Fields of Ice (R | Jo/Lucifer)
Title: Fields of Ice
Rating: R
betas: pandionpandeus and orcale_thunder
Pairings/Characters: Jo/Lucifer, Michael
Warnings: AU, spoilers for season five
Word Count: 4900
Summary: Jo isn't sure if this is Heaven or Hell. But there is almost nothing here but ice.
On AO3
Jo still isn’t sure if this is heaven.
She knows she’s dead. She remembers the hellhound and the pain. The kiss from Dean.
She’s fairly sure this isn’t hell.
This place is -- empty.
Or it was.
When she'd first arrived, first opened her eyes to the overly bright whiteness of snow. All around her was an empty expanse of snow. All empty nothingness but for an outcropping of rock that jutted from the snow like a beacon.
Jo had spent what felt like days walking towards it, the cold biting at her but not doing any real harm. So she couldn’t freeze to death, just felt like she could, which is little comfort. When she’d reached the rock, it was larger than she'd thought, a small cave at the base of it, big enough for her to curl into and rest.
That’s how she’d spent far too long, hunger gnawing at her, cold biting her. She occupied herself as best she could. She'd talked out loud, sang, and told stories.
She'd started talking to the rock itself.
The cave started to feel warmer.
Gradually the snow outside had retreated and she ventured out. A circle of green surrounded the rock, dotted with the bright red of berries revealed by the snow. Jo had eaten so many her stomach hurt, but it was a good sort of pain.
The snow had retreated more and more and a stream melted, teeming with fish . She’d then wished for trees so she could make a fire and cook some fish.
The next day there had been trees dotting her growing sanctuary from the snow.
The fish she managed to catch was the best thing she’d ever tasted.
She'd kept track of time by the light and dark. There were no stars, no sun, no moon. Just light, then dark.
It was after forty of these that she'd woken to a surprise. By her rock was a small stone house.
It was two more cycles of light and dark before she entered it. It was small, cozy, and rustic. The house had a kitchen with a wood stove, a small bedroom with a fire place and a small bathroom. A chest in the bedroom contained clothes that hadn't quite fit her but were near enough
In the small bathroom there was even a claw foot tub. There had been no plumbing but after weeks -- months -- of living in the cave this ... this was heaven.
She'd heated water on the stove, bathed, dressed in clean warm clothes she found, and burned fish on the stove.
Jo thinks now that this is some sort of purgatory, limbo, something.
She’s making the best of it. She has a garden now, started from seeds she finds in the kitchen. One day a puppy wanders up and Jo gives him some fish.
She names him Buck. He follows her to and fro on her chores.
Jo makes sure to spend part of everyday talking to the rock. She’s not sure why, but it feels important. And she misses people. She misses her mom.
Life goes on in this way. Or in Jo’s case, death.
*****
Jo wakes up during one of the dark periods to a loud crash. Like something hitting the ground hard. She stuffs her feet in her boots and hurries out, Buck on her heels.
There’s a fire burning not too far from the edge of the melted area Jo’s claimed as her own. Jo unstraps her knife from her boot and heads out towards it. Did she show up here in a similar manner?
Snow crunches under her feet and it’s the only sound until an inhuman shriek fills the air. Buck whines and Jo covers her ears. When the sound stops she sees them.
Two human figures are on the ground, rolling together. It takes almost too long for Jo to realize they’re fighting.
Then she recognizes one of the figures. “Sam?” she gasps out, her voice sounding far too loud.
Sam and the other man tear apart from each other. Their eyes focusing on her.
Behind her Buck growls.
Sam looks at her oddly, like he’s never seen her before.
It’s the other man that speaks first. “How did you come to be in the cage?” he demands.
“Cage?” Jo echoes back.
Buck grabs the tail of her shirt and pulls at her.
There are shadows across the snow behind each of them; shadows that don’t match their figures completely.
Sam -- the creature wearing Sam-- takes a step toward her.
Suddenly everything clicks in a rush. All the things that were unimportant in her new existence rush back. Cage. Lucifer escaped from the cage. So is this....
Jo’s turning on her heel and running before she can think another thought. She stumbles just as she reaches the stream. It’s then that she looks behind her.
Sam -- Lucifer is standing at the edge of the snow line staring at it.
The other man -- thing -- is a few feet away.
He can’t cross that line. It comes like an epiphany.
Jo picks herself up from the ground and strokes Buck’s head. “You aren’t welcome where I live,” she says firmly. “Either of you.”
And with a show of more courage than she feels she turns her back on them and heads back to the house.
***
Lucifer - it’s weird thinking of him like that when it looks like Sam -- is still standing at the edge of the snow line the next morning. Jo decides the best defense is to ignore them. If they can’t cross the line, she’s fine.
She works in her garden, singing under her breath, studiously avoiding thinking about the fact that she’s in the cage. The Cage. She died and went to the --
There’s a sharp sound behind her, like a growl; and when she looks over her shoulder, the two are fighting again. She can see their wings this time. They’re torn ragged things and they use them to bash into the other.
She watches, unable to look away.
Lucifer uses Sam’s larger form to his advantage against the smaller -- angel? Jo guesses it must be. Not Michael or she’d be seeing Dean.
She looks away quickly when the other angel’s nails tear into Sam’s skin. It’s not Sam, she reminds herself sharply.
Jo goes back to her garden, then fishes for her and Buck’s dinner.
She doesn’t look at them until she realizes it’s quiet. They’ve retreated from each other. The other angel’s back is to the snow line and Lucifer huddles a few feet away. They both look bloody and the snow is no longer a smooth expanse of gleaming white. It looks muddy in some places.
Jo turns away from them.
It rains that night.
In the morning, she finds the two foes muddy and drenched, still in their standoff. It lasts until Lucifer hisses something across the distance, his wings arching up. Then they’re at each other again.
Jo does her best to ignore them.
Time stretches on, until she looks one day and it’s no longer Sam crouching in the mixture of mud and snow. It’s still Lucifer, she’s grown to know those wings -- streaks of red under the soot and mud -- but it’s not Sam’s body anymore.
It looks ---
It looks more like him. Which is an odd thought. How can the devil look more like himself?
It’s on that morning she finds out the identity of the other angel.
“Why did you follow me, Michael,” Lucifer growls, moving towards the snow line. He’s not attacking, he’s just moving, not towards Michael so much as her. And shit if that’s not a little scary.
Michael -- and who is Michael wearing -- is silent long enough that Jo thinks there will be no answer.
“Because I love you.”
Jo snorts.
Lucifer looks directly at her then and she does her best to not drop her eyes.
“Liar,” Lucifer hisses.
Jo sort of agrees.
***
One of the trees yields apples one day. Jo smiles at the irony of it, finds a basket, and climbs the tree to start picking.
It’s a quiet day. Michael is sitting like a sentry again on part of the snow line, his back to her. Lucifer watches her.
It’s what he does when he and Michael aren’t tearing into each other. Jo’s starting to learn to ignore it.
“Why apples?” he finally asks as she climbs down.
Jo frowns. The tree is closer to the snow line, and so she is closer to where Lucifer is. “I like apples?” she says in confusion.
Then he does something unexpected. He smiles. “So do I.”
On impulse, Jo picks up one of the apples and tosses it to him. “So I’ve heard.”
He tilts his head to the side. His skin is damaged in ways that can’t just be from Michael’s attacks. “I enjoyed eating,” he says like he’s telling her a secret.
Jo finds herself smiling. Maybe she’s just starved for conversation; maybe the devil is just as charming as people say. “It was one of the perks,” she agrees.
Lucifer bites into the apple and nods. Then just like that the moment is over. He turns away, moving towards Michael. Jo picks up her basket of apples and goes inside.
Maybe she’ll make pie.
***
It rains for the next seven days. It’s a sharp, icy sort of rain that feels like it could cut her skin to ribbons. Jo and Buck stay inside.
Lucifer and Michael fight non-stop.
Though sometimes she swears she feels Lucifer’s eyes finding hers through the window.
***
Lucifer’s wing is broken.
Jo is horrified by the way it hangs limply at his side. He huddles against the muddy snow line -- how the snow is staying she isn’t sure. Michael has wandered off into the distance and part of her hopes he’s damned ashamed of himself.
You don’t say you love someone and hurt them like that.
Michael starts the fights, she’s figured that much out. She’s sure Lucifer has provoked a fair few, though.
Right now, though, she’s doing something insane. She’s carrying a bucket of warm water, a bunch of rags, and some apples, preparing to step across the snow line for the first time since the angels showed up.
“I’m going to clean your wing,” she tells him, borrowing her mother’s don’t argue with me tone.
Lucifer stares up at her. Jo hands him an apple.
“Do you want to lose it?” she asks.
“The nature of this place wouldn’t allow me to,” Lucifer tells her, almost apologetically.
Jo huffs in frustration. “I’m still cleaning it.”
She drops to her knees in the mud and starts to work. The feathers are stiff with blood and mud, but he holds still for her.
Jo hums as she works, stopping a few times to refill the bucket in the stream. When she finds the break, she’s almost sick. It looks --- bad.
She cleans and binds it with clean rags the best she can. When she’s done, he’s trembling.
“I’m sorry,” she says softly, giving him another apple.
He blinks at her. “For what?”
“Hurting you,” she explains. He just stares, like the words don’t make sense. “Let me clean the other one.”
Slowly, he nods.
“What song do you hum?” he asks, as she starts on the other wing.
It’s her to turn blink in confusion. “Just this song one of my friends at college listened to,” she tells him. “I don’t even remember all the words. It’s just been stuck in my head.”
He’s silent for a few minutes. “Will you sing it?”
Jo finds herself blushing. “I guess?”
“Sleeping Beauty lays her head a hundred years to rest. Then fee, fi, fo the giant fums
And to my dark Prince Charming comes,” Jo starts to sing softly. She doesn’t think she’s a very good singer and she wasn’t lying that she didn’t remember all the words.
But she sings for him and he listens.
When she’s done with that song, she starts another. It’s one of her mother’s favorites by Bob Dylan.
Soon his wing is clean and she’s out of songs. Jo gives him the last of the apples. “Don’t pick fights with Michael for a while, please. At least until your wing is better.”
Slowly, he nods. “I will do so,” he says.
“Good.” Jo feels a weird sense of giddiness. She told him not to do something and he agreed. It feels a bit unreal. “Right, I need to go clean up.”
She climbs to her feet and starts to cross back across the snow line when his hand on her wrist stops her.
“Joanna,” he says softly, as if he’s afraid something or someone else will hear her name. “Thank you.”
Jo smiles. “You’re welcome.”
That night it doesn’t rain and Jo dreams of flying in someone’s arms like she’s Lois Lane.
***
The next day Jo spots Lucifer kneeling in the dirt when she comes out of the cottage. Well(,) not exactly kneeling. He’s digging in the dirt around the snow line, dropping something, then recovering the hole...
Then it hits her. Lucifer is planting the apple seeds from the apples she’d given him.
She watches his movements and the way he keeps his injured wing held against him for far too long. He’s slow, methodical, and almost graceful.
A smile comes easily to Jo’s face and she bends down to scratch Buck’s ears. How long will the trees take to grow, she wonders. But she has carrots and lettuce to harvest and they won’t get that way with her standing there watching the curve of the devil's back.
It’s later in the day and Jo’s hands are dirty. She pulls up the last of the carrots and sits back on her heels. “Fish stew tonight,” she tells Buck.
He barks playfully back at her.
“In the dirt -- “ Michael’s voice carries unexpectedly, drawing Jo’s attention.
The archangel is standing over Lucifer. From the angle she’s at, his face is unreadable. But he looms over Lucifer, his wings arched upward. Jo’s hand is on her knife before she thinks about it.
Then Michael gestures towards the dirt.
Jo gets it suddenly.
Michael doesn’t understand what Lucifer’s doing. Not that she does, but --
She remembers what Dean told her about angels. High and mighty, smug assholes. ”Cas, got better”,, Dean had told her with a lazy grin. ”To the rest of them? We’re mud monkeys.”
Michael thinks Lucifer is lowering himself. Lowering himself by planting seeds, maybe even by wanting the apples that will come.
Lucifer just kneels there, wings curled over himself. Jo hates Michael a little bit in that moment. Hates him.
Michael moves closer to Lucifer and Jo’s on her feet. Her knife is in her hand and she is hurrying across to where they stand. She’ll be damned if she lets Michael start a fight when Lucifer’s wounded.
“Leave him alone!” she snaps, coming to a stop just behind Lucifer. “Don’t you have some self-flagellation to do?”
Michael looks up at her, eyes narrowed. It’s gone in a flash but she thinks -- was that jealousy on his face?
“This does not concern you, human.”
Jo bristles. “I live here, too, so yes, it does, asshole.”
He looks at her like she’s lost her mind and he wants to smite her all at the same time. “No one lives in the Cage. This is a prison. A place of torment. A place to be endured,” he hisses at her. “Father must have had a reason to condemn you here.”
Lucifer rises between them, flaring out his good wing. “You will not address her in that manner, Michael,” his voice is cold, even. “You will treat her with respect.”
The two stare at each other for what seems forever before Michael says something Jo doesn’t understand. Lucifer inclines his head.
Michael bares his teeth and stalks off across the snow.
Lucifer watches, his wing dropping slightly.
Jo --- Jo doesn’t know what to do or say.
“Michael was not always like this,” Lucifer says, apologizes. He doesn’t turn.
Jo bites her lip. This isn’t a problem she knows how to handle or one she thinks is wise to even think about handling. Her knife won’t protect Lucifer, and God it’s screwed up even thinking that. She can’t salt and burn this away and there’s no one for her to talk to. Just Lucifer, Michael, and Buck.
And the rock.
“Do you have siblings?” Lucifer asks.
“No,” she tells him. She’d always wanted a brother though.
“Be thankful,” Lucifer says, then heads off after Michael.
Jo frowns watching his wings as he goes. Come inside, she almost calls to him.
Buck whines at her side and Jo goes back to her chores.
***
Jo doesn’t see either of them for days.
She checks on Lucifer’s apple seeds each day they’re gone.
She dreams of feathers and cool skin when she’s lucky. Fire, blood, and hellhound teeth when she’s not.
One dream she wakes from with a groan, her thighs slick. So far, that’s Jo’s favorite dream.
***
When Jo sees a figure with wings walking towards the snow line, she darts out of the kitchen, hands still a mess from the rabbit meat pie she was attempting to make. Lucifer’s back, runs through her mind without permission, follow by a rush of what certainly feels like happiness.
She reaches the edge of the land that’s hers before she sees the figure properly.
It’s Michael.
Lucifer is nowhere to be seen.
Jo bares her teeth and pulls her knife from her boot. “Where is he?” she demands. Her minds fills with hellish visions of what Michael might have done to his younger brother. Michael might say he loves Lucifer but she doubts how far that will go against what he thinks should happen, what his Father might have once commanded.
The cottage had some -- interesting -- reading material. Outside the Supernatural novels, that is.
Michael stares at her like she was a bad smell he’d hoped would be gone by now. “You’re still here.”
“Yeah, not really any place to go,” Jo snaps. “Now where is Lucifer? What have you done to him?”
“Why do you care? He was responsible for your death,” Michael points out.
Jo flinches, remembering teeth and pain. The strained sound of her mother’s voice. “Hellhounds killed me,” she corrects.
Michael’s face is expressionless. “I do not understand you or your,” his mouth twists, “kindness to my brother.”
“I ran out of hate sitting in the snow,” Jo says. “And I think he hates himself enough,”
Michael’s quiet.
Jo eyes him cautiously. “This place is punishment isn’t it? Cut off from his family, alone, trapped in nothingness.”
“It’s not nothingness,” Michael points out snidely.
“No, it’s not and may I remind you, that you’re the one that threw himself down here,” she shoots back.
Michael looks away then. “I wished to end it as our Father wanted.”
Jo raises her chin. “You said you did it because you loved him.”
“Giving him death would be an act of love,” Michael tells her, a soft tremble shaking his feathers.
“Bullshit,” Jo snaps. “Utter bullshit.”
Michael’s wings flare, giving the impression of him throwing his hands up. “If you wish to know where my brother is, it’s someplace out there. We spoke, then he continued walking on.”
Jo grits her teeth.
She whistles for Buck, who runs to her side. “Keep an eye on the place while I’m gone,” she tells him.
Michael takes a step towards her and Buck growls. “Where are you going?” he demands.
“To find Lucifer and bring him back here,” she says as if it is obvious. It should be obvious.
“You cannot,” he protests.
“I can damn well,” Jo tells him, sheathing her knife.
Michael grabs her wrist, pulling her towards him. “Why are you doing this? You cannot know what you’re doing!”
Jo yanks away from him, wondering just what he means but not trusting him to ask. “Maybe I don’t know what I’m doing. But I’m going to find him.”
She starts walking in the direction Michael came from. The direction she remembers Lucifer walking in. The snow crunches under her boots.
Michael lets her go.
***
Jo’s feet ache. She feels like she’s been walking for days. Maybe she has been. It’s hard to tell out on the bright snow.
Her only guide is the foot prints that break up the solid expanse of white. Jo scans the horizon for Lucifer’s familiar form.
Sometimes she thinks she won’t find him.
The cold bites at her skin and she wants to sit down, rest. Just for a moment.
But she keeps walking.
Jo sees his wings first. The shadows stretch across the snow, the familiar way he holds them, the injured one. He’s standing with his back to her, a lonely sentinel in the emptiness.
“Lucifer,” she calls and her voice sounds strangely loud.
He doesn’t turn but his wings twitch.
“Joanna,” he answers her back.
Jo closes her eyes and just stands for a moment.
Then she takes a step.
And another step.
And another.
She presses against his back, forehead resting between the juncture of his wings.
Lucifer goes tense under her, wings rising slightly. He doesn’t move away.
”You scared me,” she doesn't say.
His wings arch back, brushing against her.
“What are you doing out here?” he asks her, voice low and rough.
Jo almost laughs. “Looking for you.”
His back muscles twitch, flicking his wings against her skin. “Why?”
“To bring you back,” she tells him.
“Back to Michael,” he says dryly.
Jo’s life since coming to this place, the Cage, has been simple.
This is just as simple.
“No, back to me.”
Lucifer turns then, slowly. He looks down at her, eyes strangely soft. “Joanna,” he breathes her name like a benediction.
His forehead touches hers.
“I will return with you.”
***
And he does.
They walk back across the snow together, following their footsteps.
Lucifer walks so his good wing curls slightly around her shoulders.
They don’t talk.
To Jo the walk back seems -- faster. They see Michael first, standing like a statue looking in their direction. Lucifer seems to tense, his wing drawing her in closer.
Jo, without thinking, touches the feathers, wanting to reassure him. Lucifer inhales sharply and his fingers touch the back of her wrist.
“Lucifer,” Michael says, stepping forward. The archangel’s eyes are narrowed as he takes in her and Lucifer, the way they touch, the way they stand. “Joanna.”
Lucifer raises his chin. “We have returned,” he says.
“So I see,” Michael tone is almost too neutral, too calm.
Jo rolls her eyes and huffs out a sigh. “If you two are done, I’m hungry,” Jo tells them. Buck comes running up across the snow line, barking and jumping around Jo’s legs.
She starts towards the snow line and looks back at Lucifer. “Luc, you coming?”
He stares at her like he doesn’t comprehend her words.
Jo holds out her hand. “You can help me make lunch.”
Carefully, he slides his hand into hers. “I would like that.”
She leads him across the snow line, Buck at their heels. Michael stands at the edge watching them, wings raised.
Lucifer follows her into the cottage. The rooms seem to expand to fit his wings. Somehow it doesn’t surprise Jo; it’s just another aspect of this place.
“Do you enjoy cooking?” Lucifer asks her.
Jo laughs. “I’m not sure. It’s something to do here. I never really cooked...before. There never was a need to.”
Lucifer takes another bite of stew. “You do so very well,” he tells her awkwardly.
She shakes her head. “You’re probably just hungry.”
He smiles, bowing his head slightly. “Maybe so.”
Their lunch turns out to be dinner as exhaustion starts to weigh down on Jo.
There isn’t more than one bed but the decision isn’t even one. Jo takes Lucifer by the hand and leads him to her bed. He follows, wings trembling.
It’s chaste, the way they lie together. They touch foreheads and whisper in the dark.
Jo tells him about first coming here, about the days in the cold.
Hesitantly, he speaks of how this place was once fire before the snow, but it was always empty.
His good wing settles over her and she feels warmer than she’s felt in ages.
***
Jo wakes to the sight of feathers. Splashes of red mixed in among blackened feathers. The wing is splayed across her like a blanket. She lays there for a while in the dim light.
She just...floats.
Lucifer’s eyes are closed, eye lashes dark smudges against his skin. He looks at peace.
Jo brushes her fingers against the underside of his wing. She’s touched his wings before. She cleaned them, but this feels … different. Her fingers trace down to the base of the wing, touches the skin there at the juncture.
Lucifer inhales sharply, and her eyes fly to his face.
His eyes are open, dilated to black rings.
Her fingers pause.
“Joanna,” he breathes and she shivers at the inflections in his voice. He leans his forehead against hers. “Please, do not stop.”
Jo spreads her fingers and he shudders.
Lucifer’s fingers touch the side of her neck and trail down to her collar bone. Then they just rest there. Warmth floods through her.
He dips his head further and rubs their noses together in a slow nuzzle.
“Why?” he asks softly as her fingers still comb through his feathers.
“Why what?”
“This. With me.” Each word is followed by another slow nuzzle.
Jo closes her eyes and just breathes in. He smells like cinnamon and apples. “I don’t know. I should hate you,” she whispers. “But I can’t. The thought of you never coming back ---”
“I would have had you burn with the rest, and my grace would have mourned. I would have known but I would have been less for it.”
Jo kisses him.
It’s like a static charge goes off.
The room floods with light as Jo gasps. Pleasure, so fierce and so strong that it leaves her shaking, runs through her body. Lucifer’s voice rings out loud, clear, and high like the peal of a bell. The world seems to explode around her and it’s better than any orgasm she’s ever felt, and she can feel him in a way that her mind can’t even comprehend.
The world rights itself in pieces.
Lucifer’s fingers moving up and down her spine. His breath against her ear. The weight of his wing.
“Father be praised,” he whispers as she shifts forward, tucking herself against him more. ”Are you hurt?”
Jo smiles and kisses him. “No.”
His hand trembles against her skin. “I feared ..”
“So was that angel sex?” she asks, reaching up and brushing her knuckles against the underside of his wing.
Lucifer’s exhale also sounds like a fond sigh. “In a manner of speaking.”
Jo grins and slides her hands over his chest. “I liked it.”
“We are very compatible,” he admits, pulling her closer to his body. “I would like joining with you again.”
She kisses him again, this time coaxing his mouth open slightly. “Yeah,” she agrees, breathlessly.
Outside it starts to snow.
Rating: R
betas: pandionpandeus and orcale_thunder
Pairings/Characters: Jo/Lucifer, Michael
Warnings: AU, spoilers for season five
Word Count: 4900
Summary: Jo isn't sure if this is Heaven or Hell. But there is almost nothing here but ice.
On AO3
Jo still isn’t sure if this is heaven.
She knows she’s dead. She remembers the hellhound and the pain. The kiss from Dean.
She’s fairly sure this isn’t hell.
This place is -- empty.
Or it was.
When she'd first arrived, first opened her eyes to the overly bright whiteness of snow. All around her was an empty expanse of snow. All empty nothingness but for an outcropping of rock that jutted from the snow like a beacon.
Jo had spent what felt like days walking towards it, the cold biting at her but not doing any real harm. So she couldn’t freeze to death, just felt like she could, which is little comfort. When she’d reached the rock, it was larger than she'd thought, a small cave at the base of it, big enough for her to curl into and rest.
That’s how she’d spent far too long, hunger gnawing at her, cold biting her. She occupied herself as best she could. She'd talked out loud, sang, and told stories.
She'd started talking to the rock itself.
The cave started to feel warmer.
Gradually the snow outside had retreated and she ventured out. A circle of green surrounded the rock, dotted with the bright red of berries revealed by the snow. Jo had eaten so many her stomach hurt, but it was a good sort of pain.
The snow had retreated more and more and a stream melted, teeming with fish . She’d then wished for trees so she could make a fire and cook some fish.
The next day there had been trees dotting her growing sanctuary from the snow.
The fish she managed to catch was the best thing she’d ever tasted.
She'd kept track of time by the light and dark. There were no stars, no sun, no moon. Just light, then dark.
It was after forty of these that she'd woken to a surprise. By her rock was a small stone house.
It was two more cycles of light and dark before she entered it. It was small, cozy, and rustic. The house had a kitchen with a wood stove, a small bedroom with a fire place and a small bathroom. A chest in the bedroom contained clothes that hadn't quite fit her but were near enough
In the small bathroom there was even a claw foot tub. There had been no plumbing but after weeks -- months -- of living in the cave this ... this was heaven.
She'd heated water on the stove, bathed, dressed in clean warm clothes she found, and burned fish on the stove.
Jo thinks now that this is some sort of purgatory, limbo, something.
She’s making the best of it. She has a garden now, started from seeds she finds in the kitchen. One day a puppy wanders up and Jo gives him some fish.
She names him Buck. He follows her to and fro on her chores.
Jo makes sure to spend part of everyday talking to the rock. She’s not sure why, but it feels important. And she misses people. She misses her mom.
Life goes on in this way. Or in Jo’s case, death.
*****
Jo wakes up during one of the dark periods to a loud crash. Like something hitting the ground hard. She stuffs her feet in her boots and hurries out, Buck on her heels.
There’s a fire burning not too far from the edge of the melted area Jo’s claimed as her own. Jo unstraps her knife from her boot and heads out towards it. Did she show up here in a similar manner?
Snow crunches under her feet and it’s the only sound until an inhuman shriek fills the air. Buck whines and Jo covers her ears. When the sound stops she sees them.
Two human figures are on the ground, rolling together. It takes almost too long for Jo to realize they’re fighting.
Then she recognizes one of the figures. “Sam?” she gasps out, her voice sounding far too loud.
Sam and the other man tear apart from each other. Their eyes focusing on her.
Behind her Buck growls.
Sam looks at her oddly, like he’s never seen her before.
It’s the other man that speaks first. “How did you come to be in the cage?” he demands.
“Cage?” Jo echoes back.
Buck grabs the tail of her shirt and pulls at her.
There are shadows across the snow behind each of them; shadows that don’t match their figures completely.
Sam -- the creature wearing Sam-- takes a step toward her.
Suddenly everything clicks in a rush. All the things that were unimportant in her new existence rush back. Cage. Lucifer escaped from the cage. So is this....
Jo’s turning on her heel and running before she can think another thought. She stumbles just as she reaches the stream. It’s then that she looks behind her.
Sam -- Lucifer is standing at the edge of the snow line staring at it.
The other man -- thing -- is a few feet away.
He can’t cross that line. It comes like an epiphany.
Jo picks herself up from the ground and strokes Buck’s head. “You aren’t welcome where I live,” she says firmly. “Either of you.”
And with a show of more courage than she feels she turns her back on them and heads back to the house.
***
Lucifer - it’s weird thinking of him like that when it looks like Sam -- is still standing at the edge of the snow line the next morning. Jo decides the best defense is to ignore them. If they can’t cross the line, she’s fine.
She works in her garden, singing under her breath, studiously avoiding thinking about the fact that she’s in the cage. The Cage. She died and went to the --
There’s a sharp sound behind her, like a growl; and when she looks over her shoulder, the two are fighting again. She can see their wings this time. They’re torn ragged things and they use them to bash into the other.
She watches, unable to look away.
Lucifer uses Sam’s larger form to his advantage against the smaller -- angel? Jo guesses it must be. Not Michael or she’d be seeing Dean.
She looks away quickly when the other angel’s nails tear into Sam’s skin. It’s not Sam, she reminds herself sharply.
Jo goes back to her garden, then fishes for her and Buck’s dinner.
She doesn’t look at them until she realizes it’s quiet. They’ve retreated from each other. The other angel’s back is to the snow line and Lucifer huddles a few feet away. They both look bloody and the snow is no longer a smooth expanse of gleaming white. It looks muddy in some places.
Jo turns away from them.
It rains that night.
In the morning, she finds the two foes muddy and drenched, still in their standoff. It lasts until Lucifer hisses something across the distance, his wings arching up. Then they’re at each other again.
Jo does her best to ignore them.
Time stretches on, until she looks one day and it’s no longer Sam crouching in the mixture of mud and snow. It’s still Lucifer, she’s grown to know those wings -- streaks of red under the soot and mud -- but it’s not Sam’s body anymore.
It looks ---
It looks more like him. Which is an odd thought. How can the devil look more like himself?
It’s on that morning she finds out the identity of the other angel.
“Why did you follow me, Michael,” Lucifer growls, moving towards the snow line. He’s not attacking, he’s just moving, not towards Michael so much as her. And shit if that’s not a little scary.
Michael -- and who is Michael wearing -- is silent long enough that Jo thinks there will be no answer.
“Because I love you.”
Jo snorts.
Lucifer looks directly at her then and she does her best to not drop her eyes.
“Liar,” Lucifer hisses.
Jo sort of agrees.
***
One of the trees yields apples one day. Jo smiles at the irony of it, finds a basket, and climbs the tree to start picking.
It’s a quiet day. Michael is sitting like a sentry again on part of the snow line, his back to her. Lucifer watches her.
It’s what he does when he and Michael aren’t tearing into each other. Jo’s starting to learn to ignore it.
“Why apples?” he finally asks as she climbs down.
Jo frowns. The tree is closer to the snow line, and so she is closer to where Lucifer is. “I like apples?” she says in confusion.
Then he does something unexpected. He smiles. “So do I.”
On impulse, Jo picks up one of the apples and tosses it to him. “So I’ve heard.”
He tilts his head to the side. His skin is damaged in ways that can’t just be from Michael’s attacks. “I enjoyed eating,” he says like he’s telling her a secret.
Jo finds herself smiling. Maybe she’s just starved for conversation; maybe the devil is just as charming as people say. “It was one of the perks,” she agrees.
Lucifer bites into the apple and nods. Then just like that the moment is over. He turns away, moving towards Michael. Jo picks up her basket of apples and goes inside.
Maybe she’ll make pie.
***
It rains for the next seven days. It’s a sharp, icy sort of rain that feels like it could cut her skin to ribbons. Jo and Buck stay inside.
Lucifer and Michael fight non-stop.
Though sometimes she swears she feels Lucifer’s eyes finding hers through the window.
***
Lucifer’s wing is broken.
Jo is horrified by the way it hangs limply at his side. He huddles against the muddy snow line -- how the snow is staying she isn’t sure. Michael has wandered off into the distance and part of her hopes he’s damned ashamed of himself.
You don’t say you love someone and hurt them like that.
Michael starts the fights, she’s figured that much out. She’s sure Lucifer has provoked a fair few, though.
Right now, though, she’s doing something insane. She’s carrying a bucket of warm water, a bunch of rags, and some apples, preparing to step across the snow line for the first time since the angels showed up.
“I’m going to clean your wing,” she tells him, borrowing her mother’s don’t argue with me tone.
Lucifer stares up at her. Jo hands him an apple.
“Do you want to lose it?” she asks.
“The nature of this place wouldn’t allow me to,” Lucifer tells her, almost apologetically.
Jo huffs in frustration. “I’m still cleaning it.”
She drops to her knees in the mud and starts to work. The feathers are stiff with blood and mud, but he holds still for her.
Jo hums as she works, stopping a few times to refill the bucket in the stream. When she finds the break, she’s almost sick. It looks --- bad.
She cleans and binds it with clean rags the best she can. When she’s done, he’s trembling.
“I’m sorry,” she says softly, giving him another apple.
He blinks at her. “For what?”
“Hurting you,” she explains. He just stares, like the words don’t make sense. “Let me clean the other one.”
Slowly, he nods.
“What song do you hum?” he asks, as she starts on the other wing.
It’s her to turn blink in confusion. “Just this song one of my friends at college listened to,” she tells him. “I don’t even remember all the words. It’s just been stuck in my head.”
He’s silent for a few minutes. “Will you sing it?”
Jo finds herself blushing. “I guess?”
“Sleeping Beauty lays her head a hundred years to rest. Then fee, fi, fo the giant fums
And to my dark Prince Charming comes,” Jo starts to sing softly. She doesn’t think she’s a very good singer and she wasn’t lying that she didn’t remember all the words.
But she sings for him and he listens.
When she’s done with that song, she starts another. It’s one of her mother’s favorites by Bob Dylan.
Soon his wing is clean and she’s out of songs. Jo gives him the last of the apples. “Don’t pick fights with Michael for a while, please. At least until your wing is better.”
Slowly, he nods. “I will do so,” he says.
“Good.” Jo feels a weird sense of giddiness. She told him not to do something and he agreed. It feels a bit unreal. “Right, I need to go clean up.”
She climbs to her feet and starts to cross back across the snow line when his hand on her wrist stops her.
“Joanna,” he says softly, as if he’s afraid something or someone else will hear her name. “Thank you.”
Jo smiles. “You’re welcome.”
That night it doesn’t rain and Jo dreams of flying in someone’s arms like she’s Lois Lane.
***
The next day Jo spots Lucifer kneeling in the dirt when she comes out of the cottage. Well(,) not exactly kneeling. He’s digging in the dirt around the snow line, dropping something, then recovering the hole...
Then it hits her. Lucifer is planting the apple seeds from the apples she’d given him.
She watches his movements and the way he keeps his injured wing held against him for far too long. He’s slow, methodical, and almost graceful.
A smile comes easily to Jo’s face and she bends down to scratch Buck’s ears. How long will the trees take to grow, she wonders. But she has carrots and lettuce to harvest and they won’t get that way with her standing there watching the curve of the devil's back.
It’s later in the day and Jo’s hands are dirty. She pulls up the last of the carrots and sits back on her heels. “Fish stew tonight,” she tells Buck.
He barks playfully back at her.
“In the dirt -- “ Michael’s voice carries unexpectedly, drawing Jo’s attention.
The archangel is standing over Lucifer. From the angle she’s at, his face is unreadable. But he looms over Lucifer, his wings arched upward. Jo’s hand is on her knife before she thinks about it.
Then Michael gestures towards the dirt.
Jo gets it suddenly.
Michael doesn’t understand what Lucifer’s doing. Not that she does, but --
She remembers what Dean told her about angels. High and mighty, smug assholes. ”Cas, got better”,, Dean had told her with a lazy grin. ”To the rest of them? We’re mud monkeys.”
Michael thinks Lucifer is lowering himself. Lowering himself by planting seeds, maybe even by wanting the apples that will come.
Lucifer just kneels there, wings curled over himself. Jo hates Michael a little bit in that moment. Hates him.
Michael moves closer to Lucifer and Jo’s on her feet. Her knife is in her hand and she is hurrying across to where they stand. She’ll be damned if she lets Michael start a fight when Lucifer’s wounded.
“Leave him alone!” she snaps, coming to a stop just behind Lucifer. “Don’t you have some self-flagellation to do?”
Michael looks up at her, eyes narrowed. It’s gone in a flash but she thinks -- was that jealousy on his face?
“This does not concern you, human.”
Jo bristles. “I live here, too, so yes, it does, asshole.”
He looks at her like she’s lost her mind and he wants to smite her all at the same time. “No one lives in the Cage. This is a prison. A place of torment. A place to be endured,” he hisses at her. “Father must have had a reason to condemn you here.”
Lucifer rises between them, flaring out his good wing. “You will not address her in that manner, Michael,” his voice is cold, even. “You will treat her with respect.”
The two stare at each other for what seems forever before Michael says something Jo doesn’t understand. Lucifer inclines his head.
Michael bares his teeth and stalks off across the snow.
Lucifer watches, his wing dropping slightly.
Jo --- Jo doesn’t know what to do or say.
“Michael was not always like this,” Lucifer says, apologizes. He doesn’t turn.
Jo bites her lip. This isn’t a problem she knows how to handle or one she thinks is wise to even think about handling. Her knife won’t protect Lucifer, and God it’s screwed up even thinking that. She can’t salt and burn this away and there’s no one for her to talk to. Just Lucifer, Michael, and Buck.
And the rock.
“Do you have siblings?” Lucifer asks.
“No,” she tells him. She’d always wanted a brother though.
“Be thankful,” Lucifer says, then heads off after Michael.
Jo frowns watching his wings as he goes. Come inside, she almost calls to him.
Buck whines at her side and Jo goes back to her chores.
***
Jo doesn’t see either of them for days.
She checks on Lucifer’s apple seeds each day they’re gone.
She dreams of feathers and cool skin when she’s lucky. Fire, blood, and hellhound teeth when she’s not.
One dream she wakes from with a groan, her thighs slick. So far, that’s Jo’s favorite dream.
***
When Jo sees a figure with wings walking towards the snow line, she darts out of the kitchen, hands still a mess from the rabbit meat pie she was attempting to make. Lucifer’s back, runs through her mind without permission, follow by a rush of what certainly feels like happiness.
She reaches the edge of the land that’s hers before she sees the figure properly.
It’s Michael.
Lucifer is nowhere to be seen.
Jo bares her teeth and pulls her knife from her boot. “Where is he?” she demands. Her minds fills with hellish visions of what Michael might have done to his younger brother. Michael might say he loves Lucifer but she doubts how far that will go against what he thinks should happen, what his Father might have once commanded.
The cottage had some -- interesting -- reading material. Outside the Supernatural novels, that is.
Michael stares at her like she was a bad smell he’d hoped would be gone by now. “You’re still here.”
“Yeah, not really any place to go,” Jo snaps. “Now where is Lucifer? What have you done to him?”
“Why do you care? He was responsible for your death,” Michael points out.
Jo flinches, remembering teeth and pain. The strained sound of her mother’s voice. “Hellhounds killed me,” she corrects.
Michael’s face is expressionless. “I do not understand you or your,” his mouth twists, “kindness to my brother.”
“I ran out of hate sitting in the snow,” Jo says. “And I think he hates himself enough,”
Michael’s quiet.
Jo eyes him cautiously. “This place is punishment isn’t it? Cut off from his family, alone, trapped in nothingness.”
“It’s not nothingness,” Michael points out snidely.
“No, it’s not and may I remind you, that you’re the one that threw himself down here,” she shoots back.
Michael looks away then. “I wished to end it as our Father wanted.”
Jo raises her chin. “You said you did it because you loved him.”
“Giving him death would be an act of love,” Michael tells her, a soft tremble shaking his feathers.
“Bullshit,” Jo snaps. “Utter bullshit.”
Michael’s wings flare, giving the impression of him throwing his hands up. “If you wish to know where my brother is, it’s someplace out there. We spoke, then he continued walking on.”
Jo grits her teeth.
She whistles for Buck, who runs to her side. “Keep an eye on the place while I’m gone,” she tells him.
Michael takes a step towards her and Buck growls. “Where are you going?” he demands.
“To find Lucifer and bring him back here,” she says as if it is obvious. It should be obvious.
“You cannot,” he protests.
“I can damn well,” Jo tells him, sheathing her knife.
Michael grabs her wrist, pulling her towards him. “Why are you doing this? You cannot know what you’re doing!”
Jo yanks away from him, wondering just what he means but not trusting him to ask. “Maybe I don’t know what I’m doing. But I’m going to find him.”
She starts walking in the direction Michael came from. The direction she remembers Lucifer walking in. The snow crunches under her boots.
Michael lets her go.
***
Jo’s feet ache. She feels like she’s been walking for days. Maybe she has been. It’s hard to tell out on the bright snow.
Her only guide is the foot prints that break up the solid expanse of white. Jo scans the horizon for Lucifer’s familiar form.
Sometimes she thinks she won’t find him.
The cold bites at her skin and she wants to sit down, rest. Just for a moment.
But she keeps walking.
Jo sees his wings first. The shadows stretch across the snow, the familiar way he holds them, the injured one. He’s standing with his back to her, a lonely sentinel in the emptiness.
“Lucifer,” she calls and her voice sounds strangely loud.
He doesn’t turn but his wings twitch.
“Joanna,” he answers her back.
Jo closes her eyes and just stands for a moment.
Then she takes a step.
And another step.
And another.
She presses against his back, forehead resting between the juncture of his wings.
Lucifer goes tense under her, wings rising slightly. He doesn’t move away.
”You scared me,” she doesn't say.
His wings arch back, brushing against her.
“What are you doing out here?” he asks her, voice low and rough.
Jo almost laughs. “Looking for you.”
His back muscles twitch, flicking his wings against her skin. “Why?”
“To bring you back,” she tells him.
“Back to Michael,” he says dryly.
Jo’s life since coming to this place, the Cage, has been simple.
This is just as simple.
“No, back to me.”
Lucifer turns then, slowly. He looks down at her, eyes strangely soft. “Joanna,” he breathes her name like a benediction.
His forehead touches hers.
“I will return with you.”
***
And he does.
They walk back across the snow together, following their footsteps.
Lucifer walks so his good wing curls slightly around her shoulders.
They don’t talk.
To Jo the walk back seems -- faster. They see Michael first, standing like a statue looking in their direction. Lucifer seems to tense, his wing drawing her in closer.
Jo, without thinking, touches the feathers, wanting to reassure him. Lucifer inhales sharply and his fingers touch the back of her wrist.
“Lucifer,” Michael says, stepping forward. The archangel’s eyes are narrowed as he takes in her and Lucifer, the way they touch, the way they stand. “Joanna.”
Lucifer raises his chin. “We have returned,” he says.
“So I see,” Michael tone is almost too neutral, too calm.
Jo rolls her eyes and huffs out a sigh. “If you two are done, I’m hungry,” Jo tells them. Buck comes running up across the snow line, barking and jumping around Jo’s legs.
She starts towards the snow line and looks back at Lucifer. “Luc, you coming?”
He stares at her like he doesn’t comprehend her words.
Jo holds out her hand. “You can help me make lunch.”
Carefully, he slides his hand into hers. “I would like that.”
She leads him across the snow line, Buck at their heels. Michael stands at the edge watching them, wings raised.
Lucifer follows her into the cottage. The rooms seem to expand to fit his wings. Somehow it doesn’t surprise Jo; it’s just another aspect of this place.
“Do you enjoy cooking?” Lucifer asks her.
Jo laughs. “I’m not sure. It’s something to do here. I never really cooked...before. There never was a need to.”
Lucifer takes another bite of stew. “You do so very well,” he tells her awkwardly.
She shakes her head. “You’re probably just hungry.”
He smiles, bowing his head slightly. “Maybe so.”
Their lunch turns out to be dinner as exhaustion starts to weigh down on Jo.
There isn’t more than one bed but the decision isn’t even one. Jo takes Lucifer by the hand and leads him to her bed. He follows, wings trembling.
It’s chaste, the way they lie together. They touch foreheads and whisper in the dark.
Jo tells him about first coming here, about the days in the cold.
Hesitantly, he speaks of how this place was once fire before the snow, but it was always empty.
His good wing settles over her and she feels warmer than she’s felt in ages.
***
Jo wakes to the sight of feathers. Splashes of red mixed in among blackened feathers. The wing is splayed across her like a blanket. She lays there for a while in the dim light.
She just...floats.
Lucifer’s eyes are closed, eye lashes dark smudges against his skin. He looks at peace.
Jo brushes her fingers against the underside of his wing. She’s touched his wings before. She cleaned them, but this feels … different. Her fingers trace down to the base of the wing, touches the skin there at the juncture.
Lucifer inhales sharply, and her eyes fly to his face.
His eyes are open, dilated to black rings.
Her fingers pause.
“Joanna,” he breathes and she shivers at the inflections in his voice. He leans his forehead against hers. “Please, do not stop.”
Jo spreads her fingers and he shudders.
Lucifer’s fingers touch the side of her neck and trail down to her collar bone. Then they just rest there. Warmth floods through her.
He dips his head further and rubs their noses together in a slow nuzzle.
“Why?” he asks softly as her fingers still comb through his feathers.
“Why what?”
“This. With me.” Each word is followed by another slow nuzzle.
Jo closes her eyes and just breathes in. He smells like cinnamon and apples. “I don’t know. I should hate you,” she whispers. “But I can’t. The thought of you never coming back ---”
“I would have had you burn with the rest, and my grace would have mourned. I would have known but I would have been less for it.”
Jo kisses him.
It’s like a static charge goes off.
The room floods with light as Jo gasps. Pleasure, so fierce and so strong that it leaves her shaking, runs through her body. Lucifer’s voice rings out loud, clear, and high like the peal of a bell. The world seems to explode around her and it’s better than any orgasm she’s ever felt, and she can feel him in a way that her mind can’t even comprehend.
The world rights itself in pieces.
Lucifer’s fingers moving up and down her spine. His breath against her ear. The weight of his wing.
“Father be praised,” he whispers as she shifts forward, tucking herself against him more. ”Are you hurt?”
Jo smiles and kisses him. “No.”
His hand trembles against her skin. “I feared ..”
“So was that angel sex?” she asks, reaching up and brushing her knuckles against the underside of his wing.
Lucifer’s exhale also sounds like a fond sigh. “In a manner of speaking.”
Jo grins and slides her hands over his chest. “I liked it.”
“We are very compatible,” he admits, pulling her closer to his body. “I would like joining with you again.”
She kisses him again, this time coaxing his mouth open slightly. “Yeah,” she agrees, breathlessly.
Outside it starts to snow.