A/N: Thanks so much for such an amazing response from everyone! :) It really makes my day like you wouldn't believe ^_^

Thanks to my anonymous reviewer, phantomq3 ^_^ I'll hopefully be updating on Monday mornings and Thursday nights, so at least it'll be fairly quick and regular! :D


Chapter 3

This was a most unfortunate and frustrating turn of events.

Castiel fixed the goddess in his bright blue glare, for all the good that did. Dean was beside him, currently going out of his mind; the angel regretted that he hadn't been able to shove the elder Winchester to safety as well, but at least he'd given Sam the opportunity to escape. Without him, Circe didn't have that leverage any more.

Of course, her method of retaliation had come as a bit of a surprise, and a growl was building in the back of Castiel's throat as he shifted on his paws—all four of them.

"Well, aren't you just the prettiest dogs I've ever seen?" Circe asked pleasantly, a smirk on her face though her eyes held a cold fury that was clearly on the verge of erupting. "You're going to wish you hadn't done that, angel."

"Cas!" an enormous German Shepherd barked from Castiel's left as he tried and failed to stand up on two feet. "CAS! Cas, I'm a dog! What the hell, I'm a freakin' dog, DO SOMETHING! Cas, fix this! Turn us back! I don't want to be a dog!"

The angel felt his fur standing on end, and he sighed internally. He had fur. This was going to make things significantly more difficult. Castiel's icy blue eyes narrowed slightly, muzzle pulling up in a snarl. Circe only smirked wider and with more malicious satisfaction.

"Yes, by all means… turn yourself back. I'm waiting."

"I don't understand," Castiel snarled, buying time to cover up the fact that he was now a Siberian Husky and couldn't, in fact, turn himself back. "You can only change your lovers. We have never engaged in sexual intercourse."

"Cas, just zap us back to human so I can gank this bitch!"

Circe laughed, turning to Dean. The German Shepherd was clearly about to attack, but one word from the goddess brought the attempt to a screeching halt. "Stay," she commanded, making Dean bark louder than ever. The infuriated dog was practically foaming with rage, but didn't advance.

"The hell I will! I'll get you, bitch, if it's the last thing I do! Cas, what are you waiting for?!"

Castiel's maw clenched tight with frustration as Circe turned an innocent smile his direction. It wasn't working… his grace must have been reduced enough that she was now the more powerful between them. That was a bitter pill to swallow.

"Hmm, it doesn't seem to be working, does it, angel? And no. I can change anyone. I just usually prefer to get something out of it, first." Snapping her fingers and pointing towards the kennel that Sam had previously occupied, Circe ordered, "Get in, Dean."

"No! No, damn it!" But he was already crossing the floor, stepping right into the kennel though he was swearing with all his might. "Get her, Cas!"

Abandoning his attempts to change back into an angel, Castiel bounded forward with a ferocious snarl, fully intending to rip the goddess's throat out and hope that would be enough to break the spell. Anticipating his move, though, Circe merely sidestepped, snapping her fingers with deadly menace.

"Castiel, down."

The angel found himself instantly hunching down, muzzle low to the ground. He blinked in shock, furious with himself for having obeyed the command. He was an angel, he didn't take orders from pagans! But, it seemed he was as fully ensnared as Dean was. It didn't stop him from growling with useless rage as Circe leaned over and grabbed the angel by the scruff, shaking him hard.

"Where is he?" she demanded. "Where did you send Sam Winchester?"

"Hey! Get off him! I'll rip you apart, you bitch!" From the kennel, Dean was barking non-stop, but Circe ignored him. She gave the angel another fierce shake, hand fisted in his fur.

"Where's Sam?"

Castiel snorted, trying to bat her hand aside, but he could barely raise his paw under the weight of her orders. He was resolved not to tell her a single word; he'd survived unspeakable torture before without breaking, and nothing she did to him would make the angel betray his friend-

"Speak! What did you do?"

"I flew him away," Castiel automatically answered, before uttering a sharp oath of annoyance. Apparently, she wouldn't even have to get as far as torture. The order to "speak" would suffice.

"Where did you fly him to?"

"Cas, what the hell! Don't tell her!"

As though he had a choice. Fortunately, the angel could honestly growl out, "I don't know. When I felt you grab on, I let go of Sam and gave him a push. I don't know where he landed. It could have been anywhere."

The hand in his fur clenched tightly enough for the angel to let out a yelp, though it was barely audible over Circe's wild shriek. It hurt Castiel's ears, nearly blinding him with pain, but the scream only intensified as the livid goddess hauled him up with surprising strength. Castiel scrabbled to escape her hold, cold blue eyes locked on the cage she was dragging him towards, but it did no good. Dean, muzzle on the floor as he tried to cover his ears with his forelegs against the ear-splitting screech, couldn't get out of the way in time as Circe thrust Castiel into the kennel with him.

"You're not nearly as powerful as you think, angel!" the goddess raged. "You couldn't have sent him far!" Slamming the wire door closed, Circe turned on her heel and swept from the room in a wave of tempestuous fire. The front door of the house banged open and shut a few seconds later, leaving the two dogs alone in the kennel.

"Cas," Dean huffed, wiggling from underneath the angel. "Will you move your ass? Damn it, we gotta go get Sam!"

"I'm trying," Castiel retorted, accidentally stepping on his friend as he attempted to get himself turned around. This kennel, he was convinced, had only been intended for one dog. He winced as Dean nearly crushed his tail, trying to scamper fully upright.

They ended up wedged together, Dean growling in annoyance as he wrestled his way to the door. Castiel pressed himself as close to the cage wall as he could to make room, for all that achieved. He could feel Dean's panic, acute and fierce. It was amazing that the hunter was even holding it together at all, though concern for his brother always had been enough to keep him focused.

"Damn it!" Dean barked. He pawed at the door, but the gaps between wires were too narrow; he couldn't slip a paw through, and had no way of unlatching the kennel. "Cas, I can't reach it! Switch with me, see if you can get the door open."

The angel let out a whine of agreement, but the process of shifting their positions around was a nightmare. It didn't help that Castiel had very little experience with walking on four legs and Dean probably had even less. The angel ignored his friend's protests as he had to bodily shoulder his way past Dean. Given how much the hunter had always complained about something called a "personal bubble", he knew this was probably making Dean extremely uncomfortable, but there was nothing to be done about that.

Unfortunately, Castiel's paws were even larger than Dean's, and the angel sighed.

"Hold on… I'm going to try something."

"Whatever it is, make it snappy!" the German Shepherd complained from somewhere in the back corner, sounding like his muzzle was crammed against the wall. Castiel nodded his furry head, then took a deep breath.

Everything jolted, nothing at all like the normal smooth flight that he was used to. White hot light exploded in his vision, pain erupting from his shoulder blades, and the Husky whimpered in disoriented agony as he reappeared, fortunately on the other side of the cage. He sagged, front legs giving out. The anatomy and physiology of this form weren't fully compatible with his angelic presence; Castiel's wings couldn't integrate properly with this form that wasn't meant for him, which made flight painful, exhausting, and extremely limited.

"Good man!" Dean said from the cage, panting as he stepped forward and shook himself out with obvious relief to have more space. "Now get me outta here!"

With a nod, Castiel struggled to his feet—or paws, rather—and approached the kennel. His true form was still aching from the ordeal of forcing his wings to function, and the angel knew with a heavy heart that he wouldn't be able to repeat that trick over any great distances, and certainly not with a passenger in tow. They'd have to find Sam the old fashioned way.

The angel pawed at the latch, frustrated that he couldn't simply will the door open, as he certainly could have done when he was at his full strength. He'd never thought life without powers or opposable thumbs was a distinct possibility for him.

"You have to lift the thingy," Dean snapped, impatience making him short. Castiel shot him a blue-eyed glare.

"I'm an angel of the Lord, Dean. I know how to open a dog cage."

Dean didn't reply, but the angel felt his friend's anxiety to get free, and he finally resorted to knocking the latch with his nose until it finally slid open. The hunter burst out, a growl emanating from his throat as he stood tense and ferocious. Dean's head whipped this way and that, muzzle wrinkled to reveal vicious looking teeth.

"Alright, I'm gonna kill that bitch!" he snarled, as Castiel sat down and raised a back paw to scratch at his frustratingly itchy ear. "We can't let her find Sammy! Where'd you send him, Cas?"

Castiel stopped scratching, getting to all four feet and turning for the door. "Like I told her… I don't know. Dean, I had to let go of him, or Circe would have dragged him back with us. There's no way to tell how far he might have been flung, or even what direction."

Bounding in front of him, Dean whirled around to face the angel with an expression of furious disbelief. "You sent my little brother out there ALONE, as a dog, and don't even know where he is? Are you friggin' kidding me? I thought you were lying to her!"

The husky snarled back, stepping towards the German Shepherd, impatience dancing in his blue gaze. "I did as you asked! We needed to get Sam away, now he's away."

"Yeah, until she finds him again! Can you sense him?"

Castiel shook his head, and the hunter barked out an expletive. The angel frowned. "I don't think I managed to send him very far," he admitted. "We should be able to find him. Don't you have some way of tracking each other?"

"Yeah, it's called a cell phone, Cas! But his is on the table, and mine is in my jeans! Maybe you haven't noticed, but my jeans aren't here right now! …Which means I'm naked, that's just great."

The angel ignored this last horrified complaint, turning his back on Dean and trotting out of the living room towards the front door. The heavy lock and the door knob would be much too difficult to release with paws, but there was a large picture window in the front foyer. Castiel gave it an experimental sniff, then nodded with satisfaction that they could break it.

"I got this one, Cas."

The angel didn't have time to respond before an enormous fluffy whirlwind raced past at full speed. There was a crash, a yelp, and the sound of glass shards cascading to the ground. Castiel ducked, one foreleg over his muzzle, until he heard Dean bark from outside.

"Aw, son of a bitch!" The hunter was glaring at the driveway as Castiel leaped out the now broken window to join him. His expression was so angry that for a second, the angel thought Circe must have been standing there, but when he turned to look, all he saw was Dean's car.

"What?"

"I'm sorry, Baby," Dean whined in distress, galloping to the Impala's side. "You know I'd never leave you here if I had a choice. I'll be back for you, as soon as I can drive again, I promise you."

"It can't hear you, you know," Castiel pointed out as he sniffed the air for any trace of Circe's scent. She was still too far away, which meant they should disappear while they had the chance.

"Man, we gotta work on your empathy. You SURE you can't change us back?"

The irony was not lost on Castiel, that Dean would complain about the angel's lack of feeling and then return with that question. It grated on Castiel, the fact that he was helpless against this pagan goddess. The very idea, it should have been ludicrous, and only brought his weakness into sharper relief. Stony, the angel snapped back, "I can't. My grace has been waning for some time now. I'm not strong enough anymore, if you must know. I don't like this either, Dean, but I'm doing the best I can!"

There was a pause, then the German Shepherd licked his nose and turned his head. "Sorry. Look, I'm glad you got Sam away. Let's… let's just go find him, okay?"

Castiel nodded, brushing past Dean on his way down the driveway; both of them broke into a run, tension flitting between them as the two hurried off after Sam.

They hoped.


As though it wasn't bad enough she had lost Sam Winchester, she'd also made the mistake of not giving his brother and their angel nearly enough credit. The windows rattled with the sound of her shrieks, as the goddess slammed a hand into the outer brick wall. Her power drew the broken shards of glass back up through the air, melding together and fitting neatly back into the window frame.

It was only luck that no one else was home among these humans she'd been forced to assimilate with. Certainly her furious curses would have drawn attention enough even without the noise. Not caring one bit about this at the moment, Circe stormed into the house to assess the damage. It wasn't fair! The dogs shouldn't have been able to escape the kennel.

Perhaps the angel Castiel still had more power than she'd anticipated, though at least he couldn't remove the curse.

The kennel door lay gaping open, mocking her for losing all three of her prizes. Circe moved closer to inspect the cage, eyes still flashing with thunderclouds. There was nothing to be learned from it, though, no hint of which direction the dogs might have gone. She would have spotted them on her way back if they'd taken the same route as her, though. Unfortunately, this didn't narrow it down a bit.

Circe tensed, her head tilting up almost imperceptibly. Someone was here. Though not a sound had been made to betray their position, she could sense the new presence. Whirling around, the goddess raised a hand in preparation to strike, until her intended target registered fully in her vision.

Turning aside just in time, Circe managed to halt her attack on the blonde man standing directly behind her.

"What are you doing here?" she snapped, not in the mood for this extra aggravation.

The man grinned, as dashing as she remembered him being, then swept her into his arms before she could utter a protest.

"Is that any way to greet an old lover?"

Circe was unimpressed. She rolled her eyes, pushing the man away from her. "I'm busy," she informed him, lifting her chin to show just how beneath her she found him. "What do you want?"

"What, I can't just drop in on my favorite girl, just to catch up?"

"Really, your favorite girl?" Circe demanded with an ungoddesslike snort. "I'm not fooled. You didn't come to chat, so just get to why you're here."

The man held up his hands, the cunning smirk falling away from his face. "Okay, okay," he relented. "So I might have heard it through the grapevine that you'd gotten your hands on the Winchesters. Are they here?"

As though she needed that rubbed in her face some more. "No," Circe snapped, giving him a look. "They aren't. And why do you care?"

She wouldn't have thought it possible for his expression to become so serious, having never known her previous lover to be capable of sincerity. There was an intense burning in his eyes now, though, seeming oddly concerned.

"This is important," he told her, which didn't sound like him at all. "Where are they?"

"You know, you're the only lover I've ever taken who I couldn't turn," Circe pointed out with an air of nonchalance, her mind shifting back to that peculiar puzzle as it did every time he showed up out of the blue for a romp. "Why is that?"

"You're not answering the question, Circe."

"Neither are you."

The man's mouth twitched, then quirked upwards. He shrugged, his familiar cheeky air starting to return. "Hey, it's how I roll. I'm just special, baby… I thought you knew that." He tipped her a roguish wink, making Circe turn away from him with exasperation. There was a chuckle from behind the goddess, and then he went on, "So, the Winchesters?"

"I caught them, fair and square. They're mine. If you think I'm going to just hand them over to you because you bat your eyelashes-"

"Look," he interrupted with the first tone of impatience. "There's no love lost between me and those Winchesters. I'm not going to take them off your hands. You can keep them."

A pause hovered in the air, and Circe turned back around, arms crossed. One eyebrow rose, as she waited for him to finish. The man rolled his eyes and relented.

"But there might have been an angel with them," he finally admitted. "Yea high, trench coat, no sense of humor?"

"Yes, there was an angel," Circe agreed, puffing her chest out with a pleased smirk. An angel who hadn't been able to get the best of her. "So?"

Her old lover stepped in closer, hands coming up to take her upper arms with a gentle squeeze. Once again, that oddly intense burn in his eyes bored into the goddess. "So… what did you do with him?"

Circe stared at the man, confused by this entire line of conversation. "What do you think I did to him?" she asked. "I turned him into a dog. You know, you were going to be a pig. The cutest little piglet imaginable."

"Wait, you mean it worked?" he asked in obvious surprise. "You changed an angel?"

"Yes." With a smirk, Circe allowed herself a brief moment of triumph, but that all too quickly faded back to anger and frustration. What was the use of being so powerful if she couldn't keep them within her grasp? "But he escaped with the Winchesters, if you must know."

The man's grip tightened briefly as a shadow of frustration crossed his face, but he released her quickly and turned around, a hand running through his hair. Circe had never seen him lose his composure even this much before, and it was starting to annoy her that he was getting so involved with this.

"And when I catch them again," she warned him, her voice rising, "I'm going to keep them. I meant it. You can't have them. Perhaps you haven't heard what's at stake here. The archangels are looking for those Winchesters, and if they find them, they're going to use them to end the world as we know it, and I refuse to let that happen. This world doesn't belong to the archangels-"

"And you think you're going to stop it by getting in their way?" he demanded, whirling back around with a pleading expression. "Circe… baby… think about this. You do not want to get involved. You think you can keep the Winchesters hidden forever? Michael will find them… or worse, Lucifer. They'll kill you. It's not worth it, this is a terrible idea. Just… let destiny do its job!"

"Destiny?" the goddess scoffed, drawing herself up even more in regal ire. "I'm a goddess. I am destiny. Don't underestimate my power."

The man strode back towards her, a grim set to his jaw. "Don't underestimate theirs."

Stung, Circe pulled away before he could take her arms again. She glared at him with frosty eyes. "You're a coward," she grumbled. "Get out. Maybe you're content to just stand by, but I am not."

For a moment, he seemed torn between arguing further and giving in to her willfulness. Circe continued to glower at him until he finally sighed and shook his head.

"At least let me know when you've caught them," he said. When she opened her mouth to protest again that they were her captives, he held up his hands. "You can keep the Winchesters, okay? You want to step in that pile of crapola, then I can't stop you. But I want the angel. Deal?"

What was with him and that angel? Circe regarded him for a while, trying to read past the perpetual mask that her lover always wore. She was considering refusing—after all, she could always use the angel to make sure the Winchesters stayed in line—but the man took her arms again, pleading in his eyes.

"Circe… please. If the archangels find the vessels, they won't need him. They'll kill him. Just give him to me. It's no loss for you."

Whatever. The goddess shrugged. "Fine."

The grin returned to his face and he nodded once, then turned to go. Circe watched him, then suddenly called out, "Why do you care so much about that angel, Loki?"

Her lover turned around, smirking as his golden eyes caught her once more.

"Because he's a royal pain in my ass," he answered, "and I don't want anything to happen to him."

That didn't make any sense, but by the time Circe could open her mouth, Loki was already gone.