A/N: It's a miracle, I actually managed to update in less than a week! Thanks to everyone who put this on story alert, favourites list, or my personal favourite: reviewed. I love you guys. I also bow down before The Tribble Master; my beta who helped me so much with this chapter as well as helped me rid myself of writers block. Onwards and upwards!

Chapter 13: The Devil Is In The Details

Simple things really, that's all they were at first.

An A on her math test, a date to home coming, captain of the cheer squad.

Nothing harmful, but just enough to make her happy.

She grew older, but the magic never left.

It started to play a more prominent role in her life. A sacrificed dog gave her ownership of a spell book she desperately needed. A few stray orphans helped her gain access to a building that later became her base of operation. Finally a powerful spell that led her to her fellow sorceresses.

Isabella was a witch to her very core, and this last spell would be her piece de resistance.

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The room was tense. Sam stood on one side of the room with his gun grasped firmly in his right hand. The two witches stood on the other side, with Bobby eerily floating beside them and the unconscious witch lying nearby. However no-one made any move to attack. Instead, their attention was focused on two figures in the room.

The witch and Dean.

The two were apparently locked in some kind of mental combat. Both wore expressions of intense concentration, and Sam could see the determination on Dean's face. Without warning, the witch's eyelids shot open, revealing a blinding light emanating from her pupils. Her minions let out a collective gasp of surprise and backed away from her. Sam looked at her worriedly before turning his gaze back to Dean, who groaned and twisted slightly in discomfort.

"Dean? What is it? What's happening?" Sam asked urgently. Behind him, the witch let out a moan and fell to her knees.

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Dean took a step back, blinking.

How the hell did he end up in a library?

Shelves towered above him, loaded with books. Dean looked around, confused, before ducking behind the nearest shelf. He peered around the corner, but could see nobody of any threat. Frowning, he turned back around to find a teenager seated at a nearby table. She was crying softly, her shoulders shaking and her head buried in her arms. All Dean could see was her blonde hair.

A man suddenly appeared around the corner. Dean backed against the shelf, but the man walked right past him, as if Dean were a ghost. He walked up to the girl and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Isabella! My dear, why are you crying?"

The girl raised her head and Dean felt a cold chill run down his spine. The features, the cold eyes… It was the witch. There was no mistaking her.

"Oh it's nothing. Just something silly," She said, attempting to smile as she wiped her eyes. The man, evidently the librarian, just looked at her, waiting for a proper reply. She sighed.

"Roger dumped me. On our six month anniversary!" Her eyes filled with tears again. The librarian looked a bit awkward.

"Errr yes, well… Don't fret about it. He obviously wasn't good enough for you. There will be other boys." He patted her shoulder awkwardly. Dean barely contained his laughter. Although the librarian had good intentions, he was clearly inexperienced with the teenager love life. Isabella looked up, smiling through her tears.

"You always make me feel better. Thank you Giles."

"Not a problem, Isabella." The librarian said, walking off. Dean stared after him. Isabella scraped her chair back and stood to go. Suddenly, a pile of teetering books on a high shelf fell down in front of her. She gasped before shaking her head and bending over to pick them up. Dean watched as she put them all away except one. It was a thick book, old and apparently hardly read. Isabella frowned as she looked at it. She looked around cautiously before opening the book and reading the title.

"The Mystic World?" She said sceptically. However despite this she kept a hold of it, flipping through the book.

"Isabella?" A voice called. Isabella looked up, shocked. The voice called again. Isabella quickly shoved the book into her school bag before turning to face the newest occupant of the library.

"Oh my gosh, are you okay?" The new girl gushed. "I heard what happened with Roger… I can't believe he's such a jerk!"

The two girls walked out of the library talking excitedly, leaving Dean standing there, at a loss to what he should do. Follow the teen Isabella? Or just stay here and wait for the memory to die.

He suddenly tensed as he noticed another figure standing near him. He turned his head slightly in the direction before his eyes widened.

"Get out of my head!" The older Isabella screeched, throwing herself at Dean. He quickly moved backwards, out of her reach. She flew at him again, hand outstretched. A bright light was pouring out of her eyes, nearly blinding him. Dean ducked, and was sure he could feel a powerful force brush over him.

A near miss.

Isabella lunged again and grabbed tightly onto his arm. He swung her around, propelling both of them into a nearby shelf. She slammed into the wood hard and let go of his arm with a moan before falling to her knees. Dean ran to the next row of shelves, looking for a weapon, any weapon.

You idiot, he thought. This is a library. The only thing in here is books. An outraged cry disrupted his thoughts as Isabella once again flew at him. Dean grabbed her and the two wrestled until Dean felt himself slam into a bookshelf. His eyes automatically closed as his head hit the shelf hard and he felt the pain rocket through his head.

Dean winced, waiting for Isabella to hit him, or attack him with a spell. To his surprise, nothing happened. He tensed, opening one eyelid, then the other. He was no longer in the library surrounded by books. Instead Dean found himself standing in a dark corridor. His nose prickled as a strange smell floated before him. Frowning, he gazed around the room, knowing it felt familiar but not sure why. It finally hit him. It was the room he had been taken to on his first encounter with the witches. Shifting his weight slightly, Dean moved closer to the inhabitants of the room.

There in the middle stood Isabella. She was older now; much closer to the age she was when Dean would first encounter her. There were six other witches with her, all standing beside her faithfully. She was observing them as a picky customer observes the items they want; looking for faults and any reason not to buy. Isabella was glancing at each witch, scrutinising their appearance and in some cases their magic.

She finally nodded, apparently satisfied. She took a step back and pointed her finger at one witch in particular. The witch stepped forward, looking miffed that she had been selected to bear the brunt of their leaders scorn. Isabella said nothing but continued to point. An unearthly sound escaped the witch's lips as he body began to shrivel, a bright light coming from within. It was almost as if she was burning from the inside. Dean clasped his hands over his ears, desperately trying to block out the screams. Finally, all that was left of the witch was a few clumps of her blonde hair lying on the floor.

The other witches all stepped back slightly from the remains, their expressions one of horror and fear. They all turned to look up at.

"She would never fit in. I could see in her mind that she planned to take over this coven. Thus she met her demise."

The other witches seemed to find this answer reasonable. They all nodded and one stepped out. Dean recognised her as Hannah, one of the witches he would later kill.

"Isabella, shouldn't you take one more witch? After all, seven is said to be a magical number." She said. Isabella smiled.

"Seven may be lucky for some, but six is lucky for my coven." Hannah nodded and stepped back. Isabella turned to face all the witches.

"Now, let us go and discuss our future. I have big plans for this coven."

The witches all left, Isabella included. Dean stepped forward tentatively, keeping a look out for the Isabella from his time. He saw a flash of blonde hair across the room and quickly ducked behind a pillar. He looked in horror at where he had been standing, which was now a burning pit of coal.

"How are you doing this?" He heard Isabella scream. He peeped around his pillar.

"How did you get in my head? You don't have the power to do this!" She was screaming desperately now. He could sense she was losing control as her plan unravelled before her.

"Come out and fight!" She yelled. Dean scoffed.

"That would be an even fight seeing as you're a witch!" He yelled back. She fell silent for a second. Dean peeked around the pillar again but couldn't see her. He turned around- and she was right behind him. Dean yelped and leapt back. She followed him, her face twisted into an expression of rage.

"You will die." She said before raising her hand and clenching her fist. Dean's hand flew to his throat, where an invisible force was crushing his windpipes. Coughing and hacking, he fell to his knees, struggling to breathe. She stood before him, just out of reach.

"What about your spell?" Dean asked between gasps.

"I only need your blood. There will be plenty of that even when you're dead. Fresh blood is better, but I'm not taking any chances with you." She hissed, clenching her fist tighter. Dean struggled, almost certain his bones were going to break in a second. He closed his eyes and waited for the pain to end.

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Sam had been worried enough and then Dean had started coughing harshly. The sudden noise had nearly given him a heart attack.

"Dean?" Sam called, watching in fear as Dean raised a weak hand to his throat as though trying to force off some pressure.

"Dean, just breathe!" Sam said desperately, watching his brother die before him. He stood and turned around, gun pointing at the two witches. The both shrieked and raised their hands.

"Stop it!" He yelled at them. "Stop doing this to him!"

"We're not doing anything!" One of the witches protested. Her voice was high. The two witches were lost without their leader, who was still kneeling on the floor.

"Then make her stop!" Sam roared, gesturing to the kneeling witch. The witches feared their leader more than death and neither moved. Sam snapped. He raised the gun and fired it at one of the witches. She fell back with a little gasp. Her hands scrambled to stop the blood escaping the bullet wound over her chest. The other witch dropped to her side.

"Abby!" She said desperately. Abby choked, convulsed, and then stopped moving. The other witch began moaning. Sam shuddered at the noise, and at the fact that he had killed a human. Whatever he had said previously, it still felt wrong to kill these witches.

Behind him, Dean suddenly stopped choking and Sam feared the worst.

"Dean?" He cried out, dropping to his knees beside his older brother's body. To his surprise, Dean had begun to breathe normally, if somewhat more painfully than before. Sam let out a sigh of relief and relaxed his shoulders as he sat beside Dean. The moans of the other witch still echoed through the room.

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They both knew something had happened in the real world.

Dean had opened his eyes to find himself standing in the same room where he had been kept during his first encounter with the witches. The same board was there, the same table with the silver bowl and the knife. Dean shuddered at the sight. Isabella stood next to him, but before either of them could move, a gunshot rang out. It wasn't from within the memory, but from somewhere else.

Dean turned to face Isabella, who stood still, her eyes wide in disbelief.

"He killed her," she whispered. Dean looked around, confused.

"Who killed who?"

She turned to face him. "Your brother. He killed her….. My Abby. He killed her."

Dean didn't plan on apologising to her after everything she had put him through. Suddenly an unearthly moan echoed around the room much like the gunshot had. Dean shuddered at the sound.

The door to the room suddenly opened and in entered Isabella and her five other witches. Behind them hovered an unconscious teenage female, her head lolled forward so her black hair covered her face. They strapped her to the board and stood by, waiting for her to awake.

"She was our first victim," Isabella said beside him. Dean turned to look at her, confused.

"What?"

"She was the first one." It was then that Dean recognised her from the missing profile. Kellie Heartwood, age 17.

The two stood in silence, watching the other witches who were still waiting. Finally Kelly began to open her eyelids. She moaned and tried to move, but the restraints prevented her from doing so.

"What are you doing?" She called out in a panicked voice. "Let me go!" She struggled, but to no avail. Dean tensed, feeling the urge to help her.

"Now, now, don't scream. There's nothing you can do." The Isabella from that time cooed. Kelly gasped, still struggling.

"Let me go!" She screamed. The witches all laughed.

"You're going to die," One of them told her. She screamed and started crying.

"Why me? Please, don't do this, please!" The witches just laughed until Hannah pressed the knife into Kellie's shoulder. The girl screamed. Kellie pulled the blade out and showed the other's the blood. The all grinned at each other before turning to Isabella. She smiled at them before grabbing the blade and stabbing it into Kellie's heart. Dean turned away, sickened by the sight. The Isabella beside him sighed.

"How can you just slaughter innocent people like that? She was 17 years old," Dean said angrily. Isabella glanced at him.

"I needed her for my plan."

"Why her? Why specifically her?"

Isabella shrugged. "My magic chooses for me. It chose her just like it chose you." Her expression darkened. "That choice was a mistake. You ruined my plans." She began advancing on him. Behind her, the room disappeared and they were back in the solid grey room with no escape.

"You killed my coven and you ruined my plan. My spell to make everything better." Isabella growled. Dean backed away.

"Six people. I needed the blood of six people as the main ingredient. You were the sixth."

"But you got my blood," Dean protested. Isabella scoffed.

"Not enough! The amount we need is large. More than half the blood in the body. What we took from you was only a small sample. And then you escaped, leaving us stuck. It had to be you. It always had to be you."

The two were circling each other now, keeping a weary eye out for any attacks.

"So I tracked you down. You killed two of my coven and I was mad. I wanted revenge, I wanted payback. I wanted you to feel pain. A very human concept, don't you agree?"

She danced around him, her fury increasing the tempo. "I kidnapped you and got some more of your blood. Then I returned you back to your brother. I knew you would come and hunt me down, just like I know that your biggest weakness is those you love. Your precious family. What better way to bring you down than to have them suffer?"

Den shook his head, trying to absorb all the information.

"What is this plan? Why do you need so much blood? Why is it my blood?"

"Blood is the key to it all. Blood can create… or destroy." Isabella asked. Her change in tone alerted Dean that any humanity she had revisited in the past few minutes had gone, leaving her once a dangerous witch. "I think you'll find that what this world needs is a brand new fresh start."

Before Dean could do anything however, the greyness around him disappeared, leading him once more into one of Isabella's memories. He looked on in horror as the memory unravelled before him and he began to yell.

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Sam was still slumped over, his head resting in his hands. The witch had not stopped moaning, and Sam could feel a headache coming on. All of a sudden he felt movement behind him. Whirling around, he saw Dean awake and looking horrified. Dean stood up and backed away from Sam, his face one of disbelief.

"No. You can't….You can't…. It doesn't work like that. You… why?" He asked, voice shaking. It was then that Sam realised Dean wasn't talking to him but rather talking to someone behind him. Turning around slowly, he found himself gazing at the figure of Isabella, who was very much awake.