My Brother's Keeper, Part 16 - Supernatural, NC-17
Fandom: Supernatural
Title: My Brother's Keeper, Part Sixteen( Part One Here, Part Two Here, Part Three Here, Part Four Here, Part Five Here, Part Six Here, Part Seven Here, Part Eight Here, Part Nine Here, Part Ten Here, Part Eleven Here, Part Twelve Here, Part Thirteen Here, Part Fourteen Here, Part Fifteen Here)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rating: NC-17
Table: #1
Prompt: 077 Upset
Word Count: 3627
Summary: Complete AU. On the night the demon kills Mary Winchester, John saves Dean, but before he can go back for Sam, the fire spreads. It is assumed that Sam is dead along with his mother. In reality, he has been taken and is raised by a family dedicate to the demon who killed Mary. One night after a hunt, Dean runs into him in a bar in Palo Alto, never a clue who he really is.
Warnings: Overall-Incest, m/m sex, blood play, bondage, non-con, including memories of under-age rape. Alas, no sex...Sam relapses, goes looking for his mother...and finds something else entirely.
This is my thirty-fifth ficlet for my Supernatural claim on 100_situations. Clicky for table
Sam woke as the late afternoon rain was fading, and the sun poking out of dark clouds weakly painted the small room in shades of purple and grey. He lay still for a while, listening to the quiet. He was wrung out, his emotions stamped down into a numbness that left him uncertain of himself.
Dreams and nightmares reminded him of his place, called him home. He dreamt of the woman who he’d known as his mother, and her invitation to come back. Her eyes had glowed gold. All he had to do to be welcomed back to the fold is steal the child, bring Dana with him. It wouldn’t even be hard.
Sam shook his head and got out of the bed. Outside the window the world seemed wet and grey. In Boston it would be white, covered in snow. He could be skiing with friends. He could be fucking his way through a ski lodge somewhere.
Instead he was here, in some backwater town in Kansas, of all places. Of all the places. It was one more state he could add to the list. It left South Dakota and Alabama as the only states he’d never been to.
Sam sank into the window seat and rubbed at his face. He needed to clear his head. The last of the drugs were out of his system, but the psychic had opened doors in inside him he’d never meant to be opened, and this thing with Dean was adding indecision, clouding his judgment. He needed a shower and a shave. He needed some time alone, without the feeling of them pressing in on him.
He roused himself to do those things, wandering down to the bathroom to let the water warm while he rummaged for towels. As the room filled with steam, Sam picked up Dean’s razor and looked into the mirror. His reflection stared back at him, and he almost didn’t recognize himself. “What are you doing?” he asked himself.
When he didn’t answer, Sam shaved quickly and stepped into the shower. “You don’t belong there.” She had said it in his dream. “They can never love the true you.”
Sam shook his head under the water and rubbed soap over his arms. Dean had been furious when he’d gotten a glimpse of who Sam was. John had threatened him. Sam still wasn’t much more than a prisoner. He certainly wasn’t a part of this fucked up family, no matter what Dean said.
As the water chilled, Sam stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around him, then grabbed a second towel to dry his hair. He wiped off the mirror and stared at himself again for a minute. With the days and days of facial hair gone, he suddenly looked younger than his almost 23 years. He looked like he had at 17.
At seventeen, Sam had graduated from a private high school at the top of his class, had his own group of friends that rivaled his father’s and for the first time was able to stand up against him and walk away from it. It had been a turning point. He’d walked into the temple room on his own for the first time. Offered his own gift, summoned the Demon himself.
With a deep breath, Sam turned from the mirror, returning to his room to dress. Dean had brought up a bag of clothes he said should fit him. Salvation army clothes, but better than the sweatpants he’d worn since his capture.
Sam found a pair of jeans and pulled them on, before pulling a brush through his hair.
“Going somewhere?”
Sam half turned toward the voice, already shrugging. “Thought I’d take a walk.” He moved back to the bed where the bag was spilling out over the rumpled blankets. “Clear my head.”
Dean leaned against the door and nodded. “Want company?”
Sam shook his head, his jaw jutting out as he looked up. “No. I need…to be alone.”
“Fair enough. We didn’t see any sign of demon activity in the area, so you’re probably safe.”
Sam nodded, then pulled on a t-shirt and a sweatshirt. “You should take a coat, you can use mine.” Dean added. “Its getting cold out there.”
“What are you, my mother?”
Dean’s smile faded and he shifted uncomfortably. “Sam?”
Sam shook his head. “Never mind. I’m…I just need some space.”
“Okay. I’ll be downstairs.”
Sam sank onto the bed and reached for his shoes. “Yeah, smooth.” He waited a few minutes, then got up and headed down the stairs. John looked up from his book, but Dean kept his attention on Dana, holding the same silly dog toy while she pulled at its feet.
“I-I won’t be long.” Sam said, slipping Dean’s coat on.
“Watch yourself. It gets might dark around here.” John said, before turning his attention back to his book.
Sam let himself out onto the porch and paused. He hadn’t actually expected it to be that easy. The evening was already subtracting heat from the air. He stuffed his hands in Dean’s pockets and set out. He didn’t know where he was going, exactly. Just somewhere else. Somewhere with significantly less Winchester.
John waited until he could no longer hear the crunch of Sam’s steps on the gravel in the driveway before looking up at Dean. “Is he okay out there alone?”
Dean raised both eyebrows and shook his head. “Honestly? I don’t know.” Dana bounced in his lap, her hands dragging his thumb to her mouth. “We can’t keep holding him here though. Eventually he has to make choices.”
John nodded thoughtfully. “And if those choices endanger you or Dana?”
Dean was quiet. He didn’t want to think about it. Sam had changed, he could feel it. He probably would never be an angel, but…Dean shook his head again. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe one of us should follow him.”
Dean looked up, out the window. “No. Give him this.”
John nodded, then returned to his book. Dean watched out the window a while longer, until Dana’s tiny hands touched his face and he smiled for her, watching her eyes sparkle as she giggled.
Sam didn’t know the town, or the streets, having slept most of the way into it, and he had never seen the house before, but standing there in front of it, Sam knew. He stood at the end of the driveway and looked at it. This was where it all happened. Where he lost one family and gained…demons.
The house pulled at him, it’s empty windows calling to him. He could feel that there were spirits in the area, maybe even in the house. Maybe even her. Breathing in the crisp night air, Sam picked the lock and let himself inside.
It looked like someone was moving in…or out. Boxes were stacked along one wall in the living room, but there was no furniture. He trailed a hand over the wall as he moved. It seemed as though it should feel familiar, but it didn’t. Up the stairs, where family pictures were achingly absent and he closed his eyes, letting instinct guide him.
The smell of smoke wafted toward him and he followed it, half expecting to push open the door of the room where he once slept and find it ablaze. There was no fire though, only a broken old crib and the shape of a woman.
For a moment, his chest seized up. He couldn’t remember her face, had never seen a picture…had never though to ask Dean…then she turned and his heart froze. This was no ghost of the long dead mother he had cried out for so often as a child. “Hello Sam.”
Her eyes glowed yellow and he had to force himself to enter the room. “What do you want?”
She made a placating sound and turned to face him completely. “Is that any way to talk to your mother, Sam?”
Sam cocked his head at her. “You aren’t my mother.”
“Are you sure about that?” She moved toward him and he felt himself sliding toward the wall. “Maybe I’ve been in here all along, waiting for my turn.”
Sam dug in and pushed back, surprised when her eyes shot open wider and he stopped moving. “Even so, that body had nothing to do with me.”
“Not that it didn’t want to.” Her fingers ran over her cleavage and he forcefully looked away.
“What do you want?” Sam asked again, pushing harder until the pressure popped and he felt her release him.
“My brother was…hasty, haughty. Look what it got him. Dead.” She came closer, reaching up to run a hand down his face. “If he had worried a little less about John Winchester and a little more about getting the job done, he would be corporeal now, instead of dead.”
“What do you mean?”
“You had Dean well enough in hand, and he already had the infant. Nothing should have stopped him.”
Sam shook his head. “John Winchester did nothing to stop that ritual.”
She smiled. “Of course not. But he didn’t need to be there. All he needed was you…” She ran a finger down his jaw line. “…the baby…and Dean…well, and the mother, but he had her.”
Sam’s face clouded. “Dean? What did he need Dean for?”
Her smile was wicked. “Children have mothers and fathers, Sam. Both are required to make a life. Both are required for life to be reborn.”
Sam’s head spun. “What do you want from me?” he finally asked when it appeared she wasn’t going to offer him anymore information.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Sam shook his head. “I want what he wanted.”
Sam scowled. “The time is past, she’s older than-“
“Only the baptism must be done on that night Sam. Once the vessel is prepared, we have a year to use it. Bring her to me. Bring them both to me.” She turned, her eyes glowing in the dark of the house. “Bring them and the gun and all that my brother promised you is yours.”
Sam shook his head. “I don’t think so. I may have been naïve to believe him, but I’m not stupid enough to do it twice.”
“No?” She raised an eyebrow and was suddenly right in front of him again. Her hand grabbed his right wrist, her fingers twining in the leather around his wrist. “Do you forget you made a blood oath? Do you forget what you were given already in exchange? Look at you. Do you think they will want you like that?”
He tried to pull it away, but she snapped the leather and he sagged as the magic left him. Sam curled his arm in, under his jacket, tears stinging his eyes as the pain lanced through it, through his face and side, down his leg. The glamour that had hidden his secret faded and she vanished, leaving Sam kneeling on the floor, cradling his arm, reliving the night of his most savage punishment. It took him nearly an hour to harness his emotions in again, dry his tears and bringing himself to his feet.
He shuffled to the bathroom down the hall, his jaw set in a hard line. He didn’t look at it so much as he looked at the hair he combed over it with his fingers. He turned up the collar of the jacket, made sure the sleeve covered to his wrist and stuck his hand into his pocket.
He stalked back the way he’d come, seething with rage and pain.
When he reached Missouri’s house he paused. They were still there in the living room. He set his face in a scowl and headed in, brushing past them and bounding up the stairs. He reached his room before he heard Dean’s voice calling his name. He ignored it, closing the door and stalking into the room, pacing with pent up energy.
“Go away,” he said harshly before Dean even knocked on the door.
He did anyway, opening it and poking his head in. “Sam?”
“Go the fuck away Dean.”
He took a step back and stopped. “What happened?”
Sam turned so that his right side was hidden from Dean, his eyes burning. “Nothing happened. I’m just…I want to be alone.”
Dean was in the room now, his presence pressing into Sam, suffocating and close. He took a step back and Sam took a shaky breath. “You’re angry.”
“And I thought I was the psychic.” Sam ran a hand over his face.
“Let me help.”
Sam twitched, turning his head toward Dean. “Go away, Dean.” He smiled as the compulsion forced Dean back a step. He was outside the door now.
“Sam.”
Sam’s hand came up and the door slammed shut. “Leave me alone.”
Dean’s step on the stair was heavy and both Missouri and John looked up expectantly. Dean’s face was pale and drawn. “I’ve never seen him like that.”
“He was in pain.” Missouri offered, setting aside her knitting.
“He was angry. He slammed the door in my face.” Dean looked up at them. “From across the room.”
Missouri clucked with her tongue. “Its starting.”
“What is?” Dean leaned against the wall. He was tired of not having an enemy to fight.
“His gifts. They’re exploding. He probably didn’t even realize he’d done it.”
“What pain?” John asked suddenly. “You said he was in pain.”
Missouri shook her head. “I don’t know. He went by pretty fast.”
“I’m going up.” John stood.
“I’m not so sure-“Dean started, but he stopped when he saw the look on his father’s face.
“He’s my son and he’s in pain. He has power that could hurt the rest of us. He needs to learn how to handle this.” John bounded up the stairs and knocked at the door. “Sam. I’d like to talk to you.”
He didn’t get an answer, so he opened the door and slipped inside. Like the last time, Sam was sitting in the window seat, a dark figure against the pale light of a moon that danced in and out of clouds. “Sam?”
Sam’s head leaned back against the wall. Whatever rage had been driving him seemed to have faded. “Don’t you people know what alone means?”
John smiled. “Winchesters take care of each other. You should get used to it.”
“I don’t want to.”
“I’m not leaving.” John stepped further into the room.
“Maybe I will.” Sam said, his voice cold. “I don’t belong here. I’m not the person you want me to be.”
John shoved his big hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I don’t want you to be anyone Sam. I just want to know you.”
Sam turned his face away, staring out the window. “He does. He expects me to transform into some do-gooder like him.”
John knew he meant Dean, and as comfortable as the topic made him, he nodded and stepped still closer. “Dean loves you. Despite everything you’ve done to him. I don’t think he’s got any expectations.”
They were quiet for a minute before Sam looked up at him. “I went to the house.”
This caught John off guard. He gasped and looked at Sam in horror. “I don’t know how I knew. I just did. I-“ Sam swallowed, his left hand rising to adjust his clothes over his right shoulder and arm. “I wanted to see. I wanted to know.”
“Know what?”
“I wanted it to be her. But it wasn’t.”
John held his breath. “Who, Sam?”
“It wasn’t her. I wanted it to be her. I’ve always wanted it to be her.” Sam looked up at him, his eyes dark in the gloom of the room. “Instead of the spirit of my mother, I found a demon dressed up in the body of the woman who raised me.”
John came closer and Sam held up his hand to stop him. “No. I’m fine.”
“You’re in pain.”
Sam nodded. “Yes. I am. But it isn’t so bad anymore. It isn’t new…I’d just…managed to forget.”
“I don’t understand.”
Sam looked down at his right hand, hidden from John by his knee. “Do you want to?” The question was soft and felt like an opening.
John took a deep breath and nodded. “If you are ready to tell me.”
Sam’s eyes met his. “I’ll show you. Get the lights.” Sam stood as John crossed back to the door and the light switch. He slipped Dean’s jacket off and set it on the seat. The sweatshirt came next, and the t-shirt last. He blinked a little as the lights came on, cringing and instinctively turning his damaged side away.
John waited, trusting that this was something Sam needed to do in his own time. “I don’t want this to be big and dramatic.” Sam said. “I’m not like some Lifetime movie.”
John chuckled and nodded. “Okay.”
“I told you about the punishment closet.”
“I remember.”
“I assume Dean told you about…the other stuff.”
John had to clear his throat before he could say, “Yes.”
Sam nodded. “When I was 16, I was home for summer. I was…rebellious. My father caught me with the daughter of one of our maids. The help was strictly forbidden. I could screw anything I could get into my bed, as long as they didn’t work for him. In fact, I was encouraged to screw around. Apparently they had plans for the girl I wasn’t aware of.”
He took a deep breath. “My punishment was…excruciating. Ever heard of Harriers?” He sort of smiled when John shook his head. “Not surprised. They’re a special breed. Used almost only by folks like the old man. Half-breeds. Young ones are just corporeal enough to leave bite marks and scratches. Older ones, they’re corporeal enough for a whole lot more.”
Slowly, Sam turned, taking a few steps toward John. “I got locked in a room with 20 of them. For 3 days.”
John gasped as Sam stopped in front of him, his hand rising to ghost over the scars that ran from Sam’s right ear, down his neck, shoulder, chest…down his arm and side and disappeared under his jeans. Red, raised flesh butted against concaved, puckered skin. “Dear God.” John murmured and Sam nodded. There were marks that looked like claws, and others that looked like teeth. The shoulder seemed pinched, deep marks of large claws looking like they’d tried to tear the arm completely off.
“By the time it was over, I’d lost nearly as much blood as I did in the warehouse. I had been fucked raw, and my whole right side was so much meat.” He lifted his arm, and pointed to three large scars on his side. “The one that did this got killed for it. They were supposed to hurt me, mark me, scar me…put me in my place, not endanger my life.”
John turned him, examining the marks carefully, over his back and up into his hair. “Why haven’t we seen these before?”
Sam held up his right hand, palm up. There was another mark, a thin line over the wrist. “When I was 17, I came home from school and ended it. I made my own deal with the devil. In return, I was given back my…vanity. I wore a leather talisman on my wrist. It bound a glamour that kept it hidden, kept the pain away.”
“What happened tonight Sam?”
“My marker got called in.” He sank onto the bed. “I didn’t roll over and bow down.” He sighed. “She took the talisman.” He ran a shaking left hand through his hair. “She did it to get me to do what she wants, to go back to being the obedient boy.”
“What did she want?”
Sam wouldn’t look at him, swallowed and turned away. “She’ll give me everything. I swore to be obedient. I shed blood.”
“What is it Sam? What did she ask you to do?”
Sam shook his head. “I-I can’t tell you.”
John came to kneel in front of him, cupping a hand to Sam’s face, to the burn and scars. “You can. You can tell me anything.”
Tears slipped from Sam’s eyes. “Not…now. I need…time.”
John’s brown eyes searched Sam’s, but all he could see in them was a broken boy. “Okay. All right. Get some rest then.” John stood and headed for the door.
“John.” Sam’s voice stopped him and John turned. He’d never heard Sam use his name. “Is there…anymore of the sleeping…stuff?”
John shook his head lightly. “Maybe a little, why?”
“I just…think it might be safer. For right now.” Sam toed off his shoes and stood up to pull down the blankets on the bed. “I…don’t want to hurt someone.”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll bring it up.”
“One more thing?” Sam let his eyes slip up to meet John’s again. “I don’t…I don’t want Dean to see this…to know.”
“Sam, he won’t care-“
“No, but I will. Please. For now.”
“Yeah, okay. You get into bed. I’ll be back.”
Sam slipped under the blankets, his head reeling. He could play John as long as he was vulnerable, the injured, wronged son looking for redemption. Dean wouldn’t be as easy anymore. Sam had done some pretty bad things in his service to demons. Delivered babies into the hands of foster parents much like his. This was different though. This was family.
He didn’t know when that had started to matter, but it might have been when John touched him just then. No one but nurses and doctors had ever touched him there without the glamour. He wouldn’t show it, but a part of him had risen to that touch…the part of him that asked to be sedated so he wouldn’t hurt anyone.
Title: My Brother's Keeper, Part Sixteen( Part One Here, Part Two Here, Part Three Here, Part Four Here, Part Five Here, Part Six Here, Part Seven Here, Part Eight Here, Part Nine Here, Part Ten Here, Part Eleven Here, Part Twelve Here, Part Thirteen Here, Part Fourteen Here, Part Fifteen Here)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rating: NC-17
Table: #1
Prompt: 077 Upset
Word Count: 3627
Summary: Complete AU. On the night the demon kills Mary Winchester, John saves Dean, but before he can go back for Sam, the fire spreads. It is assumed that Sam is dead along with his mother. In reality, he has been taken and is raised by a family dedicate to the demon who killed Mary. One night after a hunt, Dean runs into him in a bar in Palo Alto, never a clue who he really is.
Warnings: Overall-Incest, m/m sex, blood play, bondage, non-con, including memories of under-age rape. Alas, no sex...Sam relapses, goes looking for his mother...and finds something else entirely.
This is my thirty-fifth ficlet for my Supernatural claim on 100_situations. Clicky for table
Sam woke as the late afternoon rain was fading, and the sun poking out of dark clouds weakly painted the small room in shades of purple and grey. He lay still for a while, listening to the quiet. He was wrung out, his emotions stamped down into a numbness that left him uncertain of himself.
Dreams and nightmares reminded him of his place, called him home. He dreamt of the woman who he’d known as his mother, and her invitation to come back. Her eyes had glowed gold. All he had to do to be welcomed back to the fold is steal the child, bring Dana with him. It wouldn’t even be hard.
Sam shook his head and got out of the bed. Outside the window the world seemed wet and grey. In Boston it would be white, covered in snow. He could be skiing with friends. He could be fucking his way through a ski lodge somewhere.
Instead he was here, in some backwater town in Kansas, of all places. Of all the places. It was one more state he could add to the list. It left South Dakota and Alabama as the only states he’d never been to.
Sam sank into the window seat and rubbed at his face. He needed to clear his head. The last of the drugs were out of his system, but the psychic had opened doors in inside him he’d never meant to be opened, and this thing with Dean was adding indecision, clouding his judgment. He needed a shower and a shave. He needed some time alone, without the feeling of them pressing in on him.
He roused himself to do those things, wandering down to the bathroom to let the water warm while he rummaged for towels. As the room filled with steam, Sam picked up Dean’s razor and looked into the mirror. His reflection stared back at him, and he almost didn’t recognize himself. “What are you doing?” he asked himself.
When he didn’t answer, Sam shaved quickly and stepped into the shower. “You don’t belong there.” She had said it in his dream. “They can never love the true you.”
Sam shook his head under the water and rubbed soap over his arms. Dean had been furious when he’d gotten a glimpse of who Sam was. John had threatened him. Sam still wasn’t much more than a prisoner. He certainly wasn’t a part of this fucked up family, no matter what Dean said.
As the water chilled, Sam stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around him, then grabbed a second towel to dry his hair. He wiped off the mirror and stared at himself again for a minute. With the days and days of facial hair gone, he suddenly looked younger than his almost 23 years. He looked like he had at 17.
At seventeen, Sam had graduated from a private high school at the top of his class, had his own group of friends that rivaled his father’s and for the first time was able to stand up against him and walk away from it. It had been a turning point. He’d walked into the temple room on his own for the first time. Offered his own gift, summoned the Demon himself.
With a deep breath, Sam turned from the mirror, returning to his room to dress. Dean had brought up a bag of clothes he said should fit him. Salvation army clothes, but better than the sweatpants he’d worn since his capture.
Sam found a pair of jeans and pulled them on, before pulling a brush through his hair.
“Going somewhere?”
Sam half turned toward the voice, already shrugging. “Thought I’d take a walk.” He moved back to the bed where the bag was spilling out over the rumpled blankets. “Clear my head.”
Dean leaned against the door and nodded. “Want company?”
Sam shook his head, his jaw jutting out as he looked up. “No. I need…to be alone.”
“Fair enough. We didn’t see any sign of demon activity in the area, so you’re probably safe.”
Sam nodded, then pulled on a t-shirt and a sweatshirt. “You should take a coat, you can use mine.” Dean added. “Its getting cold out there.”
“What are you, my mother?”
Dean’s smile faded and he shifted uncomfortably. “Sam?”
Sam shook his head. “Never mind. I’m…I just need some space.”
“Okay. I’ll be downstairs.”
Sam sank onto the bed and reached for his shoes. “Yeah, smooth.” He waited a few minutes, then got up and headed down the stairs. John looked up from his book, but Dean kept his attention on Dana, holding the same silly dog toy while she pulled at its feet.
“I-I won’t be long.” Sam said, slipping Dean’s coat on.
“Watch yourself. It gets might dark around here.” John said, before turning his attention back to his book.
Sam let himself out onto the porch and paused. He hadn’t actually expected it to be that easy. The evening was already subtracting heat from the air. He stuffed his hands in Dean’s pockets and set out. He didn’t know where he was going, exactly. Just somewhere else. Somewhere with significantly less Winchester.
John waited until he could no longer hear the crunch of Sam’s steps on the gravel in the driveway before looking up at Dean. “Is he okay out there alone?”
Dean raised both eyebrows and shook his head. “Honestly? I don’t know.” Dana bounced in his lap, her hands dragging his thumb to her mouth. “We can’t keep holding him here though. Eventually he has to make choices.”
John nodded thoughtfully. “And if those choices endanger you or Dana?”
Dean was quiet. He didn’t want to think about it. Sam had changed, he could feel it. He probably would never be an angel, but…Dean shook his head again. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe one of us should follow him.”
Dean looked up, out the window. “No. Give him this.”
John nodded, then returned to his book. Dean watched out the window a while longer, until Dana’s tiny hands touched his face and he smiled for her, watching her eyes sparkle as she giggled.
Sam didn’t know the town, or the streets, having slept most of the way into it, and he had never seen the house before, but standing there in front of it, Sam knew. He stood at the end of the driveway and looked at it. This was where it all happened. Where he lost one family and gained…demons.
The house pulled at him, it’s empty windows calling to him. He could feel that there were spirits in the area, maybe even in the house. Maybe even her. Breathing in the crisp night air, Sam picked the lock and let himself inside.
It looked like someone was moving in…or out. Boxes were stacked along one wall in the living room, but there was no furniture. He trailed a hand over the wall as he moved. It seemed as though it should feel familiar, but it didn’t. Up the stairs, where family pictures were achingly absent and he closed his eyes, letting instinct guide him.
The smell of smoke wafted toward him and he followed it, half expecting to push open the door of the room where he once slept and find it ablaze. There was no fire though, only a broken old crib and the shape of a woman.
For a moment, his chest seized up. He couldn’t remember her face, had never seen a picture…had never though to ask Dean…then she turned and his heart froze. This was no ghost of the long dead mother he had cried out for so often as a child. “Hello Sam.”
Her eyes glowed yellow and he had to force himself to enter the room. “What do you want?”
She made a placating sound and turned to face him completely. “Is that any way to talk to your mother, Sam?”
Sam cocked his head at her. “You aren’t my mother.”
“Are you sure about that?” She moved toward him and he felt himself sliding toward the wall. “Maybe I’ve been in here all along, waiting for my turn.”
Sam dug in and pushed back, surprised when her eyes shot open wider and he stopped moving. “Even so, that body had nothing to do with me.”
“Not that it didn’t want to.” Her fingers ran over her cleavage and he forcefully looked away.
“What do you want?” Sam asked again, pushing harder until the pressure popped and he felt her release him.
“My brother was…hasty, haughty. Look what it got him. Dead.” She came closer, reaching up to run a hand down his face. “If he had worried a little less about John Winchester and a little more about getting the job done, he would be corporeal now, instead of dead.”
“What do you mean?”
“You had Dean well enough in hand, and he already had the infant. Nothing should have stopped him.”
Sam shook his head. “John Winchester did nothing to stop that ritual.”
She smiled. “Of course not. But he didn’t need to be there. All he needed was you…” She ran a finger down his jaw line. “…the baby…and Dean…well, and the mother, but he had her.”
Sam’s face clouded. “Dean? What did he need Dean for?”
Her smile was wicked. “Children have mothers and fathers, Sam. Both are required to make a life. Both are required for life to be reborn.”
Sam’s head spun. “What do you want from me?” he finally asked when it appeared she wasn’t going to offer him anymore information.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Sam shook his head. “I want what he wanted.”
Sam scowled. “The time is past, she’s older than-“
“Only the baptism must be done on that night Sam. Once the vessel is prepared, we have a year to use it. Bring her to me. Bring them both to me.” She turned, her eyes glowing in the dark of the house. “Bring them and the gun and all that my brother promised you is yours.”
Sam shook his head. “I don’t think so. I may have been naïve to believe him, but I’m not stupid enough to do it twice.”
“No?” She raised an eyebrow and was suddenly right in front of him again. Her hand grabbed his right wrist, her fingers twining in the leather around his wrist. “Do you forget you made a blood oath? Do you forget what you were given already in exchange? Look at you. Do you think they will want you like that?”
He tried to pull it away, but she snapped the leather and he sagged as the magic left him. Sam curled his arm in, under his jacket, tears stinging his eyes as the pain lanced through it, through his face and side, down his leg. The glamour that had hidden his secret faded and she vanished, leaving Sam kneeling on the floor, cradling his arm, reliving the night of his most savage punishment. It took him nearly an hour to harness his emotions in again, dry his tears and bringing himself to his feet.
He shuffled to the bathroom down the hall, his jaw set in a hard line. He didn’t look at it so much as he looked at the hair he combed over it with his fingers. He turned up the collar of the jacket, made sure the sleeve covered to his wrist and stuck his hand into his pocket.
He stalked back the way he’d come, seething with rage and pain.
When he reached Missouri’s house he paused. They were still there in the living room. He set his face in a scowl and headed in, brushing past them and bounding up the stairs. He reached his room before he heard Dean’s voice calling his name. He ignored it, closing the door and stalking into the room, pacing with pent up energy.
“Go away,” he said harshly before Dean even knocked on the door.
He did anyway, opening it and poking his head in. “Sam?”
“Go the fuck away Dean.”
He took a step back and stopped. “What happened?”
Sam turned so that his right side was hidden from Dean, his eyes burning. “Nothing happened. I’m just…I want to be alone.”
Dean was in the room now, his presence pressing into Sam, suffocating and close. He took a step back and Sam took a shaky breath. “You’re angry.”
“And I thought I was the psychic.” Sam ran a hand over his face.
“Let me help.”
Sam twitched, turning his head toward Dean. “Go away, Dean.” He smiled as the compulsion forced Dean back a step. He was outside the door now.
“Sam.”
Sam’s hand came up and the door slammed shut. “Leave me alone.”
Dean’s step on the stair was heavy and both Missouri and John looked up expectantly. Dean’s face was pale and drawn. “I’ve never seen him like that.”
“He was in pain.” Missouri offered, setting aside her knitting.
“He was angry. He slammed the door in my face.” Dean looked up at them. “From across the room.”
Missouri clucked with her tongue. “Its starting.”
“What is?” Dean leaned against the wall. He was tired of not having an enemy to fight.
“His gifts. They’re exploding. He probably didn’t even realize he’d done it.”
“What pain?” John asked suddenly. “You said he was in pain.”
Missouri shook her head. “I don’t know. He went by pretty fast.”
“I’m going up.” John stood.
“I’m not so sure-“Dean started, but he stopped when he saw the look on his father’s face.
“He’s my son and he’s in pain. He has power that could hurt the rest of us. He needs to learn how to handle this.” John bounded up the stairs and knocked at the door. “Sam. I’d like to talk to you.”
He didn’t get an answer, so he opened the door and slipped inside. Like the last time, Sam was sitting in the window seat, a dark figure against the pale light of a moon that danced in and out of clouds. “Sam?”
Sam’s head leaned back against the wall. Whatever rage had been driving him seemed to have faded. “Don’t you people know what alone means?”
John smiled. “Winchesters take care of each other. You should get used to it.”
“I don’t want to.”
“I’m not leaving.” John stepped further into the room.
“Maybe I will.” Sam said, his voice cold. “I don’t belong here. I’m not the person you want me to be.”
John shoved his big hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I don’t want you to be anyone Sam. I just want to know you.”
Sam turned his face away, staring out the window. “He does. He expects me to transform into some do-gooder like him.”
John knew he meant Dean, and as comfortable as the topic made him, he nodded and stepped still closer. “Dean loves you. Despite everything you’ve done to him. I don’t think he’s got any expectations.”
They were quiet for a minute before Sam looked up at him. “I went to the house.”
This caught John off guard. He gasped and looked at Sam in horror. “I don’t know how I knew. I just did. I-“ Sam swallowed, his left hand rising to adjust his clothes over his right shoulder and arm. “I wanted to see. I wanted to know.”
“Know what?”
“I wanted it to be her. But it wasn’t.”
John held his breath. “Who, Sam?”
“It wasn’t her. I wanted it to be her. I’ve always wanted it to be her.” Sam looked up at him, his eyes dark in the gloom of the room. “Instead of the spirit of my mother, I found a demon dressed up in the body of the woman who raised me.”
John came closer and Sam held up his hand to stop him. “No. I’m fine.”
“You’re in pain.”
Sam nodded. “Yes. I am. But it isn’t so bad anymore. It isn’t new…I’d just…managed to forget.”
“I don’t understand.”
Sam looked down at his right hand, hidden from John by his knee. “Do you want to?” The question was soft and felt like an opening.
John took a deep breath and nodded. “If you are ready to tell me.”
Sam’s eyes met his. “I’ll show you. Get the lights.” Sam stood as John crossed back to the door and the light switch. He slipped Dean’s jacket off and set it on the seat. The sweatshirt came next, and the t-shirt last. He blinked a little as the lights came on, cringing and instinctively turning his damaged side away.
John waited, trusting that this was something Sam needed to do in his own time. “I don’t want this to be big and dramatic.” Sam said. “I’m not like some Lifetime movie.”
John chuckled and nodded. “Okay.”
“I told you about the punishment closet.”
“I remember.”
“I assume Dean told you about…the other stuff.”
John had to clear his throat before he could say, “Yes.”
Sam nodded. “When I was 16, I was home for summer. I was…rebellious. My father caught me with the daughter of one of our maids. The help was strictly forbidden. I could screw anything I could get into my bed, as long as they didn’t work for him. In fact, I was encouraged to screw around. Apparently they had plans for the girl I wasn’t aware of.”
He took a deep breath. “My punishment was…excruciating. Ever heard of Harriers?” He sort of smiled when John shook his head. “Not surprised. They’re a special breed. Used almost only by folks like the old man. Half-breeds. Young ones are just corporeal enough to leave bite marks and scratches. Older ones, they’re corporeal enough for a whole lot more.”
Slowly, Sam turned, taking a few steps toward John. “I got locked in a room with 20 of them. For 3 days.”
John gasped as Sam stopped in front of him, his hand rising to ghost over the scars that ran from Sam’s right ear, down his neck, shoulder, chest…down his arm and side and disappeared under his jeans. Red, raised flesh butted against concaved, puckered skin. “Dear God.” John murmured and Sam nodded. There were marks that looked like claws, and others that looked like teeth. The shoulder seemed pinched, deep marks of large claws looking like they’d tried to tear the arm completely off.
“By the time it was over, I’d lost nearly as much blood as I did in the warehouse. I had been fucked raw, and my whole right side was so much meat.” He lifted his arm, and pointed to three large scars on his side. “The one that did this got killed for it. They were supposed to hurt me, mark me, scar me…put me in my place, not endanger my life.”
John turned him, examining the marks carefully, over his back and up into his hair. “Why haven’t we seen these before?”
Sam held up his right hand, palm up. There was another mark, a thin line over the wrist. “When I was 17, I came home from school and ended it. I made my own deal with the devil. In return, I was given back my…vanity. I wore a leather talisman on my wrist. It bound a glamour that kept it hidden, kept the pain away.”
“What happened tonight Sam?”
“My marker got called in.” He sank onto the bed. “I didn’t roll over and bow down.” He sighed. “She took the talisman.” He ran a shaking left hand through his hair. “She did it to get me to do what she wants, to go back to being the obedient boy.”
“What did she want?”
Sam wouldn’t look at him, swallowed and turned away. “She’ll give me everything. I swore to be obedient. I shed blood.”
“What is it Sam? What did she ask you to do?”
Sam shook his head. “I-I can’t tell you.”
John came to kneel in front of him, cupping a hand to Sam’s face, to the burn and scars. “You can. You can tell me anything.”
Tears slipped from Sam’s eyes. “Not…now. I need…time.”
John’s brown eyes searched Sam’s, but all he could see in them was a broken boy. “Okay. All right. Get some rest then.” John stood and headed for the door.
“John.” Sam’s voice stopped him and John turned. He’d never heard Sam use his name. “Is there…anymore of the sleeping…stuff?”
John shook his head lightly. “Maybe a little, why?”
“I just…think it might be safer. For right now.” Sam toed off his shoes and stood up to pull down the blankets on the bed. “I…don’t want to hurt someone.”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll bring it up.”
“One more thing?” Sam let his eyes slip up to meet John’s again. “I don’t…I don’t want Dean to see this…to know.”
“Sam, he won’t care-“
“No, but I will. Please. For now.”
“Yeah, okay. You get into bed. I’ll be back.”
Sam slipped under the blankets, his head reeling. He could play John as long as he was vulnerable, the injured, wronged son looking for redemption. Dean wouldn’t be as easy anymore. Sam had done some pretty bad things in his service to demons. Delivered babies into the hands of foster parents much like his. This was different though. This was family.
He didn’t know when that had started to matter, but it might have been when John touched him just then. No one but nurses and doctors had ever touched him there without the glamour. He wouldn’t show it, but a part of him had risen to that touch…the part of him that asked to be sedated so he wouldn’t hurt anyone.