A/N: Only one review so far… so either this story sucks, or I'm just not getting enough viewership on it. Or the SPN readers like more to a story before they review it. I'm not a "review whore" but only one seems a bit odd for one of my stories. This is my first SPN story, so maybe that's it. If you like my writing, go and check out my SPN/Twilight crossover, "The True Battle Lies Within." I've made Bella far more bad-ass than she was in the original canon, and Edward's an arse-copter. Enjoy!

Also, I made some changes to Chapter 1 of this story and re-posted it, so please re-read it before reading this chapter. Thanks in advance and I hope you enjoy the continuation of this story!

Chapter 2

Opal PoV

"I'm Opal Maxwell," I reply. "And I'd love to go into more detail, but the police will be here soon since they're expecting a new body, and I'd rather not explain all the blood on the ground with no wounds, how I'm a green eyed brunette and still alive, and most importantly how we have the ghost of Jackson Sylvane bound in iron chains. So… back to my house?"

The two men agree and drag a kicking and screaming ghost of Jackson Sylvane to my house. Sam adjusts the chain to cover Jackson's mouth so he can shut the hell up. Soon, we arrive at my house and I lead them to the cellar where I've got a ghost trap painted on the floor. Sam flings Jackson down onto it and he remains still and silent, the trap keeping him dormant.

"Okay now. Spill," Dean says. "How are you Opal Maxwell? What the hell did you do to me? And how do you know about binding and trapping ghosts?"

"Let's go upstairs and sit down. It's a lot of information," I suggest. Sam and Dean exchange a look, but decide to follow me upstairs to the sitting room. I remove the dust cloths from some of the chairs and tell them to make themselves at home. In the kitchen, I find some glasses, bottles of beer, and a bottle of whiskey and place them all on a serving tray. They seem the type to need a drink to wind down after what just happened.

"Figure you might need a drink," I offer, setting the array of drinks on the coffee table. Dean takes a beer, opening it against the table. He's scratched the wood on my two hundred year old table, but I don't have it in me to care at the moment.

"Okay, I was born in 1845. I am the original Opal Maxwell that was shot and hanged by Jackson Sylvane."

"How?" Dean asks simply.

"I'll get to that in a moment, but I think I should start with the story of my own murder and go from there, yes?" Dean nods, satisfied with my answer.

"So the original deaths did include shootings," Sam muses. "The police precinct doesn't have the old files due to a fire, they said." Opal nods.

"Yes, every person that Jackson has killed was first with a bullet and then hanging in a tree. The reason was because the bullet didn't kill me. He shot me with it and I was still standing there, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened and why blood was pouring out of my body. It hurt after a bit, but at the time, my body was in shock, so I wasn't feeling the pain just yet. That's when he knocked me out, carried me up the tree and dropped me from it."

"And it broke your neck," Sam adds. She nods. "Why didn't the bullet kill you?"

"At the time I had some idea. I know more now. The papers back then said he and I were having a sordid love affair and I left him because I knew what my father would do if I eloped with a Sylvane." Both brothers nod in agreement. "That wasn't it. I wasn't leaving Jackson because of the family feud. I left because I knew I wasn't normal, and I couldn't go on pretending to be."

"Go on," Dean urges, taking a sip from his beer.

"Ever since I was little, probably since I was born, I've been able to heal really fast. I'd fall and scrape my knee and before I could even look at it, it'd be healed. My folks always wondered how I played so hard as a kid but never got hurt. I did, they just never saw it. My wounds and broken bones would always heal within seconds. I knew it wasn't normal; I knew if anyone found out, especially a Sylvane, that I'd be ostracized from the community or worse."

"Why wasn't Jackson in the army?" Sam asks. Smart guy, at least he knows we were in the middle of a war when this happened.

"I can only speak as to why my brothers weren't, and it's because we were yankee sympathizers. And it was better for us to stay out of the war than to fight for the Union, lest we all be lynched by the townsfolk. The Sylvanes had their own reasons, I suppose, but none of their boys went off to war either. I had hoped Jackson would go, so I wouldn't have to leave him the way I did, but he never left and I never asked why. I think their father bought them out of it by giving a 'donation' to the confederacy in exchange for not recruiting his boys.

"My courtship with Jackson had gotten to the point where he was wanting to marry me and I knew I couldn't. I knew it would only be a matter of time before he learned about my little quirk. So I broke it off with him. And when I did, he went into a blind rage and shot me. When that didn't do the trick, he hanged me. And I did die. My neck broke, thus severing my spinal cord and my heart stopped. I was well and truly dead.

"It wasn't until the undertaker was cleaning me up to bury me that they removed the noose and straightened out my neck. Everything fused back together and I came back to life. The undertaker about lost his lunch when he saw me bolt up off the table, gasping for air. It was like I went from being shot to waking up in the funeral parlor across town a second later.

"After calming myself down, and then the undertaker, I told him to fill my coffin with sand or whatever so it would be heavy enough to make everyone believe I was inside, paid him as much money as I could and I ran away. I learned that I couldn't be killed, not permanently anyway, and that made my need to leave that much more dire. I snuck into my house, took a trunk worth of clothes and supplies and was on the next train outta Tuscaloosa, destination anywhere else."

"And then Jackson was killed a week later, right?" Dean asks. Opal nods.

"Yes, my brothers lynched him. Then the fathers decided enough was enough and ended the feud, calling a truce since the youngest of both families were killed so brutally. The Maxwells moved away after that, settling in Birmingham."

"This doesn't explain how you're a hundred and seventy years old, but don't look a day over twenty-five," Dean states.

"After I died the first time, I stopped aging. Since I woke up in front of the undertaker, I've not aged a day." Still figuring that one out.

"Wow," Sam adds. "That's incredible. You said died the first time. You've died more than once?

"Er, yeah," I reply. "I was experimenting, so I tried all manner of ways, and I have been murdered a few times, but all in situations I put myself in on purpose. I never have had a death wish, but when you learn you can't die, you kind of start to want to know how many ways there are to die."

"I've died more than my fair share of times, too," Dean replies. "Sammy, as well. Now back to the story."

I laugh. Dean is a bit too enthusiastic about all this. I'll have to ask him more about the dying multiple times later, but this is about me right now. "A few years later, I heard about the killings happening. I was up in New York, trying to move on with my life, working as a nurse. But when it happened several years in a row, it made national news. I saw it as the front page story on a paper at a news stand. It said how every year on the same date that I 'died' another girl that looked like me got killed the same way. Shot and then hanged. 'Course with them, the bullet did its job, so the hanging was pointless. I couldn't figure out who was killing the girls until 1875 when I came back to town and witnessed it myself.

"It was Jackson. He looked pale and sickly but he was luring these women out of their homes and to that blasted willow tree. I knew he had to be a ghost. It wasn't much of a stretch considering I'd come back from the dead. Where as I was still alive and human, he was a ghost. I spent the next few months researching ways to stop ghosts. I had hoped to finally put him to rest, as it appeared that all he was really doing was reliving the last week of his life.

"The only things I could find were how to bind a ghost. So I got some iron chains, carved those symbols into them, read the incantation, and drew a ghost trap on the cellar floor of the Sylvane home with my own blood. Got plenty to spare, so that was no problem. The Sylvanes had moved into a different house after Jackson's death. Too many memories for his mother. But their old house was still standing and vacant, so I decided to trap him there. And there he stayed for nearly a hundred and forty years. Then when the old house got torn down, the trap cracked and the chains gave way, so he escaped, and the deaths started all over again.

"I thought it was long done, so I stopped checking the Tuscaloosa newspapers, but when this last story got published, I knew something had happened and he'd broken out of the trap. So here I am, to put it right. He's trapped again, and I just need to find a way to make it permanent. Then you two showed up and almost ruined my plan. Good job getting shot. Next time, don't bother taking a bullet for me; it won't do anything."

"Duly noted," Dean replies, patting his fully healed abdomen. "So you just spilled your blood over my wound and it healed me. How does that work?" Dean asks. "Oh, thanks by the way."

I smile. He doesn't seem all that thankful, but it's the thought that counts, I guess. "You're welcome," I answer sincerely. "I'm not entirely sure how it works, but just that it does. Not the first time I've healed someone, so I knew it would work. How and why I am whatever it is I am is still a mystery. A century and a half of research and I'm still no closer. I've ruled out a few things, but can't find any concrete answers. Just a bunch of old wives tales and myths. Now, seeing as you two didn't seem at all surprised by the presence of a ghost, I'm guessing you're not new to this stuff."

"Not at all," Dean answers. "We're hunters. We hunt ghosts, demons, vampires, and anything else that goes bump in the night."

"I knew about vampires, from when I was trying to figure out what I am. Met my fair share, too. Never had a hankering for blood or a dislike of sunlight, so I ruled it out. But demons? And there's more?"

"Lots more," Sam replies. "But more importantly, we know how to gank a ghost."

I sigh in relief. "Thank goodness. Okay, what do we need to do?"

"Nothing much, just need to pay a little visit to ol' Jackson's grave, do some desecrating and burn his bones."

Um, what? I stare at them blankly. "Come again?"

"It's morbid," Sam offers. "But it's the truth. We dig up the grave, pour salt and accelerant onto the remains and then throw a match. The remains are each spirit's connection to this plane. Once they're gone, there's nothing tethering them here, so they move on to either heaven or hell, depending on the kind of life they lived."

"Yep, and I'm guessing Ol' Jack's taking the express elevator downstairs," Dean adds. "On occasion, it's a certain object that the deceased is tethered to. So burning the bones doesn't always take 'em down. Or sometimes they've already been cremated. In those cases, we figure out what the object is and burn that, too. So, to kill two birds, can you think of anything of Jack's that we may need to burn along with his bones?"

Opal considers for a moment. "No, I don't think so. Unless he's somehow tethered to that damn tree," she responds. "That's where his ghost always hovered, even when he was dormant. It was ridiculously easy to trap him because he was just standing there, staring at it with an expression of pure hatred."

"Well, we may need to wait a couple days before we do that. The police and the press will likely be taking pictures of the tree as part of their evidence and stories that no one died this year," Sam points out. "But the bones… we can take care of those right now."

The three of us ride together in the impala to the cemetery. I lead them to the Sylvane plot and they find Jackson's headstone. There's no beloved son or any message on it whatsoever. Just "Here lies Jackson Sylvane – 1843 to 1864." I guess his family was pretty angry with him for what he did to me. I knew they didn't stop the Maxwells from lynching him, and a feudal war didn't start after that, either. I learned that Jackson and I were the glue that held our families together. And when we were killed, that glue vanished and the families both fell apart. At least they didn't all kill each other off.

The brothers take turns digging and before long, the coffin is revealed. "Ten bucks says he's not in there," Dean jokes as he plunges the pick axe into the lid. Yanking it away, it does reveal the long rotted bones of Jackson Sylvane. I take a closer look, to see if I can note any identifying marks. I see one and speak up.

"It's him," I confirm. "He was missing one of his bottom teeth. Never grew in." Dean takes a closer look at the skull and see that one of the teeth is missing. Not like it had been knocked out, but it never grew in the first place. "Rumour was that Jackson's mother was also his aunt if you know what I mean." I never did know if that was true, but his mother and father both favored each other quite a bit. If memory serves, back then, it was rumoured that Jackson's mother was a bastard Sylvane daughter, had out of wedlock with some tavern whore.

"Ah yes," Dean replies. "Good ol incest deformities. And you dated this guy?"

I shrug. "Apart from the missing tooth and the rage murder, he was an alright guy. And trust me, those were hard to come by in the 1860s." Dean smirks at me. There's a twinkle in his eyes now that I hadn't seen before. Maybe he's just now warming up to the idea that I'm a person. I just happen to heal really fast and don't age. Apart from that I'm totally normal.

"Wanna do the honors?" Dean offers, holding out a box of rock salt. I take the box and shake it out over the remains. Afterwards, Sam pours some kerosene and Dean tosses a match on the pyre.

"How will we know if it worked?" I ask.

"We go back to your house, and if he's still bound and gagged in the cellar, we burn the tree down tomorrow night," Dean explains. "And if he's not there, then it worked and we still burn down the tree for good measure."

"Makes sense," I answer. "I wonder if the town will be upset about the tree being burnt down. Maybe they'll rejoice and take it as a sign that the murders are over and done for good."

Just then, Dean's phone rings. "It's the police precinct," he tells us before answering. "Grohl," he says sharply into the phone. "You've got another one?" He looks at me, his eyes full of panic. I can hear the muffled voice of the officer that's calling him, but can't make out any words. "Yep, we'll be there in five minutes. Thanks."

"What's up?" Sam asks.

"They've got another body in the tree," he says. "This one mutilated beyond recognition."

I shake my head in disbelief. "That doesn't make any sense. We've got Jackson bound in my cellar. No way he's getting out of there, and all the brunettes in town have either left or dyed their hair."

Dean laughs humorlessly. "Yeah, that's the thing. The hair on this one… while most of it's red with her blood, the officer told me, she wasn't a brunette. She's blonde."

"Whoa, okay," Sam replies. "So either the dying hair hasn't fooled the ghost, or Jackson wasn't behind all this."

"Maybe he was a puppet?" Dean suggests. "Like something else is pulling the strings. A Demon or a pagan god, maybe?"

"That would explain the ritual of it all. I thought it odd that the ghost was completely dormant except the one night. Especially the part where she said he just stood there staring at the tree in hatred for 364 days a year," Sam replies. I'm staring at the both of them, eyes wide, taking it all in. I had no idea so many monsters and myths were actually true. I knew about vampires and ghosts and whatever I am, but nothing about demons and gods and whatever else is out there. I suddenly feel like the world is a much bigger place than I'd thought it was. "You okay there, Opal?"

"Yeah, I'm just… I'm learning more in the past few hours than I have in my entire life about the otherworldly or supernatural stuff that's out there. All the research I did, and sure I read a lot about gods and angels, and all kinds of monsters, but I never knew that seemingly all of them are actually real. It's incredible."

"And it's also super fucked up," Dean adds. "Our lives ain't pretty. This job sucks. But if we don't do it, who knows what the world would be like now?" I see him shudder at the thought and I wonder just what they've been through in their few years. There's definitely something to be said about the years in your life vs. the life in your years. I'm nearly 5 times as old as these two and I feel like I've barely done anything. Mostly keeping what I am a secret, which isn't easy, but still… there's more I could be doing with my seemingly endless life.

We get to the crime scene and I'm explained as a possible victim that the two FBI agents kept safe during the night and was still with them when they got the call. "I thought if he had no brunettes to kill, the deaths would end, but I guess he just found the next available woman. Poor thing. This is the most brutal thing I've ever seen in my life," the sheriff says once we arrive. I'm made to stay off to the side and not allowed to see the body. If we'd gotten there before her heart gave out, I could have saved her. But once the heart stops, my blood is useless.

I wait with an officer, making inane chit chat while Dean and Sam go over the body. I've seen my fair share of corpses, having worked as a mortician for a few years, so I'd not be worried about my constitution, but seeing as in this case I'm a "civilian," I have to keep my distance. "I just feel terrible," I say to the officer. "I mean, if those two agents hadn't been keeping me safe, maybe this monster would have gone after me instead, and this poor girl's life could have been spared. Not that I have a death wish or anything, it's just…"

"Survivor's guilt," the officer finishes for me. "I understand where you're coming from. You fit the pattern more closely than this victim does, I'm sure you've heard. I can't go into more detail, you understand." I nod. "I wish this would stop, though. I don't know why we don't have officers posted up around the tree, at least trying to catch this monster in the act."

I know why, it's because everyone is scared out of their wits of this tree. Even during the day and during the part of the year that Jackson was dormant, no one ventured near this tree. It gave off a negative energy and no one would touch it.

After assessing the crime scene, the brothers suggest we go back to my house again. We stop at their hotel where they check out of their room and pack up all their stuff. "You don't mind if we crash at your place, do you?" Dean asks.

I shake my head. "Not at all. It's not like I don't have the room. Hell, we all three could have our own rooms and bathrooms at my place, and it won't cost you a dime. You're more than welcome."

Once we're at my place, the first thing we do is check the cellar. The chains are empty and look as though they've been scorched by fire. "Yeah, he's dead alright," Dean confirms. I clean up the ghost trap and dispose of the chains in case someone ever decides to come snooping around this house. The last thing they need to see is a demonic looking trap drawn in human blood and chains with weird looking symbols carved into the links.

Later, we're all in the sitting room, trying to think of what could possibly be still killing people. "Okay, I know you guys are the experts, but here are my ideas," I begin. Sam gestures for me to continue. "So, one, it's a coincidence, and some other crazy wacko out there is using the anniversary of these killings as his own night of insanity, like a copy-cat. Two, like you said before, Jackson was just a puppet and this killing was done by whoever or whatever is pulling the strings. But if that's the case, what about the near hundred and forty years that Jackson was trapped in the Sylvane cellar? No deaths of this nature happened during those years at all. Even this brutal killing of that blonde woman… nothing even similar has happened here. I've been looking at all the murders closely over the years."

"Okay, so maybe with Jackson dormant, but not dead, the killings stopped," Sam adds. "Like whatever was controlling him wasn't aware that he wasn't completing the ritual or something. Like as long as Jackson was still here, this other thing assumed the murders were still happening. But tonight, it knew Jackson was completely killed, so it took matters into its own brutal hands?"

That's a definite possibility. "So if that's the case, we just opened up Pandora's box by killing Jackson's ghost. We should have kept him trapped. Did they find any evidence at the crime scene?" I ask.

Dean shakes his head. "Can't even ID the body until they try dental records. Even her fingers were shredded, so no prints could be taken. The lab is also going to determine if her hair was naturally blonde or dyed."

"Is there anything more we can do tonight?" Both brothers shake their heads. "Okay, then I say we get a few hours' sleep if we can, then figure this out tomorrow with clear heads. I'll make breakfast." Their eyes light up at that.

"Like bacon and eggs breakfast?" Dean asks, sounding more like a kid than he should.

"Um, sure, if that's what you like. I was gonna make grits and toast too. And hashbrowns if you like," I answer, confused. They both are practically salivating at the thought of breakfast. "I take it you're not used to having someone cook for you?"

"Neither of us have had a real home cooked meal in a very, very long time," Sam answers. "It's very nice of you to offer and to let us stay at your place."

I wave my hand dismissively. "It's no trouble. Honestly, it's actually nice to have someone know about me. Even when I was surrounded by my family in this house, I still felt so alone. No one else was like me, and I couldn't tell anyone. So, thanks to you for showing up and helping out."

We all go our separate ways into bedrooms. I'd taken the time to pull the dust cloths off of a couple beds. "I replaced the mattresses only a few years ago, so you don't have to worry about sleeping on 150 year old beds."

"Wouldn't be the first time," Dean replies. "You should see some of the motels we've stayed in. Better yet, maybe you shouldn't." He cringes and shivers in disgust. Yeah, I really don't want to know.

"Alright, well goodnight. I'll um, see you in the morning." I turn and head down the hall towards my bedroom. It's been the same room since I was a little girl. Sure it's been updated a half a dozen times over the decades, but it's really the one place I feel I can call mine. My fingers trail over the marks in the door frame of how I grew as a child. Mother would have me stand up straight as an arrow and put a ruler on top of my head. I remember trying to stand on my tip-toes to try and gain an extra inch or so. Mother always caught me though.

I feel a presence behind me and turn to see Dean standing there. "I never really thanked you for saving me," he starts, looking down at the floor. "I mean, the words came out of my mouth, but… at the time I didn't really mean them. Getting help from a supernatural creature is never high on my list of things I like. I thought you were a monster and was trying to figure out how to kill you." I swallow back a bit of fear at that. "I don't think that anymore. But, old habits are hard to break. A hunter like me sees someone who's been alive for as long as you have, and can do the things you do… well our first reaction is to shoot first, ask questions later.

"Usually, things that live that long are vampires, witches, pagan gods, or other nasty things. We kill them. It's what we do. But I can tell that you're not. Whatever you are… it's good, not evil. So thank you, honestly, for saving me. But not for my sake, for Sammy's. I don't know what he'd do if I wasn't around anymore. Kid kinda depends on me. I've tried to get him to be independent, but I'm his big brother, and he needs me. Just as much as I need him."

I blink back the tears threatening to fall. I can remember when my own brothers felt that way about me. They're all dead and gone now, dust in the wind, but I remember being loved like that. I step forward, reach up on my toes and kiss his cheek. He seems surprised by my gesture and blushes slightly. "You're welcome, Dean," I whisper.

Before more words can be said I turn and head into my room, brushing my cheeks to catch any stray tears. I've known this man all of a few hours and I'm feeling things for him. Whether or not these feelings are romantic is yet to be seen. But it's already a problem. I've never been able to let people get close to me. Before it's because they could never know my secret, but now… well, what's really stopping me now?

I'm turning down the blankets, about to slide between the sheets when I hear a knock on my door. Opening it, I see it's Dean. I wonder if he even walked back to his room or if he's been on the other side of the door ever since I closed it. "I um… I wanted to offer you something," he says. "Sammy and I have this… uh, bunker of sorts in Kansas. It's got a huge library of supernatural books and info. Our grandfather was something called a Man of Letters, and they created this places to document and keep safe all the information about every supernatural creature ever encountered on earth. There's a good chance that there might be something about you in there. I mean, that is if you're not the only one that can do what you do. Anyway, once this case is over, if you're looking for something else to do, or even just want to try and find some answers, you'd be welcome to come back with us to Kansas."

Before I can accept his generous offer, he turns and heads towards his room. He's a bit of an awkward one, that Dean Winchester. But I can't help but feel drawn to him. Both he and Sam said they've both died multiple times. Maybe once this Haunting of Tuscaloosa business is over, we can leave here and the three of us can get to know each other better. For some reason, I feel like my life is about to change more than it ever has in my 175 years.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. As you can see, I decided to throw a twist in the case. Jackson wasn't behind it on his own… something darker and far more sinister was pulling his strings. Next chapter, we'll discover just exactly what was going on, what caused Jackson to kill Opal in the first place, and how he got roped into continuing the murders even after his death. Plus a bit more info on Opal and she'll get to know the brothers more, too. Thank you for reading!