Threefold
Chapter 4
S s S s S
Sam turned his back, unable to look at his brother's unwelcoming expression any longer. The door was slammed shut behind him muffling Dean's outraged tones. He let himself sag for a moment, his muscles overcome with grief and loneliness.
What was Bobby thinking, involving Dean in an exorcism, off all things? Sam stared down at the twitching form on the floor and let his anger roll over him. Bobby had no right being here and Dean, oh God, Sam clamped down on the heartfelt stab of longing; his brother still hadn't lost that edge of arrogance. His quicksilver emotions churned together until his sorrow was snuffed out by the sudden fury that filled him. It shored up his defenses, strengthened his body and burned through his thoughts until only the desire to strike out and purge the demon from its human shell remained.
Sam kicked at the man in front of him, something snapped, brittle and old. It felt good so he did it again, harder this time.
The prone figure grunted and wheezed. Its eyes opened, they were black and dull.
"You'll kill him, not that I care, but I think you might," it spat, words disjointed and mocking.
Sam delivered another blow, the body jerked and trembled. "He's already dead, has been for days. Do you think I can't tell? I can smell the rot." He bent down, inches from the aged face and empty eyes, "Say bye bye, now."
S s S s S
Sam stood on the front porch, wiping away the blood that trickled from his nose and watched Bobby's truck disappear from view; he turned away, concentrating on pushing the memories of his brother into the furthest and darkest recesses of his mind.
When he got back to the Impala Lilith was there, perched on the hood waiting for him. She eyed him warily as he approached the car.
"What do you want?" Sam grunted, fishing in his pocket for the keys.
Lilith swung her legs and shrugged, "Nothing much, I expected you to drag me out and lecture me on keeping my hordes under control, so I thought I'd save you the trouble. Nice job, by the way."
Sam frowned at her, "Like you care. If it was one of yours, it had a lousy taste in hosts, or is killing the host as soon as they're possessed part of the game plan now?"
"How should I know, I'm not omnipotent, you know," Lilith smiled sweetly, "I can't keep track of everything. And anyway you're so much better at it than I am. It almost makes me proud." She made a show of wiping away a non-existent tear.
"Shut up," Sam snarled leaning across the car, his head throbbed and Lilith's very presence rekindled his waning anger, his energy was low drained by his actions at the cottage, "we have nothing in common, I'm still a hunter, remember." It was a hollow threat Sam knew, it wasn't his skills as a hunter that kept Lilith in line.
Lilith narrowed her eyes at him, "Are you Sam? Is that what you think you're doing? Do you think you ever had any choice in the matter?"
Sam jangled his keys in irritation. "No, I don't think I did. There, happy now? So, yeah life sucks, boo hoo, poor me, but I can still send you back to hell or rip you to shreds if and when I feel like it. You're a self-serving parasite and I don't answer to you or anybody else any more. " Sam thought of his father's demands and his single minded crusade that had ruined the life of his children. Did matter it anymore why he was as he was, he couldn't stop it.
"Oh, not your father, Sam." Lilith said reprovingly. "I was thinking of when it really started, not that I was there. It was a long time ago, after all."
"Don't try your mind games on me Lilith; we both know how it ended last time." Sam rubbed a sweaty palm against his jeans, curiosity stirring.
Lilith slid of the car, stretching forward and resting her elbows on the hood. "No games, Sam, I just thought you'd like to know your family history, it's really quite tragic."
Sam said nothing, while he was willing to listen to any information she might have, he doubted if he could believe one word she said.
Lilith sighed. "Don't be so negative. It was way back when, when people believed in so much more that they do now. Some guys got together and made a deal," she raised her eyebrows at Sam.
"What did they want?" Sam asked evenly, playing along for now.
"Who knows? Maybe they needed a battle won, or their man on the throne or maybe they just coveted their neighbor's ass, you know how men are. So they made a deal, a deal for which they paid no price." Lilith grinned, twirling her hair around her fingers.
"How so?" Sam's mouth was suddenly dry. Had there been an answer? Another way out of Dean's deal and they had missed finding it.
"People had more gumption then, I kind of miss it. No, they didn't trade away their souls; they traded the souls of their children and their children's children and one in every generation after that, as long as each line survived. Clever, don't you think?"
"I don't believe you, the souls weren't theirs to trade." Sam said slowly, running the words through his head and trying to see where they might lead.
Lilith nodded, "Well done, Sam," she said brightly, "you're right, they offered their blood, you'd call it DNA these days, as a marker, branding their bloodlines for eternity, beasts of burden to be used as and when needed. One person taken from each generation. Some tried to recant and as you know that never works, so they passed the story down, always trying to find a way out of it and before too long they all forgot, except one direct line. Can you guess who that might be, Sammy?"
"Tell me," he whispered. Were the sins of the fathers forever going to be heaped upon him?
"Oh, you know. Your precious mommy. She knew the story, the legend and she thought she'd beaten the deal, protected her babies, with the help of your grandmother, but she died and your mother got careless, paid the price and so did everyone else in her family. There are harsh forfeits to pay when you welch on a deal, but you already know that, don't you Sam?"
Sam gazed at her, his jumble of thoughts too erratic to make sense of her words. She was lying, she had to be. His mother had been killed by the yellow eyed demon and he was gone, obliterated by the shot fired by Dean. The memories of that night in the cemetery were as fresh and sharp as ever, he thought of Jake and the others summoned to fight in a war without knowing who and what they were and winced at the sudden ache in his back. Lilith blew him a kiss.
"I see you finally get it, you're doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing. You can make and break deals all you want, dispatch as many demons as you like, but the original deal still stands and you can imagine the number of descendants out there living in ignorance." She paused tapping her fingers on her chin and frowned studiously.
Sam gritted his teeth and tensed, restraining the restless energy simmering under his skin, "I assume there's a point to you being so informative on my account, because if it's my gratitude your after you're wasting your time."
"So paranoid, all I was going say is that your bloodline isn't broken yet. Who knows what Dean will get up to now he's happy and normal, with those healthy appetites of his?" Lilith clapped her hands to her face in apparent dismay, "Oh no, you won't tell him will you?"
Sam tried to grasp onto the slim truth that Lilith had a thousand and one reasons for telling him this, each and every one designed to gain her some advantage but the heavy weight of her words was already pushing down on his defenses and minute cracks were beginning to form.
And for the first time Sam wondered if he had made a mistake.
S s S s S
Dean huffed on the shot glass and scrubbed at it with his cloth. Goddammit, when he was on shift they would have the cleanest fucking glasses in the whole town, he upended the glass and shoved it into place. He then turned his attention to the liquor bottles standing in random disarray on the shelves behind him and began lining them up, labels front and center and wiping down any spills. It was lunchtime and most of the patrons were buying light beer or soft drinks.
"Easy on the glassware there, Deano," Helen remarked, part owner and part nosy bartender. "Not that I mind your efforts, but you look kind of pissed."
Dean grunted, "Bad night."
"Right, anybody I know?" Helen glanced around the bar. There was a handful of customers scattered around the tables.
"No." Dean grabbed an empty tequila bottle and tossed it into the trash can with more force than necessary, the crackle of broken glass rattled across the room.
"Sorry," he muttered at Helen and couldn't help but think of Bobby.
S s S s S
"I'm so sorry." Those were the words he had used and Dean knew something had happened, something important, why else would Bobby look so upset and grief-stricken.
"For what Bobby, what's wrong?" He had asked, his voice catching with fatigue and concern. Bobby had stared back at him, blinking slowly and Dean could see the older man tense up, straightening his back as his shoulder muscles tightened and he pulled himself together.
"You shouldn't have to deal with this, Dean. I'm sorry I put you through that today. I'm promised to keep you safe after what happened last time and I let you down. Sam Winchester just reminded me just how dangerous it is out there." Bobby had turned away quickly leaving the table and returning to bed, not before Dean had seen the guilt in his eyes. He had stayed seated at the kitchen table. "Bullshit," he told the empty room and there he had remained until the sun had crept into the sky all the time wondering why his uncle would lie to him.
S s S s S
"Hey D. looks like you've got an admirer." Helen nudged him and Dean turned to see a young woman staring at him from the main entrance to the bar, automatically he switched on his most winning smile, the distraction was welcome.
She was a petite blonde, her long hair tumbling artfully across her shoulders. She looked a little highly strung for Dean's taste but her tight jeans and silky camisole hugged her slender body in a way that definitely piqued his interest.
Dean propped himself up against the bar. "What can I get for you sweetheart?"
"Dean?" She stepped forward hesitantly, raising her hand to him. It was then he noticed the sparkling band on her left hand, at the other end of the bar Helen sniggered.
This could be awkward, pretty girls wearing diamonds and recent memory loss did not a good combination make. Dean fixed his smile in place and nodded. "That's me."
"Oh my God, Dean. I never heard from you and, wow, you're working here. Is everything okay?" The girl reached the other side of the bar and perched on one of the stools, twisting her ring around her finger and gazing at Dean with wide brown eyes.
"Yup, everything's fine and dandy. How about you kid? You look good." It wasn't a lie, even if Dean had no idea who she was.
The girl managed to blush slightly and still look irritated, "You don't change, do you. Okay, don't tell me what you're up to, I get it. None of my business, too dangerous. Yadda, yadda." She leaned across the bar and Dean trying to ignore the way her flimsy top gaped invitingly almost didn't hear her next question.
"So are you still hunting, are you, you know, now?" She lowered her voice and then sat back on the stool oblivious to reaction she had incurred. She glanced over her shoulder at the door. "I quit, well mostly and I've just started speaking to my mom again. She's opening a Bed and Breakfast, would you believe, with the insurance money from the bar. I guess she was right, there are more important things in life and whatever I was trying to prove really doesn't matter. That said, I never thought you'd ever do anything else. " She shot him a pointed look and crossed her arms.
He must have misheard; he stared at her as she waited expectantly for his reply. Hunting, that word again and then just like that the world suddenly made a little more sense. He rubbed at a twinge in his shoulder and decided she definitely wasn't his type; she talked too much for one thing. He cleared his throat and willed the appropriately bland response into life.
"I'm taking a break, alright. I got a little messed up on a job a few months back and I'm staying with Uncle Bobby for a bit. Anything else you need to know?" He tried to sound lighthearted and fell short, a harsh edge to his voice.
The front door swung open again.
"Jo. There you are, honey. I thought you were just going to use the washroom." The man stopped, straightening up as he took in the couple conversing over the bar.
"Oh, I'm sorry." Jo slid of the barstool and pulled him towards the bar. "Dean, I'd like you to meet my fiancé, Mark." He wore expensive clothes, nothing flashy, designer jeans, a well cut leather jacket and a heavy, multi functional watch.
Mark reached out a hand and Dean shook it, resisting the temptation to return to overly strong grip. Mark eyes darted to Jo and then back to Dean, clearly forming conclusions that Dean could neither confirm nor deny.
Jo clung to her fiancé's arm. "Mark, Dean is an old family friend. We, uh, haven't seen each other in a while." Her face was pinched, as if remembering something unpleasant. "We're just passing through, Dean. We're heading for the west coast; we're getting married in a couple months."
"Well, congratulations." Dean wanted to say something, ask her what she knew but he couldn't bear the thought of exposing his vulnerability and handicap to these people. "Can I get you a drink, on the house?" He could feel Helen's beady eyes on his back.
Jo opened her mouth to reply and Mark injected smoothly, "No thank you, we must get going. He slipped his arm around Jo. "Nice to meet you," he added with great insincerity. "Come on, babe."
"Bye Dean. Take care of yourself." Jo allowed Mark to guide her to the door, before pulling him to a stop and turning to face Dean asked too casually, "Hey Dean, I almost forgot, how's Sam?"
It seemed to Dean that there and then something inside him broke loose, slipping into his bloodstream and spreading a bone deep chill throughout his body. He could feel its progress swirling through his veins with each violent pump of his heart and he heard himself say quite independently from his stalled thought processes, "Sam. You mean Sam Winchester?"
Jo glared at him, confusion on her face. "Yeah, who else?"
"He's still hunting. We don't talk much." The truth and nothing but, Dean crossed his arms and hugged himself against the cold.
"I'm sorry," she offered, but she wasn't and Dean needed her to leave.
"Shit happens. Have a nice trip." He watched them ago and then pushing past startled a Helen, left the bar.
S s S s S
Bobby sat in the shade of an overturned Ford F-150, positioning his lawn chair so that just his feet were sticking out into the warmth of the sunshine and opened his book.
Harrius Potter et Camera Secretor, the concentration required to translate the text was always good practice and it kept his mind off the events that had occurred the last time his linguistic skills had been put to the test. A lack of sleep and the unhappy conviction that he might not see Sam Winchester alive again had left him fidgety and indifferent to his normal routine.
He was about three pages in when the noisy growl of an engine reverberated through the scrap yard. It was the Camaro; Bobby put down his book and stood up, listening carefully. The engine was still pinging, Dean was supposed to have fixed the problem, they'd have to have another look at it. Bobby checked his watch, not that he needed to, Dean was not due back from work for about another six hours. Bobby swore softy to himself, he had been expecting this. He sat back down and retrieved his book, keeping one eye on the story and the other on the path that wound its way around the compound.
After a minute or two he spotted Dean sauntering along between the wrecked cars, hands in pockets and face towards the sun. Bobby dog-eared his page and watched him approach.
"You're home early," he said calmly. Dean stopped in front of him and stood silently, pursing his lips in contemplation. Bobby leaned back in his chair, internally bracing himself, in the last few months he had learnt to read Dean's varying moods with a high degree of accuracy, Dean rarely kept his mouth shut if he could help it.
"I met some chick, today." Dean tilted his head to the sky, screwing his eyes up against the bright light.
"Uh huh." Bobby acknowledged.
"Her name was Jo. Didn't catch her last name but apparently we were buddies." Dean kept his eyes closed.
"Oh." Bobby studied his face, obviously that Harvelle brat had let something slip, just how much though, Bobby wasn't sure. Hear him out Singer, he thought, don't give him anything he might not have, you know the rules.
"She's engaged to some rich a-hole, yeah, so she's given up hunting and wanted to know if I was still doing it." Dean opened his eyes and gave Bobby a slanted smile. "Which is kind of funny because as of yesterday I guess I was. Though, you know what I'm thinking Bobby, I'm thinking that's not what she meant."
Deciding that offensive maneuvers were called for, Bobby looked Dean straight in the eye and said, "It's possible I neglected to mention some of your previous clandestine exploits. So what? Doesn't change the fact you got whammied good and hard and I'm doing my level best to make sure it doesn't happen again."
Dean nodded. "Can't disagree with you there. The night it happened, was he there? Was Sam Winchester there?" He gazed mildly at Bobby. "According to this Jo, I know him and putting two and two together, he was my partner, right?"
Shit. Bobby tried to unclench his jaw muscles by taking a deep, subtle breath. Was that it? Was that all Dean had learnt, or was he stringing him along, letting Bobby dig himself deeper and deeper? Oh well, Bobby was fatalistic, nothing ventured, nothing gained. If it was going to blow up in his face there wasn't much he could do to stop it.
"Yes. He was there that night. You got hit by the demon, he left, said he preferred going solo. I tried to stop him; the kid's as stubborn as a mule. You came home. Dean, I didn't tell you about this for the same reason I've been turning down jobs for the last couple of months, I want to keep you safe. You met Sam here; you got on, at first. You hunted and now you don't. Please can we keep it that way?" How many lies before you lose track, Bobby wondered, how many before you end up back where you started?
Dean turned away, walking a few steps and then circling back, scratching the back of his head and peering sideways at Bobby.
"Is that it Bobby, is that all I'm missing or are there more surprises hiding around the next corner?"
"Who knows?" Bobby shrugged. Dean threw back his head and let loose a short bark of a laugh.
"So where do we find him?" Dean grinned innocently.
"Find who?" Bobby asked, and then realized that lies or not, he wasn't going to be able to hold onto Dean for much longer and he prayed that he would not lose them both.
"Dude. Sam Winchester, of course. I may not remember everything Bobby, but I remember enough to know I'm not the type to leave my partner out there on his own, especially when he looks like so much crap." Dean stuck out a hand and pulled Bobby from his chair.