They're on the road by noon, neither speaking until they've been traveling for several hours. Dean breaks the silence first, but he's in no way conceding anything. This is a bad idea and Sam's not going to convince him otherwise.

"So, tell me about this heart attack guy."

"This heart attack guy's name was Giles Corey. Back in the days of the Salem witch trials…" Dean snorts contemptuously here, and Sam ignores him. "Back in the days of the trials, a village girl accused him of being, and I quote, 'a dreadful wizard' and of 'wanting her to write in the devil's book.'"

"To write what in the devil's book?"

Sam shoots his brother a look, but it seems like Dean's serious. "That she pledged her soul to him? That she'd be his bride? How should I know?"

"Okay, so he got accused of being a wizard and going around collecting signatures for Satan. What'd the good people of Salem figure was adequate punishment for that?"

"Well, they took him to a field near town, put a board on his chest, and piled rocks on it until he was crushed under the weight."

"Rocks."

"Um, yeah."

"And how long did these pious, God-fearing folk watch this poor bastard suffocate?"

"It says it took about two days."

Dean just shakes his head. "Nice people, dude. I can see why you want to go visit their town."

The closer they get to Massachusetts, the tighter Dean's hands grip the steering wheel, knuckles whitening under the strain. Sam shoots him what he thinks are covert glances, convinced that Dean's going to turn the Impala around any second. He doesn't, of course. He'd promised Sam they'd look into the deaths in Salem, and he, at least, doesn't break his promises.

They hit Salem mid-afternoon, and Dean cruises the streets looking for a motel, his expression growing even darker, though Sam hadn't thought that was possible. "Who the fuck would stay at a place called The Witches Cauldron, Sam? I mean, really?"

Sam cranes his neck to check out the bed and breakfast Dean is snarling at, and smiles at the gingerbread cottage-like house. I would. Jess had booked them in for the week before last Christmas. She'd been as delighted by the theme as Dean is appalled by it.

"I'm sure lots of perfectly nice people stay there Dean. We could stay there. Clean sheets, fresh baked muffins for breakfast…."

With a few choice remarks about people who would stay in other people's houses and houses with freaky witch themes no less, Dean pulls into the parking lot of a Super 8. It's a few steps above their usual lodgings and they score what turns out to be the last room available.

"Okay, Sammy," Dean says, throwing his duffle onto his bed. "Want to tell me what we're really doing here?"

"We're here because people are having heart attacks, possibly spirit induced, and we need to see if we can stop it."

Dean rolls his eyes. "Fine, don't tell me. I'm going to catch some shut-eye and we can check out this Burying Point place later tonight. And Sammy, don't be sneaking out of this room while I'm asleep. If you decide to go sightseeing without me and some witch enchants your ass, don't expect me to come and save it. You hear me?"

"I hear you, jerk. Don't worry. Sleep sounds pretty good to me too." Sam settles down and closes his eyes. Lately sleep means dreams of Jess and it doesn't take him long to drop into slumber.

There's a woman and she's blonde, but Sam doesn't think it's Jessica. It's dark and cold where they are and he only catches fleeting glimpses of her. She's trying to say something, but Sam can't hear her and then she's gone, and it's all Dean: Dean in the wendigo's lair, Dean after the rawhead, Dean in the cabin being destroyed by that thing in their father's body. Dean bloody and screaming and…..

"Hey Princess, wake up."

Sam wakes with a gasp and rolls over on his sweat soaked pillow. Dean's staring down at him with an unreadable expression.

"It's almost midnight, Sam. Anything you want to tell me before we set out to save the world from the heart attack inducing spirit of a dreadful wizard?"

"Not really."

"Okay then, let's go."

The cemetery's a bust, at least for tonight. Sam knows this because Dean announces it every half hour, and by the time dawn is lighting the sky, Sam is ready to strangle him.

"No Giles Corey, Sammy. No chest tightening, no shortness of breath, not even a twinge of indigestion."

"Shut up, Dean. Tonight's Halloween, maybe we just have to wait until then."

"Yeah, maybe. Man, I'm starving. You bring anything to eat?"

"You already ate two pounds of M&Ms, dude."

"And?"

Sam digs in his pocket and wordlessly holds out a granola bar.

"This is your idea of stakeout supplies? Sometimes I can't even believe we're related."

Dean stuffs the granola bar into his mouth and is turning to head back to the Impala when Sam sees it. He grabs his brother's arm and Dean halts, smoothly bringing his shotgun to bear on the headstone Sam is staring at.

"What is it?"

"I'm not sure. I thought I saw something over by that grave." Sam peers at the figure perched on the nearby headstone.

"Ghost of Giles Corey?" Dean cocks the gun. "I don't see anything, Sam."

"Could just be a trick of the light," Sam lies. "You probably shouldn't be shooting up the cemetery at the crack of dawn anyway. Let me check out the name on that stone and we'll do some research. We can always come back tonight and stake this place out."

"Great," Dean grumps as they walk down the path, "a haunted cemetery on Halloween. What could possibly go wrong?"

The sun rises, bringing a soft glow to the land. Everything is hazy and indistinct; the trees move but I do not feel the gentle breeze.

People come - living beings that look and touch, but they do not see, do not feel, they hold no interest for me.

Today is different. Two men face me across the intervening graves and if I had breath it would have stilled in my throat.

I see him. My blood became dust long ago, but that which courses through his veins once ran through mine. Tainted. Dark. Does he resist?

He sees me.

"This whole place creeps me out, Sam," Dean mutters as they work their way along sidewalks crammed with costumed revelers. A group of scantily clad young women dressed as witches surrounds them and Dean doesn't relax until the girls cross the street at the next intersection. "Witches. Why can't they be sexy candy stripers for Halloween? Or Wonder Woman? She was hot, right?"

"Wonder Woman, Dean?"

"Shut up, Sam. All those comic book women with their.." Dean's hands cup by his chest and Sam smacks them down.

"Okay, I get it, you're perpetually thirteen. Can we focus here?"

"Focus on what, Sam? There was nothing there. You dig up anything on the name?"

"No. If she was a witch, she was smart enough not to get caught, and if she wasn't she was still smart enough not to get caught up in the mass hysteria that got so many other people killed."

"Mass hysteria?"

"Yeah, it was just a theory that….you know what, never mind." Sam diverts Dean's attention onto a blackboard outside the building they're passing. "You want a beer?"

Dean shoots Sam a look but allows himself to be diverted. He eyes the board, lip curling as he reads his beverage options. "Jesus, Sam! Cauldron ale. Bubbling brew. Pumpkinhead, for fucks sake!"

Dean stabs a finger at an option near the bottom and grabs Sam's arm. "This one, Sammy. Demon? Warlock? Vampire, werewolf, shifter, incubus? Anything?"

Sam grins. "Nope."

Dean shoves his way into the crowded building, maneuvers his way to the bar, and orders two Sam Adams lagers while his brother uses his puppy eyes to score a booth. Dean grabs the beers and heads over, dropping down across from Sam.

He hands one beer to his brother, signals the waitress to come over when she's got a minute and focuses his eyes on Sam's.

"Okay, spill."

"Spill what, Dean?"

"Whatever it is that you don't want to talk about. The reason you really wanted to come here. Because Sam, even for you, this hunt is lame."

"Dean.."

"Spill, Sam."

Sam concentrates on peeling the label from his beer bottle. "Did I ever tell you Jess was a history major?"

"No, Sammy. You didn't."

"She was going to go to grad school while I was in law school, get her doctorate in early American history."

"She must have been pretty smart."

Sam looks up with a tiny smile. "She was. She really was. She was going to do her thesis on the concept of mass hysteria in the Salem witch trials. She wanted to come here.."

Dean can't stop himself. "Here? To research witchcraft?"

"Not the witchcraft itself."

"Sam."

"I know, I know. But I couldn't talk her out of it. We were going to come last winter." Sam gives his brother a smirk. "We were going to stay at The Witches Cauldron. Jess thought it would be fun."

"Fun." Dean shakes his head at the concept. "And by winter, I suppose you mean..?"

"The solstice, yes. I would have found some way to keep her from coming here then though, Dean. You know I would." Sam laughs bitterly. "Turns out I didn't have to. Her not coming here, hell, her not doing anything ever again, got taken care of for me."

"Sammy." Dean lays a hand on his brother's arm and Sam allows it to stay there.

"I started dreaming about her, about her wanting to come to Salem, and I just thought…maybe…"

"Maybe if you came here, it would put some things to rest?"

"Maybe."

"And has it?"

"Not really." Not yet.

Dean leans back in his seat and takes a swig of his beer. "So, does this mean we don't have to go back and freeze out asses off at the cemetery tonight?"

"There was something there, Dean."

"Then we go back and freeze our asses off."

The waitress, dressed in a mini-skirted Star Trek uniform, arrives to take their order and Sam loses Dean's attention for the rest of the meal. Dean agreed to go back though, and that's all Sam needs to hear.

I feel the stirrings from my resting place beneath the grass. Does he return?

No. Greater power than he yet possesses crackles along the gravestones.

They cannot be here, should not be here.

This is our place.

They have no right.

It's dark in the cemetery- the night is cloudy, and even if it wasn't, the moon would be just a sliver in the sky. In addition to being dark, it's freezing, and Sam's feet crunch through the dead grass as he returns with a thermos of coffee. A cold, bored, decaffeinated Dean is not someone Sam wants to spend the rest of the night on watch with. Especially since Dean is convinced there's nothing here to be watching for.

Sam approaches the tombstone he'd left Dean leaning on and sees his brother's flailing motions in the beam of his flashlight. Dean's flinging his arms around, jumping up and down, practically doing calisthenics to keep warm. Sam's about to slow down to watch Dean look ridiculous for a few more seconds when he sees movement in the dark beside his brother. The shadows are coming from Dean's left and he doesn't see them, can't see them. Sam's about to call out; to warn his brother, but a crushing blow to the back of his head sends him down into an even deeper blackness.

They are too many- too powerful. And he is here.

Does he sense me? Know I am nearby?

I stay below ground, but the safety of my resting place is only an illusion now.

I was special to him once and he taught me much, but I spurned his advances, rejected his plans for me.

Does he remember?

I do.

Consciousness returns slowly and Sam's bleary eyes water from the light of the torches surrounding him. Shadowy figures blur in the darkness and he twists his head, looking desperately for Dean.

The torch bearers come closer and Sam can see five cloaked figures. One moves to the forefront and casts back her hood. Dark eyes stare from a delicately featured face, and Sam twists against his bindings.

"Where's my brother?"

"He's…..in the vicinity."

"Who are you? What do you want?"

"You're in a cemetery in Salem on Halloween. Who do you think I am?"

"Still leaves the question of what you want, you bitch." Sam's throat tightens like there's a hand gripping it and he struggles to breathe. The angry look on the witch's face morphs into a smile and the dark eyes glow like burnished gold as Sam tries to push himself backward through the gravestone behind him.

"What do I want? I want your brother bloody and screaming. I want you, Sammy, to fall in line like a good little soldier. But I'm not greedy. I'll just take Dean tonight. It's not your turn yet."

"My turn?"

The demon grins. "So many of my kids to visit- so little time. Gotta go, Sammy. Your brother's waiting."

"You leave him alone, you bastard."

"Oh, Sammy, I do enjoy your spunk. I'll tell you what, find us by midnight and you can have him back. Alive."

"You're not going to hurt him?"

The demon laughs at Sam's incredulous tone. "Of course I'm going to hurt him, Sam. But I'm not going to bleed him from the inside out again. Been there, done that, and I'm just not in the mood tonight. I think a good old ass-whupping will be sufficient. Just make sure you find us by midnight, Sammy."

"And what happens if I don't?"

The demon turns and the smile it flashes in Sam's direction stops his heart for a moment. "Why, your brother turns into a pumpkin, of course. "

Sam throws himself against his bindings in a frenzy. The dreams. The fucking dreams. They didn't feel like visions, but…"you sent them?"

"No, I didn't send them. I look in on you from time to time, Sammy, and it's just easier when you're sleeping. Jess was a pretty little thing, wasn't she? And Dean carved into a jack-o-lantern? Witches are so inventive. Midnight, Sammy. If you get loose, just follow the screams. Don't be late!"

The light is receding as the shadows and their torches move away. Sam watches them until only darkness remains and he prays that the direction they were headed is where he will find his brother.

Azazel and those with him do not slow as they leave the cemetery. Their business is not here, no matter what lies he told the boy.

Just one is left behind, and that one does not know me- will think me just one more spirit among many. I arise, safe now that my ancient foe is gone.

The boy fights, struggles physically with the ropes that bind him.

His power is untapped, untried. It could help him now if he would let it.

He is wiser than I though, and uses only the strength of his humanity.

For this, it will be enough.

I leave him to it and follow the foul odor of hell through the dark.

Sam's wrists are raw and bloody by the time he manages to free himself, but he ignores his injuries and heads for where he remembers dropping their weapons bag. It's not there, and he wants to scream in frustration. It's going to be difficult to rescue Dean as it is: without holy water, salt and a damned effective exorcism ritual it will be impossible. The night is silent and he tries not to think too hard about what that might mean as he continues his search.

Blood trickles in thin rivulets down his pain furrowed brow.

He's pinned to the rough, wooden wall; muted gasps trapped behind clenched teeth. This one is stubborn- the promised screams do not come. I drift closer and he shivers.

I hear a name.

Sam.

This one will be theirs, taken for a seeming eternity of torment, but not now; not yet. It is not their time and they cannot have him.

I will guide the other here.

The outcome will be what it may.

Sam travels in an ever widening circle through the cemetery. The night is still silent and he's not taking the chance that Dean is closer than the demon led him to believe. His brother could be hurt or worse, and Sam's not going to go running off on a wild goose chase if Dean's lying unconscious, not dead, not dead, behind the next headstone. A breath of colder air tickles the back of his neck and he whirls, hands raised in what he realizes is a futile gesture of defense against the likes of anything he's likely to encounter here.

The woman gently flickering in front of him is the same spirit he glimpsed this morning, he's sure of it. He opens his mouth and closes it again soundlessly as she lays a finger across her lips. She moves through the night and he follows, desperate for any avenue that will lead him to his brother.

A few dozen yards from where they started, she stops. Sam takes a few more steps and trips over the weapons bag. He falls to his knees with a muted gasp and rifles through it, pulling out what he'll need. The holy water and salt he slides into his jacket pockets. The exorcism ritual is stored in his head: he's not leaving that to chance ever again.

He looks up at the spirit and whispers soundlessly. "Is he..?"

Close by, she breathes.

Follow.

Sam takes in the tiny shed with a glance. It's empty except for one demon and Dean. Yellow Eyes and the rest of the coven are nowhere in sight. It's a trap, it has to be, but Sam's got no choice about this. His brother's depending on him.

He slips silently through the doorway, holy water and salt ready to be flung, but the demon's ready for him. It turns, holding Dean in front of it like a shield. The demon's got an arm tightly around Dean's neck and Sam can hear his brother's choking attempts to breathe.

"Stay right there Sammy, unless you want big brother to try breathing through a crushed trachea."

"Where is he? Where is that yellow eyed son of a bitch?"

The demon snorts. "You Winchesters. Think the whole world revolves around you. His business here had nothing to do with you. You were just kind of….a happy accident. Our little fun and games tonight were just to keep you out of his hair while he did what he came here for."

"Oh yeah?" Sam desperately wants to know. "And what was that?"

"Like I'm going to tell you. Just wait over there like a good boy, Sammy, I'm kind of busy here." The demon releases Dean and he slides to his knees, head lolling on his blood-streaked chest. It wraps its fingers in Dean's sweaty hair and jerks his head up roughly. Dean's eyes are closed, blood dripping from his left, but he's conscious, Sam can tell.

"It's a good look for him, isn't it?" The demon leers up at Sam, eyes black in its face. "On his knees, covered in blood. Mmm, mmm, mmm," it murmurs, running a thumb along Dean's slack lips. "I could sure think of a few things to do to him like this, couldn't you, Sammy?"

"Let him go, you bastard. We had a deal. I found you before midnight. Let him go."

The demon just laughs. "You did Sammy. You found us before the clock struck twelve. Half an hour before, to be exact. Good for you. Not so good for Dean, here. I've still got thirty more minutes to play before I have to give him back."

Sam takes a step forward, mouth opening to start an exorcism ritual, but he's barely gotten two words out before the demon freezes him in place. He struggles to continue, but the words won't move past his clenched teeth.

"Uh, uh, uh, Sammy. That's not very nice." The demon backhands Dean, sending him sprawling to the floor. "What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?"

He's trapped, doesn't yet know how to best their power.

I flow into him, embrace his essence and enhance it with my own.

His strength almost overwhelms me, but quickly I adapt. The demon has turned away, foolishly secure in its supposed superiority. When the words begin again, it turns in shock but it is too late. It cannot control me and it cannot separate us. The exorcism is completed and its smoky residue spirals back to the hell it belongs in.

The demon is defeated and I should leave now, but I linger. The power in this boy is like nothing I've ever felt. It dwarfs mine like a mountain to a pebble. I could stay. I could take it, take him.

A shudder jolts us both as my gift manifests. I see my host, leading the forces of darkness across the land, chaos and death in their wake. I see him atop a throne in hell, arrogant and cold; the other collared and feral at his feet.

I could start this chain of events right now. A nudge here, a twist there and he would fall.

No. That is not the path I chose centuries ago and it will not be the path I choose tonight. I leave his body as quietly as I entered it and watch as he falls to his knees.

Sam scrambles to his brother and pulls him into his arms. Dean mumbles and tries weakly to push Sam away, but his brother only grips him tighter. Sam swallows hard and looks up at the spectral woman still standing before him.

"Do they come true?"

They can be changed.

"I can't…," he stammers. "I don't want…"

Then see that it does not come to pass.

He nods, determined, as he struggles to his feet, supporting his brother. Dean sways unsteadily, but manages to stand with Sam's arm wrapped around his waist.

"Hey, Sammy," he murmurs, "we good to go now?"

"The demon…"

"It'll be gone before we can even start looking for it, you know that."

Sam does, but he wants that damned thing so badly he can taste it. It hurt his family again and the fact that he dragged his brother right into its clutches makes Sam realize that what he really needs out of this trip is to put the past behind him. Jess is gone, and he's going to make the demon pay for how she died, how Dad died, but he's not going to risk Dean unnecessarily to do it.

"Okay, Dean. We'll hit the hotel to pick up our stuff and get the hell out of Dodge."

"Good." Dean sighs wearily, more of his weight resting against Sam's chest. "I hope you got everything you need out of Salem, because I am so done with this town."

Sam tightens his grip on his brother. "Yeah, Dean. I got everything I need."

They lean on each other and don't look back as they head out the door, and vanish into the night.

I cannot see all that lies ahead. There are forces aligned against them, dark and light, and whether they will overwhelm the brothers is not for me to know.

The power is fading, slipping away like the tides. All too soon it is gone, he is gone.

He will not return.

Long ago I made the choice to remain, and no regrets follow me as I retreat into the earth.