Dean Winchester seemed determined to die, that was the only explanation Elo could think of as she frowned over the medical report in her lap. The boys had left the hospital a few hours ago. She'd waited for them to leave before going in herself, pretending to be in search of her father who had just undergone a cardiac bypass. She had to give the story to three different nurses, on three different floors, before she spotted the name Winchester scrawled across a white folder, which she'd slipped into her big, denim purse while the nurse at reception searched for a patient that didn't exist.
Elo was no doctor. She had never even been to a real school, but she'd spent a lot of time in libraries as a kid, reading to forget. No one ever looked for her there. Everywhere she went, she found the library, a place to escape. Doctor or not, she could see plain enough that Dean's EKG was not good. He'd had a massive heart attack. The doctor had scribbled 'electrocution' in the corner. Maybe a rawhead, thought Elo, closing her eyes. It was a warm, sunny day for Autumn. The breeze stirred her thick, dark hair, but otherwise she was perfectly still on the park bench. That would explain the missing children and the electric shock. She wished she'd been able to work the Winchester's last case, but it took most of her focus to look after the pair of them. She couldn't even do that very well.
Elo snapped the folder closed. She opened her eyes and checked her phone for the boys' location. They were still at the motel, good. Now she just had to think of a way to save Dean Winchester for a second time, from heart failure, without him knowing. Piece of cake. For a brief moment, she thought about calling up Luther, because the only way she knew to bring someone back from organ failure was to turn them into a vampire, but she didn't think Azazeal would accept undead for alive. Not to mention, calling Luther would just bring on more problems, another monster to breathe down her neck. Elo took a chill despite the bright sun. No, definitely not Luther.
But there was someone else, maybe, who could save Dean Winchester. The idea came to her like a lightning bolt. Elo leapt up from the bench and hurried the ten blocks to the motel where the brothers were staying. Using her knee to bear down on, she scribbled a name, Roy Legrange, across Dean's EKG. One of Azazeal's groupies had told her about a faith healer in Nevada performing miracles of God. "Only it ain't god," the demon had told her, cackling. "The preacher somehow managed to leash himself a reaper. Every time he does one of his miracles, someone somewhere else drops dead on the spot."
Elo hesitated a moment, looking at the name of the faith healer. It was a long shot. She couldn't be certain the brothers would take the bait. Sam will, she told herself, he'll be desperate to save his brother. She would do the same if she had any family. If she had a brother, a mother, a father, then she would never let them go, no matter the cost. Taking a deep breath, her mind made up, she darted across the parking lot to the Winchester's room. She slipped the EKG under the door, just enough that it wouldn't be caught by the wind, and then she was back across the parking lot, all in less than a minute.
Maybe an hour later, Sam opened the door. He noticed the paper at his feet immediately, picked it up, and then looked out across the parking lot. Elo was gone, safe in her own room, staring hard at her phone. Another hour dragged by and then she heard an engine roar. She parted the curtains just a crack and saw the Impala whipping away. She went back to watching her phone as darkness fell, until she was certain that the boys were heading west, to Nevada.
As she climbed into her new car, a rusted ford with a rattling exhaust, Elo didn't feel proud of herself for leading Dean Winchester to salvation. Twice now she had stolen him from death, only this time someone else would pay the price. He won't like it, she thought, I don't like it. Killing never got easier, especially killing for someone she didn't particularly care about saving.
A month passed and autumn began to fade. The cold didn't bother Elo. Her skin was always cool to the touch, whether it was a hundred degrees or whether it was below freezing. The longer she watched the brothers, the more she grew to hate them. At first, she hadn't felt much about them at all, other than mild shock and curiosity, having never known they existed. She had known their father's name for as long as she could remember, but not the boys. Now, day by day, she learned more about them, who they were, and it made her sick how they played at being heroes. Like every other hunter she'd had the misfortune of meeting, the brothers were arrogant, trigger happy, convinced of their own righteousness.
Loathe as she was to admit it, however, they were good at what they did. Pest control, Elo remembered, almost smiling. From Nebraska to Missouri, from Michigan to Minnesota, the Winchester boys hunted some big game. They'd even found one of Azazeal's special children in Saginaw, a man the same age as Sam, named Max Miller. He was on Elo's list, courtesy of a loose lipped demon, but she wondered how the boys had found him. She wished, too, that she'd had a chance to talk to Max Miller before he blew his own brains out.
Azazeal hadn't checked in for an update since then and Elo hadn't bothered finding him, though he'd want to know about Max Miller. Then again, the demon probably already did know, just like he probably knew that the boys were starting to catch onto the pattern. So why the hell does he need me? Elo was at a loss. She didn't see the point of following the brothers across the country, not when Azazeal had a thousand black eyes at his disposal, and she still didn't understand why Dean mattered at all. Leverage, she thought, always drawing a blank.
The brothers were still in Minnesota when yellow eyes finally got in touch, sending one of his groupies to pass along a summons to Chicago, the very place where he had found her. Elo considered heading east instead, maybe hopping on a boat to another country, keep running. She was sick to death of being the yellow eyed bastard's private detective, but then she remembered his promise. I can give you what you want most in the world. John Winchester. Elo caught a red eye flight to the windy city. Meg was waiting for her when she landed.
"You look like shit," said Meg, eyeing her head to foot. "You should have fed before coming. You'll have to wait now. We have work to do."
Elo didn't say a word. She needed to sleep more than she needed to feed. Besides, her dietary choices were none of Meg's damn business. If there was a demon who she detested more than yellow eyes, then it was his pet henchman. She was more arrogant than even the worst of hunters, believing that she was Azazeal's only confidant, the only one he truly trusted, when really she was nothing but a maggot under her master's boot. Elo couldn't help wondering what that made herself.
She didn't know if Meg tried talking to her on the drive, because she had learned long ago how to close her ears to the noise around her. She knew how to be alone in a crowd of thousands, how to disappear in plain sight, how to stop existing. It was a hibernation of sorts, a miniature death, and preferable to anything Meg had to say. Elo came to again when Meg parked on the curb outside of a high rise apartment building.
"What are we doing here?" said Elo.
Meg's eyes were closed. "You aren't doing anything yet," she said. "Look at the fifth floor, third window from the right, and watch."
Reluctantly, Elo looked where she was told. The curtains were open and a warm glow spilled out into the night. She could see clear into the apartment, to a dark-haired woman tossing her purse onto the couch and kicking off her heels. As Elo watched the woman settle in, Meg began to chant, words in an ancient tongue, her voice growing louder and stronger, while a feeling of bubbling hot dread pooled in Elo's stomach. She couldn't take her eyes off the window, the woman, the shadow rising up behind her, a shadow with claws that slashed at the woman's back. Blood spattered the wall and still Elo couldn't look away as the woman was ripped apart. She didn't realize when Meg stopped chanting, not until the shadow creature had finished its bloody business.
Elo felt Meg smiling at her and she arranged her face into a blank mask. Don't react, she told herself, don't show weakness. "A daẽva," she said, fighting down the tremor in her throat, the urge to scream. "Seems like you could have killed the girl yourself."
"I've been feeling voyeuristic lately," said Meg, nonchalant. "And I thought I'd give our boys a bit of a treat. They like a challenge."
Elo felt sick. She swallowed her bile. "The girl was bait," she said. There was no need for Meg to confirm. The girl had died for no reason, another casualty connected to the Winchesters, and she asked herself how many people would still be alive if all of them had died in that cursed fire more than twenty years ago. Her mother for starters and the dark haired girl whose heart had just been torn from her body by a demonic shadow.
"You're setting a trap for them," said Elo.
"Look at you, Sherlock Holmes," said Meg, almost approvingly. "Maybe you're not as stupid as I thought."
Too bad I can't say the same for you, thought Elo. The brothers were arrogant, often barreling headfirst into trouble with some half-cocked plan, so there was no doubt in her mind that they would take the bait. But the boys were lucky, too, and clever enough.
"Azazeal thinks it's time you introduced yourself," said Meg.
"What for?" said Elo, scowling. It was dull to watch them from afar, but that didn't mean she wanted to get any closer.
"To help them kill me," said Meg.
Elo was only given one step of the plan at a time. "It's almost like you don't trust me," she had said to Meg. Her part was simple enough. All she had to do was feed Dean a little information. Gaining his trust would not be easy. The only way was to play a long game. Leave him a trail of breadcrumbs and let him do the rest. A week after she arrived in Chicago, the brothers rolled into the city, taking the bait. They had already been to Meredith's apartment. They had bumped into Meg at a bar, as planned, and now Elo's moment presented itself. Sam was tailing Meg, again as planned, while Dean stayed at the motel. It was almost too easy. She was somewhat disappointed in them.
Elo took a deep breath and rapped twice on the door to room eleven. She counted the seconds- 127 - almost a minute and a half, enough time to check that his pistol was loaded and look through the peephole. Sure enough, when the door swung open, he didn't look surprised to see her.
"Get in," he said gruffly, pulling her through the door and slamming it behind him. He stood between her and the exit, his arms crossed, brows drawn. "I found your tracker," he said. "I knew you'd be here." Cute, thought Elo, he thinks he laid a trap for me. Dean's hand hovered over the pistol at his belt. "Tell me who you are. Tell me why you're following us."
"Or what?" said Elo. "You'll shoot me? In broad daylight? These walls aren't too thick. Someone's bound to report a gunshot." She slumped into the only chair in the room. It was still warm. Papers scattered the table, but her eyes immediately lit on the worn leather journal spread open. Before she could make out a single word of the jumbled scrawl, Dean snatched up the journal. She looked at the other papers and picked up an obituary clipping. Meredith stared back at her in black and white.
"Have you figured it out yet?" said Elo, turning the picture over.
"Figured out what?" said Dean.
"What killed Meredith and that other guy, obviously," she said, rolling her eyes. "It wasn't me if that's what you're thinking. You can do all the tests- silver, holy water, the whole nine yards- but it'll be a waste of time."
Dean studied her for a long time. "How old are you?" he finally said.
"Eighteen."
"You left that note back in Indiana, didn't you? About the faith healer."
Elo nodded. "You could say thanks,"she said.
Dean's hand dropped from his pistol. "I haven't killed you. That's thanks enough. How long have you been following us?"
Elo groaned internally. She had hoped they could skip the whole backstory part of getting to know each other, it was so tedious, but she had come prepared all the same. "A few months," she admitted. "My name's Eloise Bishop. Everyone calls me Elo. I'm a hunter, same as you, and I think we might be after the same demon."
A faint flicker of surprise darted across Dean's eyes. She had him right where she wanted him now. "I found a news clipping about the fire that killed your mom. Your brother, Sam, was exactly six months old. I'd seen that before, exact same set-up, with a guy named Max Miller. That's who I went looking for first, only you guys beat me there."
"And you realized we were hunters," said Dean.
"Yeah," said Elo. Too easy. Already Dean had relaxed his guard, not entirely, but enough for her to wiggle through. Like so many others before, he mistook her youth for innocence.
"What's the demon to you?" said Dean. Elo hesitated. The trick to a good lie was keeping it as close as possible to the truth. If she wanted Dean to trust her, then she had to give him something personal, something hard.
"My mom was killed when I was thirteen," she said. She didn't shed a tear, that would be too cheap, but her voice resonated with grief. "I saw the man that did it, a man with yellow eyes, but no one believed me. They shunted me off from one foster family to another, until I finally ran away. I found some hunters, the first people who actually believed me. It was a demon that killed my mom. The same one that killed yours." She looked him dead in the eyes, holding his gaze, watching as the last of his defenses melted away.
It was true that her mother had been murdered when she was thirteen, but the doing hadn't been Azazeal's. She hadn't known old yellow eyes until a few months ago. It was true, too, that she was on the hunt for her mother's killer. She was closer than she had ever been and Dean could see the zeal of revenge in her eyes.
"What took you so long to stop lurking?" he said. He stepped away from the door and sat at the foot of the bed.
"I work alone," said Elo. "Always have. Other people just get in the way."
"Fair enough," said Dean. He opened up the old leather journal. She didn't dare risk trying to take another peek, not wanting to raise his suspicions as soon as they'd been lowered. "I don't know what killed those two people," he said. "No one I've talked to knows either."
He didn't ask if she knew. Figures. Hunters were always underestimating her. They saw a little girl, nothing much else. She picked up a napkin with a crudely drawn symbol and held it up to Dean. "It's Zoroastrian," she said. "Represents a Demon of Darkness, a daẽva. They're nasty sons-of-bitches, feral. Whoever summoned this one is either extremely powerful or extremely stupid. Daẽva tend to bite the hand the feeds."
For the first time, Dean looked truly shocked. After a few moments, he laughed. Elo couldn't help but smile. Usually when she proved herself to be more than an ignorant child, men got all sore about it, offended at being shown up by a little girl. Dean's reaction was refreshing.
"Well, I'll be damned," he said, smiling at her now. "You're full of surprises, aren't you?"
You have no idea, thought Elo, hopefully you never will. "There's one more thing," she said. "Look at where the victims were born." She stood, moving to the door, and she smiled when Dean called after her.
"Are you gonna help us or just watch from the bleachers?"
Elo glanced back at him over her shoulder. Gotcha. "Better if I sit this one out," she said. "Daẽva are major league. This way, if you two get yourself killed, someone will still be on the hunt for that demon bastard." She left him to chew on that.
Not in any rush to return to Meg's derelict apartment, Elo decided to walk, just wandering, taking in the sights and smells of Chicago to celebrate her victory. She was that special kind of hungry again and there were so many hot-blooded people. Cities always had the best food. It had been months since she last fed, not daring to risk it in such close proximity to the brothers, but they had a full plate at the moment. They would never notice if she had a small snack.
Elo latched onto a gutter punk girl, maybe sixteen, with dirty blonde dreads and a torn backpack. The kind of girl who'd run away, a girl no one cared about, the girl I used to be. She followed the girl for about a mile, weaving through the crowd, just far enough behind, until the girl began to cut across a large, sprawling cemetery in the middle of the city. Elo waited until they were deep in the sea of graves, the traffic sounds a dim murmur on either side of the forested island of the dead. Purple dusk settled over the tombstones. No one would be coming to visit and leave flowers this late at night.
The dread-locked girl whipped around suddenly. "Who's there?" she snapped. "Why are you following me?"
Elo stepped out of the shadow of an angel monument. She didn't like when they caught her, talked to her. It was better to leap on them from behind and bite before they knew what was happening. She moved closer to the girl, locking eyes with her, creating a web between them. "Don't be afraid," she said. "I won't hurt you."
The girl looked back at her blankly. She didn't even blink as Elo stepped forward, closer, the sound of blood rushing in her ears. The hunger was so strong, overpowering her, no matter that she was always sick afterwards. Stop me, a tiny voice in the back of her mind whispered as she gently tipped the girl's head to the side. Please stop. Her lips touched the girl's salty skin for just a moment before she was thrown violently to the ground.
"Run," a man barked. The dread-locked girl shook her head, the web broken, and fled. Smart girl, thought Elo, on her back in the dirt, run and don't ask questions. As her dinner vanished behind a mausoleum, she looked up at the man who'd so rudely interrupted her. The blood in her veins turned to ice. The sight of him was enough to drive the hunger away. For a moment, she thought the dark must be playing tricks with her, but no, it was him, towering over her, a machete in his hand.
"Hi dad," she finally said when he made no move to kill her.
"You shouldn't be here," said John Winchester.