Chapter 4

Ovington. Who else? With one of the ancient swords from his wall grasped in one hand. Who would have guessed he keeps them sharp? Standing beside his wife's tombstone, his face trembling with emotion, but his hand steady. The blade, cold against Dean's neck. Now what?

'Get away from her!' the distraught man commanded, as though they could really hurt the woman any further.

'Mr Ovington…' Sam began. Inwardly, Dean groaned. Sam was using his reasonable voice. The one that always drove people crazy. 'Please, calm down. We have to do this. The spirit… isn't like your wife when she was alive. You can't reason with her.'

'Get back!' he yelled, his hand shaking very slightly, causing a bead of blood to trickle onto the bright blade. Tiny, only a pinprick. But it made it very clear that Ovington was in control, and Sam froze.

Trying very hard not to move, Dean tried to talk sense into the man. But Ovington's was not the face of a man who is ready to listen to sense. 'Alright, listen. I know you miss your wife, but while she's haunting your house, you're in danger. Tallie's in danger.' He hoped the sound of his daughter's name would get through to him.

'Tallie… she's the reason why my wife's dead,' the other man sobbed, not really addressing the Winchesters, but talking to himself. 'But Ellen is still here, she's still with me. I can make peace with her… as long as she's not gone... I can't have killed her. I can't have, if she's still here… it's you who wants to take her away!' he added, suddenly looking up at Sam, passion lending strength to his voice. 'You want to kill her, and I won't let you!'

Dean turned, carefully, the blade leaving a shallow cut on the side of his neck as he moved. 'Mr Ovington, your wife is dead. Look, there, that's her body!' He regretted the outburst when the point dug deeper into his skin, and a thin red path shot down onto his chest, soaking into the collar of his shirt. Reason doesn't work with crazy people, especially ones with swords.

Sam stepped back from the grave's edge, raising both hands as though somebody were holding a gun to his head, not threatening his brother with a sword. It was more or less the same thing, as far as Sam was concerned. 'Please,' he implored, 'we'll leave your wife, that's fine. We'll leave. Let him go.'

'Wait,' Dean objected. Sam glared at his brother. What? Do as he says, he's got a sword. This is not the time for heroics. 'Wait – what about Tallie? She's on her own in that house with the ghost – with your wife. I know you don't think she's a danger… but, just to be sure, ok? We'll check on her, you and I; Sam can stay here. And then we'll leave, you'll never see us again. Ok?'

Sam made a wordless sound, as if he wanted to protest too urgently to wait and form sentences. Ovington looked at Dean, and nodded. His expression was more that of a frightened animal than anything else, as if all the events had become too much for him.

'Ok… You stay here… tidy that up, fill it back in,' he instructed Sam. 'If you hurt her… I'll kill him.' He voiced the threat in a voice filled with doubt, as though uncertain that he could kill. Well, kill again, Sam reminded himself, recalling Ovington's garbled confession. He glared at Dean as he and Ovington began to walk away. This is one of your worst plans ever… he thought.

Dean glanced back over his shoulder, his eyes wide and urgent, as though he was trying to convey a message using them alone. The fingers of one hand relaxed, and something dropped onto the damp grass, unnoticed by Ovington as he continued to walk away. Sam picked it up: the lighter. The message was clear: Dean wanted him to torch the bitch anyway.

Left alone, he considered his options. He could follow them. But as soon as Ovington caught a glimpse of him, he could cut Dean's throat with a flick of the wrist. No good. He could do as he was told, fill in the grave and wait. But Ovington wasn't the only danger in the equation: he and Dean were going back to the house, and if Ellen Ovington's ghost was still as active and violent as she had been the previous night, she could easily attack them both and Tallie as well. He needed to dispose of the ghost. But he couldn't do so before the others reached the house, or Ovington would lash out when he couldn't sense her presence.

As Sam saw it, his only hope was to wait long enough for them to reach the house, and hope that in the confusion Dean would be able to move away from Ovington's blade. Then torch the bitch. Sam didn't like this plan much more than he had liked the last one. It was too vague, depended too much on luck, and he would have to guess the timing exactly right, then hurry to the house and see if he had been correct, wondering all the way how many bodies he would find when he arrived.

In the distance, he could still see Dean and Ovington's retreating backs. He squinted at them to estimate the speed they were walking at, and tried to calculate how long it would take them to reach the house. And hoped for a miracle.

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Dean walked stiffly; very conscious of the sharp point hovering in front of him, no longer pressed against his skin now that they were moving, but still close enough to make him uncomfortable. He wasn't particularly happy with this plan, but he hadn't been able to think of anything better on the spur of the moment, and he hoped that the dropped lighter would convey the message to Sammy.

Ovington's breathing was heavy and wheezy beside him. Suddenly, he stopped walking at the side of the road, and searched through his pockets, then sighed, and stopped. 'Do you have a cell phone?' he asked Dean, with such a polite manner that it seemed ridiculous, under the circumstances.

Confused, Dean held out his phone for Ovington to take. Ovington dialled quickly, a very short number, maybe only three digits… damn…

'Police, please. Yes... I want to report… well, there was this guy, in West cemetery. Digging… I mean… I think maybe he was trying to steal from the graves…'

The muffled voice on the line said 'thank you', and Ovington hung up, handing the phone back to Dean.

Damn it, Dean thought. The guy may be unstable, but he's nobody's fool.

It wasn't that far back to the house; the town wasn't particularly large. The house stood out on the horizon, grey and imposing; almost wherever you were in the town, you could see it. It stood out more than usual tonight, because some of the lights were flickering. Dean was frustrated by the slow pace Ovington set, but eventually they reached the wide front steps. It was starting to rain, and Ovington kept the blade perilously close to Dean's neck.

Ovington pushed hard on the door, but it didn't budge.

'You got a key?'

'Yes…' He produced the key, turned it in the lock, pushed again. Still, it didn't move. 'What the…? She doesn't want us getting in?'

'She doesn't want Tallie getting out,' Dean replied grimly, and he saw real fear in the man's eyes. Despite the irrational actions motivated by his grief, Ovington still loved his daughter. The sword was hanging down by his side, forgotten, for the moment. 'Back door?' Dean suggested.

Even though it was his own house, Ovington hesitated, thinking, before he nodded. People like him didn't use back doors. He jogged around the side of the house, through part of a formal garden and into a plain yard. The door opened easily. Dean guessed that Ellen, like her husband, had never ventured much into the mundane areas at the back of the house.

The corridors were dark and empty, their frantic footsteps echoing loudly as they hurried inside.

'Tallie?' Dean called, instinctively heading upstairs, intending to check her bedroom, remembering that she had used it as a refuge before, hiding under her bed.

'Here!' cried a small voice to his left and he spun round to see a pair of huge eyes watching him through a door which was open only a crack.

Dean slipped into the room and knelt on the floor in front of her. 'Tallie, is she here?'

'Yes… I think… I heard her outside, but she won't come in here. It was Mommy's room.' She said it as though it explained everything, and when Dean thought about it, she was probably right. Ellen Ovington had probably been reluctant to spend time in a room belonging to her husband's much loved former wife.

'It's gonna be ok,' he told her, and he was surprised to hear how convincing he sounded.

'Dean…' she whispered, leaning towards him as though about to entrust him with a secret. 'Is it all my fault?'

'What? No…'

'I prayed…' she muttered, her little voice so soft now that he could barely make out the words. 'I prayed that God would make her die… I just wanted her to go away, and stop hurting me… I prayed that she would die. But then,' she added, a squeak entering her voice which warned that she was almost in tears. 'Then Mrs King… and all this… it's my fault…'

'Tallie... Tallie, look at me. This is not your fault.'

'Daddy would never have killed her if it wasn't for me.'

Dean blinked. 'What happened?' he asked softly.

'She hurt me. All the time, and Daddy didn't know. Then he came home and she was hurting me… and he was mad… he ran up, and he pushed her. I don't think he meant for her to fall,' she concluded, her eyes wide open and earnest, shining with unshed tears. 'I was so happy, though, when I saw her fall… I know it's wrong, but…'

Lost for words, Dean hugged her tight, hoping that he could reassure her without saying anything. She sobbed unreserved into his shoulder.

Somewhere else, a loud noise disturbed the peace of the house, and Dean looked up, suddenly realising that he had forgotten about Ovington. Damn…

'Tallie, stay here, ok? Whatever happens, you should be safe here,' he promised, hoping that he wouldn't be proven wrong.

'Where are you going?'

'I need to find your dad. She'll be gone soon, but until she's gone, I need to protect him.'

She nodded. 'Ok.'

Dean left the room, hurrying along the dim corridor towards the front of the house, and thinking, Hurry up, Sam.

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Sam made the walk, mentally, from the cemetery to Ovington's house. This many steps to the corner of the road, then that many minutes from there to the driveway… They must be nearly there by now. He had his eyes closed, deep in concentration. But he heard the sirens.

For several moments he stood as still as he could, hoping and praying that they were just passing through. But they stopped, and within a minute there were two cops prowling the cemetery, waving flashlights around to illuminate the dark area. Sam ducked behind Ellen Ovington's gravestone, crouching down on the grass.

It started to rain, slowly at first, then harder, in heavy drops which were cold when they landed on Sam's skin. He tried to think quickly as the flashlights came closer. He could set her alight now, and then run off before the cops could see him. But according to his estimation, Dean and Ovington would be arriving at the house about now, and he would prefer to wait a bit, to give Dean more chance to get away. But if he waited, he couldn't stay here.

Cursing his luck, Sam took off at a run, with his legs bent, ducking down to avoid the glare of the two wandering flashlights. Some twenty yards away from Ellen's grave, he found a bigger gravestone to hide behind, and sat down in its shadow to wait for them to leave. Between the now torrential rain and the damp grass, he was quickly soaked to the skin. The voices of the two cops carried easily across the graveyard, even in such a downpour, and Sam sat tensed, trying not to breathe too loud.

'I'll be damned… this one's all dug up…'

'Ellen Ovington… Jesus, it's that woman from the big house. You remember? Fell down the stairs, maybe ten days ago.'

'Really? Oh, yeah… now you mention it, I think I remember…'

Oh, come on, Sam thought incredulously. Do you really want to stand here in the rain and discuss it? He looked at his watch. 13 minutes since they had left. It took maybe ten to walk to the house, so about now would be a good time to light her up. If only he could get to the damn grave. Hold on, Dean…

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Up ahead, silhouetted against the great void that was the hall, Ovington was standing in the corridor, walking towards the balcony. Crying out to the dim space as though carrying on a conversation with somebody who was floating out in the space before him.

'Ellen, listen to me,' he called, still walking forwards. Two steps and he'd be on the balcony. 'I'm sorry Ellen, so sorry. I just… I didn't know it was you, please forgive me, Ellen. Just don't hurt my daughter… I love you both; we can all be a family together.'

Dean sprinted up the corridor as Ovington stepped out onto the balcony. The distraught man cried out as some invisible force pushed him violently on, towards the edge, lifting him up…

Dean caught him around the knees and tackled him to the floor sideways, realising his mistake when the ground wasn't where it was supposed to be. Instead, the two men hit the stairs, hard, and rolled on, down the curving staircase to the hall floor. The corner of each step dug painfully into Dean's ribs, and he gave up trying to stop his descent, instead allowing his body to go limp, and bringing his arms up to protect his head. The hard flat floor came up rapidly to meet him, and when he finally reached it, it knocked the last of the air from his lungs.

After a few seconds, Dean pushed himself up slowly and painfully, groaning when every bruised muscle protested. Nearby, Ovington was stirring, too, rubbing his chest. Dean noticed that the sword had finally been knocked out of his hand, and was lying a few feet away from him on the floor. Unfortunately, Ovington noticed it, too, and he snatched it before Dean could manage to organise his abused limbs enough to move.

With a loud thunk a glinting knife arrived from nowhere and sunk deeply into the wooden panelling beside Ovington's head. Dean looked around to where it had come from, just in time to duck another matching knife which had hurled itself across the room. Above them, a heavy shield bearing a colourful pattern of diamonds detached itself from the wall, and raised itself up above Ovington's head. Dean seized his wrist and yanked him away as the ancient metal crashed onto the floor.

Dean glanced around the room, waiting for Ellen's next attack, realising that she had no shortage of ammunition: the walls were glistening with old weapons and armour, and it was only a matter of time before something hit them.

Staggering to his feet, Dean looked around for somewhere to take cover, but they were as far from an exit as possible in the room, unless they risked climbing the stairs, which seemed suicidal. He ducked a flying battleaxe, clinging onto the handrail at the bottom of the stairs as his head swam alarmingly.

Please, hurry up, Sam!

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Sam was getting twitchy, every passing moment making him more worried. The two cops had moved on from discussing Mrs Ovington, and were now debating the best course of action over the open grave.

'Seems a bit disrespectful to just leave her there like that, though…'

'Yeah… you think we should fill it back in?'

No, thought Sam, leave it, come on, it's raining; you can do it in the morning.

'We could leave it for the morning… I mean, I don't want to dig in the rain.'

Yes! That's right, now go home.

'You reckon the guy that dug it up's gone?'

Sam couldn't hear the mumbled reply, but he breathed a sigh of relief when the duo stepped away from the grave. They started walking, waving their flashlights again. Directly towards Sam.

Shit! Sam scrambled to his feet, bent at the waist to retain the cover offered by the tombstone. If he ran to either side, he would have to cross the beam of a flashlight, and would be clearly visible to both cops. The only way he could go was forward, away from the cops. And away from the open grave.

Still running awkwardly bent, he moved away, holding his hands out in front of him like a blind man to avoid colliding with any headstones. When he was out of range of the twin lights, he changed direction, following the wall of the cemetery and circling back round towards Ellen Ovington's grave. He had to stop a couple of times to avoid the glare of the flashlights. Once he had to throw himself full length on the wet grass to avoid detection; another time he ducked behind a conveniently placed stone angel.

When he came close to Ellen's grave again, he moved stealthily, from stone to stone, fishing the lighter out of a pocket as he approached. Praying that he had used enough lighter fuel that she would still burn even in such wet weather, Sam flicked the lighter open, producing a small flame which was nevertheless bright in the darkness. He tried to shield it with his hand, feeling very exposed as he walked the last few steps to the grave's edge, followed by the circling flashlight.

He dropped it, and held his breath for a few seconds as it fell. Then finally, it caught, and flames spread out around Ellen Ovington's slack grey face and cold broken body.

Sam sighed. Loudly. Suddenly he stood in a beam of bright light, and the air was full of loud harsh shouts. He sprinted off, out of the graveyard and on towards the house.

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Thank you very much to everyone who has reviewed. I'm sorry that I didn't get back to you all individually, but I really enjoyed everybody's theories! I was worried that I might give something away if I replied! ;)

I'll be as quick as I can with the next (probably last) chapter. Reviews would help me to work quicker… ;)