left, even the reddish-brown one stared at him disapprovingly or hissed at him when he went to sit by the lake where he and Loki used to feed them. He ignored it all, keeping his mind on Dean's screams as the blood-red dogs of the Hell-land fed on him. It fuelled him to work faster and longer even if it did exhaust him. Exhaustion was what he was aiming for in any case.
He was almost finished when some of the threads on the very first cloak tore. Sam guessed it was because it was the first one he had made and he had been clumsy with the loom. Sam couldn't risk doing a shoddy job so he swore mentally and tore it up and broke a chair in his anger then grimly went on to make another one.
Finally, at the end of twelve months, he was done. For a moment he stood with six whole cloaks spread around him and blinked down at his hands because he had nothing to do. It seemed impossible that he could leave this hut and this loom behind for always soon.
The next morning, he gave the servant who came to give him food a note for the council. To be precise, he left it out on the table and nodded at her to take it because none of the servants who came there would touch him or come within a feet of him if they could help it. He waited for the council to come and grimly wondered if they would hold up their end of the deal or just kill him the moment he had finished breaking the curse.
As it turned out, the council seemed none too sure about it themselves. The blonde girl looked him over and said it might not be a bad idea to let him go create havoc everywhere, her tone implying the exact opposite.
The leader eyed the cloaks and the demonic magic weaved into them with growing distaste and murmured, "It's disgusting."
Sam had an idea that the 'it' in this case was him. He raised a defiant eyebrow at them and handed her a note saying, 'We have a bargain, you keep your end- I'll keep mine.'
The leader looked furious for a brief moment then nodded sharply, "Do it then."
Sam turned around, hauled up the cloaks and tossed them on the respective swans until he got to the red-brown one where he hesitated then gently wrapped her cloak around her.
The air turned thick as if with smoke, the hut seemed to close in on them and Sam heard a voice croak out, "My feet hurt," and another snarl out, "He's turned my back raw with all the feathers he took."
A moment later, it was a clear spring evening again and before them stood two women and four men, dressed only in cloaks. The red headed one looked thoughtfully at Sam.
Sam looked back at her, somewhat embarrassed to realize how much comfort he had taken from her over the past year and she suddenly smiled, "Hello, Sam," she said in a voice rough from disuse and something in the tone struck Sam as so familiar that it made his heart ache.
He cleared his throat when he couldn't get his voice to work the first time, "Hello."
"I'm Anna," she held out a hand for him to shake. Sam took a firm hold of it and felt the ache dispel (or possibly increase) at the warmth of another human against his skin after so long.
"Anael," the off white one corrected, and he looked at Sam, "I'm Michael, I'm the eldest. Thank you for saving us." They grasped each other hands in a brief shake but Sam could see the heartfelt gratitude on Michael's face.
The brown one, Sam thought it was the brown swan because he had the same curious stare, held out a hand too as awkwardly as if he wasn't quite sure it wouldn't turn into a wing any second. Sam took it and held it and the man half smiled and said, "Sam. Thank you," in a surprisingly deep voice.
The others also introduced themselves and thanked him- Raphael in her deep, sincere voice, her twin, Israfel echoing her and sheepishly adding his apology for the scar on Sam's left elbow and a soft rumble from Uriel who nevertheless looked wary.
Raphael looked at Michael and suggested that Sam come to the castle in a meaningful way that sent Sam's warning bells ringing.
"I need to be going, I need the secret. I've spent so long on this already." Sam said, rounding on the council, shoes squeaking against the stone floor as he strode towards them.
One of the council murmured something in the leader's ear, and she glanced up and looked at something behind Sam's back. Sam twisted around but whatever was being said had finished, everyone was looking at him thoughtfully.
"It requires morning light in any case, to pass the knowledge on without transporting ourselves into a dangerous situation." the leader said, slowly, "Spend the night in the castle since their majesties wish you to. Tomorrow we will keep our end of the bargain."
Sam didn't want to but he didn't feel up to a fight, so he went with them and hoped they weren't planning on killing him. Anna smiled reassuringly at him intermittently throughout the evening, over the royal family's dinner table. Sam could see that everyone was uneasy and watchful. He asked after the Regent, who had not yet appeared to celebrate the return of his siblings and was met with several evasive non-answers.
Israfel said, "His sorrows are manifold, he's drowning them somewhere else," in a harsh voice. Uriel said something Sam couldn't hear and Raphael turned to him angrily from her twin's side.
"He would have let us rot!"
Michael looked at her sternly and she quietened, all of them fell silent.
"He did what he thought was right," Anna said finally and that seemed to be the end of the matter. Sam's mind was taken up with his forthcoming quest so he shrugged off the matter as being some sort of family problem.
So it didn't even cross his mind when he was in the room he had been offered in the castle and the thick decorative drapery on one wall moved and someone came through. He just went for the nearest knife and congratulated himself grimly for staying awake thinking he might be attacked.
Dimmed golden eyes and mobile lips pulled down at one corner greeted him and for a moment Sam wanted to rush over and just curl around Loki and never let go. Then he took in the rich clothes and the way Loki stood, just a little bit straighter than he had when pretending…pretending to be a wanderer with no aim in life.
"Who are you?" Sam said, his voice shaking, "Your name isn't Loki, is it?"
Those lips twisted into something wry and he said, "Gabriel. They call me Gabriel. King Michael's regent for this kingdom for these past four years."
Sam felt slightly sick as he realized that he had recognized Loki… Gabriel in Anna's way of speaking; that was why he had liked it so. He said, "I don't get it. You must have known what I was doing. You must have known I couldn't speak because I was trying to save your siblings. What were you thinking?"
Lok…no, Gabriel looked grim as he said, "Oh, I knew. They told me, the council, after they were done talking to you. I was away when they met you and they didn't want to wait. They didn't know who you were, didn't care even after I told them. I remembered the stories about someone selling their soul- a Winchester. I would have found some other way of getting them back. Giving you that secret is too dangerous. I tried to fix things as soon as I got back."
"So that was you fixing things." Sam said, quietly.
Gabriel looked so very sorry for a moment, as if he were the one who had been betrayed, lied to. As if he were the one who had just had his heart broken a second time.
Gabriel couldn't meet Sam's eyes any longer, he looked out the window as he said, "You're going to try to get your brother back, and you're going to break the world kid."
"Don't call me that," Sam said, surprising himself with the vehemence in his tone.
A flash of pain crossed Gabriel's face again but he said, forcefully, "Listen to me, Sam. You go in there, you will break the world."
Sam wanted to say that he didn't care. Instead he said, as reasonably as possible, "If your council knows and doesn't care, maybe it isn't that big a deal."
"They don't care," Gabriel yelled and Sam stiffened at the suddenness of it. "None of them care!"
Gabriel made a wide arc with one hand, and said, "They wouldn't... they would live."
Sam frowned at him then slowly shook his head. "I don't understand anything. Your council doesn't listen to you and they don't care that I'll break the world?"
Gabriel looked down at the floor for a moment, looking as if he were debating with himself, then he looked up and said, "I'll tell you everything."
He licked his lips and started, in a careless voice that Sam knew was artificial, "The council is allowed a lot of power, you saw. Do you know why?"
Sam shook his head again and impatiently said, "Get on with it."
"My brother's ruled for over three thousand years," Gabriel said flatly.
Sam gaped at him and tried to speak but Gabriel motioned at him to shut his mouth.
Gabriel went on, "The council chooses itself and its successors. Every once in a while there is a change and the new council crowns the King. You're too young to have seen a coronation but it's always the same. It's done up on the roof here, high up, and magic makes it a rainy, foggy day. No one ever sees the king so no one knows that it's always the same man."
Sam opened his mouth to protest again, that someone would have noticed. Some magician would have seen something odd about the entire thing in three thousand years.
Gabriel seemed to know what was coming, he said, "Magic keeps everyone complacent and we're very careful. Why do you think we needed you? You aren't a magician. There are trained people we could have asked but it was too dangerous, we couldn't risk the secret like that. The council has us under a sword. They let it out and there would be large scale panic. The people would flee, every kingdom nearby would turn on us."
Sam sat down heavily on the bed; it was beginning to make some kind of horrible sense.
Gabriel fiddled with his sleeve before going on, "I don't have six siblings, I have seven. One of them was named Lucifer."
Sam's breath caught, "The ruler of Hell?"
"Hell is his prison." Gabriel said, looking bitter, "Michael and Lucifer fought because Lucifer wanted to clear away the aristocracy- kill them- and Father told Michael to throw him out. So he's imprisoned there. If you go in, he'll be able to break out and kill as he likes. He'll break the world. And no one cares because it'll mean our family will rule everything, and they want that. I think they want a war."
Gabriel looked at him, pleadingly, but Sam looked back steadily, begging him to understand. He couldn't leave Dean in there.
"You're going to go aren't you?" Gabriel asked, it was barely a question, he sounded defeated.
"I'm sorry," Sam offered, spreading his hands in a helpless gesture. He was too, but he needed to do this.
Gabriel closed his eyes, his shoulders slumped and his head bowed. He looked the very picture of despair.
Sam didn't know what to say. He tried to think of some way to apologize or get Gabriel to understand.
The Gabriel straightened up, rolled his shoulders and said, "Then I'm coming with you."
"Really?" Sam asked, and his joy was embarrassingly evident. He went over to Gabriel and hesitantly touched his cheek.
Gabriel still looked unhappy but one corner of his mouth quirked up at Sam's touch, "I'm not letting you go into Hell alone, kiddo."
