Okay, since I've had a few positive comments on this one, I'll have a go at turning it into an honest-to-Cas story. It's shaping up to be something different from the sort of crack I usually seem to end up writing, but some of the Denizens seem to be very fond of Wee!chesters, and I'm up for any excuse to write more about canine characters. In answer to Paralesky's question, Kali in this story is, I think, an amalgam of two dogs I had when I was a kid, Penny and Macushla - certainly, I get a mental picture of Mac as an old lady when I'm writing. Kali is the kennel name of my current dog (if you'd seen what she did to my study then the back yard within the first 24 hours of her joining us, you'd understand why), who's nearly two and a half, and showing no signs of growing up yet... If anyone thinks I'm writing either Weechester too precociously, you'll have to speak up, because I have little experience with children and this is my first foray into WoW (World of Wee!chesters) - but somehow, I can't help but think that Sam must've been a precocious kid with a capacity for brat.


Chapter 2

She lifted her head, and shook it. She'd been dozing again, hovering between waking and dreaming as elderly dogs had a tendency to do (it should never have come to this). Something prickled for her attention.

She sat up, more alert, looking for the Guardian. He was lying on the hood of the truck, senses nonetheless watchful as he rested. He noticed her posture, and made his way to her side, where they exchanged an affectionate growl-wrestle, and turned his head in the direction of her cloudy gaze.

Intruder? Threat? His gaze queried.

I am... uncertain, she told him.

He concentrated, his nose twitching as he scented the air. I find nothing. It was an observation made agreeably; he might be the Guardian, and alpha in this place, but he was, after his own fashion, a Hunter's dog, and not one to ignore the instincts of a bitch of the Blood. She lifted her greyed muzzle to the air, and he felt it burn in her, dulled by her age and infirmity, but still there and pulsing. He whined a little to himself; in her prime, she must have been a savage, terrifying opponent...

I will keep watch, he told her, returning to his resting place, but sitting upright, still and alert, monitoring the air and the ground for tells of threat, ready to call a Warning.

She tried to settle again, then rose, and paced restlessly.

Still her Blood burned.

As briskly as she could, Kali trotted to the front door, scratching and woofing as crisply as her rasping old voice allowed.

The Keeper let her in without question.

...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo...

Bobby didn't say anything when the old dog went straight to the living room and settled herself where she could see both Dean, who was sitting unusually quietly with a handful of issues of Popular Mechanics and a greasy dog-eared workshop manual, and Sam, who was taking full advantage of being allowed access to a selection of Bobby's library.

"What are you reading, Uncle Bobby?" asked Sam, looking up from the book he was currently perusing. He'd become fascinated by the protective sigils in the book on protection charms that Bobby had given him, and had been practising drawing some of them with the box of pencils he'd won on the last day of school for writing the best story in his class.

"Tell you the truth, son, I'm not exactly sure yet," Bobby replied.

Sam moved his chair, and climbed up beside him. "That looks... funny," he frowned, peering at the gothic script. "Why does the printing look so funny?"

"Well, for a start, this is a very old book," explained Bobby. "It was written before there was such thing as printing, so it was copied out by hand. This is just the way everybody wrote, back then."

Sam was tracing the ornate letters with one finger, trying to decipher the ornate font. "U..t.. ut, exp... exp..e..l..f.. expelf.. i..f.. ut expelfif... d..a.. da..ee...dayee..m..."

Dean sniggered on the sofa. Bobby shot him a sharp look, and pointed out the words to Sam.

"Ut expulsis daemonibus abundans cautela non nocet," he read.

Sam looked confused. "They're 'f's," he complained, "And those aren't real words."

"That's how people wrote 's's then," Bobby told him, "And this bit is written in a language called Latin. See? 'Ut expulsis daemonibus' – that's 'when you're banishing demons' – 'abundans cautela non nocet', 'you can never be too careful'."

"Why didn't he write it in English?" Sam wanted to know.

"Well, the guy who wrote this was German, so he wouldn't have spoken English," Bobby went on. "Even if he had, it wouldn't be a form of English that you could understand easily. Latin was a common language that educated people used to talk to one another."

"Do demons speak English?" Sam asked.

"Well, yes," Bobby felt a sad pang that an eight-year-old would ask such a question, "They understand lots of languages, but Latin was the language of the church for hundreds of years. Still is, in some places. That's why it's particularly powerful when you're dealin' with the things that go bump in the night. The things your Dad chases down. Including demons."

Sam still looked confused. "That's a different number of words," he stated doubtfully, going back over the sentence. "Which word means 'you'?"

"Well, there isn't actually a word for 'you' in that sentence," Bobby smiled. "It's implied – its sorta included in the other words, and assumed that the reader will figure it out."

Sam stared uncomprehendingly at the strange words. "How are you supposed to figure it out?" he demanded.

Bobby cocked an eyebrow at him. "Kid," he drawled, "Are you really sure you want to know?"

"Yes!" answered Sam emphatically. Bobby mentally kicked himself – he had only himself to blame. Asking Sam Winchester if he really wanted to learn something was like putting a freshly slaughtered gazelle in front of a starving lion and asking it "Are you really sure you want to eat that?"

"Antiquis temporibus, nati tibi similes in rupibus ventosissimis exponebantur ad necem," muttered Dean.

"What did he say?" demanded Sam.

"That was, 'In ancient times, children like you were left to perish on windswept crags'," translated Bobby, with a dispproving glare. "Some people, such as your brother, are not willing scholars of Cicero's tongue."

"Who's Cicero?" asked Sam.

"Who was Cicero," replied Bobby, starting to feel a bit like he was trapped in a strange TV game show that was a combination of Jeopardy, It's Academic and Blankety Blanks, "Cicero was a Roman philosopher."

"Where did he roam?" pressed Sam. "Was he on vacation?"

"Not 'roamin',' Sam, 'Roman'." Bobby felt his brain lean into the turn as the conversation took off on a tangent. "From Rome. Where they spoke Latin."

"Rome is in Georgia," Sam said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously at Bobby. "I went to school there, and the books were not printed like that." He pulled an expression that would, ten years later, mature into what Dean would come to think of as a Sam Bitchface from the Classical Period. It suggested that he suspected Bobby of trying to prank him. "They talked funny, but it wasn't Latin. I could still understand them. Mostly."

"No, no, Rome, as in, ancient Rome," Bobby tried again, wondering if this was what John had to deal with all the time, "Rome was an ancient civilisation in Italy."

"Italy is shaped like a boot," said Sam, on firmer ground now, "I've seen a map. Did they roam around in boots?"

"No, boots weren't invented then," Bobby's brain pulled a handbrake turn in a bid to keep up. "They wore a sort of sandal, called a caliga."

Sam looked perplexed again. "Dean calls me that," he stated, looking at his brother. "Why do you call me that?"

"I don't call you that, Sam," Dean still didn't look up from his magazine, "I call you 'canicula'."

"What's a canicula, then?" Sam demanded. "Bobby, what's a canicula?"

Balls, the Hunter thought to himself. "It's a feminine diminutive of the word 'canis'," he replied, "And before you ask, if you learn some Latin, you'll learn what..."

Sam wasn't paying attention. His face was creased in thought in the way that indicated that Sammy Is Working Something Out. "Feminine means female," he mused to himself, "And diminutive means little. I know that, I got it right when I won the spell bee last term..." realisation struck, and he glared at his brother. "You've been calling me a little girl!" he shouted in accusation.

"No he hasn't!" Bobby corrected hastily, "Have you, Dean?"

Dean looked up, looking hurt. "No, Sammy," he said in a sad voice, "I would never call you a little girl, no matter how long your hair gets." He paused. Oh no, thought Bobby, here comes the punchline... "It's Latin for 'little bitch'."

"I knew it!" howled Sam angrily, "I know it was something mean, 'cause of the way you smirk when you say it!" He turned back to Bobby. "I want to learn Latin," he declared, "So I can be rude right back at him!"

Okay, then, okay," sighed Bobby, taking his hat off and scratching his head. "I can start teaching you a bit about Latin."

"Didn't their feet get cold if they roamed around in sandals?" asked Sam curiously. "It snows in Italy. I've seen pictures." He looked unhappy. "I wouldn't want to go on vacation in the snow if I was roaming around in sandals."

"I think I may just have a primer in my study that might be helpful," Bobby's smile was just a little bit too cheerful as he gritted his teeth.

"Ecce fiber fervidus," intoned Dean portentiously. Behold the eager beaver.

"Maybe Dean would like to join us for some grammar revision," Bobby suggested casually, "God knows, his use of the subjunctive needs work."

"Or I could get out of your way and amuse myself totally harmlessly, while putting my reading to good practical use in a constructive, wholesome way," trilled Dean, waving the workshop manual.

"Sounds like a plan," Bobby relented. "You call me if you decide you want to try welding anything, you hear?"

"Yes, Bobby," Dean replied dutifully, getting to his feet. The old dog, who had been snoozing in a the sunbeams, climbed laboriously to her paws, and was under his feet. "Hey!" he stepped awkwardly to avoid tripping over her. "Bobby, can you call Kali?"

"Let her out if she wants to go," Bobby told him, turning back to sort through one of the teetering piles of books that littered his house, "She knows where she needs to be."

"Yeah, but she's getting a bit, well, old, and, she gets underfoot, and…"

"You got a Wildhunt dog decides to keep an eye on your sorry carcass, boy, you don't question it," Bobby's voice was suddenly hard, his eyes boring into Dean. "She may be old, but she knows her job. You pay attention to anything she has to tell you."

"Uh… yes, Bobby," Dean was startled at the vehemence of Bobby's tone. He looked down at the grey muzzle beside him; the hazy old eyes were watching him keenly. "Come on then, girl," he smiled as he patted her affectionately, and they both left, Kali sticking close to Dean's left leg.

"Aha!" Bobby brandished a tattered hardcover triumphantly. "Here it is. Now, Sam," he began, opening the book as the younger Winchester sat beside him and peered eagerly at the musty page, "Latin is a language that is highly inflected. That means, lots of the words have changing endings that tell you a lot about them, so you can squash a few words in English into one word in Latin. That's why you don't have to have the word 'you', in Latin."

"Like feminine and diminutive?" queried Sam.

"Yeah," Bobby replied, "Exactly like that." Jesus, there were times when the speed of the kid's brain just plain scared him.

"Does Latin really work on demons?" Sam wanted to know.

Bobby sighed. "Yeah, on a lot of them. There are special chants you can use that frighten 'em all the way back to Hell." Sam looked worryingly thoughtful. "But there's a lot more stuff you can read in Latin. You know what a verb is?" Sam nodded. "Okay, well, let's look at how Latin verbs work…"