By the time they get home, Sam is at the end of his rope and he can tell the others are, too. Gabriel woke up once on the drive back, and Chuck had to pull over quickly so that he could throw up on the side of the freeway. Sam's heart flipped painfully when he saw the obnoxiously red blood mixing with the bile.
Chuck's beat up old car kept making alarming noises the faster they drove, but that didn't deter any of them from urging it on faster. Sam nearly cries with relief when, as they pull into his driveway, he notices Raphael's minivan. The doctor must hear them pull up because he's there as soon as Sam opens his door.
"Status," he demands, his voice hard and detached as he carefully pulls Gabriel off of Sam's lap and lifts him into a bridal carry.
"He was phased for over half an hour," Sam says, following Raphael up the walkway. Chuck and Jo follow close behind. "He passed out before Dad phased him back, and he threw up blood while we were driving back."
Raphael's lips thin but he doesn't say anything else until they reach Sam's room. The rest of the pack trails behind, practically oozing worry and distress. All of them touch Sam at some point in an attempt to offer comfort; any other time, the attention would be welcome, but now it just feels oppressive. It takes everything in him to hold himself back from grabbing Gabriel, snarling at his packmates, and running away to find a secluded place to hide.
Raphael sets Gabriel down on Sam's bed and immediately turns, shooing everyone out forcefully. Mary growls at him but leaves, and the others follow her. Sam waits until the door is shut securely before quickly stripping off his shirt. He hesitates, unsure of what to do, and looks at Raphael for help, but the doctor isn't looking at him.
He's hovering over Gabriel, two fingers at his pulse and eyes locked on the digital clock on Sam's bedside table. His lips move soundlessly as he counts heartbeats, and when he's finished he furrows his eyebrows and exhales harshly.
"Sam," he says, "do you trust me?"
The question catches Sam off guard, but he only hesitates a moment before answering. "Yes," he says, surprised to find that it's completely true. Raphael's brown eyes briefly flash with the same emotion, but just as quickly as it arrived it's pushed aside by professional detachment.
"Good. Come here."
Being ordered around rubs Sam the wrong way but he obeys anyway, worry for his mate overpowering his annoyance for the moment. Raphael pushes him to sit on the edge of the bed, near where Gabriel's head is resting on a pillow. The doctor's eyes begin to glow brightly as his fangs and nails grow longer and sharper, but he waits until Sam gives him a tiny nod before moving towards him. Sam's not sure what's going on, but he holds still as Raphael approaches his neck, though he tenses until his back is ramrod straight.
He flinches, mostly from surprise, when one of the doctor's claws comes up and slices a deep cut at the juncture where his neck meets his shoulder. It's quick and efficient, nothing like how Sam's imagined the intimacy of the Bonding ceremony, for which he's grateful.
"Sorry for that," Raphael says, once more completely human. "But I didn't want to bite you, and if I'd warned you that whole thing would have taken a lot longer since your wolf would have fought against me."
"It's fine," Sam says, wincing when the shock wears off and his shoulder starts to sting. "What do we do now? Wait, where are you going?"
Raphael pauses at the door, one hand on the doorknob, and shoots a small, reassuring smile at Sam.
"I'm letting you two have privacy," he says. "I may be a doctor, but there are some things that no one is meant to see."
"But I don't know what to do," Sam protests.
"His instincts should take over when he smells the blood, but I'm sure you can figure out a way to help the process along," Raphael says. "It might take a few moments for anything to happen, though."
"What's going to happen?" Sam asks, but Raphael is already gone. The door closes with a soft click and Sam turns back to his mate. Gabriel's chest is barely moving and if Sam focuses, he can hear the thready, barely-there pulse thrumming underneath his skin. His resolve hardens and chases away and nervousness.
He hisses a little as he runs two fingers over the cut on his shoulder, both at the pain and the feeling of hot, sticky blood. Not giving himself time to be skeptical about Raphael's knowledge, he carefully holds his fingers below Gabriel's nose.
He watches Gabriel's eyes intently for any sign of waking up, and so he misses the way his nose twitches at the scent of blood. He almost rears back in surprise when golden eyes suddenly snap open, glowing and angry and filled with hunger. Quicker than Sam can react, Gabriel has his mouth around Sam's fingers. He growls deep in his throat as he licks the blood off, the sound cutting off abruptly when his eyes lock onto Sam's shoulder.
He reaches up and pushes Sam down so that he can straddle his waist, hands on his shoulders to keep him down. Sam's pulse jumps and begins beating faster, and Gabriel zeroes in on the way it makes blood spill from his neck. He locks eyes with Sam, something in his gaze softening as he cocks his head, almost like he's asking for permission. In reply, Sam closes his eyes and tilts his head, shivering at the growl it elicits from his mate.
He gasps in surprise when he feels Gabriel's fangs pierce his skin, directly over the cut Raphael made. The pain is intense for only a second before it fades into unbelievable pleasure. Sam's breath leaves him in a breathy sigh and he instinctively tilts his head further, giving Gabriel more room to work with.
The feeling of blood being sucked out of him should feel invasive and wrong, but Sam's skin feels hot and his body is reacting in a way he'd only ever felt once before, oh so long ago on the night when he'd slept over at Gabriel's house. He can feel himself reacting: his skin flushing, his breathing speeding up, and his dick hardening, both from Gabriel sitting in his lap and the lips closed around his neck.
He feels intoxicated from all the sensations; his head feels light and his hands are losing their grip on Gabriel's waist. Before he can pass out, however, Gabriel abruptly pulls back. Sam hisses as fangs pull out of his sore skin, blinking stupidly as he waits for his brain to catch up with what's happening.
"Oh," he says intelligently, staring up at his mate with a no-doubt dazed expression on his face. Gabriel, his eyes back to their normal shade of brown and definitely more human, gives Sam an apologetic look. He licks a drop of blood off of his lip, his face flushed and his breaths coming in harsh pants, and the image does nothing to help Sam calm down.
"Are you okay?" Gabriel asks, reaching out a hesitant hand. Sam grabs it with his own before it can make contact with his shoulder, twining their fingers together and pressing a kiss to the back of Gabriel's hand. "I'm so sorry, Sammy."
Sam frowns. "Don't be sorry," he says. "First of all, I should be the one apologising to you for basically forcing you to drink blood while you were unconscious. Secondly, it was necessary to save your life, and I would gladly give up anything to keep you safe. And besides, that was… incredible. Please don't ever apologise for that, because that was probably the hottest thing I've ever been a part of."
Gabriel laughs weakly and drops his head onto Sam's chest, sliding down until he's lying on top of his mate.
"You always know just what to say," he mumbles.
Sam doesn't reply, too busy pressing a kiss into Gabriel's hair.
"Gabriel?"
"Hmm?"
"I'm so happy you're safe."
"Me, too, Sammy," Gabriel says, bring his hand up to rest if on Sam's chest, right over his heart. His breathing evens out after only a few moments, and Sam realises just how late it actually is. It's closer to dawn than sunset at this point, well past midnight but still early enough to get a few hours before the sun comes up.
He carefully pulls his comforter out from under his butt and settles it over them. It isn't long before he, too, is asleep.
…
When he wakes up, it's to the smell of pancakes and the feeling of a warm body pressed all along his. He frowns in confusion before the events of yesterday rush back to him, and he lets out a shaky sigh, overwhelmed by both the joy at having Gabriel back and all the fear he'd been suppressing until now.
Gabriel shifts at Sam's suddenly racing heartbeat, reaching up to twine their fingers together, but doesn't wake. He probably won't wake up for at least a few more hours, given that it's—Sam turns his head and checks his clock, surprised to find that it's only about five in the morning.
Downstairs, there's a muffled crash and Sam chuckles quietly when multiple voice hiss for quiet all at once. He's curious as to why everyone is awake so early but doesn't want to leave Gabriel for even a second, even though he knows that his mate would be perfectly safe were he to go downstairs and get something to eat. In fact, if Gabriel were awake he'd probably be complaining of hunger right about now.
He looks down at Gabriel, who's still lying entirely on top of Sam with his ear pressed right above Sam's heart. Sam lets out a carefully controlled exhale, fighting down the urge to hug the shit out of his mate right now. A weird fuzzy feeling makes his heart do a little backflip in his chest and Gabriel shifts again, the tiniest frown appearing on his lips.
Alright, enough is enough, Sam decides, and he gently pulls himself out from under his mate before his traitorous heart actually does wake him up. His first order of business, he decides, is a shower. Peeling off his sweaty, bloodstained shirt, he grimaces and throws it into his trash bin rather than his hamper. He gathers a clean shirt and a pair of questionably clean jeans, then hurries to the bathroom.
He doesn't notice until after his shower that his shoulder is no longer bare. The cut, when he inspects it while towel drying his hair, is long gone, as he'd expected. The bite marks, however, are not. Two circular marks, each about the size of the eraser at the end of a pencil, stand out against his skin like a scar.
Tentatively, he reaches up and runs his fingertips over them. The skin is smooth despite the marks, and they don't hurt, and once he's over that he takes a moment to consider the implications of them.
"Oh my god," he blurts, eyes wide. "We started the Blood Rites."
Downstairs, Raphael cackles.
…
It takes a few days for Gabriel to completely recover. He spends most of this time sleeping on Sam's bed, but at least once every day he goes downstairs to hang with the rest of the pack. Sam wonders if it's a conscious or subconscious thing, the way Gabriel seeks out comfort from surrounding himself by pack, but he never asks.
Chuck doesn't leave the mansion, not that anyone's complaining about that. Surprisingly, he doesn't hover around Gabriel, but he rarely lets him out of his sight and he's always available whenever Gabriel seeks him out. When Castiel eventually comes over, on the other hand, he's rarely ever an arm's length from his friend and glares at everyone whenever Gabriel so much as winces.
It both amuses, gratifies, and annoys Sam all at once, though he can't say the same for Dean when it comes to the more negative emotions. Just as Sam's never far from Gabriel, Dean's never far from Cas, supposedly because watching Cas and Gabe interact is entertaining. Sam sees the looks his brother gives Castiel, though, and he's pretty sure Dean finds him more than just entertaining.
"It's not our place to do anything," Gabriel tells him decisively one evening. They're cuddled up on the couch in the living room, pretending to watch a movie while in reality they're spying hardcore on Cas and Dean. The two of them are engaged in a conversation filled with so much tension Sam's surprised neither of them have snapped and sexually assaulted the other yet.
"You're right," Sam replies.
"And I hate it," Gabriel hisses. "Sometimes I just want to lock them in a closet together and not let them out until they have sex, but the only way they'll get their heads out of their asses is on their own terms."
"Yup," Sam agrees easily. Gabriel gives him a suspicious look.
"Why aren't you concerned about their love life?" he asks. "You're such a gossipy old lady, you should be loving this."
Sam shrugs. "They'll figure it out eventually. Maybe sooner than they think."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Gabriel asks, but Sam just smiles and closes his eyes.
A little under a week after Gabriel starts regularly drinking Sam's blood, Raphael summons him to the hospital for a blood test. He asks for Gabriel to come alone, and so naturally half the pack go with him. Sam, Dean, Castiel, Chuck, Gabriel, John, Mary, Ellen, Bobby, and Jody all cram into three cars and head out the next day.
Raphael rolls his eyes when he sees them all but he doesn't kick them out, knowing that it'd be a lost cause. He leads them to a waiting room, where he makes everyone but Gabriel and Castiel (because he wants human blood to compare to Gabriel's) wait. Sam's leg doesn't stop bouncing anxiously the entire ten minutes they're gone.
He's the first one up when the three return, and the smug little smirk Gabriel adopts at Sam's protectiveness does more to reassure him than anything else just then.
"So?" he asks, looking between Gabriel and Raphael.
"So nothing," the doctor replies in his usual disinterested way. "Gabriel's not at risk of dying anymore and his blood cell levels are stabilizing themselves on their own."
"Good," John sighs, voicing the relief of everyone in the room. Not that anyone was expecting any different, but the confirmation is more than welcome. Sam grins at Gabriel, but the smile he gets in return isn't as big as it normally is.
Frowning a little, he asks, Gabe, are you okay?
I'm fine, Sammy, Gabriel replies. Just distracted, sorry.
What're you thinking about?
Gabriel casts a surreptitious glance at where Raphael is talking to Cas, Dean, and Jody. Subtle it may be, but it doesn't go unnoticed by Sam.
It's not my place to tell, Gabriel says with an air of finality, and Sam drops it. If it was important, he knows Gabriel would tell him.
"Alright, guys, let's head out," John says, and the pack immediately heads to the door. Sam notices Raphael pull Cas aside and whisper something too low for anyone else to hear. Cas doesn't look all that worried so Sam isn't, either, but Dean looks like he's trying to bore holes in the doctor with just his gaze.
Sam and Gabriel share a look, and then they each grab one of Dean's arms as they pass by him, forcefully dragging him out the door.
"Hey!" he splutters, trying to twist out of their grasp.
"He'll be fine, Dean," Sam says.
"Yeah, so chill out with the glaring, maybe?" Gabriel adds.
"I wasn't glaring," Dean says defensively. "I just wanted to know what they were saying."
Sam rolls his eyes. They're well out of the waiting room now, and catching up to the rest of the pack quickly, so he and Gabriel let Dean go. He pouts and rubs at his arms but thankfully doesn't look back.
"Oh, please," Gabriel says. "It was glaringly obvious that you were more than curious." Dean makes a disgusted sound and speeds up to walk with Mary and Ellen.
"Is whatever Raph told Cas what had you so distracted earlier?" Sam asks quietly.
"Always too smart for your own good," Gabriel replies, smiling softly. He reaches out to take Sam's hand, rubbing his thumb in soothing back and forth motions across Sam's skin once their fingers are entwined. "It's nothing bad, I promise, but Cas asked me not to tell anyone."
"I get it, Gabe," Sam says. "I won't bother him about it or anything."
Gabriel smiles up at him. "Thanks, Sammy," he says. Sam lifts their clasped hands so he can press a kiss to the back of Gabriel's, which makes him laugh at the sheer cheesiness.
"Anytime, love."
This is the penultimate chapter, guys! The next one might take me even longer than usual since it's going to be the longest chapter yet but there's a lot that's going to happen, so. Anyway, what did you guys think of this one? Comments are always appreciated and honestly make my day, so feel free to let me know what you loved, hated, or need to rant about.