prompt

Sam has grown up in a very religious environment. He's devoted, he goes to church, he prays. He knows that God is with him, because he listens to his prayers. But as Sam grows older, he realizes it's not God that's been listening. And he realizes that he's not asking - he's been ordering, and his loyal servants would never deny their King.

A/N: The name "Proserpine" and the fact that it's Ruby's true name is taken from a very dark Wincest fic named Threefold Path to Redemption on AO3. It's another name for Persephone and I thought that it fit really well with Ruby.

***warning: anti-Christian-ish?***

Sam had never been comfortable holding rosary beads. His hands always seemed to sting after and the wood seemed to bite into his skin even though it was sanded perfectly smooth.

It happened with his crucifix necklace, too. The silver seemed to burn against his neck, the crucifix's fire seeming to make its way down his body from where it lay in the hollow of his throat.

Praying was different. Even as his skin seemed to be too small for him and he was painfully aware of every line of holy silver or wood against it, prayer didn't do that. Not usually, at least. The words only tasted like ash when he said something specifically religious, such as God or Heaven. Other times, the words seemed to ring around him, echoing silently around the church and making Sam feel like someone was actually listening.

Sam was devoted. He went to church every day and prayed as he should, yet he couldn't recite the Lord's Prayer. He knew he should be able to, but he stumbled over the phrases and the words felt like glass cutting his throat. He recited it anyway, because if God didn't want him then he'd fight for his own redemption.

He'd asked why several times. Why did it hurt, why did he seem to be the only one who had this, why did he feel better saying the words Satan and evil and demon than he did saying any religious name. He never got an answer - those were the prayers that whoever was listening (God was listening, Sam told himself) wouldn't answer.

Until now.

He had prayed and asked why and now he was standing in a pew looking at a woman with dark hair and darker eyes, smirking at him. She stood casually, hands in her jean pockets and looking like she knew something he didn't. Which, she probably did, Sam thought.

"Who are you?" Sam asked, because she'd appeared out of nowhere and there was no requirement for formalities. His mind told him demon in a hissing whisper, and he felt something stirring in him because of her presence, but she hadn't said anything so logically he shouldn't know who she was already. Not as certainly as he did, anyway, not like the coiling, smirking, confident thing shifting in his mind and the way his body straightened, certain of his position over her. Which made no sense, the logical part of Sam's mind told him, yet that part was quickly losing.

She smiled. "I thought you'd already know that, Sam," she said, and Sam again got the feeling that she knew something very important that he didn't and it was bothering him. The new thing inside him hissed at him to demand it from her, to take what he wanted because she was less than him and he had the power here -

He ignored the whispers because they made no sense, he told himself, and the whispers laughed, saying that he knew they made perfect sense and he just didn't want to accept it, he knew exactly what he was and he was being stubborn. He ignored that too, fighting desperately against this thing rising inside him, coiling and striking against the suffocation of the church's holy air and Sam's walls of devoted religious belief that were slowly crumbling.

Sam felt like he couldn't breathe. The church air usually felt too hot, too humid, but this was worse. It was choking off his words, and Sam had to take a deep breath even though it felt like glass down his throat. "I don't… I have no idea who you are," he said, and he felt the lie in his words though he had really never met this woman before.

She smiled. "I'm Ruby," she replied, and the thing in Sam rebelled at this - she was lying, trying to deceive him and that he should punish her for that. He ignored it, only paid attention to the lies part and the soft whisper in his mind that said Proserpine.

"No it's not," he said. She raised one eyebrow, mildly surprised yet Sam still felt like she knew something he didn't.

"Okay, then what is it?" she asked, in the way that someone would ask a child a question knowing that they didn't know the correct answer. The thing inside Sam hissed with irritation at this - insubordination, it supplied, but Sam forced it down and called it ignorance. He tried to ignore how the whispers laughed again, saying that they were one and the same and Sam was too soft to do what he knew he had to.

"You're going by your vessel's name, Ruby, but your true name is Proserpine," he said, and the name echoed around the church, curling tendrils of darkness contained in the holiness of the church's walls. Sam tried to ignore how his skin didn't burn when he said the name and how it rolled off his tongue as easily as God's name never had. Ruby shifted a step back, fear flashing in her eyes for a split second before it was smoothed over into a calm mask.

"So you already know a demon's true name. So what?" she said, trying to hide the discomfort in her voice.

He shrugged. "I read about demon's true names. The right person can control a demon completely with their true name. Coercion, possession, magic. If someone knows a demon's true name, then they're screwed." Ruby's eyes flicked down and Sam followed them as they glanced back up. He took a step forward. "Am I the right person?"

Sam ignored the soft hisses in his head of yes, yes, this is exactly who you are, you are the one who controls them. He focused instead on how Ruby didn't reply, and didn't notice the way the hisses curled around his thoughts, the slow, illogical anger rising in him. His voice got harder and he suddenly took.

"Proserpine."

Her head snapped up to look at him, a sliver of amber flashing around her pupils before disappearing. She nodded. "You are the right person, Sam," she said, then her voice became looser, more relaxed. She walked forward, between the pews and towards Sam. "You've always felt… wrong being in a church, right? Everything burns, your body feels like it's too small for you. Even the air seems to rebel against your presence here," she said, not a question but Sam still nodded as if it was one.

He ignored how close she was and how the burning in his body seemed to calm even more the closer she was, the air around him cool and his breaths not burning his throat. He looked down at her. "Why can't I say the Lord's Prayer?" he asked, and His name felt like holy fire in his mouth as it always did, and the whispers switched to hisses and something struck against his body like a snake, fire running through him and fading.

She laughed. "You're praying for the wrong king. You're the other side of the coin, Sam. You're not the prayed for, you're the prayed to. Don't you know what you are by now?"

He glanced down, nodded, felt the thing inside him purr at this admission. "King of Hell," he whispered, and the air around him seemed to twist and curl, snapping against his skin, every holy part of the church rebelling against him.

She put her hands against his chest and looked up at him. He looked down, meeting her eyes; they were earnest and sincere. "Why pray to the king when you are the king?"

Sam had three realizations then. One, the thing inside him wasn't just inside him, it was him. Two, this was who he was and he couldn't escape it, so he let the thing he'd been feeling since the beginning of this meeting flood through him, icy cold and contrasting sharply with the holy fire of the church air.

Three, he was a walking blasphemy and that, somehow, was more than okay with him.

He looked up and there was a congregation of people standing in front of him. Demon, his mind whispered, names flashing through his brain as he looked at each one. He smirked, hand going up to his crucifix necklace and enjoying the fire that spread through his body, a cruel sense of satisfaction running through him at his rebellion against the church he'd prayed to for so long. His eyes flicked down to Ruby, who was looking at him with something akin to pride and adoration.

"How do I start?"