Chapter Text
“These damn witches man,” an unhappy voice grumbled, the man snatching a bottle of beer from the fridge before sinking into one of the nearby chairs. His grumpy mumbling went on while he ignored the stinging of the cuts and bruises littering his face, the blossoming pain in his leg and the burn wound on his shoulder from where the witch in question had violently fought against him. Not even the taste of his favorite beer—or any alcohol for that matter—could lift his mood, and he barely even registered the two figures finally sitting down in the chairs across from him.
The tallest of the three tipped back in his seat, momentarily resting his arm over his closed eyes and dragging a deep sigh through his lungs. It was late at night and they had barely gotten any sleep, having driven for hours on end just to make it back home to the bunker as quickly as possible. For it was the only place where they felt truly safe.
Not that the man clad in a trench coat needed any sleep. He was the most aware of the three, reaching two fingers over to the lanky man beside him to brush them against his forehead in a quick gesture. For a second pleasant warmth spread through his fingers, dancing like sparks on his skin, before settling into the body and easing the pain of an earlier hunt.
“Thanks, Cass,” came the usual, but no less grateful reply spoken through yet another tired sigh.
Without waiting for any refusal—nor accepting any—he leaned across the table to the most battered of the three. As always he took the brunt of the damage, throwing himself in harms way whenever possible with no regard for his own well being. And if it came badly he would go as far as to refuse any healing, morbidly thinking he deserved the pain.
It was a disaster, really.
“Cass—“ an arm weakly tried to hold onto the angel, but he effortlessly brushed past, face tainted with frustrated worry before his palm finally came into gentle contact with the man’s forehead. A warning wince erupted from the man in question.
“Dean,” Cass replied to the noise, voice stern, and immediately a comfortable warmth rushed through his hand, spreading through Dean’s body and engulfing him like a heated blanket. The man couldn’t help but slightly lean into the angel’s touch as all pain left him, fled his body like someone receiving an eviction notice—yet as sudden as it appeared, the soothing feeling left soon after as Cass withdrew his hand.
“...Thanks.”
The silence that followed was only interrupted by incessant writing on parchment.
“Sam,” Dean spoke up, hint of a smile gracing his tired face, “What’re you writing? Can’t your nerd things wait ‘til tomorrow?”
At that Sam threw him a look so indescribable but somehow all-telling that even Cass could easily detect it as one of the ‘bitch-faces’ Dean was always describing with a grin tugging fondly at his lips.
“If you have some sort of incredibly great memory hidden from me, then by all means—write it down for me tomorrow.”
From what Cass had gathered over the years such bickering was normal for the Winchester brothers. While the angels, despite technically being siblings and constantly addressing each other as such, had never seen the need to indulge in such banter, at least the archangels seemed to have their own moments of surprising, incredibly humanlike sibling-ness. Being a mere angel, Castiel in particular had never really been one to participate. At least not until he had met the Winchesters.
Sam was grinning now, too, only amplified by the fact that he had almost managed to fall asleep in the car twice, yet somehow always immediately woke up before his head even had the chance to hit the window.
“Cass, how are you feeling so far?” Sam spoke up once more, piercing the angel with an analytical gaze that only slightly seemed off as his eyes continued to droop closed against his will, “Is whatever the witch did showing any reaction?”
Dean perked up from behind his bottle, decidedly taking in Castiel’s condition along with Sam and he couldn’t help but falter under their intense stare. For a moment he closed his eyes, trying to let his grace pick up on anything that might potentially seem wrong inside of his body, feeling the cooling energy rush through every blood vessel, every cell, everything.
“There might be a little,” he grasped for the right word, eyes looking at the ceiling to not notice their worry, “Disturbance.”
It almost felt to be coming from his chest, even though the pain he had felt upon getting hit had completely subsided.
“I can’t quite place it, but otherwise I am alright.”
Looking back down their concern only seemed to have intensified, even though it seemed they were much too tired to form proper, coherent thoughts—at least for the rest of the night.
“Why don’t the two of you go to sleep while I write down what we have discovered?” Castiel offered instead, changing the topic and gently prying the pen out of Sam’s hand before he could even just think of refusing.
“...I’d keep you from sitting here alone in the library for god knows how long writing this down—“ Dean began thinking more clearly about whether Cass was indeed alright, before he got interrupted by a yawn crawling up his throat— “But I’m far too tired and I know you don’t sleep.”
He pushed himself out of his chair, groggily starting to stand.
“So, see you in the morning.”
Cue another bitch face from Sam at Dean—Cass was getting better at deciphering them. Apparently Sam had deemed his brother to have been acting tactless and rude. Or it just meant that he needed a visit to the lavatory judging by the tension in his features. Castiel wasn’t sure; he wasn’t immune to error after all.
With a shift in his seat Sam turned to him, giving him a firm pat on his shoulder and uttering words of gratitude before stumbling onwards after his brother like a zombie. Cass was merely glad that they were going to get some rest.
Shifting his focus back to the half written page in front of him, he regarded the wobbly handwriting with narrowed eyes. The ‘l’s were almost too loopy if not to say ‘sloppy’, and Sam had managed to forget more than half of the dots meant to mark the ‘i’s, as well as written across the lines in a rather concerning amount of instances. The entire paper had more the feeling of a children’s letter, despite the gruesome deeds hidden behind almost illegibly scrawled words.
Picking up a new sheet of paper Cass began transcribing Sam’s messy notes in something readable before adding on, reminiscing what they had found out as it played before his eyes: The musty ground before the witch’s hidden entrance leaving wet soil sticking to all of their soles, the faint flowery scent upon entering through the creaky door, mixing with the stench of wither and decay in an almost morbid sense.
Life versus Death.
Flowers, sign of beginnings and growth, birth and life versus corpses, epitome of endings and stagnation, of rot and death. The world shifted into focus as Castiel remembered the book; an old tome draped in old and worn leather with its cover clad in yellow. It seemed odd now, how a book for witches, old manuscript about curses and the sort could be wrapped in such a happy, lively color.
He shrugged the thought off and wrote, pen flawlessly gliding across the paper to capture their latest adventure. Sam had wanted to implore more about the book, being almost unbelievably curious about its contents, but the witch had arrived too early, snatching it from their wary eyes. Now only the memory of it remained as it went up in flames, together with the witch. There was a symbol on the front, he remembered, drawn in sharp, inky black, carved into the yellow and Castiel gave his best to copy the rune the way he saw it in front of his eyes.
Considering the sheer amount of symbols already ingrained in his brain over millennia of experience, what was one more? Even though he was surprised he had not yet seen it. From what it appeared, it seemed to have slight touches of asia—perhaps its origin?
He placed the quill down with a careful flick of his wrist, a wince striking his body as his mind once more strayed to today’s encounter. More specifically, to the spell that had hit his body head on. Instantly he remembered the way he had felt his lungs momentarily refrain from working, feeling a sudden, inexplicable urge to cough, to claw at his chest. Something had seemed to weigh heavy within him, as if he had been dumped under masses of water or laid down to rest under tons of concrete. An Angel of the Lord, once thought invincible now momentarily being rendered useless by a mere witch’s spell?
Previously deemed completely unthinkable.
Dean had immediately yelled his name in sudden shock, cocking his gun and aiming a few couple of witch-killing bullets at the person’s head until one had finally hit, his aim off due to his head swimming with pain, blood dripping down his cheek while he clutched his shoulder in obvious agony through grit teeth. Sam wasn’t quick enough to rise from his crumpled up position on the floor thanks to his injuries, barely even managing to try and tear the book from the witch’s clutch before it got engulfed in flames by the sorcerer’s own hand. As if to ensure that whatever had hit Castiel was to stay for forever—whatever it was. Because soon after the flames had died down, once silence had encased them like a heavy blanket, the pain swelling in his chest had dissipated and his breathing had returned to normal as if there had never been a problem at all.
Still, the Winchesters kept asking him for his well-being, throwing him into the back of the Impala and immediately driving off, refusing any healing until they were home and safe. Even though he had repeatedly stated that he was fine throughout the entirety of their trip.
Dean had insisted to drive and Cass had reached over in his seat in the middle of him driving to at least cure his head injury, despite Dean’s hands furiously swatting at his firm grasp. At least the drive went more smoothly afterwards—less swaying into the wrong lane, which Sam didn’t even pick up on as he was halfway out of it in a desperate attempt to sleep.
Now that he thought of the witch, a slight scratch appeared in the back of his throat he was quick to write off. A glass of water, he decided, standing and trudging over to the kitchen with purposeful steps, light growing faint behind him as he relied on his ability to find his way around the bunker in the dark.
A glass of water might be nice.
——————
A glass of water hadn’t been enough.
He was still clearing his throat periodically, even as Sam and Dean finally emerged from their sleep, entering the library with mugs filled with steaming hot coffee in their hands. Sam’s look immediately turned worried once his eyes fell on the angel who had his hand in front of his mouth as he tried to suppress the further urge to cough.
“Everything alright man?” Dean was the first to speak though, setting down his mug on the table and falling into the chair across from Cass like a bag of flour, green eyes filled with concern. Seeing an angel struggle for breath must be an odd occurrence, Cass could only agree with the notion as his lungs gave a suspicions jab he tried his best to ignore. Worrying the brothers didn’t help anyone for one, and he could very well live without Dean’s concerned eyes almost desperately trying to catch his own.
“Yes,” he easily replied, “I’m fine.”
There was silence in which they most likely caught onto his lie, thoroughly gauging his condition and apparently not finding enough of immediate danger amiss, before Sam finally settled into the chair between Cass and Dean at the end of the table. Castiel quietly slipped the piece of parchment of last night over to Sam and watched as he skimmed it with a certain hint of academic scrutiny, watched Sam skim it if only to distract himself from Dean’s still disbelieving frown pulling at his features, yearning for attention in the corner of his eyes.
“Thanks, Cass,” Sam said, giving the paper a firm pat before picking it up, rising in his seat and walking away with a wave of his phone in hand.
The angel only stared at the man’s retreating form, almost refusing to look at Dean as he refused to find any sort of pity in his eyes. But gravity made him look over once more, inwardly easing a released sigh out of his scratchy throat as he noted the man to open his laptop, clacking away on the keys. The noise was a welcomed distraction, filling the silence of the room in a way that fortunately didn’t grow awkward in the slightest.
Soon Sam returned, letting the paper sink back onto the table before taking refuge in his former seat. Placing both hands on top of the parchment, intertwining them, he pressed his lips into a firm line before he opened his mouth to speak, “I gave Rowena a call, sent her a picture of the rune. She said she’ll look further into it.”
His mouth turned into a quick grimace not devoid of fondness while he added on, “Though she might want something of us in exchange later.”
“Obviously,” Dean grumbled, taking another sip of his coffee, probably to chase away the remnants of far too much alcohol of the day prior mixed with a terrible sleep schedule Cass noted down for further investigation in the back of his head, “Woman does nothing from the kindness of her heart.”
The itch in his throat persisted and he irked to distract himself by addressing Sam.
“Did you find another case for us yet?”
The man turned slowly in his seat, raising an eyebrow, but before he could speak Dean piped up with a chuckle easing out of his mouth.
“Eager for another hunt?” he asked, reaching over the table to give the angel a firm pat on the shoulder, “Seems our enthusiasm is finally bleeding onto you.”
Castiel could only give the tiniest hint of a smile as he watched Dean, felt the reassuring weight of his hand spreading warmth along his arm, momentarily forgetting about his worries.
“I did, actually,” Sam piped up with a triumphant smile, waking his phone screen to reread the gist of the case he had discovered, eyes narrowed against the sharp glare of electricity, “Three hour drive from here, nothing special—most likely a couple of werewolves.”
“At least not another witch,” Dean dragged out in a sigh, sinking into the back of his chair after he had let go of Castiel’s shoulder. Even Cass was surprisingly relieved to not immediately go after another witch after last night’s encounter. Watching Dean take another sip of his coffee and feeling a jab of agony surge up like a fire burning bright in his chest he wondered if he could take another of these curses.