Final Author Notes at the end.

Maelstrom

Chapter Nine

The heater's likely to give out within the next few hours, and Bobby's collected and carefully stacked a few of the fallen roof beams into the form of a teepee within the mouth of the large fireplace, gotten a flame lit and roaring to add some peripheral heat to the room, so they aren't plunged into a state of complete frigid hopelessness when it goes. They've gingerly dragged a packed-full-of gauze and bundled-up Dean closer to the stone hearth, wrapped him tightly in all three sleeping bags and the stiff, musty fleece blanket pulled from the trunk of Bobby's ride, but it's not enough. Not nearly. Dean's lost too much blood, and he's still too cold.

After a few tense, vigilant hours, Bobby's taken advantage of the sunrise and the break in the weather to step outside for a moment and take full, detailed stock of their admittedly shitty situation and see if he can get a better signal on his cell phone, maybe find a contact in close enough proximity to get the cars unstuck and a path dug to the main road before Dean takes a turn they won't be able to bring him back from.

Bringing up all sorts of questions about the logistics of Dean's crossroads deal, like does he only go to Hell if the hounds take him after a full year passes as scheduled, or is it inevitable? Is he doomed to be dragged down no matter the ways or means or exact timing? Sam knows he can't try to break the deal altogether without dying himself, but maybe there are some circumstances that can be altered.

He rubs his forehead, the headache building there one completely of his own making. He'd rather not think about Hell and deals anymore, simply comforts himself with the fact his brother made it through another rough night, and Sam will take that for now. One day at a time, while trying not to count them down. He shifts where he's propped against the stone face framing the floor-to-ceiling fireplace, sharp edges digging into his spine as he stretches out a sore, stiff leg to rest against his brother. Dean's been in and out, but more out than in, and he doesn't seem to be in a position to notice Sam moving now.

The morning has brought an abundance of sunlight beyond these walls, rays struggling through grimy glass to similarly brighten the interior of the freezing, drab hotel. The beams of light are a welcome sight and give the illusion of available warmth in the meager streams breaking free to pattern the concrete floor of the lobby, but even when Sam moves to the side to soak it in, he can't seem to remember what warm is supposed to feel like. He can't manage to register any sensation beyond the lingering chill of dread and fear coiling through his veins as he stares down at his sleeping brother who, as usual, is doing monumentally better than he should be, given the circumstances. Because he doesn't ever stop fighting.

The lobby door drags open with a shudder and a heavy, echoing scrape as Bobby stomps back inside, shivering and tucking his bulky cell phone into a pocket of his dirt-streaked down vest. He drags his hat from his head, runs a calloused hand through greasy hair, and his priorities align pretty well with Sam's as he asks before anything else, "How's he doin'?"

"He'll be okay," Sam responds automatically, a kneejerk reaction. Wishful thinking, and a refusal to believe anything else. Dean wouldn't allow for anything else. Sam needs his big brother to be okay, so his big brother will pull through for him.

The bleeding's stopped, at least, for now. They've each patched more than their fair share of battle wounds, but neither is qualified to throw a guess at what damage might lie beneath or beyond that. Probably something bad, something that can't be fixed with a needle and dental floss or by firelight. But Dean isn't supposed to take those sorts of hits, the kind that require more care and repair than Sam can manage himself, because Dean operates only within the scope of Sam's capabilities. That's just the way it is.

"We'll figure something out," Bobby says softly, like he can sense Sam's thoughts. Like this bullshit brain connection is contagious, but Sam knows better. Knows he's just predictable in his concerns. "And you?" the hunter urges.

Sam glances down at the hand he'd cut before in his haste to reach the fallen Dean, now wrapped in a strip of gauze Bobby had convinced him they could spare. Thinking back on the amount of blood his brother left downstairs, Sam's not so sure. "It's a scratch, Bobby," he barks with a bit more heat than intended, his pent-up anxiety seeking any means of escape. "I'm fine."

Bobby doesn't seem to mind his tone, or maybe he just spent so long working alongside the perpetually snappish John Winchester that he'd grown immune a long time ago. He crosses the room and stoops on the other side of Dean's sprawled form, extricating an arm from his layers of sleeping bags and blankets. But gently, like the jostle of it might actually be enough to wake him, and he holds the chilly wrist for a moment.

Dean, who's been seemingly out for the count but is always full of fight and surprises, makes a small reactive sound and his head rolls a bit, but he doesn't rouse more than that.

"Pulse is better," Bobby offers, raising his eyes to meet Sam's.

Sam scrubs his non-wounded hand across his forehead, wishing that if anything turns out to be contagious, it's Bobby's optimism. Because he could sure use some. "Yeah, a little." Better, maybe, but still in the basement. Still needing more than they have here.

Bobby takes care tucking Dean's arm back into the depths of his coverings and straightens stiffly, rubbing the back of his neck like there's a crick there he can't quite rid himself of. Sam knows the feeling. "S'warming up out there." Says it like anything not freezing will henceforth be considered warm. "Got ahold of someone with a truck, not too far away," he continues when Sam doesn't acknowledge his unsolicited weather report. "Gonna get a plow on the front and come dig us out."

"How far is not too far away?"

"Couple hours."

Sam nods, doesn't raise his eyes from Dean's pale face. "That's good."

"Storm's shut down most of the town, but the hospital is still an option."

Sam stays silent, weighing their options. Weighing risk over reward, and want over need. They've already been living the past few months under the assumption that Hendrickson will find them. That's not risk, that's certainty. That's inevitability. If they're waylaid by an extended hospital stay, well, shit, they might as well roll out the red carpet for the agent and his band of merry, heavily armed men.

"Sam?"

"Yeah."

Bobby pauses, with too many questions on the tip of his tongue to know which to put forth. "You okay?"

Sam barks harshly, not really a laugh. He can't begin to fathom an appropriate answer to that question. He stalls, shaking his head and rubbing at his rough chin, fingers dragging across the stubble of three days' beard growth. God, but he wants a shower, maybe more than ever before. It's a bit ridiculous, and even more so unhygienic, how often this life lands them in a spot without working plumbing or electricity. Dean, despite his hair being meticulously mussed, is always sporting a bit of can't-be-bothered stubble, and currently looks shadowy and halfway to lumberjack status. They got it from their father, who went through his fair share of unkempt phases, and could seemingly sprout a full beard at the drop of a hat.

"Sam?" Softly, a gentle prod, but a prod nonetheless, drawing him out of his purposefully distracting musings.

"Yeah." Sam stretches his back against the stone wall, waiting for another satisfying and much-needed series of pops and cracks along the length of his spine before forging ahead. "Honestly? I dunno, Bobby. I don't even know what's…me, anymore, you know? I'm not even sure it really matters anymore."

The past few hours, with Dean so still and sleeping and not present, it should be a relief, a welcome respite from the otherwise cacophonous torture of emotions rolling over each other. But instead, it's been unsettlingly quiet in Sam's head. He can hear himself think, and it hasn't been a procession of pleasant feelings. He'll have to get used to it, he supposes, in a thought that is morbidly detached, analytical and most certainly unwelcome. This scraped-raw, hollowed-out feeling that is the absence of his boisterous big brother. This right here, this is what life will be like. What life will feel like. He could have done well without feeling it so soon.

"I mean, what was the point of this?" Sam continues, anger picking up speed in the absence of anything else to ground him. He gestures to his head with his bandaged hand. "Whoever – or whatever – did this…what was the point?"

Bobby's eyes narrow. "Wish I had that answer for you, Sam."

"Yeah."

Bobby shifts his weight uneasily, no more comfortable without the answers than Sam is. "I'm gonna see what I can do about cleaning up downstairs before the cavalry gets here."

It takes Sam a moment. "Right." The blood left down there. From both of them, he remembers, staring down at the strip of gauze wrapped tightly around his own hand. When he raises his eyes again, Bobby has gone.

Sam resumes staring at his hands, at what he hadn't been able to clean with wipes from the kit. Faintly stained in the swirls on the pads of his fingers, caked in his nailbeds. Dean's blood on his hands. A visual reminder of what he'd already known to be true.

Dean groans, seems to have finally found his way back to the coming side of his pattern of coming and going. Sam watches as his big brother's eyes rolls beneath his lids, as he darts his tongue out to slide against his cracked bottom lip.

Sam senses it as Dean's wakefulness fully grabs hold: a phantom hot poker in his own right side and a curtain of unease and confusion dropping over his thoughts to match what his brother must be experiencing. He takes first a few steadying deep breaths, and second, advantage of this brief but welcome pocket of awareness. He scoots closer, until his tented leg is resting carefully against Dean's side. "Hey, Dean?"

"Yeah?" Dean's response is immediate but his voice is a weak, weary rasp.

Sam skips the usual, the boring, the inquiries that, however necessary, are sure to be shoved aside or met with outright fallacies. There's no use asking the man if he's okay. "That motor oil in the trunk?"

Dean's eyes don't open, but his lip twitches upward. "The bottle?"

"Yeah, jerk," Sam returns with a smile. "The bottle."

"What about it?"

Sam rubs his hands together, mindful of his sore palm. "That the one I gave you for Christmas?"

"Yeah." There's not much volume to Dean's voice, Sam's only hint that the window is closing.

"Why'd you keep it?"

Dean's throat works, and he finally drags his eyes open to regard his little brother. "What's with the twenty questions, dude?"

"Nothin.' Just wondering. You keep that protein bar, too?"

"Why, you hungry?"

Because if he was, Dean would hand it over. If Sam needed anything, Dean would do anything.

What the hell is Sam supposed to do without him?

"Be all right, Sammy," Dean says, on the verge of going again. His eyes close once more, as though they weigh a ton. "You'll be all right."

Turns out getting the cars unburied from a two-day dump of snow and sweet-talkin' their lazy, frozen engines into turning over, that's the easy part. Gettin' Dean in the back of that boat of a car, now that's a real treat.

That stubborn kid certainly didn't grow into a man that knows how to just let go and he insists on helping the whole way there, dragged along the narrow path Tucker and his plow have carved through knee-deep powder and propped between the two of them. But the short set of stairs out front is nearly his undoing, and every time his right boot touches down he folds near in half from the hurt of it, once or twice just about taking Bobby to the ground.

Bobby lets his old bones take the blame for the overall instability of their weary and hobbling threesome, but as he grips the cold, seemingly fragile wrist dangling over his shoulder, he knows the problem goes quite a bit deeper than that. And every time Dean bites back a groan, Bobby catches Sam doing more or less the same. In fact, he can't be positive whose face is drawn in more pain. Strange things, because Dean's the only one truly wounded here, but Sam feels it all the same, like the pain is his own.

Gotta put these boys right. Bobby can't stand this utterly useless feeling, of not having an answer or a fix for them. But Sam's not making quite as much with the crazy as he was before and there are more pressing matters to attend to, like getting Dean somewhere they'll be able to suss out the full extent of what damage might lie beneath that hole in his side.

Strange things, Bobby laments again, shaking his head as they trudge through the snow with Tucker watching from behind the wheel of his jet-black F350, when somethin' like this gets shoved to the backburner. He's been racking his brain for hours, for days, sifting through the dusty scraps of antiquated knowledge that's not yet proven useful but is still there, and he keeps coming away empty-handed. Or, empty-minded, as it were. Can't think of anything he's encountered before, or studied up on, or stumbled across that would do something like this. Still, he also can't seem to push away the feeling there's something just off to the edge. Something he can't quite put his finger on, but shouldn't have forgotten to think about.

Sam seems to have gotten a handle on the mental stuff, but he's still making all manner of stifled, pained noises as they lower Dean onto the edge of the leather bench. Dean himself takes every bit of it silently, like it eases his mind to act like his little brother doesn't know exactly how bad he's hurting.

Blinders on, Bobby tsks as they step back in tandem to give the guy a moment to catch his breath before manipulating his limbs the rest of the way into the car. The both of them.

Tuck's known for two things: his unnecessarily massive pickup and an uncanny ability for stating the obvious. He cranks down the window of his truck and jerks his chin at Dean huffing and puffing like that walk out of the building was the hardest thing he's ever had to do. "He's not lookin' so good," he comments drily, raising his voice to carry over the animal roar of his monstrosity's engine.

"No shit," Bobby returns with a glare, as he and Sam move to help Dean tuck his long legs into the back of the Impala.

He brushes them away, complexion pale enough to rival the snowdrifts caught along the brick face of the building at their rear. "I got it."

"Sure you do," Sam scoffs.

Dean pauses on the seat, braces himself on unsteady arms and peers up at his little brother with thoughtful, unsettled scrutiny. "You okay, Sammy?" The tail end of his inquiry is lost in a fit of shivering shoulders and chatter teeth.

"Better than you." Sam averts his eyes, drags the Impala's keys from his coat pocket and skids around to the trunk, wrestles the frozen, stubborn lid open and digs around unseen for a moment. When he pops back into view he's got a wad of dark material bundled against his chest, and pitches the hooded sweatshirt through the open door as he comes back around the ass of the car. "Here. Don't say I never paid up."

Dean raises an eyebrow. "What about the knife?"

"You don't need the knife in the car. Now shut up and get comfy." Sam waits until Dean has scooted himself across the length of the seat and then chucks the door closed and straightens, impatiently brushing bangs from a face that's fallen into an expression that doesn't quite belong to him. Hard. Older and worn, like he's seen too many things to come back from. He turns from Bobby, locks that strange gaze on Tucker. "You know if there's any kind of clinic we'll pass on our way out of town?"

Tucker nods. "Mighta passed somethin' like that."

Sam nods. "Great."

Bobby grabs him by the upper arm and whirls the kid back around. "We should be takin' him to a hospital."

Sam's jaw is set, looking stubborn to the point that it's clear the expression is for show, because he wholeheartedly agrees. How could he not? "You want to see him in a hospital again?"

"I don't want to see him DEAD, either."

"I'm not an idiot, Bobby," Sam snaps, and Bobby chocks the outburst up to exhaustion and Winchester blood. "I wouldn't suggest we skip it if…but we can't risk it."

Bobby sighs. "You're that damn worried about the feds catchin' up?"

Sam lifts a hopeless shoulder. "It's bound to happen eventually. I don't wanna go shooting flares up into the sky and help them out any."

"I don't like it."

Sam takes that in, swallows it, digests it, and lets it settle. Then he meets Bobby's eyes. "You don't have to."

A sharp whistle draws their attention. Tucker, elbow propped on the window frame, seemingly immune to the chill. Or just blasting the hell out of the truck's heater. In any case, Bobby finds himself envious. "You ladies need me to stick around for the pillow fight?"

Sam pops around looking like he might throw a punch, but Bobby just waves the loudmouth off. "Get on outta here."

"You owe me one, Singer," he calls back as he manhandles the truck into a three-point turn that's surprisingly gracefully, given the size of the thing.

And Bobby kind of wishes Tuck hadn't said that last bit. There's more than enough owed and owing going around these days.

Sam jerks out of the cloud of exhaust left in the man's wake, coughs once into his shoulder and gestures at the pair of parked cars, wordlessly requesting Bobby follow him.

At least, that's what Bobby assumes the vague sweep of the kid's arm means. Hard to know for sure, and he seems to have forgotten that not everyone can read his damn mind.

They could all use an uninterrupted stretch of real honest-to-God sleep, but when they're shivering outside of the clinic, figuring out travel plans, Sam and Bobby decide it's better to drive through the rest of the day and the night. Better to make straight for Sioux Falls, where they can actually, finally clean up and crash, instead of holing up in some skeezy motel for a few stolen hours somewhere in Ohio or Indiana. The storm system is already a hundred miles behind them, and Dean is stitched, drugged and dozing, stretched across the Impala's back seat.

Bobby takes the lead, and Sam downs enough coffee on the way to rival his brother's weekly caffeine intake. It's not until the last few miles that he starts to notice himself nodding off behind the wheel, and before being pent up in the Impala at an uncomfortable angle seems to start getting to Dean in a way that Sam can clearly translate. His brother hasn't slept the entire way, but a steady stream of pain meds from the clinic stop have made him loose and drifty, everything going on in his head slipping and sliding like ice cubes melting in a glass, and Sam hasn't really been able to corral anything specific until now.

It starts on the outside, with an audible groan as Dean shifts against the leather bench seat, rousing like he knows they're minutes away from home base, and Sam sucks in a breath as his own muscles seem to stiffen up and a dull ache picks up in no less than a dozen places throughout his body. He presses his wounded palm against the steering wheel, grounding himself and calibrating his senses to his own pain. "Y'all right, man?"

Dean releases a slow breath that clearly hurts, well, everything, and drags himself fully – or, mostly – upright in the back seat. "I'm awesome."

He's not awesome, not by a long shot, and not all of the reasons are from that fall he took. Some of these aches and pains were put there by Sam himself, and he doesn't have to shoot a glance over his shoulder to know his brother's rubbing sore, chaffed wrists.

Behind him, Dean drops his hands to slap the seat at his sides. "Stop it, Sam."

"Stop what?"

"Feelin' sorry. I get it."

"You gonna tell me not to think about the elephant in the room next?" Sam scoffs, busying himself with digging out the new bottle of pain pills to help take the edge off for them both. He rotates the wheel to guide the wide car through the tall fence enclosing Bobby's place.

Dean pulls himself forward, leaning on a forearm against the back of the front seat. "Why would I tell you not to…what the…"

Bobby's already jerked his own vehicle to a sudden stop at the sight of the sleek Mercedes SL parked at an angle across the gravel lot, effectively blocking them from pulling any closer to the house.

Sam squints. "Is that…"

Dean's fingers tighten around the stiff leather behind Sam's shoulders. "Bela."

Sam can feel his brother's heart thudding, can feel him seething, can too-easily determine every bit of strength he's pulling from his flare of anger at the very sight of her. Dean pulls away from the seatback and fumbles for the door handle, and Sam doesn't tell him to stop, or slow down, or not shoot her. Can't seem to extricate enough of himself and his stalwart caution and empathy from the overall ruckus existing between them to do so.

Dean pulls from the dregs of his nearly-tapped energy well to fling himself from the back of the car like he doesn't have a hole cutting through him and all manner of medication that should be slowing him down. A hand tucked carefully against his side as he surges forward is the only outward sign of his discomfort.

On the inside? Oh, he's pissed. And sore as hell, which only serves to sharpen the anger rolling through him, and by association, Sam.

All three men converge on Bela as she swings easily out of her convertible. She straightens and hangs onto the window frame of the open door, tilts her head. "Don't you boys know it's rude to keep a lady waiting?"

"Good advice," Dean snarls. "I'll keep it in mind next time I see a lady."

Bela raises her eyebrows and pulls away from the car to peek around them. "Were you all alone back there, Dean? Quite a change for you, isn't it?"

"What are you doing here, Bela?" Sam cuts in before the two of them resort to hair-pulling.

She presses the car door closed and stays in a casual lean against her palms on the side of the Mercedes. "You have something that belongs to me, and I'm here to collect it."

Dean makes a show of patting down his pockets. He grimaces as he bumps his sore, bandaged side and finishes the show with a bit less emphatic gesturing. "Nope, can't say that we do. We don't make a point of carrying around things that belong to evil skanks."

Bela pouts, cocking her head. "Dean, sweetie, don't be like that. It was only a little birthday gift."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, balls."

They turn in tandem to Bobby, who's standing off to the edge of the group, looking pretty responsible for…something. But Dean's always got his gaze trained on the mark, and his attention slides back to Bela, watching her eyes, her hands, her…

Really, Dean?

Dean shoots Sam a guilty look and clears his throat loudly. "What is it, Bobby?"

"The package. The one that came to my house when I was packin' up for the hunt." He turns and dips into the backseat of his car, rummaging through the items carelessly tossed inside as they were rushing to leave Grossinger's in their rearview mirror.

Dean's eyes harden, hands clenching into fists at his sides. "You sent us a cursed object?"

"Give me a little credit, Dean. The ribbon isn't cursed, it's enchanted."

Sam steps in, takes a steadying breath and attempts to inject some bit of calmness between them, before someone starts shooting off something other than their mouth. "I'm failing to see much of a difference."

"And it's not really for you," she continues, as though Sam didn't speak at all. "We'll call it a…test run. For a skeptical perspective buyer."

Bobby draws back out of his car with the small wooden case in hand. Bela reaches out as though to take the box, and Bobby steps purposefully aside, handing it over to Dean instead.

Bela sighs. She shifts to brace a slim wrist against the top of her car and rotates her body toward them, propping her elbow against the roof and her hip against the door.

Dean takes notice of her movements in a way that is making Sam increasingly uncomfortable, and he coughs, drawing his brother's attention. "Dude."

"What?"

Bela smiles and tosses her hair. "Bobby, could you be so kind as to give us a moment in private?"

"Hell, no."

"Bobby," Dean says. "It's fine. Give us a minute."

Bobby nods uneasily. "I'll be watchin'."

She presses her lips together, her eyebrows raising suggestively. "I have no doubt."

Dean waits for a grumbling Bobby to make his way across the lot all the way up to the house, but Sam isn't convinced the pause is just politeness on his brother's part because, come on. Dean's obviously and understandably hurting, but he seems to be directing a huge amount of effort into putting up some kind of wall between himself and Sam. He can tell there's something getting under Dean's skin here, but for the first time in days, he can't seem to put his finger on what exactly that might be.

When the impatient slam of the screened door against the frame echoes back out to them Dean shifts his gaze over to his little brother with an expectant look, justifying and cementing Sam's suspicions.

He plants his feet in a wide stance and folds his arms over his chest, returning Dean's look with one of his own. One that clearly telegraphs that nothing short of a biblical disaster is going to convince him to leave this spot.

Dean rolls his eyes, but doesn't press the issue. He lifts the box with an expression Sam can only label as dangerous. "Okay, Bela. What's the deal with this thing?"

"It's Celtic," Bela says, in a condescending manner. Like she's teaching them something. "And very old. Ceremonial. For…weddings." The word sends a shudder through her, as though the very idea of marriage disgusts her.

Dean catches the motion, winks at her. "Aw, sweetheart, and here I didn't think there was anything that could scare off an evil skank like yourself."

"Maybe I should've gotten you a thesaurus instead." The corner of Bela's mouth ticks upward. She seems utterly amused and completely unfazed by Dean. Both strike Sam as a bit strange, because his brother sure sounds, and feels, appropriately and seriously pissed.

Dean grins tightly. "Okay. How's 'bitch'?"

Seems as though he may have actually, finally struck a nerve. Bela's face hardens just enough to be noticeable but she recovers quickly, gracefully dropping her hands into the deep pockets of her no doubt ridiculously overpriced trench coat. "In any case, I don't have to believe in the institution of marriage to be paid, and I stand to make a LOT of money from this transaction."

Dean takes a step forward. "Not if you're dead, you don't. Now, what's the deal with the damn ribbon?" The hand clutching the box trembles slightly, his strength waning in an obvious way as he continues to fight very hard to keep something outside of Sam's mental reach.

"Bela?" Sam prods, desiring this entire interaction to be done with as soon as possible.

"The enchantment is meant to strengthen the bond between two people." She raises her eyebrows, taking in their tense posture, exhaustion and all of the visible bruises. "I can see it didn't work."

"So you were just screwing with us?" Sam demands.

"What can I say? I developed a taste for it."

And Dean loses his struggle, and the wall comes tumbling down.

A flush of heat races through Sam's body and he frowns, twisting to face his brother. "Why are you…oh, God."

"What?" If there is anyone who sucks harder than Dean at feigning innocence, Sam has yet to meet them.

"Tell me you didn't."

"Didn't what?" But Dean's eyes dart back to Bela, to the coy, knowing smile twisting her lips. "WHAT? No, Sam. God, a man's gotta have some standards."

Sam shakes his head, feeling disgusted and violated. "You're lying. And so, so badly, too."

Dean's shoulders drop and he winces. "You can tell that, huh?"

"Yeah, but not from the spell, or whatever. From that dumb look on your face."

"What'd I say before?" Bela butts in. "Drama queen, yeah?"

"Shut up!" they roar at her in tandem.

Sam can't seem to help himself. "When?"

"Berwick."

"Fairplay."

Dean frowns at Bela, then tilts his chin back. "Ohhhh. Yeah." He grins, then quickly wipes the look from his face. "That didn't count."

"It counted for me," she says, with disgusting, put-upon sweetness.

Sam waves a hand. "And I'm done. Forever."

"Hey," Dean says, clearly offended. "In my defense, that all happened before she sold us out to Gordon."

Bela laughs, a high-pitched snort of genuine amusement. "Oh, please. You're no white knight, Dean. If a certifiably mad hunter hell-bent on revenge cornered and had your own gun pointed at you, we both know you'd have given me up just as quickly."

Sam nods toward his gaping brother, owes him one for more than one mental image he could have damn well lived without. "He'd have done it quicker."

Dean shoots him a sideways glance. "Thank you, Sam." He frowns and extends the arm holding the box, wincing as he does so. He forfeits discretion, wraps his left arm around his middle to brace a hand against his side. "Look, whatever. How do we break this bond thing and get back to normal?"

"Oh, it's quite simple, actually. You just have to share a bit of your heart with your betrothed." Bela can't seem to help herself, but has the decency to put a hand to her lips as she grins. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't laugh."

Dean smirks, digging into his jacket pocket. "Or maybe I just do this." When he withdraws his hand his lighter is clutched between his fingers. He easily wrests the ribbon from its packaging, letting the box fall to the gravel at his feet as he ignites a flame and holds it to the end of the ornate slip of fabric. The ancient material catches quickly, a real beauty to behold.

Bela surges forward with wide, horrified eyes, and Dean steps back, drops the very end of the burning ribbon to the ground between them. In mere seconds, it's nothing more than a pile of very costly ashes.

The constant roar he's been saddled with settles in Sam's head, falling into the familiar, dull discomfort of his own swirling and consuming thoughts, with a side helping of what is sure to be a raging migraine in the days to come. He raises his eyes to meet his brother's, and is relieved to see the deep crease between Dean's eyes has receded.

"I can't believe you just did that."

Dean raises an eyebrow as he tamps out the smoking pile with the toe of his boot. "All good, Sam?"

He nods curtly. "Yep. Good."

"Fantastic. Let's get some breakfast."

"Excuse me?" Bela snips at them as they shove past and make their way to the house. "The two of you owe me forty grand."

Dean stops, spins on his heel with such ferocity he probably shouldn't be keeping his feet as well as he is. His eyes are dark as he threatens, "Sweetheart, I don't think you want me to ever give you what I owe you."

She's left gaping wordlessly behind them, and Sam can't help but think that if she knows what's good for her, it will be a very long time before they hear from Bela Talbot again.

It's a few days before they're fully rested and comfortable at Bobby's, a few days before Dean's weaseled his way off of the meds that don't mix well with beer or whiskey. In the middle of a lucky, mostly mild winter afternoon they drag a couple of chairs and the green cooler out onto the large, sagging porch and watch silently as the wind rustles skinny, bare tree branches and a pair of squirrels chase each other across the muddy yard, the animals taking as much advantage of the fair-ish weather as they are.

Tucked into a rickety rocker that doesn't look sturdy enough to bear his weight, Dean's still packed to the point of immobility in blankets and Sam's hoodie, but Sam isn't mourning the loss quite as much as he'd put on. Mostly because Dean looks so damn happy to be sitting out here with his little brother and Bobby, enjoying a beer. Or, enjoying a few sips of a beer, before his still-squeamish stomach predictably protests and he sets it aside on the floorboards. He doesn't touch it again, but doesn't seem too disappointed.

The fresh air is good for him, or in any case, is better than the cramped, stuffy interior of the Impala or the stale rooms of Bobby's warm and familiar but unkempt home. Sam loves the man, really, but he can't help but think it wouldn't kill him to take a broom or dust rag to the place every now and then.

His thoughts are progressively regressing to small, petty musings, and Sam finds himself almost missing the straining and stressful presence of his big brother in his mind. It had been painful, had thrown him for one hell of a loop and downright sucked on more than one occasion, but it had been a peek behind the curtain, an unobstructed view into the inner workings of an extremely complicated man who hides his inner workings quite well. Sam thought they'd be closer, coming out the other end of this thing more or less okay, but Dean is even quieter and more withdrawn than before, maybe relishing a bit in the solitude of his own head.

He's healing, you selfish ass, Sam berates himself, taking a long pull from his own beer as he studies his brother. Mild concussion, bruised ribs, and that near-skewering he'd suffered in the fall. Blood loss. And worse than any of the physical injuries, exposure. Dean had been put on display for Sam, no two ways about it. The curse, enchantment, whatever, had gone both ways, true, but Sam knows he's always been a bit more open with his thoughts and feelings. He explains and explodes. He yells, he fights. He talks.

Dean isn't nearly as open as he'd been forced to be over the past couple of days, and because of that, what he does choose to say carries a lot of weight. Or, it should. So Sam had stopped his own relentless desire to explain and explode and talk talk talk, and tried a little bit of listening, to hear what Dean has been really saying.

And besides, they technically missed the boat on the whole birthday thing, anyway. To make a big to-do now would just be asking for a beat-down.

But Sam can't help but call a little bit of attention to the situation. To the day. To Dean's maybe last birthday. His thumbnail scrapes along the metallic-y edge of the paper label on his bottle. "Dean?"

"Yeah."

"This is what you wanted, right? Just us and a couple of beers?" He sees Bobby shift out of the corner of his eye, on the other side of Dean's chair. Probably thinking Sam's up to no good here, only planning on riling his brother up, and he's readying himself to jump in and intervene if necessary.

"Mm," Dean replies, taking a deep breath of air that smells of freedom and fading winter, not mothballs and mildew and blood.

Sam can't help thinking that this sound escaping his brother seems to serve no other purpose than to put him at ease. Seems somewhat noncommittal. Because Dean never quite knows what he wants and wouldn't know what to do if he ever got his hands on it.

"Good." Sam takes another drink to ignore the ever-present desire to force his brother to say more than he wants to.

"I've been thinkin,'" Dean says suddenly, voice sounding like a hanging muffler dragging across a gravel lot.

"That's never a good thing," Sam replies with a forced grin, setting the bottom of his bottle against his thigh.

Bobby stays quiet, on the periphery on this conversation, but there should he be needed. Just as always.

Dean shifts in his chair and winces. "You know, there's a silver lining in all this?"

All this, he says. Dying and going to Hell. Sam remaining alone and helpless in the world without his stupid, reckless, dependable big brother leading him through it. He wants Bobby to choose this moment to jump in, to smack the jerk upside the head, call him an 'idjit' and put the beer back in his hand, so he can get back to acting like the Dean Sam needs.

Or maybe that's exactly what he's trying to do here, making light of a situation that would only tear them both apart if they approached it with the gravity it deserves. Still, Sam is wary, because Dean makes jokes about his impending death to cover everything else he now knows for sure is going on beneath the surface of his stoic, smartass brother. And that can only mean the jokes will be coming in darker and more frequently, and less funny as time winds down. "You asking me or telling me?"

Dean smirks. "Won't have to worry about those dirty thirties, huh?"

Sam shakes his head. "Shut up. Jerk." He drains what's left of his beer without looking over at his brother, and moves to snatch Dean's discarded and mostly-full bottle. He gives it up without a fight. "And really, dude? Bela?"

Dean raises his eyebrows and burrows deeper into the folds of his new sweatshirt. He doesn't respond, just tilts his head back and draws in another lungful of fresh, crisp afternoon air.

Bobby snickers and seems content, but Sam can see now how much is for show, can see the lines of tension and fear cutting through the otherwise carefree features of his mask. All in all, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of honestly being shared between the lot of them. Not when they have any choice in the matter, at least.

Sam stares at the side of his brother's head, willing Dean to look over at him, but he won't. You WILL have to worry about it, he silently vows. I swear, you will.

And when you turn thirty, you son of a bitch, I'm getting you a friggin' piñata.

The End

So, like I said, this was my NaNoWriMo project. I asked the Prompt Master for a list of story prompts that would inspire a 50k word story, and this is what I got to work from: Sam, Dean and Bobby on a hunt, dialogue revolving around Sam threatening to tie Dean up further if he doesn't settle down, medical shock, the infamous charcoal hoodie, a blood-covered teddy bear, Grossinger's Catskill Resort in Liberty, NY, a blizzard, NO demonic possessions, what I apparently paraphrased as "super empathy wonder twin powers" but I think was originally stated as "Sam and Dean are able to sense each others emotions through some supernatural means", Dean's birthday, a mysterious birthday present, and Dean not liking attention being called to his birthday.

I really tried to keep as much as I could within the framework of the window of time I set this story, paying attention specifically to the differences in Sam in Malleus Maleficarum.

I have to take a second and, as much as she's going to hate me for it, really and truly and in a fantastically gushing nature THANK Nova42 for inspiring and pushing me. This last chapter was a real sonuvabitch, guys, and she'll tell you she didn't do anything, but she did.

I already have a couple of new projects in the works. The next multi-chap is in progress and takes place in season 5, and I have a couple of one-shots bouncing around in my head, and then a top secret super special assignment that's about to become my main priority and should be along shortly. Ish.

One final, mushy thought: I have a handful of new, ridiculously awesome friends out there, that I feel like I've known my whole life instead of six-ish months. I got lucky, and I'm fully aware of that. And I am so, so very thankful for that, and for them.