The Fall of House Winchester - Chapter Five
“Why did you do it?”
All the candles had long gone out and Dean was still lying wide awake, Ford pressed into his side. He didn’t know when his fight became forgiveness but he knew Ford was right. He didn’t need the shackles to stay in the master’s bed any longer.
“Why did I do what?” he asked.
“Why did you leave your brother to die?”
He sat up immediately, twisting to look down at the vampire. He felt his jaw clenching and he took a deep breath against the accusation. Ford didn’t know him as well as he thought he did if he believed Dean could ever leave Sam. “I didn’t.”
Ford snorted. “Then what happened to your brother Dean? What happened to “take care of Sammy”? Or were you grateful to be rid of him when he left for Stanford? Were you relieved when they hit California first and you knew he’d never make it out alive?”
“Don’t you dare fucking say that,” Dean hissed. “I… Sammy made his choice. He walked away and I didn’t have the choice to follow. He-” Dean shook his head. “Fuck you! You don’t have the right to ask me this. What’s it to you anyway? Just another doll for your collection right?” He couldn’t stop the way his voice was rising and he pulled out of the bed, standing over his master with fists clenched. “I went to California for him, I looked for him and he was gone. It took me two months to get through to Stanford but I did and if they didn’t kill him in the first wave of attacks then my brother got out and he went so damn far underground no one ever saw him again.”
“You never went,” Ford’s gravelly voice assailed him.
“I was there for two years before I knew he had to be gone. I kept looking, went to everyone we knew and he was just gone.”
Ford threw the covers off his body and he stood over Dean, pulling up to his full height, both rows of teeth bared as he stepped forward. “Don’t lie to me Dean. Not you.”
“I would never abandon my brother.”
The strike happened quicker than Dean could see, but when Ford’s fist connected with his jaw he was knocked backwards hard enough to land on his ass, tumbling back until his head hit the wall. Ford was on top of him then, pulling him to his feet, one hand over his throat. “Don’t you ever fucking lie to me again Dean.”
His world was starting to white out as Ford kept his fingers pressed to Dean’s throat, but then he was gone completely and Dean fell to the ground.
“Jo!” Ford screamed out the open door.
A minute later Jo came running back in, looking for anything like she’d been waiting for his call. He wondered if she was.
“Master Ford? Is he alright?” she started to walk towards him but Ford stopped her with a hand on her arm.
“Go get Walker.”
“Master? But-”
“Now Jo, or you’ll stand with him.”
Her eyes were wide, beseeching as she looked at Dean for one last second, and then she turned away from him and the room.
Dean struggled back to his feet. He had no idea who they were talking about but then again after three months he still didn’t know everyone by name and of those he knew, he had no clue what they did. Jo told him once there were some people you didn’t want to know and Jess’s eyes had made him believe. He thought, from that one glimpse of Jo’s fear, that Walker wasn’t someone he should take meeting lightly.
A pair of light sleep pants were thrown at him and Ford stared down at him with eyes that seemed even colder through the mask now. He hated the goddamn thing, wanted to know what Ford looked like without it, what the real shape of his eyes were, how the bow of his mouth looked when it wasn’t half hidden but even without the mask there would have been nothing of warmth in the vampire. “Get dressed. At least you can meet Gordon like a man and not the sniveling coward you are.”
He pulled on the pants, not because of Ford but because Ford’s words made him realize he was still naked inside the master’s rooms and he didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. He leaned back against the wall at that thought, knees to his chest, closing his eyes, because what the hell was the wrong idea? That he’d become his master’s lover? Even if they hadn’t had intercourse, there had been enough intimacy tonight to make that claim. That he’d given himself willingly? He had. The fleeting moment when he’d remembered that he should be fighting had been too late and when Ford had claimed a kiss from his lips after, he’d been too weak to hold onto it. He’d opened to his master as easily as the skies open for rain.
The door pressed open and another man came walking in. He wore jeans and a simple dark tee shirt, standard clothes on the farm, but at his belt was a whip. Gordon Walker handed Ford two leather straps and then Ford was looking back at Dean. Dean looked up at Jo and he could see it in her eyes. This was why he didn’t know the man, he’d never been sent for punishment and punishment on the farm meant one of two things, a bleeding or a whipping.
He closed his eyes, praying Ford wouldn’t give him the choice. He wasn’t strong enough tonight to say what he needed to say.
“I want him bleeding, Walker,” Ford said as he walked over to Dean. Above his head were two metal rings fastened to the wall. He’d never asked what they were for. He didn’t need to now as Ford looped the leather straps through. “Stand up, slave.”
Jo was at his side, hands pulling him up when what he really wanted to do was throw up. Slave. After everything was said and done, after the seduction had finally succeeded, Ford was finally reminding him of his place. He let out a short hysterical laugh and Jo gripped his arm tighter.
“Please, Dean, come on.”
He stood with her help, then felt as Ford turned him around, wrapping a wrist in the loop he’d created. He pulled it tight and Dean had to bite his lip to keep from saying anything stupid.
Jo was still there though, her eyes wide and fearful, no matter how much she lost her temper she’d never really hurt him. This though, Ford meant him to hurt.
His other hand was pulled up into the loop and he didn’t try to fight it. He could taste blood dripping onto his lip, his nose bleeding from Ford’s fist and he looked over his shoulder as Jo was called away.
Ford stood just behind Walker, the dark skinned man smiled and he could see the perfect white teeth, nothing vampiric about him. The smile was pure malice and if he’d had fangs Dean was sure he’d be sporting them, trying to intimidate Dean.
“Tell me the truth Dean,” Ford said from behind the other man, “and this can all be forgiven.”
Dean snorted as he stood up straighter, taking a deep breath as he rolled his shoulders. He looked back at them again, “You can tell him to do his worst. I never gave up on Sammy. I will never give up on him.”
“Ford…”
“Leave Jo,” he said coldly.
“He’s not-”
He had his hand around her throat before she could say anything else.
“Leave her alone!” Dean screamed from his bonds. “You got a problem with me you take it out on my hide but you leave Jo the hell alone! You fucked her up enough already you take this out on my ass!”
Ford’s eyes turned to Dean, then back to Jo. Her eyes were pleading but he walked to the door and pushed her out. When it was closed behind him, he came back over to stand behind Dean, whispering in his ear like he was speaking sweet nothings. “Tell me why you left him to die and I’ll let you go.”
“Just get it over with. I’m tired of listening to you talk.”
Ford backed off then and Dean just turned back to the wall. He used his legs to brace himself for what was to come, even knowing he couldn’t. Not really. He knew how to handle pain, knew how to assimilate it and how to accept it, but the first few strokes always hurt.
“I want him bloody, but not scarred,” Ford said loud enough for him to hear. “He won’t be much use to me if I can’t see the original scars.”
There was nothing else, but Dean could feel the change in the air, the anticipation of the man behind him and the anger in the other. He felt the whip come close to skin, not touching, but enough to leave a sting as it sliced through the air next to him. He’d had enough whippings in the early days to know you didn’t have to get hit to get hurt. He had a feeling he’d feel more than a little tonight though.
His earlier beatings had all been about humiliation and proving authority. When he’d learned to cover himself, to keep out of trouble, they’d stopped completely. No one had been out to hurt him, to see his blood running in rivers to the floor. Not until tonight anyway.
The first crack came across the top of his shoulders and he stumbled forward with the blow, letting out a stream of curses.
“Tell me the truth.”
“I never left Sammy.”
The second crack hit his lower back and he could already feel the blood trickling down to pool at the waistband of his pants.
“Tell me the truth.”
He let out a small sob because he could say the lie so easily, but he’d given in so much tonight, so many small, easy little moments, and he’d betrayed himself completely. He couldn’t betray his brother, couldn’t betray that memory, not for anything.
“I never left Sammy.”
It continued until he’d lost count. Every time the whip cracked Ford would ask for the truth and he would answer the same. He was sobbing and he didn’t care if they could hear it. His chest heaved, lungs struggling for breath, legs on the verge of collapse.
“Tell me the truth.”
Blood dripped down his thighs and calves, the floor was pooled with it already. He had a brief wonder if Ford would lick him clean later. It didn’t matter. He could suck every bit of blood left, sink his teeth in and drink him dry. Sam was gone, for all that Dean had searched. Sam was gone and he was broken, just another slave in a pen full of worthless skin and bones.
“I never left Sammy,” he sobbed again because the truth was never harder to stomach, never harder to admit than it was now, hanging from the vampire’s hooks when he could have so easily just gone to ground himself instead of looking for his family. “I never left him. Sammy left me.”
He didn’t hear the gasp behind him, didn’t realized the next lash hadn’t fallen. His legs had collapsed under him, the weight of his confession too much to bear.
When he realized he wasn’t being struck again, there were hands on his body, Jo holding him as Ford reached up and undid the loops holding his wrists. He didn’t remove the loops from the wall and Dean wondered if that was for next time, but he couldn’t voice his question.
The room was silent as Jo practically dragged him to the bed. He couldn’t breathe as he moved, Jo’s arm around his waist pressing into his wounds. He looked up and realized someone had covered the bed with thick blankets and sheets before he was set across those on his stomach. He felt a hand at the base of his neck, strong and firm, fingers knotting in his hair before letting go. He sobbed at the loss of contact and then again because he felt anything at all about it.
“Clean him up Jo,” Ford’s voice was as wrecked as Dean felt but all he could do was watch as the vampire left the room without looking back.
The medic had come up and looked at Dean, caring for him while Jo sat at his side, fingers combing through his hair to sooth him. Ford had left orders that he wasn’t to be given pain killers, but the doctor gave him a shot to make sure no infection set in over night. He bandaged the wounds and told them both that he needed to take them off in the morning and let them breathe a while. He’d be back the next night to put more bandages on him for sleeping.
It was just the two of them then, Dean on his stomach, his arms under his head as Jo lay beside him, her cheek resting on his one forearm and stroking his hair silently.
“So this is the monster you’re so willing to follow?”
“He’s not a monster, Dean, you know that.”
“I don’t know anything Jo. What he just did to me? That was a monster.”
“You don’t know him Dean. As much as you watch and observe people, the way you charm, but you weren’t there. Ford’s always had a nasty temper, but there is nothing in this world that bothers him more than the fate of Sam Winchester.”
Dean looked up then, ignoring the pain that shot up his spine. “You know what happened to Sam?”
She looked at him, tears in her eyes. “Yeah Dean, I do. I thought,” she took a deep breath. “I thought you knew.”
“Tell me.”
“It’s not a happy story Dean.”
“Jo, I have to know.”
She nodded, then sat up on the bed, her eyes looking out over the room and he was grateful for that small kindness. He wasn’t gonna want to hear about this and she was giving him what privacy she could. Her finger started running through his hair again though and he was beginning to think it soothed her as much as it did him.
“In the first few days, no one knew what was happening. The majority of the people wouldn’t listen to the news reports and those that did were suddenly crazy, taking to staking anything that looked at them funny. There was a lot of shooting and killing that didn’t need to be done. Sam was at Stanford when the Vampire Revolution began, and by the time most of the world was figuring out the truth, Sam had a bus load of friends he was taking out of the state. It wasn’t easy. The vampires controlled the roads and the border right from the start. They set up traps for people coming in and out and even though Sam could have gotten himself and maybe a few people out he wouldn’t leave anyone behind.”
“He always had too big a heart,” Dean said softly.
“Don’t know where he got that,” Jo answered back with a little tug of her fingers. “He started taking ‘em through a couple at a time but they were only about half way through when someone got spooked. Thought Sam was gonna leave her and her daughter to the monsters. She started screaming and all hell broke loose. Sam yelled for everyone to run and they did. Sam and a handful of others stayed though, killed a good half dozen vampires before they realized they had two real live hunters on their hands.”
“You were there?” Dean didn’t look up, couldn’t because he knew the pain in her eyes before and he couldn’t look at it again, not if she’d seen his brother die.
“Yeah. Mom had to go to California to help out a friend and I went with her. She was real big on me going to college and all. She didn’t want me to be a hunter that was for sure, so she dropped me off at Stanford, thinking maybe I’d find some guys there … maybe see what I was missing. I ran into Sam right away. So I was there when all hell broke loose.”
“He was,” she took a deep breath, “I don’t know if I can describe it. He was everything. He was everywhere. Sam held us all together. He organized supplies and got transportation when it was safe enough to travel. He armed everyone, told them what they were really up against. We just weren’t enough though. When the vampires found us,” she shook her head, “there were just too many of them.”
Her fingers bit into his scalp and Dean brought a hand up to caress her wrist. It wasn’t much but it was as much comfort as he had to offer. “They didn’t turn us then. Sam was fighting like a madman and Jess was there, his beautiful girl. She refused to run and leave him when the others did. They only took five of us, killed the rest right there in front of us.”
“He managed to kill another two vampires while they were trying to take us to their master. They tortured him for it, made him watch while they turned me. We were both from hunting families though, we knew how it all worked and they seemed to realize that even though I was only seventeen, I wasn’t gonna break like that. Jess though,” her voice broke quietly, “Jess couldn’t stop herself. They started feeding off her. They kept at it for days, just enough to make her weak but never enough to kill. She started screaming whenever they came in the room. We tried to protect her, to hide her, but we couldn’t do anything, and I was…”
“You were freshly turned.”
“I could smell the blood pumping through her veins and I wanted it so much. Sam stopped me.”
“You killed him.”
“No, they stopped me before I could,” she whispered, “but I bled him good first. He never blamed me for it. Reminded me over and over how he’d pulled me in close, holding my head against his neck knowing what I had to do. He did it to save Jess. She was already too weak. She almost died anyway, when they cut out her tongue.”
“Jesus.”
“She never stopped crying, but she couldn’t scream anymore. They took her blood, raped her, and left Sam chained to the wall through it all. It only took two months for humanity to give up on itself, to let the vampires rip it to shreds, but it took six months before anyone came along and said that we were casualties of war, slaves now bound to the service of cruel masters. They never turned him. I think they knew what he’d be like if they did, his anger and his vengeance would have destroyed them. They put him on the block instead. Jess stayed with me. With Sam gone, they stopped tormenting her but she could never let anyone else touch her again. For years she was just a shell of a person.”
Jo stood up, walking to the window to stare out across the grounds. “I wasn’t there for the next part but he was sold on the auction block to a former hunter. She blamed him for something that happened to her family, blamed him because he was a Winchester so she took him home and tortured him too. She didn’t keep him long before passing him on. I was on the block at that point as well. The vampires turned me but they didn’t want anyone still sympathetic to the human cause in their midst. So we were united again. We were both worried about Jess, but there was nothing we could do about it. Our Master back then though, he was the worst sort of monster. I won’t talk about the things he did, Dean, I still don’t have the strength but as rogues, you know how they treat us,” she smiled over her shoulder at him.
He knew, it was why he’d hidden himself so completely when he’d been on the block. A lot of people wanted to hurt a hunter. A lot of vampires wanted to do more than just hurt them. They wanted to break them in the worst possible way.
“We lived under the worst conditions, little food, no shelter. Freeze in the winter. They had vamps and humans and even though he gave the humans something to eat, he never fed us,” she said with a scoff. “We were beaten for killing his slaves and beaten if we didn’t eat enough to work. Sam and I, we watched each other’s backs. He … he fed me and I made sure the other vampires left him alone. The owners though, they never let up. What they did to him all those times they took him up to the main house, I don’t know, but he always came back bloody, beaten and still defiant. He never stopped fighting, Dean. And when it got too much, when he finally snapped? I’m sure you’ve heard the story. We were in Cold Oaks, South Dakota.”
“Cold Oaks? The Muel Rebellion?”
“Sam didn’t do anything half assed,” she said with pride. “They toyed with him for a long time, but they finally went too far. It was brutal. They … they forced him to open a vein. He never, except to keep me alive, he never did it. They were ripping him apart. He should have died that day. They asked if he was willing to turn and he just kept saying no. They did it anyway.”
“It took him a long time to recover from that. They… he was weak from everything they did to him and they left him alone in a room with two other slaves. There was no way for him to stop himself. When you first come out of it, you’re just an animal, not human enough to make that sort of choice. He never forgot the people he killed. He never forgave himself or the masters for making him do it.”
“They never stopped tormenting him though. He healed better, quicker after that, but it just kept getting worse. Then one day he just, had enough. He came back from the main house and he had a plan. That night they were having a party and Sam pulled all the human servants out before locking the vampires in the house. He set the whole thing on fire. Any that were strong enough to crawl out, he was waiting.”
“What happened to him after that Jo?”
She looked out the window again and he felt his heart sink. “They called it the Samuel Rebellion at first, but the local authorities didn’t want Sam to be remembered as a hero, or a martyr so they slurred the name enough that people would think it was the real name. Sam, after that, he curled up and died. He said he was the monster they’d made him. When the local hunters came looking, he slipped away from us and he went riding out to meet them. He never came back.”
Her eyes were haunted as she looked back at him. “I’m sorry, Dean. Even if Ford doesn’t, can’t see that you’re speaking the truth, I can. I remember how you used to look out for him. He used to tell me you were out there somewhere and it was just a matter of time. He never gave up on you, Dean. He just … gave up on living after that.”
Dean nodded, not bothering to hold back the tears in his eyes. He’d asked for the story and now he knew. It was worse than he’d hoped, but not as bad as some of his fears. Sam had been with Jo and Jess through it, he wasn’t alone all that time.
“What about Ford? Why does Sam’s fate bother him so much?”
She looked at him for a minute and shook her head, tears forming once again. “Their stories aren’t all that different.”
“He knew my brother.” It wasn’t a question. Somehow, Ford had met Sam, he knew it.
Jo looked down. “He doesn’t collect the Winchester family as a hobby. He collects it out of love and that love had to start somewhere.”
Dean shook his head, unable to comprehend it all. It was too much to take in and the adrenaline that was letting him deal with the pain and Jo’s news had left him. He dropped his head back to the pillow and Jo came over, kissing the top of his head. “I’m so sorry Dean. I’ll …” she paused as tears clogged her voice. “I’ll be back in the morning to help you get cleaned up.”
All the candles had long gone out and Dean was still lying wide awake, Ford pressed into his side. He didn’t know when his fight became forgiveness but he knew Ford was right. He didn’t need the shackles to stay in the master’s bed any longer.
“Why did I do what?” he asked.
“Why did you leave your brother to die?”
He sat up immediately, twisting to look down at the vampire. He felt his jaw clenching and he took a deep breath against the accusation. Ford didn’t know him as well as he thought he did if he believed Dean could ever leave Sam. “I didn’t.”
Ford snorted. “Then what happened to your brother Dean? What happened to “take care of Sammy”? Or were you grateful to be rid of him when he left for Stanford? Were you relieved when they hit California first and you knew he’d never make it out alive?”
“Don’t you dare fucking say that,” Dean hissed. “I… Sammy made his choice. He walked away and I didn’t have the choice to follow. He-” Dean shook his head. “Fuck you! You don’t have the right to ask me this. What’s it to you anyway? Just another doll for your collection right?” He couldn’t stop the way his voice was rising and he pulled out of the bed, standing over his master with fists clenched. “I went to California for him, I looked for him and he was gone. It took me two months to get through to Stanford but I did and if they didn’t kill him in the first wave of attacks then my brother got out and he went so damn far underground no one ever saw him again.”
“You never went,” Ford’s gravelly voice assailed him.
“I was there for two years before I knew he had to be gone. I kept looking, went to everyone we knew and he was just gone.”
Ford threw the covers off his body and he stood over Dean, pulling up to his full height, both rows of teeth bared as he stepped forward. “Don’t lie to me Dean. Not you.”
“I would never abandon my brother.”
The strike happened quicker than Dean could see, but when Ford’s fist connected with his jaw he was knocked backwards hard enough to land on his ass, tumbling back until his head hit the wall. Ford was on top of him then, pulling him to his feet, one hand over his throat. “Don’t you ever fucking lie to me again Dean.”
His world was starting to white out as Ford kept his fingers pressed to Dean’s throat, but then he was gone completely and Dean fell to the ground.
“Jo!” Ford screamed out the open door.
A minute later Jo came running back in, looking for anything like she’d been waiting for his call. He wondered if she was.
“Master Ford? Is he alright?” she started to walk towards him but Ford stopped her with a hand on her arm.
“Go get Walker.”
“Master? But-”
“Now Jo, or you’ll stand with him.”
Her eyes were wide, beseeching as she looked at Dean for one last second, and then she turned away from him and the room.
Dean struggled back to his feet. He had no idea who they were talking about but then again after three months he still didn’t know everyone by name and of those he knew, he had no clue what they did. Jo told him once there were some people you didn’t want to know and Jess’s eyes had made him believe. He thought, from that one glimpse of Jo’s fear, that Walker wasn’t someone he should take meeting lightly.
A pair of light sleep pants were thrown at him and Ford stared down at him with eyes that seemed even colder through the mask now. He hated the goddamn thing, wanted to know what Ford looked like without it, what the real shape of his eyes were, how the bow of his mouth looked when it wasn’t half hidden but even without the mask there would have been nothing of warmth in the vampire. “Get dressed. At least you can meet Gordon like a man and not the sniveling coward you are.”
He pulled on the pants, not because of Ford but because Ford’s words made him realize he was still naked inside the master’s rooms and he didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. He leaned back against the wall at that thought, knees to his chest, closing his eyes, because what the hell was the wrong idea? That he’d become his master’s lover? Even if they hadn’t had intercourse, there had been enough intimacy tonight to make that claim. That he’d given himself willingly? He had. The fleeting moment when he’d remembered that he should be fighting had been too late and when Ford had claimed a kiss from his lips after, he’d been too weak to hold onto it. He’d opened to his master as easily as the skies open for rain.
The door pressed open and another man came walking in. He wore jeans and a simple dark tee shirt, standard clothes on the farm, but at his belt was a whip. Gordon Walker handed Ford two leather straps and then Ford was looking back at Dean. Dean looked up at Jo and he could see it in her eyes. This was why he didn’t know the man, he’d never been sent for punishment and punishment on the farm meant one of two things, a bleeding or a whipping.
He closed his eyes, praying Ford wouldn’t give him the choice. He wasn’t strong enough tonight to say what he needed to say.
“I want him bleeding, Walker,” Ford said as he walked over to Dean. Above his head were two metal rings fastened to the wall. He’d never asked what they were for. He didn’t need to now as Ford looped the leather straps through. “Stand up, slave.”
Jo was at his side, hands pulling him up when what he really wanted to do was throw up. Slave. After everything was said and done, after the seduction had finally succeeded, Ford was finally reminding him of his place. He let out a short hysterical laugh and Jo gripped his arm tighter.
“Please, Dean, come on.”
He stood with her help, then felt as Ford turned him around, wrapping a wrist in the loop he’d created. He pulled it tight and Dean had to bite his lip to keep from saying anything stupid.
Jo was still there though, her eyes wide and fearful, no matter how much she lost her temper she’d never really hurt him. This though, Ford meant him to hurt.
His other hand was pulled up into the loop and he didn’t try to fight it. He could taste blood dripping onto his lip, his nose bleeding from Ford’s fist and he looked over his shoulder as Jo was called away.
Ford stood just behind Walker, the dark skinned man smiled and he could see the perfect white teeth, nothing vampiric about him. The smile was pure malice and if he’d had fangs Dean was sure he’d be sporting them, trying to intimidate Dean.
“Tell me the truth Dean,” Ford said from behind the other man, “and this can all be forgiven.”
Dean snorted as he stood up straighter, taking a deep breath as he rolled his shoulders. He looked back at them again, “You can tell him to do his worst. I never gave up on Sammy. I will never give up on him.”
“Ford…”
“Leave Jo,” he said coldly.
“He’s not-”
He had his hand around her throat before she could say anything else.
“Leave her alone!” Dean screamed from his bonds. “You got a problem with me you take it out on my hide but you leave Jo the hell alone! You fucked her up enough already you take this out on my ass!”
Ford’s eyes turned to Dean, then back to Jo. Her eyes were pleading but he walked to the door and pushed her out. When it was closed behind him, he came back over to stand behind Dean, whispering in his ear like he was speaking sweet nothings. “Tell me why you left him to die and I’ll let you go.”
“Just get it over with. I’m tired of listening to you talk.”
Ford backed off then and Dean just turned back to the wall. He used his legs to brace himself for what was to come, even knowing he couldn’t. Not really. He knew how to handle pain, knew how to assimilate it and how to accept it, but the first few strokes always hurt.
“I want him bloody, but not scarred,” Ford said loud enough for him to hear. “He won’t be much use to me if I can’t see the original scars.”
There was nothing else, but Dean could feel the change in the air, the anticipation of the man behind him and the anger in the other. He felt the whip come close to skin, not touching, but enough to leave a sting as it sliced through the air next to him. He’d had enough whippings in the early days to know you didn’t have to get hit to get hurt. He had a feeling he’d feel more than a little tonight though.
His earlier beatings had all been about humiliation and proving authority. When he’d learned to cover himself, to keep out of trouble, they’d stopped completely. No one had been out to hurt him, to see his blood running in rivers to the floor. Not until tonight anyway.
The first crack came across the top of his shoulders and he stumbled forward with the blow, letting out a stream of curses.
“Tell me the truth.”
“I never left Sammy.”
The second crack hit his lower back and he could already feel the blood trickling down to pool at the waistband of his pants.
“Tell me the truth.”
He let out a small sob because he could say the lie so easily, but he’d given in so much tonight, so many small, easy little moments, and he’d betrayed himself completely. He couldn’t betray his brother, couldn’t betray that memory, not for anything.
“I never left Sammy.”
It continued until he’d lost count. Every time the whip cracked Ford would ask for the truth and he would answer the same. He was sobbing and he didn’t care if they could hear it. His chest heaved, lungs struggling for breath, legs on the verge of collapse.
“Tell me the truth.”
Blood dripped down his thighs and calves, the floor was pooled with it already. He had a brief wonder if Ford would lick him clean later. It didn’t matter. He could suck every bit of blood left, sink his teeth in and drink him dry. Sam was gone, for all that Dean had searched. Sam was gone and he was broken, just another slave in a pen full of worthless skin and bones.
“I never left Sammy,” he sobbed again because the truth was never harder to stomach, never harder to admit than it was now, hanging from the vampire’s hooks when he could have so easily just gone to ground himself instead of looking for his family. “I never left him. Sammy left me.”
He didn’t hear the gasp behind him, didn’t realized the next lash hadn’t fallen. His legs had collapsed under him, the weight of his confession too much to bear.
When he realized he wasn’t being struck again, there were hands on his body, Jo holding him as Ford reached up and undid the loops holding his wrists. He didn’t remove the loops from the wall and Dean wondered if that was for next time, but he couldn’t voice his question.
The room was silent as Jo practically dragged him to the bed. He couldn’t breathe as he moved, Jo’s arm around his waist pressing into his wounds. He looked up and realized someone had covered the bed with thick blankets and sheets before he was set across those on his stomach. He felt a hand at the base of his neck, strong and firm, fingers knotting in his hair before letting go. He sobbed at the loss of contact and then again because he felt anything at all about it.
“Clean him up Jo,” Ford’s voice was as wrecked as Dean felt but all he could do was watch as the vampire left the room without looking back.
The medic had come up and looked at Dean, caring for him while Jo sat at his side, fingers combing through his hair to sooth him. Ford had left orders that he wasn’t to be given pain killers, but the doctor gave him a shot to make sure no infection set in over night. He bandaged the wounds and told them both that he needed to take them off in the morning and let them breathe a while. He’d be back the next night to put more bandages on him for sleeping.
It was just the two of them then, Dean on his stomach, his arms under his head as Jo lay beside him, her cheek resting on his one forearm and stroking his hair silently.
“So this is the monster you’re so willing to follow?”
“He’s not a monster, Dean, you know that.”
“I don’t know anything Jo. What he just did to me? That was a monster.”
“You don’t know him Dean. As much as you watch and observe people, the way you charm, but you weren’t there. Ford’s always had a nasty temper, but there is nothing in this world that bothers him more than the fate of Sam Winchester.”
Dean looked up then, ignoring the pain that shot up his spine. “You know what happened to Sam?”
She looked at him, tears in her eyes. “Yeah Dean, I do. I thought,” she took a deep breath. “I thought you knew.”
“Tell me.”
“It’s not a happy story Dean.”
“Jo, I have to know.”
She nodded, then sat up on the bed, her eyes looking out over the room and he was grateful for that small kindness. He wasn’t gonna want to hear about this and she was giving him what privacy she could. Her finger started running through his hair again though and he was beginning to think it soothed her as much as it did him.
“In the first few days, no one knew what was happening. The majority of the people wouldn’t listen to the news reports and those that did were suddenly crazy, taking to staking anything that looked at them funny. There was a lot of shooting and killing that didn’t need to be done. Sam was at Stanford when the Vampire Revolution began, and by the time most of the world was figuring out the truth, Sam had a bus load of friends he was taking out of the state. It wasn’t easy. The vampires controlled the roads and the border right from the start. They set up traps for people coming in and out and even though Sam could have gotten himself and maybe a few people out he wouldn’t leave anyone behind.”
“He always had too big a heart,” Dean said softly.
“Don’t know where he got that,” Jo answered back with a little tug of her fingers. “He started taking ‘em through a couple at a time but they were only about half way through when someone got spooked. Thought Sam was gonna leave her and her daughter to the monsters. She started screaming and all hell broke loose. Sam yelled for everyone to run and they did. Sam and a handful of others stayed though, killed a good half dozen vampires before they realized they had two real live hunters on their hands.”
“You were there?” Dean didn’t look up, couldn’t because he knew the pain in her eyes before and he couldn’t look at it again, not if she’d seen his brother die.
“Yeah. Mom had to go to California to help out a friend and I went with her. She was real big on me going to college and all. She didn’t want me to be a hunter that was for sure, so she dropped me off at Stanford, thinking maybe I’d find some guys there … maybe see what I was missing. I ran into Sam right away. So I was there when all hell broke loose.”
“He was,” she took a deep breath, “I don’t know if I can describe it. He was everything. He was everywhere. Sam held us all together. He organized supplies and got transportation when it was safe enough to travel. He armed everyone, told them what they were really up against. We just weren’t enough though. When the vampires found us,” she shook her head, “there were just too many of them.”
Her fingers bit into his scalp and Dean brought a hand up to caress her wrist. It wasn’t much but it was as much comfort as he had to offer. “They didn’t turn us then. Sam was fighting like a madman and Jess was there, his beautiful girl. She refused to run and leave him when the others did. They only took five of us, killed the rest right there in front of us.”
“He managed to kill another two vampires while they were trying to take us to their master. They tortured him for it, made him watch while they turned me. We were both from hunting families though, we knew how it all worked and they seemed to realize that even though I was only seventeen, I wasn’t gonna break like that. Jess though,” her voice broke quietly, “Jess couldn’t stop herself. They started feeding off her. They kept at it for days, just enough to make her weak but never enough to kill. She started screaming whenever they came in the room. We tried to protect her, to hide her, but we couldn’t do anything, and I was…”
“You were freshly turned.”
“I could smell the blood pumping through her veins and I wanted it so much. Sam stopped me.”
“You killed him.”
“No, they stopped me before I could,” she whispered, “but I bled him good first. He never blamed me for it. Reminded me over and over how he’d pulled me in close, holding my head against his neck knowing what I had to do. He did it to save Jess. She was already too weak. She almost died anyway, when they cut out her tongue.”
“Jesus.”
“She never stopped crying, but she couldn’t scream anymore. They took her blood, raped her, and left Sam chained to the wall through it all. It only took two months for humanity to give up on itself, to let the vampires rip it to shreds, but it took six months before anyone came along and said that we were casualties of war, slaves now bound to the service of cruel masters. They never turned him. I think they knew what he’d be like if they did, his anger and his vengeance would have destroyed them. They put him on the block instead. Jess stayed with me. With Sam gone, they stopped tormenting her but she could never let anyone else touch her again. For years she was just a shell of a person.”
Jo stood up, walking to the window to stare out across the grounds. “I wasn’t there for the next part but he was sold on the auction block to a former hunter. She blamed him for something that happened to her family, blamed him because he was a Winchester so she took him home and tortured him too. She didn’t keep him long before passing him on. I was on the block at that point as well. The vampires turned me but they didn’t want anyone still sympathetic to the human cause in their midst. So we were united again. We were both worried about Jess, but there was nothing we could do about it. Our Master back then though, he was the worst sort of monster. I won’t talk about the things he did, Dean, I still don’t have the strength but as rogues, you know how they treat us,” she smiled over her shoulder at him.
He knew, it was why he’d hidden himself so completely when he’d been on the block. A lot of people wanted to hurt a hunter. A lot of vampires wanted to do more than just hurt them. They wanted to break them in the worst possible way.
“We lived under the worst conditions, little food, no shelter. Freeze in the winter. They had vamps and humans and even though he gave the humans something to eat, he never fed us,” she said with a scoff. “We were beaten for killing his slaves and beaten if we didn’t eat enough to work. Sam and I, we watched each other’s backs. He … he fed me and I made sure the other vampires left him alone. The owners though, they never let up. What they did to him all those times they took him up to the main house, I don’t know, but he always came back bloody, beaten and still defiant. He never stopped fighting, Dean. And when it got too much, when he finally snapped? I’m sure you’ve heard the story. We were in Cold Oaks, South Dakota.”
“Cold Oaks? The Muel Rebellion?”
“Sam didn’t do anything half assed,” she said with pride. “They toyed with him for a long time, but they finally went too far. It was brutal. They … they forced him to open a vein. He never, except to keep me alive, he never did it. They were ripping him apart. He should have died that day. They asked if he was willing to turn and he just kept saying no. They did it anyway.”
“It took him a long time to recover from that. They… he was weak from everything they did to him and they left him alone in a room with two other slaves. There was no way for him to stop himself. When you first come out of it, you’re just an animal, not human enough to make that sort of choice. He never forgot the people he killed. He never forgave himself or the masters for making him do it.”
“They never stopped tormenting him though. He healed better, quicker after that, but it just kept getting worse. Then one day he just, had enough. He came back from the main house and he had a plan. That night they were having a party and Sam pulled all the human servants out before locking the vampires in the house. He set the whole thing on fire. Any that were strong enough to crawl out, he was waiting.”
“What happened to him after that Jo?”
She looked out the window again and he felt his heart sink. “They called it the Samuel Rebellion at first, but the local authorities didn’t want Sam to be remembered as a hero, or a martyr so they slurred the name enough that people would think it was the real name. Sam, after that, he curled up and died. He said he was the monster they’d made him. When the local hunters came looking, he slipped away from us and he went riding out to meet them. He never came back.”
Her eyes were haunted as she looked back at him. “I’m sorry, Dean. Even if Ford doesn’t, can’t see that you’re speaking the truth, I can. I remember how you used to look out for him. He used to tell me you were out there somewhere and it was just a matter of time. He never gave up on you, Dean. He just … gave up on living after that.”
Dean nodded, not bothering to hold back the tears in his eyes. He’d asked for the story and now he knew. It was worse than he’d hoped, but not as bad as some of his fears. Sam had been with Jo and Jess through it, he wasn’t alone all that time.
“What about Ford? Why does Sam’s fate bother him so much?”
She looked at him for a minute and shook her head, tears forming once again. “Their stories aren’t all that different.”
“He knew my brother.” It wasn’t a question. Somehow, Ford had met Sam, he knew it.
Jo looked down. “He doesn’t collect the Winchester family as a hobby. He collects it out of love and that love had to start somewhere.”
Dean shook his head, unable to comprehend it all. It was too much to take in and the adrenaline that was letting him deal with the pain and Jo’s news had left him. He dropped his head back to the pillow and Jo came over, kissing the top of his head. “I’m so sorry Dean. I’ll …” she paused as tears clogged her voice. “I’ll be back in the morning to help you get cleaned up.”