Chapter 51.

Sam eventually went to check on Jack and Cas and Sarah were alone in the library. Cas felt uncomfortable, not knowing exactly what she knew or what she had held back because Sam was present.

There were things he should say, he knew; explanations he should give. He should give her messages for Jules, loving words, a better farewell than he had given her the day before when he made her cry. Nothing came to mind. Sam and Sarah said Jules didn't blame him, but how could she not? What he had done to her was unforgivable.

Unforgivable, like betraying Sam and Dean because he thought meddling with Purgatory was a bright idea. Unforgivable, like setting the Leviathans free on an unsuspecting world. Unforgivable, like taking God's place and murdering countless angels.

The worst, most terrible thing about the prospect of eternity in the Empty was not that it would be filled with regret and pain and loneliness, it was that he, more than any other creature consigned there, deserved it.

Meg didn't. Whatever her sins, they had never matched those that drove her to Hell in the first place - the sins inflicted on her in life. He didn't know the details. He didn't need to. He had seen the suffering around her, the pain she pretended not to feel. Nobody became a demon because their life was happy, because they felt good about themselves. Now, she was in the Empty, her sleep filled with nightmares, in which every bad thing she had ever done, every mistake she had ever made, would replay, an endless self-conviction in a kangaroo court in which the sentence was never to reach the end of proceedings. Meg would shrug and say she deserved it, but she didn't.

He looked at Sarah, who was watching him with a crinkled brow and loving concern. When he was gone, who would take care of her? He could have made a crystal for her too, but he doubted she would have accepted it and it might have been little use against the enemy most likely to hurt her ... time.

Since they met, he had been quietly negating its effects. After removing her cancer, he had reversed her arthritis and cleared her eyes of the cataracts that would eventually have made her blind. All the decay natural to old age in humans, he would bless away without a word. Her heart beat like a woman in her twenties, her lungs, liver, kidneys, all were constantly renewed and refreshed. If he went, she would begin aging again, beginning with the advantage of good health, but time would win in the end. She would end up a frail old lady, dying of something he could have prevented.

He had not thought of her, either, when he had made the deal.

"Where are you?" she said, "You seem so lost."

"What do you know?" he said.

"That you made some kind of deal for Jack and that it comes due when you find happiness."

"So, everything?"

"I hope so, because just that breaks my heart."

"I did it because ... "

"I know the because, Castiel. You did as you've always done. You took care of someone else by giving up yourself."

"I was destined for the Empty anyway." he said, "We all are: demons, angels, even, I think, some of the gods. All I really did was agree to go willingly and a little sooner."

"Is that where all the lost angels are? And Meg? At least, I suppose, you'll be together."

He hated having to disabuse her of that misunderstanding. "No. There is no together there. Everyone is locked forever inside their own head. The last time, before Jack awoke me, I didn't know there was anyone or anything else in there."

"Well, we must make sure we can get you back."

"Not possible. Even if Jack had his powers, reneging on the deal would put him in danger again. I've made my choice and it may be a bad one, but the one good thing about it is that Jack lives to fulfil his destiny and when he makes the world better, even if nobody knows it, I had a small part to play in that. And that, I think, is my destiny. That is why I exist."

"And that's enough for you?"

"For me, an ordinary, damaged, fallen, third-rate seraph, to be part of the reason for the reformation of creation, the salvation of this perfect, beautiful world and its perfect, beautiful people? It's beyond any aspirations or ambitions I ever had."

"And you get nothing?" she said, tears in her eyes.

"I saw you laugh, soon after we met and you told me you hadn't laughed in a long time. I kissed Jules, more than once and more than just kissing and she said she loved me. Jack came back to us. Sam and Dean have the prospect of a good future, a real life. They can have wives, children, maybe grandchildren. Just the thought of them being able to grab some tiny bit of peace and happiness for themselves, makes everything worthwhile."

She smiled, but a tear rolled down her cheek, then another. "So like you, to judge your life purely by what love you have for others."

"All of you have taught me love. Even in ... that place ... it cannot be taken from me. When the mistakes I made scream loudly in my head, I will at least be able to shout back, 'Dean Winchester is alive and free!'"

"You made fewer mistakes than you think." she said.

"Trust me, I remember them all. The difference between this place and that is that here, there are distractions from them."

"Jules is determined to fight for you."

"Let her think that way if it helps her, because having a purpose is important if she is to stay here. Then, when you judge that she is ready to move on, gently lead her away from such thoughts."

"And leave you to suffer?"

"I've been there before. I've experienced it all. I didn't suffer too much. Angels, as I've said before, will never feel things as deeply as humans. Now, humans, they can suffer. That's why you must do whatever you can to make things easier for Jules."

"And in the process, give myself a purpose?" she said.

He brushed the tears from her cheek. "I had hoped I was more subtle." he said.

"You forget how many times we talked late into the night. I know you as well as anyone can ever know a celestial being. Maybe Dean or Sam or Jules knows you better, maybe not, but I know you're trying to help everyone but yourself. You always do."

"There are worse endings than this one, believe me. Most angels go there without ever having lived. My life, at least in recent years, has been a full one."

"Which only gives you more to lose."

"More to give. More to offer in sacrifice. If I'd had nothing to lose, the deal would not have been worth making. It wanted to take something from me and it can, because I had something worth having."