Part 26
"She's kept there by a ring of silver stakes."
"I knew it. You owe me a Benjamin." Dean smacked his brother.
John rolled his eyes. "Boys. Pay attention. I don't think that was her true form. I think it was a show." He cut his hand through the air at Dean before his eldest could get the words out. "I still don't know what she is. It. Whatever."
"Let's hope it's a she. I don't want to think about you swinging that way." Dean just couldn't hold his tongue.
"Shut up, you idjit." Bobby swatted the boy with his hat.
"So, when we pack the saddlebags, what will we take?" Sam cut in. "Silver? Bullets? Fire?"
"They had enough silver to choke an elephant. I'm thinking it won't kill her." John braced himself against the door frame. "If they could make the silver stakes, I'm sure they had fire. They trapped her for a reason." He looked around the room. "I don't know how long she's been there but they were not able to kill her."
"I'm hoping the preacher has more luck when he gets here." Bobby snorted. "I got nothing."
"Pastor Jim is stuck because of a freak snow storm." Sam volunteered. "He was thinking Succubus but like a really old one."
"How old?" Liz asked just to get the question out there.
"Like… maybe… before men were in triple digits old." He looked to his father and Bobby. "I mean… like maybe half-blood demon old."
"And Jim has those texts." John cursed under his breath.
"Those would be the ones." Bobby nodded.
"I don't understand. If there was something like this, why isn't there any record of it?" Liz shook her head. "I mean. Surely someone would have passed the information down so that it would never be let out."
"Normally, it would be. I've spent all day with the maps and on the phone with preservationists. The town's old but not ancient." He flicked a picture that John drew of the stakes. "These look like they were done 17th century or so, maybe before. I'm thinking she didn't always live here, that's just where she got trapped." Bobby tsked under his breath. "But if this thing is old as we think, so's her game and her friends. Maybe right after she was trapped, one of her friends offed the keepers to let her out or to keep her there. Who knows why that thing's really in there."
"There's no local lore." John shook his head.
"No, you read all there was." Liz shrugged. "Two years ago."
"Who found it?"
"Well, I did."
"I'm on it." Dean made for the door.
"What?" Liz turned to watch him go.
"When you went looking for the lore, Liz, did you know what you know now?" Sam asked gently.
"Well, no…"
"Then you probably ruled out some books that you might have thought were trash."
"Oh."
--
"Who am I?" She whispered. "Who do I look like?"
"I'd say my son's wife, about six months ago."
"You like to look at her John. Come in here and I'll let you do more than look."
"Who are you?" John asked again.
"Oh, I've been around. You've met some of my daughters, John." She smiled. "Jenny, Peg, Lorelei… oh, I've had so many." Her smile grew. "But you've also known my mother, haven't you… What did you call out in the middle of the night? Soft, so your boys couldn't hear you taking a woman who wasn't their mother? Sue?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Dear Susan? The demon you took to bed, John. She's so old the mountains are newborns to her." She licked her lips. "Shame about the body you killed. Mom just… flew away. Found a new body. She always does. Lucky girl."
"What's her name?"
"Oh no. I know about you and your habit of killing my loves… Stay with me, John. No more killing, hunting. Just me in your arms for all eternity."
John swore he could feel her hand along his shoulder though about six yards lay between them. Felt the hand smooth down his chest and cup his crotch.
John sat up with a cold sweat dripping down his face, drenching his clothes. He lay in his son's living room, sunset washing him in reds and oranges. Concerned faces all around. "It's a demon… or demon-spawn."
"How do you know?"
"She told me."
Sam walked into his father's line of sight. "Why would she do that?"
"She's taunting me. Said I'd met her daughters… Jenny, Peg and Lorelei." John ran the names through his head, then tried running the names of evil bitches through his head. "Jenny Greenteeth, Peg Powler."
"Shit. Jenny, Peg and Lorelei." Bobby ran a hand over his head. Nix, nymph, whatever. Evil bitches.
Dean held up a book. "The local book of the dead. It's actually from a few towns over but I think that she lured them out here and snuffed them and then the townsfolk had to fight fire with magic."
"What's it say?" John pressed.
"Well, the death count in men was pretty damn high after the white settlements took a strong hold. I think they brought it with them." He handed over the book. "The ages of the men were… well."
"Why?" John pondered.
"Early death rates." Liz offered. "The settlers didn't live as long as we do now. I mean… 50 was ancient. All the elders were rarely into their sixties."
"So… it likes seasoned and experienced men." Sam made a face. "How many of these men were fathers?"
"All of them."
"Her daughters." John cursed to himself. "She's a breeder."
"Whoa… like?" Sam blinked at his father. "You mean… really?"
"Dude, really." Then Dean stared at his father. "You don't think you…"
"I think that was her plan. I couldn't tell you if it worked." John shook his head.
"We need the preacher." Bobby cut them off before Liz could get her question out.
--
John was starting to get used to the dreams. At least he hoped it was a dream. He just had to make sure that he kept the damn thing interested without stepping over the silver ring. John knew that he couldn't trust any of his instincts. This bitch had insinuated herself into his psyche. He had thought, for a moment, that Liz was behind the whole thing. Then he had seen it, had felt it. The image of desire was part of the thrall of the beast. He'd never admit it out loud but his son's wife was a beautiful woman. Given that she was his son's wife, would cause him the most torment as the object of his lust. That was the object after all. Torment.
John stared at her. She taunted him with big doe eyes and flashes of tantalizing flesh but she knew when to bring out the big guns.
"Maybe the new is not what you really want, John." She purred. "She's a pretty girl but she is just a girl. Maybe what you want is a woman." Suddenly, where Liz stood, there was Ellen. "I always did find you kind of handsome, John. Bill was even concerned about it from time to time."
It didn't fit. Ellen Harvelle was a fine woman but this kind of sensuality was never anything John had associated with the dead hunter's wife. Then it hit him. "Mary…. I need Mary."
"Oh, John… she's no fun." Ellen's smoky voice told him. "She's saved herself for you, married you, bore you two strapping boys… Time to pick up someone new."
"I'll walk in, willingly." John told it. "I will do… anything you want… but you have to be Mary."
She huffed. It was kind of funny, watching Ellen huff. She flicked her hand at him.
Then John woke up where he'd been having his breakfast. "Betrayal."
"What?" Bobby sat up. He hadn't even noticed that John had fallen asleep. Hell, maybe he'd fallen asleep himself.
"That's what it feeds off of." John grimaced when he swallowed down his cool coffee. He took the opportunity to check for ears while he refreshed his cup. "You know something you're not telling me but I don't know who you're protecting, Bobby."
"Well, maybe it shouldn't be said to some people."
"Like maybe Dean and his wife?"
"Like maybe them." Bobby agreed.
"Shit, Bobby, what did I tell you?" John ran a hand over his face.
"Not what you said, more like how you was acting. Maybe some things that maybe Dean said about how you was acting. But Dean don't know what I know."
"Which is what?" John turned sad eyes on his friend. "I was fantasizing about that little girl?"
"Something along those lines."
"Jesus, Bobby. It keeps calling me in my sleep. Looking like her but not the way she is now… the way she probably was when we first got here." He sighed and nearly burned his mouth with a fresh mouthful of coffee. "It's trying to keep my attention. Turned into another woman I know, thinking I'd prefer someone older right now."
"And."
"Anyone but her." John kept the name to himself because he had the one, maybe two, dreams about her in the past. "I asked it to be Mary."
"Shit, John." Bobby cursed and lost his appetite.
"She couldn't do it. Starting making excuses about why not but she never did it. She… dismissed me."
"What kind of excuses?"
"That… Mary'd never been with anyone but me. She married me. She'd had my boys… Said that Mary was no fun."
"So, betrayal, huh. Nice little torment to feast on."
"We need a weapon, Bobby. Silver is holding its body in place. Woods is limiting her range but she's getting stronger."
"We'll find something, John."
--
Jim arrived with the cold still floating off his clothes and in the crate he carried, he carried their hope. John watched as Dean unloaded the crate which did not contain a single book but instead an arsenal that the Vatican was sure to be missing. He was stunned by a particularly angry spear. Dean lifted it to the light. It had attracted his boy as well.
Jim opened his mouth to explain but John waved his hand at him to silence him. "Dean, tell me about what you're holding."
"It's crude." Dean lifted his eyes but not his head, ready for this pop quiz. "It's unpolished silver, I can smell it. Pre-Christian."
"More." John demanded.
Dean ran his tongue over his teeth, lowered his eyes to study the weapon in his hands. "It's got wood splinters fixed into it, stained with blood. Don't know what kind of blood. It's hefty. It'll take force and aim to hit home. Have to get pretty close." He twisted it between his hands to get a solid grip. He struck out with it, adjusted it and tried again. "Pretty ancient. Don't think the Romans built this thing. I think they found it and kept it."
Jim stared at the boy and crossed his arms. "You've been reading. I thought you said that reading was for kitty-cats."
"That's not what I said." Dean lowered his head, mouth turning up at the corners.
"Dean!" Liz gasped in horror at her husband actually saying that to a priest.
"Oh, my child, he's said way worse in my presence." Jim walked across the room and took the spear from Dean's hands. "This was found and smuggled out of Rome in the last century. Its origins are unknown and the carbon dating makes this weapon just older than man-made fire."
"I thought you said that evolution was against God, Pastor Jim." Sam leapt in.
"Never you mind what I said before." Jim tilted the spear to show off the wood splinters. "These… never decay. They never fall out. Never dry out. It's old world magic for old world monsters."
"That is just… awesomeness." Dean took the spear back. "Bet this things kills just about anything." He hefted it between his hands before tossing it across the room to his father.
John caught it with one hand, then twirled it until it fit to his hands. His head began to ache, which he took as a sign that it was the right weapon. "She's ringed in Silver and in Wood, Preacher."
"The settlers didn't have my connections." Jim reminded John. "Who does she look like?"
"Everyone I would avoid." John answered simply.
"We still need some back up incantations to make sure she's weak enough when we stage our attack." Bobby cautioned, the look in John's eye making him nervous.
"Everyone get some shut eye. We're hitting the books nice and early. I want her dead by midnight."
--
Frosted breath panted between the trees as John made his way over fallen logs. Spear at his back, he marched onward. Despite the cold, it was a scantily clad young woman sitting in the clearing. Leaning on the trees, he stared. She smiled. "I knew you'd come to me, John." She crossed her arms to rub for warmth. "It's so cold… I need a kiss to warm me up."
John took a deep breath, cold burning his lungs. It was snowing and the forecast was calling for a blizzard. If he got stuck, he might not find his way back before the worst of it hit. If he turned back now, he might make it. If he waited for the cover of night and the aid of his friends and his boys, they could have this over with in just two more days.
"John, I'm so cold."
John stepped over the silver spikes and the stench of dead wood met his nose before he could step back. The arms wrapped around him before he could take another breath. Decay. Death. Evil.
--
Liz frowned as the hot water kettle whistled. Nothing. She felt nothing. The silent tugging was gone. Dean bent his head over a book. Sam was asleep on top of his. Bobby was snoring on a cot in the baby's room. Jim had gone to shower. "Dean… where's John?"
TBC