Chapter Text
Something sharp was digging into his left side. He opened his eyes into a squint, his vision blurry, and felt blindly towards the object. He picked it up and studied it close to his face. It was steel, wrought in the shape of a sailboat. Dean’s mind flickered to an image of his five-year-old self playing with a wooden version, as John and Mary smiled at him from the nursery door. It was a painful thought. Dean put the steel boat down and attempted to stand. He felt exhausted, like he hadn’t slept in weeks, and his head was pounding, right behind his eye. He was standing in the middle of a very large junkyard. Steel and rubbish littered the ground in steep towers, the path between each one small and winding. He could not remember how he had arrived at this place. He felt sick and confused. He didn’t know where he was, or why he was here. He just wanted to go home…
“Lisa?”
A girl was stood in the clearing. She was smiling at him with soft, pink lips. Her brown hair was long and fell down her shoulders, and her eyes—chocolate brown—were glittering at him as she let out a soft giggle. Who else did he know with eyes like hers?
“Hello, silly,” she said, approaching him.
“L-Lisa,” he stammered, “are you real?”
“Of course I’m real,” she said, laughing again. She held out her hand and took Dean’s in it. He was shaking, but the firmness of her grip steadied him slightly, and made his head hurt a little less. “Come on, get your feet out of the dirt.”
He followed her through the piles of junk and steel. She was wearing that perfume he liked, and it filled his nostrils, reminding him of better times.
“Where are we going?”
“You need a good old rest, you do,” she said, glancing around. “You look exhausted.”
“I guess I am kinda tired.”
“Of course you are!” she said loudly. “Look,”—for they had come across a white-painted door which she opened swiftly with a twist of the doorknob, “I even made your bed for you! Now, don’t tell me that doesn’t look tempting.”
They were standing in his bedroom, an old room with a cracked ceiling and peeling walls, decorated sparsely with second-hand furniture that had been donated to the Winchesters from kindly neighbours and grudging relatives. He did not know why, but standing in his room now filled him with something that instantly lightened his entire body. His hands stopped shaking, and the pain behind his eye disappeared. He looked at the bed, as Lisa had pointed. He was tired. So tired, he could barely stand…
“I guess a five minute nap couldn’t hurt.”
He fell on to the bed heavily, and within an instant he was asleep. It was a good sleep, dreamless at first. The only thing playing in his mind was a void of black, bottomless and expansive, but comforting all the same. After a while, Dean saw pictures, heard voices, but nothing he could decipher fully. When he opened his eyes again, he felt a wonderful sense of tranquility and stillness. His bed was warm and his room was light and familiar. Lisa was sat at his desk, combing her long hair with her fingers and humming a beautiful song that he swore he had heard somewhere before.
“Lisa,” he said.
She turned around, smiled at him widely. She was so beautiful.
“Hello, silly,” she teased, getting up and sitting by him. “Enjoy your nap?”
“I had the… weirdest dream,” he said, his voice gruff from slumber. “Where’s Sammy?”
“He’s in his nursery,” Lisa said, her voice gentle and reassuring, “and your dad’s out with Caleb, don’t you remember?”
“Yeah…” Dean said slowly, his mind still foggy. He had been late getting home tonight. John had been angry—drunk again, and he had stormed into Sam’s room afterwards, the storm so loud and heavy against the nursery window. “I was… so angry with Sammy,” he continued. “He took something from me. He wouldn’t stop crying… I wished… I wished…”
“Hell-o,” Lisa called kindly in a sing-sing voice, “earth to Dean.”
His thoughts were fragmented, shielded behind fog. He looked at Lisa, the only thing that seemed real, and remembered just how much he had missed her.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry for a lot of things. I didn’t mean to stop calling. It’s not that I stopped liking you—”
“Hey.” She put a hand on his knee to shush him. “You’ve been through a lot. I mean, the fire, your mom. I’m not angry. I knew you’d come back to me, once you’d had some time.”
He took a hold of her hand and squeezed it.
“All I want is to be normal, Lisa,” he said in a whisper. “I want my dad to stop drinking. I want this house to feel like a home. I want someone I can be myself with, who won’t ask impossible things of me. I just want this pain to get a little smaller.”
“Hey… hey.” She was stroking his face now, her fingers light and cold.
“I know things seem hard now,” she said, “and the world can’t fix itself in a day. But I’m here, Dean, I always have been. And I always will.”
It was the only thing he had ever wanted to hear. He stared into her, could feel himself melting and becoming warm for the first time in this derelict house. Her hand was still on his. He took it, kissed her fingers, breathed in the scent of her perfume. She moved from across the bed, closing the space between them. She put her mouth on his, very softly. His lips felt sore and pillowy, as if they had already been kissed. He didn’t mind the pain; she was being gentle, and after a few moments, she pulled away, placing her forehead against his and breathing smoothly through a smile.
They sat like that, together, calmness washing over him in waves. He would have stayed like that for the rest of time, but the haziness of his dream had him stirred. Something told him he needed to see Sam, just to be close to him, and tell him he was safe—that they were both safe.
“Where are you going?” Lisa asked, as he pulled himself away and got to his feet.
“I’m gonna check on Sammy,” he said, walking towards the bedroom door.
Lisa stood up, quickly, and shielded herself against the frame. Dean frowned at her, but she was smiling sweetly, that same kind look in her eyes.
“He’s sleeping,” she assured him, “there’s no point going to his room now. Stay with me, Dean, I’ve missed you so much.”
She moved away from the door and enveloped herself in him, hugging him tightly. When he looked at her again, the kindness had gone from her eyes. She was teasing him from under her lashes, biting her lip—her expression wilting and full of need.
“I can’t tell you how much I think about you,” she said then, her voice low and silky. “Especially at night, when I’m alone in my bed…”
She kissed him again, and any thought of Sam disappeared. They collapsed on to the bed, their legs locked together, their hands running through each others’ hair. Dean ignored the pain and kissed her harder, desperate to get closer, to show her that the fire had not completely destroyed him.
He pulled off her top, unbuckled her bra with hasty clumsiness. He brought his lips to her chest, leaving kisses across her rosebud breasts. Lisa sighed from above him, tilting her head back so her long brown hair fell down her shoulders and tickled his cheeks. He had wasted so much time being angry, Dean thought, that he had forgotten what was important, the people who had been waiting for him all this time. He brought his hand to the cusp of her jeans and unbuttoned it, Lisa sighing again as he lead his fingers under the soft lace of her panties. She was already sodden, and the warmth of her stirred Dean instantly. He grabbed a hold of her and swung her on her back. He pulled down her jeans and threw them to the ground. Lisa’s giggles were immediately halted as he put his face down to taste her. There was a silence, a sharp intake of breath, and within a moment, Lisa had filled the bedroom with a soft, rhapsodic sigh.
The rise and fall of her stomach grew faster, shakier. Her toes curled, and her fingers wrapped around a clump of Dean’s hair until she was tugging. Her sighs turned into moans, and her body writhed beneath him as she approached her peak. Within a moment, she had brought her legs together, enclosing Dean in a shell of warmth, and shuddered into him, her moan long and airy, and as sweet as the taste between her thighs.
When he pulled away, Lisa was panting softly and giggling from behind her hand. Dean smiled back. He had missed this: the easiness of loving her. She brought herself upwards and kissed him lightly. She was giggling again.
“Get on your back, Dean Winchester,” she commanded playfully.
He lay down, his head on his pillow as Lisa began to unbuckle him. He was as stiff as a rock, and Lisa wasted little time with teasing him. She put her mouth around his hardness, moaning with him. Dean closed his eyes, pleasure eclipsing every thought he’d had until that moment. He turned his head to the side, biting his lip between each breath. When he opened his eyes again, he was looking at the used bedside table that had been given to him after the fire. It was a mess of magazines and cassette tapes, an overturned bottle of water that hadn’t been cleaned out in weeks—but there was something else, resting over the spine of an aging book, that caught his eye. It was his amulet, staring blankly out across the room. One of its horns seemed longer than the other, the right side lopsided and edging at an odd angle. He picked it up, and brought it closer to him. The gold pigment seemed new and freshly-painted, the string around it was of a thicker material. Even the face itself seemed different, like it could not see him, but was staring at something else far away.
“My amulet…” he said quietly. Lisa tilted her head up, and looked at him disgruntledly.
“What are you talking about, Dean?”
He ignored her tone. He could not look away from the amulet.
“Its face…” he said searchingly, more to himself, “it’s different.”
Lisa tried to smile, but her eyes were hardening. She stroked him, but he was no longer throbbing like he had been.
“Come on, Dean,” she smiled through gritted teeth. “I’m not gonna wait forever.”
Lisa no longer held his interest. He looked around his room, studying its layout, the mess, even the paint on his walls.
“My room,” he breathed uncertainly, “it… it’s different. My posters are in the wrong order. I never leave my guitar out of its case.” He stood up, walked towards the window where the curtains had been drawn. He pulled them apart, expecting to be greeted by an overgrown garden with a rusted swing-set. Instead, the sky was dark, and his vision was blurred by a tall tree which dead leaves stroked the glass.
“The view…” he called, “There never used to be a tree here.”
He turned around. The more he looked, the more things he found that were wrong with the bedroom.
“This isn’t my room,” he said finally.
Lisa shifted on the bed, staring at him firmly.
“Dean,” she said.
“You’re not Lisa.”
She stood up, looking anxious.
“How can you say that?” she asked, crestfallen. But Dean ignored her, and instead walked towards the mirrored bedroom’s door.
“Wait, stop!” she called, and once again shielded herself against the frame, which had been painted a different shade of white.
“Get out of my way,” he clamoured, his hands scrambling for the doorknob, “I need to find my brother!”
The mirrored Lisa held her body in place, her fists enclosed around the handle.
“There’s no need to wake him!” she said in a shrill voice that was unlike her own.
“I said, get out of my way!” Dean yelled, grabbing her hands away from the door and pushing her backwards.
Lisa screamed from behind him, her voice no longer the sweet, girlish resonance that had giggled at him from behind a soft, perfumed palm. When Dean turned around, he was not looking at the beautiful girl with long brown hair and rosebud breasts, but an ancient creature with sagging, grey-coloured skin and patches of white hair falling from her head in rattails.
“YOU—WILL NOT—LEAVE—THIS—BEDROOM!” she screeched, lunging towards him with yellow fingernails as sharp as knife-edges.
Dean stumbled backwards, out through the mirrored door, and on to sharp, rusted ground. The creature screamed at him, her mouth opened in a wide snarl of rotting fangs. Dean brought up a boot, and kicked the door closed with all his might. It slammed shut, the creature raging from behind it, but as she did, cracks began to creep up across the walls. Dean could hear the familiar sound of crumbling foundations, and the ground began to shake. He got to his feet and rushed backwards; by the time he turned around the mirrored bedroom had collapsed within itself, and the voice of the creature had died amongst the rubble.
He was standing in the junk yard again. He turned around; far ahead, behind a sea of trees and high stone walls, stood a castle. He shook his head wildly, any last semblance of the amulet’s spell disappearing. His mind was clear once more. He knew what he needed to do—but his bag was missing, and so all of his weapons, and the ingredients in the glass vial, were gone. He could go no further without them, he realised with growing dread. He put his head in his hands, trying to remember the events before the junkyard, before the ballroom, before Castiel.
The forest. They had been in the forest when Meg had given him back his amulet. He would have to go back there. It was his only hope.
“Dean? Dean?”
There were voices, calling him from far away. He looked around him recklessly, almost tripping over the mass of junk towering like a spire beside him. He followed the noise blindly, desperate to get out of this horrible place.
“Dean?”
He could make out the voice more clearly, now. It was a woman’s.
“Jo?” he called back hopefully.
“Is that you, Dean?”
Hope surged within him. He ran heavily through the yard towards Jo’s direction.
“Yes,” he yelled, excitement mounting, “hold on!”
He had reached the edge of the clearing. There, a few yards ahead, stood the figures of Jo, Ash and Bobby, all looking in different ways in the hopes of spotting him. Ash was the first to notice him. He grinned goofily.
“Dean!”
He ran to the group, engulfing the three in a hug that almost winded them. As he pulled away, his grin fell from the looks on their faces. They were staring at him with worried, taut expressions, and he wondered just how much he could get away with not telling them.
“What happened to you?” asked Jo seriously.
He faltered.
“Meg,” he said, finally settling on an answer, “she, she tried to hurt me.”
“What?”
Bobby raised his eyebrows.
“Tell us what happened, boy.”
He dithered, but the stern look on their faces forced him to speak.
“The amulet that I traded with the two wise men… she—she gave it back,” Dean started slowly, “but it was different. Enchanted. As soon as I put it on I passed out.”
Then I woke up in a ballroom where Castiel was waiting for me, and we danced, and then he fucked me against a sun set and asked me to stay forever, to rule as a king by his side.
“I don’t remember anything after that,” Dean finished unsettlingly, “other than waking up in that junk yard and hearing you guys call for me.”
No one could ever know what really happened after he put on that amulet. Castiel, even Lisa, whose once sweet taste now turned to ash in his mouth, had to remain a secret. The others, Jo, Ash, and Bobby, who were all looking at him with expressions of awe and concern, would never understand.
Jo broke the silence, folding her arms and scowling.
“I knew I shouldn’t have let her across that bridge.”
Ash nodded, but Bobby seemed conflicted.
“Why would she do that?” he questioned. “She really seemed like she was trying to help you.”
“Demon’s lie,” said Jo bluntly.
It was the end of that conversation. Whatever Meg’s reasons were, she had had an inkling of what she was doing once Dean had put the amulet on, but she had seemed so distraught when she had left him, lying their amidst the trees. He didn’t know what to think.
Dean’s thoughts were interrupted by a small, brown knapsack hanging from across Jo’s shoulder.
“My bag!”
He took it from her gratefully. Rooting around inside, he found everything the same as he had left it. He clutched the dagger for reassurance, and it vibrated in his hand.
“When we’d noticed you’d gone, we back-tracked into the forest,” said Bobby. “All we found was your bag and these weapons.”
On Ash were the bow and arrows, and Jo had the bottle of Fire Breath in her hands.
“Did you see Meg?” asked Dean timidly, but Bobby shook his head.
“No. Wherever she is, she’s long gone now.”
“Good riddance,’ said Jo, and Ash nodded.
Dean and Bobby looked at each other. They both knew it was more complicated than that, that Meg wasn’t just some demon only out for herself—but they couldn’t say these things aloud, not in front of the others, who were so sure of the way things worked in Castiel’s world, that they would not hear a different word about it.
“Come on,” said Jo finally. “We’re not far from the Tower.”
They turned around, and began walking, but their easy jesting of before had diminished, and now the group journeyed in silence.
You can move on now, Dean said to himself, as he began to follow the others. Forget it ever happened.
He walked, but another voice inside him made him stop.
But you don’t want to forget, it said—and Dean was ashamed to realise that it was the truth.
She was running, stumbling, tears dried and cracking on her pale face. She was never to go back into the labyrinth again. She was going to the safety of the entrance, where the air was still and her only company were rocks and tumbleweeds. The door was where she was meant to be, for she could not disappoint dust; she could not betray the wind.
“Meg.”
Someone had called her name from beside her. She screamed, her boots skidding in the mud, almost toppling her across it. She looked beside her. The king was standing against a tree with his arms crossed. His blue eyes looked grey and sunken, and there were more lines on his face than she had noted before.
“Castiel?”
“Where are you going, Meg?” he asked, but his voice did not veil its usual smugness. He sounded exhausted.
“I’m going back to the door where I belong!” she cried, and she had to bite her lip to stop from crying again. “I gave Dean back his amulet. I left him there, as he called after me. What did you do to it?”
Castiel held her gaze for a second before turning away. He looked towards the edge of the forest, where Meg and Dean had been. He spoke in a cracked whisper:
“Not enough.”
She hated him like this, this new way of tormented weakness, the pitiful tragedy of failing.
“You promised me,” she seethed, with newfound anger, “if I gave it to him, you’d let her go.”
“I’ll let her go,” said Castiel at once. “When Dean reaches the city.”
“What?”
The king stared her down, his cold authority returning.
“Go back to him,” he demanded in a sullen drawl. “Show him the way. That is an order.”
“You want to lose?”
“The things I want,” he said quietly, “the likes of you could never understand.”
He disappeared, then, in smoke that tarnished the air long after he had abandoned it. Meg was left gawping at the clearing, torn between the safety of the door and a chance to see the prince again, to tell him she was sorry, to end this once and for all.