Chapter 10
Morgana didn't know what was worse, sending John out to hunt or the time waiting between jobs. John had thrown himself into reading every book, journal and tome the Campbell family had collected. Morgana bought a stack of notebooks that John filled up quickly and asked for more. John barely talked to any one, he was consumed by his thirst for knowledge about anything supernatural. When Morgana tried to get him to tell her why, he just looked at her blankly as if she of all people should already know. Morgana was quickly bored sitting around watching T.V. with Dean and marveling at Sam crawling and pulling himself up months before he was supposed to be able to. She decided to take the boys with her to talk to the owner about hiring her to do work around the motel. If Morgana had been at home she would have been tinkering around her own house fixing things, painting walls, cleaning up after random people and demons who came to her for healing. Mr. Wallace, or Wally as he insisted Morgana call him was more than happy to let her stay rent free for doing all the odd jobs he himself had become to old to do. So, as soon as Sam went down for his nap Morgana and Dean set out to repair a broken lock on room 5's door.
The work kept Morgana's mind off of John's silence, and Dan's insistence that there was a lull in demon activity that always happened around the holidays. That reminded Morgana of something else she had ignored for a century or two, Christmas. Notably, Dean and John's first Christmas with out Mary and Sam's first Christmas ever. When Morgana had been a child in Avalon there was no winter, so there were no winter celebrations. As Morgana wandered the world over the last few thousand years she watched as the winter solstice evolved into modern Christmas. Not having any children in her care she had been able to just leave it to the people who lived elsewhere. Now she was stricken by the reality that she would have to find a way to delicately give the boys a Christmas without setting off John's depression or anger. Morgana worried that at any minute John would sink back into a bottle of whiskey or disappear into the night leaving the boys with Morgana indefinitely , as much as she cared about them, Morgana wasn't quite ready for that much responsibility.
Morgana hoped she would have some time to think on it, but the very next day Wally asked Morgana to start pulling out the Christmas decorations to get them ready to put up. Mr. Wallace was thrilled to have children around and a person to put the lights up for him this year. When Dean heard the word Christmas he began to jump up and down and insisting to see a calendar and Morgana to help him count how many days until Santa comes. Morgana didn't have the heart to tell him she had met several of the men who made up the Santa myth and that the ones who were actually good men were dead and the ones who were still in existence were not anyone you would want to get a present from. As soon as they had counted out the 32 days on the calendar Dean insisted they go back to the room and let Dad know. Morgana convinced him to wait until they had gotten some work done and Sam finished his nap before breaking the "great" news to John. The entire time Morgana and Dean sat in the storage room of the motel office untangling and checking strings of lights she was trying to figure out the best way to handle the merry little problem.
Sometimes luck is on your side, or in this case evidence of demonic activity. As Morgana walked out of the office, trying to keep Dean from sprinting to the room screaming Christmas at the top of his lungs, she saw a welcome sight, that ugly, old, wood paneled station wagon Dan Elkins hunted from. Dan, Greyson and John were standing next to the car talking in the frigid late fall afternoon, and not one of them had the sense to have a coat on.
"You all are going to die of pneumonia." Morgana chided them "Get inside you three."
"Dad do you know why it's cold?" Dean asked dancing around the adults. "Because it's almost Christmas!" Morgana shook her head, so much for easing into the subject. But luck was still on her side, John didn't want to look weak in front of Dan and Greyson so he grabbed up Dean, and carried him into the motel room tickling Dean the whole way to avoid having any form of discussion on the subject.
As much as Morgana had tried to keep the room clean it was still a mess from all of the books stacked around the room and random toys Sam and Dean had been playing with. There was barely anywhere to sit or stand. Dan and Greyson looked around. "Little light reading?" Dan joked.
"I have a lot of catching up to do." John said grimly. "That Ghost was a real eye opener for me. To tell you the truth, I half thought it was all some scam or bad dream until I was knee deep in a blood filled basement digging up bones." Morgana tried not to be offended by John's comments, but the fact that he thought she was scamming him, for what reason she couldn't even begin to imagine, was ridiculous.
"Seeing is believing." Dan chuckled and looked at Morgana. "Right Mora? Some times we don't see the forest through the trees." Morgana was confused, what was Dan getting at. He wouldn't dare try to reveal her identity to John, especially in front of her. There was something though, she was going to have to talk to Dan alone, soon.
"Well, we live and learn." Morgana sighed, "Hopefully." She didn't even look at Dan, but she could feel his anxiety from across the small room. Morgana laughed it off, "Well, why don't I bundle up Sammy and take the boys across the way to get some snacks and drinks for everyone. As you can see we aren't prepared for company."
"Oh, no, Mora," Dan quickly said, "We have to get into town quick. I picked up the trail of a demon that attacked a young woman on campus who was friends with Mary."
"Who?" John asked alarmed.
"Kate, somebody, Greyson you were taking notes when we talked to that highway patrolman in Olatha, what was the girl's last name?" Dan stared at Greyson expecting him to answer. Unfortunately Greyson was staring over his father's shoulder watching the same cartoon that Dean was focused on. "Grey! Are you listening boy?"
"What?" Greyson asked still distracted.
"Give me your notebook Greyson." Dan snatched it from him and pushed Greyson toward a clear spot on the floor next to Dean. "Keep an eye on the boys for us."
"Tanner." John mumbled, "Kate Tanner, she watched the boys for us on date night. They met when Mary took an art class on campus." John spoke quietly so Dean couldn't hear. "Is she okay?"
"According to the Patrolman she survived the attack but then disappeared two nights later from the hospital." Dan sat on the edge of the bed and flipped through the small notebook.
"Then today I hear on the scanner that Kate's boyfriend reported a break in at his house and he thought they were trying to set it on fire because it smelled like some one had been lighting matches."
"Sulfur?" John asked rhetorically, he knew what Dan was thinking. "Why would the demon come back?"
"I think it's looking for you and the boys." Dan didn't have time to pull punches, John nodded appreciatively. "Sorry, to have to tell you, but what ever killed Mary is still looking for you."
"It's not like we went very far," John queried "for demons they don't have very good tracking skills."
"It helps that you have Mora." Dan looked at Morgana with fear in his eyes before he said the next sentence. "She happens to be a first rate witch, the good kind, not the green warty kind." Suddenly Morgana understood, Dan was trying to explain the situation with out giving away her secret. Dan also knew how Morgana felt about being called a witch.
"A witch? You're a witch?" John hissed angrily at Morgana. If this was how he reacted to the word witch, Morgana was damn sure she was never telling him her true identity.
"I prefer healer, women who were doctors and nurses hundreds of years ago were labeled witches because they could heal people when no one else had been able to." Morgana pulled herself up proudly and looked John in the eye. She had been called a witch as long as she could remember. Yes she could cast a mean spell, any hex bag she made you would always do the trick and she was considered the High Priestess of the Grand Coven, it was more of a ceremonial title though, she no longer attended meetings. But those things were what she did to survive, and went along with her responsibility for the old magic she had been tasked to hold onto in her amulet. Morgana Le Fey was so much more than a common witch.
"She's telling the truth," Dan came to her defense, mostly to save his own hide. "There are different kinds of witches, and she is the rare good kind, more of a sorceress and healer. Have you read Parleaux's, "L'Histoire De Magiques"? History of Magic, it explains all of the different types of magic users, it is actually very diverse…"
"Yes, Dan is well read on the subject." Morgana interrupted before Dan could make it worse. "I don't remember seeing that text in the Campbell collection, but being an old hunting family they probably knew that text by heart, it's one of the first things you read as a child of a hunter." John looked at Dean and Sam sitting on the floor with Greyson. John's eyes were sad and Morgana knew why, he didn't want to think of his boys having to face the things he had read about in those books, or what he went through on that farm.
"I just wanted to ask you a couple of questions before I go talk to the boyfriend." Dan moved on. "We want to make sure we aren't walking into a trap."
"I'll just come with you." John said.
"No!" Morgana and Dan both insisted.
"Sorry John," Dan took the lead "These demons are trying to lure you out of hiding. If you come it will be a disaster. I know you want to destroy the demon that killed Mary, but trust me this was one of his henchmen, not the real McCoy."
"So I just sit here like an idiot?" John whispered harshly under his breath.
"An idiot would go rushing into town and get himself killed." Dan said as gently as possible. Dan understood and hated to have to do this to John. Morgana could see that the hunting trip the other day had done a lot to earn Dan's respect for John. Morgana wasn't surprised.
"Let's discuss this outside, Dan." John purposely didn't invite Morgana, it seemed she had some damage control to do. The two men walked outside into the cold. Morgana said nothing about the lack of coats this time not wanting to push her luck with John. Instead she spent the time busily straightening up books and picking up toys. As she did, Morgana looked for any witchcraft texts that were flattering toward witchcraft and didn't mention her. It was a difficult task. Finally she decided on an interesting text she had never read but had heard about. It had been written in the late 1960's when witchcraft was beginning to make a come back. It was a hippy dippy text that made witches seem like earth mothers who did more good than harm, it had obviously been written by a new practitioner of witchcraft since it was very rosy eyed and didn't mention Morgana in any way.
When John and Dan came back in Dan's lips were blue, but John's face was red with anger. Morgana could tell John had agreed to sit on the sidelines but there was no way he was going to be happy about it. John sat down on the floor with Dean and pulled Sam into his lap. "Thanks for hanging out with the boys Greyson." John said dismissing the boy. "Your Dad needs your help now. I will be waiting right here for you guys to get back and let me know what you found." John was deliberately ignoring Morgana, this was going to be a fun afternoon.
Dan and Greyson headed out, Dan looked back at Morgana apologetically. Morgana smiled at him to assure him she understood he didn't have a choice. Dan closed the door and all that could be heard was the T.V. and it's flashing cartoons. Morgana got up and walked to the door.
"Where are you going?" John asked Morgana without looking up at her.
"I thought I would give you guys some family time. I have a lot of things I need to get back to." Morgana answered.
"Christmas decorations?" John smiled as Dean spun around bright eyed.
"Yes, they're a mess." Morgana was confused by John's sudden change of mood. "It will take me days to get it all sorted."
"Not if we help, right Dean?" John tickled the boy, Sam squealed with glee at his brother rolling and laughing on the floor.
"Are you sure?" Morgana stepped softly toward him.
"I can't just sit here staring at whatever the hell those blue things are."
"Smurfs." Dean and Morgana said in unison. This time John laughed at Morgana and both boys were so happy to hear him laugh they both began to squeal. Morgana wasn't sure how to take any of it but was more than happy to have the help and keep both of them from thinking about what Dan and Greyson were going through in town.