Au Clair de la Lune
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, WAVE OBSCURA!!! I'm so glad that fandom gave me the opportunity to know you, darling. <3 Now to your present - hope you'll enjoy it!
Title: Au Clair de la Lune
Characters: Sam, Dean, OCS.
Rating: R
Warnings: sexual situations, consent issues, gore.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural related.
Summary: Thank God for nice people - that's what Sam thinks when he and his brother take refuge in some people's house after a rough hunt. But the threat isn't always where you're expecting it...
A/N: It's a little more disturbing than my usual, but it was written with love and apparently love for wave_obscura makes me write disturbing things - go figure. My thanks to the lovely ariadnes_string who accepted to beta this story! Title means "By the moonlight" and refers to a French traditional song.
“Dean, hey, hey! Stay with me, bro.”
“’M awake, Sammy.”
“Yeah, well stay that way.”
His brother was one heavy son of a bitch, Sam thought. Jesus fucking Christ. Dean was leaning against Sam’s shoulder, almost a dead weight, hissing in pain now and then when a movement jostled against his cracked ribs. That Wendigo had really done a number on him.
“Fuck,” he swore, almost whining because he was too out of it to censure himself.
“Sorry,” Sam mumbled.
He looked at his surroundings, trying to find his way back in the darkening woods, but dusk had drawn a gray curtain on the world and he didn’t recognize anything anymore. Hadn’t they already walked past that fallen tree? Sam stopped, and frowned.
“You lost?” Dean suddenly asked with surprising lucidity.
“I’m not…”
Sam hadn’t gotten lost since he was twelve. He never got lost; he just didn’t. They’d been in so many different places, they could never have managed with their kind of life if they didn’t have a good sense of direction. But his eyes went from tree to tree to bushes to old stumps, and he had no fucking idea of where they were and what way to go to find the Impala. What he saw around him was both familiar and weirdly out of place, like someone had taken some parts of different sceneries and had put them together again wrong.
“Sam?”
“It’s okay, Dean. We’re not very far from the car.”
Keep walking, and maybe they’d find their way back. Sam settled his arm around his brother’s shoulders, nudged him gently, and Dean started walking again with a groan. Left foot, right foot, they continued like that for some undetermined length of time. Pain was shooting through Sam’s thigh with each new step, and he felt some warmth telling him that blood was seeping again through the makeshift bandage, but he didn’t dare to lower his eyes to check on his leg. The night was clear but chilly. They had nothing in their bags but guns. Sam was loosing blood, Dean’s brain was leaking through his ears, and they just couldn’t stop and sleep in the woods.
Fortunately, an imposing house emerged from behind the trees. Sam whispered a quick prayer of thanks, and made his way towards it.
----
“Again, thank you so much.”
The woman - Janet Martin, she’d said her name was - let out a rippling laugh and shook her head good-naturally at Sam’s profuse thanks. The corners of her eyes crinkled, making her look slightly older than Sam had first thought.
“Stop thanking me! It’s nothing, I’m telling you! Since our children left, my husband and I have been so alone, you have no idea. The house feels so big.”
“And you’re very isolated,” Sam said conversationally. He was dead on his feet, but the woman was offering him and his brother a roof and a bed so he could at least spare her five minutes. Especially since she wasn’t calling the cops on them. “You’ve never thought about moving out?”
Janet Martin’s colorless gaze fell on Sam.
“Where would we go?”
“Uh, I don’t know.” She was looking at him curiously. “I was just wondering…” It made his skin prickle and he wished she would stop. “Never mind.”
“Alright,” she said in a chipper voice. She looked down on Sam’s bloodstained and torn jeans. “Do you need something…” she trailed off.
“Um.” Sam threw a look at his brother. Dean was lying on the right side of the king-sized bed; he had one hand above his eyes to protect them from the electric light, and the other palm flat on his chest, but Sam knew he hadn’t fallen asleep because of the way his jaws kept clenching. “Do you have some thread and a needle? And bandages, please?”
Mrs. Martin smiled brightly, a large grin that showed all her teeth.
“Of course. Everything you need.”
---
Knock, knock.
Sam startled. He was sitting on the bed, his back to the headboard but he must have drowsed off for a second because his heart was beating wildly. He stared dumbly at the door and for one fleeting moment he didn’t remember where he was, but then it all came back to him - a house, lost in the middle of the woods. Their refuge, thank God.
There was another knock on the door.
“S’m,” Dean mumbled. “Door. Open the fuckin’ door.”
Sam stood up stiffly and limped to the door, trying to ignore the dull ache in his thigh.
“Yes?”
A man was standing in the doorway, tall and dark-haired.
“Blankets,” he said in a deep, rumbling voice, and Sam looked down on what the man was carrying in his arms.
“Oh. Thanks. You didn’t have to… we already have blankets.”
“The nights are cold here.”
He looked at the space above Sam’s shoulder.
“You and your brother are hurt. You have to keep warm.”
“You’re right. It’s very thoughtful of you. Thanks again… Mr. Martin?” he finished, slightly questioning. He didn’t know who else it could be, but the man had never introduced himself.
“Call me Brad.”
The man didn’t smile.
“Thank you, Brad.”
Sam waited. The man didn’t move - Sam thought he didn’t even blink.
“Uh, sorry, but…” Sam held out his arms. “The blankets?”
“Right.” Brad Martin put the neatly folded blankets in Sam’s arms. “If you need anything, just knock on our door. It’s the last one at the end of the hallway. Good night.”
“Good night to you.”
Sam went back to the bed, and spread one of the blankets on his brother.
“No sleeping, Dean.”
Dean mumbled something that sounded like ‘fuck you,’ making Sam chuckle tiredly. He set the alarm clock on his cell phone to wake him up in an hour, and lay down at his brother’s side.
Darkness jumped on him, and he was asleep as soon as his head touched his pillow.
---
The ring tone of his phone penetrated Sam’s mind slowly before he realized that it was a prompting to wake up.
He opened his eyes and was surprised by the light, until it occurred to him that he must have forgotten to switch it off. He held out a hand, stretching his fingers so he could grab his phone and turn the annoying ringing off.
“Mmmh.”
Dean moved restlessly against his side. During his sleep, he had rolled over on his good side and was now pressing his face against his younger sibling’s shoulder, wetting the fabric of Sam’s shirt with his drool. Sam stayed still for a moment, enjoying the warmth, the regular breathing, the feeling of his brother alive and with him.
“Dean,” he finally called, shaking him gently. “Wake up, dude.”
Dean whined a little louder.
“I know you’re tired. But I have to check on you. Wake up.”
“Fuckin’ Nazi.”
Sam sat up in the bed and pushed at Dean’s shoulder to turn him on his back. Dean opened his eyes, moaned and closed them immediately.
“Hey, no, no falling asleep again. Need to answer some questions first.”
“Hate you.”
“I know. So first question: what’s your name?”
“Bruce Wayne.”
Sam sighed in aggravation. His hand went through his hair.
“Either you answer the question, or I keep you awake the whole night. I’m not tired.”
That was so not true. His eyes were burning, and his head was pounding with exhaustion. But he knew, and Dean knew, that he was stubborn enough to follow it through on it.
“Dean Winchester. Asshole.”
“I was just asking your official name, not your profession,” Sam said. “Now, when is my birthday?”
“May 2nd.”
“Mom’s maiden name?”
“Campbell.”
“Okay, that’s enough for now. Go back to sleep.”
“Thank you fucking much.”
Dean tried to turn on his stomach, forgetful of his wounded ribs. He grunted in pain and rolled on his back. Sam let himself slide against the headboard and closed his eyes. Opened them right away, straining to listen.
“Did you hear something?” He could have sworn he’d heard a childish voice singing, but now there was nothing but silence. “Dean?”
Dean was already fast asleep.
---
“…plume, pour écrire un mot…”
Sam sat upward, gasping. The voice was back; he’d heard it again. He glanced at Dean - his brother was snoring lightly. Sam held his breath, and for a moment there was nothing but the deafening sound of his own heartbeat.
“… ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu…”
The voice resonated strangely, getting louder, then muffled, making impossible to pinpoint where it came from. But there was indeed a voice, he wasn’t crazy. He wasn’t.
“…ouvre-moi ta porte…”
Sam jumped - the voice sounded so close, almost like someone was whispering at his ear. He threw his legs out of the bed, made his way painfully to the door, but stopped dead at the sharp thought that he was going to leave his brother unprotected. He stared long and hard at Dean’s form beneath the covers. Even if Sam left Dean some weapons, his brother’s brain was too scrambled to use them. He bit his lower lip, uncertain.
“…pour l’amour de Dieu.”
He was going to be real quick. He limped to his brother’s side and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Dean, wake up.”
A muffled groan.
“I’m gonna take a leak. I’ll be right back.”
“Mmph.”
The hallway was longer than he remembered, and plunged in darkness. Sam walked it with his hand brushing the wall, following the faint echo of the voice like a will-o’-the-wisp.
“Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot…”
The voice suddenly stopped, and Sam stopped too. He felt under his hand the bulge of a door handle. He grasped it, but didn’t press down to open. His breath was short but he wasn’t sure what it was that was making his heart beat faster. Light suddenly filled the hallway.
“Can I help you?”
Sam spun around quickly, feeling like the kid with his hand in the cookie jar. It was Janet Martin, with her hair unbound, wearing a long, blue nightgown.
“I was looking for… the bathroom. Could you…?”
“Second door on the left.”
“Thanks. Sorry for…”
“It’s no bother. How is your brother?”
“Fine, he’s fine.”
He was getting nervous for no good reason, and sweat was running down his back.
“Excellent. So goodnight, Sam.”
She turned her back on him.
“Wait!” Sam called before she could walk away. “I think I’ve heard something. A voice? It sounded like a child singing.”
She rubbed her chin thoughtfully.
“I didn’t hear anything,” she finally said. “But it was probably just one of the kids.”
“It didn’t sound like English. I think it was French.”
“Oh, you know children. The things they pick up, here and there.” She smiled suddenly, teeth gleaming in the light. “You can sleep safely, Sam. Nothing ever happens here.”
“Alright, then. I’ll just…”
“Go to the bathroom.”
“Yes. If you don’t mind.”
“Of course not.” Her smile had become softly indulgent, like she was talking to a silly child.
Sam went to the bathroom and locked himself in, just to give himself time for his breathing to slow down. He sat on the tiled floor, breathed in, breathed out, his eyes closed and his forehead resting on his knees. Suddenly, he raised his head, struck by a thought.
What kids? Hadn’t Mrs. Martin said that her children were gone?
---
Sam sat on the side of the bed next to Dean. His brother hadn’t moved an inch since he’d left him earlier. His breathing, his heartbeat were steady. Sam let out a relieved sigh.
He pondered the wisdom of leaving now, in the middle of the night. He hadn’t heard the voice in a at least twenty minutes, he felt calmer, and it seemed to him now that there wasn’t really any reason for alarm. He was exhausted, he had lost some blood - he could have dreamed the voice; he could have misunderstood what Mrs. Martin had told him. Why was he freaking out? There wasn’t anything wrong. He was just on edge, hurt, and tired. He leaned back against the headboard, his long fingers circling Dean’s wrist.
“Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot
Prête-moi ta plume, pour écrire un mot
Ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu
Ouvre-moi ta porte, pour l’amour de Dieu.”
Sam started and fell from the bed, pulling Dean’s arm with him. His brother cried out softly and Sam hurriedly let go of his wrist.
“Sorry, Dean, I’m sorry.”
Dean blinked sluggishly, clicked his tongue and looked at him with blurry eyes.
“Sam?” he slurred.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“What’s goin’ on?”
“Nothing. Go back to sleep.”
But Dean was starting to push himself up, stubborn as usual, emitting a low growl from the back of his throat when the pain stabbed through his chest and he gripped his side.
“Isn’t it time for questions?”
“You look lucid enough. I have to check on something. You lie down, I’ll be back in a sec.”
Dean’s green eyes were bright with pain but he looked more awake than he had since he’d gotten hurt. He tilted his head to look at Sam.
“Is something wrong?”
Sam smiled his most reassuring smile, which wasn’t much. He wasn’t the reassuring one.
“Everything is great.” His brother looked at him dubiously, so Sam felt like he had to add something: “I’ve just heard a noise. I wanna see what it is.”
“Hmm. What’s that saying, again? Curiosity killed the cat.”
But Dean’s eyelids were already drooping. Sam helped him lie down again, smoothed his hair in a quick, affectionate gesture, and got on his feet.
“Stay put,” he said, though he knew his brother couldn’t hear him. He just needed the sound of his own voice.
As an afterthought, he grabbed the gun on his nightstand and tucked it in his jeans. With a last look to his brother, he left the room.
---
He didn’t know what he was doing, not really. He had no idea what he was looking for. The voice had stopped singing and there was only stifling silence, save for the sound of Sam’s heart, pounding loud and steady, maddening. His leg throbbed, the pain progressively eating away at his mind until there was barely any room for anything else.
What the fuck was he doing? Why wasn’t he in his room with his brother, getting some well-deserved rest? But he kept walking, moved by a feeling that he didn’t quite manage to identify. There was something going on in this house, and he intended to find out what exactly. Why hadn’t they tried to call anyone, even just a doctor, when two messed up guys showed up on their doorstep? What kind of people would let them into their house without thinking twice? He couldn’t sleep without knowing, couldn’t trust those people with his and Dean’s safety.
He stopped, prompted by some vague instinct that it was important he did so. He was so tired, his thoughts were so muddled that it took him a whole minute to realize that he was standing in front of the door Janet Martin had kept him from opening earlier. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the need to know what was in this room. His hand found the handle again, and his heart in his throat, he tried to push the door. It opened easily, without even a creaking. Surprised, Sam stumbled a little, headfirst in the empty and dark space revealed. He almost let out a startled cry, but fortunately he could put a hand on his mouth before any sound escaped him. He found his balance, then looked around him. It was too dark for him to identify the strange shapes he could make out, but the smell… He didn’t know how he could have missed it when he was in the hallway, but now it was so strong it burned his airways, left a foul taste in his mouth, made him gag. It was all too familiar - it was the stench of death.
He started walking backward, didn’t want to see what was in the room anymore. He slipped, caught himself on the wall and felt something sticky on his hand.
“Oh, God.”
He couldn’t see very well what it was, could only tell that it was a dark substance, but he could smell it, and knew it was blood. There was blood on the walls. He left the room and closed the door hastily. He turned to go back to his room, and bumped into something warm and solid. Or someone.
“Have you lost your way again, Sam?”
This time she hadn’t switched on the light, but he recognized Mrs. Martin’s voice. She was standing so close to him that he could smell her faint lavender scent, jarring after the stink of decay.
“I… I… I’m sorry, I…”
His mind came blank. He couldn’t move. “Shh,” she said, cupping his cheek with her cold hand, pushing him gently until his back hit the wall. She squeezed up against him, maternally stroking his cheekbone with her thumb, while her other hand slid down his chest and pressed on his crotch in a not-so-motherly gesture. Sam moaned, feeling himself get hard even as he wanted to shove her and run away, helpless shivers of disgust and desire running through his body.
“Let me take care of you,” she whispered, before she bit his earlobe. “You’ll never want to leave.”
---
The cold woke Dean up. The blanket had slipped down to his hips and the air in the room was chilly. His head was killing him.
“Sam?” he called.
He was in a king-sized bed, alone. Was it the last free room in the motel again? It didn’t look like a motel. Where was Sam? He struggled to sit up, though he felt like his head was going to explode, and his chest was tight and aching. Be careful with your fucking ribs, his body was telling him aggressively.
“Sam?” he tried again.
It was useless, he could see that no one else was in the room, but he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Some part of him realized what his slow and broken train of thoughts meant - concussion. Concussion and some cracked ribs. Again, goddamn it.
But it was why Sam’s absence didn’t make sense. Concussion means monitoring - Sam should be there to monitor him. He wasn’t. It didn’t add up. Dean rubbed his face in the hope of clearing his mind, and remembering where he was and how he’d gotten here. And Sam - where the fuck was Sam?
Wait, wait - something was coming back to him. Sam’s voice. Sam had said… Sam had told him he had to check on something, that he’d heard a noise. Dean couldn’t be sure he hadn’t dreamed the whole scene, but it seemed pretty run-of-the-mill compared to his usual concussion-induced dreams, so it was probably real.
He had to find his brother. Sam was gone to check on some noise and he hadn’t come back. Dean didn’t know how much time had passed, but he couldn’t shake off the anxious feeling gnawing at his stomach. The air in the room felt oppressive. He sat on the edge of his bed, stood up, and was assailed by a wave of dizziness and nausea. He leaned against the wall, waiting for it to pass, and when it did he pushed himself off resolutely.
Somebody knocking at the door stopped him in his tracks. He didn’t know why, but the noise sent alarms through his mind. He saw his bag and Sam’s in a corner of the room, went to it silently and found his gun. His vision was blurry, but Sam wasn’t here and something was wrong. The knocking became insistent. Dean held on tightly to his gun.
“Who’s there?”
---
For a moment, Sam couldn’t find in him the strength to fight Janet undulating against him. She was trying to find her way to his mouth, holding his face between her hands while he tried to turn his head on the side, pressing his lips tightly together. Her own lips were cold and chapped, which he hadn’t noticed before, and he felt like puking, but at the same time his arousal was overwhelming, erasing all thoughts from his mind that weren’t the aching need of his dick. She took hold of his wrist and forced him to put his hand on the cool skin of her hip, where she’d pulled her nightgown up, and for some reason it made it snap back to himself. His mind cleared, and he was still hard but could think past it.
He tested the hold she had on him and found her abnormally strong - or it might have been that he was too weak - so instead of fighting her he passed his hand that wasn’t pressed against her flesh behind his back, and his fingers found his gun. To distract her from what he was doing he stopped struggling entirely, let her kiss him on the lips and even half-opened them when her tongue tried to penetrate his mouth. It felt like a piece of cold meat, but he didn’t allow himself to dwell on the sensation. He drew his arm from his back to her side, and pressed the trigger.
She squeaked and crumpled in a heap, her knees loudly hitting the floor. Sam felt the warmth of her blood soak his shirt and a wave of nausea overcame him. He pushed her away brutally, and ran without looking back.
The hallway went on forever - at this point, he was ready to think that the house was cursed, or alive - and he ran faster, in spite of the agonizing pain in his thigh and the blood he felt running down his leg, telling him that he must have popped some of the stitches. It wasn’t enough to stop him. Then a gunshot resounded in the house, and that was enough.
“Oh, Dean,” he whispered, before he started running again.
In front of their room’s door, he found Brad Martin lying on the floor with his brains blown out. Blood and gray matter had splashed on the wall, but Sam barely paid attention to it. He stepped over the body, avoiding the pool of blood forming.
“Dean!”
His brother was standing in the middle of the room, a little unsteady on his feet but sill holding firmly his gun with both hands. He jerked it in Sam’s direction when he came into the room.
“Wow, Dean! Hold on, dude, it’s me.”
“Sammy?”
“Yes, I’m here.”
“He… His fucking eyes, they were… He tried to…”
“It’s alright, now,” Sam soothed. “You can…”
“Sam, behind you!”
Sam turned to see Martin stand up slowly. Half of his face was gone, but he looked as unfazed as ever, his eyes gleaming strangely in the half-lit space between the room and the hallway. Sam pointed his gun to his chest and shot - one, two, three times, not that it wasn’t doing any good but at least it seemed to slow down Brad Martin - or whatever the fuck he was - and it gave Sam the time to shout to his brother:
“Dean, take the bags, we’re going!”
His brother still looked confused but the authoritative tone seemed to push the right button because he complied right away.
“The window!”
Dean went to the window, opened it. Sam had managed to drive Martin back to the hallway and he slammed the door to his face. Looked around him for something to push in front of it.
“Dean, the wardrobe!”
Dean had thrown their bags outside, and he ran to wardrobe and started to push it with all his strength. Sam winced when he heard his brother groan in pain because of the strain the effort put on his ribs, and it was hard to resist going and helping him but he couldn’t leave the door and let Martin come in. Sam didn’t know what he would do to them, but he had no trust in someone who could walk with a hole in his head and several others in his chest.
When the wardrobe was in place, the brothers rushed towards the window. Sam could see a huge tree with one branch close enough that he could almost touch it. It was their way to safety - if they could reach it, they would be able to leave this godforsaken house without breaking both of their legs in the process.
“Let me go first,” Sam said.
Dean was leaning against the wall, his arm encircling his middle and his face tense with pain, and he said nothing, which was agreement enough for Sam. The pounding on the door was getting louder and louder.
Sam reached out in the darkness.
---
There were plenty of places that held bad significance for Sam. Plenty of horrible memories that were just hard to let go of. But in all his fucked up life, he didn’t think he’d ever felt such a revulsion to coming back somewhere as he did when they finally found the Martins’ house in the middle of the woods. They’d come armed to the teeth, ready for everything - ghost, zombies, demons, you name it. Now that they were here, though, Bobby looked a little dubious.
“You sure it’s here?’ he asked.
Sam stared at the house for a long moment. It was both the same and different than from the last time he’d been here. He was pretty sure it was the same house, but for one, it looked a lot smaller than in his memories. More importantly, it looked completely derelict. In fact, without the nightmares Sam still had about that night, he would have thought it looked perfectly innocuous.
“I think it’s the one,” he said, a little hesitantly. “It looks kind of different, though.”
He turned to Dean for support, but his brother shrugged.
“Don’t ask me, I don’t remember a lot from that night. I was pretty out of it.”
Bobby was looking at Sam thoughtfully, and it was irritating him, making him feel like an unreasonable child.
“I didn’t hallucinate the whole thing, if this is what you think,” he said sharply. “The house is there, isn’t it? Maybe the Martins, whatever they are, put some glamour on it, I don’t know. But it was real. It was all real.”
He remembered the cold fingers of Janet Martin on him, the blood running down Brad Martin’s face and covering it like a red curtain, and he shuddered. If that wasn’t real, then nothing was.
“I say we salt and burn the whole goddamn house,” Dean said, looking at him in an attentive way that Sam identified as worry. He smiled at his big brother.
“I say let’s fucking do it.”
Dean’s grin was brighter than the sun.
---
A/N: For those who want, here is a rough translation (by myself) of the French song's lyrics:
Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot / By the moonlight, my friend Pierrot,
Prête-moi ta plume, pour écrire un mot / Let me borrow your quill, to write a note
Ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu / My candle died, I don't have anymore light
Ouvre-moi ta porte, pour l’amour de Dieu. / Open your door, for the love of God.
Also, geeky details about some references in the fic:
-The family name "Martin" was chosen in reference to a famous French crime case. In 1833, Pierre and Marie Martin, the owners of the "Auberge de Peyrebeille" (Peyrebeille Inn) in Larnace, Ardèche (South-West of France) were condemned and executed for having robbed and murdered more than fifty travellers. Their inn has received the name of "L'Auberge Rouge" (Red Inn) and has inspired a number of books and movies. Today historians agree to say that the evidence against the Martins were far from being convincing enough.
-The room Sam discovers was inspired by the French tale " La Barbe bleue" (Bluebeard): an old nobleman marry a young woman. One day he leaves the country and gives all the keys in the castle to his wife, while forbidding her to open one room. Of course, she doesn't listen to him and discovers the bodies of her husband's previous wives in the room.
Title: Au Clair de la Lune
Characters: Sam, Dean, OCS.
Rating: R
Warnings: sexual situations, consent issues, gore.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural related.
Summary: Thank God for nice people - that's what Sam thinks when he and his brother take refuge in some people's house after a rough hunt. But the threat isn't always where you're expecting it...
A/N: It's a little more disturbing than my usual, but it was written with love and apparently love for wave_obscura makes me write disturbing things - go figure. My thanks to the lovely ariadnes_string who accepted to beta this story! Title means "By the moonlight" and refers to a French traditional song.
“Dean, hey, hey! Stay with me, bro.”
“’M awake, Sammy.”
“Yeah, well stay that way.”
His brother was one heavy son of a bitch, Sam thought. Jesus fucking Christ. Dean was leaning against Sam’s shoulder, almost a dead weight, hissing in pain now and then when a movement jostled against his cracked ribs. That Wendigo had really done a number on him.
“Fuck,” he swore, almost whining because he was too out of it to censure himself.
“Sorry,” Sam mumbled.
He looked at his surroundings, trying to find his way back in the darkening woods, but dusk had drawn a gray curtain on the world and he didn’t recognize anything anymore. Hadn’t they already walked past that fallen tree? Sam stopped, and frowned.
“You lost?” Dean suddenly asked with surprising lucidity.
“I’m not…”
Sam hadn’t gotten lost since he was twelve. He never got lost; he just didn’t. They’d been in so many different places, they could never have managed with their kind of life if they didn’t have a good sense of direction. But his eyes went from tree to tree to bushes to old stumps, and he had no fucking idea of where they were and what way to go to find the Impala. What he saw around him was both familiar and weirdly out of place, like someone had taken some parts of different sceneries and had put them together again wrong.
“Sam?”
“It’s okay, Dean. We’re not very far from the car.”
Keep walking, and maybe they’d find their way back. Sam settled his arm around his brother’s shoulders, nudged him gently, and Dean started walking again with a groan. Left foot, right foot, they continued like that for some undetermined length of time. Pain was shooting through Sam’s thigh with each new step, and he felt some warmth telling him that blood was seeping again through the makeshift bandage, but he didn’t dare to lower his eyes to check on his leg. The night was clear but chilly. They had nothing in their bags but guns. Sam was loosing blood, Dean’s brain was leaking through his ears, and they just couldn’t stop and sleep in the woods.
Fortunately, an imposing house emerged from behind the trees. Sam whispered a quick prayer of thanks, and made his way towards it.
----
“Again, thank you so much.”
The woman - Janet Martin, she’d said her name was - let out a rippling laugh and shook her head good-naturally at Sam’s profuse thanks. The corners of her eyes crinkled, making her look slightly older than Sam had first thought.
“Stop thanking me! It’s nothing, I’m telling you! Since our children left, my husband and I have been so alone, you have no idea. The house feels so big.”
“And you’re very isolated,” Sam said conversationally. He was dead on his feet, but the woman was offering him and his brother a roof and a bed so he could at least spare her five minutes. Especially since she wasn’t calling the cops on them. “You’ve never thought about moving out?”
Janet Martin’s colorless gaze fell on Sam.
“Where would we go?”
“Uh, I don’t know.” She was looking at him curiously. “I was just wondering…” It made his skin prickle and he wished she would stop. “Never mind.”
“Alright,” she said in a chipper voice. She looked down on Sam’s bloodstained and torn jeans. “Do you need something…” she trailed off.
“Um.” Sam threw a look at his brother. Dean was lying on the right side of the king-sized bed; he had one hand above his eyes to protect them from the electric light, and the other palm flat on his chest, but Sam knew he hadn’t fallen asleep because of the way his jaws kept clenching. “Do you have some thread and a needle? And bandages, please?”
Mrs. Martin smiled brightly, a large grin that showed all her teeth.
“Of course. Everything you need.”
---
Knock, knock.
Sam startled. He was sitting on the bed, his back to the headboard but he must have drowsed off for a second because his heart was beating wildly. He stared dumbly at the door and for one fleeting moment he didn’t remember where he was, but then it all came back to him - a house, lost in the middle of the woods. Their refuge, thank God.
There was another knock on the door.
“S’m,” Dean mumbled. “Door. Open the fuckin’ door.”
Sam stood up stiffly and limped to the door, trying to ignore the dull ache in his thigh.
“Yes?”
A man was standing in the doorway, tall and dark-haired.
“Blankets,” he said in a deep, rumbling voice, and Sam looked down on what the man was carrying in his arms.
“Oh. Thanks. You didn’t have to… we already have blankets.”
“The nights are cold here.”
He looked at the space above Sam’s shoulder.
“You and your brother are hurt. You have to keep warm.”
“You’re right. It’s very thoughtful of you. Thanks again… Mr. Martin?” he finished, slightly questioning. He didn’t know who else it could be, but the man had never introduced himself.
“Call me Brad.”
The man didn’t smile.
“Thank you, Brad.”
Sam waited. The man didn’t move - Sam thought he didn’t even blink.
“Uh, sorry, but…” Sam held out his arms. “The blankets?”
“Right.” Brad Martin put the neatly folded blankets in Sam’s arms. “If you need anything, just knock on our door. It’s the last one at the end of the hallway. Good night.”
“Good night to you.”
Sam went back to the bed, and spread one of the blankets on his brother.
“No sleeping, Dean.”
Dean mumbled something that sounded like ‘fuck you,’ making Sam chuckle tiredly. He set the alarm clock on his cell phone to wake him up in an hour, and lay down at his brother’s side.
Darkness jumped on him, and he was asleep as soon as his head touched his pillow.
---
The ring tone of his phone penetrated Sam’s mind slowly before he realized that it was a prompting to wake up.
He opened his eyes and was surprised by the light, until it occurred to him that he must have forgotten to switch it off. He held out a hand, stretching his fingers so he could grab his phone and turn the annoying ringing off.
“Mmmh.”
Dean moved restlessly against his side. During his sleep, he had rolled over on his good side and was now pressing his face against his younger sibling’s shoulder, wetting the fabric of Sam’s shirt with his drool. Sam stayed still for a moment, enjoying the warmth, the regular breathing, the feeling of his brother alive and with him.
“Dean,” he finally called, shaking him gently. “Wake up, dude.”
Dean whined a little louder.
“I know you’re tired. But I have to check on you. Wake up.”
“Fuckin’ Nazi.”
Sam sat up in the bed and pushed at Dean’s shoulder to turn him on his back. Dean opened his eyes, moaned and closed them immediately.
“Hey, no, no falling asleep again. Need to answer some questions first.”
“Hate you.”
“I know. So first question: what’s your name?”
“Bruce Wayne.”
Sam sighed in aggravation. His hand went through his hair.
“Either you answer the question, or I keep you awake the whole night. I’m not tired.”
That was so not true. His eyes were burning, and his head was pounding with exhaustion. But he knew, and Dean knew, that he was stubborn enough to follow it through on it.
“Dean Winchester. Asshole.”
“I was just asking your official name, not your profession,” Sam said. “Now, when is my birthday?”
“May 2nd.”
“Mom’s maiden name?”
“Campbell.”
“Okay, that’s enough for now. Go back to sleep.”
“Thank you fucking much.”
Dean tried to turn on his stomach, forgetful of his wounded ribs. He grunted in pain and rolled on his back. Sam let himself slide against the headboard and closed his eyes. Opened them right away, straining to listen.
“Did you hear something?” He could have sworn he’d heard a childish voice singing, but now there was nothing but silence. “Dean?”
Dean was already fast asleep.
---
“…plume, pour écrire un mot…”
Sam sat upward, gasping. The voice was back; he’d heard it again. He glanced at Dean - his brother was snoring lightly. Sam held his breath, and for a moment there was nothing but the deafening sound of his own heartbeat.
“… ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu…”
The voice resonated strangely, getting louder, then muffled, making impossible to pinpoint where it came from. But there was indeed a voice, he wasn’t crazy. He wasn’t.
“…ouvre-moi ta porte…”
Sam jumped - the voice sounded so close, almost like someone was whispering at his ear. He threw his legs out of the bed, made his way painfully to the door, but stopped dead at the sharp thought that he was going to leave his brother unprotected. He stared long and hard at Dean’s form beneath the covers. Even if Sam left Dean some weapons, his brother’s brain was too scrambled to use them. He bit his lower lip, uncertain.
“…pour l’amour de Dieu.”
He was going to be real quick. He limped to his brother’s side and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Dean, wake up.”
A muffled groan.
“I’m gonna take a leak. I’ll be right back.”
“Mmph.”
The hallway was longer than he remembered, and plunged in darkness. Sam walked it with his hand brushing the wall, following the faint echo of the voice like a will-o’-the-wisp.
“Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot…”
The voice suddenly stopped, and Sam stopped too. He felt under his hand the bulge of a door handle. He grasped it, but didn’t press down to open. His breath was short but he wasn’t sure what it was that was making his heart beat faster. Light suddenly filled the hallway.
“Can I help you?”
Sam spun around quickly, feeling like the kid with his hand in the cookie jar. It was Janet Martin, with her hair unbound, wearing a long, blue nightgown.
“I was looking for… the bathroom. Could you…?”
“Second door on the left.”
“Thanks. Sorry for…”
“It’s no bother. How is your brother?”
“Fine, he’s fine.”
He was getting nervous for no good reason, and sweat was running down his back.
“Excellent. So goodnight, Sam.”
She turned her back on him.
“Wait!” Sam called before she could walk away. “I think I’ve heard something. A voice? It sounded like a child singing.”
She rubbed her chin thoughtfully.
“I didn’t hear anything,” she finally said. “But it was probably just one of the kids.”
“It didn’t sound like English. I think it was French.”
“Oh, you know children. The things they pick up, here and there.” She smiled suddenly, teeth gleaming in the light. “You can sleep safely, Sam. Nothing ever happens here.”
“Alright, then. I’ll just…”
“Go to the bathroom.”
“Yes. If you don’t mind.”
“Of course not.” Her smile had become softly indulgent, like she was talking to a silly child.
Sam went to the bathroom and locked himself in, just to give himself time for his breathing to slow down. He sat on the tiled floor, breathed in, breathed out, his eyes closed and his forehead resting on his knees. Suddenly, he raised his head, struck by a thought.
What kids? Hadn’t Mrs. Martin said that her children were gone?
---
Sam sat on the side of the bed next to Dean. His brother hadn’t moved an inch since he’d left him earlier. His breathing, his heartbeat were steady. Sam let out a relieved sigh.
He pondered the wisdom of leaving now, in the middle of the night. He hadn’t heard the voice in a at least twenty minutes, he felt calmer, and it seemed to him now that there wasn’t really any reason for alarm. He was exhausted, he had lost some blood - he could have dreamed the voice; he could have misunderstood what Mrs. Martin had told him. Why was he freaking out? There wasn’t anything wrong. He was just on edge, hurt, and tired. He leaned back against the headboard, his long fingers circling Dean’s wrist.
“Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot
Prête-moi ta plume, pour écrire un mot
Ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu
Ouvre-moi ta porte, pour l’amour de Dieu.”
Sam started and fell from the bed, pulling Dean’s arm with him. His brother cried out softly and Sam hurriedly let go of his wrist.
“Sorry, Dean, I’m sorry.”
Dean blinked sluggishly, clicked his tongue and looked at him with blurry eyes.
“Sam?” he slurred.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“What’s goin’ on?”
“Nothing. Go back to sleep.”
But Dean was starting to push himself up, stubborn as usual, emitting a low growl from the back of his throat when the pain stabbed through his chest and he gripped his side.
“Isn’t it time for questions?”
“You look lucid enough. I have to check on something. You lie down, I’ll be back in a sec.”
Dean’s green eyes were bright with pain but he looked more awake than he had since he’d gotten hurt. He tilted his head to look at Sam.
“Is something wrong?”
Sam smiled his most reassuring smile, which wasn’t much. He wasn’t the reassuring one.
“Everything is great.” His brother looked at him dubiously, so Sam felt like he had to add something: “I’ve just heard a noise. I wanna see what it is.”
“Hmm. What’s that saying, again? Curiosity killed the cat.”
But Dean’s eyelids were already drooping. Sam helped him lie down again, smoothed his hair in a quick, affectionate gesture, and got on his feet.
“Stay put,” he said, though he knew his brother couldn’t hear him. He just needed the sound of his own voice.
As an afterthought, he grabbed the gun on his nightstand and tucked it in his jeans. With a last look to his brother, he left the room.
---
He didn’t know what he was doing, not really. He had no idea what he was looking for. The voice had stopped singing and there was only stifling silence, save for the sound of Sam’s heart, pounding loud and steady, maddening. His leg throbbed, the pain progressively eating away at his mind until there was barely any room for anything else.
What the fuck was he doing? Why wasn’t he in his room with his brother, getting some well-deserved rest? But he kept walking, moved by a feeling that he didn’t quite manage to identify. There was something going on in this house, and he intended to find out what exactly. Why hadn’t they tried to call anyone, even just a doctor, when two messed up guys showed up on their doorstep? What kind of people would let them into their house without thinking twice? He couldn’t sleep without knowing, couldn’t trust those people with his and Dean’s safety.
He stopped, prompted by some vague instinct that it was important he did so. He was so tired, his thoughts were so muddled that it took him a whole minute to realize that he was standing in front of the door Janet Martin had kept him from opening earlier. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the need to know what was in this room. His hand found the handle again, and his heart in his throat, he tried to push the door. It opened easily, without even a creaking. Surprised, Sam stumbled a little, headfirst in the empty and dark space revealed. He almost let out a startled cry, but fortunately he could put a hand on his mouth before any sound escaped him. He found his balance, then looked around him. It was too dark for him to identify the strange shapes he could make out, but the smell… He didn’t know how he could have missed it when he was in the hallway, but now it was so strong it burned his airways, left a foul taste in his mouth, made him gag. It was all too familiar - it was the stench of death.
He started walking backward, didn’t want to see what was in the room anymore. He slipped, caught himself on the wall and felt something sticky on his hand.
“Oh, God.”
He couldn’t see very well what it was, could only tell that it was a dark substance, but he could smell it, and knew it was blood. There was blood on the walls. He left the room and closed the door hastily. He turned to go back to his room, and bumped into something warm and solid. Or someone.
“Have you lost your way again, Sam?”
This time she hadn’t switched on the light, but he recognized Mrs. Martin’s voice. She was standing so close to him that he could smell her faint lavender scent, jarring after the stink of decay.
“I… I… I’m sorry, I…”
His mind came blank. He couldn’t move. “Shh,” she said, cupping his cheek with her cold hand, pushing him gently until his back hit the wall. She squeezed up against him, maternally stroking his cheekbone with her thumb, while her other hand slid down his chest and pressed on his crotch in a not-so-motherly gesture. Sam moaned, feeling himself get hard even as he wanted to shove her and run away, helpless shivers of disgust and desire running through his body.
“Let me take care of you,” she whispered, before she bit his earlobe. “You’ll never want to leave.”
---
The cold woke Dean up. The blanket had slipped down to his hips and the air in the room was chilly. His head was killing him.
“Sam?” he called.
He was in a king-sized bed, alone. Was it the last free room in the motel again? It didn’t look like a motel. Where was Sam? He struggled to sit up, though he felt like his head was going to explode, and his chest was tight and aching. Be careful with your fucking ribs, his body was telling him aggressively.
“Sam?” he tried again.
It was useless, he could see that no one else was in the room, but he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Some part of him realized what his slow and broken train of thoughts meant - concussion. Concussion and some cracked ribs. Again, goddamn it.
But it was why Sam’s absence didn’t make sense. Concussion means monitoring - Sam should be there to monitor him. He wasn’t. It didn’t add up. Dean rubbed his face in the hope of clearing his mind, and remembering where he was and how he’d gotten here. And Sam - where the fuck was Sam?
Wait, wait - something was coming back to him. Sam’s voice. Sam had said… Sam had told him he had to check on something, that he’d heard a noise. Dean couldn’t be sure he hadn’t dreamed the whole scene, but it seemed pretty run-of-the-mill compared to his usual concussion-induced dreams, so it was probably real.
He had to find his brother. Sam was gone to check on some noise and he hadn’t come back. Dean didn’t know how much time had passed, but he couldn’t shake off the anxious feeling gnawing at his stomach. The air in the room felt oppressive. He sat on the edge of his bed, stood up, and was assailed by a wave of dizziness and nausea. He leaned against the wall, waiting for it to pass, and when it did he pushed himself off resolutely.
Somebody knocking at the door stopped him in his tracks. He didn’t know why, but the noise sent alarms through his mind. He saw his bag and Sam’s in a corner of the room, went to it silently and found his gun. His vision was blurry, but Sam wasn’t here and something was wrong. The knocking became insistent. Dean held on tightly to his gun.
“Who’s there?”
---
For a moment, Sam couldn’t find in him the strength to fight Janet undulating against him. She was trying to find her way to his mouth, holding his face between her hands while he tried to turn his head on the side, pressing his lips tightly together. Her own lips were cold and chapped, which he hadn’t noticed before, and he felt like puking, but at the same time his arousal was overwhelming, erasing all thoughts from his mind that weren’t the aching need of his dick. She took hold of his wrist and forced him to put his hand on the cool skin of her hip, where she’d pulled her nightgown up, and for some reason it made it snap back to himself. His mind cleared, and he was still hard but could think past it.
He tested the hold she had on him and found her abnormally strong - or it might have been that he was too weak - so instead of fighting her he passed his hand that wasn’t pressed against her flesh behind his back, and his fingers found his gun. To distract her from what he was doing he stopped struggling entirely, let her kiss him on the lips and even half-opened them when her tongue tried to penetrate his mouth. It felt like a piece of cold meat, but he didn’t allow himself to dwell on the sensation. He drew his arm from his back to her side, and pressed the trigger.
She squeaked and crumpled in a heap, her knees loudly hitting the floor. Sam felt the warmth of her blood soak his shirt and a wave of nausea overcame him. He pushed her away brutally, and ran without looking back.
The hallway went on forever - at this point, he was ready to think that the house was cursed, or alive - and he ran faster, in spite of the agonizing pain in his thigh and the blood he felt running down his leg, telling him that he must have popped some of the stitches. It wasn’t enough to stop him. Then a gunshot resounded in the house, and that was enough.
“Oh, Dean,” he whispered, before he started running again.
In front of their room’s door, he found Brad Martin lying on the floor with his brains blown out. Blood and gray matter had splashed on the wall, but Sam barely paid attention to it. He stepped over the body, avoiding the pool of blood forming.
“Dean!”
His brother was standing in the middle of the room, a little unsteady on his feet but sill holding firmly his gun with both hands. He jerked it in Sam’s direction when he came into the room.
“Wow, Dean! Hold on, dude, it’s me.”
“Sammy?”
“Yes, I’m here.”
“He… His fucking eyes, they were… He tried to…”
“It’s alright, now,” Sam soothed. “You can…”
“Sam, behind you!”
Sam turned to see Martin stand up slowly. Half of his face was gone, but he looked as unfazed as ever, his eyes gleaming strangely in the half-lit space between the room and the hallway. Sam pointed his gun to his chest and shot - one, two, three times, not that it wasn’t doing any good but at least it seemed to slow down Brad Martin - or whatever the fuck he was - and it gave Sam the time to shout to his brother:
“Dean, take the bags, we’re going!”
His brother still looked confused but the authoritative tone seemed to push the right button because he complied right away.
“The window!”
Dean went to the window, opened it. Sam had managed to drive Martin back to the hallway and he slammed the door to his face. Looked around him for something to push in front of it.
“Dean, the wardrobe!”
Dean had thrown their bags outside, and he ran to wardrobe and started to push it with all his strength. Sam winced when he heard his brother groan in pain because of the strain the effort put on his ribs, and it was hard to resist going and helping him but he couldn’t leave the door and let Martin come in. Sam didn’t know what he would do to them, but he had no trust in someone who could walk with a hole in his head and several others in his chest.
When the wardrobe was in place, the brothers rushed towards the window. Sam could see a huge tree with one branch close enough that he could almost touch it. It was their way to safety - if they could reach it, they would be able to leave this godforsaken house without breaking both of their legs in the process.
“Let me go first,” Sam said.
Dean was leaning against the wall, his arm encircling his middle and his face tense with pain, and he said nothing, which was agreement enough for Sam. The pounding on the door was getting louder and louder.
Sam reached out in the darkness.
---
There were plenty of places that held bad significance for Sam. Plenty of horrible memories that were just hard to let go of. But in all his fucked up life, he didn’t think he’d ever felt such a revulsion to coming back somewhere as he did when they finally found the Martins’ house in the middle of the woods. They’d come armed to the teeth, ready for everything - ghost, zombies, demons, you name it. Now that they were here, though, Bobby looked a little dubious.
“You sure it’s here?’ he asked.
Sam stared at the house for a long moment. It was both the same and different than from the last time he’d been here. He was pretty sure it was the same house, but for one, it looked a lot smaller than in his memories. More importantly, it looked completely derelict. In fact, without the nightmares Sam still had about that night, he would have thought it looked perfectly innocuous.
“I think it’s the one,” he said, a little hesitantly. “It looks kind of different, though.”
He turned to Dean for support, but his brother shrugged.
“Don’t ask me, I don’t remember a lot from that night. I was pretty out of it.”
Bobby was looking at Sam thoughtfully, and it was irritating him, making him feel like an unreasonable child.
“I didn’t hallucinate the whole thing, if this is what you think,” he said sharply. “The house is there, isn’t it? Maybe the Martins, whatever they are, put some glamour on it, I don’t know. But it was real. It was all real.”
He remembered the cold fingers of Janet Martin on him, the blood running down Brad Martin’s face and covering it like a red curtain, and he shuddered. If that wasn’t real, then nothing was.
“I say we salt and burn the whole goddamn house,” Dean said, looking at him in an attentive way that Sam identified as worry. He smiled at his big brother.
“I say let’s fucking do it.”
Dean’s grin was brighter than the sun.
---
A/N: For those who want, here is a rough translation (by myself) of the French song's lyrics:
Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot / By the moonlight, my friend Pierrot,
Prête-moi ta plume, pour écrire un mot / Let me borrow your quill, to write a note
Ma chandelle est morte, je n’ai plus de feu / My candle died, I don't have anymore light
Ouvre-moi ta porte, pour l’amour de Dieu. / Open your door, for the love of God.
Also, geeky details about some references in the fic:
-The family name "Martin" was chosen in reference to a famous French crime case. In 1833, Pierre and Marie Martin, the owners of the "Auberge de Peyrebeille" (Peyrebeille Inn) in Larnace, Ardèche (South-West of France) were condemned and executed for having robbed and murdered more than fifty travellers. Their inn has received the name of "L'Auberge Rouge" (Red Inn) and has inspired a number of books and movies. Today historians agree to say that the evidence against the Martins were far from being convincing enough.
-The room Sam discovers was inspired by the French tale " La Barbe bleue" (Bluebeard): an old nobleman marry a young woman. One day he leaves the country and gives all the keys in the castle to his wife, while forbidding her to open one room. Of course, she doesn't listen to him and discovers the bodies of her husband's previous wives in the room.