13

Everything was dark, so dark. Dark, and cold. Cold and damp. Where am I? I can't see anything and I can't move. I'm stuck. Sitting up in a chair, I can feel a blinding around my wrists pined behind my back and my ankles tied together. I'm not hurt, but I am afraid.

Close by I can feel a warmth, like a small fire or heater. I sniff the air. It's a fire, but only a little one. I can't hear the popping of wood so it must be a gas fire, something contained. A fire must mean I'm not alone so I keep quiet not to let them know I am awake. Carefully I try to shimmy out of my bindings, but with no luck. I stay blindfolded and tied to the chair, waiting, for anything really. I don't know where I am or who I'm with, but the position I'm currently in, I know it's no friend of mine.

I sat still and quiet for who knows how long before I got a strong gulp of smoke and I had to cough. Crap, I thought.

"Satine?" a calm voice said.

"Castiel?" Everything inside of me settled at the sound of his voice. I felt safe now.

"Satine, are you alright?" he asked with a slight franticness in his voice.

"I think so. Where are we?" I turned my head while speaking, trying to figure out where he was.

"I'm not sure. Somewhere in the Midwest."

He was quiet for a few minutes and I realized that I was still tied up. "Uh... Castiel, could you untie me please?"

I could hear him sigh before saying, "I can't." My heart sank.

"Why?" I tried to speak calmly, but I was more than afraid knowing he couldn't help me. "Castiel, why can't you untie me?" I asked again, this time with a lot more anger. What had they done to him?

"I'm-I'm trapped." he finally answered in a small voice. A scared voice.

I remembered what Sam had taught me about traps for creatures. An angel trap was a ring of holy oil lit on fire. That what the smell was. Now I knew we were screwed. Castiel would die the moment he set foot outside of that circle. He'd never be able to get to me.

"Are Sam and Dean looking for us?"

"I don't know. They could still be asleep. We've only been gone a few hours."

Something above me slammed and I jerked away as something landed with a CRASH beside me. Something hot.

"Castiel, what was that?"

"Fire." he barely breathed. Above us I could hear the sound of spreading flames. The ceiling above us was catching fast and I could smell and feel it. The heat quickly overcame the room. I sweat in fear as smoke started to fill the close, stagnate air.

"Castiel, is there anything around that I could knock over?" I asked, knowing that I could wiggle the chair to tip over.

"Satine, we are in a wooden room in a warehouse. There's nothing." he said, hopeless. "Satine, I don't know what to do."

Something else fell beside me. My guess a piece of burning wood. I could feel the sparks jumping off the wood and burning my pant legs.

"Ouch." I coughed to myself through the heavy smoke. The intense heat above me was painful to the bare skin of my face and hands.

I couched deep, painful couches full of smoke. The air was thick with smoke.

"Satine, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." his voice quaked. He would survive this and continue on, but my chances were dwindling with each passing second and he knew that. So did I.

"Castiel, it's going to be alright." I tried to sooth him like a mother would do to her frightened child. "Everything is going to be alright, I promise." How ridiculous did I look, telling him that somehow everything would be alright? He was trapped and I was tied up. This was going to be my end. This here was it. By the hands of a demon? That was not certain, but human or demon, that didn't matter. This was my end and it was beside an angel. My angel. At least no one else was going to get hurt at my hands. This was the final end to all of that.

I turned over towards him, "Castiel, thank you for everything." I smiled at him, not sure if he could see me and said, "Really, thank you." Each word burned my mouth as to bring tears to my eyes. I could hear something soft hit the floor and knew that he had fallen to his knees. This was braking him apart.

Something creaked above me then he shouted, "Satine!" as something fell above me.

"Satine!" the angel screamed with all his might as burning pieces of wood fell all around the defenseless woman. On his knees, he stood back up and waited for any sign of movement, anything to tell him she was alright, but nothing. "Satine?" he asked over the fire. Nothing. "Satine?" he asked louder. Nothing still. The fire raged on around him and he couldn't see her anymore. She was gone. He'd lost her. "No," he whispered. "NO!" he wailed and fell to the burning ground. She didn't have a chance. Tied to a chair and blindfolded. There was nothing she could do, and nothing he could do to help her. By the time his trap was broken, she would be nothing but ash if anything at all. It was already too late. He'd lost her.

For the first time his eyes watered and tears rolled down his face. His eyes burned and it hurt him so. He covered his face with his hands and wept. He allowed this to happen somehow. How could he let this happen? This was all his fault he told himself. He could have seen this coming. He should have, but he didn't and now his angel was gone. Stolen from him by an unknown enemy.

"Castiel," a female voice spoke to him in silence. He picked up his head and opened his eyes to a bright room with modern furniture and a lady dressed in gray with pinned up red hair. He wiped his face dry and looked at the floor below the lady. "Castiel, this had to happen. You know that it could never work between you two. She is a human, and not just any human but the vessel. She would have brought so much destruction if Crowley had gotten a hold on her again."

He just look at the floor, not saying a word. There was nothing he could say. She had become his world, everything he cared about.

"This should just be a lesson. Think of it as only that. Too many angels have done this and watched their human lovers fade with age and suffer a horrid painful death."

"You did this?" he looked up at her with furry in his eyes.

"Castiel, we saved her from a death by a demon and so many other's deaths. She would have led to one of the biggest wars we've ever fought and you have to understand that. It's over. It's done with."

"I needed her!" he stood and roared at her.

"You should have followed your orders!" she roared back at him. "You were told to end her and you ignored it. You stepped out of your place! How dare you ignore orders!"

"You killed her, knowing that she could have been on our side!" spit poured off his lips and sweat streamed down his face.

"It couldn't have worked, Castiel. Why don't you understand that? Elizabeth lost her grace for a reason. She'd fall to the same fate if not worse. She is still human, not an angel. She'd have fallen to the demons too easily."

He said nothing, just looked her in the eye with hatred. No looks of understanding crossed his face.

"Maybe it'll just have to sink in. Human emotions don't look good on you, Castiel."

He blinked and opened his eyes back to the smoky room of bright fire. He didn't care that he was shunned by all of heaven now. He wished they'd never come to him again, not now that they'd ripped his heart out and burned it.

"Castiel?" a voice asked through the smoke. He looked around, but couldn't see who it was.

"Satine is dead." he called out to the voice with nothing else to say. And what could he say, that was all that mattered now.

A large board fell down onto the ring around him, putting out a part of the ring, freeing him. He immediately went over to where Satine had been and found a charred chair. No Satine. The ends of her bindings on the floor around the chair. Had she awoken while he was away? Suddenly he was full of hope and bolted towards a dim light in an opening in the wall.

Once he was out of the small structure inside a large warehouse, it fell to ruins behind him. He'd gotten out just in time.

He stood up and looked around. A good length away he saw something splayed out on the cement floor. He ran over to it and his heart sank to the bottom of the abyss that been a calm ocean of love for her. Her lifeless body was laid on the floor. Her clothes had burned away in large portions off her body. Her skin was clouded with ash and soot. The tips of fingers were chard as well as bits of her hair. Her mouth was hung slightly open, but her chest didn't rise and fall with breaths.

He knelled down beside her and put his forehead to her hand, wishing for her to feel him and wake up again. He wanted to feel her touch again. He was touching her now, but this wasn't the same. There was no life in her touch. She wasn't there anymore.

He stayed close to her, not daring to lift his face from her hand in fear that he'd have to see what was left of her again.

"Castiel," it was the voice again. The one who'd freed him. "Castiel, back up." He looked up but didn't obey. "Now!" He slowly moved and looked away.

A gasping beside him pulled him back into the moment. He turned back and looked down. His eyes searched around before he grabbed the woman and pulled her to his chest, pushing hair from her discolored face. He kept her close, resting his head on hers.

"How?" he asked as Satine's faint breathing echoed in his ear.

"She wasn't dead, Castiel." How? She had been. She wasn't breathing, not that he could see. The large pieces of wood that fell on her would have surly killed her. How was she alive? "She was just knocked out. How could you have missed that one?"

"But she wasn't breathing."

"She was suffocating. Just needed clean air." A blanket was spread over Satine, covering up what her clothes no longer could. The angel looked over her body. The burnt parts of her fingers and arms had been healed. He held her close to him again and kissed the top of her head. "Was it her?"

"Yes, she feels that Satine will take the same path Elizabeth." Castiel answered.

A scoff. "That lying bitch. She knows for damn sure that won't happen again. Not with her." a pointed finger held towards Satine. "Satine is very different from Elizabeth."

"I know."

"Come on, Castiel."

The sound of a T.V. In the room awoke me. I opened my glued shut eyes and took a quick, blurry survey of the room, but my eyes burned too much to keep them open. I closed them and kept them closed. My throat burned so I coughed in hope of clearing it and maybe my voice would come to me. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. The fire had taken its toll, but I was out, somehow. I was alive.

I felt around with my fingers and I made out that I was on a couch. A blanket was spread over me. I had seen a light of a television in the background and the dim light of a lamp somewhere. This place was, as far as I could tell, safe.

I was awake but there was no point in me getting up. I couldn't see anything or speak. I coughed again then felt someone lift up my head as the rim of a cup came to my lips. I drank the cool water that soothed my throat.

When my head was put back down, I opened my eyes again and got a brief look at the person standing beside me. "Castiel?" I whispered in a hoarse voice. The blurry person beside me shook their head. Not Castiel, someone shorter. I had to close my eyes again, they burned at the touch of air. Whoever it was took my hand and rubbed the top with their thumb. It was a man by the feel of his hand.

I took my other hand and reached up to touch their face, my only clue to the identity of the silent man. Just as I was about to touch his face, I felt something pushed into my other hand. I rolled it over on my fingertips. A feather. Still, I pressed on with a good idea of who it was and touched his cheek.

"Gabriel?" I whispered.

"Hello, Satine." he said in a quiet, calm voice. It was Gabriel. I was sure.

"How are you-? Where am-? Castiel?" I went through quickly, my voice cracking at each word.

"Shh." he hushed me. "Castiel is outside. You're safe." His hand pushed hair out of my face. "Everyone is safe." he whispered.

I sighed and smiled. I felt safe now. Even though Gabriel had a lot of explaining to do, I was happy. Castiel was nearby, Gabriel was here with me, and he'd said everyone was safe, including Sam and Dean. They were alright. We were alright.

Gabriel was pulling away, about to leave when I gripped his hand tighter. "Don't go." I breathed. I was useless in any fight and keeping him nearby was the only way I felt assured that nothing could happen.

"Alright." he simply said and sat on the floor beside the couch, facing the T.V.

I reached over and touched his hair. "You were dead?" the awful voice inside me said.

"Keep talking and you'll make it worse." he warned. "I'll explain everything later. Go back to sleep."

"Bossy." I smiled then put my hand back at my side. My other hand still held his, resting on top of the blanket. It was the only way I was sure that he was still here. The only way I was sure he'd stay.

The angel jerked away at the sound of an opening door.

"Who was it?" Dean asked Castiel as he walked in the lodge.

"We didn't get to see." Castiel lied. Dean turned and looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "I followed Satine then was trapped. Satine was brought back in later, gaged and bound."

"But she's alright now?" Dean asked with worry.

Castiel breathed heavily before answering, "We healed her, but we can only do so much." Castiel was about to lead them into the living room when he stopped and turned to them. "Wait here." Castiel continued into the living room where he found Gabriel sitting on the floor and his hand being held by a sleeping Satine. "Anything?"

"She was up for a few, but I told her to go back to sleep."

"Are you staying?"

"I'll keep close by." he said, standing up.

"Sam, Dean, you can come in." Castiel called.

"Cas," he turned to Gabriel who was holding up Satine's hand, telling him to hold it. Castiel moved close to Satine and took her hand, looking it over as the boys came in.

Dean and Sam moved close to the couch around Castiel and looked down at the woman. "Should we wake her?" Sam asked.

"No, let her sleep." Dean said.

Hours past and night came along. The brothers went to bed and the angels joined in the living room again.

"Gabriel, thank you." Gabriel nodded at Castiel then sat in a chair close to Satine. The angels stayed close to her all night, each taking turns watching over the lodge. Anytime she stirred, Castiel was at her side, her hand in his. Gabriel would sit in a chair beside the couch and watch television. Any movement or sound she made, he'd turn to her and wait until she was back into a deep sleep.

It was dark in the room. Satine had been asleep for an hour or so in the twin bed covered in quilts that he'd moved her to. He stood close to the bed like he'd done countless times. Unlike the past times, he bent over and put his lips on the woman's then put his nose to hers. Hot tears streamed down his cheeks. Hot painful tears of guilt and anger.

How dare they, he thought to himself. How dare she pull something like this. They knew she was nothing like Elizabeth and that she'd never follow in her footsteps. They we just going to put her to waist in fear of her power, that wasn't a true threat to them. This was nothing more than a display of their power and he knew it.

The lump of guilt could not be soothed. He should have stayed closer to her. If he had, this wouldn't have happened. She wouldn't have almost been killed. Ended.

He kissed her forehead before standing up, silently vowing to himself that they'd pay for this. That nothing would ever happen to her again. He'd kill before letting anyone touch her again.

He stayed as close to her as he could get, going over the same thoughts in his head. They'd never touch her again. Not his Satine. Not the woman he'd loved more than anything.

Th-thump. Th-thump. Th-thump. Th-thump.

"Shh," I was hushed as I slowly opened my eyes. The dark blurry room around me was familiar and warm. The feel of the bed was comforting as well as the musty cabin smell that I'd grown used to. "Shh," continued the voice. I looked over to a chair that had been pulled beside the bed and I could make out a body in it. My vision was still not clear but it was better.

"Castiel?"

"I'm here, Satine." He leaned forward and put his hand over mine. "I'm here." he whispered with his forehead against mine. I closed my eyes when he got close and rested my trust in his touch.

"You're safe." I mumbled.

"So are you." I could hear the smile in his soft voice. I feel back to sleep at his touch.