Nine

With Claire seemingly squared away, Castiel's main worry returned to Dean. He and Brooke spent the next several weeks driving all over the U.S. in search of information on Cain, the hope being that if they could find Cain, that he might agree to remove the Mark from Dean's arm. If he had put it there, then perhaps he could remove it. It was a long shot, but it was the best they had, and searching for Cain gave Castiel a sense of purpose.

And Brooke loved that. She loved it when her husband seemed to know—seemed to remember—who he was. She loved that sense of confidence. Still, she worried. She worried when the lack of any solid information only made him work harder. He began to grow frustrated, his temper shortening as time went on. Sometimes, it amazed her to watch the transition in him from someone almost human to entirely angelic, in the worst way possible. Gaining information on Cain often meant dealing with demons, tying them up, torturing them. She had no issue with this—the only decent demon she'd ever known had been Meg—but sometimes Castiel seemed to relish the torture and the killing more than he probably should.

It was during the nights after those kinds of days when Brooke would remind him of his goodness, would remind him that sometimes, the mission didn't come first. She would reminisce with him about when he had been human, about his job at the Gas-n-Sip, and even further back, about their lives as Emmanuel and Ruth. And she would feel that hardness over his heart slip away, slowly, and he would remember himself. And he would hold her against him and play with her hair and speak to her with kindness in his voice.

And in this way, just as Sam was keeping Dean human, and sane, Brooke was keeping Castiel from going over that edge that he had gone over once before, in his mission to stop Raphael, by opening the doors to Purgatory and absorbing all those souls. Still, finding Cain was dirty work, and much of it was spent in dirty warehouses, talking to demons who were tied to chairs, surrounded by devil's traps.

Brooke stood in the background one day, watching her husband go to work on another demon. Her arms were crossed over her chest as she stood beside the table upon which Castiel had placed his phone. It began to ring, and she glanced at it. Winchester, she said to him, silently.

Not now, he replied.

She nodded, though he was not looking at her, and did nothing.

"Are you gonna answer that?" asked the demon, slowly, calmly.

"Not at this moment," Castiel growled.

"You're wasting your time," the demon said, as the phone continued to ring. "I told you, I don't know where he is. Me and Cain ain't friends."

Castiel circled the demon slowly, staring down at him as he sat in the chair. And, despite herself, despite everything, Brooke felt her breath taken away for just one moment, and she gazed upon his face, so stern, one eyebrow perfectly arched, as he stared down his nose at the abomination tied to the chair. Those perfect, blue, glacial eyes flicked up to meet hers, that eyebrow still raised, his mouth a grim line, and she felt a warmth in her core and a flush in her cheeks, as if he had caught her doing something dirty. As much as she enjoyed reminding Castiel of his softer side, she also enjoyed that hardened exterior, the part of him that made her want to kneel down before him.

He held her gaze across the room, pinning her in place, and said, Later.

Her eyes widened and she looked away, smirking.

Brooke had missed whatever the demon had been prattling on about, but Castiel had missed nothing. "You sure about that?" he asked it, and reached down, cutting it in the arm with his angel blade.

The demon cried out, and his cry quickly turned into, "All right!" He took a breath, whispering, "All right." He was sweating now as he stared up at Castiel, who came to stand in front of him. "He's been seen, making passes through Bogg's Marsh, one county over. No one knows why—what for. Like I said, we keep our distance."

Castiel lifted his head slightly, to stare down his nose at the demon again, and lifted his angel blade so that the tip of it hovered an inch from the demon's right eye. "And that's all you know?"

"Yes," said the demon softly, hardly breathing. "Yes, I swear."

Castiel kept the blade near his eye for another moment, and then lowered it. "Okay," he said.

The demon breathed a sigh of relief, his chin falling to his chest.

Brooke turned away, knowing what came next. She heard the demon cry out as Castiel stabbed it through the chest. It was necessary not to leave anyone alive, lest Cain get wind that someone was looking for him.

Brooke did not know exactly what had happened to her to soften her so much, recently. Perhaps it was being around Dean and watching what happened to him the longer he had the Mark, the way the need to kill drove him to insanity. Perhaps she was afraid that, in his quest to save Dean, Castiel would also be driven to insanity, would kill without need if he thought, blindly, that it would save the man he loved. She knew he would do the same for her, and for the first time in maybe ever, the thought did not bring her comfort. There had been a time, long ago, when Castiel would have done anything for a mission, and she prayed, now, that he was long past that point.

She felt him behind her, tall and strong and unyielding… yet slowly softening as he reached out and touched her shoulder. I hope that I've learned enough from previous mistakes not to travel that path again, he said, quietly. But if I ever do, please do what you can to pull me back from that edge.

###

Brooke stood beside Castiel as he bent down to pick up the shoe he'd just found near the gravesite. They were in Bogg's Marsh, following the lead of the demon that Castiel had tortured earlier that day. Brooke shivered as she looked around this dead patch of land. All the trees in this part of the marsh had been chopped down, and there were dozens—hundreds?—of unmarked graves, mounds of dirt underneath which lay the bodies. And everything here was grey, as if the dirt beneath her feet was really ash.

Castiel pulled his phone from his pocket and called Dean.

"Hey, where ya at?" Dean asked him, Brooke listening through her mental connection to the angel.

"Illinois," he said.

"Hey, Cass," Sam broke in, "we got a lead. Cain abducted a Texas death row inmate named Tommy Tolliver."

Castiel studied the shoe in his hand some more. "He's dead."

"What? How do you know?"

"Call it an educated guess." Castiel stood up, glancing at Brooke. "Cain has been very busy." He tossed the shoe on the grave upon which he had found it.

"Okay," said Dean, "where are you? We'll come to you."

Just then, a strange wind tore through the mass graveyard, and Brooke got a chill down her spine. She reached automatically for her angel blade, pulling it from her coat and looking around for whatever was making her Hunter senses kick in.

Castiel had felt it, too, and was glancing surreptitiously at the tree line in the distance. "I'll call you back," he told Sam and Dean, and hung up.

The two of them spun in slow circles, looking in opposite directions, searching for the culprit. Brooke felt her husband's electric shock of surprise and spun turned in the direction he was facing.

Cain.

Brooke tightened her grip on her angel blade, unsure of what would happen now. Cain was not approaching any closer, or threatening to attack them—yet.

"Hello, Castiel," he said. "Brooke."

"What have you done?" Castiel demanded, gesturing at all the graves.

"These bodies?" He shrugged. "Just cleaning up a mess I made a long time ago."

"Cain, I know what you were. But you'd resisted for so long." Why had he gone Dark Side now?

"What can I say?" Cain stared at the angel with piercing eyes. "I got the taste back."

Castiel lifted his chin, studying Cain, unsure of how to take such a cavalier response.

"With Abaddon's army gunning for me, I had to take up arms again, and I liked how it felt." He was walking toward them now, albeit slowly.

Brooke was white-knuckling the handle of her blade now, and stepped closer to her husband.

"Those were demons," Castiel argued. "These…" He looked around at the graves again.

Cain squatted down in front of a grave, picking up a teddy bear left on top of one of them. A child's grave. "Humans," he said. "Eh, the Mark thirsts for all kinds."

Brooke felt the Grace in her blood rise to the surface as rage overtook her.

Castiel, just as furious, snarled, "This is a massacre."

Cain looked up, still squatting beside the child's grave, holding the teddy bear. "Yes," he replied, calmly, and then he stood, tossing the bear to the ground. "And, soon, it'll be a genocide. My children, my whole poisoned issue." He was coming closer now. "A lot of them out there right now—killers, fighters, thieves… Some more peaceful than others. But they still carry it—the disease. If the Mark wants blood, I'll give it mine."

Castiel stepped towards Cain. "You'll kill them all? You are Adam and Eve's firstborn. You descendants are legion."

Cain made a face that suggested disagreement. "At most I'm culling… one in ten."

"Of everyone."

Cain stared at him. "I've got time." He paused. "How's Dean, by the way? I hear he did good, took Abaddon down."

Castiel turned his face away.

"He is not well," said Cain, catching the angel's expression.

"Even with the First Blade hidden, Dean is losing his fight against the Mark." Castiel spoke, now, through his teeth. "If we don't find a cure—

"There is no cure. I'm living proof of that. But don't worry about Dean. I'll get to him, in due time."

Now, rage burned in Castiel the same as it burned in Brooke. He released his angel blade from his coat sleeve and held it threateningly in Cain's direction.

"Sorry, Castiel," Cain said. "You're not on my list." His eyes flicked to Brooke's for a moment, and then he vanished.

Castiel looked around for a moment, as if hoping that Cain would suddenly reappear. And then he sighed, heavily, shoving his angel blade back into his coat. "Damn it," he muttered. "All that work, looking for Cain… and for what?" That rage still burned inside him, simmering, slowly beginning to boil.

"Castiel," Brooke said. She had put away her own blade, and turned so that she was facing her husband. She took his face in her hands.

He did not pull away, but his anger did not dissipate. He was frustrated, tired, thinking all that time wasted. Brooke could feel a muscle in his jaw working, under her hand. Eventually, he took a breath, slowly, and stepped closer to her, bringing his forehead down to hers. He closed his eyes, breathing steadily, and she could feel the warmth of it on her face.

"Come on," she said, quietly. "Let's get outta here. This place is creepy."

He nodded silently, and reached down to take her hand. Together, they turned and began to take the long walk back to the car.

###

"I'm sorry I couldn't bring better news, Dean," Castiel said, back at the bunker.

"It's not your fault, Cass," Dean replied. He and Sam were busy looking up whom Cain might kill next.

Sam got off the phone with a sheriff in Illinois, who had corroborated Cass and Brooke's story by ID'ing some of the bodies in the mass grave.

"So, who's next?" Dean asked. "Is he done with the Tollivers?"

"I think so," Sam replied, looking at something on his laptop. He muttered on for a moment, and then stopped. "Oh, come on. Damn it."

Everyone looked up at that and came to stand over Sam's shoulder.

"What?" Cass asked.

"Tommy had a son, estranged. who lives with his mother in Ohio." He pulled up a birth certificate. "Austin Reynolds. Twelve years old."

"Is the kid still alive?" Dean asked.

Sam Google searched Austin and pulled up a Facebook profile, studying it for a moment. "As of an hour ago, yeah," he said. "He updated his status."

Dean walked away, to prepare to leave.

"Come on," said Sam, "it's a kid. I mean, you don't really think Cain would—

"Yes, he would," Castiel growled, standing up straight.

"There were old men in those graves, Sam," Dean explained. "Women. I mean, you heard Cass and Brooke. It's a fire sale. Everyone must go." He turned and walked away.

"Where you goin'?" Sam asked.

"We know where Cain's gonna be," Dean said, stopping.

Sam stared at him, not understanding.

Brooke rolled her eyes. "We're not gonna let Cain kill a kid." She thought of the teddy bear sitting on that tiny grave and closed her eyes. "Another one."

Castiel turned to her in surprise, apparently not on board, yet.

"Okay, so, what?" Sam asked. "We track him down to Ohio, and then what?"

Dean took a breath. "Then I'll do what I have to do… I'll kill Cain."

Alarm went through Castiel, and Sam stared at Dean like he'd gone insane.

Dean turned, ignoring their faces, and made his way to the sleeping quarters. Brooke followed first, finding it odd that, for once, she seemed to agree with Dean about something. She was doing this to save a child, and if Dean was on board, great.

Sam and Castiel trailed after them.

Brooke came to stand on one side of Dean's bed while he pulled guns off his wall and tossed them into a canvas bag. He glanced at her, nodding. She nodded back, crossing her arms over her chest, but they did not speak to each other.

Sam and Castiel came to stand in his doorway, staring at him incredulously.

"When he gave me the Mark," Dean explained, "Cain said that this day would come, that after I killed Abaddon, I would have to come and put him down." He tossed another gun into his bag.

"Great, so you're taking orders from a madman," Sam scoffed.

"No, he wasn't mad then," Dean argued. "Cain resisted the Mark for a long time, then I came kickin' up trouble about the Blade. I sent him down this path. This is on me."

Castiel said nothing, but Brooke could feel his disagreement with all this, his agitation.

"It doesn't mean that you have to be the one to go after him," Sam said.

"Yes, it does. And there's only one thing that can kill him." Dean checked the clip in another gun, then put it back in and dropped it into his bag.

"The Blade," Sam murmured.

Something in Castiel shifted, then, and he stepped into the room. "Dean's right," he said, and looked at Brooke, nodding a little.

Sam was not on board, yet. "Dean, wielding the Blade against Cain, himself… Win or lose, you may never come back from that fight."

Dean looked up, staring between the three of them. "I know."

###

It had only taken one phone call from Dean to get Crowley on board with handing over the First Blade. Dean had simply told the King of Hell that he was on Cain's kill list, and Crowley had agreed to it. Still, it seemed too easy. With Crowley, things were never so simple, so Brooke decided to keep her ears and eyes open, lest the King decide to double-cross them.

Now, they waited in the allotted place, outside a barn at night. Austin Reynolds was inside, alive.

"Kid here?" Dean asked, as Brooke and Castiel returned to him and Sam.

"He's nearby," Castiel replied. "Upstairs in the barn. He's playing with a basketball."

Dean nodded. "Cain will strike soon. Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow, but soon. And when he does…" He was talking to Sam, who was still not fully okay with any of this. Brooke couldn't exactly blame him. If Castiel were about to go off and put himself in harm's way with no guarantee that he'd come out of it alive—or with his marbles intact—she'd be worried, too. Of course, Cass often put himself in harm's way, with no guarantee of anything.

Castiel heard that thought, and pursed his lips, chagrined.

"Yeah, I got it," Sam said to Dean. "You charge in with the Blade, solo. And the kid? What, we just watch and wait until Cain attacks?" He looked at Brooke, then. "I thought this was a rescue mission."

"We save the kid after Cain shows," Dean snapped, before Brooke could respond.

Brooke felt a presence nearby, demonic, but recognized it as Crowley. She was about to tell them that he was here, but Cass spoke up first.

"We know what Cain's after," the angel explained to Sam. "That's our only advantage. We want to trap Cain? We use it."

Sam smiled mirthlessly, shaking his head. "A twelve-year-old as bait. I can't believe what I'm hearing."

"Neither can I," said Crowley, approaching from the dark.

"What's the matter, Crowley?" Dean asked. "You suddenly grow a conscience? Too good to put a minor in danger?"

"Don't give a damn about the kid," the demon replied. "I'm talking about the risk to us."

"There is no us," said Dean. "You're here for one reason. That's to hand me the Blade."

"Yeah, about that," Crowley replied.

Oh, God, what now? Brooke thought, rolling her eyes.

"Seeing as this is shaping up to be one of those, uh, two-step capture then kill kind of deals, I think your buddies would agree it's better to keep the Blade out of your hands until we've got Cain sewn up, just to be safe."

No one said anything, because no one could argue with that, considering what happened to Dean anytime he was anywhere near the Blade.

"Now," said Crowley, stepping closer. "About this plan of yours…"

###

Brooke and Castiel waited in the shadows outside the barn and watched as the kid, Austin—or a very convincing version of him—came out, carrying his basketball under one arm, earphones in his ears. Cain appeared a few seconds later, seemingly from nowhere—which was entirely possible, considering that he could, apparently, teleport. Brooke remembered the day before, at the mass grave, when he had disappeared before her eyes.

"Hello, Austin," Cain said.

"What are you doing here?" the kid asked, his body frozen in shock.

"I'm here to kill you," Cain replied, calmly, removing a knife from its sheath at his belt.

"No, you won't," Castiel growled, as he and Brooke stepped up beside Austin. The angel turned to the boy and said, "Run!"

Austin turned and ran back inside the barn. Sam was waiting at the door to usher him inside, and he and Dean would protect him in there.

"You can't stop me," Cain said, shaking his head.

Castiel raised his hand in the murderer's direction, eyes and palm glowing with angelic power as he attempted to knock him off his feet. A light wind ruffled Cain's hair, but that was all. As planned. Castiel looked convincingly concerned.

Cain sighed, bored, and knocked the angel blade from Castiel's hand with his mind.

Brooke took a step toward the man, and suddenly she and her husband were knocked off their feet, flying in opposite directions. Brooke went soaring through the air and slammed into the side of an old truck. No alarm went off as she hit it. She groaned as she fell to the ground, tasting blood in her mouth, but Castiel's Grace had protected her from any brain injuries or a broken neck. She groaned again as she got up, but she could walk fine, so that was good. Castiel was also rising to his feet, and they touched one another as they met in the middle, a brief reassurance that they were both all right.

Brooke could feel that even that small expenditure of Grace, pretending to try and knock Cain off his feet, had exhausted Castiel. She worried, but there was no time for it, then.

It did not take long for Cain to follow "Austin" into the barn and get stuck in a devil's trap. After that, everyone met back up: Dean, Sam, Crowley, Brooke, and Castiel. "You guys okay?" Sam asked as Cass and Brooke walked up.

"Fine," they replied, in tandem.

"It worked?" Cass asked.

"Yeah," Sam said.

Dean took a breath, glancing down for a moment. "My turn."

"Dean, look, we want to help," Sam told his brother.

"No. No, with you in the ring, it'd just be a liability."

"Dean," Cass began, but was cut off immediately.

"I'd be too worried about what he could do to you… or what I could."

Brooke pursed her lips, staring at her feet.

"Plus, I need you four out here to… take out whatever comes out of there." He tried to smile, but his eyes were red. "And I'm serious. I mean, whatever comes out."

"Happily," Crowley spoke up, though his voice was strangely quiet.

Still, Brooke gave him a dirty look, and so did the others.

Dean held out his hand to Crowley, for the Blade.

The demon held it out to him, but withheld it. "What guarantee do I have that you'll give it back when you're done?"

Dean stared at him. "If I survive and I come out of there and I don't give it back, you'll all have a much bigger problem on your hands."

There was a twinge in Castiel's heart at Dean's words, and Brooke felt it, and reached down to squeeze his hand.

Crowley held Dean's gaze for a moment, and then handed over the Blade.

Dean seemed to forget where he was for a moment as he gripped the Blade for the first time in months. He was lost to its power.

"Dean?" Sam asked, hesitantly.

Dean finally looked up, into his brother's eyes, and smiled. "I'm good," he said, nodding. Then, he turned and went up the stairs where they had trapped Cain.

…

Dean returned perhaps five minutes later, clomping heavily down the stairs on tired legs. He didn't look as beat up as Brooke might have expected, though his face was bloodied and bruised. Mostly, though, he just looked tired, and all the blood seemed to have drained out of him so that he looked deathly pale but for the bruises slowly forming on his face.

"Dean?" Sam asked.

He did not respond, only stood there, panting, and looking so… downtrodden.

"Dean," Crowley said, taking a step toward him. "The Blade." He held out his hand.

Dean looked down at the Blade in his hand, and Brooke saw that his knuckles were bloody. His hand shook. He stepped closer to Crowley, who actually looked mildly afraid of him, in that moment. He flipped the Blade around, as if to hand it hilt-first to Crowley, but his arm went right, instead, and he handed it to Castiel, who took hesitantly.

Crowley glared at Dean. "You lied to me."

Dean still looked so tired. "It's not the first time today," he replied.

Castiel came, slowly, to stand behind Dean, nearer him. Brooke, as always, stood right at her husband's shoulder, so close that the sleeve of his coat brushed her arm.

"Cain's list," Dean continued. "You weren't on it."

Crowley stared at Dean, strangely, as if he felt truly betrayed. It was odd—a demon being offended at betrayal… He vanished, suddenly.

Dean didn't seem to have any strength left, then. His wobbled on his feet, looking like he was about to cry, and Sam rushed forward and enveloped him in a hug. "Hey, hey, hey. You did it. Dean, you did it."

But Dean did not look happy about what he had done. He looked absolutely devastated.

###

It became Castiel's job to hide the Blade somewhere safe, where neither Crowley nor Dean could find it easily. What that meant was that he and Brooke spent the rest of the night driving around, looking for somewhere obscure and out of the way to bury it. Somewhere no one would notice, somewhere no one would stumble upon it accidentally, or think to look if they did go looking.

It had been a long day, and a long few weeks for Brooke, who had been wandering the continental U.S. with an angel who didn't need sleep, to torture demons for information on Cain. At some point in the drive, she fell asleep, and awoke when her husband touched her lightly on the shoulder. She stared at him, bleary-eyed.

"Stay here," he said, quietly. "I'm going to hide the Blade."

She nodded and watched as he got out of the car. He was gone long enough that when he returned, she was startled awake at the sound of the door opening. He did not start the car right away, but sat in the driver's seat for a while, staring out the windshield, looking strangely exhausted for a being who did not need to sleep.

Is it your stolen Grace? Brooke asked him.

Partly, he admitted. And partly… everything else. All this business with Dean and the Mark, tracking down Cain…

Brooke smiled, though there was no joy in it. Kinda makes you wish we'd stayed with Daphne… or that you'd stayed human?

He looked at her with tired eyes and said, "Yes."

And she was surprised by his response, despite knowing his heart and mind. She would have expected him to say something else, something about how they could never have stayed with Daphne forever, or that trouble would have followed them if they'd tried to live normal, human lives. She did not know what to do with such blunt truth. She reached across the console in the car and touched his face. He leaned into her touch, closing his eyes, placing one hand atop hers. Then he pulled her hand away from his face, kissing the back of it—kissing her wedding ring.

She recalled, with a stab of pain in her heart, that Castiel was going to die, sooner rather than later, with that stolen Grace ripping him apart. She looked past his vessel, at his true form, and saw that ugly, twisted face staring back at her. He looked away, ashamed, and she brought his face back to look at her, rubbing a thumb along his cheek, feeling the stubble beneath her skin. He smiled just a little.

Though she was exhausted, she pulled up on the lever under her seat and pulled her seat forward.

"What are you doing?" Castiel asked her.

She only smiled and got out of the car, getting back in, into the backseat, and kicked off her shoes.

Castiel was staring at her from the driver's seat, turned halfway around, wondering if she was about to sleep, perhaps.

Not sleeping, she said, and lifted her hips up off the seat, slowly shimmying out of her Jeans.

He blinked at her, and then smiled a little tiredly. He slid his own seat forward and got out, and back in, sitting beside her in the backseat.

Undressing was kind of a silly affair, but there was something romantic about needing to genuinely help each other out of their clothes, for lack of proper space. There was much fumbling and small bits of laughter in the dark. Always prepared, a condom was pulled from the pocket of Castiel's trench coat before it was balled up and thrown into the corner with the rest of the clothes. They went at a slow pace, too tired, too sad for anything high-energy. But it was what they needed in the moment, to remind themselves of what mattered, to remind themselves that, while Sam and Dean were family, at the end of the day, it was just the two of them, alone together. Husband and wife.

Afterwards, Castiel lay with his head pillowed on a ball of clothes, and Brooke lay atop him, with his trench coat pulled over the both of them. She relished the warmth of his body beneath her, and fell quickly asleep, listening to that steady drone of Enochian in his mind.

###

Brooke and Castiel were fresher in the morning, and headed back to the bunker to check in on Sam and Dean, and to get breakfast and a shower. However, almost from the moment they arrived, they could feel the tension in the air, coming from the brothers.

"So, where's the Blade?" Dean asked, when he saw them standing in the doorway to the kitchen.

"Somewhere safe," Castiel assured him, without telling him anything more than that.

"Good."

Brooke studied the older Winchester, noting the beginnings of small scabs in various places on his face, the bruise on left cheek. And he still looked white as a sheet.

"Well, if you guys will excuse me, I think I am gonna go sleep for about four days." And Dean stood up from the table.

Sam chuckled. "Of course."

Dean patted Cass on the shoulder as he passed him in the doorway, and did the same to Brooke. She gave him the best smile she could muster before he disappeared down the hallway, though she could tell that there was more than just exhaustion going on behind his eyes.

"How is he?" Castiel asked Sam, after Dean was out of earshot.

Sam did not say anything.

"Sam?"

"Cass… Brooke…" Sam took a breath. "Dean's in trouble."