Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Fear the night, for she knows the shade inside you. Fear the night, for she will call out your demons. Fear the night, for she feels no pity. Fear the night, and do not open the door…”

Dean kept his head bowed respectfully as Ellen walked by, her deep voice roughened by the sacred smoke that she’d inhaled for the ceremony. Candles flickered all around him, weaving threads of thin light through the darkness of the sandstone church. Dean sat cross-legged on his cushion, facing the altar. Beside him, he could hear Jo breathing deeply and calmly, even though out of the corner of his eye he could see her hand trembling where it rested on her knee. Dean himself held a clutch of nerves in his chest, burning slowly like incense.

“Turn your thoughts inward,” Ellen intoned. Her dark flared trousers, ceremonial şalvar, swished against the stone floor as softly as the hiss of a candle being extinguished. “Meditate on yourself. Consider the selves that you have been. Remember the worst things that you have done, and accept that you did them, and then let them burn under the white eye of Ayın Yarısı. Be cleansed.”

Dean closed his eyes briefly. He had many things to meditate on, enough to fill ten thousand sleepless nights of vigilance. Perhaps tonight he would finally lay them to rest. He looked up at the mural behind the altar, coloured in swathes of light and shade by the candles: it showed Yarım, the Goddess in Two Halves, who saw all through her celestial twin eyes – the good with her right, Güneş Yarısı, the sun; the bad with her left, Ayın Yarısı, the moon. For too long, Dean had felt that left eye resting on him, seeing the darkness in his soul and calling it out.

“As Ayın Yarısı begins to close, turn your mind towards the best things that you have done; accept that you did those, also,” Ellen continued. “Amongst all your past selves, find the one that is strongest and most pure. Let this self fill you up, and as Güneş Yarısı opens, let it be burned into your bones with the fire of Yarım. You will remake yourself through her eyes. You will be worthy of the name of savaşçı.”

Savaşçı. Dean clenched his hands a little tighter just at the sound of the word. He was so close.

“You will not eat. You will not speak. You will not sleep. You have a cup of water in front of you, from which you may drink. We will come for you in the light of Güneş Yarısı. Make yourself with wisdom. And do not open the doors.”

Ellen let her eyes rest for a moment on Jo, before switching her gaze to Dean. Although he’d known her for years, Dean almost shivered under her scrutiny, with her face so dramatic and strange in the candlelight. The ceremonial paint made her features alien and beautiful: a white circle over her left eye, a red over her right, and a black stripe running down each cheek, touching the corners of her black lips. He saw no flicker of recognition in her eyes; they were as cold and unfeeling as Ayın Yarısı itself. Dean shifted slightly on his cushion, and dropped his gaze. Without another word, Ellen stepped forwards, passing between Jo and Dean and walking away down the aisle with slow, patient dignity. Dean heard the sound of her footsteps receding; they grew quieter and quieter as she moved through the small door into the antechamber, and finally disappeared as she went out into the night. The door closed behind her with a hollow, echoing boom.

Dean swallowed. He rested his hands neatly on top of his knees, just as Jo was doing. Casting a quick glance her way, Dean saw that she was sitting with her eyes closed, looking perfectly serene. Her hands had stopped shaking, too. Perhaps she was deep in meditation. But wait – just as Dean was about to look away, she cracked open one eye and glanced his way. She smiled slightly when she caught Dean watching. Reaching out a hand, she found Dean’s fingers and squeezed lightly. Dean took a deep breath in, and exhaled slowly. In her face, softened by the flickering shadows, he found reassurance. He nodded, and Jo let go of his hand. They took a moment to resettle themselves, before sliding their eyes closed.

Behind his eyelids, Dean saw lights popping – echoes of the candles that studded the altar. He watched as the phosphorescent clouds swirled in dull reds and yellows before fading slowly to black, and chewed his bottom lip. The cushion that he was sitting on wasn’t as comfortable as it had seemed when he’d first sat down; he could feel the uneven flagstone floor beneath, and one of his legs was already starting to go to sleep. He tried to shift positions subtly, so that Jo wouldn’t notice. Jo was a loyal friend, and almost certainly wouldn’t tell Ellen if he messed this up, but all the same – he’d rather perform the Vigil as perfectly as she did. After he became a savaşçı, he didn’t want anyone to be able to say that he didn’t deserve his position.

Savaşçı. There went that shiver up his spine again. The old fantasy reawakened, the one that had seen Dean through the past four years of rigorous physical training – he saw himself, dressed in a wide white hood and holding a great curved sword, riding through the wild lands of his country on a beautiful black horse… fending off bandits, rescuing the needy, completing perilous quests with a grin and a flash of steel… he’d be the finest savaşçı in all of Ateş Aşiret, and there’d be a queue as long as a cornfield to be married to him. Not that he’d ever accept any of them as his betrothed, of course, because his heart truly lay on the road, performing great deeds of valour. But he might spend an evening with one or two of them, and maybe pick a dewy rose in the morning before they awoke, and leave it in their bed in his place as he rode away…

Dean shook himself. Gaudy dreams were all very well for the training grounds, but this was the night of the Vigil, and he was supposed to be focusing on his true inner self. He swallowed. Generally speaking, Dean’s interest in probing the depths of his truest desires stopped at deciding what he wanted to eat for midday meal. But this tradition was the most revered part of becoming a savaşçı – only yesterday, Dean had run into Savaşçı Rufus at the library when he went to pick up Sam from his reading class, and the old warrior had told him about the deep spiritual calm he had achieved over the course of the night of his own Vigil, many years before. Dean had been tempted to ask if Rufus had felt anything approaching calm ever again, but the fierce look in Rufus’ eye had sealed his lips shut. Besides, Sam had been standing right next to him, and Dean hadn’t wanted to disparage the importance of the Vigil in front of his little brother. Sam was mostly interested in book-learning, but Dean was still hoping to tempt him into the life of a savaşçı one day.

At the thought of Sam, Dean felt a little clutch of pride, followed by a brief swoop of concern. His brother had reached the official age of adulthood only last year, and had spent the night of his Coming of Age celebration shut up in his room with his nose in a book. It wasn’t that Sam was incapable of socialising – he had a wide circle of friends, from what Dean could tell – but he was completely disinterested in the traditions and ceremonies that were the bastions of their country’s culture. It just wasn’t right. Dean tamped down the urge to chew on his fingernails; it wouldn’t be seemly in the middle of his Vigil, and he’d already worn them down to the quick, anyway.

At least as a savaşçı, Dean would have the opportunity to feel genuinely useful. More and more these days, he felt Sam moving away from him, following paths to knowledge that Dean had never walked, and never wanted to. As they’d grown up, Sam had always needed Dean, but now – Dean felt a whipcrack of anger across his chest – now he didn’t, not really. Sam needed his teachers, and his books, but not his brother. The thought hurt. But when he was a warrior, a true savaşçı of Ateş Aşiret, Dean would have hundreds, no, thousands of people who needed him, who would be grateful to him. That way, he wouldn’t need his brother, either.

If Dean were honest with himself, he could admit that this wasn’t the most honourable reason to want to become a savaşçı. The position was supposed to be a noble one: a lifetime of servitude to the King, to the country, and most of all to the common people in need of assistance. Becoming a savaşçı was supposed to be a choice of utmost selflessness. Instead, Dean was imagining that he’d use the position to gain glory, gratitude and marriage proposals. He was a terrible person. In fact, what was he even doing here, besmirching this time-honoured tradition with his own – his own feeble pettiness?

Dean took a deep breath, and tried to steady himself. This was Ayın Yarısı, Yarım’s left eye, calling out the darkness inside him just as Ellen had said that it would. It was all part of the test. For a brief moment, he opened his eyes and looked up at the mural behind the altar once more, where Yarım’s divided face was depicted. As different as her eyes were, her mouth on both sides was a flat, stern line. Whether she looked through Ayın Yarısı or the kinder Güneş Yarısı, Yarım was not a goddess who overflowed with benevolence. Maybe she couldn’t be, Dean thought. He remembered when Sam was younger, Dean had sometimes had to be strict with him so that he would learn when things were wrong. Perhaps Yarım was always teaching, and so she had no time to smile. The thought made Dean a little sad. He shuffled slightly in place, and closed his eyes again. He imagined Ayın Yarısı rising above the church in which he sat, bathing the land in cool blue tones.

“Remember the worst things that you have done, and accept that you did them,” Ellen had said. Dean gritted his teeth. His thoughts flew immediately to his mother. For a brief moment he could smell the smoke again, and hear the crackle of the flames, and the sound of Mary crying as she slammed the door – with a flinch and a hiss of air through his teeth, he wrenched his thoughts away from that night. It hadn’t been his fault, it hadn’t been. Bobby had told him enough times, and he should start believing him.

Even still, he decided that maybe it would be better to focus his thoughts on something else, tonight. There was a voice in Dean’s head telling him that he’d never be able to move on properly if his thoughts kept skittering over what had happened, and he never took the time to think it over and understand it – but it was a voice that was quiet enough to drown out, for now. After all, tonight was supposed to be about things he’d done, not things he’d seen. And he’d done plenty of things wrong in his life so far, that was for sure. He’d have to start somewhere, and lay them all out under the baleful eye of Ayın Yarısı, just as Ellen had ordered.

He supposed Ellen herself wasn’t a bad place to begin. Ever since he and Sam had been taken in by Bobby after their mother’s death, Ellen had been nothing but kind towards the boys – even if she did it in her own… unique way. But for the first few years, Dean had been ungrateful to the point of rudeness, refusing to speak to her – refusing to speak most of the time, in fact, but the problem had been at its worst when she’d been around. Dean was still unsure why he’d harboured so much resentment towards her. When he thought about it now, the only image that came to mind was of her hands. They were calloused, and cold, but she’d stroked them through his hair just like Mary used to with her soft, warm palms. It had infuriated him, but Ellen had just been trying to be kind. Dean sucked in a deep breath and remembered all the times he’d turned away from her, and refused to eat her cooking or accept her help. Time had washed those memories through and through again, leaving them dry and small, barely recognisable as his own – but tonight he had to own them. That had been him, he had done those things. But he’d apologised since and Ellen had forgiven him easily. It was time to let go of feeling guilty. He opened his eyes and looked at the painting of Ayın Yarısı, imagining the bright white beaming stare searing away his shame. Perhaps he was imagining it, but he thought that when he closed his eyes again, he felt a little lighter.

Well, since he’d just owned his guilt over Ellen, he may as well do the same for Jo. She was sitting right next to him, her steady breathing a constant balm on Dean’s fractured nerves – just as it had been for most of his life. They’d shared a room for several years, after Bobby and Ellen had first moved in together, before they’d been able to afford the larger home in the outskirts of the city of Şehir where they lived now. And all too often Dean had crawled muggily out of a nightmare with teary eyes and clenched hands, only to hear Jo’s soft breathing from the bed beside his own and find himself relaxing; turning, he’d be able to hear Sam’s snuffling snores from the other side of the room. The gentle sounds of their untroubled sleep had always helped to calm him down. Sometimes, when the dreams had been especially bad, Dean had woken Jo with his fretting; she’d been quiet and kind, her bright eyes bringing him back to safety as she tugged on his hand to rouse him. Over the years, she’d proven herself unassailably loyal, though never one to pull her punches. There was only one time that she’d ever let Dean down, and Dean winced just thinking about it, scrunching up his face ever so briefly. His overreaction to that single event still made him cringe, years later.

It had been when they were both teenagers, learning where the boundaries lay and seeing how far they could be pushed. Dean had generally found that, whilst he enjoyed drinking rice beer in a downtown meyhane that didn’t ask questions with his friends, real rule-breaking wasn’t for him; Jo, on the other hand, had frequently been caught thieving fruit from private gardens and breaking into abandoned houses. One night, she’d been invited out with a group of new friends and had tried to persuade Dean to come – being older and good-looking, he lent her some extra respect – but he’d refused, since Sam had needed help with his homework. When it had almost reached sun-up with no sign of her return, Dean had been woken up and sent out, grumbling, to find her and check that she wasn’t getting into trouble, while Bobby finished a long job at his shop and Ellen stayed inside with Sam. He’d traipsed up and down the seedier areas of the city in the darkness, calling Jo’s name and getting strange looks from the drunkards huddled in doorways and the half-naked fahişeler clustered at street corners. Everyone knew that kindly Güneş Yarısı was at its coldest and least powerful just before the dawn, and so they cleaved together and hoped to avoid the wrath of the dark – and Dean had felt so powerful, striding past them down the shaded streets, fearless. He’d just started training to be a savaşçı and he’d been so cocksure, a little knife that he’d stolen from the kitchen at his hip and a hardened look in his eyes that he’d practised in front of the mirror. He’d just been approaching his favourite meyhane when he’d seen it – a great gout of flame, belching out of one of the windows.

It had been shocking in the darkness, rude and coarse and unbelievable, and Dean had been frozen to the spot in a cold sweat for what felt like hours before he heard the sound of people calling a name, the very last name he’d wanted to hear.

“Jo!”

The sound had penetrated his fog, sending him stumbling into action. He’d taken the few steps over to the door of the meyhane on legs like wet cornstalks; pushing open the door, he’d seen smoke and fire and blurred shadows of movement, and at the far side of the room, standing on a table behind a wall of flame – Jo.

Her face had been bizarrely clear, a single point of clarity in a room full of chaos. She’d been yelling, her face brightly lit, with one hand held palm-first towards the flames. With a thrill of shock and anger, Dean had realised what Jo was doing. He was told later that he’d given a roar and plunged into the room, heedless of the flames and the heat; that he’d grabbed Jo by the waist and dragged her down from the table, the flames disappearing as she lost her balance. The next thing he remembered was dropping her to the ground outside the meyhane, finally hearing her protests.

“Dean!” she’d been yelling. “What are you doing? We were just messing around!”

Dean’s rage had turned to apoplexy.

“You did that on purpose?” he’d bellowed, and watched as Jo had cringed under the weight of his fury. “You broke the law? That law, of all the laws? Damn it, Jo, you know how dangerous making fire is!”

“I wasn’t doing anything – we were just messing around,” Jo had repeated in a small voice, hunching up a little under the weight of Dean’s anger, but Dean had been undeterred.

“You think you’re some kind of hard-ass just because you can make pretty lights? Screwing about with fire like that is illegal for a reason, and you’re just a stupid kid! You’re going to get everyone killed!”

“But we’ve got the power!” Jo had pleaded, her eyes burning through the darkness, wide and scared. All of her friends had followed her outside, and were watching the scene unfold. A few of them were laughing behind their hands. “You must have it, too! It’s wrong not to use it!”

“What’s wrong is people dying because some dumb firemaker loses controls!” Dean yelled. “You – you’re as bad as the people who killed my mother. You’re a murderer. You’re disgusting! I hate you!”

Sitting in the church, Dean could almost feel the vitriol spilling out of his mouth all over again. His fists were clenched tight in embarrassment and anger at himself. Jo had been a kid, messing around with her friends. She’d deserved a telling-off for making fire and breaking the law – after all, if she’d been reported to the police, the family could have been fined more than their house was worth – but being totally humiliated in front of her whole friend group? Being told she was disgusting, a murderer? Dean knew he’d gone way too far. They’d never talked about that night since. Jo had either kept her firemaking secret, or had stopped altogether. Dean, meanwhile, hadn’t been able to meet Jo’s eyes for weeks. Even now, years later, there was still a barely-perceptible iciness between them, a sense that something, somewhere, was a little bit broken.

Or maybe that was just Dean. ‘A little bit broken’ sounded about right.

Dean inhaled and then let it out, slowly. He’d screwed up badly by yelling at Jo, he’d known that for years. Maybe if he could let go of his shame and regret, the weight of that night would be lifted, and their friendship would finally find itself on stable foundations again. Dean looked up into the eye of Ayın Yarısı, and offered up his memories to her. Take it away, he begged silently. I’m sorry for saying those things. I did them and I own that. I won’t ever speak so rashly again. This time, there was no immediate sensation of a burden being lifted – but Dean thought that perhaps he felt a little of the cold shame in his chest melting. Well, he couldn’t expect everything at once. And the more that ice of guilt lodged in his heart turned to water, the harder it would be to hold onto.

Onto the next memory, Dean thought with a sigh. Where to go next? There were so many things. The way he’d treated Garth at the start of savaşçı training. The way he’d let Bobby down by staying out too late that one time, and missed his shift the next morning at the shop to boot. The way he’d – Dean winced at the memory – yelled so loud at Sam when he’d found his baby brother chewing on a woodcut of Mary’s face, the only image of her that he had. It was hanging off his mirror at home right now, on a long cord, with Sammy’s little tooth marks still nibbled into one side of the cedarwood oval.

Beside him, Jo gave a shuddering exhale, reminding Dean that he wasn’t the only one spending time with old demons tonight. The thought helped him shake off a little of the sadness wrapped around his heart. Jo had been there for him again, without even trying; even after what had happened between them, even with the gap in years, she was still one of his most loyal and caring friends. They’d walk out of the chapel together in the morning, greeting Güneş Yarısı as a pair of brave new savaşçılar, ready to go out into the world and save it from all its fears and troubles. Jo had managed to convince Bobby and Ellen to let her start training to be a savaşçı at just fourteen years of age, at the same time as eighteen-year-old Dean; he’d been furious back then, since Bobby and Ellen had insisted that he reach his Coming of Age before making the decision to become a warrior. Now, however, he was glad that Jo had been allowed to start training along with him. It seemed right that they should be here together.

The candles were bright and still long in tallow, ready to burn for hours to come. The Vigil had only just begun, and Dean already felt as though his mind had been scrubbed against Ellen’s washboard. Bringing up these old, bad memories left him raw and unsettled, but it had to be done. He felt as though he were pulling on the scabs of wounds that wouldn’t quite heal, and washing them clean, binding them neatly. It wasn’t pretty, but he would be a better man for it.

Outside, the night was noiseless as the grave. Through the arched windows to his left, Dean could see darkness, studded with stars that glittered as cold and sharp as diamonds. A night bright and hard enough to cut yourself on, Ellen would have said. A night to be careful. A night to remember that safety lay in the warmth and light of a house, a home, a chapel… a night to be wary, and still. Always still. In movement there was danger; only in stillness could you avoid calling down the attention and judgement of Ayın Yarısı.

Dean had a sudden itch, on his upper arm. He moved to scratch it without thinking.

The candle nearest to him guttered, wavered, and went out. The twist of smoke curled into the air like a leering mouth. Dean swallowed hard.

There was a knock at the door.

Chapter Text

Knock knock knock.

Three knocks, hammered upon the door with startling haste. They echoed through the chapel, back and forth, as though each wall caught the noise and passed it on to the next in a fearful whisper that went round, and round, and round. Knock knock knock, they murmured to each other. Knock knock knock. Who could it be? Knock knock knock.

Dean resisted the temptation to turn around. He almost smiled. He’d heard about this part of the Vigil, a test of the hopeful savaşçı’s obedience and strength of will: a trick, a temptation. If he went and opened the door, no doubt he’d find Ellen on the other side, her painted face frightening and stern against the dark of the dreaded night. But he wasn’t so easily fooled. He was going to sit right here, and do as he was told. After all, that’s what he was best at. This was probably the easiest part of the whole test.

Knock knock knock. The rapping came again, a little faster and harder, as though the person on the other side of the chapel doors were growing impatient. Strange, Dean thought. In Rufus’ story of the Vigil, which had helped Dean to prepare for this moment, the rahibe had only knocked on the doors thrice. After that, she retreated back to the safety of the priory a few hundred yards away, shielded from Ayın Yarısı – that’s what Rufus had said, but it seemed that he was wrong. Or perhaps Ellen was just an especially enthusiastic rahibe. Dean opened one of his eyes, casting a sly glance at Jo. She still had both of her eyes shut, but her brow was creased. Both of them sat unnaturally still, breathing quietly, waiting…

Knock knock knock knock knock. Fast strikes, urgent, loud. Dean’s heartrate was starting to pick up – this wasn’t right, this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. This couldn’t be Ellen, could it? It had to be somebody else, somebody in trouble. After all, this was a chapel. Everybody inside Şehir knew that tonight was the night of the Vigil, but this chapel also serviced any of the scattered nomadic tribes throughout the country of Ateş Aşiret that happened to be passing by. What if one of their number was in need of help – of sanctuary? Dean bit his lip, opening both eyes and turning to look down the aisle towards the large wooden doors that were barred shut, keeping them safe.

Knock knock knock knock knock knock… quieter, insistent, pleading. Jo sneaked a glance under her eyelids and saw Dean, twisted on his cushion to face the entrance to the chapel. She punched him in the shoulder. In the candlelight, her pupils were huge; when Dean met her eyes, she shook her head violently. Dean jerked his head in the direction of the door with a grimace; the urgent raps could still be heard. No rahibe would be so determined to tempt the Vigilants away from their meditation; it could only be someone truly in need out there.

Looking back at Jo, Dean saw that she was watching him with an expression that told him she knew exactly what he was thinking, and that she was going to kill him if he made any move at all towards the door. He twisted his mouth to the side and raised one shoulder. What am I supposed to do? he tried to say with his eyes. There’s someone out there. They need help.

Don’t you dare, Jo replied silently, her face twisting up with concern, holding up a threatening finger in just the same way that Ellen always did. She gestured up to the mural of Yarım, as if to remind Dean of why they were there. Nothing’s more important than this.

Dean sat frozen, suddenly caught between two paths. How was this happening, on tonight of all nights? Part of him just wanted to ignore the person on the other side of that door, and pretend he’d never heard anything at all. It would be so easy. And the smart choice. Yarım, he’d been training to be a savaşçı for four years, and he could throw it all away with a few brief steps down the aisle towards those doors, towards the night.

Knock knock knock…

Dean felt suddenly giddy with power, with choice… and it had him shrinking back. What was he thinking? He could just imagine Ellen and Bobby’s faces, if they heard that he’d broken his Vigil and lost his chance to become savaşçı to go and open the doors of the chapel for some passing vagrant, some foolish stranger who didn’t know that tonight was the night of the Vigil.

He couldn’t stand to let them down like that. Yarım, what would Sam think? Dean didn’t know if his brother would laugh or cry if Dean failed to become a savaşçı, after all these years of hard training. It would be sheer insanity after how far he’d come to be here. Dean glanced at Jo, and nodded. You’re right.

Jo relaxed a little, though she didn’t close her eyes again. The knocking had stopped now, or perhaps had quietened so far that they could no longer hear it at their place before the altar. Dean swallowed and twisted back around on his cushion, turning his face up to look at Yarım. Did I just make the right choice? he wondered.

The entire point of becoming a savaşçı was to help people, and here at his first opportunity, he’d acted with obedience… and yet, with selfishness. He felt a little cold wrench in his gut that told him he was going to be regretting this one for a while, and almost groaned aloud. If, in the morning, Güneş Yarısı opened onto the view of some poor freezing nomad on the steps of the chapel, that death would be on his head.

Knock. Knock. Knock. Hard and terrifying and unexpected. Dean had leapt to a crouch as quick as a fox, facing the doors. Before he could move again, he heard a sound – faint, and thin, but definitely discernible, even through the great thick wooden doors.

Help, came a voice, so quiet that it was impossible to tell if it were man or woman, mortal or Moon Demon. Help me.

Dean’s eyes went wide. He looked to Jo, but she was back to watching him with anger in every line of her face. And yet – how could he sit here, safely hidden from Ayın Yarısı, and let this person suffer? It would be no honourable passage to the life of a savaşçı if it came at the cost of his honour, his integrity. He’d carry that with him forever – yet another weight on his soul. Oh, but how could he disappoint Bobby, Ellen, Jo… Sam?

No matter what he did, he was letting someone down.

Help, said the voice again. It was hushed and thin with pain, weaving through the chapel like a thread of silver, tugging Dean away. Jo reached out suddenly and put her hand on Dean’s shoulder, as if to hold him down with her will alone.

“I… I have to help,” Dean whispered to her, his voice already a little rough with disuse. Jo rolled her eyes back under their lids, her lips thinning in anger.

“What you have to do is sit back down,” she hissed, even quieter than Dean, her tone sharp as a knife. She was furious with him for his disobedience – quite rightly, Dean thought with a flash of guilt as quick and painful as a lightning strike, after he humiliated her so completely the last time she broke the rules, all those years ago. Through her eyes, he saw his own hypocrisy, his foolishness.

And yet –

“Can’t you hear what they’re saying?” Dean said, as the voice came again, begging for help.

Please… help me.

It was so clear, so urgent – it seemed to twine around Dean’s heart and pull with a strength that was almost irresistible.

Jo’s expression shifted; she looked at him as though he’d gone mad.

“What are you talking about?” she whispered back. “Dean, we’d never be able to hear them through those doors.”

Dean stared at her for a long, long moment, as that silver-thread voice kept calling, still faint but real, inescapably so. He felt the walls of the chapel start to close in on him for a moment – was he dreaming, or going mad? Had Ayın Yarısı truly brought out the insanity within him, making him hallucinate this voice?

Please, it said. It was so silver-quiet, a gentle kiss of sound. I am in desperate danger. Please, I need you to help.

And that did it. Dean straightened from his crouch, brushing away Jo’s hand as though it were nothing, and beginning to move down the aisle. He was half in a haze at his own daring, his own stupidity; the lights of the candles were flashing and bursting in and out of his vision, painting the walls with wild shadows that moved with him, dancing alongside him with sharp-angled grins and sly, darkened eyes. Dean ignored them, keeping his gaze fixed on the great wooden door. His bare feet seemed to barely touch the cool, even flagstones beneath him, nor did he notice the swish of his dark, loose şalvar around his legs. He passed through the archway to the chapel’s antechamber and kept walking, barely noticing the way the air chilled as he approached the gateway to the night, pressing cold touches to his bare skin.

He reached the doors and put out a hand, laying it against the dark wood. Outside, the knocking had stopped, and there was not even the barest echo of the voice that had lured him here. Dean wavered. What if he’d heard some kind of demon? All the legends of Yarım’s crueller half told of the wicked moon sprites that she had at her command, which would creep down your throat as you slept and spill madness into your heart. Perhaps Ayın had grown bolder – had sent minions to seduce and distract the Vigilants? After all, if they passed tonight’s test and became savaşçılar, they would belong to Güneş Yarısı as forces for good and light. Maybe Ayın was jealous, and wanted to claim one for its own?

And yet – there had been something about that voice. It hadn’t seemed evil, it had seemed sincere… and urgent. Dean put his hand under the heavy wooden bar that held the door closed, testing its weight. If he was going to open the door, and break his Vigil, it would have to be soon. It would have to be now.

Dean took a deep breath. It was true that he’d be letting down his family if he failed the Vigil, but he’d be disappointing them even more if he left a person outside on their own, probably in trouble, just because he was selfish and afraid. And a true savaşçı wouldn’t ignore a voice like that, asking for help.

Dean made up his mind. With a grunt of effort, he hefted the wooden bar with both hands, sliding it upwards with a slow creak and slotting it with shaking hands into the mechanism that would allow it to fall shut once more, the next time the door was closed. Dean thought for a moment, wondering whether to slide the bolt across that would keep the bar raised permanently – but decided against it. If it turned out that the stranger outside was a demon, Dean wanted to be able to slam the door in their face and have it safely barred as quickly as possible. A shudder went through him at the thought.

He glanced back down the length of the chapel to where Jo was sitting. She was too far away to make out her expression. Dean wondered if she was as afraid as he was, or if there was no room for fear beside her anger.

Enough being scared, enough delaying. Dean swallowed, and reached for the door handles. The stranger outside, whoever they were, hadn’t come bursting in as soon as they heard the doors being unlocked – something that Dean wasn’t sure whether to be happy or concerned about. Less likely to be a demon, but more likely to be badly hurt or unconscious. He lifted the latches and slowly, using his body weight, opened the huge, heavy doors, just a few inches.

For a moment, he saw nothing, blinded by the darkness outside after the low candlelight in the antechamber. After a few seconds, his eyes adjusted, and he saw – nothing. Only the outlines of scrubby trees and tall graves in the distance. Dean glanced up for a moment to the sky, where Ayın Yarısı was looking down at him keenly, wide and round as though trying to give him a hint. Dean frowned and looked down, too – and there he was. A man in a dark hood, kneeling on the ground in front of the chapel doors, the candlelight painting half of his face a flickering orange and leaving the rest to the dark of the night.

Dean looked into the one eye that he could see, blue as royal blood, and swallowed hard.

“Don’t worry,” said the man, his voice as rough as desert sand. “It’s not like there was any rush.”

And then he fainted.

Chapter Text

Dean threw the doors wide with a sudden almighty effort, splashing the chapel steps with low, syrupy light, as he reached to break the man’s fall. He didn’t make it in time, and the stranger crashed onto his side, the hood of his cloak dropping over his face and hiding it from the light. Dean knelt down and hesitated a moment, before reaching for one of the stranger’s wrists and feeling for the thud, thud, thud that would tell him he hadn’t opened the doors too late. For a brief, sickening second, he felt nothing –

Ah, there it was. A little weak, perhaps, but Dean was no physician: he was probably just holding the wrist in the wrong place. Still alive, then. Which was good, but it also meant Dean had to choose what to do with him.

With deft fingers, Dean gently lifted the man’s hood away from his face, exposing his features to the light spilling out through the chapel doors. He breathed out slowly. This stranger was beautiful. The candlelight seemed to fall for the lines of his face as soon as it fell over them; he had full lips, slightly parted in sleep, and cheeks that were fine-boned and smooth. His hair was dark and cut roughly, so that it stuck out from under the front of the hood.

Dean cast a quick glance around his darkened surroundings. There was no sign of Ellen, nor of anyone else. If he carried the man inside, there was a chance that he might still get away with having opened the doors: he could just bring him in and leave him to sleep off whatever was wrong with him – probably too much rice beer – and leave the chapel in the morning with no more said about it. Jo wouldn’t give him away, he knew that for sure, and he’d make sure the man was tucked away somewhere dark and quiet, so that he wouldn’t be found until he woke up later in the day – by which point he could have conceivably wandered in after the Vigil had finished. Dean would have done right by this stranger, but he’d still become a savaşçı – what could be fairer than that? Throwing a look up to Ayın Yarısı, he frowned. He’d better get the man inside, before the white eye’s baleful influence sent his plans into disarray.

Standing, he hooked his hands underneath the stranger’s arms and pulled. He was surprisingly heavy: he had to be thickset beneath that cloak, or well-muscled. With an effort, Dean dragged him inside the doors of the chapel, into the antechamber. The man was wearing no shoes, and when his heavy cloak slipped to one side, Dean saw that he was wearing just a thin white tunic and a pair of cheap-looking yellow şalvar. Wherever this man came from, Dean thought it must be inside Şehir; the clothing would be useless against the cold of the desert at night. It even had dirt stains on it – red dirt stains? Dean realised with a little stab of horror that the rust-dark patch on the man’s tunic, just under his ribcage, was dried blood.

Crap. He’d fainted because he was wounded.

Dean hurried to close the great doors to the chapel once more, leaving them unbarred for the moment. The man’s wound complicated things. If it was bad – and when he bent down to lift the hem of the flimsy white tunic, Dean could see that it wasn’t deep, but it was long and still bleeding a little – then Dean couldn’t just leave the man to sit here all night, and allow the wound to fester and get infected in the meantime. He’d have to take him to a physician.

He glanced up the chapel’s long aisle. Jo had turned back around to face the altar, perhaps having decided that if Dean was going to fail his Vigil, she wasn’t going to be dragged down with him. A part of Dean agreed with her. It was the same part that wished he’d never opened the door at all, and left the man’s fate in the hands of higher powers.

The stranger stirred, and Dean dropped his tunic hurriedly. He rubbed his hands awkwardly on his şalvar as the man’s eyes opened, staring for a moment at the ceiling of the chapel before looking around him, seeking his rescuer. When his gaze alighted upon Dean, he frowned.

“Who are you?” he demanded, his tone still sand-rough and irritated. Dean tried not to scowl. The guy was injured, he reminded himself. That would probably put a strain on his politeness, too.

“I’m Dean,” he said, as the man sat up, grimacing with the pain and putting a hand over his wounded side. “You’re in the Chapel of Şehir.”

“I know where I am,” the stranger replied sharply. “Otherwise I would have asked that first. What took you so long?”

Dean gaped at him for a moment.

“So long?” he repeated blankly.

“I was knocking for a long time before the door was opened.”

Dean’s lips thinned.

“I was just –”

“I am working to a very tight time schedule tonight.”

“Well, I’m sorry that it took me a few moments,” Dean said, trying and failing to rein in the acidity of his tone. “I probably just gave up the chance to become a savaşçı, no big deal.” The man’s initially pleasant-seeming features actually appeared to have an unfortunate cast to them, Dean discovered on better acquaintance. In fact, they had an unkind, haughty quality. And his nose was a little beaky, too. Stupid beaky nose.

“I neither know nor care what a savaşçı is,” the stranger muttered abstractedly, pulling his hand away from his injury and frowning at the smear of blood on his palm.

“They’re warriors,” Dean explained, a little dully. “Best of the best.”

“I’m sure you can become something else instead,” the man said. He didn’t seem to be paying much attention to Dean, fussing over his tunic instead.

“That’s fine,” Dean said, watching him fiddle, his temper building. “Not like I’ve been dreaming about it my whole life or anything. No worries.”

This didn’t seem to register with the man, who was now lifting his tunic to poke around the edge of his wound, and wincing. Dean pressed his lips together, trying to quash his anger. He’d jeopardised his chances of passing the Vigil… for this guy? This ungrateful, aloof, ignorant…pain in the ass? Yarım, Dean had to be the biggest fool in all of Ateş Aşiret. He’d do better to just shove the guy back outside the doors and forget all about him. It wouldn’t be difficult, after all: the man was weakened enough that he probably couldn’t fight back, but well enough that he should be able to drag himself back to the city to get himself to a physician. And he wouldn’t be Dean’s problem anymore.

The man looked up at Dean with those wide blue eyes, and Dean sighed. He wasn’t going to do that. He definitely wanted to, though.

“You must help me,” the man said. Dean’s frown deepened.

“I thought I just did,” he said, with asperity. He didn’t know this guy; he didn’t owe him anything.

“By letting me into the chapel? That was hardly an act of kindness,” the man said. “The chapel is supposed to be open to anyone in need of sanctuary.”

“Except on the night of the Vigil,” Dean snapped. “Only happens once a year. Kind of a big deal.” His voice had risen in his anger, and he saw Jo glancing back towards them, anger in every line of her body. Dean swallowed. Jo was supposed to be soul-searching right now, and she could hardly do that if Dean was having a shouting match with a stranger at the other end of the chapel. Reaching out, Dean grabbed the guy’s shoulder and roughly hauled him up to his feet.

“Where are we going?” the man demanded weakly as Dean hustled him across the little antechamber towards a latticed wooden box at the side of the room. It was tall, almost as tall as Dean, and wide enough to fit at least two people within it. Pulling open a small door to one side, Dean pushed the stranger through it. He caught a glimpse of the man stumbling and falling against the wall of the box, before pressing the door closed behind him. He moved to a matching door at the other end of the box and entered it himself. His door closed with a creak behind him. When he turned, he saw that the stranger was sitting with his back against the side of the box, his face towards Dean, still wearing an expression of irritation. The light glinted through the wooden lattice in eerie diamonds; one of them fell neatly onto the stranger’s cheek, Dean noticed as he sat down facing forwards and crossed his legs. Between them, a low table ran the length of the structure.

“Where are we?” the man asked hazily, the diamond of light shifting on his cheek as he spoke. The walk seemed to have brought him dangerously close to unconsciousness again.

“The Vefa,” Dean said, reaching instinctively for the candles, matches and metal rack beneath the table in the centre. Maybe the man had been hit over the head, too, if he didn’t remember what a Vefa looked like. Dean began to light the candles, twelve of them, setting them out in a cluster on the table-top. The man watched him silently. The air was soon thick with the scent of wax, layered over the duller smell of old incense.

“I need your help,” said the man again, though his tone was a little softer this time. “It’s a matter of life and death.”

Dean didn’t speak. Instead, he finished lighting the candles and placed the metal rack over the top of them, so that the thin gaps in the little structure were over the flames.

“Are you listening? We don’t have time to –”

“Put your hands under mine,” Dean interrupted sharply. He wasn’t sure quite why he was making the stranger do this, but there was something calming about moving his hands through familiar motions, falling back on the ease of a ceremony he’d first performed when he was five. Also, if this man really did need his help, this would help Dean to know for sure. And then he’d be able to decide whether or not to do what the man was asking of him, whatever it was.

“Why?” the stranger asked, clenching his hands as though expecting Dean to physically force him to place them on the rack.

“Because,” Dean said, saying the first thing that came into his head, “it’s the only way I’ll trust you.”

The man’s mouth twisted sideways, his lips thin as though he were trying to swallow something sour, and then inclined his head in dour agreement. He placed his hands on top of the metal rack, wincing slightly at the heat from the flames of the candles beneath.

“Yarım listens,” Dean said, speaking the ritual invocation. “Speak only truths, for if you lie, the fire will grow tall, and burn your deceit into your skin.”

He placed his own hands over the stranger’s, palms against the backs of his hands. The man shifted his fingers a little, but didn’t pull away. When Dean looked up, he saw that the man was watching him closely, an expression of reluctant interest on his face, as though he’d never even heard the start of the Vefa ritual before.

“What is your name?” Dean said, starting easy. He looked into the man’s eyes; some people liked to watch the flames to see if they grew, but Dean found it easiest to read the truth in a person’s face, and leave the fire to Yarım. The stranger hesitated for a moment, and Dean could tell by the way his eyes flickered that he was deciding whether or not to lie. That in itself was interesting; who would need to hide their own name from a stranger?

“Castiel,” said the man eventually, his gaze direct and unblinking. He’d decided to go with the truth, then. Castiel was an unusual name, like nothing Dean had ever heard of. Maybe this guy was from one of the southernmost tribes of Ateş Aşiret, near the Red Forest. He’d heard they had some outlandish names down there, since some of the tribes had taken husbands and wives from their Red Forrester neighbours.

“I’m Dean,” Dean said softly, as these thoughts whirled through his head. “In case you’d forgotten.”

“I hadn’t,” Castiel replied. Another truth. Dean hadn’t expected that one.

“Why are you here, at the Chapel?” Dean asked. His hands were starting to sweat a little, on top of Castiel’s; the man’s own palms would be feeling the scorch of the flames through the thin gaps in the rack, though his face bore no trace of discomfort. Dean pushed away his approval; he didn’t want to give the guy any unwarranted respect. He was still an asshole.

“I was running for my life,” Castiel replied. His tone was low and even, his gaze direct. By all known signs, he was speaking the truth – and the wound on his side backed him up, too. “I had arranged to meet someone, but I was ambushed before I could make the assignation. There were several of them and I was alone. I attempted to fight but within the first few seconds, I received this wound,” he glanced down at his side with a flicker of disgust, “and realised I could not hope to win. I ran. I saw the chapel. The rest you know.”

“What – what was this ‘assignation’ about?” Dean asked next, his tone putting air quotes around the word. The guy spoke like he’d just walked out of a governmental meeting, or maybe a lecture on Ateşi literature – but he’d also seriously considered trying to fight off several unknown attackers, and then managed to make it out without another scratch once he’d started running. Dean felt the lid on his respect taking a little more strain.

Once again, Castiel’s eyes shifted left and right before he answered this question.

“A matter of grave importance,” he answered, carefully non-committal. “I can’t tell you too much. Only that I am on an errand of international significance.”

Dean’s eyes widened. Perhaps Castiel really was from near the Red Forest; or maybe – no, surely it was impossible. He couldn’t be talking about the nation to the west of Ateş Aşiret – the Water Lands? What if he came with the news that they’d invaded again, or – what if he were a spy, carrying information from the Water Court to the King? Who else but a spy would be ambushed on the way to an assignation? Who else but a spy would even have an assignation in the first place? Dean almost snorted. Assignation. What the hell.

“Are you satisfied? My hands are beginning to feel uncomfortable,” Castiel said, his tone still low, with that touch of abrasiveness that set Dean’s teeth on edge.

“There are always five questions,” he replied curtly.

“Cut it short. You need to leave, now.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Dean said angrily. “Finish the ritual, or I’ll throw you out the chapel right now and bar the door behind you, I swear I will.”

Castiel looked deep into Dean’s eyes for a long second, as though searching for a sign of weakness, and then scowling.

“Fine,” he said. “Ask quickly.”

“Why do you want my help?” Dean asked, keeping his tone clipped. No matter whether he ended up helping this guy or not, they were certainly never going to be friends. The man was rude. And inconsiderate. And petulant.

“My contact will still be waiting for me at our assignation point. He’ll be there for at least another hour, but I can’t go near or I’ll be recognised and attacked again. I need someone to go instead of me, and take him a letter. I have it inside my cloak.”

Dean chewed the inside of his cheek. The light of the candles was waning slightly: they were small, made to burn hot rather than slow. He had to make his mind up quickly, before the ritual was over.

He didn’t like Castiel at all, and certainly didn’t feel like doing him any favours. But if this was a matter of serious importance to all of Ateş Aşiret, how could he refuse on the grounds of a petty personal dislike? And carrying a letter didn’t sound especially difficult. There was no way he’d be recognised like Castiel had been, given the fact that they’d never met before in their lives and Dean had no connections at all with any kind of espionage or international politics. It should be safe and easy enough. In fact, depending on where the letter needed to be taken, he might even be back in the chapel before dawn… he might yet make the savaşçı’s ceremony tomorrow.

“Where would I have to go?” Dean asked, his last question. Castiel met his eyes once more, and Dean was struck again by how deep, how blue they were.

“The Forest of the Dead,” Castiel replied, just as the first of the candles between them went out.

Chapter Text

Dean’s first thought was that he should have known. He really, really should have known. Nothing else had gone right tonight, so why would his luck change now?

“The Forest of the Dead,” he repeated hollowly. “Right. Of course.”

“In the centre,” Castiel clarified, his eyes never leaving Dean’s.

“Well, sure,” Dean said. “Why would you want to meet on the outskirts when you could meet right in the middle?”

“I sense you’re being sarcastic,” Castiel said, his tone disapproving. “Does this mean that you refuse the task?”

“Oh, no,” Dean hissed at him. Another of the candles went out, but they both kept their hands on the metal rack, one on top of the other. “When I woke up this morning, the first thought in my head was, ‘Oh, I hope I get to go wandering through a spooky old graveyard and get attacked by a bunch of angry dead people! Not forgetting the rebel firemakers who live there as well because everyone’s too scared to go in and arrest them! Sounds like a recipe for a super evening!’”

“Then my arrival was fortuitous,” Castiel replied.

Dean resisted the temptation to dig his fingernails into the back of Castiel’s hands. He was infuriating.

“I never asked for this,” he growled. “I don’t want to take your stupid letter. It’s probably not even that important, anyway. I’ll take you to a physician to see to your wound, and that’s it.”

“I need no physician,” Castiel responded, scowling. “And I cannot force you to take the letter. The decision is yours. If you will not do it, I must do it myself.”

Dean couldn’t stop his eyebrows lifting in surprise.

“You can barely walk three steps without collapsing,” he said. “You’re hurt and you’ll get killed before you’ve made it past the first grave.” He paused for a moment, thinking. “You know what they say about people who die in the Forest of the Dead?”

Castiel shook his head mutely. The dying candlelight was pooling in his eyes and beneath his cheekbones like molten bronze, the shadows making his face seem gaunt and sharply-made.

“They say you don’t ascend to the House of Yarım,” Dean said fiercely. “You spend an eternity wandering the Forest, lost. The spirits eat your body, so your family can’t mourn you. You don’t get a grave.” Dean shuddered. He couldn’t imagine anything worse. Just the thought of Sam, Bobby, Ellen and Jo, sitting in the kitchen of their home, waiting hopelessly for Dean to come home as the hours, and the days, and the weeks passed by…

“I am asking a lot of you,” Castiel conceded, which surprised Dean. “If it helps, it is nothing that I would not risk myself. As I said, if you don’t go, I will.”

“But you’ll die,” Dean said slowly. Was Castiel stubborn or just stupid? “Didn’t you hear what I said?”

“I’ll be consigning myself to perdition,” Castiel said, losing eye contact with Dean for the first time as he looked down, his forehead creased with the weight of his fate. “But I have to try. The letter must get through.”

Dean watched Castiel for several long, long seconds. If he was willing to die – in the Forest of the Dead, no less – to make sure that this letter got through, then it really must be very important to him. And to the countries involved, Dean reminded himself. If he’d guessed right, and Castiel really was a spy, this letter might be the key to stopping a war between Ateş Aşiret and the Water Lands.

And even if it weren’t – even if this guy was crazy, and all he was trying to deliver was his grocery list – Dean didn’t want him to die. Suffer a bit, perhaps. Just enough to wipe that aloof look off his face. Maybe drop a frying pan on his foot or something. But not –

“It has to be soon,” Castiel said, interrupting Dean’s chain of thought. “If you could help me to the door…”

“I’ll go,” Dean said abruptly. “Give me the damn letter. I’ll go.”

Castiel’s whole face lightened with surprise.

“I am not forcing you,” he said gravely. “You do not have to go.”

“I know,” Dean said awkwardly. “But, well. It seems important, and I wouldn’t want you to die, so.” He shrugged.

“That is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me,” Castiel said, and he either meant that, or he’d achieved a level of sarcasm so subtle that Dean couldn’t detect it. Either way, the simple statement made Dean stare for a few seconds, before he cleared his throat and lifted his hands away from Castiel’s.

“You stay in here,” he said. “Jo won’t bother you because she’s not allowed to speak until morning. You’ll be safe. Try not to move too much or touch your wound. Just put pressure on it through your tunic. Actually…” Dean bit his lip and then reached down for the hem of his own dark tunic, ripping a long, wide strip from the bottom with a decisive movement. He handed Castiel the length of fabric. “There, that’s clean. Press that against it, alright? And wrap it around yourself tight and tie it off when the bleeding stops.”

Castiel accepted the makeshift bandaging with an expression of faint confusion, his nose wrinkling up. It wasn’t really beaky at all, Dean thought grudgingly. It was straight and angular.

“You’re kind,” Castiel said, rubbing the fabric between his fingers as though he expected it to turn to dust in his hands. He sounded confused, like he’d just found a goose egg in a hen coop. Dean shrugged.

“Don’t want you to die,” he said again. “If it’s all the same to you.”

He stood, noticing the way that Castiel narrowed his eyes at him like he was some kind of freak. Had the guy never met someone prepared to rip a tunic before?

“Give me the letter, then,” he said gruffly, stooping a little so as not to hit his head on the ceiling of the Vefa. The candles on the table had all gone out but for one, which guttered and spat. Castiel reached into the folds of his cloak, pulling out a thin, yellowing envelope, and handing it to Dean with an expression that Dean couldn’t read: he seemed to be caught somewhere between mistrust and hopefulness. Or maybe he just needed the bathroom, Dean didn’t really know him well enough to be sure.

“The person I am supposed to meet is called Ash,” Castiel said. “I do not know what he looks like, but in the message he sent me, I was told to meet him at the centre of the Forest of the Dead, under the two lamps. He said that I would know him because he was professional from the front, but… um. More inclined to festivity from other angles.”

Dean raised a sceptical eyebrow.

“That’s supposed to help me?” he said. “That’s gibberish.”

“I thought so, too,” Castiel said flatly. “I believe the exact phrase he used was, ‘business up front, party at the back’.” He tilted his head as Dean’s expression cleared.

“He’s got a mullet,” Dean explained, with a small smirk. “Type of haircut. OK. Anything else I should know?”

“It will be dark,” Castiel said, helpfully. “Very dark.”

“Thanks,” said Dean wryly. “I would never have guessed, with it being night and all.” Castiel blinked, unimpressed, and Dean gave a mental shrug. He had no idea what wavelength this guy was working on, but he definitely wasn’t tuned in to radio sarcasm.

“Take care,” he said, as Dean turned to go. Dean almost smiled; maybe the guy wasn’t such an asshole after all.

“Of the letter,” Castiel clarified, and Dean scowled. He took that last thought back.

“I will,” he said. “I swear on my honour I will do everything in my power to deliver it safely.” This, at least, Castiel seemed to understand. The uncertainty in his face faded a little, though not completely. Dean felt his heart swell in his chest, just saying the words; it sounded like the start of a quest, like something a savaşçı would say.

He left the Vefa and emerged into the antechamber of the chapel once more. He turned towards the doors; to one side were four hooded pelerinler, hanging neatly on a set of hooks. He’d need to put one of them on to go back outside: his ceremonial short tunic was too thin to protect him from the night’s cool bite, and the multi-layered coats were specially made to provide protection in combat. On the lower two hooks were the pelerinler that he and Jo had worn into the chapel, which they had been given on the day of their initiation into savaşçı training: now they were worn, scuffed, patched in places. On the higher two were the white, fresh pelerinler with embroidered hemlines and sharp, serviceable daggers in the belts; these were the pelerinler that they were supposed to put on to leave the chapel in the morning, the pelerinler of the savaşçılar. For a brief moment, Dean was tempted. The chances of him ever being able to legitimately wear this pelerin were looking fairly miniscule; this might be his only opportunity to put it on, to wear it out. To feel like the savaşçı that he’d always wanted to be. He reached out his hand…

And picked up his old pelerin, the black one. As tempting as it was, he simply wasn’t worthy of the white pelerin.

And now, perhaps, he never would be.

With a lump in his throat, Dean grimaced and pulled the savaşçı’s dagger out of one of the jacket’s belts. He didn’t deserve to carry this, either, but there was no way he was walking into the Forest of the Dead unarmed. His odds of survival looked bleak enough without him helping them along with high-minded principles.

He’d walked to the chapel barefoot, as tradition dictated, so that’s how he’d have to leave it, too. The Forest of the Dead was a little way out into the desert, so perhaps it was best that he didn’t have his open-toed sandals with him; they’d only collect the sand and chafe the soles of his feet. And there shouldn’t be too many sand vipers this far from the city; they preferred to be near Şehir’s walls, where the rats and mice gathered to pick through the city’s rubbish. That’s what he hoped, anyway. It’d be a poor death.

He stood in front of the doors, readying himself. He zipped up his pelerin, tugging it straight and pulling harder over the place where the zipper always caught on the bent metal teeth. He slid the dagger into the sheath under the coat’s first layer, above his chest. It was ever so slightly too large, an unfamiliar weight to carry. Dean looked at the letter clenched in his hand for a moment, and then tucked it, too, inside his pelerin. It should be safe in there.

He looked up the aisle, towards where Jo was sitting. He could read her anger in the straightness of her spine, the set of her shoulders. He felt a cold clench in his chest at the thought of leaving her this way. What if he really did die in the Forest of the Dead, and the last memory Jo had of him was this – a failure? Maybe if he went up there and explained…

But no, that would be foolish for so many reasons. Firstly, he’d be ruining her Vigil even more than he already had, if he distracted her by speaking to her. And secondly, knowing Jo, she wouldn’t just let him go walking into the most dangerous place in Şehir, alone and virtually helpless, for the sake of a stranger’s mission. She’d either insist on coming with him, or else knock him out and tie him up so that he couldn’t go – and probably send Castiel running for his life, too. Well, crawling for his life. The guy wasn’t going anywhere fast.

And even though there was a part of Dean that desperately wanted Jo’s help – there was even another, smaller part of him that wouldn’t have minded being forcibly stopped from going at all – he’d made a promise, now. He knew that delivering the letter was the right thing to do, and he would have to do it alone. It was time to go.

Turning away from Jo, Dean faced the doors. He reached up and pulled the peg out of its slot, so that the heavy wooden bar would fall back into place when he closed the door after himself. It would keep Jo safe, and Castiel too. He thought briefly of leaving some kind of letter for Sam, for Bobby and Ellen – but he had no paper, no pen, no time. He’d be out of the Forest before sunrise, if Yarım was kind. He could explain himself to his family if he saw them in the morning.

When he saw them in the morning.

He heaved on the door handles, swinging them open once more.

Fear the night, said Ellen’s voice in Dean’s head, as he looked up at the sky. Ayın Yarısı was wide and staring, triumphantly clear against the black velvet of space. Fear the night, and do not open the doors…

Dean set his jaw, frowning to hide his fear from Yarım’s cruel eye. As the candle clock on the chapel’s altar burned down to the twelfth line, he took a single step outside its warm glow. He stood for a moment on the sandstone steps, his heart thudding, his fingers tingling, that tightness in his chest that he always felt whenever he was disobedient. He breathed in the open air for a moment, listening to the whistle of the breeze over the flat lands of the desert to the south – and then he headed west, down the long, stony path that would take him to the Forest of the Dead.

Behind him, the door slammed shut. He heard the dull thud of the bar falling across, locking him out.

No turning back.

And no time for second-guessing, either. Dean followed his path by the light of the moon, focusing on the crunch of loose stones under his soles, hardened by years of training barefoot. To either side of him, sand stretched away; if he turned and looked back, he’d see the chapel, and half a mile or so away the outline of Şehir itself, black and looming even at such a distance. As he walked, Dean longed for the safety of the great city’s almighty walls, for the reassuring chug chug of the factories’ cogs and turbines, for the heat of the braziers on street corners. Inside the city, he was one of many, protected by the familiar press of people on all sides. Out here, he was a lone figure – a dark silhouette with streaks of moon-silver down his back. A lost soul. A madman.

Dean rubbed the back of his neck, as if to brush away the moonlight that pooled there.

“Yarım, be kind,” he said. He’d never been one for praying; he found the idea that the great goddess would actually listen to him almost laughable. He was so small, so insignificant. But tonight, perhaps, when he felt her presence so strongly – when her great white eye was keen and watchful on his lonely back – maybe tonight, she would heed his words. “Watch over me on this mission. I know I’m not – there’s probably ten thousand people who need your help more than I do, but – please, let me come home. My brother needs me.” An image of Sam’s face swam to the front of Dean’s mind, smiling slightly over the top of his book. His heart squeezed in his chest; he cleared his throat, and tried to shrug it off. He was being overdramatic, surely. He was going to be in and out of the Forest faster than Yarım blinked. Letter delivered, stranger appeased, his life would go back to how it was supposed to be – and tonight would pass over like a sandstorm, too sudden and too dangerous, but soon forgotten.

The first grave loomed out of the darkness, like the pale tip of a beckoning finger.

Dean paused when he saw it, swallowing hard. He kept his eyes wide open, but the moon’s glow didn’t seem to stretch beyond the edge of the graveyard, as if even the cruel gaze of Ayın Yarısı was afraid to watch the dark things that lurked between the tombs. With his sight dulled, Dean’s hearing magnified: there was the wind through the graves, less like a sigh and more like the indrawn breath of a giant, shadowed beast. And there – quiet and distant, was that another sound? It had been hushed, metallic, as though someone had softly drawn their dagger out of its sheath. Dean followed the unseen example, trying to stay calm. The dagger felt weighty and unfamiliar in his palm, another strange shape in a night full of sharp angles and unexpected drops. He’d been trained for situations just like this, but in the practice ground there was no real danger – no fearful sweat on his brow, no dryness in his mouth, no tremor in his fingers.

No hisses and flickers in the shadows.

Dean blew out the air in his lungs hard, summoning his courage. An image of Castiel popped into his head, inexplicably; if he could walk into this place in those ridiculous yellow şalvar, then Dean could do it in his reinforced pelerin, with a dagger in his hand. He took a few tentative steps forwards on legs like lead, each one a little easier than the last. He kept his ears strained for the slightest sound, but heard nothing over the wind. Even still, there was an uneasiness in the air, a sense of anticipation to which Dean was attuned after his years of training. He kept his steps soft, the loose sand cushioning his footfalls. The breaths of wind whistled around the corners of the graves, fast as spirits, and – was that a flicker of light? Dean kept his dagger high, ready to strike, but he didn’t see it again. The moon’s shine was barely coating the tops of each gravestone, faint licks of blueish light that didn’t help in the slightest. Dean caught himself thinking that he was lucky the Forest of the Dead was easy to navigate, designed like an enormous spider’s web with several large, straight paths starting at the edges and leading directly to the centre, just where he wanted to go; then he remembered where the spider tended to sit in a spider’s web, and felt distinctly less lucky. He kept walking.

The graves were passing by so smoothly and regularly that Dean almost felt as if they were the ones moving, not him. He began to imagine that he could see bands of darker black in the velvet air, and blinked to shake off the illusion. Hold it together, Dean. He forced down the thought that the people who had attacked Castiel – the very real, very tangible people with sharp objects and the ability to use them – must be in here somewhere. After all, why should that bother him? It was Castiel that they were after.

Of course, in the darkness, he could easily be Castiel. They could ambush him without knowing their mistake, but the damage would already be done.

He - Yarım, he was in just as much danger as Castiel would have been, if he’d been here himself.

Dean swallowed hard. Damn Castiel, that asshole. He must’ve realised what he was doing. There was no way that both he and Dean were too stupid to see the flaw in the plan until it was already happening.

Everything was quiet, and still. Dean tried not to panic. There was no reason to be afraid. None at all.

Somewhere to his left, a sharp zing of metal. He froze. Listened.

Nothing more. Maybe he’d imagined it. His mind was starting to play tricks on him, just like the stories about the Forest had always told him it would. It was the restless souls, floating around him unseen, calling out in voices he couldn’t hear – drawing out the madness inside him with their ghostly touch. He had to stop staring fruitlessly into the darkness to his left, and look back towards the direction in which he was heading.

His heart skipped and his stomach lurched as he caught sight of two pinpricks in the darkness, straight ahead. His throat was tight with fear, and he stood stock still, watching through a haze of primal fear. Were those the glowing eyes of a spirit? A demon? Dean was caught on the spear of their stare for a long, long moment; the lights didn’t move, didn’t blink. Castiel’s voice came floating into Dean’s head: at the centre of the Forest of the Dead, under the two lamps…

And Dean’s heart was racing, but for a different reason, now. If those were the lamps and he could see them, then that meant he’d almost done it. He only had to keep a grip on his sanity for a few more minutes, and then he could run out of here like the sand was hot coals. He tucked his dagger back inside his pelerin and began walking again, faster now, with more purpose. He ignored the muted noises around him – were they getting louder? Closer? More frequent? And told himself they were just the sounds of the sand swishing under his feet. He was going to make it. He might yet manage to get back to the chapel with enough time before morning to tell Castiel exactly what he thought of him, before kicking him out of the chapel – out of his whole damn life. One night of terror was quite enough.

The lamps didn’t seem to be getting any closer. Dean sped up, moving at a pace close to a run. He was breathing a little hard, more from stress than exertion. He knew that he was being careless; his savaşçı trainer would be horrified by the amount of noise that he was making. It was almost as though he were trying to make himself a target, Jody would say. But it was impossible to resist the urge to hurry, with Ayın Yarısı on his back and spirits all around him and noises, noises everywhere, definitely getting closer…

There was a brief, brilliant flare of red light, barely ten paces to the left of where Dean was standing. He stumbled to a halt, panting. No, no, no… for a second, there was darkness. A twist of smoke curled through the air; Dean could smell it strongly, as though a silent starting gun had been fired right next to him. He exhaled, frozen in place. Still, be still. Cruel Ayın Yarısı cannot see you if you are still.

And then the world went mad.

With a suddenness that made him cry out, all around him was red, bright and aching red, searing into his eyeballs and blinding him. Dean threw up a hand to cover his eyes, the smell of smoke suddenly overwhelming, filling his nose and his throat and his lungs, making him cough – he ducked instinctively and heard a swift sizzle over his head, felt the singe of his hair burning. Too late, far too late, he started to run, staying low, still blind, praying that he was heading in the right direction. All around him was screaming and yelling, the sound of metal on metal – but Dean couldn’t pause, had to keep running, had to get out of the line of fire. He ran, pulling his arm away from his eyes and opening them, trying to let them adjust to the new light, reddish and flickering; still moving, he glanced left and saw flames, cupped in the hands of a person – a person with gash-bright lips smiling sweetly, obscenely, in a face painted livid white, red rivulets running down from her eyes. With a noise somewhere between a gasp and a sob, Dean ran on. He experienced a sudden spasm of doubt – why in the name of the Everdark was he still making for the centre of the damn Forest when he needed to get out? But a glance over his shoulder told him he’d done the only thing he could; behind him, the path was a mess of fire and smoke and shouting and bodies weaving and falling, arms swooping, with screams and hoarse cries of pain…

Dean turned to face forwards, and saw a single figure in his path. It was carrying a long, heavy sword, had hair down past its shoulders, loped like a bear... Dean stopped thinking, brain paralysed by fear – and that was when his body took over. He’d practised the move a thousand times. He didn’t halt, didn’t lose any of his momentum; he ran, leapt, wrapped his legs around the figure’s neck before it even had time to raise its broadsword and twisted violently sideways. They fell to the ground together, Dean bracing for the fall and rolling as soon as he hit the sand, coming to rest in a crouch with one hand on the floor and one raised behind him for balance. The figure lay still. Dean watched it for a second longer than he should, looking at the well-made armour, and the emblazoned tunic over it. He wondered with a kind of giddy dispassion if he’d snapped the soldier’s neck, or just knocked him out cold by slamming him to the ground.

Fire behind, around, above. No time. If he could make it to the lamps, he’d be at the centre of the spider’s web; he’d be able to pick a different path by which to flee the Forest, a safe path. He was so close, now. As he picked himself up and ran, he could make out the lamps themselves, wrought with iron and casting a yellowy gas light that seemed mellow and ambrosial compared to the hellish red that lay behind. The sounds of shouting were ringing in his ears. A hand grabbed at his arm; with a yell of defiance, he twisted violently away from its grasp. He bulled forwards, arms pumping, each breath sticking hard in his chest and tasting of smoke and something darker, more visceral, more human – blood, or fear, or both. His tongue was thick with it. He broke out of the lines of graves, into the central square. The two lamps stood still, incongruously peaceful beacons against the night – and at their foot, a dark huddle of clothing. Dean, still sprinting, leapt right over it at first – and then the shape resolved itself into recognisable form in his mind, and he stopped dead. The sounds of battle were infernally loud behind him, and the stench of fire horrifically strong… and yet.

He’d promised.

Dean closed his eyes for a second, his jaw clenched tight.

And then he turned back, and walked over to the body lying in between the two iron lamps.

He crouched down beside it, taking a longer look. With a sinking feeling, he found his suspicion confirmed: business up front, party at the back.

Yarım above. What had he got himself into?

“Ash,” he said in a low voice, surprised by how raspy and thin it sounded. “Ash, can you hear me?” He was asking without much hope; the man’s eyes were closed, his face creased in pain and waxy white. Dean reached for Ash’s wrist, turning it over and pressing his fingers to it, right over a red-gold tattoo that followed the pattern of his veins. For the second time that night, Dean found himself searching for a pulse… but this time, he wasn’t so lucky. Ash’s heart was still. He was dead.

The letter in Dean’s pocket was a weight, holding him in position. What did he do now? Should he leave the letter with the body, to try to get it into the right hands? But no, surely not. The people who killed Ash had to be the same people who attacked Castiel. They might come back for the body, and giving them the letter had to be a bad idea. There was only one thing for it; Dean had to run, and save himself. There must be another way for Castiel to get his information to the people who needed it. And there was no point in Dean getting himself killed for nothing in this hellhole. The shouts and clangs were still desperately loud, striking against a nerve in Dean’s body that made him shake.

He tried to stand up, and found that his legs wouldn’t hold him. They weren’t his own; Yarım forgive, they were the legs that had snapped someone’s neck only five minutes before. And they wouldn’t obey him now.

Dean looked at Ash, his throat thick and his eyes inexplicably full. The man looked lonely in death, and cold. Ignoring the fighting, Dean shrugged off his pelerin and gently covered Ash’s body with it. He could make this right, somehow. This was a nightmare, but he could fix it…

A scream that curdled his blood snapped Dean out of his own mind with a whip crack. The battle had moved. Most of the fighters were leaving the path where Dean had originally been attacked – and heading straight for where he was now, in the very centre of the graveyard. The sounds of the fighting surrounded Dean: the crack and clang and – Yarım save him – slick squelch of knife through flesh. He cast about for a way out, a gap in the fighters, but there was nowhere to go, only the roar of fire and fire and blood… one of the figures, silhouetted black and fearsome against the flames, detached from the group and started making its way towards Dean. It was swinging a double-bladed axe in both hands, nonchalant; on its tunic was a great black stag, which Dean watched approaching with a slow, deep, paralysed horror… the figure was so close, right in front of Dean, who was still somehow on his knees – how had he forgotten to get up? Forgotten to defend himself? How was there no time left? The axe was rising up to the night sky, moonlight glinting off the edge of a blade coated in gore, waiting to fall and cleave – reaching its zenith, pausing – and –

“NO!” Dean was pushed roughly aside, falling to the ground.

For a moment, he lay still, tasting the tiny grains of sand in his mouth with hazy shock. Above him, the noises of battle seemed to be changing; the burning reds that hazed Dean’s vision were fading, leaving him lying in a pool of softer yellow.

He raised himself shakily onto one hand, to see that someone was standing over him, legs planted wide and shoulders back, yelling words that Dean couldn’t quite understand at the remaining figures, who were backing away. The floor beneath their feet was soaked dark, their bodies crunched over with the pain of their injuries. They fled. The body standing over Dean turned, and placed a hand on his arm; with a yelp, Dean pushed it away. It was hot, hot enough to sear his bare skin.

“Dean. Dean. Listen to me. Can you hear me?” Dean tuned in and looked up, to see a pair of very wide, very angry blue eyes looking right at him.

“Castiel?” he said vaguely. His brain was a mess of pain and shock.

“Get your fucking coat and stand up,” Castiel said, the unexpected curse jerking Dean back a little closer to reality. Castiel sounded furious, though Dean had the feeling that the anger wasn’t directed at him. “We’re going.”

Dean reached out and pulled his pelerin away from Ash. It hadn’t done any good, anyway; he still looked just as lonely as before, unaware of the pointless kindness Dean had shown him. Dean’s head was pounding, his stomach turning. He twisted to one side and crouched on all fours, heaving, spitting out bile.

This time, Castiel’s hand on his back was gentler, and didn’t burn.

“Come with me,” he said, when Dean looked up at him blearily. “It’s not safe here. We have to go.”

Dean wiped his mouth and nodded grimly, pushing himself to his feet. His ears were ringing, full of the echoes of the battle that had just been fought.

Castiel looked grey with exhaustion, unstable on his feet. Dean wrapped an arm around his waist, and they leaned on each other as they stumbled out of the graveyard, moving through the tombs as quietly and imperceptibly as two ghosts, lost to the world of the living.

Chapter Text

The night was endless, a hungry maw that devoured them deeper and deeper with every step that they took. They soon left the graves behind and emerged into open desert. In his haze, Dean forgot that they were two people; he had four legs, four arms, and two bodies weighed down by shock and tiredness and pain. The sand under his feet was soft and loose; walking through it was more like wading through water. His legs burned, his head was pounding, and his shoulder ached from supporting the weight of Castiel. He forced himself on, matching the other man’s pace, hypnotised by the swish, swish of their feet moving through the sand and the steady, blueish light of the moon. The sound went on, and on, and on, and the sand was a river, and he was floating away…

He woke up with the fingers of first dawn on his face, pink and delicate.

He groaned, rolled over, and spat out sand. Somewhere nearby, he heard the faint sounds of movement – for a moment he was reaching for his knife, before he remembered. Castiel. The battle. His broken Vigil.

He sat up slowly, watching as Yarım’s right eye, Güneş Yarısı, slowly opened over the dunes. Ellen would be opening the doors of the Chapel now, expecting to find two savaşçılar waiting inside – and finding only one. Jo was going to kill him. And with the way he was feeling, Dean would go along with that.

He rolled his shoulders, trying to rid them of their stiffness. He had a vague memory of collapsing onto the sand during the night, the arid rivulets seeming as soft as pillows under his aching body. On this side of the night, however, he wasn’t quite so convinced of their comfort. He groaned, and stretched out his arms.

There was an answering huff from beside him almost immediately. He glanced over his shoulder to see Castiel sitting upright, narrow-eyed with tiredness and sporting some badly singed hair on the left side of his head.

“We passed out,” he said, in a voice as gritty as the sand beneath them. Dean nodded wordlessly, still gathering himself together after last night. A sense of shame was building inside him, which he tried to push away.

“Where are we going?” he asked, the question cut out through a throat as raw as an open wound. Castiel stared at him, his mouth a flat line.

“I thought you knew,” he ground out. “I was following you, last night.”

Dean’s couldn’t help it; a wave of mild hysteria overtook him and he laughed, dry and harsh.

“So now we’re lost in the desert,” he said. “Super. You know what? I am never going on a night out with you again.”

“I’m heartbroken,” said Castiel expressionlessly, passing a hand over his eyes. Dean squinted at him in the growing light. He just had no read on this guy at all. That had to be sarcasm, right?

“I’m sure you’ll get over it,” Dean said lightly. He was so thirsty. Every word was a scratch on the back of his sandpaper throat.

For a few moments, they sat and watched the sun rise in silence: two figures sitting side by side on the sands, the sky a sweet pink kissed by orange, turning to a cooler blue in the east. They were so tiny, Dean thought. Two little humans. Barely bigger than two grains of sand, compared to the vastness of the desert around them. And yet they couldn’t have walked too far, the night before; they’d been desperate, sure, stumbling away from the horrors of the graveyard, but they’d also been tired and terrified. There was no way they’d made it more than a mile or two.

“So,” Castiel said. “Can I ask if there’s a plan?”

Dean coughed before replying. He felt as though he had half a desert’s worth of sand stuck in his lungs, after a night of breathing it in through his open mouth. At least they’d been lucky enough to wake up before Güneş Yarısı had fully opened and burned their skin with its stare.

“I guess… we go back to Şehir,” he said, with a touch of hollowness. “We need to get some water, you need to get that wound seen to, and me…” Dean rubbed the back of his neck. “I guess I’ve got to face the music for that whole, uh, life-altering decision…thing… that I did last night.”

He glanced over at Castiel, who was chewing his lip and staring off into the distance.

“Thank you,” Castiel said eventually. “For trying to take the letter to Ash.”

“I didn’t succeed and almost got killed,” Dean said shortly. “Not a lot to thank me for. You can save your gratitude for when I actually do something useful. Like, running after a stranger and saving them from a bunch of rebel Firemakers, for example.” Dean frowned as a memory surfaced from last night: a black stag on a warrior’s tunic. “And some of the King’s soldiers. What they were even doing there, I have no idea.” His eyes snapped back to Castiel, who was watching him think with his head tilted slightly to one side. “Anyway, point is… thanks for coming and, you know –”

“Saving you?” Castiel said helpfully when Dean hesitated. “You’re welcome. I realised almost as soon as you left the chapel that the plan to get you through to the centre of the Forest unscathed was very unlikely to work. I should never have asked you to go. My desperation made me… stupid. I followed you.”

“But you could hardly walk when I left,” Dean said incredulously. “What did you do, change your batteries?”

“Batteries,” Castiel said, repeating the word slowly as though tasting it on his tongue for the first time.

“Yeah, you know. Power sources. They’re everywhere in Şehir. People are using them to power their radios these days, so they’re portable.”

“Radios?”

“What, do you live under a rock?” Dean demanded, and then brushed the answer away. “Doesn’t matter. What I was saying was… we need to get back to Şehir. Even if I’m not going to become a savaşçı, I still need to tell someone about what happened last night. Find out if those King’s Men were supposed to be there, or if they went rogue and attacked those Firemakers without permission. No one’s supposed to fight in the Forest of the Dead, it’s sacred ground. I’d understand, though,” Dean said, his expression turning a little ugly. “The sons of bitches deserve it, for making fire against the law.”

Castiel’s face tightened.

“Do you really think they’re that bad?” he asked still looking out over the sands. His tone, as always, was without inflection. Dean couldn’t tell if it contained judgement or agreement.

“Yes,” he said fiercely. “Just because you’ve got power doesn’t mean that you have the right to use it, if it’s going to hurt the people around you. It’s just selfish. I mean, I was born from two firemakers, so I could do it, if I wanted to. But I never would. It’s disgusting.”

“You have the gift?” Castiel said, turning to look at him, his expression intensifying so quickly that Dean shifted uncomfortably under its weight. He went from a standstill to a sprint in the time it took Dean to blink. “You can make fire?”

“So?” Dean said defensively. “I told you, I’d never use it! Loads of people can, I’m not… it’s not like it’s strange.”

“Yes. I see,” Castiel responded. His tone was absent, as though he were deep in thought. He had a little bit of scruff coming in already, Dean noticed. It looked soft.

He swung himself to his feet, feeling his joints creak in protest. Note to self: no more sleeping rough on the sand. He was looking forward to getting back to the city, back to his house… back to Bobby’s cooking. He turned and held his hand out to Castiel, who stared at it for a long moment from his place on the ground, as though wondering what to do with it.

“You take it,” Dean said, with more than a tinge of sarcasm. Castiel’s eyes lingered solemnly on Dean’s for a moment before he reached out and gripped Dean’s hand, allowing Dean to help him to his feet. Dean swallowed as Castiel stood tall in front of him, their hands still clasped, eyes still locked. He’d only helped the guy to his feet, why did it feel as though they were having some kind of… moment? He dropped his gaze, and pulled back his hand. Everything about Castiel was bizarre. The sooner Dean could leave him and his weirdness behind, the happier he’d be.

For some reason, saying that in his head didn’t ring as true as it had the night before. Maybe it was because last night, he’d had a life to go back to – a good one, too. And today? Today, he was just a dropout from savaşçı training with no money and no purpose. And it was Castiel’s weirdness that had got him into this mess. Perhaps some part of his brain thought Castiel’s weirdness could get him back out.

That part of his brain was dumb. Castiel was getting dropped off at the hospital as soon as they got back to Şehir, and that was that.

“Dean,” Castiel said, in a tone that made Dean’s chest squeeze. It was the same tone he’d used last night before asking Dean to walk into the Forest of the Dead; it was the ‘I’m about to screw up all your plans’ tone. “I can’t go to Şehir. Now that I failed to… to deliver the letter to Ash, I have to return to the Water Lands.”

“Is that really how spying works?” Dean said, and watched Castiel’s face shift through confusion to surprise. Ha. He hadn’t known that Dean had already guessed he was a spy. “You didn’t manage to deliver your information, but you still just go back anyway, and get more?”

“I…” Castiel looked uncomfortable, as though he were trying to figure out how much he could say. Dean interrupted, sparing him the trouble of sharing international secrets.

“None of my business, I get it. But man, you should come back to Şehir, for a day or two. You must be just as parched as I am, and that wound’s not going to heal itself.”

“I have no choice,” Castiel said, with a touch of sharpness. “Have you forgotten that I am pursued? I cannot simply walk into the city and expect to come back out alive. And there are… affairs to which I must attend, back in the Water Lands.”

“Right, well – OK,” Dean said, holding up his hands to pacify Castiel. “Fine. You’ve got shit to do, I understand. There are nomadic villages all the way through the desert, you’re bound to come across one of them sooner or later, I guess. For your sake, it better be sooner. You can get water from them. And I’ll just…” Dean swallowed. “Go back to Şehir alone.”

He didn’t know why the thought of Castiel wandering off into the desert alone bothered him so much. The rising sun was growing warmer and warmer. Soon it would be sizzling hot out on the sands, dangerously so.

“Make sure you get some new clothes, too,” he said, taking a step closer, reaching out and fussing with Castiel’s thin tunic. It wouldn’t give him ten minutes’ protection from sunburn. “Something dark, lots of folds.”

Castiel allowed him to fret over his clothes, his eyes on Dean’s face. What was wrong with them? Dean acting like a middle-aged wife, and Castiel going along with it. Dean dropped his hand awkwardly, wishing that there was someone else with them, something else to pay attention to. He cleared his throat and looked out over the sands, narrowing his eyes at nothing.

“We should get moving,” Castiel said. We. As though he’d sensed Dean’s reaction to the word, Cas added, “That is, I should get moving, and so should you. If we stay here, the thirst will only get worse.”

“Right… right,” Dean said, nodding a little too hard for a little too long. He’d already decided to go back to Şehir, and Castiel wasn’t coming, so why was the thought of walking away from him here on the sands such an unpleasant surprise? “Right. We should – yeah.”

“Once again, thank you for everything,” Castiel said, reaching a hand to touch his own side – where the strip of Dean’s ripped tunic must be tied around the wound, Dean remembered. He’d done everything he could to help the guy, hadn’t he? If Castiel wanted to go off into the desert, that was not his problem. Castiel wasn’t his responsibility, not in the slightest.

“Don’t thank me,” Dean muttered. “I was useless.” That, at least, felt true. He was going to be pushing away memories from last night for years, forever wincing at his own weakness and inadequacy. He’d have been more use if he’d gone in dressed like a giant leek. At least then he would’ve made a decent distraction.

Castiel frowned at him, in a way that Dean was beginning to recognise. His expressions were subtle, minor variations on a general theme of drawn-down eyebrows and flat, unimpressed lips, but they were readable. It just took a little time to find his wavelength.

“You tried your best to do the right thing, when you could have done nothing,” Castiel said. “That has value.”

“Right,” Dean said bleakly. “Yeah, I – I guess so.”

“Something is troubling you?” Castiel said. He had his body half-turned away from Dean, on the point of leaving. Dean shrugged, taking a step backwards, getting some distance between them. Not five minutes ago he’d been thinking about how good it would be to have Castiel out of his life, and now suddenly he was lingering over the goodbye? He was ridiculous. It was like he was determined to prove himself the most pathetic person in the country in twelve hours or less. Was it really just last night that he’d been sitting in the chapel, thinking about how amazing he was? How he was going to ride around on a horse, and seduce thousands, and save the world? He hadn’t even been able to save himself, last night. And he was about to let the guy who’d come to his rescue just walk away, on his own, into the desert. Nice.

“I – I guess I’m worried about you,” Dean said, rubbing the back of his neck, not meeting Castiel’s eyes. “Or, you know, concerned. For your, uh, your wellbeing. Desert’s a pretty big place.”

“I know,” Castiel said. “I crossed it when I came here from the Water Lands.”

“Good point,” Dean said, nodding. “Yep. Hadn’t thought of that.”

“I will be fine,” said Castiel. He looked confused. Once again, Dean was struck by the idea that he wasn’t used to being shown even the least measure of kindness. He wasn’t expecting Dean to come with him into the desert, that was for sure. It wasn’t as though he’d be letting Castiel down, if he didn’t go. You couldn’t disappoint someone who had no expectations. “There is no need for you to be concerned. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”

“I believe you,” Dean said, remembering how the soldiers had run away from Castiel last night, when he’d planted himself squarely between them and Dean. How had he even managed to scare them that badly? Dean had so many questions, and none of them were going to get answers. “I just…”

The moment hung undecided, seesawing like a set of scales on a market stall with equal weights on either side. The choice couldn’t be made for him, the balance was too close; neither side outweighed the other by enough to settle the argument in his head. Dean himself had to decide where to push – which way he wanted to tip the scales.

“I will be fine,” Castiel repeated. He looked weary, resigned… adrift, as though he too had had his purpose taken away from him. It made Dean feel connected to him, even more so than before. Even more so? When had their ‘connection’ even started to happen? Yarım save him, he was going mad. Imagining he had some kind of bond with a man who’d come into his life, and taken away the one thing he wanted most… and then saved his life… Dean scowled.

Castiel interrupted his train of thought. “Goodbye, Dean.”

“Bye,” Dean said automatically, the word out of his mouth before he’d thought it through. Castiel turned away and started walking down the dune, heading in the opposite direction to the side of the sky that the sun was rising. Of course, the mountains – and beyond them, the Water Lands – lay to the west of the desert. Which meant that Dean’s course lay east, back to Şehir. Back to the parents he’d disappointed, the sister he’d angered, the brother who no longer needed him.

He stood at the top of the dune, wavering. He watched Castiel walk, his shoulders slightly hunched, looking generally irritated even from this angle. Dean almost snorted out loud. What an asshole.

The further away he went, the smaller he looked. It was as though the desert were swallowing him up.

You tried your best to do the right thing, when you could have done nothing. That has value.

Dean made his decision. He closed his eyes, offered up a quick prayer to Yarım, and started jogging down the sand dune.

“OK, here’s the plan,” he said, once he’d caught up with Castiel. “I’m getting you to the edge of the desert, alright? For the good of the country, so that you can keep… you know… doing whatever it is that you do. I’m sending a message to my family as soon as we reach something approaching civilisation. And we’re going to get some water inside us as soon as humanly possible. Sound good?”

Castiel hadn’t stopped moving as Dean talked, forcing Dean to walk crabwise to look at him and keep pace. He glanced over at Dean, and his expression wasn’t entirely forbidding. Dean took that as a good sign.

“Fine,” Castiel said, gruffly. Maybe that was just the thirst. After a short pause, he added, “Thank you.”

“One other thing,” Dean said, not acknowledging Castiel’s gratitude. It wasn’t as though he particularly deserved it, anyway. “Water is first priority, but there’s a close second.”

“And that is?” Castiel asked after a moment, as though he’d tried to resist asking, but yielded to the temptation.

“Getting you a haircut,” Dean said, with a grin. “The fire-singed look is totally passé, so they tell me.”

Castiel didn’t respond, but the corners of his lips did turn up – almost imperceptibly, but Dean was watching for it. It occurred to him that it was the first time he’d seen Castiel smile.

The thought made him bizarrely happy.

Chapter Text

The village came into sight just as Dean was about to completely give up hope.

His back was aching and his head was pounding, his tongue thick and dry, when he caught sight of a dark blur on the horizon.

“What is that, another mirage?” he asked. His voice was no more than a harsh whisper after three hours of walking. He’d pulled up his pelerin as high as it would go, to protect his skin from the sun – and then he’d noticed the redness at the back of Castiel’s neck, and handed it over. They’d taken it in turns to wear it, switching regularly, but they were both burning steadily as the day wore on.

“I – I don’t think so. It could be a village,” Castiel replied, his own voice just a scratch on a chalkboard. They’d seen mirage after mirage, the dunes flattening and the sand turning soft, shimmery and water-like under the sun’s deceptive shine. But this looked a little more real – real enough to give Dean an ounce of hope.

“It better be,” Dean said. “Because I need to pee.”

Castiel smiled again, light as a feather. Dean didn’t miss it, though. He’d managed to eke three smiles out of Castiel so far. The effort was keeping him going.

They kept walking, step after step after weary step. The sun had leached the energy from Dean’s bones, baking him to tiredness within the first half an hour. He’d thought himself so fit, so athletic after his savaşçı training, but his calves were burning with every step he took. The sand was loose and deep, sucking his feet in every time he put them down – he kept imagining what would happen if he stayed still, didn’t bother to pull free, and just allowed the sand to pull him under. And then he stopped imagining it, and told himself not to be so pathetic.

The blur on the horizon slowly resolved itself into dark individual shapes: tents, wagons… people. And where there were people, there had to be…

“Water,” Dean croaked, as they reached the outskirts of the village and caught sight of an old man pouring a bowl of clean, clear liquid into a tub full of plants. “Water…”

They stumbled over, tongues half-gummed to the rooves of their mouths by thirst; the man started at the sight of them, dropping his bowl and spilling the rest of the water. Dean held up his hands, palm-first and reassuring, while Castiel simply stared down at the water sinking quickly into the sand.

“Sorry to surprise you,” Dean rasped. “We were lost out there…”

“Say no more,” said the old man, leaning down behind the plant tub and straightening up with another bowl of water in his hands. “Please, be my –”

Castiel had seized the water bowl and raised it to his lips before the man had finished even finished speaking; he downed half the contents in three great gulps, and then passed it over to Dean without a word. Dean, who had experienced severe dehydration a couple of times in his life, took slower sips. Sure enough, beside him, Castiel was clutching his stomach.

“Deep breaths,” the old man advised. “Try to keep it down.”

Castiel groaned and heaved, but managed to hold his water. Dean handed the bowl back to the old man, wiping the corners of his mouth neatly.

“I – I have no money, efendi, I’m sorry…” Dean said, but the old man waved him away. He was hunch-backed but bright-eyed, with long silver hair and a thin smile.

“No charge for water, we’ve plenty,” he said. His voice was gritty and thin. Old Man Desert, thought Dean. “Just came from the Taze Oasis, to the south, you know it?”

Dean shook his head.

“Never been more than a couple miles from Şehir,” he said. “You know how far it is from here to the mountains?”

The old man sucked in a breath through his teeth, shaking his head.

“That’s a good week and a half’s walking, çocuk. Maybe less, if you’re strong.”

He glanced down at Dean’s physique, and then over at Castiel’s, and then tilted his hand side-to-side as if to say that he wasn’t sure they were up to it. Dean threw a glance up to the clear blue sky. If nothing else, this experience was a thorough and detailed lesson in humility.

“Well, thank you, efendi,” he said, starting to move away. Castiel, who had spent the entirety of the exchange staring between Dean and the old man with an expression of active disinterest, looked slightly happier as they began to move away. “Yarım smile on you for the water.”

“And on you, on your journey,” the old man said, turning back to his plants.

Dean could turn his attention to their surroundings, now that he was no longer quite so fixated on finding water. The array of tents, which had seemed haphazard from afar, proved to have a definite system to it: there were wide streets, with narrow alleys leading away in many directions. The place was big, too large to be called a village. Dean and Castiel walked through a residential area and into the centre, where there were open-air restaurants and small puppet and shadow theatre shows, and row upon row of stalls. With the sun beating down on them, Dean and Castiel made straight for the cover that the market’s awnings provided, letting out little sighs of relief when they were finally offered some respite from Güneş Yarısı’s uncompromising stare.

“I need more water,” Castiel announced, staring around him at the market, and the people flitting from stall to stall.

“Yeah, well, we probably could’ve mooched a little more off that old guy, if you hadn’t been acting like the world’s biggest jerk back there,” Dean said, with a little more bite than he’d intended. He, too, was still thirsty. “Come on, let’s see what we can find here. Anything we get, we halve, agreed?”

“Agreed,” Castiel said, moving away almost immediately.

“Meet back here,” Dean called after his retreating back. Castiel gave no sign that he’d heard. Dean resisted the urge to send a rude gesture after him.

Instead he chose to focus on moving from stall to stall, looking out for any water that seemed to be going spare. He walked under the awnings, the light switching from red to blue to green through the brightly-coloured swathes of material. He saw stalls full of food, clothes, toys, medicines… at one point, he found himself in an entire row dedicated to spices, and walked down it soaking in the scents of cinnamon, cumin, and sumac, staring at the sacks of bright powders. He took a left, then a right, and caught sight of Castiel speaking to a man behind a stall. He had his back to Dean, but after a moment he turned around; not wanting to be caught staring, Dean quickly busied himself with inspecting the contents of the stall nearest to him.

“Looking for something in particular?” said the short, bright-eyed redheaded girl tending her wares: hundreds upon hundreds of beautiful glass bottles.

“Uh, I’m not sure,” Dean said honestly, glancing over his shoulder. Castiel had moved further down the row of stalls, and was now speaking solemnly to a young man behind a vegetable stand. The blue awning above him brought out a strange shade in his skin, a little ghostly, with the shadows catching under his sharp cheekbones and jaw.

“Do you want it up for longer?” the girl asked. Dean snapped his head back around, his mouth falling open. She was grinning at him, and tipping him a knowing wink. “Or I can give you something to make the congress smoother,” she continued. “You’ll be slick as a lime in a bucket of water.”

“Uh,” Dean said intelligently. She was waving a bottle of purple liquid at him, flashing him another cheeky smile. “I… I have no money.”

“Hmmm. On the house, then, for a man as handsome as you,” she said, pressing the bottle into his hand. “Just make sure you tell everyone where you got it! Don’t you tie yourself to one man, you hear? Not even Mr Dreamy over there.”

“I – what – no,” Dean stammered, trying to shove the bottle back into the girl’s hand, and when that failed, stuffing it inside the pocket of his tunic before anyone could see. He could feel his cheeks turning bright pink. “I’m not – that isn’t – I don’t…”

“Oh! Would you prefer a little something for the ladies? I do an excellent line in…”

Dean backed away, leaving the girl talking to herself as she bent down beneath the table to retrieve her feminine products. He walked towards Castiel as fast as he could, praying to Yarım that his blush would be gone by the time he made it.

“Dean,” Castiel said by way of greeting, when he caught up. “You’re very red.”

“Sunburn,” muttered Dean. Castiel seemed to accept this explanation silently, and held up two large jugs brimming with water.

“I found water,” he said simply. Dean stared, ignoring the lightly buffeting of arms and bodies as people swirled around him in a sea of bubbling commerce.

“How did you get that?” he demanded, showing his own empty hands. Castiel raised one shoulder diffidently, handing Dean the taller of the two jugs.

“I told that boy I needed it,” he said. Dean turned to look over his shoulder at the stallholder Castiel was indicating; the kid was glancing fretfully down towards them every few seconds, as though afraid that Castiel might come back.

“I told you to get water, not frighten the life out of the locals,” Dean said, turning back to Castiel with half a smile. “Still, not bad.”

Was it his imagination, or did Castiel stand a little taller, preening just a touch under the praise? Dean buried his smile in the jug of water, allowing himself to drink deep and long. Even though his jug was the larger, he finished before Castiel; he watched Castiel finishing off his own pitcher, a little of the water splashing out over his cheeks in his eagerness to drink it down. The drops ran down to Castiel’s chin, and dripped onto his chest.

“Uh, so,” Dean said, to distract himself. “We’ve got water, but we’re gonna need way more than this if we want to make it all the way to the mountains. We’ll need food, clothes… weapons…”

“You have your dagger,” Castiel pointed out, touching its hilt to remind Dean that it was still in the inside sheath of the pelerin Castiel was wearing. Dean nodded.

“Still,” he said. “We need something for you. And more water, food… we can’t hope to scrounge it all. Don’t suppose you have any money hidden in those ridiculous şalvar?”

Castiel glanced down at his yellow şalvar, looking offended.

“No,” he said snippily. “I don’t.”

“That’s great,” Dean said. “Awesome. I thought this espionage crap was supposed to be glamorous? What do we do now, sing for our supper?”

Castiel opened his mouth to answer – irascibly, if his expression was anything to go by – but then closed it, looking thoughtful. Dean turned to follow his gaze, which had latched onto something: a tall sign leaning up against a huge tent, which was pitched several metres away from the market stalls. Dean read the sign, and gulped.

“You know,” he said with a hollow grin, “I wasn’t serious. I can’t actually sing. Like, at all.”

“Everyone can sing,” Castiel said, walking over to the sign, “but that wasn’t what I had in mind.” He paused next to it, reading the smaller text. Dean was too busy being hung up over the bigger text to bother moving on to the rest.

The INFERNAL CIRCUS Has Come to Town! it read. For One Week Only, Experience the MAGIC! The SHOCKS! The WONDERS! Acts wanted, apply within.

“You can fight, correct?” Castiel said, turning to Dean. He really was sunburned, Dean thought. His skin was red and already starting to peel.

“I’ve been trained,” said Dean, a little weakly. He wasn’t sure what Castiel was driving at, for one thing; and for another, he wasn’t even sure he deserved to say that he could fight anymore. After all, the last time he’d had the opportunity, he’d spent most of his time on the ground getting misty-eyed over a dead guy he didn’t even know.

Putting it so harshly, even within the confines of his own mind, made Dean wince. Castiel missed it, as he was looking back at the sign.

“I can fight, too,” he was saying. “This is how we’re going to earn the money we need. Circuses pay large amounts for talented acts. We’re going to be one of them. Tonight.” Dean had never seen him so animated; despite the heat and their hunger, he was finally showing a measure of enthusiasm. It was almost sweet, Dean caught himself thinking: the way his eyes lit up and locked with Dean’s as he leaned forwards slightly, trying to be convincing.

“Oh, sure,” Dean said, trying to tamp down his smile and look cynical. “Yeah, definitely. I’ll wave my dagger around, and you throw a punch or two. Super. We’ll be a real hit with the crowd, I can feel it.”

“I have done choreographed fighting before,” Castiel said, swaying away from Dean as he looked back towards the sign. “I can make this work. But I need your help, to get us in.” He met Dean’s unimpressed gaze. “Unless you have a better way to get the money we need?”

Dean gave himself a full ten seconds of hard thought, staring around the bright bustling marketplace, looking for something – anything – that would mean he didn’t have to get up on a stage tonight and look completely ridiculous in front of thousands of people.

Well, hundreds. Probably. The thoughts still turned his insides to water.

“Dean,” Castiel said, reaching out and putting his hand on Dean’s shoulder. “Trust me.”

And oh, Yarım, suddenly there it was again: that sensation of something happening – some kind of moment, a palpable strengthening of the connection between them. The stare between them lingered, until Dean blinked and looked away. He scuffed the ground with his bare feet, wincing at the sensation – the heat of the desert sand had managed to burn even his hardened soles.

“Well – okay,” he said, a little gruffly. “If you seriously think we can do this, then –” he shrugged, shifting Castiel’s hand slightly further down his shoulder; he hissed and moved away, struck by a sudden pain. Looking down at his arm, he could see why: livid on his skin was a bright red handprint, tender and raw. How had he managed not to notice that all day? He reached up his hand and poked lightly at the brand’s index finger, his face creasing.

“Man, what did you do to me?” he demanded, looking up at Castiel, who was watching him with a slight wariness in his gaze.

“I – I did not do that,” he said, that touch of unease coating the edge of his voice, too. Dean frowned.

“Sure you did, I remember,” he said. “Last night. You put your hand on my shoulder, and it burned.” He couldn’t keep the suspicion out of his voice. How could Castiel’s hands have become so hot, if it wasn’t something to do with fire making? Castiel, though still looking disquieted, answered with composure.

“That’s impossible,” he said simply. “My hands couldn’t burn you. I must have gripped a place where a firemaker already touched you, that’s all.”

“Well…” Dean said dubiously, remembering the hand that had grabbed his shoulder as he’d been running towards the twin lamps at the centre of the Forest. “OK, but I was still wearing my…”

“Come on,” Castiel said easily, interrupting. “We don’t have time to waste.” He was doing a much better job of appearing unruffled, now, his expression smooth – but it had taken a little while for his mantle of calm to fall into place. Dean couldn’t help wondering what was underneath it, what he was hiding. He reminded himself that the man was a spy, an agent whose moral centre was probably several miles further into the grey area than his own. And Dean was helping him for the good of Ateş Aşiret, and only because of that. He had to be more careful – and that meant less time spent being impressed, fewer long stares, fewer… moments.

“Fine,” he said, and he could hear a new coldness in his tone – a distance regained. Castiel glanced at him for a second longer than necessary, but made no comment. He’d noticed, but he wasn’t going to say anything about it. That was probably for the best.

“We need to speak to the Circus Manager and convince them to let us be a part of the show,” Castiel said. Dean swallowed.

“Should we not, uh, have some kind of… act, you know, ready? Before we try to get hired?”

Castiel shook his head.

“We can work on the performance aspect this afternoon,” he said. “But we’ll need a space to do that and inside the circus would be best. It’s hot out here.”

Dean rubbed the back of his neck, feeling the heat of his skin. He was sure that he was already badly burned, despite how acclimatised he was to the sun after growing up in Şehir. Castiel was right.

Besides, maybe the circus manager would give them some food. Dean’s stomach was starting to control his brain; he nodded.

“Let’s go get hired,” he said with a sharp little grin, pushing past Castiel and into the circus tent.

Inside, there was a hubbub of activity. When Dean’s eyes had adjusted to the darkness, he could see that people were flitting to and fro, calling loud instructions to each other as they worked to construct a huge stage, and tiers of seating all around it. The big top was huge, canvas stretching high above their heads. The air was slightly steamy and close, and smelled of sawdust and sweat. Dean looked around, an expression of faint disgust on his face; the place was filthy, and most of the people were, too, by the looks of them. Then again, after a night in the desert and a day’s walking, he wasn’t one to talk. Castiel, meanwhile, was surveying his surroundings without apparent judgement.

“There’s the manager,” Dean said, pointing down towards a short man wearing a dark pair of şalvar and a loose tunic. He wasn’t shouting especially loudly, but there was something in the way he sent the people around him scurrying that made Dean sure he was higher up the food chain than most of them. Standing close to him was a tall woman, strikingly beautiful, with long red hair – she must be from the South – and slash-of-crimson lips. For a moment, Dean was back in the Forest of the Dead, seeing a lividly white face, blood red lips…

Dean blinked. This woman had an aura of superiority about her, just like the short man; she was obviously important. Dean glanced at Castiel, who nodded; together, they made their way towards the pair of them. Dean did his best to look confident. They stood no hope at all of getting away with this, unless they both looked like they knew what they were doing.

“Gentlemen,” said the short man, when he caught sight of them. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.” His accent was strange; perhaps he, too, was from the south. Dean opened his mouth to speak, not quite sure of what he was going to say – but Castiel beat him to it.

“I’m Castiel, and this is Dean,” he said. “Are you the manager?”

“Crowley, at your service,” the man said, with a little ironic dip of his head that told Dean very clearly that the service he’d most like to render them would be sending them on their way.

“We heard you were looking for acts, for the show,” Castiel said, his voice flat and steady. “You want us.”

“Do I, now?” Crowley said, his narrowed eyes sparkling. His hair was dark, and so was his short, stubbly beard. “What makes you think that?”

“We’re the best,” Castiel said simply. Dean was taken aback by how assured he sounded; even he almost believed it. “How much will you pay us per show?”

“I pay three hundred nakit,” Crowley said. “No negotiation.”

Castiel looked at Dean and raised his eyebrows disapprovingly. Dean played along, taking a step back and shaking his head, moving to go.

“We never work for so little,” Castiel said, following his lead. “Thank you for your time.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Crowley said, putting one hand on Dean’s arm and gripping it surprisingly tightly. “Come on, you didn’t even tell me what your act is, yet. How am I supposed to know what you’re worth, until I see the goods, kids?”

Castiel took a moment to turn back around, as though he had all the time in the world.

“We do performance fighting,” he said. When Crowley’s eyes narrowed sceptically, he added, “You probably haven’t heard of it.”

“Can’t have been to Şehir for a while,” Dean interjected, giving Castiel a knowing smirk. “Bit behind the times.”

“Of course I’ve heard of it,” said Crowley loudly, with a touch of bluster. “Where do you think I live, last century? I’ve been looking for a couple of performance fighters for months.”

“Then you’re in luck,” said Castiel smoothly. “We’ll accept five hundred nakit each, for every performance.”

“Plus food and a place to sleep,” Dean added, giving the tent a cursory glance with an exaggerated look of distaste. “So long as you have somewhere cleaner than this.”

“The talent sleeps in the wagons,” Crowley said, his eyes glittering. A thousand nakit per night for a new act wasn’t extortionate; Castiel had chosen his figure well. The manager thought he was getting one over on them, clearly. “You’re good, are you?”

“The best,” Castiel said, with a touch of impatience that was nicely judged, as though he’d given the answer a hundred times. “We’ll need a hundred nakit up front. I’ll leave this dagger as security.”

Dean was careful not to react and blow the whole thing, but it sent a twinge of uneasiness through his chest to see Castiel handing the savaşçı’s dagger into Crowley’s eager hands. It was worth at least two hundred nakit, if not more; what if Crowley simply decided to sell it?

“That was my father’s,” he improvised, speaking at the lowest end of his vocal range, as deep as he could go, hoping he sounded threatening. “If you sell it, I won’t be happy. Our fighting isn’t just good for performances.”

Crowley’s eyes were beetle-black in the big top’s lighting, with more than a hint of mischief.

“I have one or seven bodybuilders in my pay, who wouldn’t be averse to a challenge,” he said, with just a hint of a smirk at the corners of his lips. “But I’m a man of my word. I won’t sell your dagger for a quick nakit. I prefer to make long term investments.”

His grin towards Dean was decidedly unsettling, but Dean decided to let it go. The guy was creepy, so what. They were only planning on hanging around as long as it took to get paid enough to buy their supplies, and they’d be out of the circus and out of the town.

Crowley reached into his dark tunic, and pulled out a small sack of coins. He counted out a hundred nakit with meticulous care, and then threw an extra one onto the pile in his hand with a little wink.

“Have a çay on me, kids,” he said, handing the money to Castiel, just as the red-haired woman behind him approached them. She was sharp-eyed, and she smiled with a cruel edge – as though she could do any one of a thousand terrible things to you, and was taking her time deciding which one to choose, Dean thought. Overdramatic, but there really was something about her that made him shudder. He recognised someone who definitely wouldn’t be taken in by their bravado and lies; Castiel seemed to be thinking along the same lines, because he hefted the pile of coins in his hand, offered Crowley a muttered thanks, and began walking quickly away.

“Not too fast,” Castiel said, as Dean hurried to catch up with him. They walked together out of the circus tent, not speaking. Dean wondered what they must look like to the circus workers who caught sight of them; two sunburned men in sandy, ripped clothing, swaggering through the tent as though they owned the place. Apparently they didn’t look too bad, though, because they’d got the job – and they attracted more than a few appreciative glances as they made their exit.

Dean tried to feel excited about that, but any enthusiasm for romance seemed to have evaporated after last night’s fiasco. He’d always thought that he was a smooth lover – but then, he’d always thought he was a brave, talented warrior, and that hadn’t worked out too well. Dean ignored all the people staring at him, ducking his head and hunching his shoulders.

“Where the hell did you learn to manipulate people like that?” he muttered out the side of his mouth. He glanced sideways in time to catch Castiel’s pleased smirk.

“You weren’t so bad, either,” Castiel said, and Dean couldn’t deny the little pleased thud his heart gave at hearing those words. “We made a good team.”

Dean grunted, trying to sound non-committal. No more moments, he reminded himself sternly. Castiel and the temptation of his friendship were not an option.

“Food first,” he said, when they emerged into the sunlight. Castiel nodded his agreement, and they took a few minutes to wander the market, finally choosing to eat kofte from a stall tended by a big, smiling woman who beamed brilliantly at them and gave them some free water when Dean complimented her use of paprika. When they were done eating – unsurprisingly quickly, given how long it had been since they’d last had food – Castiel turned his attention to the clothing stalls.

“The most important part of the act will have to be the look of it,” he said, running his fingers over a measure of smooth red satin. “Since we haven’t got long to rehearse a routine, we’ll have to rely on our aesthetic more than our technique.”

“But the things we buy have to be functional,” Dean pointed out. “They’ve got to last in the desert, too. We don’t have the money to buy separate gear for the show and for the journey. You are not getting me on the stage in that,” he said with a grin, as Castiel picked up a pink, shimmering pair of very small shorts.

“I think they would look good on you,” Castiel said seriously, which shut Dean up quickly. Castiel moved on to look further down the stall, at the thicker garments: hooded jackets, long tunics, şalvar in every colour imaginable.

“What about this?” he said, pulling out a pelerin that was similar to Dean’s. “Dean?”

“Hmm?” Dean stopped rubbing the material of the pink shorts between his thumb and forefinger, and looked over at what Castiel was holding. “Oh, yeah, nice. You get that, and then I can have my one back.” Not that Dean was complaining about Castiel wearing his pelerin, especially. The dark colour looked good on him, anyway. How did he manage to look anything but a mess, with singed hair and a sunburned face?

Castiel looked at the garment in his hands critically, eyes narrowed. The stallholder, a tall, bearded man a little older than Dean, was watching them both with a kind of distant amusement.

“We need something with more… panache,” Castiel said, putting the dark pelerin down. “Yours is black, I need something… brighter.”

“Can’t you just get the sand-coloured one?” Dean asked, pointing it out. “Good camouflage.”

“Blending in is the opposite of what we want to do tonight,” Castiel said distractedly, moving around the stall. “I want something… like this.”

Dean almost choked when he saw the pelerin that Castiel was holding. Bright white, with a golden lining and embroidered silver sleeves, it looked like the pelerin of one of Yarım’s angels, not hardy desert gear. But he could see the resolve settling in Castiel’s eyes, and groaned. It was happening. Castiel was going to get up on that stage tonight looking like some kind of shiny spangled cherub, and Dean was going to have to stand next to him. And fight him, or something.

Castiel paid for his new pelerin and for a couple of pairs of şalvar, one black and one white. Dean had looked hopefully towards the heavy-duty boots at the end of the stall, but Castiel had ushered him away with a firm hand on his shoulder.

“Later,” he said. “We have to practise.”

They headed back towards the circus tent, the sun still beating down on the backs of their necks. They were lucky that the stage was set fairly far back from the seating area, Dean thought, wincing as he touched the raw skin of his face. Hopefully the audience – his stomach rolled over at the word – wouldn’t be able to see their sunburns.

Castiel pulled aside a circus worker inside the tent, informing her with an authoritative sharpness that he and Dean would require a space in which to practise. She nodded deferentially, and started to lead them to one side of the giant tent. Castiel might be an asshole, Dean reflected, but it did make people pay attention to him. Maybe Dean could learn something from that. He’d always tended to rely on luck rather than decision-making to see him through, and then felt hard-done-by when things hadn’t turned out his way. Perhaps he just needed to be smarter about how he asked for things.

The circus worker took them to a smaller tent that adjoined the big top, heavy folds of brocade forming a partition between the two. As soon as she’d left, Castiel dropped their latest purchases onto the floor, and wandered towards the end of the tent, stripping off Dean’s pelerin as he went. The ground was just sand, but to one side there was a low, wide sofa, with a soft-looking throw lying across it. Dean almost moaned at the sight of it. His feet were aching, his back was sore, his eyes were itching… his entire body was calling out to lie down on that sofa and sink into a deep, deep sleep.

“No,” Castiel said, following the direction of Dean’s eyes. Dean looked up at him in surprise, caught in the act. “We don’t have time, Dean.”

“Just half an hour –”

“No,” Castiel repeated, more firmly. Dean scowled at him.

“Who made you the leader, anyway?” he grunted, hearing the petulance in his own voice and hating it, suddenly hating Castiel for bringing it out in him. He was supposed to be the leader, damn it: the warrior, the brave one, the strong one. And Castiel was making him feel like a wet lettuce leaf. He’d come along on this journey because he’d thought that Castiel wouldn’t make it on his own, but in reality, it wasn’t as though his help was actually even needed. Castiel probably considered him more of a hindrance than anything. No wonder he was trying to assert his superiority: he probably wouldn’t trust Dean as far as he could throw him.

“Nobody,” Castiel was saying, sounding surprised. “I wasn’t aware of any hierarchy between us. I think we don’t have time to sleep, seeing as we only have a couple of hours in which to put together a circus act. That’s all.”

“Oh,” Dean said, trying to find a reason to keep being angry and failing. “Fine.”

He was pathetic, he really was. Leaders and followers, trying to come out on top when there wasn’t even a competition. How old was he, again?

Castiel, apparently unaware of Dean’s silent fuming, was taking up a stance at the far side of the tent. He bent his legs, pulled up his fisted hands, kept his shoulders loose, and turned to the side.

“This is going to be easier than you’re thinking,” he said. Maybe he had picked up on Dean’s wobbling confidence, then, even if he hadn’t completely understood the reasons for it. “All we have to do is memorise a set of fighting moves – perhaps twelve different attacks and blocks. Then, we perform various combinations of them for our act. It will be easy.”

Dean grunted, taking up the starting pose that he’d been taught – arms close to the body, shoulders hunched, feet planted wide, facing forwards. Castiel looked at him with a critical glint in his eyes, but made no comment.

“The first move should be something simple,” he said instead. “Hand attack followed by spinning kick? You could block that with your elbow, and then duck the kick. If you’re fast enough,” he added, with a sliver of slyness in his tone, which Dean picked up on immediately.

“Oh, I’m fast enough,” he said, narrowing his eyes with determination. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

Castiel bounced on his feet for a few seconds, readying himself. He looked confident, Dean thought, his chin up and an expression in his eyes that told Dean he might just be in trouble. And then, with a suddenness that took Dean’s breath away -  he moved. He was fluid and fast as water poured from a pitcher, and he struck Dean hard across the face with the heel of his hand.

Dean yelped, and clutched his face. Castiel watched him dispassionately, his head tilted to one side.

“You know,” he said, “it would help you to block my attack if you actually moved.”

Dean shot him a furious glance. He’d never been hit like that, never. Normally, no one could get close to him in training. But Castiel moved with a speed and grace that Dean had never seen before. He frowned, and dropped his hand away from his face.

“Come at me again,” he said gruffly. “I’m ready this time.” He bounced on his heels a few times, like Castiel had done, to get himself into the zone.

Castiel bent his head in composed acquiescence. Screw that son of a bitch and his self-assurance. He’d taken Dean by surprise the first time, but he wasn’t going to get that chance again.

When Castiel came at him this time, pooling over the space between them like a flood, Dean was ready. He blocked Castiel’s quick jab and then ducked as the other man’s leg came around for the spinning kick, flying neatly over his head. Before Castiel could land his foot, Dean reached up, grabbed it, and pulled. Castiel went over like a ton of bricks, his arms windmilling for a second before he handed hard on the floor, with a little ‘ooft’ of surprise. Dean stood up, dusted off his hands, and grinned down at him.

“Gotta keep your wits about you, Cas,” he said, standing above him and offering him a hand up. “Especially with me around.”

Castiel glared up at him from the floor, not taking his hand.

“My name is Castiel,” he said irritably. “And that was not in the moves we prescribed.”

“I thought I might change it up a little,” Dean said. “Thought you’d be fast enough to see it coming.”

Castiel scowled and grabbed Dean’s hand, allowing himself to be helped up.

“I didn’t see it coming because it was cheating,” he said. Dean let go of his hand, and clapped him on the shoulder.

“Never had a sibling, I’m guessing?” he said, as he took up his fighting stance once more. “If you don’t expect the dirty play, you’ll never be able to defend against it.”

“Yes, well,” Castiel replied, obviously stung, “you’ll never be able to defend against anything with that stance. Turn your body sideways, offer a smaller target. Your attacks will have more power that way, too.”

“This is the way I was taught how to do it… at savaşçı training,” Dean said, looking at Castiel as though he were mad. “As in, the most elite warriors in the entire country fight with this exact stance.”

“They’re all doing it incorrectly,” Castiel said bluntly. He moved over to where Dean was standing, and pushed his shoulder back, so that he was side-on. “Better.”

“The savaşçılar have been fighting the same way for over two hundred years –” Dean began indignantly, resenting Cas’ closeness and resisting the urge to give him a childish push.

“Then they’ve learned nothing in all that time,” Castiel interrupted. “Loosen your shoulders, you’ll be faster to react.” Dean opened his mouth to retort, but found that he had no good answer. Even still, he refused to do as he was told. He’d been trained, damn it. He didn’t need Castiel’s help to be a good fighter. Castiel huffed out an angry breath through his nose, and took hold of Dean’s arms, pulling them upwards. His grip was strong, his hands warm. Dean clenched his teeth, and allowed himself to be manhandled into position.

“If nothing else,” Castiel said, “it will look better on stage if our fighting styles parallel each other. And the better we look, the more likely Crowley will actually pay us the full amount that we agreed on.”

Dean shrugged churlishly, looking at the ground, but clenched his fists in readiness.

“Next move,” he said gruffly. Castiel eyed him for a moment, but backed away to his side of the tent and took up his matching stance.

The afternoon melted like a candle, more quickly than Dean would have liked. Despite the initial friction, he had to admit it – there was something about mock-fighting with Castiel that he liked. There was a rhythm that they found, after the first few bouts: Castiel struck, Dean blocked. Dean crouched and kicked, Castiel leapt and rolled. Castiel jabbed, Dean dodged. There was a steady beat to their movements, an underlying cadence and flow that made that each pattern of steps into a sinuous dance; every parry was a flourish, each dodge an elegant displacement. Dean found his feet starting to move for him, the actions falling into muscle memory, while his heart beat in time to the shared tempo. He was breathing hard as they worked, eyes on Castiel; their bodies worked to stay attuned, to hold their synchronicity.

The tent was paltry shelter from the heat of the day, and the sweat ran off them as they danced, dripping down their necks and staining the backs of their ragged tunics. Dean eventually yielded to the hot press of the thick air on his skin, and raised his hand to call a brief halt while he tugged his tunic off over his head. His şalvar would have to stay on, but they were loose and thin, designed so that they wouldn’t hold the heat.

Dean had turned away to take off the tunic; when he turned back, he caught Castiel’s eyes lingering on his bare shoulders. Was he imagining the slight spark of appreciation in the other man’s expression? He cleared his throat, and swung his arms back and forwards a couple of times to relieve some non-existent stiffness. He had a strange sensation in his chest as he readied for the next bout; what was that? Confusion, uncertainty?

Excitement?

Dean met Castiel’s eyes. Their intensity made him blink, his lips parting slightly.

“Are you ready?” Castiel said. They were five feet apart, and yet the words travelled the space between them soft and warm, a lover’s murmur. Dean opened his mouth to answer…

“Hello, darlings,” came a voice from the door. “Having fun?”

Dean turned away from Castiel quickly, guiltily; Crowley, who was poking his head through the curtains, caught the swiftness of his action and grinned wickedly.

“Not too much fun, I hope,” he added. “Excellent physique on the tall one, there. What is it, hard dieting?”

“Training,” Dean muttered uncomfortably. Having his body admired had gone from exciting to uncomfortable in under ten seconds. He didn’t look at Castiel.

“Weak on the smart answers, good-looking,” Crowley observed dryly, moving further into the room and producing a dagger from behind his back. The savaşçı’s dagger. “Thought you boys might want this back, for your practising. I presume you’ll be using it during the show tonight.”

“That’s correct,” Castiel interjected, before Dean could speak. Dean took a few steps back and turned half away, allowing Castiel to take control of the conversation.

Man, for a second there he’d actually been doing an adequate job at something. Awesome, Dean. You can fake-punch someone in the face, but you can’t manage one witty comeback. Super.

Crowley was handing Castiel the knife, eyes roaming appreciatively over his strong arms and sweat-soaked tunic.

“I see Brains over there isn’t the only stud in the stables,” he said, his dark eyes glittering. “What are you into, Blue Eyes?”

Castiel glowered at him.

“The destruction of my enemies,” he growled, without missing a beat. Dean raised a hand to cover his smirk as Crowley blinked and took a step back, maintaining his own thin sneer.

“I know when I’m not wanted,” he said. “Show starts at seven, be behind the stage before quarter to. And you’re not wearing those, are you?” He gestured meaningfully at Cas’ hideous şalvar.

“Our outfits have been taken care of,” Castiel snapped, turning his back on Crowley. The circus master shrugged and winked at Dean, before taking his leave.

“Nice guy,” Dean remarked, the lightness in his tone a little hollow. “I mean, I’m not gonna invite him to my next dinner party, but, you know. He makes a great evil, almost-bald circus master.”

Castiel didn’t seem to be listening; instead, he was hefting the weight of the savaşçı’s dagger in one hand, looking thoughtful.

“We can use this,” he said. Dean gawped at him for a second.

“I know the guy’s a dick, but I don’t think we should stab him,” he said uncertainly.

Castiel blinked.

“I meant that we could use it in the performance,” he said. “Although… your plan does present a certain temptation.”

Dean smiled, starting to shiver a little as the sweat on his back began to dry. Castiel noticed, and lifted his arms, pulled himself into his stance. There was weariness written between the hard lines of his muscular body, but his jaw was set.

“Back to work,” he said, and Dean followed his example.

“Back to work,” he repeated, with a grin.

Chapter Text

Behind the stage, there were the mingled scents of sweat and piss and body paint. Dean wrinkled his nose, and tried not to touch anyone or anything. Even Castiel, master of composure, had an expression of faint disgust on his face.

On the other side of a wide, red curtain, inside the main circus tent, they could hear the clamour of hundreds of voices. They sounded exuberant and expectant. Dean could feel his heart thudding in his chest, fast and hard and painful: he’d never done anything in front of such a big group of people before, let alone perform a semi-improvised fighting routine that he’d only started learning that same afternoon. Having had a maximum of maybe four hours’ sleep the night before. And only ten lamb kofte all day to stave off his hunger.

“You should have eaten,” Castiel said in his ear, obviously working on a similar line of thought, pressed close by the density of performers all around them. Dean lifted one shoulder, too nervous to reply. He felt as though he’d be sick if he opened his mouth. He could feel Castiel’s eyes on him, silent and slightly awkward. He could probably guess how Dean was feeling, but he had no idea what to do to help. Perversely, that made Dean feel slightly better. At least the guy wasn’t totally perfect.

“You look good,” Castiel said eventually, in a tone that suggested he was trying to be encouraging. Dean smiled weakly, more in response to the effort than because Castiel’s words actually helped in the slightest.

“You do too,” he managed. They’d got dressed separately, Dean deciding to leave their tent altogether when Castiel stripped off his tunic and began pulling down his şalvar with no shame at all, no hesitancy. It hadn’t been a bold, teasing move – it had been as though Castiel really hadn’t cared at all whether Dean saw him in all his clothes or none of them. Dean wasn’t entirely sure what to think about that.

And when Castiel had emerged from the tent in his white şalvar and spotless new matching pelerin… he’d been bright, dazzling in the dark and musty tent with sawdust under his feet. There was grace in his shoulders, in his eyes, in the way his longer hair fell loosely over the side that was singed. He could have told Dean that he’d been sent from Yarım above, and Dean would probably have got down on his knees.

He’d walked over to Dean, his feet bare like the saints’ had always been, blessing the ground with the kiss of his skin. And he’d opened his mouth to speak, his eyes alight with the knowledge of ages…

“I’m hungry,” he’d said. And Dean had snapped his mouth shut, and swallowed, and nodded. They’d gone and bought keşkek, and Dean had eaten none of it, his heart simultaneously in his throat and the pit of his stomach.

He wasn’t regretting that decision now. His insides were doing flips, and he was pretty sure that anything he’d eaten wouldn’t have stayed down for long. He sighed, and pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead. Everything was so big, so confusing, so tiring. His muscles were aching. All he wanted to do was be back home. He’d managed to write a letter before the show had started, to send back to his family – or at least he hoped he had. He’d scratched out a few words on some cheap paper he’d found at the market while Castiel was eating his keşkek, and slotted it carefully into the dusty wooden box at the top of the market, anyway. He hoped it would find its way to Bobby and Ellen’s house eventually. He’d try again every time they found themselves in a place with a post service.

Writing home, and thinking of his brother and Jo and Bobby and Ellen, had cemented the sick feeling in his stomach that had been growing every time he thought of his responsibilities at home, of the people who counted on him. Going with Castiel had been a snap decision, one that had seemed right at the time – but he’d turned his back on everyone he knew, to help someone he’d met barely a few hours before.

Someone who’d saved his life in that time.

Someone who probably didn’t actually need his help anyway.

Someone who might, in fact, be a really, really terrible person.

Someone who’d saved his life, for Yarım’s sake, how bad could he be?

And so Dean went in circles, round and round. He felt as though his head was going to explode. Every now and then he emerged onto an island of pensive calm; he reminded himself that this wasn’t forever, that he’d probably be home inside two weeks, and it would all be over. And then he thought about what his family would say when he returned, and he cringed. He couldn’t pretend like this was some kind of meaningless jaunt. No matter how things stood with Castiel – whether he was good or evil or somewhere in between – Dean had made a life-changing decision that he would never be able take back. He thought that if he had the chance to explain himself properly, Sam might just understand – and the other three, too. But there was no guarantee that he was going to get that chance. If Sam had done this to him, Dean would be too angry at him to even look him in the eye for months afterwards.

“Dean,” Castiel said. “I need you to focus.”

Dean looked at him, blinking back the wetness in his eyes and pressing his lips together, hard. Castiel looked disconcerted.

“Are you –”

“I’m fine,” Dean interrupted brusquely, slightly too aggressively. He looked down at his feet. “Just… nothing, it’s fine.”

“If you’re nervous…”

“Doesn’t matter if I am or not,” Dean said. “Just gotta get on with it, right? And then we can hightail it out of here and make for the open road. Desert. Whatever.” He grinned crookedly. Castiel didn’t give him so much as a flicker of a smile in response, but his eyes were a little softer, a little kinder than usual when he put his hand on Dean’s shoulder.

“If you do not want to do this,” he said, “I understand. I believe you’ve been having second thoughts about coming with me, this afternoon. I wish to stress that I do not want to force you. I am capable of travelling alone.”

Dean blinked at him, his mouth half-open with no words to say. Castiel had a better read on him than he’d initially thought, it appeared. He was watching Dean with those blue, blue eyes, an expression on his face like – Dean struggled for the words – like he already knew what was going to happen. Like he knew Dean was going to leave him. And like that knowledge hurt, just a little bit.

Dean blinked, looking at Castiel with new eyes. Suddenly he seemed less – perfect, less unreachable.

“I’m staying,” he said firmly. And he couldn’t help himself thinking that it was worth it, the whole damn thing was worth it, just to see the way Castiel’s mouth dropped open in surprise, and the way his eyes changed – the way warmth kindled deep within them, genuine and profound for the first time since they’d met. It was as though he’d been hoarding kindling in their depths, and only now was Dean beginning to find the way to strike the flints over them.

“You don’t have to,” Castiel said again, as though he couldn’t quite believe Dean’s answer.

“I know,” Dean said. His awareness of how close they were was steadily increasing; he resisted the inexplicable urge to flick his eyes down to Castiel’s lips, conscious of how that would look. “No one’s making me. I want to.”

Castiel stared at him, as though he’d never heard anything so strange in his life. Had no one ever shown this guy the least measure of kindness, or loyalty? Dean remembered the surprise on his face when Dean had handed him the torn-off strip of his tunic – and then, shit, he remembered the reason he’d done that in the first place.

“Cas,” he said, “how’s that wound you had? We didn’t get you any new dressing for it or anything, I – I totally forgot.”

“Castiel,” said Castiel absently, without any real fire. “And it’s fine. Clean, not painful.”

“But –” Dean began, remembered the length of the cut on Castiel’s torso – how it had brought him to the edge of unconsciousness.

“I’m a fast healer,” said Castiel determinedly, an edge in his voice that Dean didn’t understand. He took the hint and dropped the subject, though with a frown and a slight step backward that almost had him treading on the toes of the weightlifter who was standing directly behind him. Yarım damn him, every time Castiel seemed within Dean’s reach, he made sure to push himself away.

“Gooooooooood evening, everybody!” Dean heard Crowley say on the other side of the curtain, distracting him. The noise of the crowd was stilled for a moment, and then crashed into applause. “My, my, my, what an audience. I see some beauties – good evening, Ma’moiselle – and some beasts, too. If you’re not sure which one you are, come and see me after the show, and we’ll find out.” Dean would have rolled his eyes, if his subsiding nerves hadn’t made a sudden resurgence. Hearing the audience reacting to Crowley’s banter had reminded him that it was entirely possible that they could be booed off the stage if they weren’t good enough. He tried to swallow, but his throat was too thick with nerves. “What a show I have for you tonight! Gilda, making the trapeze a breeze! Tracy, showing us all how to ride several stallions at once – easy, boys! And let’s not forget our clowns – Ed, Harry and the gang!” The crowd went wild: obviously these acts were popular, maybe regulars on the circus tour. “But tonight’s first act is completely new, everybody. Brand, spanking new. Although spanking’s not on the schedule until later.” Dean could just imagine the saucy wink that Crowley was giving his spectators. It couldn’t be him and Castiel first, could it? Surely Crowley wouldn’t throw them out there when the audience was totally cold, on their first night? “With their talents yet unproven, I leave it to you to decide their fate. Make some noise for the desert fighters, Dean and Castiel!”

Castiel offered Dean a small, slightly sick-looking smile – apparently he wasn’t completely immune to nervousness, either – and then pushed the red curtain aside, and stepped out onto the stage.

Nothing could have prepared Dean for what he saw. Every last seat in the tent was taken, and there was a laughing, jostling rabble sitting on the floor, too; he wouldn’t have been surprised to have seen people swinging from the top of the tent, it was so full. It was a sea of faces, rising in a great tiered wave of expectant eyes. There were huge lights on the edge of the stage, being swirled around the audience by kids no more than six or seven years old. As Dean watched them, they swung the gas lamps round to illuminate his horrified face, blinding him almost completely with their glare. He blinked furiously, turning his face to the side, towards Castiel.

“Can’t see a damn thing,” he mumbled into Castiel's ear, and then, before he could stop it spilling out, “’m fucking terrified, man.”

As his eyes adjusted, Castiel put that hand on his shoulder again. This time, Dean was ready for the way that his heart jumped a little in his chest. He almost laughed. How in the name of Yarım did his body have time to react to a hand on his arm when he was standing in front of hundreds upon hundreds of people, pretty much on the point of fainting from sheer nervousness?

Castiel leaned in, and Dean could see that his eyes were bright and clear.

“Let’s show them what we can do,” he said, and in his voice was a hint of a challenge, a question – asking Dean to meet him halfway, to do what was needed to make this work.

Dean gulped, and tried to gather what courage he had. Not a lot, as he’d found out recently, but he was going to use it if he could.

“Come on, then,” he said, and was glad that the audience was too far away to hear the way his voice shook. Castiel nodded, and stepped back a few paces – and took up his stance.

Dean followed his lead, unable to stop himself glancing out at the audience. Did they look as good as Castiel had promised they would – him in white and Dean in black, the forces of good and evil about to clash in an epic battle? Or did they look how Dean felt, like a couple of stupid boys wearing fancy dress?

“Dean,” Castiel called across the space between them. His voice was as soft, as intimate as ever, carving out a place for them in this tent full of eyes and expectancy. The audience’s murmuring grew louder and more impatient, drowning out the rustle of food packets and creaking of chairs – but it all seemed distant when Dean looked into Castiel’s eyes. “Ready?”

Dean adjusted his pose, digging his feet into the layer of sawdust that coated the wooden stage, making sure his stance was flexible, not too taut. He remembered the feeling of Castiel’s hands pushing his shoulders, and shut his eyes for a brief second.

“Ready,” he called.

“Two,” Castiel said, barely above a whisper, but Dean caught it. Two: high kick, double punch, twist and upward jab. Go.

He moved, letting his feet do the thinking for him, following the route that they’d plotted over the afternoon. His kick was a little lazy, but Castiel covered for him with a dramatic overreaction that made it look more impressive; his follow up double-punch was better, and Castiel had to work to parry the first and dodge the second.

“Five,” Castiel muttered as Dean twisted past him. Five: crouch and trip, kick to the stomach, left punch. The segue from jab to crouch was neat and smooth. They were already finding their rhythm, tapping into the naturalness and dance that they’d achieved in practice: after five, eight. After eight, eleven, three, six. Eight again, but reversed. The audience were getting absorbed, Dean could sense it: they were starting to gasp when Castiel came close to pinning him, or when he almost tripped Castiel over with a viciously fast swipe at his legs. And yet it wasn’t quite enough. They needed to be on their feet, clutching their faces, yelling. This performance wasn’t going to be enough, they had to change it up.

Dean held up a hand to Castiel, indicating that he needed a break. Castiel complied instantly, moving to circle Dean slowly, as though searching for a weakness. Dean, meanwhile, surveyed the stage. It was mostly empty, but in the corner there was a ladder, presumably for the clowns – or perhaps just for the construction crew. Either way, it was just what Dean needed.

“Go with me on this,” Dean said, moving his lips as little as possible. “Bring the dagger into it.”

Castiel blinked once, to show he’d understood.

Dean ran across the stage, eliciting a few surprised intakes of breath from the audience. He picked up the ladder in both hands. It was a simple affair, straight up and down, no supports whatsoever. Dean felt himself relaxing as he held it in his hands. They’d worked with these for months in savaşçı training, to improve their agility and balance. He knew he could still do this.

Whirling the ladder above his head, he ran for the centre of the stage. Castiel planted his feet when he saw Dean coming, reaching into his pelerin and producing the savaşçı’s dagger, which glinted wickedly in the yellow lamplight. Dean didn’t pause, and threw the ladder at Castiel. As he’d expected, Cas caught the top rung in one hand instinctively, while the bottom of the ladder thudded into the sawdust; Dean leapt off the ground, the crowd starting to whoop and yell as he hopped from rung to rung as quickly as he could, one two three four five six seven and jump, performing a neat flip over Castiel’s head and landing on the balls of his feet behind Castiel’s back.

The crowd went wild, but Dean didn’t spare them a thought; he moved to give Castiel a sharp punch in the side, but before he could execute the move, a foot lashed into his stomach. He had no idea how Castiel had reacted so fast, but the spinning kick had caught Dean completely unawares. Stumbling, he turned his imbalance into a backwards somersault and rolled back to his feet as quickly as he could, one hand on the floor and the other straight out behind him. Castiel was already flying at him, dagger in hand. Now the audience were involved, shouting and cheering for their favourite. Dean watched Castiel approach, only realising he was grinning when Castiel’s eyes glinted at him in return.

The dagger flashed down and Dean struck Castiel’s wrist, hard. Castiel dropped the dagger and Dean caught it in his other hand, stabbing forwards at Castiel’s ribs, but Castiel twisted away as fast as a fox. At the last moment, Dean realised that Castiel had his foot hooked around Dean’s ankle; as he completed his twist, Cas pulled Dean off his feet. Dean threw himself into the fall, one hand on the floor to take his weight and push himself onwards as he did a full backwards flip and landed upright, stumbling a little. He’d had to drop the dagger to avoid collapsing, though, and Castiel was picking it up off the ground now, advancing on him with his shoulders back, head dipped menacingly. The crowd was yelling, half of them elated in support of Castiel and half yelling for Dean to act, to do something, anything.

Dean began to move around Castiel, heading for the very centre of the stage, where the ladder still lay in the sawdust. Some of the audience liked his play, but others were shouting against it – the same move wouldn’t work twice. Dean agreed with them. He stooped and picked up the ladder, lifting it off the ground and higher, above his head. He turned it in his hands, once, twice, picking up speed; soon it was whirling over his head like a huge, vicious blade. Castiel eyed it for a moment and then ducked low, obviously hoping to get under it; Dean pursed his lips, concentrated, and moved his arms, passing the ladder around the back of his body, then to the front and over his head once more in a neat loop that went round and round. There was no way Castiel was ever going to get close enough to attack. He met Dean’s eyes, and tilted his head. Dean grinned, and jerked his head in a little self-satisfied nod. Yeah, that’s right. You’re gonna have to figure this out on your own. Castiel’s eyes narrowed. He started watching the ladder go round, and round. Dean thought he saw Castiel’s lips moving, as though he were counting.

Surely not, he thought. That’s impossible. Tell me he’s not going to –

In one smooth, unruffled movement, Castiel dropped the dagger, stepped forward, reached out a hand – and caught the ladder, bringing it to a dead stop two inches from his face – without even looking at it.

The audience went completely crazy, shouting loud enough to deafen. Whether they could sense the very real competitiveness between him and Castiel, or whether it was simply the spectacle, they were lapping up the performance more eagerly than Dean ever could have hoped. He dropped the ladder at the same time as Castiel; it clattered to the floor as they moved in close, fighting hand-to-hand, vicious and fast, barely pulling their punches at all as they sought an opening. This was the closing stages of the fight: whoever got the best of this bout would be the overall winner. Dean’s hand slammed into Castiel’s side; he barely reacted, jabbing at Dean’s throat almost too quickly to parry. Their strikes were fast and furious, their dodges even faster. Dark and light clashed, just as Castiel had intended, every blow desperate, each force hungry for the victory. Kick, lunge, block, punch. Castiel’s swinging right fist almost connected with Dean’s cheek; he only avoided it by dropping, allowing gravity to pull him down to the floor faster than his muscles could take him. He was preparing for the rest of the practised move, low spinning kick and a roll to the side, when Castiel took him by surprise. He span on his heel so that he was facing away from Dean’s crouch, and then sat down – so that he was sitting on Dean’s shoulders, Dean’s head between his thighs, which he squeezed together as he pulled all his weight backwards. The pair of them crashed to the floor on their backs, Dean still wedged between Castiel’s legs. He tried to struggle out from under the other man’s weight, but then he heard the crowd’s yelling change; in unison they drew a long, shocked breath. He stopped moving and paid attention to what was above him. Something long, silver, and shiny. A dagger, poised above his chest.

Dean stared at the blade for a few seconds, and then tilted his head to look back at Castiel.

“You cheated,” he muttered. Castiel must have fallen backwards to find the dagger within his reach.

“I learned,” Castiel said with a smile.

“Castiel…” Dean trailed a hand slowly up Castiel’s leg. Castiel’s eyes widened for a second – and that was when Dean struck. Fast as a viper, he snatched his hand away from Castiel’s knee, grabbed the dagger by the blade, cutting open his palm – and, arching his back to reach, plunged it deep into Castiel’s chest. Red spurted everywhere, gushing over the white şalvar, the beautiful new pelerin.

His eyes still wide with shock, Castiel swayed where he sat… and then fell backwards.

Dean crawled out from under his legs, and moved around him, lifting the other man’s head and resting it in his lap. He cradled Castiel’s face in his hands, stroking his cheek as his blue eyes fell slowly closed.

Dean glanced out at the audience, or what he could make out of them past the bright gas lamps. He saw hands over mouths, faces glazed with tears. They were spellbound.

“I think you can get up now,” he muttered to Castiel.

Castiel’s eyes flicked open again.

“Now?”

“Now.”

They both stood up. The audience’s appreciation started slowly, but it kept on growing, building up to a roar of tumultuous applause as Dean and Castiel took three deep, sweeping bows, like they’d practised. By the time they’d taken their last, the noise had reached ear-splitting levels once more, with whistles and screams joining the clapping. Crowley emerged onto the stage, and he was beaming at them.

“Did you see that!” he yelled to the crowd through a huge megaphone; they called back to him, a swirling mass of sudden love. “Did you see that! Quite a debut for our new duo!”

It was the happiest Dean had seen him. Crowley grabbed his arm and raised it into the air.

“Your victor!” he shouted, to a mixture of cheers and catcalls. “Didn’t like the result? Come again to see our fantastic desert fighters. You never know what might happen next time!”

Dean did his best to smile as the audience kept clapping. Now that it was over, and they’d succeeded, he just wanted to get backstage, get their money – and find a place to sleep. He glanced over at Castiel, who seemed to read his expression without difficulty; he tilted his head questioningly towards the red curtain through which they’d emerged onto the stage. Dean nodded and they left the stage together, Dean shaking his arm out of Crowley’s grip. The audience kept clapping behind them, but neither turned around to acknowledge it. Leave them hungry, said a voice in Dean’s head. Where did that one come from? Someone had said it to him once. Probably Sam, quoting from some book or other.

“I’m going to kill you,” Castiel said, looking down at his white pelerin, which was soaked through with the fake blood that had come gushing out of the pouch under his arm, which Dean had burst with his last, fatal stab.

“Hey, we agreed. Loser gets covered in fake blood.”

“When I agreed to that,” said Castiel peevishly, “I thought I would win.”

Dean laughed. It came out creaky with tiredness. Castiel was fiddling around inside his pelerin, pulling out the spilled blood pouch.

“Let’s get our money first,” he said. “Then find a place to sleep.”

Castiel nodded silently; he, too, was tired. They pushed through the other acts waiting backstage, finally running into someone they recognised at the very edge of the group: the tall, red-haired woman who’d been with Crowley earlier in the day. Dean remembered thinking that she was probably in charge, and that suspicion was confirmed up close by the quality of her clothing and the superior tilt of her chin. She was used to being obeyed.

“Great show tonight, boys,” she said, smiling through lips as red as the fake blood on Castiel’s pelerin.

“Thank you, efendi,” said Dean warily.

“Are you in charge here?” Castiel demanded, slightly less respectfully. Dean sighed internally and tried to cut him some slack. They were both exhausted.

“I certainly am,” she replied, holding out her hand to each of them. “Abaddon. Meeting you two is an absolute pleasure.” The way she said it had Dean shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “I guess you boys’ll be wanting your pay?”

“Yes, efendi,” Dean muttered. She was so beautiful, but there was a predatory look in her eye that had him on alert, muscles tense despite his tiredness. She reached into the inside pocket of her sleek grey tunic, and pulled out a thin wad of notes.

“Don’t spend it all in one place,” she said, smiling hypnotically. “See you back here tomorrow!”

“Actually, we will not be returning,” Castiel said flatly, as he took the money. “This was an exclusive performance.”

Dean hissed through his teeth as Abaddon’s smile vanished.

“Oh, what a shame,” she said, her voice as light and cutting as a razor wire. “Won’t you stay just a few more nights?”

“Sorry,” Dean said, grabbing Castiel by the arm and starting to move them both away. “We can’t stay. Unavoidable, uh, thing. It was great to meet you,” he finished lamely, as he reached the door of the little backstage tent and pushed out through the folds of thick fabric, out into the night.

“We could’ve just left,” he said to Castiel as they began to walk away, with a bite of anger in his voice. “You didn’t have to tell her we were going.”

Castiel shrugged.

“What difference does it make?” he said. The night was milder than the one they’d had before, or perhaps it simply felt that way with the mass of tents protecting them from the cool of the desert. Dean lifted a shoulder and let it fall.

“Just… didn’t feel quite…” he said, breaking off when he heard the sound of light scuffling behind him. He looked at Castiel, and knew that he’d heard it, too. They kept walking unhurriedly, ears strained. There was nothing…

And then there was a hand around Dean’s neck, huge and strong and squeezing, choking the air and the sound out of him before he could react. Glancing right, he saw that Castiel was in a similar predicament. He tried to lash out, but his arms swung backwards and connected with what felt like the side of a cliff face. Yarım save them, Dean’s vision was already starting to blur through lack of air. He coughed and struggled, trying to draw breath, but the person holding him had a grip of iron.

“Easy, Hellhounds,” said a sweet, soft voice, finishing on a laugh. Abaddon walked into Dean’s field of vision, smiling brilliantly. “There are so many benefits to running a circus,” she purred, “but my favourite has to be the staff. Where else would I find seven-foot muscle mountains prepared to follow my every order? Hold them tighter.” The order was rapped out quickly, and its execution was even quicker; the fingers around Dean’s throat pressed tighter, choking him in earnest. He tried to kick, to swivel, to punch, but he found only air.

“Let them go,” Abaddon said, just as he was about to pass out. Dean collapsed to the ground as soon as he was released, and heard a matching thud that told him Castiel had fallen beside him. Abaddon squatted down beside them, watching them try to catch their breath through bruised throats, her smile wide and lethal.

“No one leaves my circus unless I say so,” she said. “Crowley might think it’s all contracts and agreements, but I have ways of making the talent loyal to me. Now, I’m going to put this one in chains.” She put her fingers under Dean’s chin, tilting his face up to look at her. She surveyed his features for a moment, before transferring her gaze to Castiel. “And if you don’t want him to start losing fingers, you’ll stick around. Do you understand?”

Castiel watched her, still breathing hard. Abaddon didn’t break their stare; in fact, her smile only widened.

“I said, do you understand?” she repeated. “Or do I need to give you a demonstration? My Hellhounds are so much fun. They’ll take fingers off whenever I ask them too. Won’t you, boys?”

A grunt deep enough to have come from the mouth of a troll sounded somewhere to Dean’s left.

“No,” Castiel rasped. “No. I understand.” He shared a look with Dean, and then glanced down to the ground. Dean followed the course of his swift glance. Castiel had his hand splayed in the sand, five fingers spread out. Five fingers. Five.

Crouch and trip, kick to the stomach, left punch.

He caught Castiel’s eye, and nodded almost imperceptibly.

“Good,” Abaddon was still saying, the exchange so fast that she’d noticed nothing. “Time to go, then.”

“Yes,” agreed Castiel. Dean tensed his muscles, waiting… “Time to… Go.”

Dean moved with all the speed he could still muster, swinging his weight into a crouch and then sweeping out one outstretched leg. The man behind him – the Hellhound, as Abaddon had called him – was more of a monument than a human being, but the swiftness and determination of Dean’s kick to the back of his knees had him stumbling. Before he could recover, Dean was standing, bringing his knee up as he went, connecting solidly with the man’s washboard stomach. He finished the job with a brutal punch that slammed into the Hellhound’s ear, sending him sprawling.

Dean turned to see Abaddon taking a stance, lean and poised as a long-legged cat, fists up. He eyed her over, and didn’t fancy his chances. Behind him, his Hellhound was starting to recover, too. Castiel was still struggling with his; the punch hadn’t landed sweetly, and the bodybuilder was bent over with pain but still fighting. Dean made his decision. He lifted his leg high and slammed his foot into the second Hellhound’s cheek, making him howl with pain. Grabbing Castiel by the arm, he hurdled the fallen Hellhound and began to run. He heard Abaddon give a sharp, irritated shout as he and Castiel disappeared into the velvet cloak of the dark.

And it was shockingly dark, even under Ayın Yarısı: the capricious eye turned the glow of its gaze away when Dean needed it most. They stumbled through the rows of tents, cleaving to the safety of each other’s grip, making sure not to get separated in the blackness. Behind them, the sounds of Abaddon and the Hellhound in pursuit were enough to keep them running.

“This way!” Castiel called, dragging Dean towards the outline of a tent. He’d spoken loudly, and Dean was angry with him for giving away their position – how could he be so stupid? – before he understood Castiel’s plan. They came to a halt and stepped in close to the tent, blending in against the fabric. They waited, hearing their sounds of their pursuers approaching – and then their yells of annoyance, as the tent’s guy ropes tripped them up, sending them sprawling. Dean nodded to Castiel, and took his hand.

Laughing, coated in silver like mad desert foxes, they ran away into the night.

“That was fun,” Castiel said dryly, as they curled up under the awning of a small tent on the outskirts of the town, trying to find comfort in the sand for the second night running. Dean grinned at him, huddling as close to the tent’s fabric as he could for warmth.

“Not bad,” he agreed. “Night, Cas.”

This time, Castiel didn’t correct him.

Chapter Text

And on they walked.

Every step was a quiet agony, a burn in the muscles. Every breath was a thirsty rasp. And the sands stretched on and on, without end. The heat alone was enough to call out the imps of madness, but that interminable reach of endless grit sent them dancing. The horizon shimmered like a lake, making promises it could not keep.

“Pass the water,” Dean rasped, holding out his hand. Cas gave him the flask wordlessly, lost in his own world of endurance.

At least they’d managed to get the supplies that they needed, Dean reflected. He didn’t like to imagine the state they’d be in if they hadn’t had the courage to visit the market one more time before leaving, eyes peeled for any sign of the Hellhounds, and keeping a long and careful distance from the circus tent. They’d bought what they needed, no more: just a couple of backpacks, new clothes for Cas, food, water and tools to make a fire. And a little aloe, to soothe their sunburn. Dean hoped they could use their remaining money to buy more water, later. That was the first thing they were going to run out of.

He took a sip of it now, savouring the sensation of moisture in his mouth for a few sweet seconds, before forcing himself to swallow it and hand the flask back to Cas. He watched Cas reach up behind his head and tuck the flask back into the top of his pack. He looked tired, from what little Dean could see of his face: they were both wrapped up in soft, layered headscarves, to protect themselves from the fierce glare of Güneş Yarısı. They both had their eyes narrowed against the itch of grit and tiredness; it was nearing the end of the day, but still they pressed on. They’d stopped earlier to eat a few cold kofte and some fruit, but the rest of the day had been spent walking. And walking. And walking.

The silence between them had been a little stilted at first, but they’d found a quiet rhythm and become buried in their own thoughts, the atmosphere smoothening as their self-awareness became less acute. Dean had spent most of the day thinking about his family – a combination of guilt and sadness, predictably enough. He was starting to truly upset himself, imagining them sitting in the house, going over and over Jo’s version of what had happened, trying to understand his decision to leave. Perhaps trying not to think about why he hadn’t come back. What if they thought he’d left forever? What if they thought he was dead?

“So,” Dean said aloud, to distract himself. There was no point agonising over it; he was here now, he’d sent them a letter, and he’d come so far that it would be foolish to turn back. Besides, he wasn’t even sure that he wanted to. “Last night went well.”

“I thought so, too,” Castiel said after a moment. “I was unaware of your prowess with ladders.”

“I got all kinds of prowess,” said Dean, tipping Cas a wink. Cas stared at him blankly through his headscarf. Casual flirtatious remarks still a no, then, OK. “Uh, anyway. Yeah, I picked up a thing or two during the four years that I was training to be a savaşçı.” He tried to keep the bitterness, the wistfulness, out of his voice as he said it, but couldn’t quite manage it.

“Savaşçı,” Cas repeated. “You keep using that word. I still don’t understand what it means.”

“Seriously, man, how is there so much you know nothing about? I thought everyone had heard of the savaşçılar.”

“Savaşçılar, now?” Cas said, with a touch of bite. He didn’t like not knowing things, Dean made a little mental note. Interesting.

“One savaşçı, lots of savaşçılar,” Dean explained. “Singular and plural. Like I told you, they’re the most elite warriors in the whole of Ateş Aşiret. Most soldiers are the King’s Men, right? Big black impala insignia on their chests, couple of them almost killed us both back in the Forest of the Dead.”

“I remember,” said Cas dryly.

“Those ones must’ve gone rogue,” Dean said reflectively. “Or they were bought. No other reason they’d be attacking a spy for their own country, right?” Castiel avoided Dean’s eyes, and Dean cleared his throat. He definitely wasn’t supposed to know about the spy thing. “Anyway, point is, the King’s Men’s duty is to the King, but the savaşçılar’s allegiance is sworn to the people. That’s what makes them so awesome. They’re not so traditional as the King’s Men, either. Only guys can be in the King’s Men, but anyone can be a savaşçı.”

“And yet you tell me they haven’t changed their fighting style in two hundred years,” Cas pointed out, his voice slightly muffled through the material of his headscarf. “That certainly smacks of traditionalism.”

“They don’t need to change,” Dean said, with asperity.

“Everything needs to change,” Cas said calmly, unperturbed by Dean’s tone. “Otherwise, it cannot improve.”

“Oh, yeah?” Dean said. “That’s not what you said to me this morning when we were buying clothes, and you wanted another one of those damn white pelerinler.”

Cas fingered the hem of his sand-coloured pelerin discontentedly.

“I liked the white one,” he said.

“Oh, you made that much clear,” Dean assured him, teasing. Cas frowned down at the ground, where his feet were kicking up little clouds of sand with each step.

“I was very reasonable,” he muttered. Dean snorted.

“You told me that I had a face like an ass and the personality to match,” he said with a grin.

“And I stand by that,” Cas said seriously, now looking out towards the horizon – but Dean could see the little crinkles around his eyes that told him Cas was smiling, too. He let the conversation fall away again, thinking.

Even though he was slowly resigning himself to the fact that he would never live to wear the savaşçı’s pelerin, there was still a teenage Dean somewhere in his heart who was wounded by Cas’ dismissive attitude to the Order. Maybe it was because he’d cherished the dream for too long, kept it too close, so that now any affront to the savaşçılar was a personal offence.

Or maybe it’s just because Cas is right, said a little voice in Dean’s head. Dean pushed it away. He was coming to terms with leaving his fantasy behind, but he wasn’t ready to even begin dealing with the idea that it had never been a particularly good fantasy, anyway.

Cas didn’t seem ready to let the subject drop, either. He turned to Dean, rubbing a piece of grit out of one of his eyes.

“So I interrupted a part of your savaşçı training, when I arrived?” he said.

“A ceremony,” Dean said heavily. “The Vigil. It’s the last thing you have to do before you become a savaşçı. If I’d made it through the night, I’d be wearing the white pelerin right now.”

Cas went silent for a moment, thinking.

“They’re not all that amazing,” he said eventually. “Beige ones provide better camouflage.” His tone had an edge of contrition, though, and Dean knew that this was Cas’ way of offering an apology. He reached out a hand and clapped Cas lightly on the shoulder, to show that he understood.

It was only now that he had something close to an apology that Dean realised he didn’t need one. He’d made his own decisions that night; if he’d wanted to stay in the chapel, then Cas wouldn’t have stood a chance of getting him to leave. After all, Jo had been there, too, and she had somehow managed to avoid going on a hare-brained cross-country trip with a total stranger. Dean hadn’t been hoodwinked or coerced: he’d been in control the entire time. And he’d chosen to go with Cas. Yarım only knew why, though.

Maybe Cas represented a kind of freedom from responsibility, or at least a different way to be needed. And maybe, with his lack of self-awareness and his general confidence, he exemplified many of the things Dean most wanted to be. Dean glanced over at Cas, who caught his gaze and held it for a moment. Maybe it was just that, that feeling he got whenever their eyes locked and didn’t let go for one second, two seconds, three.

Dean cleared his throat. That was a whole other line of thought that he really didn’t need to go down right now. He was getting off that train before it left the station. If the train was going somewhere, he was not going to that place. That was not where he wanted to go. He was very happy… here. Off the train. Definitely not getting back on the train.

Convincing, Dean told himself. Real nice.

The simple fact was that no matter how Dean felt about Cas, he couldn’t allow himself to get too attached. Cas was travelling back to the Water Lands – Cas was a freaking spy – and Dean was going to have to leave him at the border, and head home alone. And that was that. They’d probably never see each other again. Having any kind of – feelings – for Cas would only complicate everything and cause him pain. Say it again, Dean: definitely not getting back on the train.

Cas pulled his headscarf down to expose his face, full lips slightly parted, and Dean could have sworn he heard the faint sounds of train wheels turning. Damn it.

“Perhaps if you stayed awake tonight and didn’t eat, it could count as your Vigil,” Castiel said thoughtfully. Dean smiled slightly, a little touched that Cas was trying to think of ways to help him.

“Nice try,” he said, following Cas’ lead and pulling down his headscarf. The sun was low on the horizon, too weak to burn them now. “But the Vigil always happens on the full moon. Ayın Yarısı has to be at its widest, to see all your faults and cleanse you.”

Cas was silent for a moment. Dean glanced towards him quickly enough to catch the tail end of a sceptical look that had passed over his face as quickly as light dappling over water.

“So you made… a confession?” Cas asked, his tone ambivalent. Dean didn’t understand why he seemed so reticent – and so uninformed – about the religious traditions that every kid in Ateş Aşiret was taught before he was five. Maybe his parents had been radicals, living far enough from the capital to escape notice.Dean didn’t want to push for information, though. Better to keep a distance between them, a space of untold histories.

“Well, I accepted the wrongs that I had done, and then let them be burned away,” he explained aloud.

“Wrongs?” Cas said, his eyebrows lifting subtly in disbelief. “What have you ever done wrong in your life?”

“Lots of things,” said Dean defensively. Cas didn’t reply, but the slight pursing of his lips spoke eloquently of his scepticism. Dean scowled.

“I was rude to my parents,” he said. “And… I shouted at my sister. That’s as far as I’d got in the Vigil, before you arrived.”

Cas was pressing his lips together now, as though trying to repress a smile.

“You were starting with the least important things, then?” he said.

“No, I –” Dean started, his frown deepening. “Those things were on my conscience…”

“Then you were harbouring guilt unnecessarily,” Cas said. “Everyone is rude. Everyone shouts. If we all carried shame with us for the rest of our lives –”

“Then maybe we wouldn’t do it again,” Dean interrupted angrily. Cas threw him a narrow-eyed look, so he carried on, the words spilling out before he’d really thought them through. “Those things might not seem so bad to you, but I hurt people that I care about and that matters to me – and I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Who do you even think you are, trying to tell me what I can and can’t feel guilty about? My wrongs might not seem so huge in the grand scheme of things – and sure, so I haven’t killed anybody recently, or –” Dean broke off. The memory of snapping a soldier’s neck, resurging fast enough to take his breath away, clamped his mouth closed.

During the fighting, in the Forest of the Dead… he might have taken that man’s life, and he’d barely thought about it since. He used to be able to say that he’d never killed anyone – in fact, even the idea that he could have done so used to be a freaking joke to him – but now it was a reality. He’d taken another man’s life. He was a murderer.

Suddenly, his fights with Ellen and Jo seemed very pale, and very distant – and Cas’ amusement made a little more sense.

“Guilt is a deterrent from positive action as much as negative,” Cas said, with a gentleness to his tone that Dean didn’t often hear. “It paralyses. You can’t act as you did before, but you are too filled with shame to believe yourself capable of change.”

“I know,” Dean muttered, still buried in his thoughts.

“So you can’t hold onto guilt over every small thing that you do,” Cas pressed.

“I know, I know,” Dean said. “This is what the Vigil is all about! And maybe I would’ve done a better job of it if you hadn’t shown up halfway through.”

His tone was aggressive, compensating for a newfound source of guilt that he’d somehow, somehow managed not to think about until now. He swallowed, and breathed out slowly. So he’d killed someone who had been trying to attack him – someone who’d have taken his life without compunction, in all probability. Dean had saved his own life by killing his attacker, so didn’t that make him… kind of like a soldier? After all, what had he been expecting to happen when he became a savaşçı – that his enemies would just melt away as soon as he walked through the door? At some point, he was always going to have had to start fighting for something. It didn’t feel good, but it did feel inevitable. And Dean supposed that meant that he’d just have to make his peace with it, somehow.

In his mind, he heard the sound of the soldier’s neck snapping under the weight of his body. He jerked his head, as though trying to shake off a wasp.

Making peace with it might take a little while, then.

“I’m hungry,” Cas said. “And the sun is starting to set. Let’s set up a camp and eat some food before we lose the light.”

Dean nodded, pulling down his own headscarf and feeling his face gingerly. He’d been burned worse than Cas the day before, but today he seemed to have avoided any further damage. He’d use some aloe tonight, and hopefully that should clear up the worst of it.

They unpacked their things haphazardly: sleeping mats unrolled before the windbreak was put up so that they blew away, and various food parcels scattered across the floor as Cas searched for what he wanted to eat. Dean tutted as he returned from retrieving the sleeping mats, and Cas sent him an irritated look.

“I wouldn’t have to litter the desert with our supplies if you hadn’t put the apples right at the bottom of your pack,” he said irascibly. “They’ll bruise there, anyway.”

Dean, who was busy unrolling the windbreak – a length of cheap fabric fastened between two wooden stakes – scowled back at him.

“Well, maybe next time the efendi would be so kind as to order ahead,” he said sarcastically. “So that his food can be made ready in advance.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Cas responded grumpily, finally retrieving two apples and setting about stuffing the rest of the food back in Dean’s pack. He came over to help Dean secure the windbreak, the two of them working in silence. When they were done, Cas caught Dean’s eye and smiled slightly. There was an acknowledgement in his gaze of their little spat, but also a lightness that told Dean there was no real harm done. Dean smirked, and grabbed his apple from Cas’ hand.

“I offer a thousand thanks,” he said, with an exaggerated bow. “Would his Majesty care to help me cook, or does he find himself fatigued?”

Cas glowered at him, and went to snatch up his pack before Dean could reach it, pulling out the fire-making equipment.

“I’ll start the fire,” he said. “You get the food.”

Dean offered him a flourishing courtly bow, which Cas acknowledged with a mockingly graceful inclination of his head, before bending down to rummage through the food packages once more. He pushed aside bags of fruit and bread, finally finding a soft, squishy, paper-wrapped package of meat – ham, smoked and thinly-sliced. Dean busied himself with making up their meal, layering the ham over the fresh bread, taking far more time than he needed to. He could see his hands starting to shake, and cursed them inside his head for betraying him. There was nothing to worry about, nothing. The equipment they’d bought would make a fire that didn’t even burn especially high or hot.

“Is the food ready?” came Cas’ voice from behind him. A wisp of smoke floated over Dean’s shoulder; just the scent of it made him cold all over. He could feel a light sheen of sweat on his upper lip. Yarım, he was being pathetic – again. So they had a fire, so what? It wasn’t as though it were suddenly going to start raging out of control, the flames higher than his head, the thickness of the smoke so deep in his lungs that he thought he was drowning, and light bright enough to sear his eyeballs surrounding him on every side while the screams rang louder and louder and more desperate, and it was a voice he knew, he knew that voice and he couldn’t save her…

“Dean,” said Cas, “I don’t mean to question your methods, but I want to assure you that it is absolutely impossible to digest your food by staring at it.”

Dean breathed out steadily through his nose, trying to regain control of himself. He shuddered. Of all the nights, that was the one he would never choose to revisit – but it happened every single time he was anywhere near fire.

And yet Cas had been so pleased when he’d found the coals and the slow-burning fire starters at the market, and Dean hadn’t had the guts to tell him no. After all, it was probably wise to have a fire. It would help to keep away desert wolves, and stave off the chill of the night. So he’d said yes, and now here they were – and he’d just have to make the best of it.

He picked up the two thick slices of bread, holding them carefully so that none of the ham would fall off. He cleared his throat and tried to seem calm. The most important thing was that Cas didn’t notice that something was going on; Dean couldn’t explain it, but just the thought of seeming so stupid and vulnerable over something as simple as lighting a fire… it made him want to curl up and never speak again. He pasted on a smile as he got to his feet and turned around, refusing to let his eyes zero in on the circle of flames licking over hot coals that stood between himself and Cas, separating them, too high to walk through, too hot to approach, roaring in his ears like a merciless, ravening beast…

“Dean?” Cas said, and his voice had changed; the irony was all gone, and Dean thought he heard a faint kiss of concern at the edge of the confusion. “What’s wrong?”

Dean blinked. Cas was watching him closely, his head to one side; in front of him, a little fire crackled innocently.

“Nothing,” Dean said. Nothing. Just an ordinary, tiny little fire. Nothing’s wrong.

“Can I have my food?” Cas asked with a note of caution in his tone.

“Sure,” Dean said automatically, but he didn’t move. The fire was hypnotising, drawing his gaze back again and again. The coals were already a thick, smug orange, the colour pulsing and shifting in the heat as though they were alive and breathing. Dean hated them, hated their scorching arrogance and foul, fuming breath. One of them spat up a spark, and Dean flinched.

“Dean,” Cas said, standing up and moving around the fire. He passed so close to it that Dean winced, waiting for it to roar up and snap at him – but it lay still, docile. Even still, Dean couldn’t stop eyeing it suspiciously. “What’s the matter?”

Dean pressed his lips together to stop them trembling. He was exposed to open flame so little, since firemaking was illegal; the last time, he hadn’t spoken for hours afterwards. He could feel the memories starting to unravel in his mind, spooling out like a thread, ready to sew him a beautiful set of nightmares for the weeks to come. Cas was still standing close, but Dean could barely focus on him, couldn’t even remember what he’d asked. His breathing was erratic, he realised, and there was a rushing sound in his ears. He staggered, and Cas caught him under his elbow, steadying him.

“Dean?” he demanded, more urgently. He eased the dinner out of Dean’s grasp with one hand, keeping the other reassuringly under Dean’s arm. “Can you speak?”

Dean cleared his throat, trying to focus. Cas’ face was a little hazy, but his grip on Dean’s elbow was strong and grounding.

“Don’t like fire,” he mumbled. He was expecting Cas not to hear, he’d said it so fast – but perhaps Cas had already figured it out, and had been expecting this answer, because he nodded solemnly.

“That’s alright,” Cas said, a little pointlessly – probably trying to be reassuring – and Dean felt a kick of anger in his chest, because no, it wasn’t alright, it was stupid and pathetic and downright annoying, and he hadn’t wanted Cas to see, and now they were stuck in this awkward situation that Dean didn’t know how to diffuse and he couldn’t even think straight anyway, and it was all a mess, again, could he not stop screwing up?

He looked at Cas, for something to do – some way to break the downward spiral that his brain was falling into. Cas was watching him pensively, but not pityingly – thank Yarım for small blessings. Dean tried a weak half-smile, aiming to seem wryly self-aware, but Cas didn’t respond. He had a little frown on his face, eyes squinting and brows drawn low, that might have made Dean’s heart squeeze if it hadn’t been too busy thumping against the inside of his ribcage as though pleading to be let out. Traps within traps, Dean thought, looking at the fire. Traps within traps within traps…

“Fighting practice,” Cas said, snapping his fingers. Dean blinked.

“Wh-what?” he muttered past the lump in his throat. The fire was a constant orange scar in his vision, no matter where he looked. And the smell…

“Fight with me,” said Cas. He took his hand away from Dean’s arm – and Yarım damn his body, Dean swayed a little, following the lost contact like he was touch-starved – and he stepped backwards, taking up his stance.

“Cas, I don’t… I can’t…”

“Five,” Cas said authoritatively. Dean wanted to sink to the floor and cry. He couldn’t fight, not now, not with his breathing shallow and raspy and the stench of smoke in his nose and his brain trying to overflow with memories that he didn’t want to see again, please, Yarım, not again…

“Dean,” said Cas, more gently. He pulled off his pelerin and tunic, stripping so that his top half was bare. “You can do this. Five.”

Five. Crouch and trip, kick to the stomach, left punch. Dean swallowed. Slowly, unwillingly, with his eyes constantly flicking to the fire and then back again, Dean pulled up his hands, and set his feet apart.

“Knees bent,” Cas said. “Pelerin off and tunic off. Shoulder towards me.”

Dean found it in himself to scowl at Cas, but he did as he was asked. The handprint burn was still livid on his arm, he noticed dully. Maybe it would never fade.

Cas tilted his head at Dean questioningly. Dean swallowed hard, tried to blink away the light blisters on his eyes – and then nodded.

Cas came at him as quickly as ever, but Dean was prepared now. He concentrated, timing his movement perfectly so that Cas’ kick went over his head, and then swinging his foot around to trip him. The last time he’d executed this move had been against Abaddon’s Hellhound; even though Cas wasn’t as – how to put it – visually imposing as that mountain of a man had been, he presented his own, very real, threat. If they’d been fighting with no punches pulled, he wouldn’t have fancied his own chances.

The fire was still burning, of course, and they were uncomfortably close to it, now that Dean thought about it. He felt his breath catching in his chest. What if one of them fell in? What if Cas fell in, and Dean couldn’t pull him out in time, and he started to scream, and –

“Seven,” Cas said, snapping Dean out of his thoughts. He punched, once twice in quick succession, and then went for the upward jab that Cas parried too easily. He wasn’t giving Cas much difficulty.

“Reverse one,” this time. Dean spun neatly on his toes as Cas aimed a high kick just under his ribcage, and then lashed out himself towards Cas’ groin. His attack was defended neatly, and followed up by a swift succession of sharp punches. Dean let out a long exhale and focused harder on Cas’ body, reading his movements and blocking them more efficiently. Cas noticed the change, and stepped his own pace up a notch. He didn’t smile, but Dean could sense that he was pleased – perhaps in the line of his shoulder, or the tilt of his head.

They fought in silence, sweat starting to pour off them. Güneş Yarısı slowly closed, and Ayın Yarısı’s cool gaze opened onto their continued sparring. They weren’t fighting competitively; there was no winning or losing, only the next move, the next muttered number, the next moment their bodies aligned for a moment before they pressed apart again, in the dance that Dean was coming to know inside out.

“Seven,” Cas called. Dean’s favourite. His downward strike towards Cas’ head was blocked, and then they both were spinning, rolling their backs together, shoulder to shoulder, before coming to face each other once more. Cas’ body felt strong and supple, his skin smooth and warm, the press of it starting a hunger that Dean felt in his chest – seven, seven, seven, he hoped, every time they came to the end of another set. Let it be seven.

Eventually, after a full hour of work, Cas called a halt. They were both dripping with sweat and smiling at each other, the silence between them easy as they stretched out their aching muscles. Dean’s stomach rumbled, and he stooped to pick up his food, still lying where Cas had left it after taking it from Dean’s shaking hands.

“Where would you like to sit?” Cas asked. His tone was emotionless – once again, Dean was grateful for his lack of unnecessary pity. He never knew what to do with pity. He always felt as though he had to make obvious use of it, to act as though it had helped him hugely – even though it rarely had – because otherwise, the person giving him sympathy would probably think he was a stubborn asshole, determined to be miserable. But the fact was that pity wasn’t actually all that helpful, so Dean ended up feeling as though he were lying to the person who was trying to care about him. At least with Castiel, there was no pretence. Dean appreciated that more than he could say.

“Let’s go here,” Dean said, a few steps back from the fire, but near enough to feel its warmth. It was still burning strongly, even though it had been untended for over an hour; those supplies that Cas bought really had been worth getting excited about, Dean reflected. He took a huge bite out of his bread and ham, Cas copying him to his right.

For a while, they ate without speaking, Dean enjoying the sensation of food in his mouth, chewing, swallowing, and starting to feel full. He wasn’t sure if it was because he hadn’t been getting much food of late, but his appetite seemed to have shrunk; maybe his stomach was a realist, because it seemed more than happy with what it could get. Dean found himself wishing that all of him could be so pragmatic.

“What are you thinking?” Cas asked, before taking another bite of bread and chewing it solemnly, eyes on Dean. Dean watched him for a moment, unable to help smiling slightly – but his smile vanished when he turned his mind to answering the question. He looked over at the fire, and gulped, and stared down at the sand instead.

“I – I dunno,” he said. “Lots of things. Mostly about… changes, I guess. Adapting to things.” He struggled to articulate himself without sounding ridiculous, but Cas was nodding as though he understood perfectly.

“You have undergone a lot of new experiences in a short space of time,” he said. “Am I right in assuming that the fight in the Forest of the Dead was your first experience of mortal combat?”

“Yeah,” Dean said, his face twisting up uncomfortably at the memory.

“You did well,” Cas said simply, after swallowing his mouthful.

Dean, whose bread was sitting half-eaten by his side, snorted derisively.

“Cas, I lay down on the floor for most of it, and I was sick,” he said, repressing a shudder at his own ineptitude. “I’m not sure I’m gonna be getting a gold star.”

Cas’ brow creased.

“Gold… star?”

“You know, when you do well in class… the teacher gives you a gold star?”

Cas looked mystified. Dean waved his hand, dismissing it.

“Point is, I sucked,” he said forcefully. “I spent all that time training and it came to nothing when I was actually in danger. It’s probably a good thing I didn’t become a savaşçı. I’d have been the worst one Ateş Aşiret’s ever seen.”

Cas’ frown was still in place, but it was more thoughtful than confused, now.

“You made it to the centre of the Forest,” he pointed out. “That can’t have been easy.”

“No,” Dean said miserably. There it was again – snap – playing over and over in his mind, his stupid pig-like stubborn-ass mind. “I had to… a guy came at me, and I – I swear, Cas, I didn’t mean to, but I think… I think he’s…” Cas waited for him to finish the sentence, his expression unreadable. “Cas, I think I killed the guy,” Dean finished weakly.

“Perhaps you did,” said Cas, sounding calm. “Perhaps you didn’t. Does it matter?”

“What? Yeah, Cas, it matters just a little bit if I’ve killed someone!” Dean almost shouted. He could feel tears rising to his eyes, and blinked furiously.

“Good,” said Cas. “I’m glad you think so. Now, what are you going to do about it?”

“What am I going to…” Dean let the sentence trail away, not understanding. Cas huffed out a sharp exhale and looked towards the fire, letting the light from the flames play over his features.

“It matters to you that you killed someone, and it also matters to you that you didn’t fight at all later on,” Cas said. “You can’t have it both ways, Dean. You can’t fight without expecting to kill: you’ll lose. You have to choose what to do. Either the fact that you killed someone matters to you, and you decide to stop fighting. Or, the fact that you stopped fighting matters to you more, and you choose to carry on. It’s up to you.”

Dean thought about it for a few long minutes, staring into the fire without seeing it. Cas allowed him the time he needed, finishing up his food and then simply gazing upwards, tracing the stars’ patterns with wide blue eyes.

“I want to protect the people I care about,” said Dean eventually. “More than anything else.”

Cas watched him without interrupting, his expression free of judgement.

“So…” Dean said, working it through, “I think that means… I have to be prepared to hurt some people, to save others. I’m never going to go looking for a fight, but if someone’s attacking a person that I care about, I want to be able to defend them, right? So I’ve got to be ready to do some damage.”

Cas nodded, his eyes locked with Dean’s.

“Dean,” he said. “May I ask you a question?”

Dean swallowed. He had a feeling he knew what was coming, but he nodded all the same. Let it come.

“Why are you afraid of fire?”

And there it was. The hardest question of his life, which was also the easiest to answer. Six words were usually enough to see off even the most curious.

“My mom died in a fire,” he said, the words dry and automatic. Cas absorbed the information in silence for a moment, before shifting, placing a hand lightly on Dean’s knee.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly, and Dean could see that he meant it. His face was drawn into sad lines, the firelight running over them as though trying to kiss his sorrow away. Dean ducked his head, bringing up his knees and resting his elbows on them. Cas drew his hand back, though he remained sitting close.

“It was a long time ago,” Dean said as bracingly as he could. It was true that time had greyed out the vividness of the horror, in some ways – but in others, the terror of that night lived on. Cas nodded wordlessly, his eyes on Dean’s interlocked hands. There was something about the smoothness of his expression, his lack of emotion, that had Dean spilling more of the story than he ever usually did. “I was four. Sammy was just a baby. We were all sleeping… I remember hearing a crash. Some kids broke in, started lighting shit up. I think it was supposed to be a joke, or a statement, or something? Anyway, they were young, they were shit at firemaking, and the flames got out of control. My dad – he gave me Sam, he told me to run… he was trying to find my mom, but she was trapped. I could – I could hear her…” Dean broke off, a few tears leaking down his cheeks. He never got this far in the story; he’d never told another living soul so much about that night. He couldn’t even look at Cas as he continued. “Dad was looking in the wrong place. She was trapped in my bedroom. She’d gone looking for me – she’d tried to save me –” Dean could hardly speak round the lump in his throat. “She saw me,” he said. “She saw I had Sam in my arms, he was so heavy I could barely hold him up… she told me to run. I – maybe my memory’s fucked, but I could’ve sworn –” Dean gulped, tears streaming down his face. “I swear she nodded and – and smiled at me, told me – told me to go – before I started running. And then she – the fire, she was – she was screaming…” Dean’s voice shook, and then died.

Cas’ movement was natural and fluid; he reached for Dean’s hand, and clasped it between both of his own.

They sat side by side, not speaking, not moving, but unquestionably together. Cas wasn’t even looking at Dean, wasn’t rubbing his hand to comfort him, wasn’t asking him to feel better in any way – and so Dean simply let the tears flow, on and on, tears that he’d sniffed back and stifled and hidden away whenever he could, never letting Sam see his big brother with anything but a smile for him. And Dean didn’t regret those decisions for a second, but Yarım above, it felt good to just – just stop caring, and cry until his eyes were sore and his nose was running and his lungs ached from taking breath after shuddering breath. Cas never took his hand away. He was a silent support, the mountain face against which Dean’s storm broke. And if Dean thought he caught the reflection of a little wetness on Cas’ cheeks, too, he didn’t say anything about it.

Eventually, Dean had cried himself dry. The fire was starting to simmer down, the coals fading from orange to a deep, velvety red. Dean realised that he’d been staring at it for some time without fear, without memories rising up in his mind. He smiled slightly, his face coated in dried tears, feeling like the rind of a fruit, and squeezed Cas’ hand before letting it go.

Cas looked over at him, and – seemingly without thinking – reached up to wipe away Dean’s last tear, smoothing his thumb over his cheek.

It was a sudden action, startling in its boldness, its simplicity. Dean’s breath seemed to be caught in his chest, his eyes fixed on Castiel’s; Cas visibly swallowed, and then stood up, moving around the dying fire towards his sleeping mat.

“It’s late,” he said, by way of explanation. His words raised Dean from his wide-eyed daze, and he got up too, retrieving his own sleeping mat and placing it neatly parallel to Cas’ – with a decent distance between them – next to the windbreak.

“Night, Cas,” he said. After a brief pause, he added, “Thanks.”

“Goodnight, Dean,” Castiel answered. There was a note in his voice that suggested he wanted to say more, but he didn’t break the silence again. Dean drifted into sleep with the sensation of something started, but not finished – something exciting, something – something good.

Chapter Text

When the sun rose the next day, Dean was awake to see it. His body ached from last night’s sparring, but it wasn’t altogether unpleasant; the burn in his muscles was familiar after his years of training, and he half-smiled through his grimace as he stood up, stretching away the stiffness. He looked over at Cas, who was still sleeping soundly, and moved quietly over towards their packs to make breakfast.

He pulled out their packages of cereals and dried fruit, mixing a little of each together in the empty brown paper bags that had held the bread they’d eaten last night. His stomach rumbled as he worked, and he sighed. If nothing else, this journey would have him losing that last bit of puppy fat around his tummy.

He straightened and walked over to Cas, eyeing the horizon as he walked. Just like yesterday, the sands’ reach seemed interminable, flat and empty, both a threat and a challenge: You’ll never make it. Come and try. Dean scowled at it, and turned his attention back to Cas, who was a messy scruff of hair poking out the top of his thin blanket, body stretched out on his sleeping mat.

“Morning, Cas,” Dean tried, hovering above him a little awkwardly. “Uh, I made you breakfast.”

There was no response; Cas slept on, his breathing deep and regular. Dean squatted down, putting the brown bags on the floor.

“Cas,” he said again, a little louder. From this angle, he could just make out the top of Cas’ face, buried in his blanket with a little frown. He couldn’t help smiling slightly as he reached out and shook Cas’ shoulder gently. “Cas, c’mon, wake up.”

Cas didn’t move. He breathed in deeply, snoring just a little. Dean watched him for a few seconds, his smile widening.

“Come on, you lazy ass. You don’t want to find out the techniques I learned at savaşçı training for waking someone up in the morning, I swear. Not pretty.”

His words didn’t have any affect; Cas’ eyes remained firmly closed.

“I will sit on you,” Dean said. “I mean it.”

Cas was motionless. Either his ears were made of cloth, or he was faking, Dean thought. There was no way that he wasn’t even slightly awake by this point.

“I’m going to count down from three,” he said loudly, giving Cas another little shove. It had no effect. “Three.”

Did Cas’ eyelids twitch slightly? There was a tightness to his face, an awareness that hadn’t been there before. He was definitely faking, then. Dean grinned.

“Two,” he continued, waiting for Cas to sit up, to wave his hands, to push Dean away with a scowl and a few snappy words.

“One?” he said. Cas’ eyes were still resolutely shut, and – was that a slight smile, at the corner of his mouth? Dean’s grin faded. The son of a bitch was awake, but he wanted to know if Dean would follow through on his threat. Judging by that smug little smile, Cas seemed to suspect not.

Dean was damned if he was going to back out now. He stood up swiftly, turned around, and let himself fall, hard, right onto Castiel’s midriff.

“Ooft!” Cas said, shooting upright, his face creased in pain. He’d been braced for it, Dean could tell – must have opened his eyes at the last second and seen what Dean was about to do – but he was still winded. He heaved in air for a few moments, eyes wide… and then scowled up at Dean, who was still sitting on his stomach, looking complacent.

“Good morning,” he said, smiling down at Cas. Cas watched him for a second, eyes narrowed, before giving him a hefty shove onto the sand. Dean landed ungracefully, his legs akimbo, reaching for the two paper bags of breakfast still sitting patiently on the sand.

“Made you breakfast,” he said, tossing one to Cas, who was sitting upright with his blanket wrapped tightly around him. His eyes were narrow with sleep, his hair mussed and standing on end, his beard ever-more impressive. He reached a hand to his neck and rubbed, looking uncomfortable; Dean could see that his bare skin there was still bright red.

“Crap, the sunburn,” he said, putting a hand to his own shoulders and feeling that the skin there was still hot and dry, and starting to crack a little. With all the aches and pains from fighting, he hadn’t even noticed the way the burn was tingling. “We can’t put aloe on now, it’ll all rub off on our clothes. We’ll do it tonight.”

Cas grunted in agreement and reached into his breakfast bag, pulling out a dried apricot and chewing on it with an expression on his face that Dean could only describe as sulky.

“Not a morning person, then?” Dean said, grinning. It hadn’t been so obvious the last couple of nights, when they’d both been badly-rested and irritable on waking, but after a good night’s sleep, Dean was feeling refreshed – and Cas, apparently, wasn’t.

Cas threw him a look that was so heavy with loathing that it almost knocked Dean backwards. He laughed, and took a bite of dried apple.

“Well, I can talk for both of us, then,” he said, smiling warmly. “Let me do a little nut-shelling for you. We’ve got enough supplies to last another five or six days. The desert still looks endless. I want ten rashers of bacon. And we have another joyful day of walking ahead of us. Sound good?”

Cas didn’t respond, but ate his cereal with silent, grumpy concentration. Dean took a mouthful of his own, chewing it without enthusiasm. He wished they had milk, or yoghurt… he hadn’t realised how good he’d had it back in Şehir, until he left.

Back in Şehir… that had him thinking of his usual morning routine at home. Sam was usually awake at dawn, to get to the library before school started. Dean wondered what his little brother was eating for breakfast today. Probably something similar to Dean – for some reason, he seemed to actually enjoy eating food that was definitely made for desert mice, not humans. He probably had his long hair in his eyes as he read his book at the kitchen table. Dean felt a little clutch in his gut. Sam had been mostly ignoring him for weeks, now – months, even – and he probably didn’t miss Dean all that much; after all, he’d been found complaining about his older brother’s noise all too often, and about the way he left his weapons lying around the house. All in all, once the initial shock wore off, Sam was probably glad to see the back of Dean. But that didn’t change the fact that Dean missed him, badly.

“This is terrible,” Cas said in a voice as dry as the sand beneath them, looking down at his bag of cereal as though it had insulted him. “I need bacon. And coffee.”

“A man after my own heart,” Dean said, coming out of his reverie with relatively good grace, offering Cas a brief smile. He stood up, and downed the rest of his bag’s contents by pouring it into his mouth in one go. Cas watched him, squinting up against the early-morning sun, and then followed his lead. Dean folded up his empty paper bag, and tucked it into the inside pocket of his tunic for later. As he did so, he felt the backs of his fingers brush up against glass – for a second, he was confused, and then he remembered. The red-haired woman at the market. The tussle over the thin, wide bottle of purple liquid that she’d been trying to force on him. The frantic concealment of it in the pocket of his tunic. Dean could feel himself blushing when he thought of all the opportunities the little bottle had had to fall out – when they were practising their performance, when they were on stage… he was cringing just thinking about it. And yet here it was, still lodged over his heart, a little glass bottle of lubricant that he had no way to dispose of without showing Cas. His blush worsened as he pictured trying to explain that away. No, the only thing to do was leave it where it was, and hope it didn’t fall out at some inopportune moment.

“Time to go,” he said, clapping his hands together and rubbing them, preparing to pack up their little camp and move on. Cas looked up at him blearily, and then shed his blanket with a little groan of protest.

“Hey, only five more days like this,” Dean said jovially, picking up his sleeping mat and starting to roll it up. “After that, we’ll either be somewhere else, or we’ll be starving to death.”

Cas picked up his blanket and rammed it into his pack with unnecessary force.

“I’ll take the starvation,” he said. “The world is a terrible place, and we should all leave it as soon as possible.”

Dean fought back a smile, and kept packing. Definitely not a morning person, then.

*

The day passed in much the same way as the previous one had, and as the next ones would, Dean suspected. He hadn’t studied many maps of Ateş Aşiret, but over the years he’d garnered the vague impression of a desert that ran all the way to the mountains, over which lay the Water Lands.

“Things aren’t too tricky on the border at the moment, right?” he said, after a couple of long hours of walking. He adjusted his headscarf, making sure it covered as much of his face as possible. The muscles in his legs were straining in protest, begging him to stop, to sit down; he’d thought his warrior training would prepare him for anything, but he was being shown over and over again that he’d been taught almost nothing of real value at all. Or perhaps he simply hadn’t learned it correctly. Either way, he’d have made a pretty terrible savaşçı.

Not that it mattered, since he wasn’t going to become one.

Round and round and round, same thoughts, different day. Dean cleared his throat, and tried to pay attention to Cas’ answer to his question.

“… nothing especially dangerous,” Dean zoned in to hear Cas saying. “A few raids from the Water Warriors were reported, but I didn’t see anything in the Pass. There was something, though…” Cas frowned. “A sensation of… expectation. Are you aware of any political stirrings in Şehir?”

“Nothing,” Dean said, shrugging as he walked. “Just the usual. Everyone hates the Water Lands, half the people think we should keep to ourselves, everyone else thinks we should attack them before they attack us.”

Dean couldn’t see most of Cas’ face under his headscarf, so his reaction was difficult to judge. He didn’t speak for a moment, though, and the expression in his eyes was complex.

“Ateş Aşiret could not hope to successfully invade, though,” he said tonelessly. “Not since firemaking was outlawed.”

Dean stopped walking, his heart thumping.

“Seriously?” he demanded. “You’re gonna tell me now that you’re pro-firemaking?”

“I didn’t say that,” Cas replied. He’d stopped too, his eyes hard and expressionless. “I said that Ateş Aşiret’s ability to pose a threat to the Water Lands has been compromised by that decision. They still shape water, their warriors are trained in the art of it. It makes them very powerful. If Ateş Aşiret invaded, they’d be crushed.”

Dean stared at him.

“That’s… the biggest pile of bullshit I’ve ever heard in my life,” he said, starting to walk again. “Have you not been paying attention for the last ten years? The factories that have popped up all over the country, especially in Şehir? Firemaking was holding us back, man. Without it, we’ve been working on real shit. We’ve got central heating, we’ve got gas lamps. We’ve got people in hospitals being revived with electricity, after their damned hearts have almost stopped. We’ve got radios.”

“So the Ateşi army can radio ahead to say they’re coming,” said Cas dryly. “Excellent strategy.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Dean said, shoving his shoulder lightly. “You really think that none of the new technology we’ve been coming up with is military? I bet half the factories in Şehir are working on new weapons. I heard a rumour about a kind of crossbow that can shoot tiny metal arrows, faster than you can see.” Dean’s expression turned ugly. “I’d like to see some Water-Land jack-off try to shape water with a hole through his chest.”

Castiel didn’t speak for a long, long time after that. Dean supposed that he’d tired of the conversation. It was interesting, though. The tension between the Water Lands and Ateş Aşiret had always been high, and it had only escalated when firemaking had been made illegal; suddenly every Ateşi civilian had been certain that water-wielding barbarians from across the mountains were going to come flooding into their cities and murder them as they slept. Ridiculous, of course, but their fear had sparked an industrial revolution, the like of which might never be seen again.

“Lunch?” Dean suggested after another few minutes of walking in silence, but Cas shook his head.

“Not yet,” he said abruptly. “We can go on.”

And so on they went.

*

Castiel was angry, and Dean couldn’t figure out what he’d done.

He’d barely spoken a word as they’d eaten their lunch, and at first Dean had paid no attention, lost in his own thoughts; it soon became obvious, however, that every time Dean tried to start a conversation Cas’ replies were monosyllabic – if they appeared at all.

Dean couldn’t understand it. He let the hours drag on in silence, analysing everything that had happened so far that day. It had to be what had happened right before Cas had stopped speaking, right? But they’d just been talking about politics, hardly something that Cas would take personal offence over. And so he went round again, working through the day systematically, looking for the flaw, the place where he’d screwed up.

He came up empty-handed every time. The sun was starting to set, blessed coolness sweeping over the sands as Güneş Yarısı closed. Dean cleared his throat. He hated conversations like this, but he wasn’t going to sit through an entire awkward evening this way.

“Cas… what did I do?” he said. It was probably late enough to take off his headscarf, now, but he left it on; there was a kind of security in the fact that Cas couldn’t see his face, and read his every expression.

Cas turned to him, his eyes flinty. Dean gulped.

“I didn’t mean to make you mad, whatever it was,” he said, almost gabbling. He had a sick feeling in his stomach. Cas looked upset, really upset, and he had no idea why.

“Dean, I…” Cas trailed off, his eyes reaching for the horizon as he sought the words to express himself. Finally, he stopped walking, pulling down his headscarf. “I want to know that I can trust you. Can I?”

“Of course,” Dean said quickly, almost indignantly, but Cas was waving his hand dismissively. Dean pulled down his scarf, too, frowning.

“No, not like that,” Cas said obscurely, determinedly. “I have to know whether… Dean, there are… there are things about me that I haven’t told you. As, I am sure, there are things about you of which I am unaware.” Dean shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other, blinking a couple of times before looking down at the ground. Cas dipped his head, acknowledging something he’d already known to be true.

“I can’t tell you all my secrets,” Cas said, with a regret in his voice that was raw, and tugged at Dean’s heart. “And I won’t ask to hear yours. But what I want to know is, can I trust you?”

“What do you mean?” Dean said, a little hoarsely. “What does trust mean, if we can’t tell each other everything?”

Cas pressed his lips together, his eyes locked on Dean’s.

“It means you’re with me,” he said. “And I’m with you. That we’re on the same side… our own side.”

Dean swallowed. He had no idea what was happening in Cas’ brain, but it was obviously deep and important. And he didn’t understand why there were sides, but… if it came to it, he’d be on Cas’ side, wouldn’t he? Who else was he going to meet out here in the desert, who might need his loyalty more? Sure, of course he was with Cas. And – more than he’d expected, enough to frighten him just a little – he wanted Cas to be with him. On the same side. Their own side.

“Yeah,” Dean said. “You can trust me.” Cas’ features fluctuated through a dozen expressions before settling for satisfied. He nodded, apparently appeased by Dean’s more considered answer.

“Good,” he said, and walked on.

Dean watched him go, his expression caught between confusion, and something harder to put a name to – something like resignation, acceptance of the inevitable. He’d been busy trying not to get attached to Cas, and he’d completely forgotten that Cas might start getting attached to him – something that had apparently already started happening, if that conversation was anything to go by. Dean rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, wincing at the friction over his sunburn. Cas cared so quietly that Dean had barely noticed, until now. This was going to mean trouble.

And even still, Dean followed Cas’ footprints in the sand – footprints that took him forward, and ever farther away from home.

*

Their sparring that night was, perhaps, the most intense it ever had been. By tacit consent, once the fire had been lit, they’d stripped off their tunics – Dean being a little more careful with his, now that he’d remembered the incriminating bottle in his pocket – and taken up their stances. A certain peace was beginning to grow from the familiarity of the movements, now: it was no longer a struggle to match Cas’ pace, but rather a normality, even – a pleasure. There was something about the way their bodies moved seamlessly, as though connected by ribbons at the wrists and heels, that made Dean’s heart squeeze tight in his chest; it was a sensation of unity, of belonging, that was almost overwhelming.

The first time he predicted the next set without Cas having to call the number, he grinned. Cas met his eyes with surprise as Dean looped his arm over Cas’ head, already preparing to move from six to eight. He’d known exactly what Cas was about to do, from the way he’d glanced left before crouching low, and angled his body sideways as he struck. They didn’t pause, but kept moving – Cas whispering the words when Dean paused, which happened more and more rarely as the night grew dark around them. Their sweating bodies were attuned to each other completely, Dean entirely focused on picking up the signals from Cas’ movements that he needed to predict the next move. It was a dance, it was a puzzle, it was a game; it was physical and cerebral and… spiritual, a closeness between them that Dean had never felt with anyone else before. When it was time to stop, they both flopped down onto the sand without needing to ask.

“We’re getting better at that,” Dean said lightly, looking up at the sky, still breathing hard.

“I’m hungry,” Cas answered, and they sat up as one to start making dinner. Dean ran his hand lightly over the skin of his shoulder, where the handprint burn was still red and slightly raised. He wished it would go, but it seemed to be sticking around; it had hardly changed in appearance since he’d first noticed it.

When the fire was burning, reflecting bright and beautiful in Cas’ eyes, Dean pulled the bottle of aloe that they’d bought out of his pack, and held it up to Cas questioningly.

“You want to use this?” he asked. He needed some, too, but it was more polite to let Cas use it first. Cas accepted it, pouring a little of the thick liquid out of the bottle and applying it to his neck with a hiss of pain as it slathered over his burn.

He began rubbing it in, his fingers working in slow, even circles across his slick skin. Dean watched him silently, his eyes fixed on that motion, those hands, the imagination of that sensation. Cas’ skin dipped a little under his touch, so he was pressing firmly, using the strength in his fingers to rub the oil in deep. Dean swallowed hard. Cas caught his eye, and his gaze didn’t drop after one second, two seconds, three…

“Would you like some?” Cas said, and Dean could have sworn his voice wasn’t usually that low, that velvet-smooth with a fray of seductive roughness at its edge.

Dean took the bottle of aloe, not trusting himself to speak with those eyes still locked on his. Cas’ face was gorgeous in the firelight, Dean falling in love with the flames he’d always hated for the way that they cherished Cas’ features, kissed the smoothness of his jawline under the stubble, and ran tender hands over his high, pink-tinted cheeks. He was breath-taking, Dean couldn’t deny it. His lips were slightly parted, hovering over a question, or perhaps something else…

Dean blinked, and moved an inch back. It felt like moving through tar, but he had to, he had to. He couldn’t let this happen. It just wasn’t fair on either of them. Not only was there the fact that they were going to be parted soon, but today’s conversation had also reminded Dean how little he truly knew of Castiel, of his motives, his past. It was so easy to lose sight of that in the face of the – the connection, the bond that they had, but Dean couldn’t plunge headfirst into something with Castiel when there was so much keeping them apart. He had a feeling that if he jumped, he’d never get out again – he’d never want to. Cas was still watching him, his eyes hot and deep and intense and his lips, his love so warm and close and tempting…

Dean coughed and dipped his head. No.

Even though he wanted to, even though his whole body was a hunger, a human-shaped appetite for the press and pull of touch and oblivion… even still, he couldn’t do it. It just wasn’t fair to Cas, or… or to himself. It would hurt so much more when they had to part, if Dean missed Cas in his arms, instead of just by his side.

Cas handed the aloe over wordlessly, accepting Dean’s decision in the way that his fingers curved delicately over only the top half of the bottle, making sure that their skin didn’t touch.

“Cas,” Dean said, as Cas stood up to go to his sleeping mat. “I… sleep well.”

“Goodnight, Dean,” Castiel replied, his tone unreadable.

As they fell asleep that night on opposite sides of the fire, Dean could have sworn he saw Cas’ eyes glittering, open and watchful as he sank into sleep.

He dreamt of half-open doors, and faces he almost knew.

Chapter Text

The next day was a torture.

The sun was glaring and cruel, staring down at them as though hoping to reduce them to wisps of smoke with the force of its heat. Dean could have sworn it was working; he was sweating furiously under his pelerin, though he couldn’t take it off – not if he didn’t want his skin to crackle right off his bones. Cas was similarly uncomfortable, fidgeting with his clothing and stumping across the sand with obvious annoyance.

They didn’t bother stopping for lunch; instead, they kept walking, Cas rooting around in Dean’s pack and plucking a couple of withering apples out of it. They ate in silence, stomachs still growling long after they’d finished. They permitted themselves a sip of water every hour – one feeble trickle of moisture that didn’t come close to satiating their thirst. Despite their discomfort, however, they didn’t argue as they had yesterday; they walked mostly in silence, offering each other a pat on the shoulder or a nod of encouragement every now and then. They had little energy for more. Dean’s legs had reached a peak of pain, the muscles seizing and straining as he moved, each step an effort of will.

“Dean,” Cas rasped. The sun was past its zenith, but the heat was still intense enough to make Dean feel as though he were dissolving. “Dean – I’m glad you’re here.”

Dean kept walking, trying not to show how taken aback he was. Cas had spoken candidly enough to convince, and besides – it wasn’t as though Dean had been pushing for it. But he’d chosen to say it all the same, and Dean couldn’t help but feel a little tremble in his chest. He’d never heard those words before in his life, not directed at him.

“Thanks,” he said hoarsely, thirst parching the emotion from his tone. “Thanks, Cas.”

“This would not have been possible without you,” Cas said. “I would never have made it alone. I am sorry if I haven’t appeared as grateful as I should. I am unused to being shown kindness.”

The way he said it, quick and matter-of-fact, told Dean that he’d rehearsed the lines in his head a few times before saying them. Despite the heat and the clamminess of his hand, Dean reached out and squeezed Cas’ fingers.

“I figured,” he said. “It’s OK.”

They ploughed on through the sand, heads bent. There wasn’t even a whisper of a breeze. Dean kept replaying those words in his head, round and round, making himself smile. I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad you’re here. It felt good in the same way that sparring with Cas felt good, like – like he had a place to be, a place to stay. A place to belong.

Of course, that was crazy, Dean thought angrily. You haven’t known Cas long, and soon you’re going to be saying goodbye to him forever. Stop getting attached, just – just stop.

Dean’s chest ached, in a way that it never had done before. He looked down at it, pushing his hand against it through his pelerin. Heartache, he thought. He’d heard people talking about it, but he’d always thought that they’d been speaking metaphorically. After all, he’d gone through enough trials and trouble in his life to warrant a little heartache, if it were real, hadn’t he? And yet here it was now, for the first time, a pain in his chest that didn’t ease, that surprised him with its physicality. He scowled. How was this possible?

It was true that everything felt a little – a little looser, somehow, since the night before last. As though when he’d cried, Dean had finally pushed aside a dam that he’d been trying to hold up for years, throwing brick after brick onto a crumbling structure. And now that it was down, now that the river was flowing as it should, maybe he was catching up for lost time. His heart throbbed in his chest, as if in agreement.

But in breaking the dam, had he – had he broken himself? Dean pushed worriedly against his chest, willing the pain to stop. It ignored him, worsening slightly. What if – Yarım save him, what if it never went away? Dean’s sadness had been with him for years, unspoken, leaking out in anger and protectiveness and long, long days without speaking, without eating. What if now he had this pain in his chest forever, to go with it? It had been better when it was all inside his head, rather than in his body, too.

He should never have opened up to Cas. He should have kept that dam in place, exactly where it was supposed to be, keeping him safe from the pain.

It was all because he’d come on this journey with Cas. Before he’d come, he’d been… strong Dean, good-looking Dean, Dean the savaşçı in training, best in the class. Now, he knew better. He wasn’t strong; he was weak, and cowardly, and… sad. He wanted things he couldn’t have, he was no one’s golden boy. All those lessons he’d aced in the classroom had been turned to nothing in less than a week. He should never have come. He should have lived in blissful ignorance for the rest of his life.

Dean could feel tears welling up in his eyes again, and blinked them away furiously. He shouldn’t have opened up to Cas, he shouldn’t have revisited any of those memories.

And yet…

Perhaps this had always been inevitable, perhaps – perhaps it was right, even, that he finally felt the measure of his own sadness. Dean’s forehead creased as he thought back. Maybe he’d been hurting for years, without even knowing – hurting and bruised behind a wall of numbness, and now that he’d realised, now that he felt it, he could… start to make it better? The river was flowing as it should, he thought again. Maybe its waters could wear away the hard parts of his heart, and clean away the rubble. Give it back to him how it was supposed to be, soft and clean and whole.

And no matter what happened… Dean knew that without Castiel coming into his life, he’d be a lesser man. It was wrong to think that he’d once been a warrior, and that Cas and the journey had taken that from him. In truth, he’d just seen behind his own façade, pushed over the cardboard cut-out of the person he’d thought himself to be. All his false arrogance and idle dreaming and emotional numbness had been stripped away. And it hurt, it hurt badly, and yet… perhaps it felt like the right kind of pain. The kind of pain that healed, and left a clean, white scar over skin that was unbroken. And maybe – maybe when this was over, he could find his strength again – a new strength. A real one.

“Cas?” Dean said roughly. “I’m glad I’m here, too.” He looked over at Cas, whose wide eyes crinkled into a smile as he watched.

“You are a better man than I thought you were, when we first met,” Cas said quietly. Dean snorted.

“Same here, to be honest,” he said, thinking back to the first time he’d met Cas – how he’d disliked his rudeness, his dumb authoritative tone… and his nose. “I thought you were a total pain in the ass, actually.”

Cas’ forehead creased.

“Pain in the ass?” he said, his eyes dipping downwards, looking at Dean’s…

“You know,” Dean said gruffly. “Moron. Idiot. What part of Ateş Aşiret did you say you’d grown up in, again?”

He’d meant the question jokingly, but the expression in Cas’ eyes was dark and serious.

“A tribe in the south,” he said sternly, flatly, as if by rote. “Near the Red Forest.”

“Thought so,” Dean replied after a moment. “Wasn’t anyone ever all that nice to you, down there?”

Cas paused, thinking.

“No,” he said. “They weren’t. I was always alone.”

“Didn’t you have brothers or sisters?” Dean asked. Not that having siblings always helped with loneliness, Dean thought, pushing away thoughts of Sam. It wasn’t his brother’s fault that they didn’t have much in common any more.

“Many,” Cas said with a grimace. “But I never knew them all very well. We had very different… ideologies.”

“Right,” said Dean, nodding as though he understood what that meant. So Cas believed in something that his brothers and sisters didn’t? There was that whisper of heresy again, the one that Dean had picked up on before when they’d been speaking about the Vigil. It gave Dean a cold feeling in his gut. His own relationship with Yarım had always been… distant, in the sense that she’d never spoken to him – not even once – but he’d been taught to believe in her ever since he was born. Everyone believed in the goddess. If you didn’t… Dean cast a guilty look up at Güneş Yarısı, watching him, seeing his spark of doubt. He pushed the subject away. Better not to risk it.

“Well, I’m glad you’re finally getting a little kindness in your life,” he said lightly. “Maybe you could learn a thing or two.” He held out his hand, silently asking for the bottle of water in Cas’ pack.

Cas looked at him askance as he reached back and handed it to him.

“Learn a thing or two?” he repeated dubiously while Dean drank his sip, his tone walking the line between amusement and confusion.

“Yeah, you know,” said Dean, deadpan, as he gave it back. Cas tucked it away into his pack. “So that you won’t be such a grumpy bastard next time we have to talk to other people.”

Cas stopped walking.

“I am not a grumpy bastard,” he said, sounding positively prim. Dean couldn’t help but laugh at him – and when Cas reacted by putting his hands on his hips, that only made him laugh more.

“Stop it!” Cas said, and Dean was laughing even harder, throwing his head back and taking a couple of steps to correct himself when that put him off balance. Cas’ eyes were narrowed, but Dean could read the spark of enjoyment under his affront.

“I am very polite when speaking with the general public,” Cas insisted. “I am brief and to the point.”

“Brief to the point of rudeness, you mean,” Dean said, grabbing Cas’ shoulder and shaking it with a broad grin on his face. Cas shrugged him off and gave him a little push back, and they started walking again.

“I don’t care about their opinion of me,” Cas said simply, after a few moments. “Why should I pretend to like them when they probably don’t like me?”

“Well, because… it’s polite,” Dean said. “It’s what people do.”

That was the wrong answer and Dean knew it as soon as the words came out of his mouth. Cas’ brows were drawn down low into a deep frown.

“I feel no need whatsoever to comply with societal convention,” Cas said grumpily. Dean rolled his eyes as Cas went on, “Society is filled with flaws and unfairness. There is no reason for us to pander to its traditions.”

“Sure there is, if you want people to like you,” Dean said.

“I don’t particularly want or need people to like me,” Cas replied flatly. “Their opinion of me is irrelevant.”

“You must be fun at parties,” said Dean, smiling.

“Parties are not fun,” Cas responded. “With or without me.”

“Maybe that’s because you’re determined not to like anyone at them,” Dean pointed out. “Maybe they would be fun if you tried to make friends.”

“I shouldn’t have to try,” Cas snipped. “Relationships form easily between similarly-minded people. I’m not going to waste my efforts attempting to connect to someone with whom I have almost nothing in common.”

“You know, Cas,” said Dean, “there’s taking a high moral standpoint, and then there’s just being a dick.”

Cas glowered at him.

“Name-slinging doesn’t win an argument,” he said.

“Neither does being a dick.”

“Excellent riposte,” Cas said dryly. “You must be known in Şehir for your witty comebacks.”

“Comebacks, not so much,” Dean replied, his mouth replying before his brain had fully caught up. “Coming on backs, now that comes up more often.”

Cas actually paused halfway through a step. Dean guessed that if he could’ve seen Cas’ face, his mouth would be hanging open.

“Uh…” he said. Yarım damn him, the one time he had a quick reply ready and it had to be one of the dirtiest things he’d ever said outside the bedroom? Super.

“That sounds like quite the reputation,” Cas said after a moment, his tone smooth and easy. Dean could say what he liked about Cas’ interpersonal skills, but he couldn’t deny his ability to gloss over difficult moments.

“It’s… uh… yeah,” Dean mumbled. He was glad the headscarf was covering most of his face, so that Cas couldn’t see his blush. Damn, that one would have gone down well in a bar in Şehir. He’d have to remember it.

The thought of going back to his old haunts in Şehir, getting in some drinks, hitting on some cute strangers… it made him feel cold inside. He tried to ground himself in the present, looking down at the sand, tasting the dryness in his mouth, hearing the swish swish of their feet moving in time. He wanted to remember every detail. The journey wasn’t even over, and he already knew he was going to miss it terribly when it was over. The ache in his heart throbbed a little, reminding him that it was there. I know, buddy. It’s gonna be OK.

Dean glanced over at Cas, and caught him staring. He allowed himself a moment gazing into those blue, blue eyes, matching their colour with the wide open sky above them – the sky that was free of clouds, free of buildings and spires, free of limitations. It was huge, and deep, and exactly what it wanted to be.

Dean wanted to dive into it, and stay there forever.

*

When they stopped that evening to set up camp, they moved swiftly and efficiently, performing the jobs that needed to be done without difficulty. They crossed each other’s path like a lattice, never getting in the other’s way. Dean opened up the windbreak and turned to pick up the hammer, to find Cas already holding it out for him to take, his own concentration entirely on unrolling the sleeping mats with his other hand. Dean took it, his little finger brushing slightly against Castiel’s.

He snatched the hammer away too fast to pretend as though he hadn’t noticed it happen, but Cas didn’t react at all – to the contact, or to Dean’s nervousness afterwards. He finished unrolling the mats, and then pulled off his tunic, ready to spar.

The fire was lit, but Dean barely glanced at it as he followed suit. His pulse still started to race if he looked at it for too long, but he found that he was no longer quite so frightened by the flames as he had been.

It spat a little, and Dean flinched.

He did still have some way to go.

When they fought later on, it was with single-minded fluidity. Dean no longer had to try in order to be able to tell which move Cas wanted next; it was in the curve of his neck or the angle of his arm or the leftward glance of his eyes. Cas’ body was a language that Dean had learned to speak – and the first time Dean pre-empted Cas, and took control of which set came next, Cas reacted with barely a pause. They began to take turns choosing, deciding whose choice was next in a fraction of a second’s worth of eye contact. Their dance was becoming faster, and harder: their muscles were strengthening, adjusting to the constant push, push, push of walking and fighting and walking once more.

Before they were finished, their movements were called to a halt by the sound of a yell, echoing across the desert like a stone skimmed across its sandy surface.

Dean and Cas came to an abrupt halt, Cas still gripping Dean’s upper arm for a moment in a grapple hold.

“What was that?” Dean asked, and Cas let go, frowning.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It sounded like a person.”

Dean stared out onto the sands, as far as the circle of firelight would allow.

“Do you think we should…” he said helplessly, gesturing into the darkness. Cas lifted a shoulder.

“Do what?” he said. “Spend our night searching for a needle in a haystack?”

Dean chewed his lip, straining his ears for any more sounds. Was that… did he just hear faint, echoed laughter? He squinted, trying to scan the darkness for any signs of life. The sands were so flat, here, that he should surely be able to see any fires that were lit for miles around.

“Dean…?” Cas said, watching his face.

“There!” Dean interrupted, pointing out into the blackness. Far away, almost indiscernible from the stars nearest the horizon, was a smudge of yellowy light. Cas narrowed his eyes at it, tilting his head to one side.

“Many people traverse the desert,” he said, after a pause. “Perhaps it’s a group of travellers. Or perhaps it’s another nomadic village, a few miles away.”

Dean swallowed. For some reason, the sight and sounds of other people in the desert unnerved him. He felt as though he and Cas had been building their own little universe out here, and the unwanted reminder of the real world’s existence made him feel irrationally angry at the owners of that fire.

“Morons,” he said uncharitably. “Bet they’re firemakers, too.”

Cas said nothing, but continued to stare into the darkness. Dean turned away, stumping back towards their own firelight, letting the warmth of it bathe his body.

“Come back to the fire,” he called after a moment. Cas was still standing with his back to the flames, but at Dean’s words, he turned round with a small, worried smile and came to sit down.

“My legs are killing me,” Dean groaned, as Cas joined him. “And I’m hungry.”

“Those should be about ready,” Cas said, glancing towards the fire. Dean had set up a makeshift spit using the savaşçı’s dagger and the cheaper knives that he and Cas had bought at the market, and Cas had speared a couple of their potatoes and roasted them over the flames as they sparred. They were starting to smell glorious – back in Şehir, Dean would have turned his nose up at a plain potato, but here and now he would have fought a desert wolf for a scrap of hot food.

Cas reached a hand towards the handle of the nearest knife, hissing at the heat and pulling it back; even before he’d fully recoiled, Dean was reaching for his headscarf and passing it to Cas to wrap around his fingers before he tried again. Cas nodded in acknowledgement as he took it, lifting the knives away from the flames with a frown of concentration and sliding the potatoes off their sharpened blades, onto the brown paper bags that Dean had ready. They split open the potatoes’ cracked skins, and breathed in their steamy, fibrous scent as though they were smelling pure nectar from Yarım’s garden.

They smiled at each other over each sweet, burning mouthful, like treasure-hunters who had struck gold. The potato filled their stomachs like cold food never could, relaxing their aching muscles a little more with every hot, delicious bite; they were gone all too soon, but for the first time in a few days, Dean felt satiated. He found himself staring into the fire, his eyes soft and peaceful. He blinked and turned, to find Cas watching him with a small, unconscious smile on his face. He looked as beautiful as he always did in the firelight, his face an orange-kissed silhouette that Dean could hardly stand to look at in front of the inky black background of the night. He was almost blindingly gorgeous, his eyes brighter than the stars in the sky.

That was the most horribly clichéd thing I’ve ever thought in my life, Dean thought. But he wasn’t taking it back.

“Why’d you always look at me?” Dean said. A dangerous question, a leading question, and he knew it. But Cas was so close, so touchable and warm and near, and it was making his head spin.

Cas didn’t answer for a moment, seemingly weighing up his options. Dean watched him think, trying to keep the fondness out of his eyes.

“Because you are interesting,” Cas settled on saying, not meeting Dean’s gaze. Dean pulled a face.

“Well, I do try,” he said jokingly, but Cas shook his head seriously.

“That’s the opposite of what you do,” he said. “Your face… moves, changes. It’s like – a book that I can’t read fast enough.” Cas’ gaze was roaming Dean’s face as he spoke, almost dreamily, as though he’d forgotten that Dean could even hear him. “It’s fascinating. Usually, the expressions of the people around me mean very little. I either don’t understand or don’t care, but… I could spend hours watching you.”

Dean was stunned into silence, his mouth half-open. After a beat of disbelief, he started to feel as though his heart was going to burst out of his chest, it was beating so hard, so strong. His eyes were fixed on Cas’, unable to look away.

“Cas…” he said, unsure how to answer. He swallowed, and watched Cas’ eyes dip to his throat.

“Forgive me,” Cas said, looking down at his loosely-clasped hands. “I’m not usually so…” He trailed off, apparently uncertain what exactly he’d been, but aware that it had crossed a line that they had been carefully negotiating up until now. Dean wanted not to care, wanted to be completely unmoved by hearing Cas speaking about him like that – but he couldn’t help his body’s reaction, the way his pulse was racing, the way his skin was all afire with tingling, the way he was hungry – so hungry for Cas, hungry in his hands and in his mouth…

“Cas,” he said again, still having no idea what to say. He’d been told before that he was handsome; he’d always known, from people’s reaction to him, that he was good-looking; but this was the first time in his life that he’d felt truly attractive, in himself, inside and out. It was a feeling that he didn’t understand, didn’t know how to react to. “That’s… that’s really… no one’s ever said anything like that to me before.”

Cas squinted up at him, his expression disbelieving. His scepticism pulled a little distance between them, gave Dean some space to breathe.

“It’s true,” he said, spreading his hands.

“I cannot be the first person to notice your beauty,” Cas said, his voice so low and natural, speaking those words as though they were easy, as though they were obvious. Dean could feel himself falling, actually falling, the sensation in his stomach and in his head, giddying and not nearly as unpleasant as he needed it to be.

You can’t have this, he reminded himself, with all the sternness he could muster. You can’t.

“Well, no,” he said, rocking back slightly, putting more air between himself and Castiel, as though that might help to lessen the pressure of his heart against his ribs. His heart, which didn’t hurt anymore, it… it wanted. Desperately. “Other people have told me I’m pretty.” He fluttered his eyelashes comically, cajoling a smile out of Cas. “But no one’s said it quite like that.”

“Maybe no one has seen you quite like this,” Cas said, almost too softly to be heard.

Dean was speechless. Cas had been paying attention to him, all this time – and he’d known that, of course he had, but he hadn’t thought about it, because… well, because he was half-hopeful and half-terrified, full of a need that he knew could never be satisfied, and so certain that this could only end in hurt for both of them.

“We – we should get some sleep,” he said, with an almighty effort. “Long day tomorrow. As usual.”

Cas nodded silently, his features arranged to be unreadable. What are you thinking? Dean wondered. Do you think I’m clueless, or that I’m rejecting you? Do you understand why?

They lay themselves down on opposite sides of the fire as usual. Cas had his back to Dean tonight, the flames’ light flickering over the soft curls of hair at the back of his neck. The temptation to pick up his blanket, take the few easy steps around the fire, lie down behind Cas, and press his lips to that warm skin was almost overwhelming. He could sense Cas’ hurt, his confusion, and he didn’t know how to fix it. He wanted them to keep living in this bubble that they’d created, to never come out of the desert again – to live here forever, whilst the rest of the world waited in stasis. But that was impossible. He was who he was, and Cas was Cas. Those things were real. And the way that he felt for Cas – that was an infatuation. It seemed real, but it could never be realised – it was nascent fire that could never be more than a spark, a wish, flaring brightly against the sky before fading to black. And so it was an infatuation, a crush. A crush so heavy that it was going to break his ribs and grind his heart to a powder. A crush.

Dean sank into an uneasy sleep, shallow and dream-filled.

He saw Ash, lying on the floor, the tattoo on his wrist shining brightly under the light of Ayın Yarısı, which was wide open and crying stars in the sky – and he looked again, and Ash was his mother, lying on the ground with the tattoo on her wrist and the emptiness of death in her wide, staring eyes. Dean tried to cry out, but his mouth was sewn shut… he was stumbling backwards, reaching…

And then a hand, in his. A body that didn’t stop him falling, but instead fell with him. And lay next to him, curved against him. He turned his head to see blue eyes.

Cas. Of course.

Dean was happy to see him here.

“I haven’t told you everything,” Dean said without speaking, but Cas pressed a finger to his lips.

“I do,” Cas said, and that didn’t make sense; Dean opened his mouth to tell Cas so, but it was sewn closed, how had he forgotten? Cas ran his fingers regretfully over the threads in his lips, and then down over Dean’s chin, over his throat, his collar bones. Dean could feel his body reacting. He was sweating; Yarım, he was half-hard already, just from the lightest trail of Cas’ warm, purposeful hands over his skin.

“Cas,” Dean gasped, and Cas nodded.

“You’re a better man,” he said seriously, and then touched his finger to Dean’s forehead – and somehow it felt amazing, fuck, it felt perfect, the friction against his skin all-encompassing, stretching down his abdomen, rubbing against his hardness in just the way he needed, the way he was aching for… and Cas’ eyes were still on his, vision skittering in and out of focus, Cas impossibly far away and then incredibly close, his open mouth on Dean’s neck in a hungry press that Dean couldn’t quite feel properly… he was getting closer, and –

“Cas!” he called, his body jolting with pleasure, his eyes flying open, and seeing only the night, only the stars, only the wide, wide sky…

For a moment, he just breathed, collapsing back onto his sleeping mat with a curse and a hand pressed over his eyes.

Of all the things to dream about…

Dean’s mind replayed the moment when Cas had leaned down to kiss his neck, his lips so pink and perfect. The imagined sensation sent a shiver of desire all the way down his spine.

“Dean?” Cas’ voice sounded through the night, making Dean jump; he quickly rolled over onto his side, hiding his obvious arousal as best he could with his thin blanket. “Are you alright?”

“M’fine,” Dean muttered, his face bright red. Yarım save him, he’d just had the most pleasurable and intense dream of his life, and Cas had barely even touched him in it. He tried to think of something, anything at all that wasn’t the sensation of warmth and friction across his body, or the way Cas had stared at him as Dean had cried out his name…

“I thought I heard you call my name,” Cas said. “You sounded…” He let his voice trail away, obviously searching for the right word; before he could find it, Dean cut in.

“It’s nothing,” he said, more firmly. “I was just dreaming, it’s all good.”

“I see,” said Cas, in a tone that suggested Cas saw rather more than Dean would have preferred. It occurred to him that there was no trace of bleariness in Cas’ voice. Did that mean… what if he’d been awake the whole time? Dean’s entire body was afire at the thought of Cas lying with his eyes wide, watching Dean jolt and moan out his name in the throes of his pleasure…

“Well,” Dean said hoarsely, “sorry for keeping you up.”

Dean could almost taste the obvious smart-ass answer to that on the tip of his tongue; I think it’s more the other way around right now, Dean, begged to be said – but Cas resisted the temptation, and said nothing more than an innocent, “Goodnight, Dean.”

He’d definitely thought of it, though. Dean was sure.

He rolled over on his mat, facing away from the flames. He could feel the outline of the bottle of lubricant on his chest when he lay this way – and suddenly its presence in his life wasn’t so much a source of embarrassment, but of possibility…

Dean sighed, closed his eyes, and tried very hard to think of nothing at all as he drifted back into sleep.

It almost worked.

Chapter Text

Dean had expected awkwardness the next day, but he was surprised once again by Cas’ ability to lack self-consciousness. Their morning routine went as it usually did – though Dean was a little more careful with how he shook Cas into wakefulness, and Cas opened his eyes almost immediately, as though to spare Dean the closeness of contact.

They set off across the sands once more, making sure to keep the rising sun directly behind them, heading due west. Their supplies were starting to look a little thin, and there was no sign of another nomad village to be seen; they’d struck lucky that first time, incredibly lucky, but they couldn’t rely on doing so again. Dean gave them a little less for breakfast, making sure that they would have enough to last at least another two days – perhaps three, if they cut down even further.

They started out across the sands, and today Dean’s muscles didn’t ache with the very first step. He felt loose, relaxed, ready. Strong.

He looked out to the horizon, and frowned.

“Does that look… closer than usual?” he asked of Cas, pointing out into the distance. Cas, who was busy wrapping his scarf around his head, paused to look in the direction Dean was indicating.

“The horizon?” he asked, his voice still rough with its morning burr. He squinted at it. “Perhaps.”

They kept walking. If the horizon really was closer today, that could mean only one thing: dunes. An end to the interminable flatness. In short, the promise of a new landscape.

It was only when the expectation of different surroundings was whispered that Dean found how keen he was to hear it. He was tired of the sands, of the dryness, of the thirst. He was no fan of heights, but right now, he would have willingly sold a kidney to be standing on a mountain, perhaps taking a deep drink from a gushing spring. Just the thought of clear, crystalline waters…

Dean seemed to be made of nothing but unquenchable thirst, these days.

His mind kept flicking back to the dream, as hard as he tried to keep his mind away from it. It had been so vivid, so intense, the sensations almost real… Dean wondered how much of it really had been real, if he’d been using his own hand before he awoke. Yarım, and Cas had probably been watching…

Before he could dwell on it for too long, walking that knife-edge of embarrassment and – Yarım forgive him – excitement, Dean turned his thoughts to the first half of the dream. He’d hated it, and yet there was one part that he couldn’t quite let go; the tattoo, blazing bright on Ash’s wrist, on his mother’s. She couldn’t really have had that tattoo, could she? So why had he dreamed it onto her – her body?

“Cas,” he said aloud. “You remember the tattoo on Ash’s wrist? Not too big, kinda red and gold, looked like veins?”

Cas, his eyes on the horizon, made an unintelligible affirmative noise. It was still too early for lengthy interaction.

“D’you know anything about it? Like… what it is?”

Cas glanced at him for a long moment, seeming to weigh him silently, deciding what to say.

“No,” he said finally. A lie, Dean was sure. Cas probably had a reason for telling it – something to do with spies, then, in all likelihood. Dean dropped the subject; he didn’t want Cas to feel pressured to compromise his mission.

“I love tattoos,” he said instead. “Always wanted to get one.”

“Commitment,” Cas said, reaching up a hand and rubbing the tiredness out of his eyes. Yarım, he was adorable in the mornings. Dean wanted to press his lips to the lines under his eyes and make him a cup of coffee.

Focus, Dean, focus.

“It is a commitment,” he conceded. “Not something I’ve ever really done before. No idea how it would go.”

Cas looked at him sideways, his eyes sharp.

“You don’t have a partner, then?” he said, suddenly seeming much more awake. Ah. Dean could see his line of thinking: obvious attraction plus inability to follow through equalled someone waiting at home. Sorry, Cas. Nice try.

“Nope,” Dean said, trying to make it sound as easy as Cas would have done, in his situation. “I’ve had my share of, uh, flings and fun… but nothing that lasted. For some reason, they all said I was emotionally unavailable.”

He was glad that he was wearing his headscarf, so that he didn’t have to paste on a wry grin as he said it. It was true, he knew, but hearing it behind their lame excuses every time had chipped away at his soul. Sorry, Dean, I’m just not looking for a relationship right now… Thanks, Dean, but there’s no need to pretend like that, I know you don’t really want to date me, haha… You’re a good fuck, Dean, but I don’t really want anything more... At least not with you.

“Unbelievable,” said Cas, his voice so soaked in sarcasm that Dean could hardly believe he’d once thought Cas didn’t understand it. He smiled, and shrugged.

“No big deal,” he said lightly. “I had other things to focus on, anyway. For a while after… after what happened to my mom, I was all my little brother had… and then there was savaşçı training, and –”

“You were all your little brother had?” Cas cut in, sounding curious. “What about your father?”

“Bobby and Ellen were great,” Dean said, jaw clenched. “But Sam relied on me pretty heavily. Which was fine, you know. I guess I relied on him, too. Maybe more than I should’ve. I think he kind of resents me for it, now.”

Cas frowned.

“You suffered a terrible experience,” he said. “If you only had each other, it’s right that there was a reliance between you.”

“Yeah,” Dean said. He felt strange talking to Cas about his brother, almost disloyal, but he’d been carrying his hurt over Sam’s behaviour around with him for months now, and… well, Cas already knew so much more about him than anyone else, so why not? It wasn’t as though Sam and Cas were ever going to meet. And Cas wouldn’t judge Sam harshly. At least, Dean thought that he could trust Cas not to do that. He cleared his throat. “I dunno, I guess sometimes we got wrapped up in our own little world, you know? There was Jo, too, but Sam’n’me… I took care of him, I made sure the kids at school treated him right. I…” Dean struggled to find a way to articulate the closeness between himself and his brother, and came up empty.

“You love him very much,” Cas said, a smile in his voice.

“’Course,” Dean said, a little thickly. “He’s my brother. But – recently, I don’t think he’s… I don’t know what to do, or even what I did wrong, he’s just…” Dean lapsed into silence, making a show of adjusting his headscarf so that he didn’t have to speak.

“Dean?” Cas pressed, not allowing him to let it go. Dean swallowed.

“He ignores me,” he said, trying to keep the hurt out of his voice and failing. “He doesn’t talk to me, he just… sits up in his room, wrapped up in books. And I love that he’s so smart, don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t be more damn proud, but… I miss him.” Dean’s voice wobbled slightly on that last phrase, the emotion rising in him like a freak wave, sudden and strong. “I miss talking with him, how he used to come running home with all these stories about the crap he’d learned in school… he used to like me, and now –” He broke off abruptly, before his waterworks started up again in earnest. Words weren’t enough to describe how sharply he felt the lack of his brother’s good opinion. Sam’s eyes had once lit up when he’d seen Dean coming into the room; now he kept them fixed on his books, grunted and shrugged, refused to come out and train with Dean in the evenings. It was like he hated Dean.

“I’m sure Sam still likes you,” Cas said thoughtfully. “How old is he?”

“Eighteen,” Dean said, a little croakily.

“Dean, at eighteen, I was miserable,” said Cas. “I snapped at everyone I spoke to, ignored the people closest to me, and spent most of my time being deliberately unhelpful.”

Dean half-smiled.

“So your nineteenth birthday was yesterday, then?” he said, earning himself a glare and a one-handed shove from Cas.

“The point I am trying to make,” Cas went on determinedly, “is that Sam sounds like a normal teenager. Pushing the boundaries of the people he loves, finding his place in the world.”

“Yeah… maybe,” Dean said. “I just wish we were still friends. I think maybe I was too hard on him sometimes, when we were kids. But he didn't listen to anyone else, and someone had to tell him right from wrong... I dunno.” Dean ducked his head. He didn’t like to think about it too hard; it felt like putting weight on a bridge that was already on the point of breaking, as though if he pushed in the wrong place, the whole thing would come crashing down. As it was, it had been holding up, just barely.

“It sounds as though your role was difficult,” Cas said. “Being a taskmaster, protector and friend all at once isn’t easy.”

“I could’ve done it better,” said Dean, almost as a whisper. This was a shame that he’d carried with him for years, so ingrained that it was part of his own foundations. “Sometimes I got jealous, or angry, and I shouted at him when he didn’t really deserve it. It’s probably why he doesn’t like me now.” He was doing his best to speak lightly, but his words had a clang to them which spoke of the depths from which they’d risen. He sounded hurt, he realised. Hurt and ashamed.

“Dean, you were a brother,” Cas said. “My brothers’ attitudes towards me varied between dislike, hatred and total indifference. Most of them didn’t even bother to get to know me.” He hesitated for a moment, a pause in the conversation like the gap between stepping stones. “You cared about Sam. Despite your mistakes, I think that’s what is most important.”

Dean lifted his shoulder in half a shrug.

“He always knew he could rely on me…” he began.

“Exactly,” Cas interposed.

“… up until I ran away to the mountains with a guy I’d never met before. He probably hates me for leaving.” Dean felt as dry as the desert itself, inside and out. “We’ll never be friends again.”

There was a moment of silence.

“I think,” Cas said, “you will see him on your return, and perhaps this experience will prompt a much-needed conversation.” He sounded awkward, stilted; Dean remembered what Cas had said yesterday about how little he knew – or, indeed, cared – about the feelings of others. Cas was making a real effort to console him, negotiating unknown waters.

“Yeah,” he said, wanting to reward Cas’ efforts. And he did feel better, now that he thought about it. Maybe he and Sam could actually talk about their issues? He’d kept it all bottled up inside, assuming that Sam would think he was stupid – and be even more likely to hate him – if he opened up, but Dean’s hurt and confusion was fracturing their relationship just as much as Sam’s reticence. Realising it was like a lightning strike through Dean’s mind. He had to talk to Sam, just like Cas said – and when he got back would be the perfect time to do it, when they weren’t still caught in the rut that they’d dug themselves into.

“Thanks, Cas,” he said. “For putting up with me moaning at you.” If he wasn’t careful, Cas was going to ditch him in the middle of the desert because he couldn’t stand any more grumbling.

And yet Dean didn’t really believe that would happen.

He frowned, examining his feelings, waiting for the familiar spike of fear. He was always afraid that the people around him would leave him. He’d barely known Cas any time at all, not nearly long enough to build up that kind of trust. He must be afraid that Cas would leave him… the fear had to be there. Dean waited. It normally started with a coldness in his stomach.

It wasn’t there.

For some reason, Dean really didn’t believe that Cas would leave him behind. Maybe it was because they relied on each other, out here in the desert. Maybe it was because he thought Cas was too decent to abandon him, stranded on his own. Maybe it had more to do with their simple physicality – the pull between their bodies, the thread strung between them that hadn’t even been pulled taut in days, hanging loose by their sides as they walked together, side by side.

Whatever it was, Dean looked at Cas – and he didn’t feel afraid. Not even a little.

He swallowed hard. This – this was important. This was big. Cas was the first person he’d ever met whom he hadn’t assumed would leave him if he said the wrong thing, or argued, or spoke his mind too strongly. Half the reason he hadn’t spoken for months when he first went to Ellen and Bobby’s was fear that they would find out he was a bad person, and make him and Sam leave. And Sam himself had always been the closest exception to the rule, but these days he’d been acting – well, not as though he wanted to leave, but rather as though part of him had already left. Everyone left Dean – except now, inexplicably, his heart didn’t seem to think that Cas would.

All this, when Cas was the only person he’d ever known who absolutely had to leave his life. Their friendship went as far as the mountains, but couldn’t cross. The one person Dean trusted not to abandon him, and he was going to have to let him go.

Dean looked over at him now. Cas was watching him, his eyes expectant.

“Hmm?” Dean said. “Sorry, I was just thinking.”

“I said that you were always welcome to my expert advice,” Cas said, with a healthy slice of irony in his voice. “And I wanted to know if you were thirsty.”

Dean took the water with a grateful nod, tugging his headscarf down to take a small swig.

Perhaps this newfound lack of fear wasn’t specifically tied to Castiel, Dean thought to himself hopefully, as he passed it back. Maybe he was growing as a person, learning to trust in new ways, and when he got back to Şehir he’d find himself a different man, a man able to forge meaningful connections without the ever-present nagging fear that other people didn’t feel the same way, that they didn’t care as much as he did, that they were going to leave. Perhaps it wasn’t the fact that Cas was Cas, maybe it was just because he was here. And when he had other people around Dean, his trust would be given to them, just as easily.

Dean closed his eyes, and Cas’ face leapt into his mind – earnest and kind and just a little bit sad. He had such an easy sincerity about him; he invited trust with the smallest of gestures, the slight upward curve of his lip, the narrowing of his eyes, the wrinkling of his stupid, stupid nose. And he was hardly an open book; he had long, long depths that Dean knew he didn’t understand – but it was as if… as if when Dean spoke down that well, the sounds that echoed back to him were clear and true. Cas was an enigma, but he was a good one. Dean felt it.

Sure, Dean thought to himself wryly, trying to get back to his original train of thought. It has nothing at all to do with Cas being Cas. Nothing whatsoever.

He swallowed hard, and tried to focus all his attention on walking. He shouldn’t think about Cas. He shouldn’t think about anything except his own footsteps: the ones that were taking him forward, the ones that would soon take him back home.

*

The horizon really had been closer. They’d hit dunes around the time when they ate lunch, and had spent the whole of the afternoon and evening making far slower progress, heaving themselves up the sandy hills and fighting gravity on the way down.

They set up camp in silence, limping around on legs that had been tested in new and unwelcome ways. This time, they couldn’t see any firelight as the darkness closed in – but the dunes were so high all around them that they probably wouldn’t have known if there had been an entire army camped a hundred feet away.

They sat together by the fire, nibbling on the skins of their potatoes. Every now and then, their shoulders grazed together. Dean told himself that this was acceptable, because he had sat down first, and Cas had chosen to sit close enough to allow it. The entire thing was out of his hands.

“There’ll be places to buy food when we get to the mountains, right?” Dean said suddenly. Cas looked over at him, but Dean went on quickly before he could say anything. “You know, so that you’ll have enough to eat when you cross the mountains, and… and I’ll have something for the journey back home.”

“Yes,” said Cas, his tone reflecting the subtlety of Dean’s; it had the same determined lightness, the same underlying drag of unspoken sadness. “And we still have enough money left to buy it, so there won’t be any more impromptu circus acts.”

Dean grinned.

“That was something,” he said. “If you’d have told me a week ago that I was going to get up on stage and prance about with a knife and a ladder, I’d have laughed in your everdark face.”

Cas smiled down at his hands, clasped loosely between his knees. His beard was starting to really grow out, long and soft-looking. Seeing it, Dean brushed a hand up against his own cheek; sure enough, he had his own fuzz coming in, maybe a little longer than Cas’.

“You were very brave,” Cas said. Dean shrugged.

“I only did it because you were there,” he said, and then – because he was stupid, and had a damned runaway mouth, he found himself adding, “You’re really something, Cas.”

Cas glanced over at him, his eyes wide and surprised, his lips unfurling into a small, delighted smile. He didn’t speak, but let his obvious pleasure answer for him. The silence between them was different tonight – not so heavy and taut with physical want, but warmer, more thoughtful. Deeper. Dean lay back, looking up at the stars. Cas followed his lead – of course he did – and Dean felt it again: that unity, that sense of belonging together. They looked up together, two pairs of eyes, two hearts, under one magnificent sky.

“Isn’t it strange,” Cas said after a while, “that there is nothing between the Earth and a star, but – the distance is still insurmountable?”

Dean said nothing, letting his silence speak for his confusion.

“Between the Earth and the stars is only blackness,” Cas said, waving a hand up at the dark, dark sky. “It’s nothingness. But they can never cross it.”

He looked over at Dean, who was watching his face with quiet wonder.

“There’s nothing keeping them apart,” Cas said softly. “But they’ll never touch.”

If Dean could have done it without falling absolutely and irrevocably in love, he would have reached out and taken Cas’ hand.

Instead, he twisted his fingers into a tangled lattice over his chest, and tried not to mind the ache in his heavy, leaden heart.

“Maybe they will one day,” he said eventually. He spoke to the sky, like a plea, or a prayer. “If the star falls to Earth.”

They fell asleep where they lay, their backs against the cold sand, their bodies curved towards each other, pulled by a force that could not be denied – and held in place by a weight that could not be cast away.

*

Dean woke to the sound of a nightmare.

The animal howl ripped through the dark, bloodthirsty and wild like the cry of a wolf. It was wet and raw and close, so close, and coming ever nearer. Dean was paralysed for a long, agonised second, before his body reacted, muscles swinging him into a crouch, wide round eyes peering into the dark – and one hand reaching for Cas, grabbing for his arm.

Cas’ hand took Dean’s, and made a silent, strong fist. They sat motionless, Dean praying that whatever foul creature had made that noise had passed them by.

And then a flare went up, illuminating the sands like a firework that went on, and on – and by its ghostly, vicious light, Dean could see them. All around him and Cas, like jackals ready to pounce.

Soldiers. More of them than Dean could count, and all of them approaching at a terrible speed. One of them yelled again, and Dean gasped, his breath ripped from his chest by fear. His heart was thundering, his hand slipping out of Cas’ as he leapt inelegantly to his feet, stumbling in his hurry. His eyes scanned the ground for the pelerin that he’d abandoned earlier, during their sparring – shit, there it was, on the other side of the fire. The soldiers were closing in, their tunics white, their boots thudding heavily over the ominous shink shink shink of their chain armour. They were running down the dune, picking up speed. One of them fell, and was kicked and stepped on mindlessly by the others as they ran on, single-minded as starving hounds. Dean glanced back at Cas, and saw a mirror of his own desperate hopelessness on his friend’s face. There were too many of them. They didn’t stand a chance.

But they had to try. Dean moved for his pelerin at the same time as Cas dived towards the fire, picking up two of the knives that they’d used to roast potatoes earlier. Dean’s hand wrapped around the hilt of the savaşçı’s dagger, and he raised it to waist-height, keeping his legs bent. At least some of the soldiers were faster than the others, staggering their arrival a little – just enough that Dean could hope that they might not be completely consumed by the first oncoming wave.

The closest of them was coming from the east. Dean turned to face him, and felt Cas press up behind him, guarding his back with his own body. His pulse spiked painfully. The soldier nearest him was shorter than Dean, bearded and lean, with the fire of a fight in his eyes as he ran. He yelled as he came within ten feet of Dean, raised his arms to wield his axe, revealing the sigil emblazoned on his tunic…

“Wait!” Dean yelled, one hand out to stop the soldier. But the man didn’t pause, bringing down his axe in an almighty swing that would have cleaved Dean’s head in two if he hadn’t lunged backwards and to the side, knocking Cas over in the process. Disadvantage of fighting back to back, Dean noted grimly, as though there would ever be a chance to put this new knowledge into action. Neither of them were making it out of this alive.

The soldier was coming for Dean again, looking furious that his first blow hadn’t landed. More were hot on his heels, scrabbling for purchase down the sands like rats, their swords and axes glinting like sharpened rodent claws.

“Wait – wait,” Dean tried again, more urgently, holding his hand up once more. “Stop. You don’t know who you’re dealing with.”

The soldier lunged again, and without Cas at his back, Dean could duck away more easily. He turned to see Cas fighting, in close hand-to-hand combat with a brute of a man at least a foot taller than he was. The guy was a monster.

“Dean!” Cas yelled, as the man swiped for his stomach and he only just dodged away.

“You have to listen!” yelled Dean, hearing the panic in his voice. His heartbeat was roaring in his ears. His own soldier had been joined by three more, circling him warily – the black stags on their chests silhouetted against the white. “Please, you have to listen! Don’t hurt him, I’m ordering you – my name is Dean W-”

Dean cut off, as the side of his body exploded into pain.

He felt the knife drive through his skin, just above his hip bone. Whilst he’d been watching the soldiers in front of him, another had attacked him from the side.

Dean twisted, staring at the knife that was lodged inside him. When he moved – shit, his legs trembled beneath him, when he moved he could feel the blade grind against the bone of his hip, the flesh within him.

He turned, lost.

“C-Cas,” he stuttered, holding out his arms towards Cas’ turned back. “Cas?”

The soldiers around him were yelling, not pressing their advantage, and Dean didn’t understand but the pain was a fire, a raw and unbelievable sear that he couldn’t think through. Cas turned, and he saw Dean reaching for him, and he saw the blood on Dean’s outstretched hands, and he saw the knife. His mouth dropped open.

Dean lurched towards Cas, waving his dagger furiously at the soldiers who were converging on him behind his back.

“Get back!” he yelled, his free hand pressed to his side, trying to hold himself together. The pain was terrible, unbearably sharp, and he needed to take the knife out but there was no time, the soldiers were almost upon Cas and all he was doing was standing stock still, staring at Dean with absolute horror in his eyes…

The soldier nearest to Cas lunged forward with his axe. Dean shoved his friend aside, too desperate to avoid being rough. All his energy was focused on that axe; with an almighty effort, he brought the dagger up in a swift, deadly arc – felt it connect, felt it slide through flesh, stick on bone, and then keep moving…

The axe fell to the floor, and so did the hand that held it. The soldier screamed, and the man next to him drove forward before Dean could regather his strength – this soldier’s knife was long, and serrated, and it was close close close close –

And in.

The second stab was worse than the first, so much worse. Dean watched the blade sink into his shoulder, hearing a scream rip out across the night and assuming it must be his own… but then there was a presence beside him, a whirling fury of knife and strike, and Cas was beating back the soldiers closing in on them with sheer desperate ferocity. Dean lifted his hand up to touch the hilt of the knife in his chest, and almost passed out as it moved inside him. He sank to his knees, and heard Cas shouting, soldiers shouting…

And then, inexplicably, the sound of a whipcrack.

He forced his eyes open, to see a silver snake snapping through the air, sinuous and thin and deadly. It tore through the air, crystallising and becoming brighter, heading straight for three of the soldiers… Dean couldn’t flinch, couldn’t retch, couldn’t even react as their heads thudded to the sand, and their bodies swayed for a second before following them down.

Panic spread quickly. The soldiers were running, some of them away, some of them closer. Dean’s body juddered with pain and he almost pitched sideways, but he was caught by a great column, a pillar of strength that smelled like sand and heat and something familiar, and comforting; one hand came to rest on Dean’s head, gentle as a kiss, and Dean realised that he was kneeling pressed up against Cas’ leg – that somehow, somehow, Cas was still standing…

He looked up, the movement making him cry out. Cas’ hand slid down to cup his cheek, and as it did so, Dean saw him – snarling, holding still to keep Dean steady, one hand whirling above his head and wielding that snake, that silver snake that Dean had seen – the one that had looked as though it was made of –

Cas was shaping the water.

And he was ruthless, he was desperate; Dean couldn’t close his eyes, couldn’t tear his gaze away from Cas’ face as he struck out again, and again, and again, until the sounds of yelling were distant and thin, and there was no one left to fight.

Cas breathed heavily, his chest rising and falling. One hand was still bathed in water, which extended in a long, vicious whip – as Dean watched, it receded slowly; Cas turned it into a soft, innocent globule, tinted red by the pain it had wrought.

Dean tried to speak, but the pain was too great. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. Everything was pain.

Cas looked down at him, his eyes terribly, terribly sad.

“I can heal that,” he said, reaching down to take Dean’s shoulders in both hands, trying to support his weight so that he wouldn’t fall over when Cas moved. Dean batted his hands away weakly.

“You – you –” he tried to say, his jaw clenched savagely to stop himself from screaming.

“I can fix it, Dean,” Cas insisted, holding out the water still shining slickly around his hand. Dean’s anger gave him strength and he pushed it away.

“Get away from me,” he said thickly, through the darkening miasma of his pain. “You get the fuck away. Don’t ever touch me again. You liar.”

Unconsciousness claimed him, but not before he saw the look on Cas’ face: not before his heart broke, shattered bloody into two.

Chapter Text

Dean was dreaming again.

He was walking, one arm wrapped around a column that moved beside him. He was lucky that it did, because Dean had glass flowers growing out of his chest, and he didn’t want them to break. He had to be so careful, he had to walk so slowly.

He turned his head like the passage of the sun, bone-grindingly slow, and saw blue eyes.

“You lied,” he whispered to them. It was a secret. “You lied to me.”

There was a low, vocal rumbling in his ears, like a roll of thunder that he’d heard a thousand times. There was a meaning to it, he knew. He felt safer inside the storm. He looked up, and he could see the clouds gathering overhead. As he watched, they turned dark and ugly, swelling and purpling and belching out a great, hot lightning strike, that stretched down as thin and purposeful as a monster’s claw and raked down his left side.

Dean yelled, and fell, but there was a cinch around his middle. The column was wrapping itself around him, keeping him upright, subsuming him. Soon he would be stone, too. He was desperate for that, for the dryness of it. He was wet everywhere – wet down his chest, down his side. Wet and bloody in his heart. He looked down and the glass flowers tinkled innocently at him. They were beautiful. They couldn’t help growing out of his body. They’d never meant for him to get hurt. They hadn’t meant to lie…

“No,” Dean said to them. His body felt as though it were splitting in two. His legs were still moving, though, so he had to be fine. “No. No.” He had no more words than that. He tried to close his eyes, and found them already closed. He floated in milky darkness, his legs scissoring on and on along a sawblade of pain.

“Dean!” Someone calling Dean’s name jerked him out of his unconsciousness. He opened his eyes blearily to see the desert, the desert, always the desert…

But wait – the ground beneath his feet was harder than before. He looked down at it, his head rolling: dirt. Sandy, scrubby, cracked dirt, but still dirt. There was a dried-out cactus pushing its ugly, blunted nose out of the ground a few feet away.

“Dean, look…” Cas’ voice, pushing a spike through Dean’s chest. No – that was the wound, the knife still lodged inside it. Dean raised his head with an almighty effort, looking in the direction Cas was pointing – and saw a tall, straight spire sticking up into the sky like a blade. Around its base was a hazy cluster of buildings: the blade’s hilt, dark as if with dried blood. Dean swayed, his stomach turning, but Cas’ arm was tight around his waist.

“Let me heal you,” he said again, a litany that had lulled Dean into sleep as they walked, and walked, and walked.

“You touch me with your foul magic,” said Dean, “And I’ll kill you.”

“Then we’re going in there,” Cas said, jerking his head towards the castle on the horizon. Dean was falling into dreams again; the last words were spoken by a thundercloud. “I’m not letting you die.”

Dean shuddered as another streak of white-hot pain lanced across his chest. The thundercloud’s kindness was crueller than its indifference might have been.

They kept walking, Dean pinned to misery by the knife in his chest.

*

Dean’s legs gave out.

He’d been walking through fire for an eternity, the flames licking up his body, making him groan and cry out. He’d have kept going infinitely, too dazed by blood loss and pain to know how to stop, but his legs crumbled beneath him like pillars of salt and suddenly his back was on the ground, and he was staring up at the sky.

No, those were Cas’ eyes, looking down at him with a quiet resignation.

“We’re almost there,” said his voice. Dean couldn’t quite connect the movements of his mouth with the sound of him speaking. “I am going to carry you.”

He pulled Dean to a sitting position, firmly, but without roughness. He looked so sad that he almost smelled of it, Dean thought. Or perhaps that was just the copper scent of his own blood. He looked down at the knife still buried in his chest, and reached for the handle. Cas slapped his hand away, a sensation so light that Dean couldn’t feel it through the blanket of his agony.

“Leave that in,” Cas said, in tones so forceful that Dean obeyed before he’d consciously decided to do so. “I don’t have anything to staunch the blood, if you take it out, and you’ll bleed to death. If you’d just let me…”

“No,” interrupted Dean muzzily, and watched Cas grit his teeth. He hauled Dean to his feet, gripping him tightly to keep him from falling. Dean stood, shaky as a leaf resting on a single edge. Cas turned around slowly, keeping Dean’s weight steady. Eventually, Dean was leaning on Cas’ back, his uninjured right side pressed against the curve of Cas’ spine.

“Put your arms around my neck,” Cas said, bending his legs so that he was lower than Dean. “Be careful to hook the knife over my shoulder.”

Dean did as he was asked as best he could. It was registering somewhere deep inside him that he was incredibly, incandescently angry with Cas – that their friendship was over – and yet he still hadn’t been left behind, to die in the desert. This made him even angrier.

“You should leave me,” he said, groaning as Cas hefted his weight off the ground, jarring his wounds. He felt a wide, wet lick of blood dribble down his chest. “You should just leave me. There’s no point anymore.”

“I’m not letting you die,” Cas said, sounding grim and determined enough to frighten away the Reaper with his tone alone. Dean said nothing, but inside, he fumed, pain pouring gasoline on the hot coals of his anger. How dare Cas be loyal to him? There was nothing truthful between them, but Cas was still going to save him? Dean’s jaw was clenched tight enough to hurt.

Cas began to move, bent and struggling. Looking up, Dean could see that the castle was still impossibly far away. There was no way that Cas could make it with Dean on his back, a burden that Cas didn’t have to bear.

“Put me down,” Dean said, his cheek pressed against the back of Cas’ head. His hair was soft, and smelled like Cas. Dean closed his eyes, and ached.

“No,” replied Cas, without any real heat. He wasn’t going to leave Dean, and they both knew it.

Cas marched onwards, every step a strain that Dean felt in his own body. He tried to keep his muscles tight, to support some of his own weight, but his body wasn’t obeying him. Cas carried Dean as though he were a dead man, the sun beating down mercilessly upon them. Yarım was watching them through her great hot eye, as distant and careless as ever.

And the castle grew closer, and closer.

*

There were voices, voices everywhere. Dean’s ears, accustomed to the sound of two voices – his own, and Cas’ – heard them like pans clanging, keys ringing, bells tolling. He winced, and pressed his face into Cas’ hair, breathing in the now-familiar scent. And then he was falling, falling backwards, and the comforting press of Cas along the front of his body was gone, the scent of him was gone.

“Cas –” he said desperately, and felt a strong hand take his. He was moving, and yet lying still. He pried his eyes open, peeling apart the thickness of sand and sleep, and saw that he was on a stretcher, being carried by several strangers down a wide, open road. In the corners of his vision he could see the houses that lined the sides of the avenue. He looked down, found the hand in his; his gaze wandering up the arm, over the shoulder, to Cas’ face.

“Son of a bitch,” Dean said. “You made it.”

Cas looked down at him, the barest hint of a smile easing the tiredness and sorrow on his face.

“We made it,” he said.

Dean fell back into sleep, his fingers tight around Cas’. When he dreamt, he saw mirrors: his own face, fractured, angered, cold.

*

When Dean woke, he was alone.

He stretched his fingers, feeling the spaces between them, and frowned. He opened his eyes, and stared for a moment at the grey stone ceiling. He blinked. The air smelled dusty, with a slight hint of old incense.

He was inside. It surprised him how alien that felt, now.

He sat up, and then creased with pain, falling back onto the mattress where he’d been laid. His head was buzzing and his tongue was thick, tasting vaguely sweet and spiced. He remembered that flavour from the time he’d broken his arm when he was six: poppy. He’d been drugged.

He lifted a hand to his chest, reaching for the hilt of the knife and finding nothing. He looked down at it, and saw only clean white bandaging. They’d put him to sleep and dressed his wounds, then. He poked at the white cloth gingerly, and felt only a slight needling sensation from the injury beneath. The poppy must be still in his system, but his head felt relatively clear.

He tried sitting up again, slower this time. The burn on his shoulder was still there, he noticed, livid red on his bare arm. They hadn’t been able to heal that, then. The wound on his side was covered by white cloth that wrapped around his whole torso. The tip of an angry, purple bruise poked out above the dressing, and Dean ran his fingers across it lightly.

He was alive. Cas had kept his word.

Dean’s thoughts shrank away from the mention of Cas. That was something he didn’t want to think about, not now. And yet – where was Cas? The space around Dean’s body felt wide and lacking, off-balance, missing Cas’ quiet counterpoint.

The room in which he was sitting was nice enough: just a simple chamber, light and clean, the floor stone-flagged and the windows wide. His bed was the only furnishing, the sheets mussed and twisted.

The door in the corner opened quietly, the hinges creaking with the weight of the heavy wood; Dean waited for the person behind it to emerge, caught between hope and dread, holding his breath –

And releasing it when a man emerged from behind the door, a man who wasn’t Cas. He was wearing a white, loose robe that contrasted sharply with his black skin; he looked rich, and regal. And yet there was something in his eyes – a sharpness, an edge of mistrust slicked over by a smile. Dean didn’t smile back.

“Where am I?” he demanded. The man looked a little taken aback by Dean’s rudeness, but his smile was soon neatly rearranged. He stepped further into the room, brushing down the creases in his robes with steady hands.

“Walker Castle,” he said. He had a pleasant voice, low and smooth. The name rang a bell in Dean's mind, from his studies back in Şehir - he remembered seeing it inked on maps of Western Ateş Aşiret. “My name is Gordon Walker, I’m the savaşçı who owns this place.”

“Where’s Cas?” Dean asked, paying little attention. Something about this guy was making him anxious, heart beating faster. The way he was looking at Dean... it was as though he were wondering how valuable he might be. Dean felt as though at any point, Gordon Walker might come over and check his teeth, see if he was fit to be sold at market like a horse.

“Your friend?” Gordon was still smiling, still trying to seem friendly, though his eyes were distinctly colder. “He’s in another room.” There was something that Dean definitely didn’t like about the way that Gordon had said that. What kind of ‘room’ exactly did they have him in?

“I want to speak to him,” Dean said aloud, picking at his bedspread nonchalantly. “You know… to say thank you. Where can I find him?”

Gordon’s smile only increased as he thought for a single beat, the hollowness behind his eyes making Dean feel ill. What was going on?

“Of course,” he said. “Why don’t you come down to the main hall? I’ll send a slave for – Cas, was it?”

“Castiel,” Dean corrected. “He prefers Castiel.”

“We’ll get him downstairs,” Gordon said. “Can you walk?” He made to help Dean up off the bed, but Dean held out a hand palm-first to stop him, swinging his own legs off the mattress.

“I can manage,” he said wryly. “Uh, thank you, by the way. For this.” He gestured vaguely towards the dressing on his wounds, preparing himself to stand up. Gordon wasn’t smiling anymore – he seemed to have realised that it was having the opposite effect to the one that he’d intended – but he accepted Dean’s thanks with a courteous nod.

“We have very skilled physicians,” he said, watching as Dean levered himself upright. The wound in Dean’s side felt taut, and he imagined that there was some stitching under the bandages that he was stretching tight – but it held, and it wasn’t unbearably painful. “You’re lucky. You were in a bad way.”

“I’m aware,” Dean said dryly. It was funny how pain sent his tendency to sarcasm through the roof. He began to limp forwards, following Gordon out of the door and down a long, bright corridor. “We were attacked in the desert.”

Gordon frowned.

“We’ve eradicated most of the bandits in a fifty mile radius,” he said. They descended a flight of stairs, Dean wincing but making no protest. “There was a plague of them out there before I became a savaşçı, but I stamped them all out, the gutless sons of whores.” There was an ugly look on his face. Dean guessed that Gordon had done quite a lot of the stamping himself, and enjoyed it, too.

“They weren’t bandits,” he explained grimly. “They were King’s Men. Gone rogue, I guess. Second time it’s happened to us. I can’t understand it.”

“King’s Men?” Gordon’s ears had pricked up at that. “How many?”

“I – I couldn’t tell in the darkness,” Dean said, a half-truth. If he gave Gordon even a rough estimation, he’d have to explain how they’d managed to escape the attack – and the only way to believably do that was to tell him about Cas’ watershaping.

That wasn’t such a bad idea, though, was it? Cas was a water-shaper, which meant that he was from the Water Lands. Which in turn meant that he wasn’t a spy from Ateş Aşiret, as he’d told Dean; he must actually be a spy from the Water Lands, gathering information here to take back across the border.

Now that he thought about it, Ash had probably been another one of the Water Land spies, and Cas had been trying to rendezvous with him that night – and of course, that was why the King’s Men had attacked Cas in the Forest of the Dead! They’d known that Cas was a spy!

Dean felt the realisation breaking over him like a great, cold, terrible wave. The King’s Men hadn’t gone rogue; he had. When he’d chosen to help Cas, he’d been aiding an enemy of the state. Cas had turned him into a traitor by asking for his help, by lying to Dean about who he really was.

Dean was boiling mad, too angry to speak, too angry even to listen to Gordon as he droned in Dean’s ear about the castle’s history. Should he tell Gordon now about Cas’ true identity? It would be so easy. And they’d take Cas back to the border, kick him back to where he’d come from, so that he wouldn’t be Dean’s problem anymore… it was tempting. And it seemed fair, after all that Cas had put him through, all the lies he’d told.

But – not yet. Cas had dragged Dean, half-dead, out of a desert that would have happily swallowed him whole and picked him down to his bones. Dean owed him the chance to explain himself, at least. And even beyond that, beyond owing… there was something else stopping him speaking out. A little twist in his heart when he thought about betraying Cas to his enemies. He gritted his teeth. Even now, when Cas had lied to him about everything he was, Dean still didn’t want to lose him.

That was madness. He would have to tell Gordon about the watershaping at some point. Cas would try to persuade him that he’d been doing the right thing, but Dean couldn’t let himself be swayed. Cas was the enemy, now, and they were on opposite sides of a rift that would never be healed. And Dean’s heart would just have to learn to deal with that.

It didn’t feel heavy, now. The hardness, the rock-strong protection that he’d built up around himself, had shattered in a single night – in a single moment.

It only felt broken.

Dean snapped out of his reverie as Gordon pushed through a tall, impressive door with ornate wooden panelling, showing Dean through into a huge hall. It was big enough to fit the entire circus tent from the nomad village inside, the ceiling impossibly high, with dark rafters supporting the weight of it. Beautiful sculptures lined the grey stone walls on either side, depicting moments from Ateşi history – savaşçılar, mostly, shown fighting monsters and thieves, defending the worthy. Dean swallowed. This was the world he’d wanted – had almost succeeded in entering. Gordon was watching him stare, looking smug.

“It’s been in the family for generations,” he said carelessly. Of course, he’d only brought Dean here to impress him; or, perhaps, to scare him. Either way, to show off the fact that he had a lot of power, and a lot of space to use it. “Excuse me, I have to go attend to a business matter. It won’t take long. I’ll send Castiel down in the meantime. Please, have a seat.”

Gordon indicated one of the low divans, which were scattered liberally across the hall. The space must be used for meetings, and for dining, Dean thought. The divans were all upholstered in grey. He selected the nearest one and sat down on it, wobbling a little more than he’d have liked. He tried crossing his legs, but it was agony; instead, he let them stretch out in front of him, resting his weight backwards on the heels of his hands. He chewed his lip. He wanted to see Cas, but he also desperately didn’t. He wanted to show Cas how much he’d been hurt, rub Cas’ face in the damage he’d done – but he also wanted to make every effort to hide his pain, and pretend he’d never been all that invested anyway. It was embarrassing to think how much he cared for someone who’d duped him so completely.

The door swung open, and Cas walked in. Castiel walked in.

He looked tired, swooping dark lines under his eyes and messy hair. He’d shaved, though, and when Dean put a hand to his face, he realised that he’d been shaven, too. They must have done it while he was sleeping.

“Dean,” said Cas, walking forwards quickly, approaching the divan where Dean was sitting, and kneeling down in front of it. “They wouldn’t tell me where you were…”

“I’m fine,” Dean snapped, cutting Cas off. There was something he hated about seeing Cas like that, on the floor while Dean sat, like he was begging. Cas’ mouth closed slowly, as though he was struggling to put a lid on all the words he had to say.

“Dean…” he began again, after a moment. He sounded colder, and he’d rocked his weight back so that he wasn’t so close to Dean. It was better that way, Dean thought. It made it easier to say what he had to say… to lose what he had to lose. To lose what he had already lost. “I know you’re angry at me.”

“They should make you a detective, not a spy,” Dean said abruptly. He couldn’t look at Cas. He curled his body forward, bringing his feet in, hunching himself up small and picking at a loose thread on the new black şalvar he was wearing. His chest was still bare besides the dressings, but it was so warm in the castle that he didn’t feel underdressed. Cas, on the other hand, was still wearing his pelerin – the one he’d worn to carry Dean here. Dean could see dark, rusty spatters of red on the left shoulder, where his wound had… dripped. He swallowed.

“Dean, please, just let me –”

“Cas, I know what you’re gonna say,” he interrupted. “You’re gonna tell me you’re sorry, and you had your reasons. But that’s bullshit. I don’t want to hear your reasons and I don’t want your apology, OK?”

Cas watched him silently for a moment, still kneeling on the floor before him, looking into his eyes as though hoping to find the kindness in one that he couldn’t see in the other. Too bad, Cas. I’m not Yarım. Both my eyes tell the same story.

“You don’t want me to apologise?” Cas asked quietly. “Even after… what you saw last night?”

“You mean the watershaping?” Dean said loudly. “No. I don’t want your bullshit apology. For one, I know you’re not even sorry. And then there’s the fact that I don’t care. At all.”

“You don’t?” Cas said disbelievingly, and Dean’s anger swirled up inside him like a storm.

“No, I fucking don’t,” he said. “I’ve known you less than a week, Castiel, you really think I give a shit that you didn’t tell me who you are? You think this is important to me?”

“But – I thought –”

“You thought wrong,” Dean said savagely. “I don’t care about you. I never did. You acted like an asshole right from the start, why the fuck would I like you? Why would anybody?”

Cas was staring at the floor, now, letting Dean’s fury wash over him like hail. Dean knew that he was saying things he couldn’t take back, but the rage inside him wouldn’t be contained, and the words kept spewing out of him like acid. Half him was hoping Cas would rise to his words, and half was hoping that Cas would never even look at him again.

“You lied to me and you made me think that I could trust you,” he said. “I’m fucking lucky that I don’t give a shit about you, because if I did, I’d have had my fucking heart broken.”

“You wouldn’t have been alone,” Cas said. He’d been staring down at the floor, but now he lifted his eyes up, and Dean saw with a clench in his gut that they were full of unshed tears.

“You think – you think that’s gonna – nobody cares you’re broken, Cas,” Dean said viciously, the words going off like a gun in his hand – two bullets, one for himself and one for Cas. “I hate you. I hate that you made me into a traitor. And I hate your disgusting watershaping.”

Cas’ head was dipped once more, his body swaying with the strength of the blows. Dean told himself that he was pitiless. He was in the right, damn it all to the Everdark. Shaping water and making fire were equally foul. It was all magic, it was all the same shit that had got his mother killed. And Cas had been one of them, all this time. He’d used it to kill those soldiers, as easily as breathing. He’d probably done the same thing to countless other people, just because he could.

“I was just trying to do what’s right,” Cas said. His eyes on Dean’s were huge, and deep, and terribly, terribly sad. “Please, believe me.”

“I don’t!” Dean yelled, surging to his feet just as Gordon came into the room, followed by three tall, burly-looking bodyguards.

“Is there a problem here?” Gordon asked, taking in the tableau: Dean swaying on his feet with a thin line of blood appearing on his bandages, where he’d ripped his stitches; Cas kneeling on the floor, his back to the door, head bowed as though he were carrying the weight of a thousand worlds on his shoulders.

“Yes, there’s a problem,” Dean shouted. “Get that bastard water-shaper away from me!”

The words were out before he’d decided to say them, spilling over his lips in his anger like an undeniable tide. They rang through the air into a sudden silence. Dean stared at Gordon for a second, his eyes wide, before turning round to see…

Cas was watching him, of course he was. Dean caught the tail end of his expression of horror; saw it transition seamlessly into resignation. Cas lowered his head, accepting Dean’s decision. The words were out now – and there was no taking them back.

“I didn’t…” Dean stuttered, turning back to Gordon and seeing that his eyes were sparkling cruelly. “I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s alright, Dean,” said Cas, looking down at his hands. “It’s alright.”

“Dean?” Gordon said, signalling his bodyguards. Without a word, they crossed the space to where Castiel was kneeling and pulled him roughly to his feet, pinning his hands behind his back. “Your name is Dean?”

“No, wait,” Dean said wretchedly. “I mean – I mean, yeah, I’m Dean, but please…”

“Dean Winchester?” Gordon pressed, and Dean’s stammering came to an abrupt halt. How could Gordon know…? But maybe – a sudden light – maybe this was what he needed to do? Yarım, he was so stupid. All he had to do was order Gordon to leave Cas alone… right?

“Yes,” he said, trying to pull himself up taller. “I’m Dean. Dean of House Winchester. My father is John Winchester, King of Ateş Aşiret.” He didn’t look at Cas, didn’t want to see his mouth fall open. Surprise, surprise, buddy. “And I order you to –”

“Dean Winchester,” Gordon interrupted, striding towards him with his hands outstretched. “Holy shit, we found you! Oh, but of course, you’ll have no idea,” he went on, when Dean’s face crumpled into a frown. “Your dad put out a call on the radio a few days ago, saying you’d been kidnapped by a spy from the Water Lands. There’s a reward. Everyone’s looking for you.”

Dean let the words fall over him as softly as rain, barely sinking in.

“My dad’s name is Bobby,” he muttered, obscurely. Gordon cocked his head at him, but his smile never wavered. That’s the smile of a man who knows he’s struck gold, thought Dean. Literally, if what he’d said about a reward was true. Why had his father done that? How had he even found out that Dean was missing? Had Bobby and Ellen gone to him for help, when Dean hadn’t come back from the Vigil?

No matter. Dean shook his head as if to clear it, trying to get back on task. Cas.

“Look, it wasn’t like you said,” he began. “And I know that with what I just said, it sounds like Cas isn’t – isn’t a good guy, and he’s not, but I don’t want you to… I didn’t mean to…”

“Dean,” said Gordon, clapping him on the shoulder. “You’ve had a tough few days, it’s fine to be confused. Let’s get you back to your room.” He gestured to one of his bodyguards, who surrendered his superfluous grip on Cas’ shoulder and came to stand beside Dean instead, wrapping Dean’s arm around his beefy shoulders and taking his weight easily.

“No – no, wait,” Dean said feebly, as Cas was led away by the two henchmen. His eyes were on Dean as he went, and even though he didn’t want to – even though he was trying his hardest not to understand Castiel at all in that moment – Dean could read his fear, his sadness… and his surrender. He wasn’t going to fight. Yarım damn him, he looked too broken even to try. He was pushed roughly out of the door, his eyes on Dean’s until he was out of sight.

“He’ll be taken care of,” said Gordon, with a touch of dark humour in his voice.

“You don’t understand,” said Dean urgently. “What are you going to do to him?”

Gordon looked over at him, and grinned.

“You’ll like this, Dean,” he said. “For kidnapping a Prince, almost murdering him? There’s only one possible punishment. He’ll be hanged in the morning.”

Dean allowed himself to be helped back to his room in a fog of panic, his body trembling every step of the way.

Chapter Text

Dean paced up and down his room, his eyes dry with tiredness. He hadn’t even bothered trying to sleep again, knowing that it would be impossible.

What had he done? He’d never meant… even when he’d been seriously considering telling Gordon that Cas was a water-shaper, the worst he’d envisioned had been Cas being taken back to the Water Lands and told sternly not to come back. He was so fucking naïve. How could he have been so stupid? Obviously spies from the Water Lands were going to be taken seriously and made an example of, not slapped across the back of the hand and told to go home. Especially this close to the border.

Plus, apparently Dean’s father had finally decided to show an interest in him for the first time in years, and alert the entire country to his absence. It would have been embarrassing, if Dean hadn’t had bigger problems to deal with. The fact that Cas was now an infamous national criminal wasn’t going to make escaping from this place any easier.

Of course, the question wasn’t whether or not Dean was going to break Cas out, but how. He’d managed to glean the location of the castle dungeons from the bodyguard that Gordon had ordered to escort Dean back to his room, but the fact remained that there were only two of them up against the population of this enormous castle. Add to that the fact that Dean was injured, and you had a recipe for both of them getting themselves killed.

Maybe he should wait to try to get to Cas? They had to move him out of his cell in the morning, to get him to the – Dean shuddered – to the scaffold, didn’t they? Surely it would be easier to grab him from there than to break into a dungeon. But the idea of Cas coming so close to the noose made Dean feel sick. He couldn’t wait; besides, if he tried, he’d probably pass out from the pain at some point during the night and be lying in his room, unconscious, while Cas was murdered in the square below his window the next morning. He had to act now, while there was still time – while he still had a little energy left.

For a moment, his head spun dizzyingly. He couldn’t believe that he was planning to risk his life for Cas, again, even though he’d betrayed Dean’s trust, even though he was a water-shaper, a killer. It was madness. And yet it was a madness that was inevitable. Dean’s sense of justice had its place – and it was far, far behind the amount that he cared about Cas. Still. Even after all the things that he’d said, just a few hours before.

The problem wasn’t moral, but purely logistical. Cas was being kept underground, presumably several long flights of stairs down from the floor where Dean’s room was: one higher than ground level. Dean was weak, exhausted by climbing stairs, much less fighting his way down them to get to Cas, and then back up them to escape.

And he would have to fight to get down there. Gordon had been nothing but courteous; the guard outside his room had been posted there ‘for Dean’s safety’ – but the glint in his smile told Dean everything he needed to know. Gordon could sense his confusion, his rebellion – and he wanted to make sure his reward came in before Dean had the chance to escape. Dean was just as much a prisoner in this place as Cas was.

In his own way, Dean supposed, Gordon was doing the right thing. He’d been ordered by his King to find Dean Winchester, who’d been kidnapped by a Water Lands spy. Gordon wasn’t to know that Cas didn’t deserve to die for kidnapping Dean – but there was no way to show him, either. The only possible way forward was to break Cas out of that dungeon and have him run for the mountains, where he’d be safe. And Dean could explain to his father what had really happened when he got back to Şehir, and they could lay the whole thing to rest.

And so Dean paced, and paced, and paced, keeping himself from slipping into unconsciousness by walking around, feeling the jarring pain in his side and his chest. No one had come to stitch his wounds back up, and they were bleeding more freely with every passing second. Shit. He had to think strategically; he had to think like a satranç player, use the small advantages that he had to best effect.

It took him half an hour, striding up and down his room, occasionally stopping to sip a little water out of the jug on his bedside table – but nothing could wash away the thickness in his throat, the sandpaper dryness of guilt and nerves. He should never have got Cas into this situation. He was so useless. The words had just come spilling out of his mouth before he could stop them, like he was a moronic five-year-old with a grudge. It was just like when he used to shout at Sam, when he’d yelled at Jo. He was always going to be the same. Useless.

Dean shook himself. That kind of thinking wasn’t getting Cas out of the dungeon. What was it that Cas had told him? He couldn’t carry guilt for every tiny thing, or something like that. Well, as conflicted as Dean’s feelings for him were, that was still good advice. He took another, larger gulp of water – and inspiration flashed into his mind like a lightning bolt. Hold on. They’d shut him up in here, but he wasn’t actually a prisoner, was he? He was a Prince, technically, for crying out loud. If he wanted to go somewhere, if he was adamant, they couldn’t risk offending him for fear of insulting him and incurring his father’s anger. He didn’t have to fight his way down to the dungeon – he just had to ask to be taken.

He raised himself to his fullest height, ignoring the pain in his side. He wished he had some more clothing, to make himself look more impressive. As it was, he couldn’t let his appearance speak for him; he was going to have to act… princely, in order to get what he wanted. Something that probably wouldn’t be easy, given the fact that he’d been raised as a mechanic’s son since he was four.

It didn’t matter. How hard could it be? He just had to put on a demanding voice and act like he expected to be obeyed – no, like it hadn’t even occurred to him that his orders might not be followed to the letter. Essentially, pretend to be a dick. Or – Dean found himself actually grinning for a second – pretend to be Cas.

He turned to leave his room – and then at the last moment, he pulled himself up short. He chewed his lip, looking over at his bedside table… and then went over, and picked up the jug of water. Use the small advantages you have to best effect. This wasn’t an acceptance, it was a strategic move.

There was no way to conceal the jug. Again, he was going to have to rely on seeming too princely and authoritative for the guard outside his room to ask questions. Dean gulped, and then pushed away his nerves. He was Dean Winchester, of House Winchester. Prince, heir to the throne. Whatever he wanted, he received. And right now, he wanted to go down to the dungeons.

He flung open the door, startling the guard who was lounging against the wall on the other side. That was good, Dean knew. A guard who was lazy and bored would be easier to bend to his will than one who was vigilant and conscientious. He kept his expression stony and forbidding, making sure he was standing up straight with his shoulders back. Yarım, that hurts. He could feel the ripped stitches moving, tugging at his skin.

“I want to go down to the dungeons,” he said. A mistake. He didn’t want to go, he was going. He sounded more petulant that authoritative. The guard was frowning.

“The savaşçı said…” he began. He was shorter than Dean, with brown skin and a weak chin. He had a few spots, too – he couldn’t be older than Dean. On a good day, Dean could have knocked him out in twenty seconds and been on his way. Yarım curse these wounds.

“The savaşçı is aware that I am a Prince,” Dean said, with a slight edge to his voice. “As everyone in this castle should be.” That had been nicely judged; not too angry, not as though there were any real threat to his superiority. Like a bear swatting away a bee.

The guard had his hands clasped, now, a little nervously. Good. Time to press his advantage.

“I am going down to the dungeons to see the spy,” he said coldly. A glance at the guard’s chest revealed a necklace: a pair of eyes, one gold and one silver, hanging on a copper chain. The sign of Yarım. The guard must be a devout man. “I… want to give him the chance to repent his actions, and offer his soul to the cleansing of Yarım before he dies.”

The guard’s expression lifted. He raised his hand to touch his necklace, chewing on the inside of his cheek for a moment before nodding.

“It is the will of Yarım that everyone be given the opportunity to burn away their past before death,” he said, talking more to himself than to Dean, obviously wrestling with his conscience. Gordon must have given strict orders that Dean was not to leave his room.

“Our duty to Yarım supersedes all others,” Dean said, dredging up a line that the rahip always used to say at the end of the New Year service. The guard’s frown cleared, and he nodded.

“That is true, your highness,” he said, and Dean almost cringed at the title. He managed to offer a small nod, as though accepting it as his due. “Would you like me to show you to the dungeons?”

Dean almost refused, not wanting to have to maintain this ridiculous holier-than-thou princely façade down all those stairs – but then the wound in his side gave a painful twinge, and he forced himself to be practical.

“Yes,” he said decisively. Time to push his luck. He held out the jug. “And carry this for me.” He offered no explanation, and the guard didn’t ask for one. He took it without a word, without so much as a curious lift of an eyebrow. Dean blinked, trying not to seem too surprised. Maybe he could get used to being a Prince, after all.

“This way, your highness,” the guard said, starting to lead the way. They walked along the same corridor that Dean had taken with Gordon earlier, except now it was darker: the sun had almost set. Ayın Yarısı was opening, and bringing the nightly chill. Dean shivered.

“Are you cold, your highness? I can fetch your pelerin, if you would like. I know that it’s been freshly laundered.”

What a stroke of luck, better than Dean could ever have hoped for! He nodded authoritatively, pulling an impatient expression.

“I assumed it had been thrown away,” he said. “Fetch it for me now.”

Yarım, he sounded like such a dick. But the guard responded, putting the water jug down on the floor and leaving Dean to wait in a narrow hall, diving down a narrow corridor to one side. Dean could hear his feet slapping on the stone as he ran. He was actually running, just because Dean had sounded a little impatient. This was a glimpse into another world – one that Dean wasn’t sure he liked. It seemed like too much power for someone like him – for anyone, maybe.

The guard was only gone for a matter of minutes. Dean spent the time leaning up against the wall, trying not to move too much and tear his wounds open any more than he already had. The poppy had worn off completely, now, and the pain was terrible. When the guard returned, he saw the creases of pain on Dean’s face and cringed.

“I’m sorry for taking so long, your highness,” he said, offering up Dean’s pelerin, boots, and a fresh tunic. He bowed low, chin tucked to his chest, begging forgiveness. When he did so, Dean could see the tops of red, livid stripes at the top of his back, poking out from the neckline of his tunic, too neat and precise to be wounds gained in training or combat. His mouth fell open. They beat their guards here? No wonder this one was so quick to obey.

“It’s not a problem,” Dean assured him quickly, taking the clothes. “Uh… if you could help me…”

The guard leapt to assist Dean putting his clothes back on, pulling the tunic over his head and helping him to push his injured arm through the sleeve, before bending down to lace up his boots. It was strange, and surreal, to be given such intimate, physical help by a stranger, but the guard’s expression was unfazed. Perhaps he helped the nobility to dress themselves in dark corridors all the time.

“Thank you,” Dean said, as the guard zipped up his pelerin for him. There was no dagger in the inside sheath – Dean assumed it must have been lost during the fight in the desert – but there was something in there. He patted his chest, feeling for the outline of it: a bottle. He frowned for a second, and then almost laughed aloud when he remembered. He didn’t have a dagger, had no weapon at all – but somehow he’d managed to keep hold of that damned bottle of lube. Unbelievable. What the laundry workers must have thought when they found that in his tunic, he had no idea, but they’d placed it dutifully in his pelerin’s pocket for him all the same. He thanked them silently for the laugh they’d given him.

“Ready to go, your highness?” the guard asked, picking the water jug back up and taking a few steps forward. Dean followed his lead, still grinning to himself. Lube in his pocket, as he went to save his friend from certain death. There was something about the incongruity that was rising a kind of hysteria in him. He pushed it away as best he could, coughing to hide his ridiculous desire to giggle.

They descended more stairs in silence, the air becoming colder and colder as they passed the ground floor and kept going. The dungeons were deep beneath the castle: Dean counted seven long flights of stairs before they reached an iron gate, where a tall, lean guard was standing. Dean’s heart sank a little at the sight of him; his eyes were sharp and alert, and he was already looking at Dean with a decent measure of suspicion. He was glad that he was fully-clothed, now, and able to rely on his appearance a little more to carry his act. He looked down his nose at the dungeon guard, waiting for his guide to speak for him.

“Prince Dean wishes to speak to the Water Lands spy,” his guard said. “To bring him into Yarım’s light before his sentence is exacted.”

The dungeon guard grunted, looking Dean up and down. He had light eyes, and a grizzled, scrubby spread of stubble over his chin.

“Does he have the Savaşçı’s permission?” he demanded, in a voice like a dusty velvet curtain, soft, with a slight rasp at its edge. It made Dean shiver.

Dean allowed a slight frown to crease his forehead, just like the one Cas had worn at the circus when they’d been talking to Crowley. Hopefully he was nailing it like Cas had.

“I am unused to being questioned,” he said coolly. An unhelpful memory arose in his mind of the last time he’d tried to tell Jo what to do, back at home. He’d ordered her to clean out her locker at the savaşçı’s training centre. She’d thrown a shoe at him.

“Well, I’m unused to allowing strangers into the dungeon,” the guard growled. Dean’s guard looked scandalised.

“Remember who you’re talking to, Alistair,” he hissed. Alistair looked at Dean challengingly, as though waiting for him to make the next move. Son of a bitch, this wasn’t going to be easy. When Dean didn’t respond immediately, Alistair turned his attention back to Dean’s guard.

“Remember who you are talking to,” he said gently, silkily. Dean repressed a shudder. The man was terrifying. “Unless you’d like to really earn your stripes.”

It was a strange thing to say, and Dean was confused – until he remembered the thin, red welts that he’d caught sight of on the guard’s back. So, Alistair must be the one who’d inflicted those. Dean’s guard was shifting uneasily, his gaze shifting between Dean and Alistair. Dean took pity on him. In addition, he’d had an idea – one that he didn’t especially like, but it was the only thing he could think of that might actually work. And it wouldn’t work if Dean’s guard was still there beside him.

“You can go,” Dean said to his guard. “Go back to your place outside my room. I’ll be there soon.”

The guard barely took the time to nod gratefully and pass Dean the jug of water before leaving, fingering his necklace as he went. Poor kid, Dean thought. He seemed keen to please, if a little young and lazy. Dean couldn’t imagine what he might have done to deserve being whipped.

As soon as he was heading back up the stairs and out of earshot, Dean turned back to Alistair. He let his princely coolness slip a little, and gave him a smirk.

“He’s got a real stick up his ass,” he said, allowing a some familiarity to slide into his tone. “Wouldn’t shut up about Yarım’s grace the entire way down here.”

“He’s the worst guard in my garrison,” said Alistair comfortably. “Yarım’s grace might be great, but his definitely isn’t.”

Dean chuckled appreciatively.

“I’m sure you have your ways to improve him, though,” he said ingratiatingly. Alistair eyed him sharply, and then smiled.

“A lick of the whip never hurt a man’s enthusiasm for the job,” he said. Dean nodded easily.

“It’s the only way to shape them,” he said. “Not that I’m complaining.”

Alistair was watching him speculatively now, his posture easing.

“You got the accuracy?” he asked. “You gotta land at least three strikes in the same spot, or it doesn’t break the skin.”

“Oh, yeah,” Dean said, sickened, trying to seem nonchalant. “Yeah, I usually do five or six.” Alistair was nodding along, looking grudgingly impressed. Dean couldn’t wait any longer. “So, can I get in there to, uh… talk to the spy?”

He winked at Alistair as he said it.

“I see,” Alistair said musingly. “Bringing him into Yarım’s grace, is it?”

“Exactly,” Dean said with a smirk. “You understand.”

“Perfectly. He kidnapped you, is that right?” Alistair asked, as he reached for the keys hanging from a belt around his waist.

“Son of a bitch got the jump on me,” Dean improvised. “Let’s just say, I owe him a thing or two.”

Alistair laughed, a soft, slithering chuckle that sent a chill up Dean’s spine. The man was completely repulsive.

“You need any tools?” he asked, as he swung open the gate to the dungeon and walked Dean down a long, dark corridor, lit only by flickering open braziers. Dean wondered if they even had gas lamps yet, this far from Şehir.

“Uh…” Dean glanced down at the jug of water in his hands. He had to be convincing. “If you’ve got a whip, I’ll take it.”

Alistair unhooked a leathery coil from his belt and handed it to Dean without a word. Dean took it, wrapping his hand around the thicker end. It was smooth with frequent use. He felt sick.

“Here’s your boy,” Alistair said, coming to a halt at a grimy, rotting wooden door. The smell of the place was awful this far down the corridor, a mixture of smoke and sweat and dirt. Alistair rammed a key into the lock, cranked it to the side, and threw open the door.

Dean stepped forward, trying not to seem too hesitant. The stench of the cell washed over him, and he held in his urge to retch. He could just make out a figure crouching in the darkness in the corner of the cell. As Dean watched, the figure shifted slightly, and there was the sound of clanking. Yarım, they had him chained at the wrists and ankles.

Even in the blackness, Dean knew it was him.

Castiel. He’d found him.

Chapter Text

“Castiel?” Dean said coldly, mindful of Alistair’s presence. Cas didn’t look up at him. As Dean’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw that Cas was sitting with his arms wrapped around the tops of his knees, his head buried in the crook of one elbow. He was still wearing his pelerin and grey şalvar, though they looked dirty and befouled.

“I had a little fun with him earlier,” Alistair said, his voice coming from outside, in the corridor. When Dean turned to look at him, doing his best to wipe the horror off his face, he saw that Alistair was bringing in a brazier for him to see by. “If I’d’ve know you were coming, I’d’ve left you fresh meat. He’d not too beat up, though. Not much fun to play with. Doesn’t scream easy. Do you, Water scum?” Alistair called across the cell mockingly to Castiel, who didn’t react.

Dean’s fist was clenched tightly around the whip. He tried to stay calm, and not act rashly. He had to get Cas out of here, that was the most important thing. If he attacked Alistair and screwed it up by getting beaten, Cas would have no other way of escaping. He’d die.

So Dean forced himself to laugh hollowly.

“He’s a stubborn son of a bitch,” he agreed. “But I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’ll leave you to it,” Alistair said, to Dean’s relief. He’d been terrified that Alistair was going to ask to stay and watch. “I see you brought your own water to clean up with. Smart.”

“I’m nothing if not prepared,” Dean said, a little feebly, he thought, but Alistair didn’t seem to notice.

“Holler for me when you’re finished,” he said. “Or if you want a helping hand.”

Dean couldn’t manage anything more than a thin smile in response. Alistair gave him a wink, and then left, creaking the door closed behind him.

As soon as he was gone, Dean dropped the whip as though it were a poisonous snake. He put the jug of water down, too, and rushed over to where Cas was sitting, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Cas – Cas,” he said. “Shit. Talk to me, are you alright? What happened? I’m gonna get you out of here, alright, I’ve got a…”

He broke off as Cas looked up at him. The right side of his face was smooth, but in the smoky brazier light Dean could see that his left eye was sealed shut by a laceration that ran from his forehead down to his cheek, thin and vicious and still leaking blood. Dean stared at it, his mouth opening and closing. Cas watched him through his one good eye, his gaze non-judgmental, only… sad. Still sad.

Dean could barely breathe, he was so full of guilt.

“Your Highness,” Cas said softly. Dean wanted to shrink to nothing.

“Cas,” he said. “I’m –”

“I don’t want your bullshit apology,” Cas interrupted, and Dean withered into silence. He deserved that. “I know you’re sorry. And you know I’m sorry.”

“You shouldn’t be sorry,” Dean said wretchedly. He wanted to reach out and hold Cas, but he knew that would probably be over the line. He didn’t deserve to be the one to give Cas comfort. And Cas would probably shrink from his touch, anyway, now.

“I should,” Cas said. “I lied to you.” His good eye was cast downward, and a single tear escaped down his cheek. Dean’s lips started to tremble.

“I lied too,” he said. “As much as you did. I’m a Prince and I didn’t tell you… you’re from the Water Lands and you didn’t tell me. We’re even. I had no right to be so mad… no right to do this…”

“It was a little extreme,” Cas said, with a touch of his old dry humour. Dean choked out a laugh around the lump in his throat.

“I never meant – I thought they’d just take you back to the Water Lands. I was so stupid, Cas. I’m so – I’m so sorry.” He was on the verge of real, heaving tears again, just like that night in front of the fire when he’d told Cas about his mom. He bit it back. This was no time to have a breakdown.

“Listen,” he said. “We’re going to get you out of here, alright? I know the way out, seven flights up and down a corridor to the laundry rooms. It always gets hot in a laundry room, so I figure there must be a door or a window we can break through and get out.” Cas was watching him, nodding along.

“Only thing is, we have to get you out of this dungeon, first. And that’s going to be impossible with you in chains and me wounded. So…” Dean reached back and picked up the jug of water. He looked down at it for a second, and breathed out, before putting it down next to Cas.

Castiel stared from the water to Dean.

“You… you said…”

“I know what I said,” Dean interrupted. “I said a lot of things today that I know I shouldn’t have. I don’t like it, but – but this is the only way to get you out of here alive. There’s no question. Do what you gotta do.”

He met Cas’ eyes, determined. Cas read the sincerity in his gaze and swallowed, nodding.

“Pour the water into my hands,” he said, cupping them. Dean could see that the manacles around his wrists were too tight, cutting cruelly into his skin. Dean lifted the jug, his heart thudding. He hated this, hated the fact that he was helping Cas to shape water. But there was no other way. He’d probably never be able to look his reflection in the eye again, but he had to do whatever it took to get Cas out of this place.

He poured out the water. It gathered in Cas’ hands, none of it dripping away, held too perfectly to be natural. When Cas’ hands were full, Dean stopped, and shrank back from Cas. He didn’t want to be too close when Cas started shaping the water, in case it got out of control.

Cas’ eyes were focused on the water. As Dean watched, his breathing slowed and evened out; he took a few seconds to calm himself, before starting to shape. The water rose out of the pool in Cas’ hands in a thin, frail strand. Dean stared as it wavered for a second, and then twisted its way towards the chains on Cas’ wrists. The water in Cas’ hands drained away as he siphoned it into his manacles, spiralling his fingers to steady the movement. When he’d packed as much water into the locks on the cuffs as possible, he twisted his fingers sharply – and Dean gasped as the water turned instantly to ice, cracking open the locks as it expanded into a solid. Cas shed the manacles, making sure to keep control of the water, and performing the same neat trick on the cuffs around his ankles. Dean watched him silently, caught between amazement and repulsion.

When Cas had freed himself, he stood up, wincing. The water had formed a loose globule around his hand, just as it had after the fight in the desert. It glistened and moved, and Dean couldn’t look away.

“There is a forest not far from the castle,” Cas said. He spoke quietly, barely moving his mouth, to avoid jarring the wound on his face. “Just beyond the walls. If we can make it into the trees, we can lose them easily.”

Dean nodded, jerking his eyes away from the rippling water.

“Got it,” he said. “Let’s go.” He stood up, too, creasing over in pain as he did so. He tried to hide it, but – of course – Cas caught the movement, and paused.

“We will never make it out of here if we are not fighting with our full strength,” Cas said. “I – I can heal you, heal us both, with the water. If you’ll let me.”

Dean gritted his teeth. A part of him had been prepared for this, though he would never have been the one to suggest it.

“Do it,” he growled, unzipping his pelerin and pulling up his tunic, refusing to allow himself to wince with the pain, though his legs weakened with the sudden vicious ache. “Just do it.”

Cas approached slowly, as though wanting to give Dean the time to back out, if he wanted to. Dean appreciated the gesture, but it wasn’t necessary. He’d already resigned himself to this.

“Every second counts, Cas,” he said. “Let’s hurry it up.”

Cas moved towards him with more purpose. He looked into Dean’s eyes for a moment, saw the determination in them, and nodded.

“Hold still,” he instructed.

“Will it hurt?” Dean couldn’t help asking, and then shook himself. “Don’t answer that. Just do it.”

Cas nodded, his eyes already focused on the wound. For a moment, he held the hand with water gathered around it close to Dean’s skin… and then he pressed forwards, coating Dean’s side in wetness… and then, whilst Dean was still bracing himself for the pain, he was pulling back.

“Done,” Cas said. Dean looked down at his side. The skin was clear, unbroken. Dean wiggled a little from side to side, testing the muscles: they didn’t even ache.

“Well, that was anti-climactic,” he said. Cas smiled, with the half of his face that hadn’t been lacerated. Yarım, Dean was going to pay for that one in the afterlife. He hoped so, anyway. He deserved it.

“That sounds like a complaint,” Cas said. He reached out and tugged down the collar of Dean’s tunic, to give him access to the wound on his chest.

“You should’ve just done it to me in the desert,” Dean said. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the thought occurred to him that that sentence was true on more than one level. Not the time, Dean.

“You didn’t want me to,” Cas said simply. “And I understood why. I had no right.”

And suddenly, Dean was left speechless in the face of Cas’ – what even was that? Loyalty, maybe? He’d ignored the logical course of action, just because Dean had asked him to do so. He’d put himself in terrible danger, walking into the castle of his enemy, just to get Dean the help that he wouldn’t even have needed if he hadn’t been acting so pig-headedly.

Cas had lied to Dean about many things, but he hadn’t lied about one thing: you’re with me, and I’m with you… we’re on the same side… our own side. Cas had meant it. He’d ignored his duty to the Water Lands, and carried Dean to safety – and carried himself to his own death sentence, at the same time. No matter what else Cas was, he was Dean’s friend.

Cas healed his second wound with equal swiftness.

“I don’t blame you,” he said now, pulling Dean’s tunic back into place with gentle hands, the backs of his fingers brushing Dean’s skin – needlessly, since Dean was in no pain and could have done it himself. But he allowed it to happen, trying to pretend he was barely noticing. “For not wanting to be healed. Or for the fact that I was locked up. I chose to come in here with you. I could have left you to be found outside the walls of the castle, and carried on to the mountains. But I…” his voice tailed off. Dean nodded, allowing Cas the luxury of letting his meaning go unspoken.

“I know,” he said. “I – I know. Just… sorry. And thank you.”

Cas nodded, his face kissed by the light from the brazier, which brought out the darker blues in his eyes. He was mesmerising.

Not the time, Dean.

“Ready to go?” Dean asked, but Cas held up a hand.

“Not quite,” he said. “I – I will not be able to fight to my fullest capacity if I cannot see through both eyes.”

Dean’s mouth fell open as he understood Cas’ meaning.

“You can heal yourself? Cool!” he exclaimed, before he’d thought it through; Cas looked at him, surprised, but made no comment. Dean groaned internally. Way to turn into a groupie for watershaping in the space of two seconds, he chastised himself.

“Not perfectly,” Cas was saying. “Not when I can’t see what I’m doing. I’ll do the best I can…”

He raised his hand to his face, coating the left side completely in water. He kept both eyes closed for a moment, frowning; through the marbled radiance of the water, Dean could see the livid red cut thinning, receding, disappearing completely. He tried not to look too impressed. Yarım, shaping the elements was wrong. He shouldn’t find it nearly so fascinating.

Cas lifted his hands away from his face, and turned to Dean. The cut was completely healed, except… over his eye, stretching down his cheek, there was a thin, white scar. It was shiny, as though it had been there for years.

“Did I heal it?” Cas asked. “Is it gone?” He put his hand up to his face, feeling for the abrasion. Dean caught his hand before it could find the line of smoother skin, the permanent disfigurement.

“You healed it,” he said. “But there’s – there’s –”

“A scar,” Cas finished for him. His hand gripped Dean’s a little more tightly for a second, and then let go. “I thought there might be.”

“Can’t you heal it more?” Dean asked desperately.

“No,” Cas said. “Once it’s done, it’s done.” He looked into Dean’s eyes, and saw how distraught he looked. He reached up his hand and cupped Dean’s cheek. “I don’t care,” he said simply, earnestly. “I swear, I don’t. I just want us to get out of here alive.”

Dean swallowed down his tears and nodded, refusing to allow himself to lean into Cas’ touch.

“Then let’s go,” he said croakily. “You ready with the water?”

“Ready,” Cas said, backing up so that he was leaning against the wall next to the door. He would be out of sight when Alistair first opened it. Dean met his gaze for a moment, and nodded.

They were ready.

“Alistair!” he hollered, banging on the wooden door. It felt slightly slimy. Dean rubbed the grime off on his pelerin with a grimace, trying not to think about where it might have come from.

He could hear the sound of approaching footsteps on the other side of the door, and then there was the heavy clank of the key turning in the lock.

“I didn’t hear the piggy squeal,” said Alistair, as he pushed open the door. “Did he take his punishment like a good boy?”

His sickening grin froze as Cas twisted out from behind the door, the water swirling between his two hands. Without a word, Cas lashed out, his hand stretching, flinging the water towards Alistair in a loop and then pulling tight around his neck. Dean watched, his heartbeat racing, as Cas calmly choked Alistair until he was unconscious, his lips blue and his eyes bloodshot as they closed.

Dean wondered if he could have found it in himself to be so efficient when dealing with the man who had lightly tortured him, permanently scarred him… he might have been tempted to leave Alistair with a matching scar, at least. Dean knew that Cas could do it, had seen him whip water brutally during the fight in the desert. But Cas didn’t. Not that kind of man, Dean thought, as Cas bent down to pluck the keys from Alistair’s belt.

They stepped over Alistair’s body, Cas reaching a hand back through the air as though to guide Dean out of the cell. They jogged up the corridor, Dean marvelling at his ease of movement. He’d always taken his strength and his health for granted, until they’d been taken away during that fight – and now that they were restored, he felt more powerful than before. His body had known pain, real pain, now, and he wasn’t afraid of it any more.

Cas unlocked the main door to the dungeons, and they began to climb the stairs, leaping them two at a time. Dean hadn’t seen anyone on his way down, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t night patrols of guards; they had to stay alert. His heart was thudding in his chest, his eyes jumping to every shadow that flickered.

They made it up four flights of stairs before they lost their luck. Turning the corner to head up the fifth, they ran straight into a team of three guards, all decked in chainmail and helmets, with daggers in their hands. Dean didn’t allow them time to recover from their surprise. Enjoying his newly-refound full range of movement, he drew his arm back and slugged the nearest guard full in the face, the punch landing neatly on his nose. Dean felt it crack under his knuckles and pulled back, his stomach turning. The guard went down, and didn’t get back up.

Meanwhile, Cas was dispatching one of the guards with his water, while the other circled behind him. Dean acted swiftly, striding over, lowering his centre of gravity and kicking the man hard on the back of one knee; the guard collapsed with a cry, which was summarily stifled as the man’s mouth filled with water. Cas had him gargling uselessly for a moment on the floor, before he passed out.

Dean turned to Cas pulling the water back to his hand, standing in between the other two sleeping guards. He looked terrifying, the battle-anger in his eyes, his muscles strong and lean under his filthy pelerin and şalvar.

“Nice one,” Dean managed, and Cas nodded.

“You too,” he said, indicating the man with the broken nose.

They ran on, up the stairs. Dean prayed that no one had heard the guard’s shout before Cas had managed to cut it off. His footsteps were loud and heavy on the stone stairs, too, ringing up and down the dark stairwell, but they couldn’t take the time to move more quietly. They had to get out before anyone noticed Cas was missing from the dungeon.

As they emerged out of the stairway and began to head down a corridor, they met another group of guards. These ones saw them coming, and had their weapons up; even still, they were no match for Dean and Cas. They were dispatched quickly and efficiently, Dean opting for quick, jabbing punches to their wrists and then faces, while Cas relied on his watershaping. This time, before running on, Dean stooped and picked up a couple of the daggers that the guards each carried. Shorter than the savaşçı’s dagger he’d lost, they were still serviceable and sharp.

The guards’ chainmail wasn’t so intimidating at close quarters, Dean noticed. The links were thin and were made of a metal cheaper than silver. Useful to note. If you stabbed it hard enough, it probably wouldn’t provide perfect protection.

They pressed on, moving more stealthily and cautiously now, waiting to check that there were no unpleasant surprises waiting for them before they turned corners. When they reached the corridor that Dean’s guard had taken to fetch his pelerin, Dean hustled Cas down it, pressing his shoulder and using his body weight instead of breaking the silence with a word. Cas followed his directions, and they soon found themselves following the scent of damp washing to a large, steamy room, lit by a fire that stretched along the length of one wall, with wet clothing hanging in front of it to dry overnight. Dean barely had time to eye the flames nervously before Cas was dragging him forward, heading for a door in the corner of the room.

Before they reached it, Cas whipped out a hand, sending water pouring into the lock and clicking it open with ice, just as he had in his cell. For the first time, Dean had a small glimpse into how stifling it must have been for Cas to go as long as he did without shaping water, whilst he was travelling with Dean. He seemed to use his skill as easily as breathing, natural and intuitive.

When they reached the door, Dean twisted down the handle and threw it open, preparing himself for the cool blast of outside air – and being dismayed to see another room, closed in and windowless. Along one side were metal sinks, with washboards built into them; this must be where the clothing was initially brought for scrubbing. Each sink was attached to the wall by a short metal chute. Dean moved forwards and peered down the nearest one. It was dark, and seemed to stretch beyond the wall.

“Sluice gates,” Cas said, coming up behind him. “Miniature ones. They hold the water in the sinks for washing, and drain it away afterwards.”

“So… they lead outside?” Dean asked hopefully. Cas shrugged.

“They might,” he said. “Or they might lead to somewhere else… below the castle, maybe.”

Dean chewed his lip for a moment, thinking. Cas was watching him, waiting for his decision. Why? It wasn’t as though he had any more idea of what they should do than Cas did, but it was still him making the decisions. He exhaled sharply through his nose.

“We’ll try it,” he said. “We met six guards just getting here. There’s bound to be more of them near the front doors.”

Cas nodded, silently accepting Dean’s decision. Dean stared at him for a moment, not sure what he was waiting for – and then Cas’ hand was pushing at his shoulder, forcing him to move.

They made for the nearest sluice gate, vaulting into the deep sink to which it was attached and then clambering forwards into the darkened aperture. Dean went first, crawling on his hands and knees. At the bottom of the tunnel was a thin puddle of water, and slimy drips tinkled down from the ceiling. Dean pulled a face, and kept moving, using his hands to feel his way along in the blackness, making sure that the floor didn’t suddenly drop away. There was a slight downward slant, so that the water would pour the right way.

“This tunnel is long,” Cas said after a few minutes of crawling, his voice echoing strangely in the enclosed metal space. “It must be leading to the castle walls, unless it goes in a loop somewhere.”

“Don’t get my hopes up,” Dean warned. “Knowing our luck, that’s what’s happening right now. We’re gonna end up poking our heads back out one of the other sluice gates.”

Was he imagining the way that the tunnel seemed to be lightening? Suddenly he could pick out details, the rivets in the metal, the greenish slime on the walls. He winced, and part of him wished everything was still dark.

“Nearly there,” he said. “Bets on Gordon Walker waiting for us at the end?”

Cas didn’t reply; maybe he was too busy praying – or doing whatever it was that Water Lands people did when they wanted something, Dean corrected himself. He had no idea what that was. His hands and knees were starting to ache as the end came into sight: a small, round circle of dim light that gave no hint of what lay beyond. They approached it far too slowly for Dean’s liking, but there was only so far that he could push up the pace. Finally, finally, the shapes beyond the tunnel began to resolve themselves into recognisable forms: the dark night sky, filled with stars, and beneath them – a layer of varying greens…

“Cas,” Dean whispered, almost too hopeful to believe it. “Cas, I think… I think I can see trees.”

Cas actually stopped crawling.

“Trees?” he said.

“Trees,” Dean confirmed.

“So we’re… we’re going to come out… in the forest?” Cas asked, sounding as though he hardly dared to believe it.

“I – I think –” Dean began, and then stopped short. Just below the tops of the trees, something else had come into view. Something long, and grey, and imposing. Dean sighed.

“Scratch that last,” he said. “There’s a wall there.”

Cas pressed closer to Dean, leaning up against his ass to peer over his shoulder.

“We’re screwed,” he said. “It was nice knowing you.”

Dean snorted.

“Good attitude there, Cas.” He kept crawling. Maybe the wall was just a small one, a climbable one. Maybe it wouldn’t be so difficult to get past it…

He reached the lip of the tunnel, which was just a few feet above the ground. The wall rose up against the night sky, lit by the braziers along its length. It was solid. It was guarded. And it was huge.

Dean swallowed.

“What were you saying about being screwed?” he muttered. There were guards everywhere, scattered across the short distance from the castle itself to the wall. The wall was a bastion of menacing strength, looking completely impregnable – except for…

“There,” Cas said, noticing it at the same time as Dean. “The gate. It’s open.”

As they watched, Dean and Cas saw the back of a large wagon beginning to reverse through the gate; a night-time delivery, which explained all the guards, too.

“Shit,” he said. “We couldn’t have come at a worse time.”

Cas, however, was looking at the wagon speculatively. It was moving incredibly slowly, with men on either side of it yelling forwards at the driver, trying to get it better angled to enter the courtyard. Dean followed Cas’ gaze, trying to understand.

“Once that wagon’s halfway through the gate,” he said slowly, catching up to Cas’ train of thought, “it’ll be a bitch to move back out. If we try to make it through then, they won’t have time to close it on us.”

“Assuming we can make it as far as the gate,” Cas pointed out. “They’ll all come at us, Dean.”

Dean pursed his lips. He looked back out at the scene once more, frowning. This was a sluice gate, and it led to a courtyard? That wasn’t right. He looked down, and saw a large, dark hole, neatly bricked around the edge.

“Cas,” he said. “There’s a hole right there, like a well or something. Can you get water from it?”

Cas was silent for a moment. Dean assumed he was doing some water-sensing type shit, but he didn’t turn round to check; he was trying to plot the movements of the guards to see if there was any pattern, any moment when their backs were all turned and he could get them a few seconds’ advantage.

“Yes,” said Cas eventually. “I can. It’s there… but it’s deep. Give me a few…” his voice petered back to silence, for over a minute this time. So far as Dean could see, there was no way of predicting which direction the guards were going to go next. They must have been ordered to patrol at random.

“Cas, someone’s gonna notice you’re missing soon and sound the alarm,” Dean said, when the silence had gone on for a minute and a half. His chest was becoming unnaturally tight with nerves; it had been easier when they were moving.

“I – I’ve got it,” Cas murmured. “Is it there?”

Dean looked down again. In the well, he could see a thick, rippling layer of water, hovering just below the rim.

“It’s there,” he said. “Are you ready?”

“Dean – wait,” said Cas, and the water fell a few feet as he lost his concentration. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Dean demanded, too aggressively, but his heart was in his throat now, he was so afraid. “Oh, yeah, I’ve broken you out of the dungeons but I’m not quite sure I want to –”

“This will be bloody,” Cas interrupted bluntly. “Some of these guards will have to die for us to escape. Are you prepared for that?”

That shut Dean up. He looked out at the guards one more time, with new eyes.

Each one of them probably had a family, a home, a pet. Ideas, thoughts, tastes. They were individuals. Some of them were probably just as young and inexperienced as the guard outside Dean’s room. He hoped the kid was still there, and hadn’t been ordered out here.

Because it’s so much easier to kill people you don’t know, Dean.

“We have to get out,” he said unsteadily. “Or they’ll kill you.”

“I know,” Cas said softly.

“I can’t let that happen, Cas.” He twisted around in the tunnel, to look Cas in the eyes. His face was near-impossible to discern, after Dean’s eyes had adjusted to the brighter light of the courtyard. Dean reached up a hand and cupped Cas’ cheek, so that he knew where to talk to.

“I’m not letting you die,” he said. “I don’t care who I have to go through. We’re getting you out of here.”

He felt Cas nod, his smooth cheek rubbing against Dean’s palm. Dean nodded, too, and turned back to face the courtyard. The wagon was over halfway through; they were lucky that it was so heavy, so difficult to manoeuvre, or they might have lost their opportunity entirely.

“OK,” Dean said, steeling himself. “Listen, you do this without killing them if you can, got it? Wait to use your watershaping until the last possible moment. We’re gonna walk out there, try to go unnoticed for as long as possible. When they do notice us, it’s normal combat until there’s no other choice. You still have your knives?”

“No,” Cas said. Dean cursed, and handed back one of the ones in his hands.

“Have this,” he said. “Non-fatal wounds only, if you can. Aim for the places where I got stabbed. The chainmail they’re wearing isn’t great quality. If you stick the knife in hard enough, it’ll go through.”

“You really were trained as a warrior,” Cas said dryly. Dean huffed out a nervous laugh.

“On the count of three, we get out of the chute and walk. OK?”

“Yes, Dean.” Cas sounded determined, ready. Dean looked down to check, and saw that the water was still at the surface of the well, ready to be used.

“Three. Two. One…” The numbers disappeared too fast; Dean wasn’t ready like Cas was, but he never would be. He swallowed hard, clenched his jaw, and said, “Go.”

They slid out of the tunnel as quietly and neatly as Dean could have hoped. The perfect start.

It was sheer bad luck that a guard nearby had turned to look at the castle just at that moment, and caught sight of them in the shadows.

“Hey!” he shouted, alerting everyone in the courtyard to their presence. In the darkness, the guards stared around, confused; Dean knew they had seconds to make a move before they were inundated.

“Move, move!” he hissed, starting to run. There was no time for inconspicuousness now; it was a run and a prayer to Yarım to be kind, just this once, be kind.

Dean could hear the swish of Cas’ water rising above them. He didn’t stop to look back, but yells of alarm sounded across the yard, becoming angry shouts and orders. A pair of guards close to Dean locked onto him, running at him with weapons drawn. He barrelled into them, running at full pelt now, willing to risk the sharpness of their daggers; he shoulder-barged the first, who fell into the second, and they both went sprawling. Dean leapt over them, stumbling only a little before running on. He could still hear Cas’ footsteps behind him, over the shouting and the sound of his own heavy breathing. They were still together. They could still make it.

More guards, standing still this time, harder to throw off-balance. Dean bulled towards them, holding his dagger up in front of himself aggressively. One of the guards was younger than the other; he was wavering, his knife pointing towards the ground instead of upwards. Dean hesitated for a millisecond, and then attacked his partner; a swift, deep stab to the upper leg, retracting the blade before he could engage Dean in serious combat. The young guard watched Dean run on with a mixture of fear and horror, crouching down beside his partner.

Sorry, kid.

And now there were too many of them to fight hand-to-hand. Dean motioned to Cas, a quick beckoning movement over his shoulder. Cas understood at once. A great sheet of water, clear and rippling and curved around them in a circle, smashed across the courtyard in every direction. The guards were sent tumbling to the floor and in their chainmail, they were slow to get up; Dean and Cas leapt over their prone bodies, agile as cats and desperate, utterly desperate.

They were almost at the gate. They were almost out. And all of the guards around the wagon had been taken out by Cas’ wave of water. Their path was clear.

They squeezed in between the wagon and the gate, their progress slowed horribly for a few seconds. Round the front of the vehicle were a pair of burly men, who looked more seasoned than any of the guards inside the castle had. They’d fight dirtier, Dean knew it just by looking at them.

“Cas!” he shouted. “Three – fast!”

They dipped in perfect unison, using their momentum to their advantage as they rammed their shoulders into the wagon owners’ unarmoured bellies. Cas’ man went down, but grabbed at Cas’ ankle as soon as he landed on the ground, sending him sprawling, too. Meanwhile, Dean’s man had a stomach like rock, and didn’t seem to have felt the blow in the slightest. Dean squared up, his dagger out. His opponent was unarmed.

Dean considered throwing away his dagger, to be honourable; then Cas’ man got to his feet and kicked Cas, hard, in the stomach. Dean’s ideas of chivalry evaporated. With a roar of rage, he slashed his knife across his own man’s chest, moving too quickly to be blocked, sending him stumbling back in shock and pain. He switched his attention to Cas’ man, who had his back to Dean, relying on his partner to take care of him. Dean took half a second to evaluate him. Strong, determined – dirty fighter, as he’d predicted. Not easy to beat. They had to flee, now, before more guards came pouring out through those gates. With his teeth gritted and a fierce determination in his eyes, Dean took two steps forward – and sank his knife hilt-deep into the man’s flesh.

With numbness spreading through his body, and over his brain like a fog, Dean hauled Cas to his feet and tugged him away towards the line of trees. They ran into the shelter of the forest, scarred, wounded, scared – but still together.

Chapter Text

In the darkness, the trees loomed over them. They were huge and twisty-haired like silent sisters, accepting Dean and Cas into the warm embrace of the gloom, wiping away the sounds of the castle almost as soon as they were beyond the first few thick trunks. Even still, Dean didn’t slow for half an hour, running on and on and on, trying to keep a straight course as best he could whilst avoiding the tree roots bridging the leafy floor. Cas didn’t stop, didn’t question him, but followed in his wake.

Yarım be blessed, they’d done it. They’d escaped from that hellish place. Dean’s lungs ached but he kept going, determined to make sure that they couldn’t be found by any of Gordon’s guards. There was no way Dean was letting either of them be taken back.

It was only when he finally did stop, bending over with his hands on his knees to catch his breath, that he realised how quiet the forest was. After the whispering nightly winds of the desert, the stillness of the gloom seemed strange, but not unpleasant. The air around them was heavy with moisture, completely different to the dry, baking heat to which they’d become accustomed; Dean was sweating slightly in the humidity. It smelled sweet in the forest, though, like new sprouts, fresh growth. Dean looked over at Cas, who was leaning up against one of the trees, and laughed, shaky with adrenaline and relief.

“Not bad,” he said. Cas nodded, his chest still heaving after their sprint.

“Best yet,” he replied. Ayın Yarısı’s light was filtering through the leaves above, dripping down over the branches to the ground where they stood. In the low, milky light, Cas looked almost otherworldly, the scar over his eye like a strand of spider’s web. Dean straightened up, listening for any sounds of pursuit and hearing nothing. A wave of tiredness rushed over him as he realised that they were out of danger, for now. His eyes were heavy and his body ached. He realised he was still gripping the knife that he’d used to stab the wagon-owner, the blade still shining red. He swallowed hard and stooped quickly to wipe it on the ground, before tucking it into his pelerin.

“Sleep now?” he asked Cas, who nodded firmly. There was no way either of them could go further tonight. Dean kicked at the leaf-strewn floor, wondering how safe they would be if they slept where they were standing. Cas’ nose wrinkled at the sight of the damp mulch.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Dean said, shrugging.

“Then I am not a beggar,” said Cas, “I am a chooser.” He was looking up at the trees, his eyes tracing the spiral patterns of the darkened branches above. Dean watched him for a moment, his mouth slightly open, and then snapped it shut and put his hands on his hips.

“That’s great, Cas,” he said, “but if it’s a choice between sleeping on the ground or sleeping standing up, I think I’ll take the horizontal option.”

Cas’ only response to this was to send him a quick, exasperated glance before stepping away, towards one of the tree trunks nearest to them. He looked at it speculatively for a few moments. It was huge; if Dean and Cas had stood on opposite sides and wrapped their arms around it, their fingers wouldn’t have met in the middle. It was a titan, resting still and easy, perhaps sleeping soundly, perhaps quietly watchful. Its roots were a great sprawling mess, lurching up out of the ground like the tentacles of a docile monster.

“Cas…?” Dean said. “It’s a great tree, but I’d rather find somewhere to sleep…”

“There’s no need to search,” said Cas a little absently, putting a hand on the tree trunk, wrapping it round a protruding knot in the wood.

“Right, sure, because we’re gonna climb the tree and sleep there,” Dean said sarcastically. When Cas didn’t smile or roll his eyes, Dean went still. “Please tell me we’re not going to climb the tree and sleep there.”

“It’s the most comfortable place in the forest,” Cas said, turning to Dean with a little frown, unable to understand why he wasn’t immediately enthused by the idea of climbing the twenty feet to the lowest branch. “I didn’t pass through here on my way to Şehir, but I’ve heard about the forest on the other side of the Southern Mountain Pass. It’s supposed to be beautiful.”

“Best appreciated from the ground, I’m sure,” Dean said a little desperately. When Cas raised an eyebrow, Dean dropped his head. “I, uh… I don’t like heights all that much.” Yarım, he was so tired. Maybe Cas could climb the tree if he wanted to, and Dean could curl up at the bottom of it.

Cas’ expression dipped momentarily into a frown, before softening into kindness.

“I’m going to climb to the first branch,” he said, “and then I’ll help you up.”

“You could just leave me here,” Dean said, trying not to look up at the tree. It made him feel unwell just thinking about being up there, with so much space between them and solid ground. Cas smirked, just a little, and not unkindly. He tugged off his pelerin and began to climb, swiftly and gracefully, grabbing hold of the places where the tree’s bark whorled and bumped. Dean watched him go higher and higher, the moonlight laving through his hair and over his body, clothing pulled taut as he strained to reach the next handhold. Clearing his throat, Dean looked down at the floor. He wondered whether Cas’ view had been this good when they’d been crawling out of the tunnel together.

Cas finally swung himself across onto the lowest of the tree’s branches. He was too high up for Dean to make out his expression in the gloom, but he was strangely still and tense, as though waiting for something to happen.

“Cas…?” Dean said, suddenly afraid. Had he seen something? “What’s wr-”

He broke off when he saw the water droplets starting to form.

They hung in air like opals hung on an invisible web, glittering coldly and expanding as Dean watched. He gulped and looked up to Cas, who was moving now, his hands curving, shaping. Dean tried to calm the frantic thudding of his heart. Cas was shaping water, taking it from the air and making it into droplets all around him. As they grew in size, they began to extend delicate, curling tendrils, watery bonds that swirled and intertwined and fused together, encircling Dean in a sphere of rippling liquid. Yarım, what was happening? Dean was on the point of calling out to Cas again, asking him to stop – and then the water cage started to rise. Dean only realised that it had formed under his feet, too, when he was lifted gently off the ground and into the air.

He was flying. In a cage made of shaped water.

He should have been absolutely terrified, but… there was something incredibly beautiful about it, something so very… Cas. He couldn’t explain it, but it was there in the blue sheen of the water, in the softness and precise delicacy of the shaping, in the strength of the liquid lattice.Dean reached out a tentative hand towards the wall of the cage, and felt the ribbons of water flowing over his fingers for a moment before snatching them back. He felt his stomach getting left behind as the sphere picked up a little pace, though he remained perfectly steady, supported by a plane of flat, solid ice that had crystallised under his feet without him even noticing.

Dean floated upwards for a few seconds longer, barely noticing the floor slipping away beneath him as he watched little bubbles snapping out of the flowing cage’s water into the air – and then there was a light jarring as he landed, and the cage was melting from top to bottom; the carefully-worked patterns dissolved into a fall of cool water that splashed onto the branch of the tree where the cage had landed, and then down to the forest floor. As the structure fell away, Dean found himself standing a few feet away from Cas, who was smiling tiredly at him and lowering his hands to release the water he’d been shaping.

“Don’t look down,” he said. Dean didn’t, but he could see in the bottom of his vision that the branch wasn’t so narrow as it had seemed from below; in fact, in had to be at least seven or eight feet wide, and Cas had landed him in a little dip in the branch’s rounded camber, so that it would be almost impossible for him to roll off in his sleep.

“Thanks, Cas,” he said, crouching down carefully and then stretching out, letting the tree branch take the weight of his aching muscles. He rested his head against the bark and closed his eyes. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it would do for now.

He was just starting to drift off when he heard footsteps moving along the branch. He’d assumed that Cas had found himself another dip to sleep in, but now he felt gentle, firm hands lifting up his head and placing something beneath it – something soft and cushiony, which stopped the bark from digging into the back of his head.

“Cas?” he muttered, cracking open his eyes.

“Just some moss,” Cas explained, standing up. “It’s clean. I checked.”

Dean smiled sleepily. For a second, he thought that Cas was going to lie down next to him – for a second, he thought he was going to be brave enough to ask for that – but then the moment slipped away like water, and Cas was moving back to his own space on the branch. Dean sighed, and let his eyes fall closed once more. His brain was buzzing with thoughts, but he could deal with them in the morning. For now, he focused on the quiet of the forest, the sweet freshness of the air, and the sound of Cas’ breathing, until he fell asleep.

*

Dean was woken by a drop of water falling on his cheek.

He blinked his eyes open blearily, raising his hand to his face to brush away the droplet.  For a moment, his eyes hazed with sleep, all he saw was a blur of brilliant green, swirling and rustling; then he rubbed his eyes sleepily, and the swathes of green resolved themselves into leaves, a great canopy with dabs of sunlight dropping through here and there, tinted sap-bright and beautiful. There were no sounds, other than the light pattering of morning dew dripping from the leaves, down to the floor below. Dean smiled. For the first time in what felt like forever, he felt truly secure.

He sat up, and saw Cas stretched out further down the branch. A light tickling at the back of his neck told him that a piece of moss had got caught there; he brushed it away, and then crawled over to where Cas was lying, being careful to not look down. He peered at Cas’ upside-down face for a few seconds.

“Cas,” he said softly, and for the first time, Cas opened his eyes at once. He smiled immediately, without artifice, and Dean’s heart squeezed; he realised he was smiling back, the expression falling over his face easily, unconsciously.

“Good morning, Dean,” Cas said quietly, his tone languid and intimate. Yarım, Dean wanted to lean down and kiss him so badly. His lips were so close, so pink, and looked so soft.

Cas’ stomach rumbled, and Dean snorted.

“Hungry, by any chance?” he asked, rocking back onto his heels. Cas sat up, rubbing the back of his head; Dean looked down, and saw that he’d slept with a much thinner coating of moss for a cushion than the one he’d given to Dean. He said nothing about it, unsure how to bring it up without embarrassing Cas, but it made his heart twist just a little.

“Yes, I am,” Cas was saying. “And I know exactly where to get food.”

He swung himself upright and stretched, still only wearing his tunic and şalvar.

“Is your pelerin still at the bottom of the tree?” he asked, not daring to lean over the edge of the branch and look. Cas peered down instead, and Dean resisted the urge to grab hold of his legs just in case he fell. Cas had excellent balance, for Yarım’s sake. He needed to stop being so antsy about being up high.

He risked a glance towards the ground, and his stomach seemed to tilt. Antsy was probably fine. No need to push his own boundaries. After all, before last night, being this high would probably have had him clinging to the branch and begging to be let down. Was it because Cas was there, that he felt so much more secure? Or was it because after the past week, he felt… so much older, and stronger, too, than he ever had before? Maybe those two things were inextricable. Cas made him stronger.

Cas finished stretching, and then turned to the tree trunk and began to climb down it, moving so swiftly and surely that Dean was left with his mouth open.

“Are there a lot of trees in the Water Lands?” he called down. “Because you could probably do that for a living.”

“Not a lot of trees,” Cas said, looking up at him with a grin as he reached the floor. “Lots of ice and rocks. Trees are easy after climbing up glaciers.”

Dean decided that he didn’t like the sound of the Water Lands. Trees were one thing, but crawling up and down sheets of ice sounded like his perfect nightmare.

Cas had his hands outstretched, moving them in a soft circle. Dean was about to ask what he was doing, until he noticed a flat disc forming in the air next to the place on the branch where he was kneeling. It looked smooth and shiny white. Ice.

Dean looked down at Cas, who raised his eyebrows expectantly.

“You want me to get down on that?” Dean said disbelievingly. “What happened to the magical pretty cage thing?”

Cas rolled his eyes and moved his hands once more, keeping his palms and fingers flat, drawing more water out of the air and condensing it into droplets that conglomerated, forming a small railing around half of the disc of ice.

“Better?” he asked, with a smug little smile. Dean glared at him, breathing out a curse before standing up carefully. The ice disc sparkled innocently up at him in the fresh, minty morning light. Dean scowled at it for a few seconds, and then stepped onto it. It wasn’t so slippery as he’d feared it might be. He took hold of the cool railing, feeling the slight ice burn in his fingers but not letting go – in fact, gripping it all the harder when Cas made the lightest of gestures and the disc floated gently down to the forest floor.

“Are you alright?” Cas asked solicitously, as Dean stepped onto solid ground once more, and his icy elevator dissolved behind him. Dean sent him a sullen look, with the barest hint of lightness playing around his mouth and in the twinkle of his eyes, letting Cas know that he wasn’t really upset.

“Fine,” he grunted. “Did you say you know where to find food?”

Without a word, Cas started to move across the forest floor. It was clear of any scrubby bushes or bracken; the spaces between the tree trunks were disturbed only by the roots of the trees themselves. Cas had walked only a little way, Dean following him and staring up at the canopy of leaves above, before he stopped next to a tree that was smaller than all the rest by a long way. Amongst its branches, Dean could see fat green fruit nestling between the leaves, glittering with dew. They looked almost too perfect to be real – but Dean gave Cas a boost and he picked two of them off the tree, and when he passed them down they felt ripe and fleshy under Dean’s fingers.

“I saw the tree last night when we were running,” Cas explained when Dean put him back down on the floor. He’d been so careful not to touch anywhere he shouldn’t; he was almost sweating with the stress of it. “I thought it might be useful later.”

“Always with the long-term plan, Cas,” Dean said, a little too fondly, perhaps. But Cas didn’t seem to mind. They sat down together at the base of the apple tree’s trunk, which was still thick and strong even though it was so much smaller than the others – at least five feet across. It looked sturdy and friendly, a dwarf in the land of giants.

When he bit into his apple, Dean almost groaned with happiness. The apple was sour, bursting over his tongue with a stinging deliciousness, exquisite and unique like nothing he’d ever tasted before. He devoured the whole thing, larger than his clenched fist, before Cas had even managed half of his.

“No more,” Cas said, answering Dean’s as-yet unspoken request when he threw away the core, nibbled down to the seeds. “They’ll make you sick if you eat too many.”

Dean accepted his words with a grunt. The first one had filled him up, anyway. He didn’t really need more, for now.

The apple tree stood at the centre of a kind of quiet glade, with no other trees for several feet on either side. The ground was covered in soft, fresh grass, and sunlight fell sweetly through the gap in the canopy high above, illuminating the space like one of the stage lights back in the circus tent in the desert – only with soft, beautiful, natural light, untainted by the scent of gas and smoke. Dean looked over at Cas, who was still munching on his apple quietly, the sunlight falling in soft dabs over his hair, his face, his shoulders, haloing his body in a way that felt only right, Dean thought.

The scar over Cas’ eye was clear and visible, not unpleasant but certainly noticeable. Staring at it, Dean had a sudden thought; he tugged off his pelerin and twisted his arm so that he could take a look at his shoulder. Sure enough, there on his upper arm, the burn mark in the shape of a handprint was still livid and strong.

“I did give you that,” Cas said softly, catching Dean looking at it. “I’m sorry I lied to you when you asked before. My hands were hot from shaping water into steam, and I…” he trailed off for a moment. “I’m sorry. I haven’t done it since.”

“You should,” Dean said lightly. “Sounds like a cool trick.”

Cas took another bite of his apple and chewed it moodily. Dean rocked his body sideways, nudging Cas’ shoulder with his own.

“I don’t mind,” Dean said. “I really don’t. Hey, this way, we’ve kind of each left our mark on the other, I guess.”

Cas stared at him for a second, and then reached up his hand to his face.

“I’d forgotten,” he said simply, tracing the shape of the line from where it started, on his cheek, to where it ended, above his brow. He didn’t look sad, or angry… he didn’t look anything, his expression flat in a way that Dean was coming to recognise as Cas’ won’t-talk-about-it face.

“Hey,” he said again, trying to smile. “It looks badass. It’s a good spy scar, you know? Makes you look mysterious.”

“Yes,” Cas said, his expression turning strangely sheepish. He went to take another bite of his apple, and then seemed to change his mind. “Actually, Dean… I’m not – I’m not a spy.”

Dean gaped at him for a second. Cas met his gaze, not speaking, but not looking away.

“But – but you said!” Dean exclaimed after a moment. Cas shook his head.

“You assumed, and I did not… disabuse you of the notion,” he said delicately. Dean snorted, caught between amusement and anger.

“So first I think you’re a spy for my own country, then I think you’re a spy for an enemy country, and now I find out that you’re not a spy at all? You are from the Water Lands, though, right?”

“Yes,” Cas confirmed swiftly, as though eager to be sincere now that the truth was finally being asked of him. “I am from the Water Lands. But I’m not a spy.”

“Well, then… what are you even doing here?” Dean said blankly. “Why did you go to all that effort… what were you doing trying to meet that guy, Ash? Wasn’t he a spy too?”

Cas sighed, resting his elbows on his bent knees and dipping his head down.

“It’s a long story, Dean,” he said. “And one that I’m not sure you’ll believe.”

Dean shrugged.

“I followed you across the length of the country on the strength of a story that I apparently made up all on my own,” he said, with a wry grin. He’d been so sure that Cas was a spy. “Try me.”

Cas offered him a smile, throwing away his apple core and wiping his hands on his şalvar to get rid of the sticky juice on them. He cleared his throat a couple of times, looking nervous.

“I once told you that I didn’t have friends as a child,” he began, finally. There was a prepared note to his voice that made Dean wonder how many times Cas had imagined telling Dean this story. He made his posture deliberately loose and soft, trying to help Cas relax. “That was true. I spent large amounts of time alone. Our tribe was based near the mountains, close to the Southern Pass, so I used to spend most of my time climbing up and down them looking for caves. Other members of the tribe used to climb to hunt, but I climbed… just because I could. And because I wanted to know everything about the mountains.”

Dean nodded along, letting Cas know that he was still listening. He could imagine Cas, younger, perhaps a little slimmer without the muscle tone of adulthood, pulling himself up the sides of mountains with sinewy strength.

“One day, I… I found something. Something that I’d never expected to see. It – it was alive, in a cave…” Cas’ voice petered out. He seemed to be searching for the right way to tell this part, and coming up blank. “It had nowhere to go when Ateş Aşiret banned firemaking,” he said wretchedly, eventually. “It had siblings, but they were all hunted down and killed by the King’s Men, on the King’s orders. Because their biology is so centred around fire, they too felt the King’s wrath after the death of the Queen, as well as human firemakers…”

Dean’s mouth was slowly falling open. Surely not. It had to be impossible. They were all gone, every last one of them. There was no way one survived, and made it to the Water Lands unnoticed.

“Are you saying,” Dean croaked, “that you found a… a…”

“Dragon,” Cas finished, watching Dean’s face with his utmost intensity, waiting for signs of disbelief or anger. Dean, however, felt only shock. The dragons were all dead, everyone in Ateş Aşiret knew that.

“It spoke to me,” Cas said, seeming more determined now that he’d cleared the first hurdle. “It taught me hundreds of things. I learned some of the customs and politics of Ateş Aşiret. I learned the language. I learned about the King and the Queen, and their two sons, who were sent to live far away after the… the death of their mother.”

Dean nodded, forcing away the sudden thickness in his throat.

“After Mom died, we went to live with Bobby and Ellen,” he said. “We didn’t go far, though, that was just a story for anyone who might be looking for us. We actually stayed in Şehir.” He waved his hand, dismissing the tangent. “Doesn’t matter, whatever. Carry on?”

Cas frowned down at his hands for a moment before continuing.

“One day,” he said, his voice a little thinner now, as though remembering something unpleasant, “I came to the dragon’s cave and I realised how much thinner and smaller it looked. I’d known it for a few years, at least, by that point… and I thought it might be sick, so I asked it if there was anything I could do.”

Cas swallowed, his hands clenching and unclenching.

“It told me that it needed fire,” he said. “Not ordinary fire, but the fire given through the connection that only a firemaker and a dragon can share. Without those flames, the dragon was growing weak. The relationship between firemakers and dragons had always been symbiotic, and without it… the dragon was dying.” Cas cleared his throat roughly, tilting his head back. Dean could see that his eyes were a little shiny, and his heart gave a little stab of sympathy. This mattered to Cas, really mattered. “After so many years together, the dragon’s death wouldn’t only be the passing of the last of a great race… it would also be the loss of a great friend. My only friend. And so I did the only thing I could think of.”

“You came looking for a firemaker,” Dean said wonderingly. “That’s why you went to the Forest of the Dead – it’s where the rebel firemakers all lived! And that tattoo on Ash’s arm… it was…”

“The mark of a firemaker,” Cas confirmed, nodding. “I asked around as soon as I entered Şehir, trying to find where the firemakers were. I knew there must still be some – or rather, I hoped. After a few weeks of near-misses with authorities across the country, I finally heard about the base near Şehir. I asked my informant to set up a meeting with one of the firemakers, and she came through; I was to meet Ash. I travelled fast, but by that point a group of King’s Men following me from the South had almost caught up. They attacked me just as I entered the Forest of the Dead. It was as I fled from them that I saw the lights inside the chapel, and I ran for it. And I found you.”

“Actually, I think I found you,” Dean interjected. “I opened the doors and found you just about passed out on the steps.”

“I had travelled a long way in a very short space of time,” Cas said indignantly. “And I had shaped a lot of water trying to escape the King’s Men.”

“Sure, sure,” Dean said airily, waving away Cas’ explanations. “All I hear are excuses, Cas.”

Cas opened his mouth to argue back, and then seemed to realise that Dean was messing with him, and shut it again with a glower.

“I sent you down to meet Ash with the letter I had written for just such a contingency. It asked Ash to come back with me to the Water Lands, and to meet with me at dawn, an hour due west of the Forest centre. When you left the chapel, I found some water in an urn and drank it, drawing strength from it and healing my wound.”

“I wondered how you’d managed to perk up,” Dean said, thinking back to that night. “Did I ever thank you for coming after me, in the Forest?”

“I wouldn’t have needed to, if I hadn’t sent you down there myself, into terrible danger,” Cas said. “Sometimes… my plans lack a little common sense.” Dean grinned to himself, and put his hand briefly on Cas’ shoulder. Cas smiled gently, acknowledging the gesture.

“After we escaped the Forest of the Dead, I thought I’d lost my chance of ever bringing a firemaker back to the Water Lands,” Cas said. “Ash was the only one who’d been willing to speak with my contact in the south. I was going to go back to her, ask her to try again, but then…” Cas cast Dean a quick, anxious glance. “Then you asked to come with me.”

Dean frowned, his eyes narrowing.

“Why should that have anything to do with needing a firemaker?” he asked, confused.

“You – well, you said you could do it,” Cas said in a small voice. “Make fire. You said it ran in your family…”

“Me?” Dean interrupted, and Cas cringed a little. “Wait, I don’t think I can be hearing this right. I agreed to get you safely back to the mountains – a gesture I now realise was totally pointless, by the way, since you’d been running up and down the country on your own for weeks – and you thought you could somehow entice me up a damned mountain to make fire?”

“I thought… I thought it was possible,” Cas said weakly, rubbing one hand up and down his bare forearm. Dean felt his anger ratchet up another notch.

“Well, it’s not,” he said bluntly. “I’ve never done it.”

“You still could,” Cas said, almost too quietly to be heard.

“Cas, this is me we’re talking about,” Dean said, trying not to speak loudly and failing, in his sudden fury. “I’m scared of fucking fire. I – I – for Yarım’s sake, it killed my mom! How the fuck can you sit there and tell me I have to –”

“I’m not telling you to do anything,” Cas said sharply. “When I found out about your history and hatred of fire, I realised that my plan would never work, in all likelihood. But I kept going, because… I thought it was possible that you could change your mind about watershaping, and firemaking. I had to hope, Dean.”

Dean looked into Cas’ big, sad eyes, and his sudden, flaring anger cooled a little.

“To save your friend,” he said, and Cas nodded.

“I wouldn’t have thought of it if there were any other way,” he said, sounding suddenly desperately weary. Dean knew, in that moment, that Cas had turned over the problem in his mind again and again, until his mind was tired and bruised from being struck again and again in the same place. “But my friend was dying and there was no other way to save it. It was the only creature back home who ever looked at me with anything other than indifference or contempt. It’s beautiful, Dean. Incredibly beautiful. And –” Cas paused again. “Dragons have the ability to produce and fertilise their own eggs, their gender is completely fluid. The dragon has an egg, Dean. When I let it die, I kill both of them.”

Dean swallowed hard as he finally saw the enormity of Cas’ dilemma. He couldn’t ask Dean to make fire, because he knew Dean hated fire. But he couldn’t let his friend and its baby die, and for them to survive, he needed Dean to make fire.

“Give me a second to think this over,” he said abruptly. Cas nodded silently, burying his face in the crook of his elbow, just like he had in the cell at Walker’s Castle.

Dean watched him for a long moment, trying to summon up some rage towards him for the deceit, for the way he’d manipulated and striven towards a goal that he’d never shared with Dean. Dean should be feeling as though he’d never known Cas at all, as though a whole new side of him had just been revealed. But the feeling simply wouldn’t come. The fact was that Dean understood what Cas had done, perfectly. He’d been trying to save his friend, and he’d been willing to do anything, anything at all – and that aligned absolutely perfectly with Dean’s knowledge of Castiel. He’d lied because he’d known that Dean would never come with him if he’d been told the truth straight away, and Dean couldn’t find it in himself to blame Cas for that. If it had been one of his friends in trouble – Yarım, if it had been Sam – then Dean would have done exactly the same, and a lot worse too, to save him.

It could all be a lie, of course. It could all be just another layer of deceit, a spy’s gambit to get the Prince of Ateş Aşiret over the border and into the Water Lands, where he could be ransomed back to the King at an astronomical price. Dean looked over at Cas. He had lied so much already. Was it really a stretch to believe that he could betray Dean’s trust in him? Dean chewed his lip.

Whenever he could, at the times when it had really mattered, Cas had given Dean nothing but honesty, Dean thought. He realised that he finally understood Cas’ words in the desert in their entirety, and they made his heart strain with a kind of strange, nostalgic sorrow, as though he already missed what they were, what they were going to be: you’re with me, and I’m with you… we’re on the same side… our own side. Cas hadn’t always told the truth, but he had always been true to those words; whenever they were together, there was no Water Lands, no Ateş Aşiret, just… them, putting each other first. Putting each other’s safety first. No, putting each other’s wishes first, Dean corrected himself, remembering how Cas had respected Dean’s furious orders not to heal his wounds in the desert with watershaping. Even at the risk of his own life, Cas had put what Dean wanted above anything else. That wasn’t the mark of someone who wanted to hustle him over the border and get paid; those were the actions of someone who truly cared about him. Surely. And besides… Cas looked up, and Dean met his gaze. The now-familiar shivers went down his spine. There was no way that look was a lie, that intensity of expression, that flicker of – affection, or kindness, or whatever it was. Cas wasn’t lying to him.

And if Cas was telling the truth, then he needed Dean’s help. Just like Dean had needed Cas’ help in the desert, when he’d been stabbed. Just like Dean had needed Cas’ help in the Forest of the Dead, when he’d been lying on the floor surrounded by soldiers. Just like Dean had needed Cas’ help, if he was honest, when he was sitting inside that chapel, still the arrogant, insecure, lonely boy that he’d lost somewhere in the desert, left lying in the sand.

“OK,” Dean said.

Cas left a pause, waiting for more, frowning when Dean didn’t continue.

“OK?” he questioned, his eyes roaming over Dean’s face.

“OK,” Dean repeated. “I’ll come. I’ll – I’ll try to help you.”

Cas gaped at him. For the first time, Dean saw him truly and totally taken aback.

“That’s impossible,” he said. “You have to go back to Şehir now. Your father is looking for you –”

“Let him,” Dean said, a little wildly. When Cas raised his eyebrows, he went on, “He hasn’t checked up on me in more’n five years, I go missing and suddenly he’s putting out national search parties? Let him look. I’ll go back when I’m damned well ready, not when he tells me to.” His heart was beating fast at the thought of defying his father, the King, but it was more excitement than nerves. Cas was staring at Dean as though unable to take his eyes off him. Suddenly, with a swiftness that made Dean jolt, Cas stood up.

“The way through the mountains is too dangerous,” he said. Dean followed his lead more slowly, rising to his feet. “It’s – it wouldn’t be safe.”

“Cas,” Dean said impatiently, to Cas’ turned back. “You know, I think if I gave a crap about safe, I wouldn’t have hiked across the damned desert to make sure you got to the mountains alright. You really think that after everything, I’d crawl back home and leave you here alone?”

Cas turned. His mouth was working, as though he was forcing it to voice objections that he didn’t want to speak.

“I lied and manipulated to get you here,” he said.

“You did everything you had to do to save your friend,” Dean replied. “There’s nothing I understand more than that.”

“I shouldn’t have –”

“Who cares what you should or shouldn’t have done!” Dean said loudly. “Do you want me to come with you or not?”

“Of – of course I…” Cas said, trailing off.

“What’s the problem, Cas?” Dean demanded, stepping closer to him. “What’s going on? I’m offering to help you, and you suddenly don’t want me around anymore?”

Cas looked up at him. In his anger, Dean had stepped too close, but it was too late to back out now; they were inside each other’s personal space, both lit from above by the shining light of the sun.

“I – I just – it would be selfish of me to ask you to come,” Cas muttered, his eyes roving over Dean, his eyes, his lips, his throat. “I can’t be so selfish again, not when…”

“You’re not asking,” Dean said staunchly. “I’m telling you that I’m coming.” He was keeping his gaze fixed firmly on Cas’ eyes, only his eyes, Yarım, but it was an effort. Cas swayed a little closer as he shook his head, and Dean’s pulse soared.

“I can’t allow that,” Cas said, and Dean scowled at him.

“You don’t allow or disallow jack shit,” he said angrily. “I make my own decisions, like I always have. You think you could have persuaded me to come all this way if I hadn’t actually wanted to come? And now I want to stay with you!”

“Dean, I just…” Cas’ mouth was open, and as Dean watched, his tongue poked out slightly, running smoothly, quickly along the length of his soft lips. Eyes, Dean. Look at the eyes. Cas exhaled sharply, and Dean was close enough to feel it. Cas’ breath was a little warm, and smelled like apples. He was so, so close.

“What?” Dean demanded. “Come on, what? Spit it out, Cas!”

Cas’ eyes narrowed in determination.

“Your charity does you credit,” he growled, his voice dropping low. Dean gulped and tried to focus. “But – as much as I want to…” Cas broke off, tried again. “Dean, it isn’t fair for you to remain with me. It isn’t what you want, and I can’t work against your wishes any longer, do you understand? I’ve brought you this far, and it was wrong. I won’t take you any further.”

Dean’s mouth fell open, and Cas’ heated gaze snapped downwards for a moment, and then back up.

“You – you shut the fuck up,” Dean said, lifting a finger and stabbing it into Cas’ chest. “You think this is charity? That I don’t – that I don’t care about you at all? How dare you tell me what I want, what I don’t want? Why are you making this so damned hard? I’m telling you that I’m the only one who knows what I want, and I want to stay!”

“It’s impossible –”

“You’re making it impossible!”

“That’s not –”

“Just let me stay with you!”

“Dean, you have no reason to stay!” Cas all but shouted. Dean clenched his fists.

“Damnit, Cas!” he yelled. “You’re my reason to stay!”

A stillness fell over them, sudden and complete. In those few seconds, Dean could have sworn that they crossed out of time, into a place where the silence was absolute, where they was only him and Cas, existing in a world that was entirely their own, entirely heated gaze and close skin and open lips and want, want, want…

Cas’ eyes dipped from Dean’s eyes down to his parted lips, lingered there for a second, and then rose back up.

And suddenly Dean could take it no more. To the Dark with wanting and waiting and hoping and denying. To the Dark with looking, and looking, and looking, and looking. To the Dark with it all. Dean surged forwards, leaned through and crossed the space between them in a second – or perhaps an eternity, an achingly long moment that stretched out forever in a promise, an expectation, a terrible, beautiful hope…

He stopped short just a whisper away from Cas’ lips, his nose brushing Cas’ cheek, his head tilted forwards so that their foreheads were pressed together. He breathed in just as Cas breathed out, and tasted apples, tasted warmth, tasted a love that he knew that he needed. It was so close, now, but he couldn’t have it if Cas didn’t give it. He waited, his eyes falling closed, his breath shaky and his heart beating louder and harder than it ever had in his life. There was a rushing in his ears, and there was a coldness on his skin, a lack of touch that lasted one second, two seconds, three…

“Dean,” said Cas, his voice hushed and throaty, and Dean’s brow creased, but he couldn’t move away… not yet. He wouldn’t do it until he actually heard the words of Cas’ rejection. For now, he tried to build himself a world in the moments he had this close to Cas, in the scent of his skin, so close – shockingly familiar, sweet and rich and wonderful – and the feel of his breath, the sensation of his gorgeous proximity. “Dean, are you…”

“I want to stay with you,” he murmured, opening his eyes, looking down at Cas’ cheeks, at his lips, so near. “I w- I want to be with you.”

“Dean,” Cas said, in a voice that was so full, so brimming with interwoven everythings that Dean couldn’t even begin to untease the strands – and then Cas’ fingers were on his cheek, steadying him, shrinking the universe down to five small circles of soft and wanted touch, light and electric, sending sparks across Dean’s whole body. When Dean didn’t pull away, Cas pressed harder, pushing his palm to Dean’s cheek and his fingers into Dean’s hair, his nails dragging slightly and making Dean shiver with pleasure, his mouth falling open at the strength of his want, his need –

And then Cas’ lips fell through the nothing between them, and landed on Dean’s. They didn’t fall perfectly aligned, Dean’s lower lip between Cas’ top and bottom, but it was still – Yarım above, it was perfect, it was everything. Dean didn’t move for long seconds that stretched on and on, too overwhelmed by the sensation of Cas’ lips against his to even consider movement: oh, Yarım, their softness, their fullness, the way the press of them felt like electricity, like skin and skin, like the stinging, dazzling deliciousness of forest apples… the sensation of warmth and slight slide on the inside, where Cas’ lips became his mouth…

It was chasing down that liquid movement that finally had Dean lifting his hand to wrap around the back of Cas’ neck, pushing his lips down and over Cas’ more fully, exploring them in motion. Yarım, how they felt when he pressed hard, how they felt when he pulled back and Cas chased him, pursing his lips to keep the contact. There was a slight chapped roughness to them that Dean loved, that sent songs of friction rolling over his body, bathing him in pleasure; and then – oh, fuck, then Cas opened his mouth, and Dean responded without even thinking, and before he knew it their kiss was deep and deep and deeper, tongues meeting and loving it, easing the most gorgeous sensations from each other with the frictions, the rhythm, the taste taste taste…

Dean dropped the hand on the back of Cas’ neck and simply gathered him up in his loving arms, wrapping them around Cas’ torso, one above the other. Cas’ other hand was in Dean’s hair, too, now, and he was tugging on it, pulling Dean in as close as he could get. And it still wasn’t enough. After so long staring, and needing, and imagining, and dreaming, Dean needed Cas close in every way possible. He dropped his lower arm and pushed his hand up the back of Cas’ tunic, soaking in the joy of being able to run his hands over the smooth, warm skin that awaited him. Cas was humming his enjoyment into Dean’s mouth, a vibration that set his lips tingling, that left him desperate for more; as though sensing his need, Cas pulled back ever so slightly, took Dean’s lower lip into his mouth, and bit down on it softly, teasingly.

Dean groaned. The feeling of Cas’ teeth, slightly sharp and hard against the softness of his lips, sent his nerves into overdrive. He was on fire for Cas, so full of desire for him that he could barely breathe; he let his fingers fall low, low, lower down Cas’ back, pressing hard at the dip in his skin that rose just above the line of his şalvar, eliciting a gasping exhale from Cas as he released Dean’s lip from his gentle bite.

“D-Dean,” he said, as Dean pressed down further and pulled back from their kiss so that he could see Cas’ face. He was flushed pink, his lips red and slick with kiss, his eyes closed as he focused on the sensation of Dean’s touch. Yarım, he was so, so beautiful. And Dean could touch him. Dean could be touched by him. Even the thought of it made him suddenly weak in his knees; he swayed into Cas, who opened his eyes and brought his hands down Dean’s neck to his shoulders, resting on his pelerin – and then, with an intensity in his eyes that stripped Dean of anything but wonder and lust, he trailed his hands down Dean’s chest, down his stomach, and lower still…

Dean moaned and dropped his head to rest on Cas’ shoulder as the friction of his touch through the material of his şalvar sent shivers running up his spine, down his legs, putting a hot, golden coil of heat in his gut.

“Cas,” he breathed into Cas’ skin, when Cas didn’t move away. “Cas, can we – please, I want to –”

Cas shifted his hand, feeling the weight of Dean’s outline through his şalvar, and Dean trembled, his muscles tensing as he thrust lightly into the touch. He buried his mouth against Cas’ shoulder where his tunic had pulled to one side, exposing the skin, to keep from crying out again: kissing it, first gently, and then harder – and then, when Cas’ exploring hands touched the sensitive head of his cock through his şalvar, biting down, hard. It was Cas’ turn to moan, a low, needy sound that had Dean shaking, his legs finally giving way beneath him and collapsing them both to the floor, tangled in each other. Cas landed on top, the hardness of his arousal pressing against Dean’s hip.

Dean reached up, wrapping his hands around Cas’ neck and guiding him into a kiss, more urgent even than before, messy and hot and desperate. Cas’ hands were on Dean’s chest, taking his weight for a moment as he shifted to straddle Dean just above his hips, curling over so that they didn’t lose the contact of the kiss. He reached under Dean’s neck, tugging at the zip of his pelerin with hasty, needy fingers; Dean pushed himself upright, wrapping his arms around Cas’ lower back to keep them steady. He was focused completely on the slide and press of tongue and lips, allowing Cas the space to push his pelerin down his arms and off. Without it, everything seemed so much closer, so much better; Cas was taking his own weight in his thighs, his ass just brushing Dean’s cock, making Dean gasp into their kiss with little breaths that Cas caught in his mouth as though they were treasures. Unable to resist any longer, Dean pulled up the front of Cas’ tunic, breaking off the press of their mouths as Cas stretched to take it off completely, allowing Dean the sight of his tanned bare chest, naked and shining with a light sweat in the heat. Dean took a moment to simply stare up at Cas, who was looking down at him with wide, wide eyes, breathing a little hard.

With their eyes still locked, Dean leaned forwards and softly, slowly, pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the centre of Cas’ chest. He reached up with his right hand, and ever so gently caressed around the edge of Cas’ nipple, before running the pad of his finger right over it. He could feel Cas’ cock, hard and heavy between them with the tip resting against his abdomen, give a twitch. He smiled.

“You like that?” he asked, doing it again.

“I – uuuuuh,” Cas managed, his eyes falling closed as Dean took his hand away and used his mouth instead, licking, sucking, and – remembering Cas’ moan, earlier – biting. Cas’ hips bucked, his body thrusting forwards unconsciously. He wrapped his hands around the back of Dean’s head, holding him in place; Dean kept going, loving the taste of Cas’ skin and the feel of his arousal, and Cas’ hips started to move rhythmically, forwards and backwards, pushing the head of his cock against Dean’s stomach and making himself gasp at the sensation. He trailed his hands down Dean’s neck, over his shoulders, eventually pushing against them and lying Dean out flat beneath him. He shifted his weight, lifting himself so that Dean could reach down and pull of their şalvar. Dean did, first his own – he couldn’t help but suck in a breath at the feel of cool air around his cock – and then Cas’.

And he pulled them down with reverence, unable to take his eyes away from the skin being revealed, darkened by a line of softly-curling hair that led down, down, down, and then… he pulled the şalvar over Cas’ cock, loving the hiss Cas gave at the friction, and he saw it for the first time. Long, and flushed sweetly pink at the tip, a single purple vein visible on one side. Dean stared at it, at the skin that led down to it, at the bead of precome gathering at the head. He looked up, to see Cas watching him stare, his mouth open and his pupils blown wide.

“You like that,” he said, not a question as Dean had said it, but a statement. As if in a dream, Dean reached down and wrapped his hand around Cas’ cock, letting his touch speak for him. Cas gave a little sigh, thrusting into Dean’s hand, once, twice. Dean felt Cas’ cock roll under his touch, twisting slightly as he reached the end and feeling a hot lick of arousal at the way Cas’ eyes fell closed, his brow creasing and a deep, wanton growl escaping from his lips.

Cas leaned down to kiss him, deep and warm and hungry. He allowed his weight to fall to one side, landing on the grass next to Dean, who didn’t stop kissing, didn’t stop tugging lightly at Cas’ cock – until suddenly Cas’ free hand was gripping him tightly, and using the slick of his precome to slide slowly, sensually up and down Dean’s length. The feeling of being wrapped in Cas’ fist was almost overwhelming. For a moment, he forgot how to move, how to breathe, how to do anything except feel gloriously enveloped in pure, golden pleasure that radiated from his cock and out, over his whole body in a wave of gorgeous heat.

Cas pressed an open, needy kiss against Dean’s parted lips, and he came back to reality just enough to start moving his own hand again, adjusting his grip and jerking Cas off in earnest, feeling Cas do the same for him.

“Cas – Cas – uhhhhhhhh,” he moaned, trying to tell Cas how good it felt, how fucking incredible it felt to be with him like this, to be feeling the warmth in his abdomen uncurling, loosening, rising in him like a wave – Yarım, this was going to be over fast, he wasn’t going to be able to wait –

“Dean,” Cas whispered, his head resting on the heel of his hand, cheek pressed against his own upper arm; his eyes were dreamily closed, his forehead creasing as he came closer and closer; Dean pressed forwards, pushing his brow to Cas’ as he felt his orgasm closing in, shooting lines of hot liquid gold pleasure up and down the length of his cock, preparing to be released in a glorious wave that rose and rose and rose…

“Cas!” he shouted, his voice rough, as he came over Cas’ hand, over his stomach. Cas whimpered at the sound, so close, so close… Dean turned his head, opened his mouth, and bit the soft skin of Cas’ upper arm.

“D-Deeeaan,” Cas cried as he followed Dean over the edge, his eyebrows up, eyes open, looking at Dean as though he were discovering the secrets of the universe in the lines of his face as his orgasm rushed over him, and his come painted Dean’s stomach.

Dean gently released his bite on Cas’ arm, pressing the lightest of kisses over the oval of teeth marks left on the skin.

He turned his head, and looked into Cas’ eyes.

“I’m staying with you,” he said.

Cas, panting slightly, nodded a silent agreement.

Chapter Text

Dean and Cas lay lazily in each other’s arms, watching the sunlight dapple through the leaves of the apple tree above them.

Cas had his head on Dean’s chest, and Dean could feel the weight of it rising and falling as he breathed. There was something quietly miraculous about that, he thought – something he couldn’t quite grasp hold of, about affecting things without trying, about falling into a rhythm that was natural, and inevitable, and soothing. They’d been this way for over an hour, he guessed, completely still, revelling in the novelty of body pressed against body – of how much better it felt to juxtapose themselves, how easy were their muscles, their minds, when they were wrapped together.

He had a lot of things to say, but he didn’t want to speak and break the gossamer-thin gauze of contentment that lay over them. There would be time for that later. For now, there was just the simple enjoyment of finally, finally being exactly where they wanted to be. Dean’s heart was beating steady in his chest, strong and slow. It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt at all.

The sun moved overhead, gentle as a caress over their intertwined bodies.

“I guess we should get moving,” said Dean eventually. Cas sighed, low and grumbling, and tightened the grip of the hand that was resting on Dean’s hip.

“We probably should,” he agreed after a minute or more, pushing himself up onto his elbow and looking down at Dean. He didn’t smile, but there was a happiness that rang out from every line of his body, from the tilt of his head and the lines around his eyes, like a clear, strong note from a pure glass bell. Dean smiled to see it, not daring to raise a hand to touch Cas’ face in case he shimmered away like a mirage.

“You are so…” he began, trailing away for a moment. “There’s – there’s not even a word for you.”

Cas leaned down and pressed a kiss to the side of Dean’s mouth, and then put his hand under Dean’s chin and guided him into a full kiss, their lips soft and relaxed, pulling easy sighs, lazy pleasure from their mouths. Dean knew they should be walking, but there was something about Cas’ mouth that he couldn’t stop wanting; every time Cas tried to pull away, Dean chased him, tugged him back down for more. He could feel his body, so loose and eased, starting to react to the plushness of Cas’ lips, the liquid warmth of his mouth.

“Come on,” he muttered into Cas’ mouth after five minutes, or perhaps fifty. He sat up, pulling Cas with him. “We have to go.”

They helped each other upright, Dean scooping Cas’ tunic off the ground and holding it out to him; Cas took it, giving him a grateful kiss that lasted a second, ten seconds, twenty… their wandering hands were fascinating, each new inch of skin a boldness, a trust. Dean slid his arms around Cas’ neck, relaxing into the press of their bodies. He could feel Cas’ hardness growing between them, and it encouraged his own, and their kiss became dirtier, needier, amplifying quicker and messier than before – Dean’s brain was hot and syrupy clear, and hadn’t they been about to leave? But this was too good to stop…

Dean dropped his arms from around Cas’ neck to place them on his hips; after a moment, Cas reached down too, pushing his hands into Dean’s and lacing their fingers together. He took a step forward, and then another, pushing Dean with his body, guiding him backwards until he was pressed up against something tall, and hard – the trunk of the apple tree. Cas stretched up his arms, pressing Dean’s hands against the bark above his head, his lips moving against Dean’s, humming in the way that he knew that Dean liked; Dean sighed into Cas’ mouth, loving the sensation of being held in place, of being kissed so thoroughly, so headily.

Cas’ lips broke away from Dean’s, trailing down over his chin, tracing the curve of his Adam’s apple down to the dip of his chest – and then down further, Dean pushing his head back against the tree as Cas brushed his hands down Dean’s sides, eliciting a shiver, a groan. His skin was so sensitive, reacting to Cas’ slightest touch with hot, delicious needles of bliss. He buried his toes in the grass, curling them in delight and smiling as Cas’ ministrations took him lower, sucking kisses to his stomach, mouthing down the trail of fine hair on his lower abdomen – nosing at the base of his cock.

Cas pulled away for a second, leaving Dean’s skin cool and sheened with sweat in his wake. Dean opened his eyes and looked down to see Cas kneeling in front of him, ready to give him pleasure, looking as though he were psyching himself up for it. A sudden sense of unease overtook him. It had been different when they’d both been enjoying themselves, but when it was just Dean, he felt a sudden pressure. He needed to make this good for Cas, somehow, too, but that was impossible.

“Cas – you don’t have to – ahhhhhh,” he moaned, as Cas ran his tongue, hard and wet, along the length of his cock. “You – you don’t…”

Cas took Dean into his mouth, his lips a perfect ‘o’, his eyes open and determined. Dean’s knees went weak, his body arching into the sensation of warmth and tightness; Cas started to move, holding Dean’s cock at its base in one hand and sliding his mouth up and down, quickly, efficiently. Dean’s legs trembled, and he pressed his weight back into the tree, letting it support him. He had to show Cas that he was doing a good job, right?

“Mmmmm,” he said, tipping his head back and closing his eyes. It did feel good, after all. Yarım, so good, when he sucked at the head like that. “Yeah, Cas – feels so good…” he groaned loudly. Was Cas enjoying this? Surely he couldn’t be. What if his knees were hurting already? Dean tensed his stomach muscles and held his breath, trying to focus on the sensations in his cock, bring himself to climax faster.

“Yeahhhhh, Cas,” he said. His brain was too fixed on the idea of Cas’ discomfort to really enjoy the way it – ah ­– the way it felt to be taken inside Cas’ mouth. He couldn’t relax, just needed it to be over, so that he could give Cas his turn, and not feel so selfish… “Uhhhhhhhh,” he groaned, tensing even further. “Yeah, Cas, I’m gonna – I’m gonna –”

The sensation of liquid heat around Dean’s cock disappeared abruptly. He gasped at the feeling of cool air around his arousal, shocking and unwelcome. He opened his eyes to see Cas getting to his feet, his expression intense and forbidding.

Dean swallowed, and didn’t meet his gaze. Cas came in close, and pressed a kiss to Dean’s cheek, surprisingly sweet and gentle; Dean’s heart squeezed in his chest, and he sighed and dropped his head down to Cas’ shoulder.

“Cas… I – sorry,” he muttered. “I just – I don’t know how to…”

“I’m going to do that again,” Cas said, when Dean broke off. He raised a hand, palm flat to Dean’s cheek, his thumb stroking gently. “And this time… there’s a rule.”

Dean looked up at Cas, finally meeting his eyes: they were watching him closely for his reaction, fond and a little sly. His heart beat faster.

“A rule?” he asked gruffly, almost shyly, and with an undeniable excitement that he couldn’t hide. “Like… like what?”

Cas studied him for a second, and then leaned in to kiss him – once, and twice, firm and hot. When he pulled back, his eyes were sparkling.

“No speaking,” he said, and Dean’s mouth fell open. “No noises, or I stop. Agreed?”

“Cas…” Dean said, his breath coming a little fast. Yarım, it sounded so strange, but Dean wanted it… wanted it more than he’d ever have imagined. He could feel a tension building up in his thighs, in his cock, just at the thought. And yet… “Cas – do you – are you OK doing this? Because I don’t want you to do it if you –”

“Dean,” Cas interrupted him, bringing up his other hand so that he had Dean’s head clasped in his grip. He came in closer as he spoke, until his lips were brushing against Dean’s with every husky word. He smelled good, strong and musky. “I have been imagining doing this for days.” He felt the way Dean shuddered, smiled slightly, and went on. “You feel incredible in my mouth… you taste so sweet. So make this last as long as you can.” Dean pressed forwards for a kiss, deeper and more open than before. Cas returned it, before pulling away, kneeling once more.

“No sound,” he warned, his eyes dark with bliss. Dean, looking down at Cas – so excited to take him, to make him feel joy – and he felt his lips tremble. He nodded silently, too overwhelmed by lust and emotion even to smile. Cas turned his attention back to Dean’s cock, breathing out as he opened his mouth – Dean shuddered as he felt the breath of air on his tip – and then taking him into his mouth.

Dean pressed his lips together as Cas began to build up a rhythm, sucking as he pulled up, sliding his tongue along Dean’s length as he moved back down, again and again and again. It kept getting better, the sensation more and more intensely pleasurable the longer Cas went on, sucking and sliding, his mouth making little wet noises as he moved; Dean felt a groan slowly building up in his throat, and swallowed it down. His toes curled and uncurled in the grass as he tried to stop his hips bucking forward. His forehead was creased with bliss, and then – and then suddenly Cas wasn’t pulling off his cock at all, but instead sucking down, and down, and down, further and further, the heat and the wetness overwhelming, until he had Dean deep inside his throat. Dean’s eyes screwed up, and he bit his lip in a frantic effort to stop himself crying out. It felt unbelievable, and he was breathing hard, whining just once at the end of a breath and feeling his heartrate soar because please don’t stop, please don’t stop… He looked down, cheeks flushed with the effort to stay quiet, and saw that Cas had his eyes open, staring up at Dean with his beautiful lips wrapped tight to Dean’s skin. Dean sucked in a breath and had to hold it to keep himself from moaning, his head tipping back to rest against the tree – he was getting closer, his fingers clutching at air. One hand finally buried itself in Cas’ hair, running through it, the softness so sweet against his fingertips. His legs were shaking with the effort of keeping himself upright as heat, that gorgeous golden heat, unfurled at the base of his cock, and Cas was pulling back a little now, and moving forwards, and pulling back, and moving forwards, just enough friction to move Dean closer and closer by tiny degrees – Dean’s mouth was open, shaping noiseless words, praises, profanities, silently begging Cas to move faster and harder, begging to be finished…

Cas’ hand came drifting up his thigh, light as a feather touch, almost too much for Dean to bear. He was still making those tiny little movements, kissing the head of Dean’s cock to the back of his throat, so good and so small that Dean wanted to cry. His muscles were wound up tight, and Cas’ fingers stroked up his leg to his clenched stomach, and then down, past his swallowed cock and under – cupping Dean’s balls in his hand, and gently teasing his fingers over them. Dean gasped almost loud enough to be a moan, and he tightened his grip on Cas’ hair, pleading with him silently not to stop. He was so fucking close, and it was going to be fucking amazing, he just needed one last push –

Cas’ gentle fingers turned firm. As he kept Dean’s cock moving in his throat, he pressed their tips to the skin behind Dean’s balls – and back, further back, into the crack of Dean’s ass –

Dean came with a whine, a long, drawn-out, blissful whine, just as Cas touched his index finger to Dean’s rim. He’d meant to warn Cas before he came, in case he wanted to pull off, but his orgasm came for him like a freak wave, hot and powerful and incredibly fast, his hips thrusting helplessly, his back arched with sweat dripping down it, his eyes screwed up tight as he rode the tide…

The sensation dissipated slowly, sweetly, wonderfully. Dean kept his eyes closed as his tense muscles unravelled, his brow cleared, his shaking fingers released their grip on Cas’ hair. Cas pulled off his softening cock slowly, carefully, being careful not to jar the sensitive tip with his teeth. Dean heard him stand up, felt him come in close, pressing gentle kisses to Dean’s neck.

“Better?” he asked, one hand resting on Dean’s hip. Dean managed to open his eyes, blinking into the sunlight. Cas pulled back to look at him, his eyes crinkling with happiness when he saw Dean’s bleary, blissed expression.

“Good – good rule,” Dean managed hoarsely. Thank Yarım Cas had done that for him. It had taken away all the pressure to come loudly, to be obviously enjoying himself; it had given him the space to really enjoy himself, to bury himself in the sensations, the noises of Cas’ mouth, the reactions of his body.

“I’m glad,” Cas murmured. Dean felt something pressing against the top of his thigh and looked down to see Cas’ arousal, hard and pink and beautiful, lightly dragging against Dean’s skin. He looked back up at Cas, who was taking the time to map Dean’s face, tracing the lines of his features.

“Cas,” said Dean. “Cas… I want you inside me.”

Cas’ gaze jerked sharply to Dean’s eyes, his mouth falling open.

“Dean…” he said, his voice husky and thick. “Are you –”

“I’m sure,” Dean said firmly – and he thought he’d never been more sure of anything at that point. Feeling so sated, so loose, he could imagine nothing he wanted more than to lie back and be filled up by Cas, surrounded by Cas, taking him in as deep as he could until Cas was ready to come. His shivered the more he thought about it. He moved away from the tree a little, letting his still-shaking legs fold beneath him, pulling him down to the grassy floor. He lay back and propped himself up on his elbows as Cas followed him down, stretching his legs out and leaning down to kiss Dean slowly and sensually. For a long, long while, they simply kissed, forgetting about everything else.

“We can’t,” Cas murmured regretfully, his thumb gently rubbing at Dean’s chin as he finally pulled back just a little. “We don’t have any… oil, or lubricant.”

Dean reached up to kiss him again, smiling against his mouth as he prepared for what he knew might very well be one of the best moments of his entire life.

“I do,” he said, and Cas sat back, his eyes narrow with confusion. Dean couldn’t help a snort of undignified laughter escaping; he pressed his lips together, trying to contain himself. He was giddy with happiness, with expectation. He owed that red-haired girl at the market in the desert a damned fortune, for giving him this. He reached for his pelerin, lying a few feet away, and dug into the pocket. He wrapped his hand around the pretty glass bottle that had been with him all the way across the desert, into and out of Walker’s Castle, and now to here, in the middle of the forest. He pulled it out and handed it to Cas, who read the curly-lettered label with widening eyes.

“Dean,” he breathed, his gaze flicking back to where Dean was lying smugly in the grass, grinning. “How long have you…”

“Since the market in the desert,” Dean said. “Stallholder gave it to me for free, for being handsome.” He winked at Cas, who smiled and tipped his head to one side.

“That seems fair,” he said, and Dean laughed, letting his head fall back to rest on the grassy floor. His body felt so good, strong and buzzing with life, muscles eased and relaxed. He wanted this forever, he thought. He could live forever in this forest, and wake up every day to the scent of dew and leaves and Cas. He was almost unbearably happy, aglow with joy. He peered up at Cas and caught him staring, his blue eyes wide with wonder.

“You know, that’s not for decorative purposes,” Dean said, glancing towards the bottle of lube and then back to Cas. He smiled, and saw the awe in Cas’ eyes grow. “What?”

“You are so beautiful,” Cas said, totally unselfconsciously, his lips pulling up slightly on one side and down on the other, as though he was too full of emotion to be able to choose one expression. Dean lay in surprised stillness for a moment. He’d never been – no one had ever said that to him before, not in that voice, not with those eyes…

He sat up and wrapped his hand around the back of Cas’ neck, pressing their foreheads together. Cas brought his hand up too, mirroring Dean’s pose. For a few seconds, they simply held each other, looking into each other’s eyes. For the first time, Dean felt the enormity of what they’d done. He liked Cas – he really liked Cas, and Cas liked him, and… and they should be together. They should stay together. Not just until the mountains, but beyond them.

Dean let out a breath, pushing those thoughts away for now. They could think about the future later. For now, there was just him and Cas, together in this moment.

He leaned forwards. At first the kiss was strong, chaste, emotional – but then Dean opened his mouth a little, let his tongue run the length of Cas’ bottom lip, and then bit down lightly. He let his hands start to roam, and Cas followed his lead, trailing his fingers over Dean’s chest and down his stomach. Dean spread his legs, and Cas broke away from their kiss to crawl in between them, reaching back for the bottle of lube and breaking open the seal.

“Ready?” he asked, his eyebrow quirking in a way that had Dean’s heart beating fast, his sated cock showing just a little interest. It was too soon, almost painful, but not quite – and Dean wanted this, wanted it so, so badly.

“Yes,” he whispered, letting his head fall back, looking up at the trees. For a few seconds there was nothing, and he was just lying with his legs apart, debauched and hopeful, and then – soft as a kiss, and loving – Cas’ finger, slick and warm, was pressing at his rim. Dean sighed, relaxing into the touch; as if reassured, Cas pushed a little harder, circling the edge, letting Dean’s muscles acclimatise to his presence. Dean breathed deeply, happily, his eyes falling closed as he let himself be carried into gentle bliss. When Cas pushed his first finger inside, his mouth opened and he gasped, lips turning upwards in a smile. He opened his eyes, knowing Cas would be watching him, and met his gaze for a moment.

“More,” he said simply, roughly. “More, Cas.”

Cas began to move a little faster, his finger sinking in and out of Dean, loosening him. When he was ready, Cas pressed a second finger inside, scissoring them gently; Dean could feel himself widening, but Cas was taking his time, making sure that Dean was comfortable. Cas slipped in a third finger, and the sensation was suddenly so much better, so much more intense; Dean’s breathy sighs became little moans of happiness, his hands fisting in the grass. It almost hurt to be aroused again so quickly, but it was a sweet pain, an ache that felt so good.

“Cas,” he choked out, his legs starting to twitch and shudder in the air with each thrust of Cas’ fingers inside him, “Cas, I’m ready, I’m ready. Please.”

Cas leaned down to press an open kiss to the inside of Dean’s thigh, before moving back; Dean whined as his fingers slid away, missing their warmth, their length. He raised his head to see Cas pouring out more of the lube into his palm and rubbing a generous amount of the liquid along the length of his cock, his lips drawn back in a slight hiss at the friction of his palm; Dean pressed his hand against the weight of his own arousal at the sight of it, jacking himself a couple of times before Cas’ attention was back on him. He raised his legs even higher as Cas approached, laying himself out; Cas watched him for a moment, that awestruck expression back in his eyes, before lining himself up and leaning over Dean, letting his weight fall on the backs of Dean’s legs, folding them up to Dean’s chest. He braced his arms on either side of Dean’s body. Dean could feel the head of his cock pressing against his rim, and his body stuttered, his brain seemed to fall into a miasma of expected bliss – he found himself grinding down, impatient, ready for Cas to be inside him – and then Cas pressed harder, pushing his cock past Dean’s rim and on, and in, and in…

For a few seconds they lay still, breathless. Dean stared up at Cas dazedly, folded up and lost in the feeling of perfect fullness, impaled on the thick, rounded spear of pure pleasure; Cas, for once, had his eyes closed, chest heaving as he rested his head against Dean’s calf for a moment. Dean stared at him, mapping the swooping lines under his eyes, the sharpness of his jaw, the angle of his cheekbones. He was beautiful, and he thought Dean was beautiful…

Dean tensed his muscles and Cas’ eyes snapped open at the sudden tightness.

“Move, Cas,” Dean murmured to him, his lips parted, eyes wide. “Move.”

Cas’ eyes darkened, and he began to thrust with his hips, small movements at first that grew stronger and deeper as he built up a rhythm. Dean’s mouth was open in an ‘o’ of bliss, his eyes falling closed; Cas shifted his arms, moving his elbows up onto Dean’s chest and clasping his hands behind Dean’s neck, pulling their heads together, starting to make little groaning noises that grew louder and more prolonged as he kept going, and kept going…

“Uhhhhhhhh,” Dean moaned, the first time Cas’ cock hit his prostate, his entire body tensing up; learning the angle, Cas surged onwards, finding that sweet spot every time and pounding into it. Their bodies were sweating, pressed so close together that Dean couldn’t get a hand around his own cock, but he barely needed one; it was enough to be filled, to be thrust into so perfectly, so desperately. Cas’ pace was building, his face creasing as his climax came closer.

“Feels so good, Dean,” he said, his voice rough and throaty, mouth inches away from Dean’s. “It feels so good –”

“Cas, Cas,” was all Dean could manage to gasp out, his body too wired to find words for it.

“Dean, I’m – I’m –”

“Come,” Dean ordered, panting, Cas’ rhythm breaking and stuttering as he reached the peak of his pleasure, and…

“Deaaaaaan,” Cas moaned, thrusting into Dean deeply one last time, and the sight of his face as he came, the sound of his name on Cas’ lips, was enough to take Dean with him; he came again and he swore he saw stars, spilling over Cas’ chest as Cas’ come released inside him. It felt unbelievably good to be so full of Cas, to be wanted by him, to want him so badly and to be able to have him…

When Cas pulled out of Dean slowly, regretfully, Dean missed the weight of him inside. Cas lifted himself away from Dean’s chest as he sat up, and Dean let his legs stretch out on the grass.

“Good thing I’m a little bendy,” he said, grinning, as Cas flopped down beside him and put his head on Dean’s shoulder.

“You’re not the only one,” Cas mumbled, looking up at Dean with eyes hazed by bliss, and Dean laughed. He pressed a kiss to Cas’ cheek, curling his arms around him; Cas bent up one leg, letting it fall between Dean’s.

“We’ll have to explore that later,” Dean said, and Cas murmured a softly-worded assent. Dean’s eyelids were heavy, the warm sun playing over his weary body.

Just five minutes, he told himself. Then we’ll start walking again…

*

They woke up when the sun was thick and honeyed, in the balm of the afternoon. For a while, they both lay still, knowing the other was awake but unwilling to acknowledge it, since that would mean movement; eventually, though, Dean trailed his fingers down Cas’ chest, and slowly sat up. Cas, forced to come with him, muttered a soft curse into Dean’s shoulder.

“Hey,” Dean said, hooking his fingers under Cas’ chin and grinning. “Don’t act like you’re not pleased to see me.”

Cas opened his eyes and sat up properly, keeping his shoulder pressed against Dean’s. He stretched, looking around their grassy glade, and then up to the sun.

“It’s late,” he said. “There’s probably not much point trying to walk today.”

“Nice try,” Dean told him with little chuckle, nudging him with his elbow. “But we can at least make a little progress. Look, the sun’s over there, and it was there this morning… means that way’s west. Just a little way,” he said cajolingly, when Cas made a grumbling noise in his throat. “Not far.”

They stood up and began to dress, not bothering to make the effort of finding excuses to brush against each other, but instead shamelessly letting their hands linger on each other’s hips, stomachs, chests. A little of their urgency, their tension, had been relieved, but Dean still felt a little heady at Cas’ touch. How had he not realised how badly he’d needed this? Sharing a space with Cas had always made him happy, but sharing his personal space… that made him feel as though he could fly.

When they’d gathered their clothes and meagre possessions, and taken another couple of apples each from the tree above their head, they were ready to leave. Just as they were about to go, Dean put his hand on Cas’ shoulder, stilling him.

“Wait,” he said, pulling out the knife inside his pelerin and approaching the tree trunk. He began to carve, chipping away at the bark to reveal the lighter wood underneath. When he stepped back, there was a neat D & C halfway up the trunk, bright and clear. Dean turned to Cas, who was staring at it, his expression unreadable; sensing Dean’s gaze, he let his face relax into a smile and reached out his hand.

They walked together through the forest, fingers interwoven as tightly as the branches of two trees that had grown tall together, wrapping their boughs in loops, and now could never let go. The light was beautiful and ethereal, casting them both in gold and green; the air itself seemed to hum with happiness, as though the very trees themselves could sense Dean’s contentment and were singing it back to him, in deep, eternal voices that he couldn’t quite hear. They climbed over tree roots, pressing on, soaking in each other’s relaxation and joy. Dean couldn’t keep his eyes off Cas, staring at his lips, his soft hair, the stubble coming in on his cheeks; at the grace of his body as he moved, the lines of his neck, the curve of his strong arms.

He was so damned lucky. He couldn’t stop thinking it, couldn’t stop smiling about it. He’d known for a while that there was something between them, a mutual desire that he’d refused to allow to overflow into action while Cas still hadn’t known who he really was, while he’d still been so focused on the moment when they’d have to split apart; but now, Cas knew who he was, and still wanted him – and Dean knew they had to part, but that seemed desperately far away compared to the next second, and the next one after that, and the one after that, which he chose to fill with holding Cas’ hand, and watching him as he walked.

Cas glanced over at him and his lips turned upwards, his eyes crinkling. His smiles seemed to come more easily, now, more naturally. Dean wondered suddenly how this – this relationship between them, this feeling – fit into Cas’ brain. What was he thinking about? Was he pleased, or resigned, or happy? Had he hoped for this, or had he thought it might be better, or different? Dean knew their story only from his side, and he had a sudden desire to hear it from the beginning, as Cas told it. Had he wanted Dean all along, or had it grown over the days they’d spent together? How – how was Cas stitching this development into the past he’d already woven?

“Cas,” Dean said, “you – you are happy, right?”

Cas looked at Dean as though he was mad, his fingers squeezing Dean’s a little tighter.

“I have never been happier,” he said simply, with a note in his tone as though he himself were as surprised as anybody.

Dean dipped his head, his mouth curling into a soft, pleased grin. Yarım, he thought he might even be blushing. Because that was the most important thing, he knew. However Cas was processing this, if he was happy – if they were both this incredibly, ecstatically happy to be together – then that was all that mattered. For now.

As they walked, Dean gradually noticed the sound of running water getting louder and louder. He smacked his lips together, craving a drink to wash away the sticky sweetness of apple in his mouth. Suddenly, and unexpectedly, they rounded a large tree trunk to see that the floor in front of them dipped down and turned to glass, blue and reflective… Dean blinked, and realised what he was looking at. The river flowed slowly but surely, its waters clear and shining in the dimming afternoon light. It looked incredibly tempting, after a day of sex and walking in the sun. Dean turned to Cas, a hopeful question on his lips, to find him already pulling down his şalvar with his free hand.

They undressed quickly and efficiently, throwing their clothes into a shared messy pile on the river’s grassy bank and sitting down, dipping their feet into the water. It was blessedly cool, a touch of the divine against Dean’s hot and sweat-sticky skin. He shifted, ready to slip fully into the water; Cas offered him his hand and Dean took it gratefully, using Cas as support while he tested the strength of the current, the smoothness of the rocks at the bottom of the river.

“It’s great,” he said, not letting go of Cas’ hand, but instead tugging on it, using it to guide Cas into the water. “Come here.”

They swam together, Dean so heady with happiness that the minutes passed by in a blur of liquid kisses and arms around waists and skin pressed against clean skin. He and Cas came together and fell apart as easily as water reeds swayed by the wind. Eventually, they stopped their meandering, lazy swim to wash themselves in earnest. Dean scooped the water over Cas’ neck, rubbing away the dirt ingrained there with his hands, and then it was his turn – Cas’ firm, graceful fingers working over his shoulders, under his arms, down his sides, finally cleansing him fully of the dirt from the desert.

“Would you like to see something?” Cas murmured to Dean when he was finished. Dean laced his fingers through Cas’ and kissed him, before pulling back and nodding. The sun was setting, now, Güneş Yarısı’s closing sending great splashes of orange and yellow and pink across the sky, visible in a neat slice where the river’s path cut through the canopy of leaves. The glow on the river was soft and golden-pink, the shadows warm and sated and friendly. Cas took a step back from Dean, finding a firm footing on the riverbed, and then brought his hands up to his chest and round, circling them – shaping the water, Dean understood, with a little kick in his chest as he realised that the thought didn’t cause him any discomfort at all. Actually, he was excited to see what Cas was creating.

Cas’ eyes were closed as he shifted and changed the water’s shape, holding it in the strength of his will. It formed behind him, spreading out from his body in two sheets that glittered and rippled, given texture and detail by the curve of Cas’ hands, the delicate movements of his fingers. Dean’s breath was taken from his lungs as he understood what Cas was creating, but he stayed silent until Cas was finished: until they were done.

Wings. Wings made of water, shimmering in the sunset glow, flicking rainbows across the surface of the river. Cas still had his eyes closed, his expression completely calm and peaceful, his white scar shiny against the tanned skin of his cheek and brow; the water springing from his naked back seemed natural, fitting, a part of him that he’d always had, but Dean simply hadn’t been able to see before.

Dean moved closer, raising a hand to touch the water wings. Cas’ connection with the water was so strong, his concentration on it so absolute, that he seemed to sense Dean’s touch; he smiled, and a single tendril of water emerged from the wing and wrapped around his wrist, as though to tug him closer. Dean obliged, his hand deep in the wing, moving through it to touch the place where it joined with Cas’ skin. The water felt cool, rushing over his hand as smoothly as the river itself. Dean couldn’t speak, didn’t even want to try. He watched as the water wings started to dissolve, Cas letting them fall gracefully back into the river in a delicate spray. The uppermost water feather on one of the wings fell more slowly than the others, and caressed Dean’s face lightly before losing its shape and dripping down his cheek, the cool, wonderful echo of a beautiful dream.

Cas opened his eyes, and smiled.

“Cas,” Dean said, “I love you.”

Cas went still for a moment, and then his hands were seeking Dean’s, interlocking as they should.

“And I love you,” he said. The sincerity in his voice, in his eyes, made Dean’s heart falter for a moment – and then beat hard, and strong, as though drumming along to a song of joy, as though finally figuring out how the tune was played. He smiled, lifting their joined hands, and pressing a kiss to Cas’ knuckles. Cas’ skin felt wet and warm under his lips.

The night was starting to close in, the air gaining the chill that Ayın Yarısı brought every evening. They made for the bank and pulled themselves out of the water, sitting at the river’s edge for a moment and letting themselves dry off before they got back into their clothes. Cas leaned on Dean’s shoulder, his wet hair dripping down Dean’s chest and back, tickling his skin. Dean turned, and pressed a kiss to the top of Cas’ head.

“I love you,” he said again, because he could, because he meant it. There was no other way to describe the feeling that he had when he looked at Cas, when he thought about him; he was in love, absolutely, utterly, unquestionably. His heart sat warm and comfortable in his chest, finally at ease. He’d been through the desert, he’d come out of the castle, and now he was in the forest – and it was good, and his heart was loving, and it was loved.

Cas sighed deeply, contentedly, and pushed a little closer to Dean.

“I love you,” he said in return. Dean wondered what the words meant to him; how Cas thought about himself, how he thought of his heart, his body, his mind. How they combined to make his love a true one.

Truth. That was what had been missing in Dean’s life, before Cas. Well, many other things, too. But he’d been lying to himself for years, blocking himself up and choking down his feelings, pretending he was made of rock. And if he’d made it through that Vigil, he would have stayed the same forever. But now… Dean rested his cheek against Cas’ hair. Now, he’d been through his own kind of Vigil. He’d finally owned all the truths that he’d been hiding from himself. How he felt about his mom’s death. How he was scared he’d ruined his relationship with Sam. How he hadn’t been a good fighter. And Cas… Cas had been his very own Ayın Yarısı, seeing his faults and his flaws and his weaknesses and accepting them – and in doing so, burning them away.

And Dean had been given the space to remake himself. He was stronger and happier and braver than he’d ever been before. He was a better fighter, able to defend and protect the one he loved – and a better lover, too. He’d never, never have even considered letting himself fall so hard for someone, when he was back in Şehir.

“I’m glad I love you,” he added into the quiet, watching the clear river water drift slowly past them. Cas raised his head, and kissed Dean on the cheek.

“I have never been happier,” he said again. He looked soft, pliant, relaxed. Whatever his thoughts had been, they must have been happy.

They fell asleep under a tree next to the river that night, too exhausted to do anything but rest. Dean dreamed of nothing at all, but knew all night that he was holding Cas close, and smiled.

Chapter Text

Dean woke with his arms around Cas for the second time, and it was even better than the first. He had his cheek pressed against the top of Cas’ head, breathing in the scent of him, fresh and sharp in the cool morning air. He reached up a hand and pressed it to the side of Cas’ head, holding him in place for a soft kiss to his forehead.

Cas sighed, and opened his eyes.

“I sleep better by your side,” he said quietly, the morning burr still rough in his throat. Dean looked up at the canopy of leaves above them, smiling. He hadn’t realised that Cas had any trouble sleeping, although it would explain his usual grumpiness in the mornings. The idea that Cas slept more soundly when he was with Dean put a sudden lump in his throat.

“Cas,” he said. “It’s a long way through the mountains, right?”

Cas shifted slightly, so that he could look up at Dean’s face.

“No,” he said. “The pass takes… perhaps two days’ walking to cross. We’ll reach the Water Lands by tomorrow evening.”

“Right,” Dean said, a horrible sinking feeling in his gut. Once they were past the mountains, there was only the journey to the dragon, and then once that was over – once Dean had done some firemaking, don’t think about that just yet – he would have to head home, to Şehir. He missed his family, and there was only so long that he could leave his father looking for him up and down the length of Ateş Aşiret. But when he went home, he would have to leave Cas behind. It wasn’t safe for him, outside the Water Lands.

Focus on today, Dean. Forget about tomorrow.

Yarım, he was starting to sound like one of the ridiculously cheesy signs that Sam had hung up all around his room. He missed those signs. He missed Sam’s room. He missed Sam.

He turned to Cas, pulling him in closer for a moment, and then rolling them upright. They got moving fairly swiftly, stripping their clothes off and carrying them over the river high above their heads, and pulling them back on when they clambered back out on the other side.

“If we’d been smart, we would’ve thought to do that last night,” Dean said wryly, disliking the feeling of his şalvar clinging to his wet skin. Cas smiled at him.

“We had other things to think about,” he said, and Dean smiled back at him. Their progress through the thinning trees was relatively swift, compared to yesterday’s easy meandering; before the sun had gained any real heat, they were emerging from the forest, leaving the glowing green light behind. Dean felt a sudden clutch of fear as the light changed slowly to a deeper, stonier blueish grey. What if – what if he and Cas only worked while they were in the forest? What if it had all been some kind of trick of the light, a mixture of the dizzying scents and tastes and sights? What if when they came to the mountains, they found that their love only lived when it was amongst the trees?

Oh, he was being stupid. He reached out and took Cas’ hand, and it was just as warm as ever, and he was just as welcome. Cas was Cas wherever he was, and Cas said he loved Dean. That meant that Cas loved Dean whether they were waist-deep in a mirror-glass river, or halfway up a freezing mountain.

Right?

“Cas.” Dean tugged on his hand, turning Cas around to look at him, halting their progress. He opened his mouth and then closed it again, trying to find the words to explain himself. I know I love you and I know you said you love me, but I’m doubting everything and I need you to tell me again.

Cas watched him struggle for a moment, his eyes locked on Dean’s. When Dean didn’t speak, he frowned and squeezed his hand.

“There’s a phrase in the Imiq language,” Cas said slowly, and Dean was briefly confused until he realised that Water was an Ateşi word; the people of the Water Lands wouldn’t call themselves Water Landers. Imiq, Dean said to himself, committing it to memory. Imiq.

“What phrase?” he said aloud.

“Se’o sada,” said Cas, circling his thumb over the knuckle of Dean’s index finger. “It means… it’s difficult to translate, but it means… between us. Just us. I see only you.”

“S-Se’o sada,” Dean said to himself. Just us.

“It makes me think of you and me,” Cas said softly. “From the start, there has been something between us. A… a bond. Se’o sada.”

Dean smile was as sudden and bright as the morning sun. Cas had felt something between them, since the first time they’d met, just like Dean had. His fears were groundless. It hadn’t been the forest that had made them love each other. It had been inevitable, a feeling growing within them since the start.

“Se’o sada,” said Dean again, letting Cas start walking again, pulling him forward. Se’o sada.

The sparse trees thinned further still, the canopy of leaves spattered against a grey, heavy sky. The grass under their feet was getting shorter and scrubbier – which was fine for Dean in his boots, but he worried for Cas, whose shoes had been taken when he’d been shut away in the cell at Walker Castle.

They emerged out of the treeline with a suddenness that took Dean’s breath away. Above them, rising out of the ground like great, grey behemoths, raking the sky with their craggy, snow-sharp tips, were the mountains. At last, the mountains. The heavy sky that Dean had thought lay above them was actually the rocky mountain face of the nearest titan, rising sheer above them, chill and heartless.

“Please tell me we don’t have to climb,” Dean said, staring upwards. Cas turned towards him, catching his eye with a little smile.

“There is some light clambering involved,” he admitted. “The Southern Pass is not as smooth as the Northern. But it’s easy work. Like I told you, it won’t take more than two days. And there are caves for us to sleep in tonight.”

“Caves,” Dean said unenthusiastically. “Do they by any chance serve keşkek in these caves?”

“No,” Cas said regretfully, obviously remembering the warm stew they’d eaten at the market in the desert with nostalgia. “But I do know where we can get some food.”

They walked on, the scrubby grass turning stonier with every step they took away from the forest. Cas started to place his feet a little more carefully, wincing once or twice as a sharp jut of rock stabbed into his foot.

“Cas, come here,” Dean said, when it happened for the third time. “You’re going to wreck your feet.”

“It’ll be easy to heal them,” Cas reminded him, brushing Dean off. “When we find water, I’ll fix it.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dean said, pulling Cas back towards him and turning round. “Come on, I’ll give you a lift.”

Cas eyed his back dubiously.

“I’m heavy,” he said. Dean could read his nervousness in his eyes.

“I know,” Dean said, grinning and tipping Cas a wink. “This won’t be the first time I’ve had you on top of me.”

Cas couldn’t help smiling at that, and he relented, vaulting onto Dean’s back and wrapping his legs around Dean’s waist, trying to support as much of his own weight as he could. He was so determined not to be a burden, to support himself, Dean thought. Cas’ muscles stayed tense, and he didn’t speak much as they trudged on up the stony slopes towards the Pass.

Dean supposed that after years of being friendless and independent, it would be strange to have someone to rely on. Maybe Cas didn’t want to lean on him too hard, in case he got used to it and forgot how to be strong on his own. Dean had always had someone there for him, and he’d always been there for other people. He’d never lived Cas’ quandary. He did understand wanting to seem strong, though – wanting to be the guy that people came to for help, not the guy who needed it. The only time he’d felt even mildly comfortable taking kindness from other people was… well, when it was their job, or when they gave him no choice about it, or when he felt as though he could reciprocate. Maybe that was what Cas needed, the feeling of being able to give back as well as take from Dean.

The thing was, Cas had already done so much for Dean. He’d wrung truths and emotions from him that Dean hadn’t even sure had been capable of giving; more than once, back in Şehir, he’d wondered if he would ever feel truly, deeply connected with someone in the flowers-and-kisses kind of way. Any previous attempts had mostly felt like pretending, like wanting to feel something that wasn’t there. He’d been pouring himself dry into loves that were frail and porous as imaginary silk – and now, finally, he had what he needed. A love that felt real, and solid – a love he could pour himself into and feel as sweet and strong and clean as fresh milk in a pail. And for that, Dean would have carried Cas up a hundred mountains, a mile of hot coals.

There was no way to say that without sounding ridiculous, of course. No way to tell Cas that no matter what he had to sacrifice for him, it would feel worth it. That a little extra weight was exactly what his back had been crying for. That he wanted to be there for him – that he wanted there to be no need for Cas to remember how to do everything alone.

“Thank you for carrying me,” Cas said aloud, breaking into Dean’s train of thought. He was a lean, heavy line against Dean’s back, his legs powerful, his lips falling to place a kiss on Dean’s shoulder.

“It’s OK,” Dean said. “It’s… se’o sada.”

Dean felt Cas’ laugh where his ribs were pressed to Dean’s back, silent to anyone who didn’t have their skin pressed to his chest. Dean wondered how many other laughs like that he’d missed, over the course of their time together.

The sun beat down on them as Dean walked, sweating under the burden that he carried.

“Not far,” Cas reassured him, after half an hour of struggling up loose, dark shingle. “Once we reach the top of this hill, it plateaus for a short distance before the Pass. That’s where the food is.”

The crest of the rocky hill still looked miles away to Dean, seen against the dazzling glare of the sunlight. Dean shifted one of his hands away from where they’d been gripping Cas’ thighs, shielding his eyes from the shine.

“Güneş Yarısı’s got it out for us today,” he grumbled. His arms were aching. “Yarım must be watching closely.”

Cas was quiet for a moment, a pensive silence that Dean recognised as the prelude to a question. He allowed Cas to gather his thoughts, his breath huffing in and out of his lungs as he pressed on up the hill.

“Do you believe in Yarım?” Cas asked, eventually. He sounded cautious, as though he knew he was probing on a subject upon which they were likely to disagree. Dean swallowed, deciding not to think his answer through, but just say what leapt into his mind.

“I guess,” he said. “Every believes in Yarım. It’s not even belief, it’s like… knowledge. The sun is her right eye and the moon is her left. She watches over us.”

“And intercedes on your behalf?”

“Well… so they say,” Dean said, with a touch of rueful cynicism. “She’s never spoken to me, so if she has ever done something for me, it was pretty much on the sly. Still, much appreciated,” he said loudly, nodding up to Güneş Yarısı, just in case. “I dunno, man. I guess after… after Mom died, it was nice to think of a – a mother up in the sky, watching out for me ‘n’ Sam.”

He felt Cas’ chin dip twice against his shoulder as he nodded thoughtfully.

“Does Yarım disapprove of firemaking?” he said curiously, a few moments later. Dean blew air out through his cheeks.

“Not anymore,” he said. “Back when it was legal, she was the one who controlled it, who gave the firemakers a little of her gift. But when my father made firemaking illegal, he forced the church to stop preaching that. Said it was a heresy to use Yarım’s power, and that she considered it an affront… which is why she took her vengeance on my mother, made those kids’ firemaking go out of control.”

“Do you believe that?” Cas asked swiftly, his hand gripping Dean’s shoulder. Dean tilted his head from one side to the other hesitantly.

“Not really,” he said. “It doesn’t sound right. I think they were just dumb kids who broke into the palace on a dare and thought they’d have some fun, and then lost control. If the goddess had wanted everyone to stop firemaking, she could have just… willed it so. We’re all her creations, we bend to her desires like flames in the wind – that’s what the scriptures say, if I’m remembering it right, anyway. She wouldn’t have to kill my mom to make a point. And I don’t think she’d want to, anyway.” He stopped talking, aware that he was starting to ramble a little, but Cas nodded again, his body warm against Dean’s, comforting. Dean swallowed. He didn’t usually open up about things like this, ever; in general, he tried to pretend he didn’t think about the big questions at all. It’s not as though he was smart enough to bring anything new to the table, anyway.

He took a deep lungful of fresh mountain air, cold all the way down to the base of his chest, and then released it. That was a harsh thing to say about himself, he thought. And then he thought, Cas wouldn’t like that I think that way. He could just imagine the way Cas’ brows would drop if he could hear Dean saying that he was stupid. Fine, he told the frowning Cas in his mind, fine. Not stupid. Happy, now?

“In our mythology,” said the real Cas, breaking into Dean’s thoughts, “there is no goddess, or god. No one governs humans except themselves.”

“That’s weird,” Dean said automatically, and then paused. Was it really weird? He tried to imagine looking at the sun and seeing not the eye of the great goddess, but just… a ball of flame? He snorted.

“How’d you explain the sun, then?” he said. “If it’s not Güneş Yarısı, then what is it?”

“A star,” Cas said. “Close up.”

Dean giggled, thinking Cas was joking, but stopped when he realised that Cas wasn’t laughing with him.

“Wait, you mean it?” he said. “Cas, the stars are tiny. And white. And not hot.”

“I told you, it’s close up,” Cas explained patiently. “We believe that the sun circles the Earth in an infinite circle, as does the moon. They swirl above us, a loop of energy and light. The sun melts the snow for water, the moon pushes and pulls it, and we drink it, we shape it. We’re all connected.”

Dean caught a glimpse of the world that Cas was describing: the connectedness, the infinity of it. He frowned. It seemed a lot simpler and a lot kinder than believing in Yarım, feeling constantly under the weight of her watchful eyes.

“But – but how do you know what to do?” he said. “Who tells you what’s right and wrong?”

Cas thought about it for a second, adjusting his weight so that he wasn’t resting so heavily on Dean’s hips.

“No one,” he said. “Not the sky, anyway. We tell ourselves.”

“But who’s in charge? Do you have a Queen or a King?”

“No,” Cas said, sounding faintly amused by Dean’s confusion. “We have a tribemeet every year, where the Imiq tribes all send ambassadors to the Castle on a Cloud. They review the tribal laws, and vote on whether to enact new ones.”

“Castle on a Cloud?” Dean asked, feeling mazed.

“The castle on the other side of the mountains,” Cas said, and Dean could hear the frown in his voice. “Don’t they even teach you about that in Ateş Aşiret?”

“I never learned a damned thing about the Water Lands, other than… well, that they’re our enemies, and that we, uh, we beat them in lots of wars.”

“You did not!” Cas said indignantly. “That is completely inaccurate. The Imiq have never lost a war with Ateş Aşiret.”

Dean considered this for a moment.

“Well, you’re still on your side of the mountains, and we’re still on ours,” he said. “Maybe they decided to call it a draw.”

Cas laughed, and the tension diffused. They were nearing the top of the hill, now; the conversation had helped to distract Dean from the ache in his back, and the growing cramp in the back of his legs. The ground under his boots was still stony and sharp, though, so he couldn’t put Cas down yet.

“There hasn’t been a war in my lifetime,” Cas said, as Dean ploughed on. “I wonder when the next one will be.”

“Maybe there won’t be another one,” Dean said hopefully. He didn’t even want to think about what a war between Ateş Aşiret and the Water Lands might mean for him, especially now. Cas, however, squeezed his shoulder fondly, as though he was being naïve.

“You said yourself that half of Şehir’s factories were probably making weapons,” he said. Dean nodded, remembering the conversation they’d had about politics back in the desert. Cas had told him that near the border, things had felt tense and expectant. He tried to sense a little of that now, but there was nothing; only the clean air, the light breeze, the monochrome scene of snow and rock and shale.

His father couldn’t be planning a war against the Imiq, could he? Surely not. There was no reason to; as long as the two countries both stayed on their respective sides of the mountains, they couldn’t bother each other too much. Still, maybe when he got back to Şehir and went to see his father to tell him to call off the search, Dean would bring it up with him. He could tell John about Cas, how he wasn’t dark or savage, as Dean had been raised to believe that he should be. Dean knew better than to think he could persuade his father that shaping was anything but evil, but maybe John could be persuaded that the Imiq didn’t have to be his enemies. After all, it would probably free up a bunch of Şehir’s factories for pure commerce; the kingdom would probably be a lot richer if their factories all made tradeable goods, instead of spewing out weapons to hoard in case of attack.

Finally, when Dean’s brain was still abuzz and his back felt like it was about to break, they reached the top of the hill. Dean saw that Cas was right: spreading out under his feet was a plateau of dark, spiky rocks, shimmering in the sun with ice crystallising on their backs like diamond dewdrops on the wings of black butterflies. At the far end of the plane, a few hundred feet away, the slopes of two mountains sailed down and crashed together, forming a narrow but relatively flat-looking mountainous path. Nestled next to the path’s entrance, blowing smoke out into the air like sooty, muggy kisses, was a little chimneyed brick hut.

“Food,” Cas said, pointing towards it. Dean’s stomach gave a grumble. If there was a fire, did that mean there would be… hot food? He started to walk faster. The two apples he’d eaten yesterday had been delicious, but not nearly enough to fill him up. He couldn’t wait for the sensation of a full belly. The distance between them and the hut seemed to melt under the force of Dean’s enthusiasm; he was practically jogging by the time they reached the door. He set Cas down gently, making sure not to stab his feet on the stones now, after he’d carried him all the way up.

“Thank you,” Cas said, smiling at Dean as he reached out a hand to push the wooden door of the hut open. Dean beamed back at him, taking his hand and squeezing it for a moment before letting go.

Inside, the hut was crowded and warm, with animal-hair rugs hung up on the walls to help insulate the heat from the big, crackling fire in the grate to one side. Cas turned to Dean, his eyes concerned, but Dean flicked him a smile and shook his head. The flames weren’t bothering him.

There were low tables strewn haphazardly across the room, with fat, plush armchairs around them, covered in throws and cushions of random, mismatched patterns. They looked old, and weathered, like beaten old men gathered to groan and complain about the way the cold made their joints ache. Above them were copper pots and pans, hanging from wooden rafters; and on the air, under the sharp scent of burning wood, there was something else… something rich, and strong, and savoury…

“Good morning,” said a clear, pleasant voice to Dean’s left. He turned to see a dark-haired, light-eyed woman standing behind a counter, behind which was a huge cabinet overflowing with what looked like coats, trousers and shoes. The woman had a friendly look in her eyes, her skin unwrinkled, her clothing simple and a little frayed, but clean.

“Uh, hi,” Dean said, approaching the counter with a smile. Cas moved with him, standing by his side. “I – well, you see, the thing is, we’ve walked a long way, and we’re hungry, and we have to make it through the Pass, but the thing is… see, we were captured, and they stole all our money,” Dean said. The story sounded ridiculous, even to his own ears. He wouldn’t be surprised if the woman threw them out without any further questions.

To his great surprise, however, her smile brightened and she tipped her head towards the window next to her counter.

“I saw you carrying your friend over the shale,” she said, her eyes twinkling. “It looked like an effort.”

“I told him he didn’t have to,” Cas said, sounding exasperated. Dean squeezed his hand under the counter, where the woman couldn’t see.

“He doesn’t have shoes,” he explained to her. “His feet were gonna get ruined.”

“It was kind,” she said brightly. “One kindness deserves another. I’ll give you however much you can eat, for free.”

“Alright,” Cas said, and the woman was halfway through saying,

“No, really, I insist –” before she realised what Cas had said and broke off. Dean stepped on Cas’ toe, and Cas frowned at him.

“That would be fantastic, thank you so much,” Dean said politely, smiling winningly at the woman as she came out from behind the counter and led them towards one of the empty tables. “We really appreciate it.”

“No problem,” she said with another light smile. “My name’s Hannah, by the way. The keşkek today is lamb, will that be alright?”

“Amazing,” Dean said, with a semi-manic fervour that he tried to tamp down when Hannah cast him an amused look. He took a seat on a wide armchair, and was pleased when Cas chose to sit beside him instead of choosing one of his own. Cas leaned back while he sat forwards, fidgeting with the tattered hem of the rough cloth covering the table in front of them. The light in this part of the hut was a little gloomy, since they were distanced from the fire; Dean wasn’t complaining about that, though. The flames weren’t panicking him, but he still didn’t particularly like the idea of getting too close.

Hannah brought out their food in two wide, deep bowls; Dean forced himself to thank her politely before digging in, picking his bowl up in his hands and scooping the keşkek into his mouth almost faster than he could swallow it. Cas, beside him, was inhaling his own serving with a speed that was almost as impressive. The stew tasted absolutely incredible, the meat tender and flavoursome, the vegetables cooked until they were sweet and delicious. The portions vanished within the space of a few minutes, Cas scraping up the last of his sauce with his spoon, and Dean licking the bottom of the bowl.

There was a jug of water set out on the table for them, which Hannah must have brought at some point when Dean’s attention had still been entirely focused on the keşkek in front of him. He picked it up and slurped in several mouthfuls, before handing it over to Cas. His stomach, unused to being fed so well, felt happily swollen under his tunic.

“Ahhh,” he said, leaning back into the armchair’s soft cushions and closing his eyes. “I haven’t felt so full in my whole life.”

“Really?” Cas said, sounding amused; when Dean opened his eyes, Cas was watching him slyly, and Dean suddenly realised what he was talking about. He gave Cas’ shoulder a little push, grinning at him.

“Dude, not appropriate,” he said, glancing around guiltily in case Hannah was nearby. Cas lifted one shoulder carelessly, and reached to lace his fingers through Dean’s. The easy affection, given so shamelessly even in a place where they could be seen by other people, made Dean’s breath catch in his throat. Cas smiled at Dean, a touch of pride in his eyes. Being with Dean made him feel proud. Dean gripped Cas’ fingers. He didn’t know how to express how – how happy it made him, that Cas felt no hesitancy, no bashfulness. No shame. He didn’t have words for this feeling of belonging – oh, except…

“Se’o sada,” Dean murmured, and Cas smiled and leaned back to press a kiss to Dean’s cheek, one of the sweet, gentle ones that made Dean’s chest feel as though it were crumbling under the weight of his feeling.

“Se’o sada,” Cas said back, his voice low and rumbling. Dean reached up and ran a hand through Cas’ hair, ostensibly trying to push it into some semblance of order, but ultimately just enjoying the sensation of thick, soft brown hair between his fingers.

They stood up when Hannah came back into the room, pushing through a side-door and smiling when she caught them staring at each other, hands still clasped together between them. She approached their table and picked up their bowls, looking at Cas’ feet critically.

“I can give you boots,” she offered. “And a coat.”

Cas looked at her as though she’d gone mad. Despite Dean’s subtle attempts to signal take what you’re offered and don’t ask questions, he said,

“Why would you offer me those things for free?”

Hannah smiled.

“You look Imiq,” she said. “And your friend is kind, for an Ateşi. I like helping Imiq, and I like helping kind people. Besides, you won’t make it far if he has to carry you the whole way to the Castle on a Cloud, will you?”

“Are you Imiq?” Cas asked, and Hannah nodded. Cas spoke a few words in a language that Dean didn’t understand, which was staccato and swift like a hailstorm. Hannah replied at length, Cas nodding along while Dean scuffed his feet awkwardly on the stone-flagged floor and imagined eating more keşkek. His stomach was telling him no, but his mouth was telling him yes.

“My apologies, Dean,” said Cas, after a minute or two of private conversation. “It is good to speak my own language again.”

Dean nodded and shrugged, smiling at him before turning to Hannah with raised eyebrows.

“So… are those boots still a go?” he asked, hoping his smile was charming. Hannah beamed back and nodded, moving behind the counter towards the cabinet stuffed with clothing. She searched through it for a moment, whilst Dean did his best to savour the feeling of being warm, of being inside; he supposed it wasn’t one that he would have again for a while, in the cold mountain pass and the icy Water Lands beyond.

“Here,” Hannah said, passing a thick dark pelerin and a pair of solid black boots over the counter. “Those are well-worn, so they shouldn’t give you blisters if you wear them with socks. And the pelerin matches your… friend’s.”

“Um,” said Dean. “Actually, neither of us have socks.”

Hannah rolled her eyes at them and fussed around in one of the cabinet’s drawers. Dean had the sense that she was enjoying taking care of them, though he had no idea why. She handed each of them a pair of socks, and Dean started toeing off his boots to put them on. They felt warm, and fluffy. Cas was lacing up his boots in large, careless knots that Dean knew would come undone in two seconds; tutting, he knelt down and tied them himself in quick, efficient bows. As he stood up, Cas started to pull the pelerin on over his tunic. Dean turned back to Hannah, smiling.

“One last thing before we go,” he said. “I don’t suppose that by any chance, you have… a bathroom?”

“Of course we do,” Hannah said, looking a little startled. She pointed towards a door to one side of the room, on the opposite side to the fire grate. “Just through there.”

Dean nodded gratefully and moved towards the door. The idea of relieving himself alone, in a way that was clean and inside and not fifty feet from where Cas was standing and facing the other way, was one that was almost as exciting as getting some good food in his belly had been twenty minutes ago.

When he emerged, much more comfortable and smoothing down the lines of his şalvar, he saw Cas standing awkwardly by the counter conversing with Hannah. As Dean approached, his posture loosened visibly and he smiled, opening up his hands as if offering himself up to Dean for approval. The boots looked sturdy enough, and the new pelerin was a good fit – it hugged his torso warmly, and his muscly arms, too. Dean realised he was staring and blinked, turning his open-mouthed gawking into a smile.

“Nice,” he said simply, but his reaction seemed to have already spoken for him; Cas’ eyes were sparkling and he was watching Dean with the slightest hint of a sexy smile around the corner of his lips. Yarım, Cas could read him so easily. Or perhaps Dean had just been being extremely obvious. Cas headed towards the bathroom, too, and Dean turned to Hannah with a smile.

“Thank you so much for all your help,” he said.

“It’s my pleasure,” she replied earnestly. “I think we all need a little kindness in times like these.”

“Times like these?” Dean said, frowning. “What’s happening?”

Hannah picked up a cloth lying on the side of her counter, and started wiping down the wood.

“Nothing yet,” she said. “But there have been strange faces in the Pass for weeks. And a quietness… none of them speak, none of them stop for food. There’s something amiss.” Her expression was solemn and concerned, her blue eyes clouded with worry.

“Can’t be good for business,” Dean said with a wry, understanding smile that Hannah returned.

“It’s not,” she agreed. “But I have enough to see me through, and to help others along.”

“And we’re grateful for it,” Dean said, bringing their conversation full circle as Cas emerged from the bathroom.

“Safe travels,” Hannah said, as she ushered them both out of the door. She pressed a paper-wrapped package into Dean’s hands, waving away his protests. “And come in again if you’re passing.” Dean smiled and assured her that they would; while Cas spoke a few parting words to her in the Imiq language that they shared. She beamed at him and nodded, waving them off from the door of the hut until they were on the mountain path, and out of sight. It must be incredibly lonely up here, Dean thought. She couldn’t get many passers-by. Maybe that went a little way towards explaining her kindness; she was just pleased to see them.

And they had been pleased to see her, too, Dean reflected. That keşkek had been incredible. Perhaps she’d packed them a little in the package she’d given him as they left; it surely wouldn’t be terrible eaten cold.

But it hadn’t just been the food that had made meeting Hannah good for Cas, Dean thought. It had also been meeting someone like himself, someone who spoke his language, for the first time in weeks. Dean chewed his lip as he thought that through.

“Cas,” he said eventually. “Does it… does it bother you that I don’t speak Imiq?”

Cas frowned at him. He was walking easily in his new boots; they were a good fit, then.

“Why would you?” he said. “You were never given the opportunity to learn it.”

“I know, it’s just…” Dean licked his lips, seeking a way to express himself. “I was wondering if it takes something away, you know, from… from when we talk, because… because it’s all in a language that isn’t yours.”

“I don’t feel that way at all,” Cas said swiftly, as though he didn’t even have to think about it, a reaction that eased the concern in Dean’s heart a little. “Firstly, I am more than well acquainted with the Ateşi language. I have been speaking it for years with the dragon, and I feel that I can imply and infer nuance with success.”

“Even if you do sound like you ate a dictionary,” Dean teased, earning himself a glower. He was starting to treasure those, to count up how many of them he could gather in one day.

“I am capable of self-expression in Ateşi,” Cas said primly. “But secondly, and more importantly, I… I feel as though we have our own language, or own manner of speaking.”

“Huh,” Dean said, liking the sound of that answer. When Cas didn’t seem inclined to continue, Dean frowned at him curiously, pressing for more.

“I feel as though… when we are together, our conversation is not contained purely in the words we use,” Cas said. “We use our eyes, our hands, our…” he placed a hand over his heart. Dean understood. It seemed that when he’d been walking beside Cas in the desert, feeling his heart shift and ache inside him, he hadn’t been the only one. “It is not something I have ever experienced before. But it intensifies the bond between us… or perhaps it is the intensity of the bond between us that allows it. Either way, it takes our communication to a level that goes beyond mother tongues.”

Dean fell quiet for a moment, to process that answer. It was kind of beautiful, the idea that he and Cas could speak without words, without even touching. Just with the tides in their hearts that rose into their eyes and washed over the space between them, with their words like boats that floated on the surface.

“I like that,” he said, his voice a little gruff with shyness. “I like that you think that… about us.” I like that you think about us at all, he wanted to say. Makes me feel less stupid for spending all of my time doing it.

Cas smiled at him, and reached for his hand.

“Us,” he said. Dean’s head twisted to look at his expression, but he didn’t look worried or unsure; his smile was small, but placid, and his eyes were full of happiness when they met Dean’s gaze. It was so easy to make Cas happy, Dean thought – and then he remembered that he’d had a moment earlier because Cas had sat on the same chair as him, and decided that they were both just as bad as each other.

They walked on in silence, concentrating on negotiating the uneven path between the two great mountains on either side; Dean tried not to look at them too hard, since they made him feel almost terrifyingly small, ready to be crushed. The air cooled further and further the longer they walked, until Dean could see his breath in puffs of vapour when he exhaled. He rubbed his hands together for warmth, wishing that he’d worn warmer clothing – but of course he couldn’t have done, or he’d have roasted alive in the desert sun.

“We aren’t here for long,” Cas said, as though he could read Dean’s thoughts. “And we’ll spend tonight in a cave, for warmth.”

“A cave won’t be much warmer than being out here, will it?” Dean said, his teeth starting to chatter. Cas only smiled enigmatically, and said nothing more – which left Dean frustrated, but also a little hopeful. If Cas knew something he didn’t, then maybe they really would get a decent night’s sleep in the warmth tonight.

They trudged on, boots cracking the shards of rocks beneath them as they passed. The path was well-worn in places, but sometimes new falls of rocks had them clambering over awkward, sharp boulders, being careful not to rip their clothing and let the cold inside.

Dean decided to save their food package for the evening, so that he wouldn’t be trying to sleep on an empty stomach; besides, he hadn’t had so much to eat in days, and his tummy was still full and happy about it. The only reason he wanted to eat was to take the edge off the boredom; the forest had been a kind respite from the drudge of walking for hours in a landscape that never changed. The growing burn in his muscles – not acute like when he’d been carrying Cas, but slow, and creeping – was familiar, the ache in his calves almost an old friend.

Güneş Yarısı moved across the sky quickly, the hours melting away like the ice coating on the slate beneath their feet. Dean’s hunger was clawing at his stomach once more by the time it was sinking over the horizon, leaving sharp, choppy pinks and oranges in its wake.

“The cave is somewhere…” Cas said slowly, stopping to survey the sheer rock face to the left of the path. Dean looked at it too, and felt his heart sink. The cliff was steep and pitted, with any number of cracks and fissures that could have been the entrance to a cave, or just a scar on the rock.

“Have you been here before?” Dean asked worriedly, as Cas narrowed his eyes at the rock, as though trying to frighten it into revealing its secret.

“Like I told you,” Cas said, “I know these mountains well. The entrance is difficult to spot, but it’s definitely somewhere…” he trailed off, and then seemed to remember that he’d been speaking. “Somewhere around here.”

They surveyed the cliff together in the fading light, Dean chewing his lip. The air around them was growing cooler and cooler as night set in, Ayın Yarısı open and baleful above them. If they couldn’t find a place to sleep that was out of the line of her cold stare…

“There,” said Cas suddenly, pointing to a slim, curved fissure in the cliff, just a few feet above the path. It looked far too thin to allow a human being passage through it, but Cas approached it confidently, and pulled himself up onto the small ledge that the fracture afforded before straightening up and starting to slide through the tight gap, into the rock face. Dean followed his lead, with a little less grace; the crevice was just as skinny as it had looked from the outside, the rock chafing against his shoulders as he pulled himself through. He couldn’t see anything beyond the faint outline of Cas, who was still turned sideways, pushing through the tunnel.

“Cas, are you sure…?” he began, and then suddenly they were out, the rock falling away on either side unexpectedly, leaving Dean stumbling for a second without its support. The cave was completely dark, something that Dean hadn’t thought about before entering; now that they were inside, it seemed obvious, though. Of course there wouldn’t be any light inside a mountain. Fear the dark, said a little voice in his mind that sounded like Ellen. He pushed it away.

He heard a faint plink, as though a drip from above had fallen into a puddle of water. So it was dark, and it was damp. Perfect.

“Well, it’s warmer than the desert,” Dean said, and his voice echoed once, twice, and on… the cave must be huge, Dean thought. He listened for Cas, and heard shuffling noises a few feet away from him in the blackness. “Cas?”

“Last time I was here,” Cas said, “a few weeks ago… I left some… yes,” he said triumphantly, and then there was the scraping of a box being opened, the hiss of a match being struck, and – light. The match illuminated Cas’ face for a moment, looking strange and supernatural in the yellowy glow, before he lowered it towards something in his other hand: a candle, Dean saw, as its wick guttered and then burned brightly with a strong, orange flame.

“There are others,” Cas said. “I left them all around the cave, in case I came back through on my way home.” He took the lit candle with him, following the light that it shed around the cave, touching it to the wicks of other candles that were perched on ledges and scattered across the floor of the cave. “They’re slow-burning, so they should last ‘til morning.”

Dean watched the cave being revealed to him, a little more with every candle, as though the curtain of blackness were being slowly raised to reveal the treasure behind. His mouth fell open as he took in the scale of it, the sheer size; the candlelight glittered faintly over crystallised, shimmering rock in a ceiling that was at least thirty feet above them, and the back of the cave was still a dark, untouched mystery a hundred feet away from the entrance where Dean was standing. The floor was of greyish-brown, dull rock, which dropped away suddenly halfway across the cave into a pool of still, blue water. Dean took a few tentative steps towards it, looking down into its depths; by the warm light of the candles, he could see that it wasn’t deep, and scattered across the bottom were more crystals, sharp and strange and beautiful.

“Not so bad, is it?” Cas said lightly. Dean shook his head, still overawed. He’d never seen anything like this in his life before. The only crystals in Şehir were fragments sold in boxes for prices that Dean couldn’t have afforded even if he’d wanted to.

They sat down together and Dean unwrapped the package that Hannah had given them; inside, there was a large hunk of bread, and a generous portion of white goat’s cheese. They divided it between them, Dean insisting on saving some for the morning, despite the appetite he’d worked up walking all day. They were licking crumbs off their fingers all too soon, and Dean was dreaming about the hot keşkek he’d eaten earlier.

“Is it far from the end of the Pass to where the… you know, the dragon lives?” he asked, reaching over and brushing some rock dust off the shoulder of Cas’ pelerin. Cas shook his head.

“It lives perhaps three miles from here as the crow flies,” Cas said. “But I won’t make you climb the mountains. We’ll go round, and be there… probably around midnight tomorrow.”

“We won’t be stopping again before we reach the dragon?” Dean said, his heart sinking. The idea of walking at night, in the cold, was not at all appealing.

“Time presses on us,” Cas said. “We lingered in the forest, we wasted time at Walker’s Castle. I am afraid that if we wait much longer…”

Dean reached out, and squeezed Cas’ hand.

“It’s OK,” he said. “We’ll get there in time. We’ll save your friend.”

Cas smiled at him gratefully, squeezing his fingers in return. A thought that Dean hadn’t wanted to address, but knew he would have to, arose in his mind.

“Uh… Cas. About the whole, saving the dragon… uh… thing. How do I – how do I do it?”

Cas frowned.

“I’m not sure,” he said honestly, and Dean’s stomach did a flip. What if it required a master firemaker? “All I know is that the dragon asked me to bring a firemaker.”

“But I’m – I’m not even really one of those,” Dean mumbled. “Haven’t got the tattoo or anything.”

“The firemaking mark is not a tattoo,” Cas said. “It is a brand on your skin, caused by the heat of handling fire. It will come, if you use your power often enough.”

Dean fiddled with a loose thread on the knee of his şalvar, barely listening to Cas’ explanation. What if Cas had brought him all this way, had all this hope resting on him, and then Dean failed? He didn’t want to imagine the look on Cas’ face if the dragon turned to him, and shook its lizardy head. What did dragons even look like, outside of picture books, anyway?

“Maybe we could practice,” Cas suggested tentatively. “You could learn how to summon fire.”

Dean’s head jerked up to look at Cas incredulously.

“You want me to just… learn to do it now?” he said, his voice coming out a little high-pitched. Cas shrugged.

“It’s your decision,” he said quietly.

Dean swallowed. He couldn’t think of many things he wanted less than to have fire in his hands, completely his responsibility. His mind flicked through a few dozen worst-case scenarios, most of which ended with gouts of flame rolling across the length of the cave, engulfing everything and everyone in it…

But then he looked at Cas’ face, and saw his muted want, saw how hard Cas was trying not to show it, so as not to put any pressure on Dean. He looked hopeful, desperately hopeful, behind his veneer of calm. And Dean didn’t want to say no, didn’t want to disappoint him. He wanted Cas to be happy, more than he wanted to indulge his paranoia.

“OK,” he said, eventually. “Show me how. But – but you gotta be ready with the water, in case it gets out of control, yeah?”

In answer, Cas twisted his body towards the pool, curving his hands through the air, raising a sphere of water and guiding it over to where they were sitting. He held it in his hands, as easily as though it were made of glass. Dean nodded, somewhat reassured.

“Just throw it on me if it looks like things are gonna get crazy,” he said. Cas’ safety was more than worth a drenching.

“Sit opposite me,” Cas said, and Dean obliged, scooting over the rock so that he was sitting cross-legged, facing Cas. “Now, the power to summon fire comes from within you. Imagine you have a flame burning in your chest… in the centre, beside your heart. Can you feel it?”

“How do you know all this?” Dean asked, closing his eyes and trying to make himself feel a fire inside his chest. All he felt was slightly soggy nervousness.

“Dean, I had a dragon for a friend,” Cas said dryly. “Do you really think I wouldn’t ask it any questions about firemaking?”

“Good point,” Dean said. “Yep, very good –”

“Concentrate,” Cas interrupted, and Dean fell silent. He tried to focus his attention, tried to make some kind of heat come from inside him. Nothing. He was definitely still hungry, though.

“Cas, I’m drawing a blank here,” he said out loud. “You’re sure that I can even do this?”

“Positive,” Cas said, sounding so certain that Dean actually believed him. “Stop thinking about it as something you have to create. The power is inside you, and it has been since you were born, and it will be until you die. There is a fire that burns inside you, which will never, ever go out. Find it.”

Dean’s brow creased, and he changed his tactic. Instead of trying to make himself feel something, he examined what he did feel. Hunger, yes. A little cold. A lot of nervousness. But under that, there was… there was something. Coming from his chest, right in the centre, like Cas said. He breathed steadily, evenly, letting his awareness of it grow.

It was as though a deep, bass note had been playing inside him his whole life, so familiar to him that he had stopped hearing it at all – and now that he tried, now that he really listened, he found it was powerful and strong.

“I’ve got it,” he whispered. “Cas, I – I’ve got it. It feels like a fire… inside me.” Hot, and intense, and deep. Strong and hungry, wanting to be used, wanting to grow.

“Let the flames rise,” Cas said. With his eyes closed, Dean was even more aware of the sound of Cas’ voice that usual; the rough, deep, gorgeous quality of it. He thought about it, and felt the flames inside him flare a little hotter. He almost smiled. Of course. Of course. When his heart had turned to rock it the desert, it had been the walls he’d built around it being burned black and charred by the growing fire inside him, the flames fanned by having Cas beside him. When his heart had shattered apart after seeing Cas shape water, it had been because the flames had died, the sudden cooling cracking and splitting the hard outer shell that he had built. And now, the fire sat next to his heart, warming it as it should, glad to finally find it whole, unhidden by a thousand barriers of loss and denial.

Dean breathed out, and let the flames grow within him, licking up to his shoulders. The sensation was so real, so intense; he could feel the heat playing under his skin, almost painful, but not quite.

“Keep going,” Cas said. “Let it flow down your arms, into your hands, and out through your palms.”

It was easy, wonderfully easy. The flames scurried down his arms, chasing down his veins and arteries. They reached his wrists, the heels of his hands, his palms – he pushed, just gently, opening his eyes, and –

“Ouch!” for a single second, a flame flared to life between his curled fingers, and then just as quickly snapped back to blackness. On his wrist, a bright little flare of red and gold, like a shining tattoo, lit up for a second and then died.

“Congratulations,” Cas said, smiling at him. “You just summoned fire for the first time.”

Dean rubbed his wrists, too shocked to smile, to celebrate.

“It hurt, when I pushed,” he said. Cas nodded.

“I believe that’s normal,” he said. “In order to create light and heat, the flames have to take a little of your energy. You will grow accustomed to the feeling, if you want to.”

Dean nodded, still reeling. He’d summoned fire. He, Dean, had summoned fire. And it hadn’t been terrifying, it hadn’t been cataclysmic… it had felt simple, and natural. As though it had been a part of himself all along, that he’d been pushing down and hiding away – trying to follow his father’s laws. For the first time, he questioned whether his father had been right to make firemaking illegal after Mary’s death. And yet…

“Fire is so destructive,” Dean said, his brow creased. “All it does is destroy. I wish I could shape water, like you.”

Cas tilted his head thoughtfully.

“Fire isn’t only used to destroy,” he said. “Light and heat are sight and strength. Fire is a life-giver, just as much as water.” Dean nodded slowly.

“It felt good,” he said softly. “It felt… good.”

Cas nodded, standing up and letting the water in his hands play over his fingers.

“It is a part of us,” he said. “It is not something to fear. You have as much control over your firemaking as you have over yourself. It is the same as tempering your anger, curbing your fears… holding in your cries of pleasure,” Cas finished, Dean’s eyes snapping up to meet his. Cas held out his hand, and Dean allowed himself to be helped to his feet and led across the cave, to where the aquamarine pool sat still and cool. Cas released his hold on Dean, and held out his hand; he frowned, eyes falling closed.

Dean watched the water, waiting for something to rise out of it, to be shaped… but nothing happened.

“Uh, Cas, I don’t want to worry you, but whatever you’re doing isn’t working,” Dean said – and then he saw it. Rising faintly off the surface of the water, soft as smoky curls: steam. Cas was heating the water.

“Not bad,” Dean breathed, as the pool started to bubble in places. Cas opened his eyes, looking smug. “You got any other tricks?”

Cas considered him for a moment, and then took a few steps backwards, turning away from Dean. Dean watched him curiously, not understanding. A few seconds passed, and then –

“Remember this one?” said a silver voice in Dean’s ear, Cas’ voice, as soft and intimate as if he’d been standing right next to Dean, murmuring the words into his ear. Dean jerked, and heard Cas laugh.

“How the – what did you just do?!” Dean demanded, looking around him as though checking for mirrors, for strings, for any kind of illusion. “Wait – is that what you did in the chapel, back in Şehir? When only I could hear you, but Jo couldn’t?”

Cas nodded, turning back to Dean, his eyes crinkled into a smile. He was so beautiful that Dean couldn’t help drawing him into his arms, and pressing a soft, dreamy kiss to the side of his head.

“I’m not sure how it works, exactly,” Cas admitted, speaking quietly into Dean’s shoulder, letting himself be held. “It’s like… when we speak, we move the air around us. And part of air is water. So I can send that movement further, in a specific direction, like… throwing a rope of sound. It took me a long time to find you in the chapel, I had no idea what I was aiming for.”

“So you could have got Jo, instead,” Dean said. He rubbed his hands up and down Cas’ back a few times, and then brought them forward, reaching for the zip of his pelerin. “It was just chance that I heard you.”

Cas’ eyes were soft and warm as Dean stripped him of his pelerin, and reached for the hem of his tunic to pull it up over his head.

“It was chance that brought me to you,” he agreed. “But it was our choice to stay together.”

Dean leaned forwards and kissed him, their lips moving softly, slowly. They were growing to know each other’s taste, the shape of each other’s mouths: it was no longer an exploration, but a relaxation, a reawakening of a familiar desire. Cas helped Dean out of his pelerin, and then slid his hand below the line of Dean’s şalvar to take hold of him, giving him a few gentle, lazy strokes that sent shivers up Dean’s spine; he felt himself hardening under Cas’ touch.

“Dean,” Cas murmured, even the vibration of his voice through Dean’s chest enough to turn him on further. “This time, I want you inside me.”

Dean shuddered, his stomach muscles clenching, his jaw tight. He sucked a kiss to the side of Cas’ neck, loving the feeling of Cas drawing a sharp breath as he bit down just a little.

“Is that –”

“Yes,” Dean said roughly. “Yes.”

Cas pulled off his şalvar, and then Dean’s, his eyes bright and keen. He laced his hand through Dean’s and led him to the very edge of the pool, Dean stooping to scoop up his pelerin on the way. Cas dipped a foot into the hot water, and then smiled and stepped right in, standing on a ledge that left him calf-deep in the hot, steaming pool. Dean fumbled in his pelerin’s pocket and drew out the glass bottle of lube. Around a third of it was gone, used in the woods.

“We’ll have to stop by another market some time,” Dean said, grinning, as he too stepped into the water. It was wonderful, just hot enough to redden his skin – a blush that spread to his cheeks, when Cas knelt down on the ledge where Dean was standing, resting his elbows on the dry rock around the pool, his ass just above the water – ready for Dean’s touch.

“Good?” he asked, looking up at Dean’s awed face with a smile, curving his back up enticingly, pushing his ass higher into the air. He looked absolutely incredible, the candlelight playing over his shiny, steam-reddened skin, his eyes dark with expectation. Dean swallowed hard and stepped down from the ledge, letting the warm water rise up over his knees, his thighs, his hard, red cock. He came up behind Cas, putting a hand on one of his cheeks, and pressing a kiss to the other.

“Good,” he said hoarsely, as Cas leaned into the touch, spreading himself wider. Dean pulled away for a moment, removing the top of the glass bottle and pouring a generous amount of the clear, gelatinous liquid inside over his index and middle fingers, before reaching out to put the bottle on the edge of the pool beside Cas’ right elbow. He placed his free hand back on Cas’ round, gorgeous ass. The wet skin felt so warm beneath Dean’s fingers; he felt his cock twitch, his hunger curling a little tighter inside him.

“You look so good,” Dean said, trailing his fourth finger lightly downwards from the bottom of Cas’ back, making Cas’ shiver.

“Dean,” he said, “Dean – please –”

Dean stopped teasing, and pressed the tip of his index finger against Cas’ pink, shining rim. Cas gasped, pushing back into the touch; he took Dean’s finger inside, up to his first knuckle, before Dean was expecting it. Cas felt so warm, so tight, soft and wet with lube and just – fuck – wonderful. Dean slid his finger out, and back in, his hand shifting to Cas’ hip to hold him in place, to feel for any shivers of pain – but Cas was loose, relaxed and wanting. Dean built up a rhythm of quick little thrusts, Cas spreading under his touch, accepting Dean’s finger deeper and deeper; when Dean put in his second finger, Cas groaned with pleasure, his feet kicking a little in the water.

Dean leaned forwards and placed a kiss on the smooth skin at the top of Cas’ ass, and then another, and another, lower each time; oh, Yarım, he couldn’t help himself – he pulled his fingers out of Cas, making him gasp at the loss, and then pressed his mouth to Cas’ rim, sucking a sweet, wet kiss. Cas cried out, Dean aware of his body juddering at the sensation – Yarım, he loved that, making Cas react so beautifully with just a kiss, just his tongue. He did it again, licking a little more this time, pushing his tongue forward, rimming Cas’ hole. And he didn’t want to stop… he pressed on, pulled cry after cry of bliss from Cas’ lips, his body bucking back into the wet warmth of Dean’s mouth and the firm push of his tongue. Dean took Cas’ thighs, muscled and trembling, in his hands, holding him steady as he went rougher, using his mouth to widen Cas, to prepare him. Cas’ noises were higher-pitched and thin, now, as though he’d lost control, as though he wasn’t even aware of the sounds he was making, too deep in the sensation of Dean’s mouth to care.

“Dean – Dean,” Cas said eventually, pulling away just a little with obvious effort, his voice growling and dry. “I want – I need you to…”

“I got you,” Dean said, rubbing Cas’ thigh with one hand as he reached for the lube with the other. He slicked his fingers over once more, pushing them inside Cas without being gentle, and hearing Cas’ answering groan of happiness; he scissored them, making sure Cas was wide enough, before pulling back out. He slicked his cock with the lube instead, hot under the water, and moved to sit down on the ledge beside Cas, who was still leaning on the edge of the pool, panting, his arms shaking a little under his own weight. Dean reached underneath him, holding his body with a hand on either side, pulling Cas into his lap.

“Come here,” he said, and Cas exhaled shakily, pushing his mouth against Dean’s in a long, slow kiss as he lowered himself, Dean’s hands guiding him into place… and he moaned, loud and drawn-out and beautiful, into Dean’s mouth as he was filled, finally, by the length of Dean’s hard, aching cock. For a moment, he was still, and Dean’s body was overwhelmed by the feeling of being inside Cas, wrapped in his tight, warm heat – and then he moved, just a little, up and back down, and gasped. His knees were on either side of Dean’s legs, trembling with the effort of holding himself steady. Dean pushed upwards a little, unable to help himself, needing the friction.

“You look – you look – Yarım, Cas,” Dean stuttered, bringing one hand up to cup Cas’ face, the other still resting on his hip. Cas took a few shaky, steadying breaths, and then placed his hands on Dean’s shoulders, one on either side, leaning back a little so that Dean’s hand fell away from his cheek. Gently at first, but getting stronger, getting rougher, he started to move – rolling his hips to begin with, and then when that wasn’t enough, using the strength in his thighs to lever himself up and down. He rode Dean’s cock with an expression of pure bliss, his back arched, every muscle tense, his brow creased; Dean watched him through the steam with his mouth open, his skin shining with sweat as Cas worked along his length. Cas didn’t need Dean’s steadying hands anymore, so Dean leaned back, stretching his arms out along the rock behind him, tipping his chin up but not allowing his eyes to close, even though it felt so – ah, fuck – so good, because he wanted to watch Cas like this, flushed and shaking and tense as he rode himself closer to climax on Dean’s cock… the water around them was swirling, slapping against Cas’ ass every time he rose and fell…

“Ahhhhhh,” Cas cried out, as he found the perfect angle and moved even faster, his hands digging deep into Dean’s shoulders. “Ahhhh, Dean… Deaaaan, I – I need…”

Dean reached down, his own body starting to shake and shiver as he neared his orgasm, his breathing growing faster, turning to little grunts pulled from his throat every time Cas dropped, enveloping Dean’s length completely, taking him so deep – he took Cas’ cock in his hand, pink flush gorgeous in the blue, bubbling water, and began to stroke him off, the water creating a strange, wet friction that Cas seemed to love: he swayed forwards into Dean’s touch, slowing his pace so that he could wrap his hands around the back of Dean’s neck, moaning and losing his rhythm. Dean wrapped his free arm around Cas’ back, pulling them close as they came towards their peak together, fuck, Dean was going to come, he was going to come –

“Uhhh – uhhhh - uhhhhhhhhhhh,” he groaned, pressing his face against Cas’ chest as his release ran through him, a gorgeous loosening of his muscles spreading over him as he came, and came, and came, still wrapped in Cas’ heady heat; Cas was with him, his climax too pleasurable for him to even make a sound, his mouth wide and his eyes closed, shiny with sweat, pressed close to Dean’s shuddering body. He spilled and spilled, still drawing little moans of bliss from himself as he bounced lightly up and down, finishing himself off… and then, it was over. Dean ran his hands up Cas’ sides, keeping him close as they breathed heavily. Cas was still shaking.

“Dean – that was – that was…” Cas panted, his hold on Dean’s neck loosening, his head dropping down to rest his brow on Dean’s shoulder. Dean closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of Cas, and pressing a soft line of kisses to the base of his neck.

“Y-yeah,” spoken reverently and hoarsely, was all he could manage to say. He pressed his hands against Cas’ sides, lifting him; Cas allowed it, sighing at the loss of Dean inside him. Dean stood, still lifting Cas, and Cas wrapped his arms and legs around his body, his weight easily carried with the buoyancy of the water helping them. Dean kissed him, tender and firm, holding him as close as he could.

“I love you,” he murmured, “I love you.”

Cas pulled back slightly, and reached up to run his thumb over Dean’s lips, down his chin. Everything was bathed in steam, so warm, so comforting.

“I love you,” Cas said, and the fire in Dean’s chest was golden, and brilliant – hot enough to burn forever.

Chapter Text

Dean was dreaming. About Cas, of course.

“Don’t turn away,” he said to Cas, who smiled and kissed his forehead. He was wearing Dean’s pelerin, but Dean didn’t mind. Behind them, the sky was sifting through day and night as though looking for something, but Dean only had eyes for Cas.

“It’s quiet,” Cas said. “Strange faces in the mountains.”

“They don’t matter to us,” Dean said, reaching for Cas. “Se’o sada.”

“Se’o sada,” said Cas. “I want to kiss you everywhere.”

“Yes…” Dean murmured, as Cas pressed firm, close-lipped kisses to his neck, his chest. He was lying down, suddenly, as though the ground had decided it would be better to rest against his back and had moved without warning. Cas’ mouth was down to his stomach, now, his kisses breathier, open and soft. He hummed in his throat, like he knew Cas would if it were him. Was he Cas? Cas loved Dean. Spider webs of golden pleasure were spreading under his skin, a tracery of bliss. No, he was Dean, Dean loved Cas. He sighed as Cas took Dean’s length into his mouth, and simply held him there, completely still, for what felt like forever; Dean was too happy to ask for more, enjoying the laziness of slow and languid sex. Cas’ tongue was rubbing slightly, a prelude to more movement; he began to suck, lips so tight to Dean’s cock, always so tight… Dean moaned loudly, his legs rising into the air. Cas didn’t increase his pace, moving with patient determination; Dean’s groans were getting even louder as he came nearer to climax by sweetly slow degrees.

“A-Almost there,” he said, “Almost… uhhh,” he moaned, his eyes flickering open; he had just enough time to register the ceiling of the cave, his own legs in the air, Cas’ mouth actually around his cock, before his body was arching and he was coming into Cas’ mouth, his cries as long and loud as Cas’ had been the night before, not checked by self-consciousness. Dean let the orgasm run through his body like a river of light and heat and fuck, yes until he was finished, and Cas was pulling off him, pushing his şalvar back on to keep him warm.

“Well…” Dean said, looking up at him. “Good morning.” Cas was smiling at him, his hair ruffled, eyes still bleary with sleep.

“Good morning,” Cas replied, coming in to place the lightest of kisses against Dean’s cheek. “Did you sleep well?”

“Sleep was good,” Dean said. “Waking up was better.”

Cas smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners, and cupped Dean’s cheek with his hand as he kissed his lips.

“I told you I wanted to kiss you everywhere, and you said yes,” said Cas.

“Oh, that was real? I was dreaming about you.”

“Only good things, I hope.” Cas’ eyes were sparkling as he sat up, and began pulling his tunic back on. They hadn’t bothered to dress fully again to go to sleep the night before, since the cave was warm and wet with steam. Instead, they’d found the flattest piece of rock they could find and curled up together, Dean’s head resting on Cas’ thigh, and Cas’ on Dean’s, forming a kind of circle with their bodies. Dean had to admit that if he’d woken up first, right next to Cas’ cock, he probably wouldn’t have been able to resist it either.

They dressed quickly and ate the last of the food that Hannah had given them, their domesticity coming easily after spending so many days travelling together. When they were ready to set off, Dean took a last look around the cave. The candles were guttering and flickering out, one by one. Perfect timing, thought Dean. As though they were exactly where they were supposed to be.

They pushed out of the fissure, returning to the chill air of the mountain pass. When Dean emerged, he breathed in deeply, feeling it scrub the very bottom of his lungs before he released it as a puff of smoke-like vapour.

“Hey, Cas,” Dean said, and blew another cloud. “Maybe the dragon will like me because I can breathe steam.”

Cas watched him do it again, dry fondness on his face as he turned away, and started walking.

“You can breathe actual fire, Dean,” he said, as he went, and that had Dean interested.

“What?” he demanded, jogging a few steps to catch up to Cas. “I can… I can breathe fire?”

“The dragon told me it can be done,” said Cas, smiling at Dean’s excitement.

“I have a new dream,” Dean said dramatically. He felt so good this morning, his body humming, his brain abuzz with love for everything – for the mountains, for the scrubby alpine plants on the path, for the pale sun in the milky sky. And, of course, for Cas. Most of all for Cas.

“There are many things a firemaker can do,” Cas said. “Breathing fire is one of them. Another is summoning and directing lightning. Also, the dragon told me that with enough skill, a firemaker could shape the flames in much the same way as I can shape water.”

“Like making patterns, like… oh! Could I make a dragon breathing fire out of fire?” Dean asked, and Cas dipped his head into a smile.

“If you practise for long enough,” he warned. “It takes work to master these skills.”

Dean waved Cas’ caveat away with a careless hand.

“Practising is easy,” he said. “All you gotta do is keep going. I’m gonna be good at this crap one day.” His face fell. “Well, if I practise in secret. Seeing as firemaking is illegal in Şehir, and all.”

Cas reached out and squeezed his shoulder.

“You’ll find a way to make it work,” he said. “I’m sure of it.”

Dean smiled at him gratefully, his cheeks turning a little red at Cas’ faith in him. They walked on through the pass, Dean’s steps quick and energised, Cas’ a little more careful. At one point, they had to climb over a large rock-fall, heaving themselves up to sit on the boulder and swinging their legs around to jump down on the other side; Cas winced as he landed on the boulder, and walked stiffly after leaping down.

“Are we a little sensitive in some areas?” Dean asked coyly, when he noticed. Cas glowered at him, and Dean wondered if he was going to pay for that later. A part of him really, really hoped so.

He lifted his head, frowning, when he heard the sounds of faint shouts and cries echoing through the peaks. It was difficult to tell where they’d come from, as they rebounded off the cliff faces. Dean turned to Cas for an explanation, but received only a shrug.

“The Northern Pass is only a couple of miles north of the Southern,” Cas said, after a few moments had passed without any more noises. “Maybe a group is passing through there. They tend to use the Northern one, because it’s so much wider and smoother. But only big groups can travel there, because of the bandits.”

Dean nodded uneasily, his good mood darkening a little. Strange faces in the Pass. Why was that phrase lingering in his mind? He tried to push it away, and feel as carefree as he had a few minutes ago. After all, they were approaching the end of the journey, and soon they’d be helping Cas’ dragon, and then they could find somewhere to sit and eat, and sleep, and fuck, and then… Dean supposed… figure out what to do next.

The day leaked by, refusing to pass as quickly as the one before. Dean spent most of it trying to drink Cas in, to enjoy his presence as much as possible; if he wasn’t going to be able to have this view for long, then he wanted to make the most of it while it was there. He had a pain in his chest again, a little burn of nostalgia for a time that was still here – as though he was already living in the future, looking back on his current self with terrible envy.

To distract himself, he decided to practise his firemaking. He concentrated, relaxing his shoulders and breathing evenly, feeling for the heat inside him, just as he had the day before. He soon felt the flames go flying down his arms, easier and stronger than the day before – and this time, when the fire burst out of his palm and into light, he didn’t flinch away from the scalding sting in his wrist. He kept the little blaze burning, blue at the centre and yellow at the edge, throwing up miniature sparks towards his face. He felt no fear, he realised with wonder. He wasn’t terrified of fire anymore.

“That’s better,” Cas observed, noticing Dean cupping the flame as he walked. Dean grinned at him, and let it go out.

“First step towards fire breathing,” he said, and Cas nodded solemnly, just a hint of dryness in the glint of his eyes. Yarım, Dean loved him so much – loved that he could read that ironic little sparkle now, where before it would have passed unnoticed.

Dean wondered suddenly whether any human being had ever noticed the little things about Cas before. He’d told Dean about how lonely he’d been, how isolated, before he came to Ateş Aşiret. What if Dean was the first person to see these things… these beautiful things? He cleared his throat, his cheeks turning red. If his past self could see him now, thinking something like that…

Dean thought that actually, his past self would probably be a lot more caught up thinking about the fact that someone like Castiel was walking along beside him to be bothered about what exactly was going on in his future-self’s head.

“Cas,” he said aloud, “can I, uh, can I tell you something? Promise not to laugh.”

Cas swung around to look at him, blindingly beautiful and angular and soft and…

“Yes,” he said, his eyebrows drawn down. “I promise.”

“And you won’t tell anyone else that I said this?”

Cas’ eyes widened slightly; he looked almost worried.

“I won’t tell anyone.”

Dean cleared his throat.

“You, um. You – you’re beautiful. That’s all.” Ridiculous, yes. But Cas deserved to hear it. And Dean might not have all that long to say it.

Cas looked over at him, frowning, his eyes narrowed. Dean puffed a nervous breath out into the cold air.

“I mean it,” Dean said. Now that he was in, he found himself sputtering. “I – I’m not great with words, but I just… you should know. You gotta know that you’re absolutely beautiful. I just wanted to tell you.” He was so stupid. He should have saved saying this for the next time they had sex, so that it could have been excused as a meaningless lover’s murmur in the dark. He was reddening, wishing he could take the words back.

“Well, thank you, Dean. But I’m just… me,” Cas said, raising his arms slightly as he walked. “I… don’t think I’m beautiful or ugly, I just… am.”

Dean thought about that for a second, distracted from his embarrassment, chewing the inside of his cheek.

“You know, we’ve got a phrase,” he said. “’Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’. So, like… things are beautiful when someone thinks that they are. And I think that you are. And you should, too.”

“I should think I’m beautiful?” Cas said, sounding amused by the idea.

“If you could just see yourself, Cas,” Dean said, his voice coming out a little hoarse. “You’d understand.”

Cas looked at him askance.

“You told me I was beautiful,” Dean reminded him. “Back when we were – back in the forest.” Cas smirked a little at the shyness in Dean’s voice.

“I meant it,” he said. “Because you are beautiful. When you smile, I wonder how I ever lived happily without you.” He said it so matter-of-factly that Dean almost missed it, almost glossed right over it – but then the meaning of Cas’ words hit him and he was silenced for a moment, taking them in. Damn it, he wanted Cas to feel this way.

Well, he had enough things to say, didn’t he? He spent the majority of every day waxing lyrical in his head about Cas. He could share some of those things, couldn’t he?

Yarım. This was going to be embarrassing.

“Cas, you – you have eyes like – like the river in the forest,” Dean said, mumbling, starting off hesitantly because he was shit at this, he really was, but he wanted so badly to do it right. “They’re blue, and they… they change. When I look into them, I see you, and I see… I see myself, reflected… in a kinder light than I deserve. I feel so… strong.” Cas made to speak, but Dean overrode him. “And – and your lips,” he said, smiling, relaxing just a touch. “Yarım, your lips. The shape, and – and the way you make them all thin when I say something dumb.  The way you smile with them second, and your eyes first. And the way you get those crinkles, uh, crow’s feet, at the corners, there. The way you wrinkle your nose up, sometimes. The way you’re so kind, and – haha, and so fucking rude to everyone, and so weird. The way your hair all sticks up in the mornings. And when, when you hold me. I feel like there’s no one else in the universe because… who else could fit, beside you?” Dean came to a stop, not wanting to look up at Cas for a second.

Yarım, he was such a fucking sap. What had half of that even meant? Your eyes are like the river, because they’re blue? Yarım damn him to the Everdark, so that he’d never have to think about having said any of that ever again…

Cas took Dean’s hand, and pressed it to his lips. Dean looked up, surprised – and saw that Cas’ eyes were shining, and his smile was so bright, so pleased, so happy, that Dean couldn’t regret a single one of the dumb, ridiculous, stupid things he’d just said.

“No one’s ever…” Cas said, trailing off, and pulling Dean to a halt so that he could kiss him properly, warm and close and full of heart.

“Now I have,” Dean murmured against his lips, when they broke apart, and Cas smiled shyly. They walked on, into the afternoon light, with their hands still clasped together.

*

Evenings were swift and strange in the mountains, the setting sun ducking behind a peak and leaving great swathes of the land in premature gloom. The night took Dean and Cas unawares, just as they came towards the end of the Pass. The path was widening, the rock-falls becoming less frequent.

“Almost there,” Cas said. “We can stop for a minute and look at the castle, if you’d like?”

“Will we be able to see it? It’s pretty dark,” Dean pointed out. Cas only smiled mysteriously, and said that he should wait and see. “Now there’s a response I’ve always liked,” Dean grumbled, and Cas only smiled wider.

They rounded the last curve of the Pass, hand in hand, and emerged onto a wide, flat plain of coal-dark stones.

“They’re normally covered in snow, but it’s summer,” Cas said, and Dean looked at him as though he’d gone mad.

“Well, that explains the heat,” he said. Cas rolled his eyes.

“We don’t all live in a desert,” he said. “Welcome to the Water Lands, Dean.”

Dean looked around. It was a little lighter now that they were out of the shade of the mountain, the sunlight grey and hazy. He could see rocks, and rocks, and more rocks, rising in a hilly wasteland up to the horizon. On either side, they stretched for miles. Behind them were the mountains, silent monsters with white ice maws.

“Nice place you got here,” Dean said, earning himself a scowl.

“It’s better than miles of sand,” Cas said, and Dean laughed.

“You’re telling me you’d take this over the sunshine and keşkek? You’re lying.”

Cas’ glower was dark enough to fuel nightmares.

“We can go south immediately, and go to the dragon,” he said, “or we can go north for five minutes, and see the Castle.”

“Just five minutes?” Dean said, scratching his chin. His stubble was really coming back in, now. Cas nodded. “Is it worth the detour?”

“The Castle is frequently described by newcomers as the most amazing thing they have ever seen,” Cas said colourlessly. Dean reached for his hand, and squeezed it.

“Everything OK?” he asked, and Cas softened.

“It’s strange to be back,” he said. “I… miss the forest.”

Dean smiled bravely at him, pulling him in for a hug.

“The forest is right here,” he said. “Se’o sada.”

Cas’ arms came up, and gripped him tightly.

“Se’o sada,” he murmured. Dean hugged him tighter for a moment, and then stepped away.

“C’mon, let’s see this Castle,” he said bracingly. “I’ve gotta see the most amazing sight of my whole life, haven’t I? And then we can go and help your friend.”

“I’m worried we’re too late,” Cas confessed, as they started to walk north, moving around the base of the nearest mountain. “I have this feeling inside… like I’m certain something bad is going to happen. I’m afraid we’re too late to save it.”

“We can go now, if you want…?” Dean said, pausing, but Cas patted his shoulder, and led them on.

“Fifteen minutes later won’t make a difference now,” he said. “And… a part of me doesn’t want to find out, one way or the other. While I don’t know, I can still imagine that we’re in time.”

“We will be,” said Dean, putting his arm around Cas’ shoulders. “We will. C’mon, we’ve made it all this way, haven’t we? We can’t have come all this way for nothing. We’ll make it.”

Cas smiled slightly, and Dean squeezed his shoulder, and let his arm drop back down to his side. The darkness was growing around them, and Dean started to wonder whether this little jaunt around the mountain was even going to be worth it – and then it came into sight.

The Castle on a Cloud.

At first Dean didn’t understand what he was seeing. He’d been staring down at the rocks, making sure not to trip, when Cas said,

“Here. You can see it best from here,” and Dean looked up to see… something. Something standing on the side of the mountain, set deep into the rock so that it looked like it had grown there, like the winds and rain had somehow eroded this out of stone… and yet that was impossible. Impossible, because the Castle on a Cloud wasn’t made of stone, but glass.

It was made of clear, unsmoked, reflective glass, that bent and changed the light, making Dean blink and squint at it in confusion; one turret was grey, another was black, that wall was a deep, smoky purple – but through all of them, you could see the one beyond – and when he concentrated, narrowing his eyes, Dean thought he could even see the people beyond, little ant-like figures scurrying about the structure. The rooves were spiralling and crystallised, swirling over the glassy buildings like the crests of waves – and beneath the whole structure, hiding its base completely and extending far down the mountain, was a thick, smooth, pearlescent cloud. A milky hemisphere with a long, swirling train, it hung unnaturally still beneath the Castle. Beams from the lamps inside the Castle spilled out through the transparent glass walls, and the cloud rested beneath, diamonding the light into rainbows that arced through the darkening night.

“The water shapers keep a cloud up there, so that there’s always water to draw from,” Cas explained, frowning. “It’s a lot larger than usual, today.”

“It’s incredible,” Dean said, his eyes wide, taking it in. The Castle was high above them, but it still looked huge; he wondered how big it would seem from the inside. Perhaps, with the glass walls, it would feel as big as the mountain itself.

A sudden gust of wind blew across the plain from behind Dean and Cas, up towards the mountain. Dean watched as it displaced a little of the cloud’s shape, pushing it up towards the Castle… and revealing…

“What the…” Dean narrowed his eyes, trying to understand what he was seeing. Huddled on the side of the mountain in a great dark mass, with glints of silver here and there, were… people? More and more of them were revealed, camped on the mountainside beneath the Castle…

“Is that – an army?” Dean demanded, stepping closer. “Holy shit – holy shit, I think it is. Cas. Cas, are you seeing this? What the fuck… are those Water Landers, or…?” He fell utterly silent as he caught sight of the banner, minuscule at this distance, and yet one that Dean would recognise anywhere.

A black Impala on a white background.

The flag of King John.

“No – no,” Dean said, suddenly feeling as though he was underwater. He took a couple of stumbling steps towards the Castle. “No, this – this isn’t right. That’s –” Dean turned to Cas, his eyes desperate. Cas was staring up the mountain at the ragged line of soldiers that they could see. “Cas, that’s – that’s my father, that’s – it’s an Ateşi army. My… my father’s invading the Water Lands.” He spoke the words numbly, as though he hardly understood them. He turned back to the mountain, begging the banner to have evaporated, for the whole damn army to have evaporated, just a trick of the light… but they were still there. Shit, they were still there.

“Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Yarım, oh, Yarım. What do we do? Maybe – maybe if we go up there, we can stop it,” Dean said wildly. “C’mon, we’ve gotta try!”

“Dean, wait – what are you doing?!” Cas said, grabbing Dean’s pelerin just as he started running, and pulling him back.

“We’re going up there!” Dean said frantically. “We – shit, I can’t believe this is – Yarım, come on, we’ve got to stop whatever’s happening up there, come on, let’s go…” He tried to tug his sleeve back, but Cas dug his heels into the stones at their feet, and hung on grimly. Dean turned back to look at him, his eyes wide.

“What are you doing?!” he yelled, dragging harder against Cas’ grip. “We have to help!”

“No,” Cas said. “No, we don’t! We can’t!” Dean kept tugging on his sleeve, trying to free himself. “Dean – Dean, wait – you swore you’d help me save my friend!”

Dean stared at him for a long, silent moment, feeling the weight of the world shifting around them.

“Are you joking?” he shouted. “There’s an army up there attacking your people, and you want to go –”

“Save my friend?” Cas interrupted. “Yes!”

“Cas, there’s thousands of people up there! What if we can do something?” Dean tugged on his sleeve again, but Cas’ hold was one of steel.

“What could we possibly do,” Cas said, his tone removing the question from the words, making them a statement of hopelessness. “We’re just two people, Dean!”

“Yeah, and one of us is a damned Prince,” Dean snapped, putting all his weight into pulling on his sleeve. He couldn’t believe that Cas was even considering anything other than running up that mountain, right now, to try to stop whatever was happening. Were they moving, were they already fighting? Dean hoped not, hoped that they’d be able to hear open warfare even at this distance. A siege, then. That meant there was still time, time for him to run up there and convince his father to break it off, to go back home.

“You really think anyone will listen to you?” Cas demanded. “Think, Dean! You can’t stop it, you can’t save them, and my friend –”

“Your friend is one, and up there are thousands!” Dean yelled. “Would you fucking listen to yourself for a second? You want to leave them all to die?”

“I’m not stupid enough to think that I can do anything about it!” Cas shouted. “This isn’t happening because of us, Dean, and there’s no way that you and I can stop it!”

“You don’t know that,” Dean said, shaking his head, his eyes wide. “Maybe my father’s here because of that, that thing about you kidnapping me! Maybe if we show him I’m alive…”

“You’re being naïve,” Cas interrupted.

“And you’re being absolutely heartless! How can you tell there’s nothing we can do when –”

“There is something we can do! We can go and save my fr-”

“Your friend is a dragon, Cas, these are people – real, actual people – for Yarım’s sake, let me go!”

“No – Dean, you promised – please, you have to come, I’m begging you –”

“You said yourself that the dragon is already dead, anyway!” Dean yelled fiercely, and watched Cas’ eyes darken with a sinking in his chest.

“Those people up there are my people!” Cas snapped back furiously. “Theyknow how to defend themselves! My people aren’t defenceless, Dean, they can handle this without us…”

“We have to try to help,” Dean gritted out, tugging at his sleeve once more, trying to escape. “Let me go!”

“FINE!” Cas released Dean’s sleeve, quickly enough to send Dean stumbling. “Go! Be a face amongst a hundred thousand, and see if it gets you anywhere!”

“Cas –”

“You told me in Walker’s Castle that you didn’t give a shit about me,” said Cas, and Dean winced at the profanity from Cas’ mouth as though he’d struck a deadly body blow. “And now I know that’s true.”

“You think I don’t care about you?!” Dean demanded, furiously. “Cas, I’ve killed for you, and I’d die for you! How can you say that –”

“I crossed the desert, I fought and I starved and I burned to save my friend, and now you’re going to let it die? Just because your father won’t leave my people alone? How can you be so selfish?”

Dean’s mouth dropped open at Cas’ sheer unfairness.

“You want to talk about selfishness?!” he shouted. “How about letting a hundred thousand people die just because you’re not willing to try to save them?”

“How about the last dragon dying because you’re determined to get caught up in your father’s petty warmongering?” Cas snapped back viciously. “Go on, go. Run! If you want me, I’ll be in the cave under the mountain with twin peaks. But I’m not foolish enough to expect anything more from you now.”

“Cas – Cas, come with me –”

“I know I can’t save my friend,” Cas said, with sudden, deadly quiet. “But I will be there in its last moments, if I can. And when it’s dead, so are we. So is this. You son of a bitch.”

Without another word, Cas turned away.

Dean watched him go, shaking, too shocked and numbed for tears. Cas’ retreating back soon disappeared into the gloom. Dean counted, one second, two seconds, three – sure that Cas was going to come back, shaking his head, saying he’d been stupid and wrong and that he was with Dean, he was going to help him – but nothing. He wondered if Cas had been counting, too, hoping that Dean would chase after him. Oh, Yarım, how he wanted to. But if there was something, anything he could do to stop the fighting, he had to try, and before it was too late. His father might sound the attack on the Castle at any time, and if Dean missed it – if hundreds of thousands of soldiers died because he was selfish, and went after Cas – then he’d never be able to forgive himself.

He took a deep, trembling breath – and then started running towards his father’s army.

*

The course up to the camp was gruelling; the stope was steep, but not steep enough that he needed to climb instead of running. Dean wasn’t sure if his lungs were gasping for air from the strain of the ascent, or the slowly-sinking realisation of where things stood with Cas.

When it’s dead, so are we. So is this. Dean screwed his eyes tightly shut for a second and jerked his head from side to side, trying to clear it of the look on Cas’ face as he said those words. It didn’t work; it played on a loop, round and round and round. So is this. So is this. So is this. You didn’t give a shit about me. So is this.

But he was doing the right thing, and he had to hold onto that. Fuck, if he didn’t do what he thought was right, then who was he? What was he? He couldn’t live with himself if he ignored his principles, his people, to run off with a man he hadn’t even known a month to go chase down a damned dragon. The fact that he was completely, inescapably, and achingly in love with that man – well, that was something that he was going to have to live with. Somehow.

He ran on, trying to focus on the exertion, the burn in his lungs, the cramping in his legs. He was almost there, almost there. The glints of light that he’d seen in the army earlier had been reflecting from big, brutish metal catapults, their heads snouted and ugly, sitting patiently like dogs awaiting their chance to wreak havoc on the glass walls of the Castle. He pushed on past them, attracting the attention of the soldiers guarding them; he ignored their shouts, heading for the centre of the camp, where he could see white tents emblazoned with a black stag.

The cloud below the castle was close, now, Dean noticing the first milky tendrils of it weaving through the middle of the camp. It must have enveloped the whole of the Ateşi army, before the wind blew it out of shape. Dean wondered if the watershapers in the Castle beyond had noticed, if they were trying to push it back down. It would be hideously disorienting to be surrounded by fog, after all; it would grind the Ateşi’s organisation to a standstill. As it was, things seemed to be mobilising, soldiers pulling on armour and sharpening weapons all around him as he jogged past them.

“No, no, it’s OK – I’m – I’m Dean,” Dean gasped out, breathing hard, holding up his hands as two soldiers finally got their acts together and stopped him, levelling long pikes at his face. “I’m Dean Winchester, and I’m here to see my father. Tell him I’m here, he’ll recognise me.”

Would he, though? Dean felt a sudden twinge of doubt, as one of the soldiers cast the other a dubious look, before disappearing into the largest of the tents behind them. Dean hadn’t seen his father once since moving to Bobby and Ellen’s. Surely John would know his own son, though?

“Dean’s here?” Dean heard a gruff voice say, and then the flap of the tent was pushed aside, and there he was – John Winchester, with his grizzled beard and dark eyes and saturnine, strange smile.

John stepped forwards, batting the remaining soldier’s spear away as though it were a moth, and pulled Dean into a short, sharp hug.

“F-father,” Dean began, stammering a little at finally being so close to the man he’d watched, loved, missed, from afar for so many years. “John –”

“Call me Dad, Dean,” said John, putting his arm around Dean’s shoulder affably and guiding him into his tent. Inside, it was much more plush than Dean had been expecting; there was a sofa, a bed, a desk, several chairs…

“Nice place,” he couldn’t help saying dryly, looking around. His father was here to make war on people, and he did it with a wardrobe and three damned vases in his tent?

“All for show,” John said, following Dean’s deprecating glance. “I’ve got some barons who’d rather I was six feet under. I need to show them I’m powerful, or else they’ll start getting ideas. And one way to show them I’m powerful is to have more shit in my tent than they have. Anyway,” he waved a hand carelessly. “You didn’t come here to talk about civil politics, I’m sure. Why are you here, son?”

Dean opened his mouth to answer, but John was already speaking again, cutting him off as he rooted around in his desk for something.

“Why am I even asking that? Young Prince with warrior training turns up to an invading army – you’re here to help, of course you are. Good boy.”

Dean tried to enjoy the two words of praise, scant water for the wilting flowers of certainty that he was trying to grow in his chest. Had he done the right thing, coming here? Really?

“Uh,” he said nervously. “Actually, uh – Dad – I’m not here to help. I’m here… to stop this.”

John laughed, his back turned to Dean as he perused a sheaf of papers.

“Good one, son.”

“I’m serious,” Dean said, finding a little anger and letting it buoy him up, make him strong. Yarım, he missed Cas. Cas would have already said what he’d come in to say, frightened John into agreeing, and be ordering a bowl of keşkek from the camp cook. “I’m here to put an end to this. There’s no need to attack the Castle.”

John turned to Dean, apparently taking a moment to assess whether or not Dean meant what he said. When he saw only sincerity in Dean’s gaze, he frowned slightly, putting his papers down on the desk.

“Dean,” he said. “I’ve brought my army through the desert, through the mountains, and I’ve finally arrived at this damned Castle. Why in the name of Yarım above us would I call it off?”

“Because I’m here!” Dean said hopefully, holding his arms out slightly as if to present himself to his father. “You came to get me, right? You put out search parties up and down the country… you must’ve thought I was kidnapped by a Water Lander… but, uh, Dad, he’s actually not bad! And you don’t have to attack the Castle because… I’m not kidnapped!”

John squinted at him for a long second, and then laughed again – harder and colder than the last time.

“Dean,” he said, “don’t get me wrong, your ‘kidnapping’ was an excellent reason to get Şehir and all of Ateş Aşiret to support the idea of an invasion. The Poor Lost Kidnapped Prince was an great story. But I’ve been searching for an excuse for months, now. You really think an army like this springs up within weeks, just because you flunked your Vigil and ran off?”

“That – that – what?” Dean stuttered, nonplussed. You’re being naïve…

“Remind me to thank the godless bastard who managed to convince you to leave that chapel,” John said, bending over his papers once more. “He gave me just what I needed.”

Dean gaped at him for a few seconds, and then snapped his mouth shut.

“His name,” he said coldly, “is Castiel.” John glanced up at him, and shrugged with one shoulder.

“One Sewage Shaper is much like another,” he said. “They all bleed the same with an arrow through their chest.” Dean’s anger sealed his mouth shut, left him trembling. “Now, why don’t you go and get kitted out? You can’t fight a battle like that, you’ll be needing some armour. Find your brother, he’ll help you.”

“Sam’s here?” Dean said, staggered.

“Of course,” John said. “I insisted. When I take the Castle, I want at least one of my sons by my side. Now, I can have both.” He smiled, a grin that Dean did not return. Oh, Cas, what have I done…

“I’ll go find Sam,” Dean said numbly. “I’ll go find him.”

“Good boy,” John said, coming round the desk to clap Dean on the shoulder on his way out – his hand falling right over the handprint scar that Cas had left on him, a mark that burned under John’s touch, as though all of Dean’s anger was centred there. “Attack’s in a few hours. Be ready.”

“Yes, sir.”

Dean left the tent, fuming, heading into the greyish, sour milk light – and ran right into someone tall, gangly, and familiar.

“Dean?!”

“Sam,” said Dean, and pulled his brother into a hug. For a second, he just gripped onto his brother, like a drowning man clinging to a rock. “What, did you grow two feet since I left?”

Sam laughed, a sound so familiar that it twisted Dean’s heart. Yarım, he’d missed his little brother.

“Sammy,” Dean said, pulling back and reaching up to ruffle Sam’s hair. “I’m sorry for… you know.”

“Running away without explanation?” Sam said, his grin souring. “Yeah, thanks for that.”

Dean glanced over his shoulder, suddenly aware of how close they were standing to John’s tent. He didn’t trust his father not to eavesdrop, and even though he wasn’t planning on saying anything especially secret to Sam, he wanted their conversation to be private.

“I tried to send a letter,” he said, putting his hand on his brother’s shoulder and guiding him away, towards the shadow of another tent. “Didn’t it get to you?”

Sam sighed, raising a hand to his forehead in a gesture more grown-up than any Dean had seen him use before. It seemed as though he hadn’t been the only one forced to mature just recently.

“It’s complicated, Dean,” he said. “John brought Jo in for questioning as soon as the Vigil ended and everyone realised you weren’t there. When he heard what had happened, he told her not to tell anyone that she’d seen you leave voluntarily, on your own… but obviously she came home and told us.” Dean smiled tightly.

“Obviously,” he said. Apparently not even the King of Ateş Aşiret himself could tell Jo what to do. He felt better about that shoe-throwing incident, now.

“Then your letter arrived,” Sam went on. “And John heard about it, I don’t know how. He hauled us all in, and told us we couldn’t tell anyone about it. Then he said we’d be staying at the palace. He called us his guests, but… it was pretty obvious from the start that we were more like prisoners. We weren’t allowed to speak to anyone, not even servants, in case we tried to start rumours that you were fine, and not kidnapped. Guess he needed the story to be intact as an excuse to invade. Then he started the army marching, and he told me I was coming too. I tried running away a couple times, but no dice. So here I am,” Sam said, smiling wryly and shrugging. “John’s loyal son.”

“This isn’t your war,” Dean said fiercely. “He shouldn’t be making you fight it, if you don’t want to. Dad and his army can deal without you.”

“This isn’t anyone’s war but John’s,” Sam said, scowling. “I’ve spoken to the barons, the troops, everyone. None of them want to be here. Most of them have been fed a pack of lies about the Water Landers, but even with all their prejudices, they’d all rather be at home.”

“Wait… you think the Water Landers are… OK?” Dean said, surprised. He’d never talked to Sam about this, back in Şehir.

“Yeah,” Sam said, frowning deeply. “We’ve done just as much terrible stuff to them as they’ve done to us over the years. There’s no reason to demonise them, unless we plan on demonising ourselves, too.”

“Yeah,” said Dean. “Yeah. Look, I – you know that I actually really did meet one of them. Castiel.”

“You did?” Sam said. He sounded envious. “Does he speak Imiq? What does he think of our religion? Did you talk to him about the political systems of his people, because I can’t find anything about –”

“Sam, nerd talk later,” Dean interrupted, squeezing his brother’s shoulder. “The thing is, I kinda – I promised that I would do something for him, and then I bailed to come up here, and – and see if I could stop the siege.”

“Well, that was dumb,” Sam said, succinctly. “You never stood a chance.”

“I had to try!” Dean said.

“Of course you did. You’re Dean Winchester, the biiiiiiiig hero.”

Dean punched his brother lightly on the arm, cringing at himself.

“Point is, I screwed up,” Dean said. “And I don’t know what to do. I feel like I should stay here, and do something, but…”

“But there’s nothing here to do other than try to shout down a brick wall,” Sam said bitterly. “Believe me, I’ve tried. There’s nothing for you here, Dean.”

“You’re here,” Dean said. “I’ve got to look after you.”

Sam’s eyes went big and sad for a moment, before he reached out and gave Dean’s arm a little shake.

“Dean, I’m eighteen,” he said. “If you hadn’t noticed, I’ve been looking after myself for a little while now.”

“I had noticed,” Dean said, trying to keep the darkness out of his tone. “I – I had.”

“Dean, you know I care about you…”

“And I care about you,” Dean said, looking up into his brother’s face. Even his eyes looked older, as though he’d seen more, done more, thought more. Dean felt a strange twist of pride.

“Then care about me enough to trust me,” Sam said earnestly. “This isn’t where you’re supposed to be, Dean. There’s nothing you can do here. Go to where you’re needed.”

Dean sighed, and dropped his head, thinking. He had to make his decision quickly, or it would be made for him.

“Come with me?” he tried, looking up at Sam with a persuasive grin – or his best attempt at one, which probably wasn’t all that convincing right now.

Sam shook his head.

“I’m playing the long game, Dean,” he said. “Kings aren’t elected, they’re born. But the barons have to know that I’m here, and I’m capable, if they’re going to back me when the time comes. I have to stay and prove myself. If I bail now, I look untrustworthy.”

“I – Sam, you – you want to be King?” Dean said– his brain giving its best try at shocked, anyway, since it felt as though all the emotions had already been wrung out.

“I think I’d do a better job of it than John is doing,” Sam pointed out with a wry smirk, and Dean had to agree with him there. Still, the thought of his baby brother as Kingof an entire country… that was crazy. Wasn’t it? Sam did seem to have grown up, some, since the last time Dean had spoken to him. And if it was what he wanted…

“Well,” he said aloud, seeing Sam’s face narrow-eyed and nervous, awaiting his disapproval. “Well, I don’t know about the barons, but you’ve got my backing any day of the week.”

Sam’s grin was sudden and brilliant, and he pulled his brother into a quick hug.

“I missed you,” he said, and Dean smiled as he squeezed Sam’s shoulder. “You – you’ve changed.”

Dean’s smile faded a little.

“I’ve seen some things,” he said. “Done some things, too.”

Sam pulled away, and put his hands on his brother’s shoulders. He looked into his face, and read the sadness there.

“I’m sure whatever you did, you did because you had no other way to save someone you care about,” Sam said firmly.

“Is that good enough?” Dean asked, strained and thin. Shit, he needed to go, but this was important, this was everything. Because if it wasn’t enough, if Dean had wounded and killed and fought and turned himself into a bad person … then what was it all for? Who was he? Not Dean, the big hero, that’s for sure.

Sam raised one shoulder.

“Some would say yes, some would say no,” he said. “The only answer that matters is your own.”

Dean smiled weakly.

“You’ve got that kingly wisdom thing coming in,” he said, and Sam laughed.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, “I’d do anything I had to, to protect the people I care about. Anything at all. And I learned that from you.”

Dean grinned at him, and punched him on the shoulder again.

“That’s my boy,” he said, and Sam rolled his eyes with a smile.

“If you’re done having a crisis of conscience,” he said, “I think it’s time to go. Otherwise John’ll figure out a way to keep you here.”

“Yeah,” Dean said half-heartedly, and then cleared his throat. “Yeah,” he said again, stronger. “I’m headed south. There isn’t much time, or at least – I don’t think there is. But maybe I can still make it right…”

Sam smiled at him, a sudden gust of wind ruffling his long, dark hair.

“Then run,” he said, pushing Dean’s shoulder. Dean took a few steps back.

“Take care of yourself, Sam –”

“Go on, go!” Sam said, grinning, shoving him a little. “Now!”

“Sammy – promise me –”

“I promise, Dean, OK? Now, go on – RUN!”

Dean took a last look at his little brother, wisps of cloud swirling around his head, a fire in his eyes and a smile on his face – and then he turned.

And he ran.

Chapter Text

Arms pistoning, heart pounding, breath sawing down his throat, Dean ran. He sprinted down the mountain, almost falling, nearly pitching over and breaking his neck on the slopes – but he didn’t slow. He couldn’t. If there was the slightest chance that he could still make it in time to save the dragon, he had to do everything he could to get there.

On and on and on through the night. The light was almost completely gone, now, the stars studs of hard light against the hushed velvet sky. Dean reached the base of the mountain and pressed on, heading south. What was it that Cas had said? A mountain with twin peaks. He had to make it. He had to be in time.

When it dies, so do we. So does this.

Dean bulled onwards, barely seeing the ground ahead of him, not caring. Nothing mattered now except getting to Cas. His decision was made. It felt like no matter where he was, tonight, he was in the wrong place – but now he’d made his call. He thought of Sam, wondered briefly if he should’ve stayed. What if by being at his brother’s side, he’d have been able to – to shield him from a dagger strike, or push him out of the way of a crossbow bolt?

Care about me enough to trust me.

I trust you, Sammy, Dean thought. I trust you.

His feet pounded over the stones. He passed the entrance to the Southern Pass, not stopping to spare it the slightest glance. His muscles ached. His lungs ached. He didn’t care. It would all be worth it, if he could only make it in time. His heart was thudding in his chest, impossibly loud. His ears were roaring, screaming him on. Run, run, run, run, run. There was nothing but the next step, the next sandpaper breath, the next heavy blow of his heart against his ribs. Yarım damn it, where was this mountain? He saw only single peaks outlined against the sky…

Dean… said a faint voice. Dean… please.

“Cas?” Dean shouted, before he understood. “Cas - where are you?”

Dean...

The voice was light, silvery, thin. Cas couldn’t hear him; he was sending his voice out from wherever he was with the water in the air, begging Dean to come to him.

Dean found a higher gear.

He ran harder than he ever had in his life before, desperate. Cas’ voice faded in and out, as though he was sending it out in a spiral, trying to guide Dean to him.

It’s almost time, Dean.

“I… know… I… know,” Dean rasped thickly, running on, heading for the direction that the voice seemed to be coming from – a large mountain, single-peaked, except… there. As Dean approached and his angle changed, he saw it. A second peak, almost hidden by the first, raking up against the stars like an icy talon.

Dean…

“Wait – wait – wait for me, Cas,” Dean gasped, each little indrawn breath painful. “I’m almost… come on, please, I’m almost there…”

He was nearly at the base of the mountain, now, which rose far more sheer and cruel than the one where the Imiq castle was built; it was a solid vertical face, with fissures cracking open its rocky façade.

“Cas!” Dean yelled, as he ground to a halt, staring between the crooked smiling gaps in the rock. There wasn’t time to check them all, fuck, but maybe Cas could hear him? “CAS!”

He ran further around the mountain, looking for something, anything, to hint where Cas had gone. There was no snow on the ground to show footprints, and the stones were flat and even, giving him no clue.

“CAS!” Dean yelled again. Please, please hear me…

“Dean?” a shouting voice, made quiet by, muffling rock.

“CAS –”

“DEAN!”

And then Dean saw it. The lightest brush of orange candle glow, painted over the tops of the shiny stones outside one of the largest fissures on the rock face. He ran for it, breath caught in his throat. Please, please, please…

“Cas – Cas– is this the right – please, Cas, are you –”

“I’m here!” The words Dean had been desperate to hear were spoken so close that his heart leaped, and then there, finally, thank Yarım, there was Cas. Dean didn’t stop running; he barrelled into Cas’ arms and held on, tightly.

“I’m so – I’m so sorry,” he said, still breathing hard. He couldn’t choke out any of the hundred things he wanted to say, apologies he needed to make.

“Dean – Dean,” Cas said, crushed against Dean’s chest. “Please, it’s almost – you’ve got to come…”

Dean dropped his grip and Cas seized his hand, dragging him deeper into the cave. The mandarin glow only grew as they hurried on, the rocky walls widening, the ceiling rising.

“Cas, is it close?” said Dean urgently.

“It’s just here…” Cas’ voice was echoing and strange in the tunnel, his eyes wide and desperate as he dragged them on. “You mustn’t be afraid,” he said. “We’re nearly there. Don’t be afraid…”

They rounded a corner, and Dean’s mouth dropped open.

The first thing he saw was an eye. Golden-green and slashed through with black, unblinking, huge. Watching him.

Dean gulped, frozen to the spot. He felt Cas’ hand come to rest on his shoulder, and couldn’t even lean into the reassurance of his touch.

The dragon shifted slightly, and Dean would have yelped if his throat hadn’t turned to stone. What he had taken to be the walls of a small cave were moving, bending; Dean stood in petrified silence for a long moment before understanding what he was seeing. The walls had scales, great greyish scales… he blinked once, twice more, mouth still hanging open, and the picture suddenly made sense.

The great scaly legs, iridescent in the candlelight and huge, moved in a little tighter to the gargantuan, huffing torso. The dragon was lying down, its arrow-shaped head resting on the ground, ears lying flat. It exhaled like a belch of heat from a furnace, and thin smoke wheezed out of nostrils as long as Dean himself.

The dragon filled the cave to bursting. It had almost no room to move, even to breathe.

“Don’t be afraid,” Cas said again, his voice floating through the air like a mirage, making no sense to Dean’s panic-blanketed brain. “We have to go closer.”

Dean reached out and gripped his wrist, begging him not to move. What was he doing? How could Dean have let himself be led here?

Cas turned to him with those wide, sad eyes, and Dean remembered why he’d chosen this – what he had promised to do. Reluctantly, tremblingly, he let himself be led forwards.

They approached the dragon’s head. Cas reached out, and laid a hand on its great, dry, cracked snout.

“Castiel,” said a voice that thundered, that rumbled like the echoes of the universe’s creation out of the belly of the earth – a voice that was hot, and seemed to sear in through Dean’s ears and scorch his brain. He fell to his knees, speechless, tears rising into his eyes.

“The man I told you about is here,” Cas said, rubbing his hand up and down the little part of the dragon’s snout that he could reach. The longer Dean looked, the more he saw signs of sickness. The dragon’s scales were cracked and frosted in unhealthy white, and the ribs in its belly showed clearly through the stretched skin. A single tear dripped down Dean's cheek. He was shaking.

“The firemaker,” the dragon said, profound grumblings of tired hope in its avalanche voice. “It may not be enough. But let him come.”

Cas looked to Dean, seeing the tears in his eyes and saying nothing, asking nothing.  Dean swallowed hard; he understood. Cas wouldn’t push him any further than he wanted to go. Anything he did would be his own decision.

He got to his feet, knees almost giving way beneath him. The dragon’s eye was fixed on him, sharp and searching. The gash of a pupil was so large, so dark... it was a chasm into pure blackness, into a void so intense that Dean was afraid of falling into it. Fear the dark.

“Approach,” the dragon groaned, with the voice of eras. “Place your hand on me.”

Dean breathed in, a tiny sobbing inhale, and mastered his resolve as best he could.

He came close to the dragon, fighting every nerve in his body. Yarım, how he wanted to run. All of his senses were heightened; he could hear every spit and hiss of the candles, and the sighing of a growing wind whistling through the entrance of the cave. The dragon smelled sharp, like mint leaves or burning camphor; it only made Dean’s eyes water more, the scent catching hard in the back of his throat. Dean lifted his hand hesitantly, looking to Cas, who nodded. His legs, his arms, were no longer his own; everything was a world away, separated from his understanding by the sweating and trembling fear. Taking a deep breath, Dean managed to take one more step closer – and pressed his hand to the dragon’s hide, just beneath its staring eye.

The shock of the sensation was immediate. As though the point where they touched was a gateway, Dean felt the consciousness of a being – of another being, alien to himself – creeping up the veins of his arm, huge and powerful and terrifying. It could tear him to shreds from the inside out, it could obliterate him with a thought, it could pour itself into him until there was nothing left of Dean at all – and – and yet…

Lost inside his own mind, Dean stopped in his tracks, gasping. Even though the being within him was terribly strong, the sensation of its conscious touch was… gentle, and careful.

The dragon was handling him as delicately as it might a paper rose between its deadly claws.

Suddenly, Dean had a sense of the dragon as a living, breathing creature. A creature who could crush him, who could obliterate him with that one, single, deadly thought – but who had decided not to. Dean’s heart was beating frantically fast in his chest. He didn’t trust the creature not to snap him in two, with the capriciousness of a beast. But for now, he was alive.

He felt the dragon’s presence – hot and dark and bitter, like a wave of steaming liquid filling him up – reach his chest, where it rested for a moment, shifting gently. The feeling was strange, uncomfortable, unnatural, and yet – Dean didn’t think the dragon was trying to hurt him. He tried to relax, to breathe deeply, but his legs were shaking beneath him and suddenly, without warning, they folded.

He collapsed to the floor, breaking the contact with the dragon’s skin; in a rush, the consciousness inside him was gone.

“The fire inside you is strong,” the dragon said, in its voice of thunder.

“Does that mean…?” Cas said hopefully, but the dragon cut across him.

“I can make no promises. The egg must survive. If the firemaker can save me, afterwards, we will try.” Dean saw Cas nod, his expression caught between sadness and courage.

“I’ll do my best to save you,” he said aloud, catching Cas’ attention and the dragon’s. “T-tell me what I have to do.”

“All you must do is lay your hand on me. I will draw fire from inside you, and use it to feed my young one, and – if you can bear it – myself.”

“I can bear it,” said Dean determinedly. He was kneeling before the dragon, and he raised his hand once more. Before he placed it back against the dragon’s scales, however, he hesitated. “Will – will this take my firemaking away?”

“Fire grows, without being consumed,” the dragon intoned. “It will briefly burn low, that is all.”

Dean nodded bravely, trying to steel himself for what was to come. No matter what he was sacrificing, it was worth it to save this almighty creature, he told himself. And – more than that – it was worth it to keep Cas from the horror of losing someone he cared about. Better than just about anyone, Dean knew how that felt – and he would have given far more than his firemaking to save Cas from it.

Cas approached, just as Dean was about to reconnect with the dragon. He knelt behind Dean, aligning their bodies, so that he could hold Dean upright with his own strength.

“If it is too much,” he murmured in Dean’s ear, “say something, anything, and I will stop it.” Dean nodded, leaning back into Cas a little more, his back pressed to Cas’ chest.

“I’m not scared if you’re here,” he said, because it was almost true. With Cas behind him, the needles of fear in his hands and his chest were gone. Cas reached down and laced the fingers of their right hands together, his palm to the back of Dean’s.

“If I could do this for you…” Cas said.

“I know,” Dean interrupted. “I – I know.”

Dean breathed in and out, once, to steady himself – and then he was ready. “Let’s do this,” he said, and lifting Cas’ hand with his own, he reached up and placed his palm against the dragon’s warm, dry scales.

The effect was even stronger, more overwhelming, all-consuming. The dragon’s consciousness swept up his arm in a tide, reached into his chest, and wrapped around his fire – before pulling back, equally swiftly. Dean felt his flames go chasing down his arm, just like when he was firemaking – only now, they were so much stronger, so much hotter, so much more powerful. They poured through his hand and into the dragon, Dean feeling a little of his awareness go with them…

And suddenly he was within the dragon. It was his consciousness inside another’s body, deeply enough to feel the slow, slow thud of its rocky, cold heart, to feel the rattle of its pneumonic lungs, to taste the cool dankness on its tongue. And the more fire the dragon took from him, the stronger their bond became – until he wasn’t just sharing a body, but sharing a mind; his thoughts were the thoughts of a dragon, his memories were reptilian and airborne…

He remembered being chased down by the hunters in Ateş Aşiret, who’d wanted to drag his body back to Şehir and claim their reward from the King. He remembered fleeing, his wings finally giving out over the mountains, and crashing down to rest in this cold, dreaded place. He remembered crawling into a dark, foul hole into a cave – this cave – and seeing a boy come in through a crack in the wall just a few moments later, looking curious and worried. Cas. He remembered the gentleness of the boy’s hands as he’d bathed the dragons wounds. He remembered trying to speak with him, and hearing only an odd, staccato language in answer. He remembered languishing for months, and then years… growing too big to move properly, and always too full of despair to try to get back out of the cave. He’d had only the boy for company, slowly teaching him Ateşi and the ways of the people who’d once been his friends…

And then he remembered realising he was dying. The coldness in his skin sank deeper with every year. By the time he realised that he needed to move to survive, to find a firemaker, it was already too late. The cold had reached the fire inside his chest, and snuffed it. Without his fire, oh, how he ached with the pain of ages…

And then, the miracle. The swelling of his belly, the egg. He remembered his joy, his bittersweet joy, at knowing that he wouldn’t die as the last of his kind. But the egg needed quickening, and he had no fire left. So he’d asked the only person he could for help…

Dean’s perception blurred, and wobbled. He was getting weak… weak in his two arms, two legs –

He remembered that he was human, not dragon, and that his knees were hurting him, and his chest was achingly cold. And he was almost pitching forwards, held in place only by the arms of Castiel – Cas…

And the dragon kept taking, and taking. Dean could feel its emptiness, still: all the fire it had taken, it had given into the egg at its side, the egg that Dean could sense, now, through their connection, though it was hidden behind the dragon’s mighty bulk. Did he have enough left to save the dragon itself?

“I can take no more,” the dragon said, its tone soft and sad. “It will kill you, firemaker.”

“Take it,” Dean hissed, through clenched teeth. “I can do this. Take it.”

“You are brave,” said the dragon, and Dean wasn’t sure if the words were being spoken aloud, or through the bond that he and the dragon shared. “I can see why Castiel likes you. I am glad… it is good that he found a new companion, before I passed on.”

“No – no,” Dean insisted, grinding the words out around the coldness in his chest. “I can do it! Take it now!”

“I cannot –”

“DO IT!” Dean roared, forcing it himself, sending the flames he had left scorching down through his shoulder, his arm, his wrist – and into the dragon, through its bloodstream, into the dark cavity in its chest where bright heat should be. He poured everything he had into there, not caring how much he had left, only wanting the dragon to live so that Cas could be happy, please let it be enough, I’m so sorry, Cas, I don’t know if I have enough…

With a suddenness that made him cry out, Dean felt the connection between himself and the dragon snap. His mind whirled, and he fell, dizzied, back into the strength of Cas’ arms – and then he crunched forwards as the terrible pain started, the coldness in his chest sending spasms of agony throughout his whole body. He cried out, terrified, clutching for the warmth inside him that was no longer there. He felt only darkness, darkness, darkness. Fear the dark…

“Dean – Dean!” Dean heard Cas shouting, his head resting against Cas’ shoulder. Cas sounded panicked, terrified. “You have to give it back – give him some of the fire back, he’s dying!”

Dean blacked out for a moment, and the dragon’s response was no more than an incoherent rumble overhead. When the world hazed back, he was looking into Cas’ eyes.

“Dean, listen to me,” Cas said, and his voice was low, now, with only the barest shake betraying his fear. Trying to be calm for Dean. Dean wanted to smile at that, but his lips were frozen. “There is still a fire within you. Find it. Can you hear me, Dean? Find it!” He was rocking Dean, slightly, as though to comfort him. Dean felt his throat tightening, his breaths coming short, wanting to stop altogether. His back was arching and relaxing, his body struggling weakly against the terrible cold. It hurt… it would be so easy to just… “Don’t you dare,” Cas said furiously. “Stop – stop looking like that – Dean, please! Please!” Tears were rolling down his cheeks. Dean jolted, blinking.

“Cas,” he murmured. Cas wanted him alive.

He had to stay alive.

He closed his eyes. He’d poured so much of his fire away, and he only understood that he needed it to live now that it was gone – but there must be something left, didn’t there? He felt through his chest like a pair of frozen hands reaching out towards heat, seeking, seeking…

There. Tiny, and dying, the barest embers of what had been before, but Dean knew he could save it. He concentrated, pulling all of his energy into the focal point in his chest. He felt his hands go stone cold, and his legs, his face –

A spark, in the darkness. A heat in the cold. Dean coughed, coughed again, and there it was – a flame. Tiny, but growing brighter. He could feel it within himself, flickering, guttering, but alive. He was alive. He opened his eyes, to see Cas staring at him, his cheeks tracked by tears. Dean reached up a hand, and brushed them away.

“I’m –” he tried to say, and coughed dryly, Cas holding his head steady. He took a few gasping breaths.

“I’m fine,” he tried again, hoarsely. “You… big sap.”

Cas laughed, a tight little choked-up sigh that was half sob.

“I thought you were going to die,” he said. “It never occurred to me that I could be asking you to… to sacrifice yourself. And you were going to… if I hadn’t pulled you back…”

“You wanted your friend to live,” Dean croaked. His little fire was burning brighter with every second spent looking at Cas.

“I want you to live as well, you asshole,” Cas said, shaking him a little. Dean tried to laugh, and coughed again.

He sat up shakily, supporting his own weight but staying close to Cas. Together, they looked towards the dragon, who was lying exactly as it had been – for a horrible second, Dean thought that after all, it hadn’t worked, he hadn’t given enough…

Except, oh, under the pearlescent sheen of its scales, a beautiful orange-pink fire was playing through its blood. And when it opened its eyes, its gaze was bright and clear; as they watched, it raised its head, huffing out a strong, thick cloud of smoke.

Dean smiled to see it, and turned to Cas to see his reaction. Cas’ face was so full of wonder, so full of relief that was almost disbelief. Dean could understand why. Cas had trailed up and down strange and dangerous lands on an impossible quest to save his friend. He’d given up everything he had to find a way to help the dragon stay alive. And Dean – Dean couldn’t regret a single one of his decisions, when he saw Cas looking like that, when Cas’ task was finally complete. He reached forward, and took Cas’ hand.

For a moment, neither of them said anything. They simply looked, and it was enough.

The dragon was huffing great breaths, in and out, holding the egg close to its fire-laced belly. Beside it, still sitting down with weakness making his body shudder, Dean squeezed Cas’ hand in his own.

“Cas, I – I’m sorry for bailing on you,” Dean said. He bent his head. “You were… you were right about my father, about the army. I should’ve listened when you said there was nothing I could do. I just…”

Cas reached up and slid his free hand to rest against Dean’s cheek.

“You had to try,” he said. “I understand that. I was wrong to make you feel ashamed for it. Even if you hadn’t made it here in time, it would have been worth trying to stop the siege. I – I’m the one who should be sorry, Dean. I was selfish. Trying to save one life when I could have been trying to save thousands. I… I only…”

Dean squeezed Cas’ hand, leaning into the touch on his cheek.

“It’s OK,” he said. “I get it. Impossible choice.”

Cas nodded, looking pale. Dean wished that he could take it away from him – the memory of having made that decision, of having been more prepared to allow his people to die than his friend. In Cas’ position, if Sam were in danger and so was all of Şehir, and he could only try to save one… well, Dean didn’t like to think about the answer to that one. And Cas had been forced to think about it, had been pushed by fate into making that call.

Dean sighed. There was nothing he could do about that now. All he could do was repair what he could to help Cas get through this.

“One more thing,” he said. “That – that thing you said, when we argued… about how I don’t – I don’t care about you. Because of what I said in Walker’s Castle.”

Cas blinked and looked down.

“You know that’s bullshit, right?” Dean said, dipping his head to catch Cas’ eyes. “I didn’t mean it then and I sure as shit don’t mean it now. I care about you, Cas. I care so damn much. And I don’t ever want us to leave each other like that again.”

Cas’ tears had been drying on his cheeks, but his eyes were full of them again when he looked back up at Dean.

“From now on, what we do, we do together,” Cas said. “Se’o sada.”

“Se’o sada,” Dean said, turning their loosely-held hands into a clasped fist, a promise. He leaned forwards and pressed a soft, chaste kiss to Cas’ lips.

“Castiel,” said the dragon, reminding them both of its presence. They stood up, Dean a little shaky, but feeling stronger with every moment that passed. Like the dragon had said, his fire grew back; it had not been consumed. “Thank you. And my thanks also to the firemaker. I owe both of you my life, and the life of my child.”

Dean bowed his head, accepting the dragon’s thanks without words. He didn’t know what he would say, anyway.

“It is likely that your nascent firemaking abilities will be stronger, after this experience,” the dragon said. “I caution you not to use them too much, too soon. Fire breathing and summoning lightning can wait until you are more skilled.” It dropped its great, reptilian eyelid once, quickly, and Dean’s jaw dropped. Had he just been winked at by a dragon?

“Yes, Sir,” he said. Quietly, to Cas, he added, “Your friend talks just like you.”

“Actually, I talk just like my friend,” Cas pointed out. “Who has excellent hearing.”

Dean turned back to the dragon, who was watching him with a beady eye. He grinned nervously, and waved.

“Sorry about that,” he said.

“It is pleasing to hear that my student exhibits proficiency in Ateşi,” the dragon replied, with a smiling rumble in its voice. “I taught him well.”

“Right,” Dean said, “right, yeah. Great… proficiency.” He turned to Cas, who was watching him with his eyes crinkled at the corners. “Cas… what do we do now? See, I know we can’t stop the battle, but… maybe there’s still time for us to do something – we could, I don’t know, join in the fighting somehow, and –”

“On which side, Dean?” Castiel interrupted, and Dean fell silent, a clutch of dread in his stomach. “I believe we agree that the right is on one side, but your people are on the other. Can you fight against either of those things?”

Dean opened his mouth, and then closed it, thinking hard. There had to be a way out of this, there had to be. He couldn’t have come all this way and done all these things, just to be powerless now. If he could only think of some way to help, some way to change his father’s mind, some way to persuade the Ateşi nobles to take their soldiers back home…

“None of the Ateşi want to be here,” he said slowly, thinking aloud. “They – they only came because my father forced them to. Sam said –”

“Sam? Your brother is here?”

“Yes,” Dean said, scowling. “My father made him come along. Sam’s against the whole thing, but he’s going along with it to give the barons a show of his strength and loyalty, so that they might back him over my father when the time’s right.”

“But presumably that opportune moment won’t be within the next hour or so,” Cas said. “Which means we can’t rely on Sam to stop the battle from happening. Is there no way at all to convince John to stop?”

“I can’t think of anything,” Dean said desperately, knuckling his forehead. “We’ve got no leverage, nothing he wants. He cares about me, but what am I going to do? Threaten never to speak to him again unless he calls the whole thing off? He’s made it eighteen years without me, I’m pretty sure he can carry on that way.”

“There must be something he values,” Cas said. “Something that we could threaten, some way that we could…”

“Excuse me,” said the dragon. “I couldn’t help but overhear that you wish to disrupt a battle?”

Dean and Cas threw each other a glance, before nodding in unison.

The dragon smiled, its reptilian lips drawing back to reveal sharp, pointed teeth.

“I am good at disruptions,” it said – and Dean smiled, too.

Chapter Text

“OK, look, I don’t want to spoil the party,” Dean said, as the dragon stretched its legs one by one, cracked and dried-out scales sloughing off its skin as it moved. Dean tried not to shudder. “But, uh. The thing is, that, um. The whole problem here was that you couldn’t get out of the cave to find yourself a firemaker, right? So… how’re you gonna… um…”

He petered to a halt as the dragon fixed him with one beady eye, sweating slightly.

“I was trapped in this cave by my weakness and despair,” it growled. “Now that I have my strength again, I will be able to leave the cave. However, doing so could be disruptive to the surrounding ecology.”

Dean squinted up at the dragon, and then looked to Cas.

“Rocks might fall on our heads,” Cas said.

“Right,” said Dean, nodding seriously. “Right. So, so we should – we should, um. Let’s just…”

The dragon began to shift its entire body, the sandpaper scales along its back crunching against the ceiling of the cave. Its claws scraped down the back wall, seeking a purchase from which – presumably – to push.

A single pebble fell from the ceiling. The dragon stared down at them both, its eyes alight with life.

“I suggest you run,” it thundered, in that voice deep enough to call back through time itself. Dean stood frozen for a few more seconds, petrified, until Cas grabbed hold of his sleeve and pulled him away, gripping him tightly as they made a break for the thin fissure through which they’d come. Squeezing through it after Cas, Dean heard the dragon snarling, vibrating the very rock around him, sending shivers up his arms and down his spine. His legs were as weak as wet paper when they stumbled out onto the great black-pebbled plateau beneath the twin-peaked mountain, to find that the beetle-black stones were jittering and shaking, clicking against each other as if in abject fear. Tap tap tap tap, something is coming, something is coming… Dean and Cas kept running, struggling to find a footing on the shifting, quivering rocks, still holding onto each other’s arms –

All around them, rocks and boulders went pelting past, jagged smatterings of broken mountain rock. Behind them, they heard a groan as loud as the Earth itself waking, and then a roar, raw and blood-thick and hot, searing out over the land for the first time in decades…

Dean and Cas stumbled to a halt and turned, still grasping at sleeves and arms, trying to keep a hold and a strong purchase on something steady on this night of shifts and terrors. Dean’s breath shuddered at what he saw. Emerging out of the rubble of its prison, muscles juddering with cramped disuse and thick snout raised to show fearsome, pink-stained teeth, was the dragon who should have been dead. The dragon that he had somehow managed to save.

The dragon who was going to help them stop a terrible battle from happening tonight.

Dean turned to Cas, trying to make sense of the tangle of his thoughts. Cas was staring and staring at the dragon, a single line of red, red blood trailing wetly down from his temple. His eyes were full of sheer sweating wonder, happiness, terror. Dean reached up, and swiped his thumb through the trail of Cas’ blood.

“Rock get you?” he asked. Cas could barely jerk his head in answer, turning his eyes to Dean, overwhelmed. Dean tried to smile for him. “Plan worked,” he said. “You did it. You saved the dragon.”

Cas could only shiver under his touch. Dean squeezed his shoulder, feeling a hundred miles away from his own body. He wanted to lie down here and sleep, sleep for a thousand years, until all the troubles were over and he had no more responsibilities… until the black pebbles covered him over and swallowed him down, down, down, where he couldn’t hear anything…

Faintly, from the North, came the sound of a shout, and then another.

Dean swallowed down his fear as best he could, and pressed his fingernails into his palms.

I’m real, he told himself. I’m real, and I’m here. And I’ve got to stop this.

“OK, here’s the plan,” he said, trying to stride forwards and achieving more of a determined stumble. He could hear Cas moving behind him, keeping close. He felt his heart swell a little at the sound. He could be braver, with that chink of stones to his right. “We fly over there, to the Castle. Mr – that is, uh, Mrs – well, Dragon, Sir – M-Ma’am –”

“Castiel found ‘Professor’ convenient,” said the dragon, with a touch of dryness that Dean recognised. He saw so many of Cas’ traits in the dragon, too. No wonder they’d been such good friends, shaping each other over the years.

“Professor, then,” Dean said, trying to tamp down the way that the ridiculous gap between a bespectacled professor and a saw-toothed dragon screwed even further with his grip on reality, “You’ll throw some flames, and…” he waved his arms a little, “scary… fire… stuff? Um, over the army, and then bring us in low. Make it look real impressive, like… whip your tail around, you know. Just don’t actually hurt anyone. Cas and I’ll be shouting, telling everyone to back off. Hopefully, we can start a panic in the Ateşi army, and send them running home. They don’t want to be here anyway.” Dean dipped his head, thinking of Sam caught up in a riot of terrified Ateşi warriors, armed to the teeth and desperate. He let out a shaky breath. This was the only way. If Sam were here… he’d tell Dean to do it. Dean knew him well enough to know that much for sure.

“They want to please their King and get lots of money from him,” Dean continued, in what he hoped was a bracing voice, “but let’s hope that doesn’t match up to seeing a real-life angry dragon, ready to char them to a cinder. And afterwards, we go for cake. And the Professor here gets to come back to the cave and get the egg, and we’ll find somewhere safe for it to hatch, and…” He could hear the tremble in his own voice. He was losing it, just trying to imagine picking up pieces after what they were about to do.

“I’m getting ahead of myself,” he said. “Let’s stick to the cake for now.” His attempt at humour sounded feeble, even to his own ears, but just trying made him feel slightly better. A touch of normality on this night straight out of a bad dream.

Cas moved round to face Dean, blinking at him solemnly.

“Are you sure this will work?” he asked, his eyes heavy. Dean almost snapped at him. Of course I’m not sure this will work, he wanted to say. I have no clue. We could be about to get a lot of people killed. But they’re only going to kill each other anyway if we do nothing…

“We have to try something,” Dean said, as firmly as he could. “This is the best shot we have. I’m not forcing either of you to do it, but…”

“I’m with you,” Cas said, his hand finding Dean’s shoulder holding onto it.

“I, too, am with you.” The dragon’s deep rumble echoed through the mountains, across the darkling plain. Dean’s heart throbbed. Maybe, just maybe, there was a chance that he could fix this. That they could fix this. Together.

For a moment, none of them moved. The air around them was cold and sweet, and Dean took deep breaths of it, suddenly seized by a need to remember this moment – the three of them, safe and together. Dean raised his eyes to the skies above, clear and star-bitten. He knew that there was nothing else to do but this, but Yarım, he was scared. He was absolutely terrified. He reached for Cas’ hand.

“Dean?” Cas said softly, turning to him. The dragon moved behind him, lifting its head to see the sky for the first time in so, so long. Dean watched Cas, seeing the depth of galaxies in his eyes.

“You – you said once that we were on the same side,” he said. “Our own side.”

Cas nodded, his jaw setting.

“You and me,” he said.

“Cas – what if our side is the bad side? What if we’re in the wrong? What if we’re about to make a huge mistake, and get everyone killed, what if we hurt Sam or what if…”

“Dean,” Cas said, gripping his hand tightly. “We don’t have to do this. We can stay here and let the battle play out. We can go and find your brother, and protect him.”

Dean fell still.

“You’d… you’d join the battle on the Ateşi side, to help save Sam?” he said softly, staring at Cas, who frowned at him as though he’d asked whether the sun would rise tomorrow.

“My loyalty is to you,” he said, slowly. “Our own side, Dean. I meant it. I will defend Sam with my life, if you ask me to. Just as you would have given your life to save my friend.” Dean glanced up towards the dragon, who was still watching the stars, tracing their patterns. Its expression was utterly unreadable, but Dean thought he could sense a little of the dragon’s emotion. Fear, for itself, for its loved one. Bittersweet joy, at being free. And terror – at being free.

“There’s so much choice,” Dean said, choked up. “I don’t – I shouldn’t be the one who gets to decide who lives and who dies, I can’t decide that…”

“But you will,” growled the dragon suddenly, unexpectedly. “No matter what you choose tonight, firemaker, you will change the fates of every single person in these mountains. The living, the dying, the yet-unborn. There are babes in their mothers’ wombs who will be told stories of this night.”

Dean blinked back tears. It was too much, it was all too much. He wasn’t made for this. He wasn’t ready. He couldn’t make this decision.

The dragon looked down at him, its eyes full of sudden and terrible compassion.

“What would you like the stories to say?” the dragon asked, with fire still playing in the blood beneath its lucent skin.

Dean swallowed hard.

“That –” he said, and his voice died. He felt Cas’ hand squeeze his shoulder tightly, and tied again. “That we tried,” he ground out, around the lump in his throat. “That we tried to save them all.”

The dragon dipped its head.

“So we fly,” it said. “And we hope.”

“And we do this together,” Castiel said, his eyes strong and resolute. “You and I.”

Dean drew Cas in to his chest, holding him tightly, grounding himself with the press of their bodies together. He buried his face in Cas’ neck, just for a moment, allowing himself the luxury of a world that was quiet, and dark, and smelled like home. And then he raised his head.

“Se’o sada,” he said, and Cas nodded, his lips pressed flat together, his eyes so strong and intense that it took Dean’s breath away.

“Se’o sada,” Cas said, his lips shaping around the words with love, with fear, with determination.

Together, they turned to the dragon, who was crouching for them, ready.

They climbed up onto the dragon, from its claw, up its leg, to its great, scaly back. Dean could feel the lines of heat running through its veins, and see the light of the fire beneath its iridescent scales, which felt cold and sharp against his buzzing palms. Cas crawled up the dragon’s neck and sat behind its mighty head, gripping onto the pair of twisted, grey horns that spiralled out from over its ridged, arched brows, his legs dangling down on either side towards the faraway ground. Dean climbed up behind him, legs trembling, teeth chattering, and put his hands around Cas’ waist, holding him tight so that they wouldn’t fall off.

“Did you forget that I’m scared of heights?” Dean said to Cas, glancing down at the ground with an shaky exhale. He wasn’t sure how he still had room for any more emotions, but somehow the idea of flight, actual flight, was filling him with a terrible dread. Behind him, he heard the dry, rustling sound of the dragon extending its wings with a low, humming roar, bones creaking.

“I didn’t forget,” Cas muttered back.

“Well, I’m going to give you a reminder all the same,” Dean said tightly. “Cas – I’m scared of heights.”

“Hold onto me,” Cas said. “Just hold onto me and everything will be alright.”

Dean pressed his forehead down against Cas’ shoulder, screwing up his eyes – and beneath them, the dragon started to move.

The dragon ran along the great dark plain, its legs pumping, unwieldy and clumsy after so long in the dark. Its wings began to push through the air, the effort rippling the muscles under the skin where Dean and Cas were sitting. The dragon gave another roar, louder and deeper and terrifying, utterly terrifying. Dean clenched his arms around Cas through jolt after jolt as it jumped, and fell, and jumped, and fell, and – and he yelled aloud as it gave one great, final leap upwards – its wings caught the updraft, and they were off the ground – they were still off the ground – a mighty sweep of wings, and they were away.

They were flying.

Dean kept his eyes clenched tightly closed, holding onto Castiel with all of his might. He could feel the wind rushing past his face, catching on his clothes, his hair, as though trying to drag them apart. He gasped against the speed of it, struggling to draw breath as they climbed higher. Castiel’s hand was reaching back, pressing against the back of his head for a moment, before letting go.

A great crash of thunder rent the air, louder even than the cry of the dragon. Dean had opened his eyes before he’d even decided to do so, and gave another shout of fear. The ground was sweeping past below them, sheer grey mountain rock and shiny, coal-black stones, dizzyingly far away. And in front of them… in front of them stood the mountain, and cut into its side, a third of the way up, was the Castle on a Cloud. Where the cloud itself had once been white and low to the ground, it was now deep, angry and dark, roiling over the Ateşi army, still radiating rainbows of light through its whorl and swirl. And it was so thick, so huge… as Dean watched, it enveloped the army and the Castle completely, hiding them both from sight in a thunderous, furious mass. The rolling roar came again, and bolts of lightning flickered and whipped through the whirling cloud.

“They’re readying for battle!” Cas yelled, over the shriek of the wind. “The cloud is a weapon!”

They were almost out of time. The dragon’s thudding wingbeats matched the pace of Dean’s heart as they grew closer and closer, thud thud, thud thud, thud thud – please please, please please, please please let this work…

The dragon flew onwards, heedless of the danger as it plunged downwards. There was no other way to reach the Ateşi army but to fly into the swirling fury of the clouds, and further still, onwards and through – it let out another bone-shaking roar as it appeared through the clouds above the Ateşi and the Imiq soldiers, a great gout of infernal flame spurting out of its vicious open maw, unfurling over the armies like a banner of fiery heat that signalled hideous pain, and terrible destruction.

Beneath the clouds, rain was falling, a devastating pelt of water that skinned Dean’s hands, his face, anywhere exposed. He gasped, instantly drenched. Through the downpour, Dean saw the soldiers beneath them freeze, the Water Shapers halting their movements and the Ateşi’s weapons hanging useless in their hands. They’d arrived just as battle was about to be joined; Dean could see no dead bodies between the lines, yet, but weapons were glinting lightning back towards his eyes. The dragon dropped lower, and Dean could see the looks of frozen horror on their faces as the beast from their nightmares appeared shrieking out of the sky. He saw – oh, Yarım, he saw his father, there, visible from miles away in his shining golden armour… and that had to be Sam beside him, staring upwards, the pair of them tiny figures far beneath them.

“GET BACK,” he roared in their direction, and the dragon punctuated his order with another fierce whip of flame, its wings beating hard to keep them aloft. They dropped a little lower, despite its efforts. “GET BACK! YOU WILL NOT FIGHT THIS BATTLE!”

“GO HOME!” Cas yelled, and Dean squeezed his arms tighter, pressing his cheek into Cas’ soaked hair, feeling his own heartbeat when he pressed his chest to Cas’ back. They dragon rolled beneath them. They were so powerful, up here together. They could stop this battle, they could make this work. They could do anything. “GO BACK OVER THE MOUNTAINS!”

The dragon roared, and the thunder rolled, and the lightning flashed. The clouds above them whirled purple and red and black, light ricocheting through them, through the rain, painting the scene below in a thousand colours of fear and confusion. The dragon dropped lower, grumbling in fear of the lightning, and the scene below came closer and clearer. Some of the Ateşi soldiers were listening, dropping their weapons, only to be faced with the levelled crossbows of their commanding officers. Dean squinted desperately through the rain, watching John waving his arms, shouting orders. The dragon fell even lower, sending out fierce sparks from its mouth, its flame undimmed by the rain, by the cold.

“I SAID, GO BACK!” Dean screamed, ripping his throat – but he had to shout loudly, the soldiers had to hear, all of them had to hear. “TURN AROUND, AND LEAVE!”

“GO HOME! GO BACK OVER THE MOUNTAINS!” Cas yelled, his voice piercing and desperate. More soldiers dropped their weapons and started to back away, a small wave that spread like a ripple – great swathes of them not wanting to be left alone to fight the beast, and following their friends. Dean’s eyes were on Sam, on John. He saw his father being given something – something than glinted in the dark rainbow light, something metallic. He narrowed his eyes. The dragon was facing him, now, Dean having to lean out to keep watching his father’s movements. They’d dropped so far that they were only feet above the ground, maybe twenty or so. Was he – was John taking aim?

In front of him, Castiel was still shouting at the Ateşi soldiers. Dean could feel the dragon roaring beneath him, even though he could barely hear it over the rush of the rain, the roll of the thunder, the vicious klaxon sound of his own sudden panic.

Dean watched as his father’s arm bucked with a recoil. He’d fired a shot, but – but what had he been aiming at? Dean stared around wildly beneath him, leaning out impossibly far, trying to see his father’s victim. He pulled himself back upright, seeing nothing. There was a scratching under his jacket, and he reached to slap at it – and found his hand grasping the shaft of a metal arrow, the tip just kissing the skin of his chest through his pelerin. He took his hand away, and saw that his palm was glazed with red.

“Cas, what –” Dean started to shout, and then had the words punched out of his lungs.

The arrow was pluming out of Cas’ back – a grim, metallic flower with a bed of blood spreading at its root. Dean watched the red fanning out across Cas’ pelerin, too caught in swift, numbing horror to make a sound, only drawing in a single, rasping, gasping breath.

Cas slipped, the movement so sudden that Dean couldn’t catch him and hold him in place. Cas’ body twisted as he fell, his hand outstretched, reaching back for Dean. In horrific slow-motion, Dean stretched out his own hand, further, further, fighting to grasp… he was slipping, he was falling too, he was going to go pitching right off the back of the dragon and down to the ground –

Cas’ eyes were on him, looking up as he fell down, the light inside them already fading even as his fingers sought and sought for Dean’s. Dean met their gaze, his mouth open in a silent cry.

Se’o sada.

Dean pushed himself out further, seizing Cas’ hand and gripping it in his, their fingers holding messily together, rain-soaked and blood-slipped and desperate.

And they fell.

Dean didn’t close his eyes, not even for the wind, not even for the rain, because this was it, he knew it – this was it, this was it, Yarım, this was it. They were falling and they weren’t coming back, Yarım, Yarım, this was it. His body was tilting horribly, his stomach wrenching, his guts twisting, his mouth still open, wanting to yell out but failing… he sucked in a breath –

Every second of this was his, was Castiel’s, every single second belonged to them. He wanted with a vicious anger to pack a thousand years into the time, eyes locked on to Cas’, still too shocked to cry out or to do anything but look, and look, and look tight, don’t think, don’t… don’t think… the dragon was roaring, shaking the very rain around them. Dean tried to take a breath and had it stolen by the rush of falling. Oh, Yarım, Yarım, when they hit the ground, no, no...

On the way down, Dean kept his eyes on Cas, and Cas watched Dean, trying to speak it all, say it all even as the air tore against their clothes. Tore, as though pleading with them to stop, to save themselves, to do anything, to fly. And all Dean knew as the ground rushed sickening close was Cas’ hand in his, Cas’ hand in his, Cas’ cold hand bound to his by the blood on his palm…

They landed, and they broke with cracks and shuddered last breaths.

Chapter Text

Dean blacked out as he hit the ground, and his leg shattered.

He sank into a merciful darkness for a few seconds, before the raindrops spattering his face drew him back. He was aware of the dragon coming to land, roaring and snarling, the vision thudding in and out of focus with the pulse of his heart; soldiers were approaching, running towards him, and towards the broken huddle on the ground a few feet away from him, something mud-spattered and… oh, a curve of a shoulder that he knew – Cas –

He crawled over to Cas, unable to feel his body, using the strength in his arms to drag himself, to haul his body up, to turn Cas over. And he saw… he saw that there was blood in Cas’ mouth, blood on the side of his head, and blood on his chest… a spreading star of red around the arrow that was speared straight through his heart.

Dean’s howl could have woken the gods of old. He screamed, he screamed, unable to form words, unable to do anything except rip his own throat apart as he clutched Cas to him, staring around as though looking for someone, anyone, who could help them.

The soldiers were still coming, Ateşi and Imiq, bearing down upon them, weapons raised.

“GET BACK!” Dean yelled, trying to stand, to beat them away, but his leg folded beneath him in a splintering of agony that grounded him, had him bent over and crying… but the soldiers were still coming for Cas, they were going to pick him up, they were going to take him away, they were going to hurt him –

“I SAID, GET BACK!” Dean shouted, holding up his hand and releasing a burst of flame from his palm, soon quenched by the rain.

The soldiers came on.

Dean roared, roared like an animal, summoning the fire from the deepest part of himself, from the explosion of pain in his chest; this time, the flames were white hot and vicious and devastating. The soldiers backed off, hands up in surrender, but Dean paid them no attention.

He pulled Cas closer into his arms, wiping the trail of blood away from his lips with tender, shaking fingers, looking into Cas’ blue, faraway eyes. Dean shook his head, shook his head, shook his head…

He had nothing to scream with anymore. Suddenly, even though the thunder still rolled, the dragon still roared, the lightning still lanced and struck all around them – suddenly there was only the two of them, in a total, deep, dark quiet.

Dean pressed his hand to Cas’ cheek, stroking his thumb along the cheekbone where his scar was stretched, white and shining.

“Cas,” Dean whispered, the rain pounding on his head. “Cas, no, no, no, no, no. Cas, no. You can’t. You can’t just. C’mon.” He rocked Cas in his arms, gently, so gently. “Hey, hey. It’s OK. I’ve got you, Cas, it’s OK, can you hear me? It’s going to be OK. You ‘n’ me, remember? You ‘n’ me, together. Just like we said.” He sobbed in a breath, the tears beginning to roll down his cheeks. “Don’t do this to me. Don’t leave me.” He pressed his brow against Cas’, begging him to blink, to move, to breathe. “Hey. Hey, come on. Come on now. You’re OK. Can you hear me?”

Dean was vaguely aware of movements around him – a great keening roar vibrating the ground he was lying on, and something – something thick and powerful, a muscular tail, slamming into the ground not far away. The dragon had landed, was protecting them, keeping the soldiers at bay.

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but the weight of the body in his arms.

“Can you – c-can you – C-Cas,” Dean said, once more, brokenly. There had to be… something he could do, he had to do something, but – but – Dean looked down into Cas’ open, staring eyes. Cas had the slightest upturn at the side of his mouth, as if at the last – as if, when he’d been looking at Dean for the last time, he’d tried to…

Dean bent over Cas, sobs wracking his body. He shuddered under the strength of them. He was being torn in two, his body was being shredded. He pulled back, and Cas’ eyes were still open, still sightless. Dean pressed a hand to his cheek, mouth open in a wordless groan. He looked down at the arrow in Cas’ chest – or perhaps it was a little higher up, in his shoulder. It didn’t matter, Dean could only stare at it, hating it, hating it, if he could only get it out then Cas would… Cas would wake up…

He started pulling on it, his hand slipping on the wet shaft, finding a grip at the metal-fletched end and hauling, ripping the wretched thing out of Cas’ body with all the strength he had to give, tearing open gashes in his palm. His own blood mixed with Cas’ in his hand, coming together indistinguishably – and the arrow slid out like a poison dart, its venom already spent. Dean held it in his hand by the shaft, and Cas’ body was free of it, but he didn’t move. He couldn’t.

“Cas, Cas, you gotta hear me, you gotta – you gotta tell me what I need to do,” Dean choked. “I can’t fix it, I don’t know how, I don’t know how, I can’t fix this, don’t – don’t leave me, please, I lo-love you, you love me, and we’re… we’re supposed to…” His voice faded to nothing, the thunder filling his silence, and the lightning flashing overhead like fireworks, marking the passing of Castiel in light and heat, flashes of brightness against the dark.

There was still movement happening all around the two of them, shadowy figures seen through the rain. The two of them, Dean thought fiercely through his numbness and his terror, refusing to think of Cas as… of himself as alone, no, no, it couldn’t be…

If he had only been able to shape water, then maybe Dean could have healed him. Healed him, before his heart had stopped. But all he had was fire, useless fire, fire that could only destroy everything it touched.

Fire isn’t only used to destroy. Light and heat are sight and strength. Fire is a life-giver, just as much as water…

Cas’ words, echoing through Dean’s mind – the only way that he was ever going to hear Cas’ voice again, with the thin resonance of memory. What good was a life-giver if it couldn’t give life when he needed it most? What fucking good was that? Dean’s shoulders were shaking uncontrollably, dry, heaving sobs of shock.

A bolt of lightning cracked down into the soil just metres away, and Dean didn’t even flinch. He gripped the arrow tighter in his bleeding hand, willing it to evaporate, for Cas to blink and smile, for everything to be okay.

Cas lay still in his arms, unspeaking.

The ground where the lightning had struck was sizzling slightly, a few white sparks of electricity flickering in the rain-drenched air. Dean watched them dully, his arms holding Cas closer, so close that Dean couldn’t see his face, only feel the weight and warmth of his body.

Sparks…

Dean sucked in a breath.

Electricity. Electricity.

It was his own words that came floating back to him now, spoken in the desert a lifetime ago.

We’ve got people in hospitals being revived with electricity, after their damned hearts have almost stopped…

And in that moment, Dean knew what he had to do.

He didn’t bother pressing his fingers to Cas’ neck for a pulse. Either it was there, and this would work, or it wasn’t, and – and –

He took a few steadying breaths, gazing blank-eyed down at Cas, preparing himself. He had no idea how this was done. It didn’t matter. He would learn. He had to.

Dean looked down into Cas’ face one more time, his lips twisting at the sight, more tears falling.

“Cas… I don’t think you can hear me,” he said, speaking so softly that it was almost a whisper. Was that a tiny twitch of Cas’ open eyelid? Dean shook his head; it couldn’t have been. “But if you can, I’m about to do something really, really stupid, and I don’t think – I’m not sure that I’m gonna –” He looked around, face working, desperately hoping that Sam was somewhere near… but his brother was nowhere to be seen. Dean sucked in a breath that came out as a sob.

He would be going out alone, then. But Sam – Sam would understand, he’d take care of Cas, if this worked.

“Cas,” Dean said, and stopped. He was becoming more and more aware of the way his shattered leg was twisted up beneath him, the sensation like a screech of pain in a wailing crowd. His lips were trembling. He had to move fast but, oh, Yarım, he was afraid… he didn’t want to die. But the body in his arms was a weight that inevitably tipped the balance. “C-Cas. If you can hear me, if we don’t get to…” He shuddered to a stop, and started again, even his chin trembling, forcing out every word around the sobs caught in his throat. “It’s worth it, you hear me? Just… it was all worth it. Every – every damn thing.” He clenched his hand on Cas’ shoulder, gripping it tightly. “S-Se’o sada,” he whispered, pushing Cas down to the ground, away from his body – and then he raised the arrow in his hand upwards, and pointed the metal shaft to the sky.

And he called.

Face tilted up, eyes closed, he called.

He knew the lightning was up there, knew he could bend it to his will. It was elusive, it was like trying to catch flame between his fingers – but he pulled harder, tightening the heated coil of fire inside himself, calling, calling…

There was nothing, and nothing, and nothing, and then –

A lance of lightning speared through the air, viciously quick, answering his summons.

And it ripped through his body like a wire set alight, raking over his skin, through his chest. He roared, his head tilted back in agony, fought for control with everything he had. His eyes burst open, and he could see that he was surrounded by sparks of brilliant light, sparking and sizzling in the rain against the dark of the clouds above him… he wrestled, he struggled, and he – he had it –

With the last ounce of breath in his lungs, Dean pushed the smallest twist of electricity out of his body, through his palm – he forced his dying muscles into movement with sheer willpower, gathering lightning to his chest to gain control – he extended his hand, hovered it over Castiel’s chest – and sent a tiny whip of lightning into Castiel.

Cas’ body jerked on the ground, his muscles spasming with the force of the electric shock. Dean could barely spare time to look at him as he slammed his closed, bloody fists into the ground, releasing the rest of the electricity into the rock of the mighty mountain with a desperate sob.

When it was gone, his body hollow and smoking without it, he sat back up to look for Cas. The scent of burning was strong, and there was a light growing across Dean’s vision, a light that took everything, obliterated everything, and only darkness was left…

Dean gasped back to wakefulness with his body still crouched over Cas’, about to fall. He must have only blacked out for a second, if that. He shook his head muggily, trying to clear his vision –

Dean barely dared to look down. If the arrow really had gone right through Cas’ heart, and not his shoulder – or if his heart had completely stopped before the shock – then he would still… he would still be gone. Dean couldn’t look. He had to look. But he couldn’t bear to look, oh, he couldn’t see those eyes again, so familiar but so far away…

A hand on his face. Soft, weak, trembling.

Dean gasped, looking down – and Cas’ eyes were open.

Cas’ eyes were blinking, flicking slowly from side to side. He coughed, and winced.

“Cas?” Dean said, with no breath in his lungs, no space in his mind for anything but numbness. “Cas, can you hear me?” He clutched Cas’ body to him, the blood around his shoulder would starting to flow once more. “Listen, you have to heal yourself, OK? There’s a wound on your shoulder and – and you’re dying, you have to…”

Before Dean could finish his sentence, Cas’ hand fell away from Dean’s face…

And curved, and sliced through the air, shaping the water. He formed a shaky globule, and pressed it against his shoulder, his face working against the agony of movement.

“Yes – yes,” Dean said, as the water was absorbed by Cas’ clothing. “Is it working? Cas –”

“It’s working,” Cas whispered, in a voice as quiet as a single raindrop falling. “But Dean… everything is broken… my ribs, I – I can’t breathe…”

“Fix it,” Dean said. “Fix it, now.”

“Dean – I don’t know if I can –”

“I’m telling you, you can! You are not leaving me again! You swore, remember, you swore!” Dean laughed suddenly, silently, half hysterical, at being able to argue with Cas – at hearing the sound of his voice, at seeing his face. “You said together, Cas.”

“Se’o sada,” said Cas softly. And he moved his hands, and shaped the water.

The rain bent to his will, driving towards his broken wreck of a body and forming a loose, rippling mass over it. It trembled for a second, and then Dean’s body was consumed, too; he took a deep, desperate breath as the water passed over his head, the shattered ribs in his side sending a twisted knife-stab of pain through his lungs. For a moment, the water simply held shape around them, outlining them; and then Dean watched through the dark diamond gloom as Cas twisted his fingers, and the water started to weave its magic.

Dean could feel it sinking into his clothes, into his skin. Its goodness, its healing light was inside him, pushing him back into place, mending his torn muscles, his lungs – with two, three, four cracks of agony, his broken leg. He was running out of air. The water was working its way up to his hairline, and he felt the itch of it healing a cut that he hadn’t even known was there –

And then it was over. With a soft hushing noise, the water dissipated.

Dean cupped his hand to Cas’ cheek, holding him close.

“Cas?” he asked, every nerve in his body trembling. “Cas, t-talk to me. Was that too much? You didn’t have to heal me too, I was –”

“You were dying, you asshole,” Cas muttered, with his eyes still closed. Dean stared at him for a moment, open-mouthed, and then managed a shakingly half-sobbed chuckle.

“S-sorry about that,” he said quietly. “I’ll try not to do it again. If you could do the same…”

“Believe me,” said Cas. “I don’t ever want to do that again.”

Dean didn’t have the strength to smile; he could only stare at Cas, held tightly in his arms, cold but talking and alive, Cas was alive.

“How – how do you feel?” Dean asked tentatively. Cas frowned, and then slowly, painfully sat up, his face creasing in pain, his breathing laboured.

“As though I just got struck by lightning,” he groaned. “What happened?”

Dean swallowed, a smile finally managing to make its way onto his face.

“Well, actually,” he said, “funnily enough –”

“Dean?” The sound of a familiar voice close by snapped Dean out of the little world that he and Cas had carved for themselves in the centre of the battlefield. He looked up, to see his brother standing close by, his hands raised as though to fend off an attack. Right. He’d sent huge spurts of fire towards anyone who’d tried to come close, and behind him, he could hear the sounds of the dragon grumbling in warning.

Dean gave Cas’ shoulder a squeeze as he stood up, and Cas followed his lead, wobbling on his feet a touch before leaning into Dean and angling his body so that he appeared to stand perfectly upright.

“Sam,” Dean said grimly. “Where’s our father?”

“He’s right over there,” Sam said, coming a few steps closer, and hesitantly reaching out, grabbing his brother’s arm. “You’re – you’re not hurt? Yarım, Dean, I saw you fall, I saw the lightning, the water… what just happened?”

Dean looked into Sam’s eyes, willing him to understand.

“I can explain everything to you later,” he said. “For now, I need to speak to John.”

The clouds above them were lifting, changing; the rain eased to a light patter. Dean turned to see the dragon baring its teeth at the Imiq Shapers, frightening them into halting the downpour. With the thick, dark cloud dissipated a little, the light from the Castle could shine down on the battlefield more clearly – illuminating the figure of John, as he walked through his stilled, shocked soldiers, to the place where Dean was standing, Cas still leaning on him, Sam by his side.

“John,” Dean said coldly, greeting him.

“Dean,” John replied, his eyes going wide. He was wearing full, shining battle armour, a crown around his helmeted head. “Son… that was you, up there on the dragon? And – you called down the lightning?”

Dean brushed John’s words away as unimportant.

“You shot Castiel,” he said, the words coming out jerkily, his anger thick in his throat. John stared at him for a moment, and then to Cas, and then back to Dean.

“You’re not really going to be angry at me,” he said, holding out his hands. “Dean, be reasonable –”

“You shot Castiel. You almost killed him,” Dean said, holding onto his temper by a thread, his body trembling against Cas’ with sheer rage.

“Dean, there was a dragon in the sky, flying above my army…”

“What does that matter?! What the fuck does that matter?!” Dean yelled, and the soldiers nearest them flinched. The ones further away were gathering in to hear. None of them seemed keen to start up the fighting again. “If you hadn’t dragged your damned army all the way to the Water Lands for no reason, then –”

“No reason?” John snorted, his eyes bright as though he were laughing at a joke that Dean hadn’t quite understood yet. “Dean, these Water Bastards are godless. They’re evil. We can’t trust them, and they need to be –”

“No? Well, I trust this one,” Dean said, stabbing his finger to Cas’ chest.

“Oh, I saw him! Yarım, Dean, can’t you see that he’s… he’s something dark? You must have been taught that shaping the elements is wrong. He’s a Moon Demon, a Water Devil, one of Ayın Yarısı’s foulest spawn.” When Dean opened his mouth to answer furiously, John sighed, and reached out a hand. “We can talk about this more back in my tent. Come away now.”

Dean wanted to scream at him without words, roar in his face until he ran. He swallowed hard, and tried to squash his fury down into something small enough to be expressed.

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” he snarled shakily, making John’s eyes widen. “You think shaping is evil? It just saved my life. Cas just saved my life. Doesn’t that make any difference to you?”

John frowned.

“So, you managed to get one of the bastards to like you,” he said. “They don’t feel like we feel, Dean. Dogs can be trained to be loyal to their owners, too. Now, come on. Come with me.”

Dean shook his head, and Cas didn’t move an inch. They stared at John, twin gazes, like Güneş Yarısı and Ayın Yarısı made human; two halves of a split entity, one warm and golden-haired and burning up with rage, the other dark and blue-eyed and cold as the grave. They stood together, lending each other strength, judging John Winchester with all his faults, all his pride and brutishness and obstinacy.

And finding him unworthy.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Dean said, setting his jaw. “You came here to hurt them.” He gestured back towards the Imiq, who were watching the scene unfold with wide, hard eyes. Dean wondered how many of them spoke Ateşi, and understood what was happening. “So long as you still want to do that, you’re going to have to go through me. Go through us.”

John’s eyes darkened.

“If you’re not with me, you’re against me,” he growled angrily. “You really don’t want to put yourself in that situation, Dean. Maybe one day, when the crown passes on to you, you’ll understand the position I’m in. It’ll be your burden to bear, and you’ll see what I go through. And you’ll see the power I wield.” He narrowed his eyes at Dean threateningly.

After a beat of silence, Dean offered him a thin smile, and shrugged.

“We have a dragon,” he said lightly. “Or had you forgotten?”

“Dean. I am your father –”

“No,” Dean interrupted, his expression slow, and deep, and fiery hot. “You’re not.”

“Dean, please, you –”

“Bobby Singer is my father.”

John’s face turned from angry to apoplectic.

“I never would have believed this of you. Associating with foul beasts and monsters from nightmares,” he spat. “You’re as bad as one of them! And if I’m not your father, then you’re not my son.” He waved his arm at Dean, crunching his fist as though screwing up paper. “I disown you, Dean. You’re nothing to me.”

“F-fine,” Dean said, ignoring the part of his heart that was tearing - the part that had always cherished the dream that one day, John would come to the house and talk to him, take him away, take him home. Love him, like a father. “Fine. Go. Leave. I don’t care.” Cas leaned into him a little heavier.

John’s expression sharpened, like a wolf that had scented prey.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he snarled. “I came here to get something done, and I intend to do it.” He looked around at his soldiers, standing wide-eyed and slack-jawed around them, listening to every word. “Soldiers,” he boomed, drawing his sword out of his scabbard with a shing and pointing it towards the Imiq, towards Dean.

“Attack!”

The silence that followed his shout was ringing, and absolute.

John stared around his army, his eyes widening.

“I… ordered you to attack!” he shouted. “I am your King, and I am ordering you –”

“You don’t have to do what he says,” said a voice to Dean’s left swiftly, as a few of the soldiers started reaching for their weapons uncomfortably. Sam stepped forwards, his eyes bright and hard. “You don’t have to listen to him. Believe me, as someone who’s been listening to him ever since we left Şehir… it’s not worth it.”

John seemed to crumble, his sword falling down to his side.

“Sam…” he said, looking at his son as though he were a stranger – or rather, like the stranger he truly was.

“Dad,” said Sam. “I’m with Dean on this. A war against the Water Landers – against the Imiq – would just be pointless and wasteful. You’re prejudiced against these people and it’s making you a bad ruler.”

“Sam – for Yarım’s sake, it was people like them that killed Mary!” John shouted. Sam clenched his fists.

“Your blind obsession with vengeance is going to kill thousands more!” Sam snapped back, whipcrack-fast. John’s mouth fell open in consternation. He stared at his two sons, at the army that he’d brought to this place, at the nobles he’d kept close and cosseted for years… none of them with him. He growled, and tore the crown off his head, ripping it away from his helmet. In a swift, furious move, he sent it rolling down to the muddy mountain floor.

“What’s a King who no one obeys?” John spat. “I abdicate, here, in front of all my barons. I bet every one of you sons of bitches will be happy to see the back of me. Well, to the Everdark with all of you. Fuck all of you!” He turned back to face his eldest son, and kicked the crown towards him with a wry, vicious little smirk. “Your turn now, Dean.”

Despite himself, Dean couldn’t help but try to take a small step forwards, wanting to – what? Stop John from walking away? Get him to pick the crown back up? But Cas made a small noise as he almost slipped off Dean’s shoulder and to the floor, and Dean stopped, checked himself, and supported Cas’ weight.

John, on the point of turning away, saw all of it. His features flattened and hardened into bright-eyed fury.

“You,” he said, pointing a finger at Castiel. “You did this.”

“Hey,” Dean said, frowning. John looked smaller without his crown, with his golden helmet, almost comically conical, perching on top of his head. “Leave Cas out of this.”

“That – that bastard is why you’re standing there and not behind me,” John hissed, one fist clenching, the other wrapping around the hilt of the great wide broadsword at his hip.

“Dean’s decisions are not someone else’s to make,” Castiel said, speaking up with more sharpness and anger than Dean had expected.

“Dean’s decisions have been someone else’s all his life,” John scoffed derisively, and then caught Dean’s eye. “What, son? Did you choose to be a savaşçı? Or was the training paid in full, so along you went? And did you choose to come here to the Water Lands, or did this godless son of a bitch convince you to come?”

“He chose,” Castiel said coldly, gritting his teeth and moving away from Dean, taking an angry, shaky step forwards. “He chose. He asked to accompany me, to keep me safe.”

“Did he?” John said jeeringly, smirking bitterly around at the crowd around them. “So that’s why he’s doing all the talking now, then? Because he’s so good at making choices for himself?”

“You are a sad, stupid old man who picks fights with the wrong people,” Cas snapped, to mutters and indrawn breaths. Even Dean winced, and John’s face went from cold resentment to hot, focused anger in a single blink of his dark eyes.

Castiel was turning back towards Dean when the swift inward breath of a sword being raised was heard in the air. He had his eyes on Dean’s face when the rapid crunch crunch of stones sounded, as a man in full armour crossed the distance between himself and his enemy with murder in his eyes…

Dean elbowed Cas out of the way with a wrench of his shoulders, his hand rising instinctively. Before he could think about it, he’d thrown a great spurt of orange flame towards John, searing over his golden armour and sizzling down his sword, making him yell in pain and drop to his knees. Dean didn’t hesitate. He pressed his advantage, moving in close, his palm up and directed towards John’s face.

John, kneeling on the plain among the dark, dark stones, spat at his eldest son.

“Put that down, you darkling bitch. You couldn’t kill me,” he hissed, trying to get to his feet. Dean pulled back his top lip in a snarl and released another burst of flame over John’s head, feeling the heat and power licking down his arm, hungry to be used.

“I could,” Dean said, sweating. John laughed.

“You’ve never hurt a fly in your life,” he said.

Dean blinked, and in the fraction of a second behind his closed eyelids he heard the snap of a neck between his thighs, felt the shik of a knife slotted home between two ribs.

“Two,” he said calmly. John blinked at him, a little stupidly. “I’ve killed two people.” He raised his hand again. “I could kill you.”

The desire was sudden, mad, intense. John looked so pitiful before him in his stupid helmet, red-faced and undignified, utterly the opposite of everything Dean had pictured all those times he’d dreamed of being taken back home by his glorious father, the King of Ateş Aşiret. Dean wanted to stamp out this version of John, give himself back the image he’d kept for so long… he wanted Cas to be safe, the Imiq to be safe, the innocent Ateşi warriors dragged into his father’s wars to be safe…

It was logical to kill him, thought a small part of Dean, as he stared into his father’s eyes.

“Dean?”

It made sense. He couldn’t hurt anybody anymore if he was dead. And Dean had killed before. He – he knew he could do it.

John’s gaze was steady. He was brave, Dean thought. Or maybe he just truly believed that Dean wasn’t even tempted to go through with it. For the first time in his life, Dean truly wanted to actively defy John’s expectations. Sam would probably thank him, too.

“Dean.” There was that voice again, interrupting his train of thought. Cas. Dean turned to look at him, his palm still raised, not even shaking.

“Don’t do this,” Cas said. “Not on my account.”

“He’s – he – Cas, he – he’s the one who…”

“He has done many bad things. But don’t kill him, Dean. Stop. Please.”

“Cas…” Dean swallowed, his hand wavering just an inch. Just one burst of fire, well-placed, would be enough… “Cas, it’s because of him that the dragons were hunted down. He murdered the family of your friend. Don’t you want him dead?” He paused, and then looked up to his right, where the dragon was standing with legs folded in close to its iridescent sides, watching the scene unfold. “Don’t you?” he said to it.

The dragon huffed out a curl of thick, greyish smoke.

“He is one link in a chain of events from long ago,” rumbled the dragon, startling the soldiers around it, sending several of them to their knees. “Killing him now gains me nothing from the past, and nothing for the future.”

Dean turned back to Cas, who only blinked at Dean slowly, his plea already heard.

Finally, Dean looked to Sam, standing with his eyes wide, gaze flickering between Dean and John and Dean’s hand. Dean caught his eye, and inclined his head in a question.

Sam hesitated for one long second. Two long seconds. Three.

And then, decisively, he shook his head.

Dean looked down at John. He could still do it. Even against the wishes of Castiel, of the dragon, of his own brother, Dean could still do it. He felt dizzy with choice. It would be so easy… and yet – and yet. There was something inside him, something stronger than the voice whispering to him, tempting him to do it. Something that told him that killing John would be the first step down a path from which he could never return. Something that told him that seeing the burnt-out corpse of the man he’d once idolised lying bloody and charred before him in the mud wouldn’t be a release, but rather a blot, a brand on his soul, a new set of chains.

Slowly, slowly, Dean lowered his hand. John let out a breath that Dean hadn’t realised he’d been holding.

“You’ll regret this, Dean,” John said, rolling upright with awkward indignity in his armour, and stamping wretchedly away.

For a moment, there was complete silence – and then the cold wind rolled down the mountain in a gentle, outward sigh.

Sam stooped, and picked up the crown that John had kicked away. He held it delicately, looking down at it for a moment, before turning to Dean.

“Your turn now,” he said, repeating John’s words, holding it out to his older brother with a strange, sad little smile on his face.

Chapter Text

Dean sat with Cas by his side, in a familiar world made strange.

A small fire flickered in front of them, and there was sand beneath their feet. It felt right, especially with Cas sitting next to him, their shoulders pressing together and their fingers intertwined, each of their bodies naturally paying attention to the other. If Dean looked only into the flames, listened only to the sparks and snaps of the fire, he could almost imagine that none of it had happened – not the forest, not the dragon, not the battle.

He could imagine that it had all been a hunger dream. Or maybe a nightmare.

But if he blinked and looked up, the illusion was shattered. All around them was the hustle and grumble of an army at rest, fires scattered over the sands with men and women gathered around them, chewing at their baked potatoes and tough, preserved meat. On their way back to Şehir, the army had stopped for the night at a small, ruined temple city, Başlangıç. The priests had been driven out years ago when they’d refused to stop practising firemaking, choosing to follow Yarım’s original law over the King’s and paying the price for it in blood. Now, the entire city of temples and obelisks and chapels stood empty, walls cracking and small lizards scampering over the steps.

Sam had asked Dean to stop here on the way home, since it was only a half-hour’s walk North of the Ateşi mouth of the Northern Pass, and he’d thought that the buildings could provide good shelter for the night. When they’d arrived, however, the soldiers hadn’t been keen to enter the ruined temples, and Dean understood why. He was eyeing up the suspicious rusty smears on door frames and columns just as much as the soldiers were.

Dean still wasn’t used to walking with them, a noisy rabble even when they were stepping in time, disciplined. And he also wasn’t used to Sam sitting at the same fire as him, staring into the flames as the evening peach of the sky turned slowly to darker blues and purples.

“Do they bother you?” Dean said to his brother. “The flames?” Sam jerked his head up, and smiled.

“No,” he said. “They never did.”

Dean nodded his head, squeezing Cas’ fingers absently as he thought hard.

“You know, you can probably do it too,” he said to Sam. When his brother looked confused, Dean held up his free hand; on the wrist, just below his palm, a faint tattoo of muted red and golden yellow could be seen. Dean summoned a spark of fire, and the tattoo glowed for a second, aureate lines running down his forearm and up to his palm.

“Show-off,” Sam said, and Dean felt Cas smile, next to him.

“You could do it too,” Dean said. “If you wanted.”

Sam was frowning, a light, cool breeze worrying at his long hair.

“No,” he said quietly. “Well, maybe one day. But for now…” he glanced around the soldiers nearest to them. Some of them were talking behind their hands, heads dipped, glancing over at Dean every now and then. “For now, I think we have to be careful. It’s been years since firemaking was legal and people have got used to hating it. And with the Kingship unstable…”

Dean waved his hand, shushing his brother into silence.

“Hey,” he said gruffly, “problems for later, OK? All that political crap can wait until we get back to Şehir.”

Sam knuckled his forehead.

“You know, Dean, when you’re in a position of power, everything you do is political. Dad understood that, even if he did use it wrong.”

Dean let that sink in for a moment, frowning down at the sand under his feet. He sent a glance over to his pack, leaning next to Castiel’s just outside the ring of light from the fire; inside it, John’s crown lay wrapped in a scarf. Your turn now, Dean.

John himself had been nowhere to be found when Dean and Castiel had gone to his tent, whilst Sam consulted with the barons about the best route home. The King had fled, possibly further into the Imiq Lands, or possibly back into Ateş Aşiret. Dean had a shrewd idea that his father might have made for the Southern Pass, and ended up at Walker Castle – but he had no desire to check out his hunch. Let him rot there, thought Dean. There was still an inch of pity, and another inch of care, in his heart for John Winchester – but two inches on a miles-long road of neglect wasn’t enough. Dean didn’t want to see John again for a very, very long time.

Of course, that left the question of the crown, and what would happen when they got back to Şehir.

Just as he had at every opportunity since John had thrown the crown down into the dirt on the mountain, Dean jerked his thoughts sharply away from the consequences. A small voice in the back of his head was telling him things he didn’t want to hear, things about responsibilities and duties and the fact that Cas probably wouldn’t want to live out the rest of his days in a palace in Şehir, surrounded by the stigma against his people and cut off by an expanse of desert from anyone who so much as spoke his language…

“So, wait,” Sam said, breaking into his thoughts. “You got up to the bit where you’d made it out of the Forest of the Dead – genius, by the way, Castiel, sending my brother down there instead of you when it was too dark to tell the difference anyway…”

Castiel seemed to consider a sharp retort, but decided to accept Sam’s evaluation with a little shameful tilt of his head.

“It was not my finest moment,” he agreed.

“In Cas’ defence,” Dean said, “I didn’t even realise myself until I was actually in the Forest, and I was the one actually walking into mortal peril, so… probably should have figured that out a little sooner.”

“Yeah, you think?” Sam said dryly, but with a smile. “But then, how’d you guys make it across the desert after that?”

Dean turned his head to look at Cas, who was smiling at him.

“Well,” Dean said, “we got lucky. We ran into one of the nomad towns. And, uh. It so happened that they had a circus. So we –”

“Dean,” Sam said, a delighted smile on his face, “please tell me you had to dress up as a clown to cross the desert. Please.”

Dean snorted, sending Sam a mock-exasperated sidelong smile.

“Are you kidding? The make-up would’ve hidden my natural good looks,” Dean said, raising a hand to his hair and primping it up. He heard Cas laugh softly beside him, and Sam grinned and rolled his eyes.

“So, what actually happened, then?” he demanded. “Did you just go to the circus for fun, or…?”

“Actually,” Cas said, “we fought each other. On stage.”

Sam’s eyes widened, just like they had when Dean had bought him his first atlas when he was seven. Dean couldn’t help smiling to see Sam like this again, bright-eyed and enthusiastic and – well, and kind of brilliant, too, though Dean would probably never tell him that. But he was brilliant, dishing out advice like he was some kind of eighty-year-old sage, not an eighteen-year-old boy. When you’re in a position of power, everything you do is political. Where did he learn that?

“- show you, if you’d like,” Dean zoned back in to hear Cas say, getting to his feet and pulling Dean up with him by the hand. “It’s a series of moves that we memorised, and learned to perform.”

“Sure!” Sam said, looking intrigued.

There wasn’t much space in between the fires, but with a little of Dean’s chivvying some of the soldiers shifted round to make room, forming a kind of loose circle of onlookers. Dean swallowed hard. It had been a while since they’d done this; getting ready to do it again felt like finding a pencil he’d lost after buying himself a fountain pen. When they’d done this every night, they’d been so desperate to touch, and this had been their crutch, their physical release. They didn’t need that anymore.

But it had been more than that, too, Dean thought, as he slipped off his pelerin and took up his stance. It had been fun, and it was entertaining to watch, he knew that much from the circus. He kept his tunic on, and so did Cas, even though the heat of the fires around them would probably put sweat patches down his back and under his arms. The thought of moving against each other like they did, half-naked and sweating, with all these people around them… it would feel more voyeuristic than Dean really liked to think about. The tunics didn’t make it completely better, but they helped. Dean was glad that Sam had been able to find them both new tunics, şalvar and pelerinler, after their own had been covered in mud and blood after the battle.

Cas dipped his eyes down and left, gaze shiny and hard in the firelight, a tight smile on his lips. Dean knew what that look meant, and smiled back. Cas wasn’t going to hold back. He wanted to win, Dean could read it in the tilt of his chin. And that meant that the glance down and left was probably a feint. If he had to guess, Dean would say that Cas was going to lead with Eleven, a quick upward jab to his face, followed by a kick to his stomach.

Dean released a soft, steady breath, letting the crowd fade. Güneş Yarısı’s fading light pressed its loving hands to his shoulders, his hair, his face. He arched into its warmth for a moment, enjoying the sensation – and then he looked at Cas and narrowed his eyes. I’m ready.

Cas rocked back on his heels, and then stepped forward, fast as a fox. Dean snapped up his arms to block Eleven’s upward jab – he’d been right – and spun away from Cas’ follow-up kick. It wasn’t hard to sink back into the rhythm that they’d always had beating between them, rolling from move to move, hearing not the little gasps and laughs of the crowd, but only the sighs of each other’s breath, in and out, smooth and steady.

Se’o sada, thought Dean. I see only you.

Cas’ elbow whirled towards his face, and he was almost seeing stars.

He parried, and riposted with a low, swirling kick that Cas leapt neatly, to scattered applause. Their pace increased steadily, the beat of their rhythm picking up as their heartrates thudded faster. Dean had almost forgotten how much he loved this, the press and remove of their bodies, the speed with which they could dance. Cas’ smile was bright, and Dean knew that he felt the same way.

Cas was the first to break, taking deep breaths as he asked for a respite with a tilt of his head, a blink. Dean pulled back, circling around Cas with a small, triumphant grin on his face. Score one to me.

Cas was standing with his hands raised, but not fisted – in fact, they were completely flat, fingers extended, just like they always were when Cas was –

Splash. Dean gave a little groan as a thin wall of cold, cold water collided with his back, splashing all down his tunic and his şalvar. The crowd around him was laughing, and Cas was standing with his hands loose by his sides, smiling with a glint of mischief as Dean dripped onto the sand. Cas raised one brow, and Dean narrowed his eyes. So, they were playing with elements, were they?

He snapped a flame to life in the palm of his hand, and the crowd around them went deathly still.

Dean passed it easily from hand to hand, feeling no pain. As the dragon had predicted, his firemaking skills had become far stronger after sharing a connection, and after summoning the lightning, too. The firemaker’s tattoo glowed down his arm, golden lines bright. The atmosphere was tense, taut with expectation. Dean looked to Sam, who was eyeing the crowd with a mixture of nerves and speculation.

Turning his attention back to Cas, Dean saw that he was getting back into stance, not missing a beat. He grinned, and Cas smirked back at him, reaching for the bottle at his belt. He drew out a thick globule of clear liquid, and Dean swallowed. No more thin walls of water taken from the air; if that hit him, it would hurt. Dean pressed his lips together in determination, eyes flicking over Cas, predicting his move.

This time, when they fought, they fought with ropes of fire and water dancing between their hands. Their perfect synchronicity never wavered, the tendrils of ice-tipped water snapped short by hot bursts of fire, and the searing lines of flaming heat always quenched by a well-placed fall of water. Cas was smiling as they fought, alert but not fearful, and the crowd seemed to pick up on his mood; they began to invest themselves in the fight once more, gasping and clapping and calling out encouragements to their favourite. An Imiq and a firemaker being supported by Ateşi soldiers, Dean had time to think. He never would have predicted this. He grinned, and poured himself into the fight. He never had to worry about hurting Cas through the soft, flexible walls of water, so he could hurl his full strength against them, putting on a light show that had the soldiers cheering and clapping.

After a while, his back was starting to tire, though, the muscles in his arms straining just a touch. It was time to bring the fight to an end.

Cas could sense it too, and the crowd as well; the end stages of the battle were drawing near. Water and fire were being thrown with more precision, more intent than before. A snake of water almost tripped Dean; he launched back a great wave of fire, which Cas doused with a waterfall, bringing his fist around in a sharp, brutal punch that almost connected with Dean’s left cheek. Fire and water clenched in their fists, Dean and Cas began a series of vicious, close hand-to-hand moves. Jab, jab, punch, block, swing, parry, jab… the crowd around them were shouting and clapping, Dean could hear his own name being called, and Cas’ too – he kept his focus tight, swing and a miss but Cas was off balance, and Dean’s own right side was too open but he swung up his left hand, the one with the fire in it, and pressed it to almost touch Cas’ cheek – victory!

Around them, the crowd were cheering and laughing. Dean only had eyes for Cas, who seemed strangely unbothered by the burn of fire close to his face.

Dean felt a tendril of water lick his cheek, and turned his eyes right. Clenched in Cas’ fist was a solid ice dagger, held almost against Dean’s skin. As Dean watched, the single shoot of liquid water that had touched his cheek was crystallised back to a fine, sharp point.

“Huh,” Dean said, looking back at Cas, not moving the perfectly-controlled flame in his left hand away from his face. “Call it a draw?”

Cas glanced to his right, and eyed the flame.

“Done,” he said, smiling at Dean. As one, they dropped their weapons – Dean extinguishing his flame, and Cas letting his dagger fall to the ground as water in a soft patter of drips and drops. Dean pressed his soft, empty hand to Cas’ cheek, and Cas followed his lead. They pulled each other in for a kiss, breaking apart quickly when the crowd around them catcalled and whistled good-naturedly. Dean reddened, smiling shyly. Cas, beside him, looked proud as he wound his hands into Dean’s.

“Not bad,” Sam said, grinning as he approached them. The soldiers around them began to go back to their fires, the entertainment over. “You learned all that since you went away?”

“I was already almost a savaşçı,” Dean pointed out with a little bite. “Let’s not forget. I had training.”

“Training in all the wrong things, apparently,” Sam said, running a hand through his long hair. “I’ve never seen you do anything like that when I came to your practices.”

“Yeah, well – well –” Dean said, trying to find some way to defend his original training, and failing. It was true, Cas had taught him more useful fighting stances and moves in one afternoon in a circus tent than he’d learned in his four years of training to be a savaşçı. The only good the training had done him was making his body lean and supple, ready to learn a better way to fight.

“Also,” Sam said more quietly, cutting under Dean’s stuttering, “nice job with the firemaking and watershaping, guys. That’ll be a huge deal when we get back to Şehir. All the soldiers here are gonna be talking about it. Hey, would you mind going round and talking to some of them? Just to… you know, show them you’re normal people, that firemakers and Imiq – I am saying that right, aren’t I? Okay, good – and Imiq aren’t monsters or anything…”

Dean glanced at Cas, and read the same feeling on his face that he felt, himself. A kind of sudden, heated sadness, a fullness-of-words, a desire to be alone.

“Sure thing, Sam,” he said. “We’re just gonna go for a walk first, though. Be back in a few, OK?”

“Oh, sure. No worries, take your time.”

Sam waved them away with a smile, heading towards another fire with a warm grin on his face. Dean watched him go with pride spreading warmth through his chest, before he cleared his throat and tugged on Cas’ hand, and led him away.

The streets of Başlangıç were utterly quiet, with sand blown over the pavements that were probably somewhere underneath, long since buried without the tending of the rahibeleri. Dean and Cas walked hand in hand through the maze, one temple much like another, one chapel the same as the next. Dean kept silent, wondering whether they could stay here forever if they just kept walking without words, round and round in a spiral of same same same. That was all he wanted, right now. Change was coming, and he wanted to fight it with everything he had; but there was nothing to pit his muscles against, nothing to try, nothing to rail at.

Time was rolling them forwards, and there was no way to battle it back.

Dean looked over at Cas, squeezing his fingers and smiling as best he could. He didn’t know what the future held for himself, or for Cas – and he was trying desperately hard not to be afraid, but he couldn’t help it. The promise of tomorrow loomed like a shadow, a great void of darkness that could swallow them up in its great maw, chew them up and then spit them out, split them up.

“Can we go inside one of them?” Cas asked, coming to a stop outside a chapel at the edge of a little square and tugging at Dean’s hand, peering through the half-open door. Dean hesitated, somehow not wanting to disturb the place, even though there were no rahibeleri left to chastise them – but Cas was already pushing through the door, and pulling Dean in after him.

Inside, the chapel was utterly still. The dying golden sunlight dripped down through a ruined roof, spilling like syrup over the pews, the altar, and the large, dark wooden box with two doors tucked away to one side, which Cas now approached.

“This is... we went into one of these,” Cas said, running his hand over the laquered lattice window in one of the box’s doors. “In the chapel at Şehir.”

“The Vefa,” Dean confirmed, smiling at him from the aisle, tiles sparkling pink and purple in the evening light.

“You wanted to know if you could trust me...” Cas said thoughtfully, flattening his face against the little window, trying to peer inside at the two cushions and the low table with candles beneath that would be set between them.

“I had pretty good reason not to,” Dean pointed out, his tone light and teasing. “You didn’t exactly come in radiating good thoughts and sunshine.”

Cas turned around to smile at him, his eyes glinting darkly from the shadows, kindness in the tilt of his head.

“We could do it again,” he said, tipping his head back towards the Vefa. “I’m not sure I radiate good thoughts and sunshine, even now.”

“Not really necessary,” Dean said, watching Cas making his way down the length of a pew; he stretched out his hand, just a little shyly, and Cas took it in his own. Dean let himself be drawn into Cas’ arms, breathing in the familiar scent, letting his chin dip down to rest against Cas’ strong shoulder. They stood in the centre of the aisle together.

“Are you sure?” Cas said. “I promise not to cheat and put the candles out with water.”

Dean snorted, and shook his head, bumping his cheek against Cas’ hair.

“I already know everything I need to,” he grunted softly. Above them, through the holes in the roof, he could see the last light tea-stains of yellow being washed out of the sky by night’s crystal dark waters. “I trust you.”

Cas pulled back, his hand coming up to cup Dean’s cheek.

“Then take that look off your face,” he said, frowning, his eyes looking as deeply into Dean’s as they always did. Dean shrugged awkwardly, dropping his gaze to Cas’ throat and swallowing hard.

“M’not making a face,” he mumbled.

“You are,” Cas said bluntly. “You’re looking at me like... like you’re scared, Dean. I don’t understand. You managed to do everything. You already saved the dragon, you saved my people and yours. There is nothing left to fear.”

Dean let out a shaky breath as Cas shifted his touch against Dean’s cheek, tucking his fingers under Dean’s chin instead and gently tipping his face upwards, trying to meet Dean’s eyes. Dean cleared his throat, wanting simultaneously both to take a step backwards, out of Cas’ arms, and also to bury his head in Cas’ shoulder and be held tighter than he’d ever been held in his life. He huffed a few quick breaths in and out, eyes flicking around the little chapel.

“Dean,” said Cas. “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”

Dean blinked hard, and managed to turn his gaze to Cas’. He shrugged again, his throat thick.

“It’s just... I don’t know, man, we’re just two normal people now,” he said, nerves making his voice hoarse. “When – when we were in the desert, it was you and me, no one else, and it was crazy. We were stuck with each other. But now...” Dean couldn’t seem to stop his shoulders rising and falling. Cas was still watching him silently, waiting for more. “Now, I... you don’t need me to fix the dragon, you don’t need me to help you across the desert, you don’t – there’s no reason for you to...”

Dean’s voice shivered and died, even as Cas took Dean by the shoulders, his grip almost painfully strong.

“You think I only stayed with you because I needed you to survive? Or to save my friend?” he demanded. “Dean.”

Dean opened his mouth to speak again, and then closed it, shaking his head.

“I love you,” Cas said fiercely, his voice low and growling. “I love you. Do you understand?”

Dean nodded, feeling dried-out and thin inside. Love, he thought. He understood what it meant to him, to Dean himself; it meant unswerving loyalty, it meant a happy ache in his chest, it meant permanency and hands gripped tight and eyes that didn’t turn away when it came down to the bone. But that was just him, just one way of experiencing love. Cas... Cas meant what he said, Dean knew that. But it was no certainty that Cas’ kind of love was the kind that would last, the kind that would decide to endure, that would choose to always keep coming back for more.

Cas dropped his hands away from Dean’s shoulders, laced his fingers through Dean’s, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. When he pulled away, Dean chased his mouth in a rush, suddenly desperate for the contact, for the taste, for the familiarity of Cas’ mouth moving against his own; for the reality and undeniability of physical need. He squeezed Cas’ fingers before dropping them and wrapping his arms around Cas’ waist, pulling their bodies tightly together. Cas let out a little hum in his throat against Dean’s mouth, making Dean’s lips tingle with the vibration. Dean’s shoulders relaxed as he slid his arms lower, his hands slipping down over Cas’ curved, muscled body. He found a grip on Cas’ firm thighs and, with a little grunt of effort, lifted him.

Cas wrapped his legs around Dean’s waist and let himself be held, his arms around Dean’s shoulders, pressing kiss after kiss to Dean’s wet, warm lips. Cas was a solid weight in Dean’s arms, a heat that encircled him – but it wasn’t enough, wasn’t enough, he needed to be closer, hotter, filled up completely until the fear inside him had no more room and simply disappeared...

Dean began to walk, carrying Cas up the aisle of the chapel. As they moved, Cas turned his attention to Dean’s neck, sending little gasping shivers up Dean’s spine as he kissed and kissed and kissed again, warm tongue drawing unhurried circles over skin, teeth nipping at the lobe of Dean’s ear. Dean took them past the pews, the last dregs of sunlight fluttering over Cas’ hair and his own arms. He reached the steps up to the altar and ascended them, carrying Cas; he stood before the sacred table, the shadows falling thicker than the dust. Gently, he set Cas down atop the altar, letting the heavy worked-stone table take his weight.

When he pulled back, Cas’ cheeks were flushed, his lips pink and open, his breath a little fast. Above them, Ayın Yarısı’s sly light squinted through the rafters and beams, painting Cas’ face in blues and darker blues.Dean leaned back in to kiss him once more, and then stepped down from the altar, leaving Cas sitting up there alone as he walked back to the front pew and reached down, pulling out kneelers from underneath the bench – cushions intended to soften the hardship of praying. These ones, kept in the front pew, should be used for prayer only by royalty or at weddings – but turning around to look at Cas, sitting on the altar, Dean couldn’t feel sorry. Cas was Dean’s royalty, his moon-haloed monarch; he was watching Dean now with undisguised hunger in his eyes, gaze tracing the lines of Dean’s shoulders, his stomach, his hips, as though able to see through his clothes to the soft pliancy of the skin beneath.

“Dean...” he said in his rockfall voice, fingers clenching the edge of the altar table, legs dangling off the side. “Come here.”

Dean gripped the cushions tighter in his hands and did as he was asked, stepping back up to where Cas was sitting and leaning against the table between his legs, pressing a hot, intent kiss to his lips. He placed the kneelers on the table behind Cas, who shuffled backwards, sending little clouds of thin dust rolling upwards into the air around him. Dean clambered up onto the table, his breath soft and his eyes filled with Cas, Cas, Cas, on the table in front of him, lying back with his head resting on a cushion, hands reaching upwards like a supplicant. Dean lowered himself down gently, his heart thudding strongly in his chest, whispers of need thrumming through his veins.

They kissed, and kissed, Ayın Yarısı rising ever higher above them. At first they were unhurried, comfortable in each other’s arms, enjoying the simplicity of your arm here and my hand there, then your lips there and my breath stuttering, then your leg my leg your leg my leg, a neat lattice of interlocked limbs – but then Cas rolled his hips forwards, grinding against Dean’s hip ever so slightly, and suddenly the hunger unrolled, unfurled, demanded. Soft touches turned to clutches, and Dean rolled Cas up on top of him, a leg on either side; Cas sat up, straddling Dean, pulling at his pelerin. The night was settling in, but there was still enough heat left over from the day to put a sheen of sweat over Dean’s skin as Cas began tugging off his own clothes, pelerin first, and then his tunic up over his head.

His own pelerin still caught around his elbows, Dean sat up, pressing a hand to either side of Cas’ naked torso and kissing along the skin of his chest, gently teasing one of Cas’ nipples into his mouth and swirling his tongue over it. Cas’ body tensed, his hips rolling once more. He groaned, his hands coming up to bury themselves in Dean’s hair. Dean sucked Cas’ nipple further into his mouth and gently pressed his teeth down, nibbling at the sensitive skin as he used his fingers to pinch and release the nipple on the other side. He felt Cas’ breath shudder, and his fingers tightened in Dean’s hair.

“D-Dean,” he moaned, almost a whisper, as Dean switched sides with his gaze always upwards, watching for the falling-open of Cas’ mouth, the lines of pleasurable tension in his neck. “Yes...”

Dean didn’t let up, his mouth kissing and sucking, loving every moment that he spent making Cas feel good. He reached up a hand and trailed his fingers along the front of Cas’ şalvar, feeling a single drop of pre-come sliding down the length of his own hard cock when he touched the outline of Cas’ arousal.

“Dean,” Cas breathed, “Dean, Dean –” He pressed a hand to Dean’s shoulder, forcing him back and away from Cas chest and then tugging almost angrily at Dean’s clothing. “Do you – do you have...?”

Dean reached into the pocket of his pelerin, and pulled out a slim, purple glass bottle. He grinned as he shook it victoriously.

“Broke my leg and about a thousand ribs,” he said, his voice low with lust and amusement. “But this son of a bitch survived. Yarim knows how.”

“I don’t care,” Cas said starkly, the humour barely seeming to register beyond his own immediate need. Yarim, whatever Dean had done to Cas had got him really worked up. Apparently his nipples were even more sensitive than Dean had realised. Dean pulled off his own pelerin and then ripped his tunic over his head, Cas sighing with happiness as he pushed Dean down to lie flat against the altar, the bare skin of his back singing against the coldness of the stone. Cas’ weight was gone for a moment, and another, and another – and then there was a tugging of material around Dean’s hips, and Dean looked up to see Cas, naked and kneeling, pulling off Dean’s şalvar with a look of reverence in his eyes.

“Cas – Cas,” Dean said, as Cas finished slipping the material off Dean’s feet and began to kiss his way up Dean’s legs, hands tracing patterns over his hot skin. Cas’ lips reached the inside of Dean’s thighs and Dean couldn’t help the way his legs rose into the air, his stomach twitching as he tensed and untensed, pleasure building up inside him as the anticipation grew and grew. His head still cushioned by the kneeler, Dean watched as Cas sucked a hard, deep kiss to the place where his thigh met his hip, and then in a swift, single motion, opened his mouth wide and swallowed down Dean’s cock.

Dean’s back arched and he almost cried out, but he bit his lip and swallowed the sound, remembering the rules of Cas’ mouth: no sound, or he stopped. Dean settled back onto the cushion, pressing his lips closed and trying to breath steadily through his nose. Cas was unmoving, Dean’s cock still inside his mouth, the head brushing against the back of his throat and making Dean twitch and sigh.

When Dean had control of himself and was silent, Cas began to move. He pulled up and down, and Dean watched him hollow his cheeks and suck as he rose, tugged a whine from Dean’s throat that was utterly involuntary. Cas’ eyes flashed up to Dean’s but he didn’t stop, his eyes falling closed as he wrapped his hand around the base of Dean’s cock, the fingers of his other hand sliding down to press against Dean’s rim. Dean’s legs were shaking, the swirl of Cas’ tongue and the lingering, firm touch of his finger as it pressed and rubbed almost too good for him to bear; as silent as he tried to be, a long, drawn-out whine escaped his throat again, as he felt heat building up in a way that was so good, so good, so familiar, he knew where this was going...

“C-Cas!” he gasped, threading his fingers through Cas’ hair and tugging. “Cas, wait – wait...mmmmmh...” Cas rose, Dean sighing as the warmth of his mouth was lost.

“Dean?” he said, using his thumb to wipe at a lick of wetness at the corner of his own mouth, his lips red and eyes shining. He laced his fingers through Dean’s. “Is everything alright?”

“Yarim... yes,” Dean rasped, regaining control of himself, reining himself back in. He’d been so close. “Just – just – I was gonna... I want you inside me, I want to come with you inside me.” He said it quickly, as though embarrassed about it – but Cas leaned forwards at once, and pressed a sweet, soft kiss to his forehead, making him blush even more.

“We can do that,” Cas said, his own voice throaty as he reached for the glass bottle and coated his index finger in the thick, clear liquid inside. Dean reached for the second kneeler that he’d picked up and canted up his hips, placing it under his ass as Cas settled himself, taking in the sight of Dean with his legs spread, his cock hard and flushed red, his mouth slightly open in anticipation.

“Ready?” Cas asked, taking Dean in hand and squeezing once, index finger stuck out, before sliding his touch down, down, and down, pressing against Dean’s rim. This time his slick finger slid easily inside, Dean muttering under his breath and trying to lie still, to slow down the wind of the coil of pleasure tightening inside him. Cas worked him open with tenderness and care, efficiently but lovingly, only occasionally reaching down to palm his own achingly hard cock when Dean let out a deeper groan.

When Dean was ready, his words coming out as broken curses and his skin salt-sweet with sweat, Cas poured the last of the glass bottle’s contents into his hand, slicked himself over with a rough sigh at the much-needed contact, and lined himself up. Dean, empty and gasping without Cas’ fingers inside him, pushed down a little, grinding his rim against the head of Cas’ cock.

“Dean,” Cas stuttered, reaching down to hold Dean in place, a firm hand on each of his hips, before pushing forwards. Both of them let out groans as Cas pressed inside Dean, his thighs trembling with pleasure and effort as he buried himself in slick, warm heat. Dean raised his legs into the air, wrapping them around Cas’ back, drawing him in closer, closer, nearer, and Cas leaned into it, laying down so that their chests were flush, his lips coming down to meet Dean’s in a surprisingly soft, sweet, slightly messy kiss. Cas gasped into it a little as he moved, hips rolling forwards ever so slightly.

Dean brought up his hands, holding Cas’ face steady to kiss him harder as Cas began to move more deliberately, building up a rhythm of gentle, tiny thrusts. They breathed into each other’s mouths, lips forming shapeless, lust-loose sounds, Dean’s eyes falling closed and his brow creasing as Cas continued to make only the smallest of snapping movements with his hips. Dean’s body was desperate for more, so much so that he had to stop himself from tensing up his hips, trying to fuck himself up onto Cas’ cock – but oh, he couldn’t demand more, because he wanted this to last forever: the heady pleasure of making love with Cas, soft and slow and desperately close, with the roof open to the heavens above them and the scent of each other surrounding them, a world of their own.

“I love you,” Dean murmured. “I love... I love you... don’t ever leave me.” The words tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them, spoken into the safety of the heat between their bodies. Cas didn’t give him time to regret them; he leaned forwards and kissed Dean, strong and deep, and began to move his hips a little more. His rhythm stayed torturously slow, achingly good, but now his cock was deeper inside Dean every time, starting to find the angles that felt good, good, good...

“Uhhhhh, yeah, Cas,” Dean groaned softly, his fingers shifting, raking down Cas’ shoulders. Cas shivered under the touch, and his rhythm stuttered for a moment before reasserting itself. “Love – love you so much.”

Cas leaned down and kissed Dean, moving too much for it to be neat, instead pressing his mouth to Dean’s lips, his cheeks, his chin, over and over.

“I love you, too,” Cas said, his voice a growl that made Dean moan beneath him. “I love you, do you understand?” Dean squeezed his eyes shut, trying to listen to Cas, trying to believe him. It – fuck, so good – it was all too good to be true. It couldn’t last...

Cas kissed him again, sloppy and warm.

“I love you so much and I need you, Dean, I... I... uhhhh. I need you,” Cas ground out, his hips circling. Dean’s gasps and grunts of pleasure were becoming more frequent, sweat starting to roll off his skin as all his muscles tensed with pleasure. “I need you. Always. To leave you would be to tear myself in two, Dean...”

Dean felt his breath stutter in his chest, his heartbeat thudding against his ribs. He gripped Cas’ shoulders more tightly as Cas upped the pace, pushing in and out of Dean with more determination, but still with that same care and strength of intensity; he looked into Dean’s eyes as he spoke, lips twitching down occasionally with a flick of extra pleasure as he caught the perfect angle.

“You said that you trusted me,” he said, his voice shuddering over the words. “So - mmmmmmm - trust me now, Dean. I swear that I love you, and that I will choose you, over and.... and over again.”

Dean tipped his head back, watching Ayin Yarisi watching them. He should be scared of that cruel gaze, but he couldn’t be, not with Cas all around him, not like this. Fearing the night would have to wait for later. He and Cas ground and pressed and clung to each other, not holding still in the dark, but moving rhythmically and without fear in the half-shadow, half-lunar light.

“I swear that I will not leave you.”

Dean’s hands travelled up to cup Cas’ face, his lips starting to tremble. Above him, Cas was watching from close up, his eyes sweeping in smooth curves over Dean’s face. He rolled his hips a little harder and Dean cried out, the sensation putting an arch in his back, a crease of pure pleasure on his brow.

“I swear that I will be beside you,” Cas murmured, breathless, “until my body fails and my mind is gone and the only memory that means anything at all to me is – is you, like this...”

Dean could feel his eyes brimming with wetness, born of the intensity of his pleasure, the power of Cas’ words, his love, his body...

“Cas...” he managed to get out, his mind awash and his heart ablaze.

“You are - burned into my soul with fire,” Cas growled against his cheek. “I will never love another the way that I love you.”

Dean gasped out a low, coarse sob, and a tear rolled down his cheek. He was getting close again, in a way that felt pure as the tide of the ocean – unstoppable, and cleansing, and so, so good...

“For better or for worse, I will be with you forever,” Cas said hoarsely. Dean looked into his eyes, and saw that Cas was weeping, too, a single tear track rolling down the line of the whitened scar down his flushed cheek. “And when we die and we are born again, I will look for you, Dean. And I will find you. And I will fall in love with you all over again.”

Dean grabbed Cas’ face and kissed him, just as Cas thrust into his prostate, throwing Dean’s eyes open and his brows up in unexpected bliss. Cas sucked a kiss to his neck, his pace unrelenting, now, his hips thrusting back and forth and back and forth, bringing them both to the very brink...

“Se’o sada,” he murmured huskily. “Dean, I love you. Do you understand?”

The look in his eyes was so passionate, so true, that Dean couldn’t doubt him. As certainty rushed through him, washing away his fears, so too did the peak of his ecstasy; he spilled between them, the clench and release of his muscles and his desperate, husky cry of Cas’ name enough to take them both over the edge together.

“I understand,” he said, when they’d untangled themselves and retangled themselves, arms wrapped around waists, legs one over the other over the other over the other. The dust hung around them in silver motes, shining in the moonlight like tiny stars with nothing between them but shadow. Dean swished his hand through the cloud; some of the specks swirled away from him, some of them crashed into each other, some of them disappeared out of sight. And one of them – Dean caught one of them between his finger and thumb.

“I understand,” Dean said softly, and Cas pressed a strong, loving kiss to the corner of his mouth. They lay in the lint of the broken city all night, with the stars above them and history all around them, breathing in and out their own little world of here and now and this and seeing nothing else, nothing at all, except for each other.

Se’o sada, was Dean’s last thought, before he fell asleep. Se’o sada.

Chapter Text

Dean stood on the balcony of the palace at Şehir, looking out over his city.

It was still beautiful to him, even now, when he’d seen mountains and forests and crystals and rainstorms and castles that rested on clouds. The houses were a thick, colourful jumble, misshapen and thrown together like children’s toys; the factories in the distant industrial district were curling out coils of smoke, old men with their pipes watching the rest of the city with bright fond eyes. Dean watched them with a smile on his face, a small one, with just a hint of sadness at the corners.

“It’s gonna be tough, being King,” said a familiar voice behind him. Dean’s smile widened as he turned to see his brother approaching, pushing through the wide open glass doors of his bedroom and joining Dean on the marble balcony. Sam came to stand at the ledge beside his brother, resting his elbows on it and looking out at Şehir. A slight breeze blew, ruffling his long hair and the gauzy white drapes tied to the column behind him.

Dean sighed, and nodded.

“Don’t you worry, Sammy,” he said. “You’re gonna do great.”

Sam turned to look at him, the afternoon light glinting off the thin golden circlet on his head.

“You think so?” he said, and Dean clapped his hand to Sam’s shoulder.

“I know it,” he said. “You’re perfect for this.”

Sam’s creased brow eased, and he offered Dean a bright, warm smile.

“Thanks, Dean.”

Dean squeezed his shoulder once before letting go, and looking back out at the city. The houses were one giant sprawling mess, but if he squinted, he thought he could see the road where Bobby and Ellen lived, in the distance. Home.

“What about you?” Sam said, a little tentatively. “What are you going to do now?”

Dean blew air out through his cheeks, and lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

“I hadn’t really thought about it,” he lied. “Maybe I’ll stick around here, or something. Bobby always needs work done.”

“You know, I could get you a retake on that Vigil,” Sam said. “If you still want to join the savaşçılar.”

Dean looked over at him quickly, frowning.

“You can do that?”

“Dean… I’m King.”

Dean stopped for a moment, and blinked out into the distance. He was going to have to get used to the fact that his brother had power.

He considered the offer for a second. He could rejoin savaşçı training, do the Vigil again, become a warrior… even live out on the road, just like he’d always wanted. What could be more perfect? He’d get to have his own savaşçı’s dagger, wear his own white pelerin…

They’re not all that amazing… beige ones provide better camouflage, said a little voice in his head. Dean swallowed a smile, and shook his head.

“Thank you, Sammy,” he said. “But… I think I outgrew that dream a little while back.”

“Left it out on the open road,” Sam said, in a mock-growling voice that had Dean shoving his shoulder good-naturedly. “Dean… you didn’t actually want to be King, did you?”

“Yarım, Sam, no. We’ve been over this. It’d tear me apart, trying to take care of all those damned people. I just got lucky that John disowned me right in front of everyone before he abdicated.” He grinned. “Besides, like I said. You’re perfect for this.”

Sam nodded, his brow wrinkling. Dean tilted his head, and then realised that he was doing it just like Cas always did. The thought made him smile.

“Hey,” he said aloud. “I know that look. What are you plotting?”

Sam glanced up at him, a little guiltily.

“It’s – it’s nothing. Well, I mean, it’s something, but… it’s just an idea. Based on what you told me about how Cas taught you to fight better?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Dean said. “Totally whipped my ass at first. What about it?”

“Well, it’s just, you were going to be a savaşçı, right? An elite warrior, best of the best. You were passing all your training exams at the top of the class. But you had your ass handed to you when you got into the field.”

“Okay. Nice nutshelling,” Dean frowned. “Is this supposed to be going somewhere, or…”

“Dean, I don’t want to start any wars,” Sam said earnestly. “But I also want to be able to say that our warriors can hold their heads up next to the elite from any other nation. But all the teachers are so steeped in their old ways... I’m thinking of overhauling the whole system.”

Dean’s eyebrows were raised high, his mouth open.

“That… is ambitious.”

“It’s common sense,” Sam said. “Warriors aren’t good enough? Train them better. And – I can’t think of anyone more worthy to train them, than you.”

If Dean had looked surprised before, he was now utterly agape. He stared at Sam, waiting for him to grin, to punch him in the shoulder, to tell him he’d been had… but no. Sam looked completely serious, waiting for Dean’s response.

“Sam, I’m – I’m twenty two, I can’t run the savaşçılar…”

“You’ve been further and survived more than most of the savaşçılar who taught you,” Sam pointed out. “You’ve been taught fighting techniques that actually work in close hand to hand combat.”

“I… I…”

“There’s a city on the mountain border,” Sam said. “Don’t know if you know it. North of the passes. It’s calledBaşlangıç.I thought, if you went there… set up an academy… it’d be a clean break for the savaşçılar. You could train them in mountain terrain, as well as in the desert.”

Dean gawped at his in silence for a second, trying to fit the idea into his head. It was huge, it was incredible.

“You’ve really thought about this,” he said. “You think I could do it.”

“I do,” Sam said earnestly. “Dean, if I can be King, you can head up the savaşçılar. I gotta say… this is partly selfish. It would be good for me to have the strongest warriors in the country under the hand of someone I know that I can trust.”

Dean nodded.

“Smart,” he said, and Sam grinned.

“I am,” he said. “But it wasn’t just my idea.”

Dean frowned at him for a moment, and then his brow cleared.

“Cas?” he said, and Sam nodded.

“He pointed out that it could be, uh, ‘advantageous to have the strongest military forces in the country completely under my control,’” he said, with a smile. “He’s really got his head screwed on. I can see why you like him.”

Dean grinned, ducking his head down so that his brother couldn’t catch the way he was reddening slightly.

“So, wait. He’s OK with the whole thing?” he asked. “Even training the savaşçılar? He doesn’t see it like… he’s helping the enemy?”

Sam shook his head.

“He told me that he doesn’t see me as the enemy,” he said. “And that he wanted to help me. He was talking about loyalty a lot. Said he wasn’t loyal to a country, but to a person.” Sam blinked over at Dean, smiling ever so slightly. “I think – don’t take this the wrong way, but I think Cas likes you, man.”

Dean punched him lightly on the shoulder with a smile, thinking.

“So what do you say?” Sam said. “Başlangıç?”

Dean barely had to pause.

“Başlangıç,” he confirmed. “And you’d better radio every day to tell me how things are going here.”

“About that,” Sam said. “Actually, I’m working on something better than the radio relay system. I was talking to Bobby last night, and he was talking about wires, and how they can carry sound if you use…” he waved his hand, dismissing it. “I’ll tell you another time.”

“No, wait, that sounded interesting –”

“C’mon, Dean, you have to go tell Cas about the plan. He’ll be waiting to hear your answer, he knows I was gonna ask you about it this afternoon.”

“Really?” Dean said, lifting his arms off the balcony and taking a step back. “So I can…”

“No more bureaucracy for you today,” Sam said, turning to grin at him. “Go home. Tell your boyfriend you’re taking him to the land of far, far away.”

“Shut up,” Dean said, unable to keep the smile off his face. He turned, and Sam called after him.

“See you for dinner?”

“See you for dinner, Sammy,” Dean called back, over his shoulder. “Little bitty boy King.”

“OK. Remind me to kick you for that one later!” Sam shouted, laughing, as Dean ran through the glass doors and out of sight.

He pelted through the palace. They’d only been back in the city for a day, and it had been a manic flurry of papers and ceremony and a swift but impressive coronation. Dean felt as though he hadn’t touched the floor, they were moving so fast.

He hared around a corner, and almost careened right into Jo, who was walking with her nose in a sheaf of documents. Grabbing her shoulders, Dean pulled her into a giant hug, making her yell with laughter and wriggle furiously out of his grip.

“Dean!” she said, as she was released. “I’m guessing Sam told you the plan?”

“Did everyone know except for me?” Dean asked, grinning at her. He’d barely seen her since they’d returned to Şehir, and he hadn’t got over how good it was to be around her again.

“Pretty much,” Jo said airily, smiling back at him. “Sam told me because, you know, I am a savaşçı. One of us managed to pass the Vigil. So once you’ve set up the academy out in Başlangıç, I’ll be coming down with all the trainees to lend a hand.”

“You will?” Dean said, feeling a tide of relief sweep over him. The idea of setting up his own training school seemed a lot less daunting when he added Jo to the picture; he could just see her, hands on hips, telling everyone what to do and radiating authority without even trying. “Oh, thank Yarım.”

“Flattered,” said Jo, with a wink. “What are you even still doing here? Go tell Cas! Who is awesome, by the way,” she added. “Like, seriously. Can I be his friend forever?”

“You’ll have to ask him,” Dean said, beaming. It gave him a light, brilliant feeling in his chest when other people spoke well of Cas. He turned to go, and then pulled back at the last moment.

“Jo…” he said, and she stopped, too, looking back at him. “You know, that thing… you remember when we were younger, and you were in that meyhane, and you were firemaking, and I… I said some things…”

“I remember,” Jo said, her eyes darkening just a little.

“I just – I wanted to say how sorry I am. I always have been, ever since all that shit came out of my mouth.” he swallowed hard, but he wanted to get this off his chest, once and for all. “I was so wrong to yell at you like that. I wish I could’ve said sorry sooner, I was just…”

Jo held up her arms, and pulled Dean into a tight hug, her head tucked under his chin. Dean kept stammering for a few moments, and then stopped, squeezing her tightly.

“I always knew you didn’t mean it,” she said, her voice slightly muffled against his new, dark pelerin. “Seeing that must have brought back some horrible memories. I never blamed you for what you said. And I always meant to apologise, too, for putting you through that, but…”

Dean pressed a quick kiss to the top of her head, and nodded.

“I know,” he said. They pulled apart, both a little embarrassed. Jo punched him in the shoulder, and grinned.

“See you for dinner?” she said, and Dean nodded, smiling.

“See you for dinner,” he replied, and turned, and ran on through the palace, down flights of stairs, out into the sunshine. He ducked into the streets of Şehir, his feet following a path that he knew like the back of his own hand. He was going home.

*

“Cas!” Dean called, as he pushed open the door. “Cas, you here? Oh, hi, Ellen,” he said, as she poked her head out round the door to the kitchen with a smile on her face. “Cas around?”

“He’s upstairs,” she said, looking surprised but pleased when Dean pulled her into a hug. “I was just going over to the shop to take Bobby some keşkek. Want some?”

“Later,” Dean said, letting go and heading for the stairs. “Thank you!”

“See you for dinner!” Ellen called back, and Dean heard the front door slam as she closed it behind her. He vaulted up the steps, leaping them two at a time.

“Cas!” he called. “Cas, you awake? You better not be napping, I will sit on you –”

The door at the end of the light, airy hall banged open, and Cas came running through it; Dean had a brief vision of a bare chest and loose red şalvar before Cas was leaping into his arms, sending him stumbling, only just catching his balance by spinning them around.

“Cas, you crazy idiot, we could’ve fallen down the – mmm –” he was cut off as Cas pressed a firm, warm kiss to his lips, holding Dean’s face with both hands, smiling as Dean continued to spin them slowly.

“It wouldn’t have mattered,” he said, trailing his lips over Dean’s cheek as he spoke. “You and I are good at falling.”

Dean pulled back with a frown on his face.

“Was that a reference to the time we fell off a dragon and I broke my leg and you almost died?” he said. “That is very distasteful.”

Cas laughed, his eyes crinkling, such a rare sound that Dean couldn’t help but lose his teasing frown and smile too, reaching up for another kiss.

“Did Sam talk to you about…”

“About the crazy plan you hatched without my knowledge? Yeah, he told me all about it,” Dean said, starting to walk them back towards his bedroom. He enjoyed seeing the look of trepidation on Cas’ face for a moment, and then relented, and grinned. “I’m in.”

Cas went still, his hands still resting on either side of Dean’s face.

“You are?” he said softly.

“Are you kidding? It’s perfect,” Dean said. “We get to live together, near the mountains, near the dragon and its egg – holy shit, do you think we’ll get to see it hatch?”

“Probably,” Cas said, beaming, as Dean went on enthusiastically.

“And we’ll get to train the new savaşçılar, and maybe take a few trips, you know, to the forest, to the caves…”

Cas’ kiss was longer and deeper this time, and when he pulled back, his eyes were sparkling. Dean walked through the door to his bedroom, and dropped Cas down onto the springy mattress, sliding down to sit next to him and thread his hands through his hair.

“I love you,” said Cas softly, and Dean pulled him in, kissing him strong and sweet and passionate.

“I love you too,” Dean murmured, looking into his eyes and seeing that look in them – the intensity, the depth, the strength, the heart. The look Dean had fallen for in the forest, that he never wanted to lose. That he’d fought to keep, and won.

It had always been that way, between them.

It had always been Se’o Sada.

And it always would be –

Forever.

Chapter Text

Ateş Aşiret (A-tesh a-SHI-ret) – the country of Dean’s birth

Ateşi (a-TESH-i) – native to Ateş Aşiret

Ayın Yarısı (ay-IN ya-RISS-uh) – the moon, believed by the Ateşi to be one eye of their goddess, Yarım

çocuk (CHO-chuck) – child, son

efendi (eh-FEN-di) – master, sir

fahişeler (fa-HEE-sheh-lehr) – prostitutes

Güneş Yarısı (GOO-nesh ya-RISS-uh) – the sun, believed by the Ateşi to be one eye of their goddess, Yarım

Imiq (IM-ick) – Castiel’s people, a conglomeration of tribes living to the west of Ateş Aşiret; also, as an adjective, native to the Imiq

keşkek (KESH-kek) – a hot Ateşi stew

pelerin (pe-LEHR-in) – an Ateşi jacket, usually thick and designed for desert travel

pelerinler (pe-LEHR-in-ler) – plural of pelerin, see above

rahibe (rah-HEE-beh) – a priestess in the Ateşi church

rahibeleri (rah-HEE-beh-lehr-i) – plural of rahibe, see above

Se'o sada (SEE'-oh sah-DAH, apostrophe denoting a glottal stop between ‘see’ and ‘oh’) – an untranslatable Imiq (see above) phrase, signifying a special human bond

şalvar (SHALL-var) – loose, light Ateşi trousers

satranç (SAT-ranch) - an Ateşi board game, based on strategic thinking and tactical manoeuvring

savaşçı (sa-VASH-ah) – an Ateşi knight, warrior

savaşçılar (sa-VASH-ill-ar) – plural of savaşçı, see above

Şehir (sheh-HERE) – the capital city of Ateş Aşiret

Vefa (VEFF-ah) – the box in an Ateşi church in which the truth of a person’s soul is tested by the fire of Yarım

Yarım (YA-rihm) – the goddess of the Ateşi church