Chapter Text
It was a relatively short walk down the hill towards the Labyrinth’s entrance. Dean’s brown walking boots treaded softly against the ground, and his clothes would occasionally latch on to the snare of haggard-looking scrubs—as if even the plants of Castiel’s world were his slaves, attempting to ensnare Dean forever between their prickled thorns.
Dean didn’t know what to think. He marched down the hill quickly, but his mind was lost in a haze of questions and doubts.
He had never meant for this to happen. Wishing Sammy away… it had only meant to be a joke—a cruel, vicious joke, enveloped in a fury of grief and bitterness—but a joke nonetheless. He had not once thought that his mother’s stories were any less than, well, stories!
Dean wished he had asked Castiel about Mary.
Seeing the Demon King stood before him in his brother’s bedroom, with his glowing eyes the colour of an ocean at dawn, and the puckish smirk etched on his face as he told Dean that he would never see his brother again, had all been too much to deal with.
Dean hadn’t been thinking clearly in that bedroom. Hell, he hadn’t been thinking clearly for the past six months! But now his mind was sharp, and he wanted to know why, and how, his mother had known all along that the Tale of the Two Brothers was real, and Sam and Dean were one day to be tangled in this parable of betrayal and war.
How could she not have told him?
If he had known, then maybe he could have stopped this. All of it.
Dean thought about the fire, or, more specifically, something his mother had said during the fire.
“It’s happening. Like he said it would.”
Had Mary known all along that a fire would burn down their home and kill her? Had somebody told her? Warned her?
Why hadn’t she warned her family?
Dean shook his head and gritted his teeth. Before this day, Dean thought he had known everything there was to know about Mary Winchester, but it turned out she had been keeping secrets from her family for years. She had even been willing to die with them.
Dean now realised, with a slight twinge in his heart, that he had barely known his mother at all.
Dean contemplated the issue at hand, and had to fight back a shudder—if he didn’t make it to Castiel’s castle in three days, then his brother was lost forever.
This was the second time Dean had betrayed someone who loved him. The demons that had held him down in the nursery, their eyes black and their skin the reek of rancid flesh—this was the future that awaited Sammy if Dean did not get to him in time.
Failure was not an option. He knew that much.
Dean wondered whether he would see Castiel again any time soon.
He had not been how Dean had pictured him from Mary’s stories at all. Dean had always imagined the King of Demons as a monstrous creature; an ungodly hybrid of brutality and evil, neither man nor beast, living or dead. Castiel, however, seemed nothing more than a man—with the egotistical, self-obsessed vanity of a man. The fact that he was a king at all seemed almost like fraud.
Shaking his head at the thought, Dean used his hands to move the unruly bush-strays out of his path, gritting his teeth as the sharp, thorn-like branches scraped at the exposed skin on his arms, leaving tiny white scratches.
Making his way through the last amount of shrubbery, Dean was met by a sight that both appeased and troubled him. There, a mere few metres away, was a giant wall, and in the centre of it, a door.
This was it, Dean thought, the door that guarded the entrance of the mighty King’s Labyrinth.
Dean took a step towards it. The ground between the marshy hill and the mammoth wall was an unappealing brown colour, much like Dean’s boots, and it was sparse apart from the odd rock and wilted bush. Dean looked to his left. The wall went on for miles and miles, and there did not seem to be an end in sight. He looked to his right, and it was very much the same. The air was completely still, and it seemed to be deserted.
Dean walked towards the door, and placed a hand on the looming ingress.
It was rough to touch. The rock, or whatever the door had been made of, appeared to have had parts eroded from time and weather, although Dean somehow doubted that the murky coloured sky and non-existent wind ever changed in this place. The texture was bumpy and irregular, and the whole door appeared to be in the process of disintegrating—as if the inhabitants of Castiel’s world had been locked inside their prison for so long, they had forgotten that this door existed, and so here it stood ignored.
Dean looked at the door more closely and frowned. After a moment, Dean noticed that some of the bumps weren’t just an outcome of smelted ruin; they were actually carvings.
Dean took a step back. Immediately, the picture became clear: faces snarled in savage expression; creatures fighting one another with claws as sharp as knives—and above them, on elevated ground, beings bent over as if in praise, their knees and foreheads touching the earth, as they bowed in servitude to the man who stood before them.
This man was Castiel. He stood straight and tall, with his arms lifted in the air. He was looking up at the sky above him, and a part of it seemed to be open, beaming light into his crystal-blue eyes.
Dean couldn’t help but laugh. Although he had only met Castiel a short while ago, his self-important arrogance could be seen unquestionably clearly in the carving on this door.
“You don’t half think the sun shines out of your ass, do you, Cas?”
Dean laughed quietly, hoping that the king had heard every word. Then he stopped.
He had called him Cas.
Clearing his throat gruffly, Dean composed himself and knitted his brows together in concentration. Getting to the entrance of the Labyrinth had been the easy part. Now, all he needed to do was actually get though it.
Dean scoured the door for a knob of some sort, something he could use to push or pull the door open with. He had tried urging it ajar with his shoulder a few times, but it hadn’t budged. He kicked it—hard—like the time he had had to force his way into Sammy’s nursery during the fire, but, again, the door stayed shut.
Perhaps Castiel was toying with him for making fun of the carving. If the king was one to hold grudges, then Dean had managed to screw himself over before he’d even had a chance to get into the damned Labyrinth! Good going, he thought.
“Come on,” he said, rattling at the door again. “Come on, you son-of-a-bitch. Open up!”
Dean slammed his fists against the rocky texture, and groaned loudly in irritation.
“Swearing and kicking won’t get you anywhere,” came a voice suddenly from behind him. “The door has feelings too, you know.”
Dean whirled around.
There, stood in the clearing, was a woman.
She was smirking at him, and her hands were resting on her hips in such a way that implied she was mocking Dean’s door-opening skills, or in this case, lack thereof.
Dean had been sure that no one had been following him down that hill, and he had only checked the clearing around the wall moments ago, and he was adamant that the place had been deserted.
Dean did not trust this girl. He did not trust this girl one bit.
“Who are you?” he asked her harshly. “Where’d you come from?”
“But I’ve been here all this time, Dean,” said the girl haughtily. “You just haven’t been paying attention.”
Dean blinked.
“How do you know my name?”
The girl laughed and rolled her eyes.
“Everyone knows your name here, Dean. You’re famous.”
Famous…
“Are you human?” he asked the girl, his voice quieter, hopeful.
The girl laughed again. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, the whiteness of her eyes had been replaced by a sheet of black. No, this girl was not human, not by a long shot—she was a demon.
“Does this answer your question?” the demon smiled flirtatiously at Dean, whose own green eyes were wide with shock.
“Stay away from me!” he said, arching his body against the door. “Stay back or I’ll—“
“You’ll do what?” the demon asked. “Kill me?”
“W-well…” started Dean.
“You couldn’t,” she said flatly, crossing her arms. “Even if you tried. No one can die here.”
Dean raised his eyebrows.
“Seriously? Well then, I’ve got nothing to worry about, have I?”
The demon shook her head, tauntingly.
“Just because you can’t die…”
The black-eyed woman turned around and began to pace slowly, still with her arms crossed against her chest.
“The things that can happen to you in there…” she said quietly, her head nodding towards the door of the Labyrinth. “There are some fates far worse than death, Dean, believe me.”
She stopped pacing, and looked at Dean. Her eyes had returned to their normal brown. She looked human again.
“How’d you do that?” asked Dean. “With your eyes.”
“Oh…” she started. “All demons can do it. It’s sort of like a light switch, see?” She then proceeded to close and open her eyes several times, changing them from black to brown, black, to brown again. As she stared nonchalantly at Dean for a couple more moments, Dean stifled a gulp. In the odd, half-light of the Land of Lost Souls, the demon girl with the brown eyes and brown hair was almost pretty.
“You said I was famous,” he said, in an attempt to break the silence.
“Yeah,” the girl said jeeringly. “You’re a real David Bowie.”
Dean sighed.
“You knew I was coming?”
The girl puffed out her cheeks in contemplation.
“I had an inkling,” was all she said.
Dean sighed again. He was getting impatient.
“Listen, lady—“
“Meg,” she interrupted.
“…Meg,” Dean repeated slowly, deciding the best way to go about things was to change his approach.
“Look,” he said, his voice slow and clear, as if he were talking to an invalid. “I’m real busy right now, and I kind of need to get into the Labyrinth pronto. So, unless you and your friends wanna’ come out and gank me, I’d really appreciate it if you could help me get inside.”
Meg stared at him for several moments, her face blank. Then, she smiled brightly.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to be a little more specific than that, Dean.”
Dean stammered, and stared at her in confusion.
“More specific?” he asked incredulously. “How the hell can I be more specific than that?”
Meg shrugged.
“You tell me.”
Dean felt like bashing his head against the Labyrinth’s door—or hers. At this rate, three days would pass before he could even enter the goddamned thing.
“Lady…” he said, his hands rubbing at his eyes slowly, every part of him attempting to resist the urge of either hurting himself, or the demon girl stood before him.
“I have had a really shitty day, but if you could tell me how to open that door—” Dean pointed behind him. “I would be extremely grateful.”
Meg pointed in the same direction Dean had just done.
“You wanna’ go through that door?” she asked interestedly.
“Yes,” said Dean, as politely as he could. Meg’s face suddenly lit up.
“Well, why didn’t you say so, silly?”
Meg brushed past him so she was standing directly in front of the mighty structure. She was beaming.
“I haven’t had a chance to do this for the longest time!”
With that, she brought her face close to the rock, and whispered something. She spoke so quietly that Dean could not hear what she was saying. Her voice was so gentle, though; sensuous. As if she was talking to a lover.
Slowly, the mighty door that guarded the entrance of Castiel’s Labyrinth began to open. It happened slowly, and the door scraped across the earth in a loud, monotonous groan. Dust and sand particles seeped through the air in an animated dance of freedom and ecstasy, as if they were finally waking up after a century of sleep.
Indeed, this door had not been opened for a very long time.
It only made Dean wonder why Meg was on the other side of it.
Meg stood to the side to allow Dean to enter. As he did, he was met with nothing more than a wall very much like the one guarding the outside. Dean looked to his left, and saw an endless path that merely ended in fog a hundred miles away. Then, he looked to his right, and saw exactly the same thing.
Somehow, Dean wasn’t surprised. King Castiel was a piece of crap, and if Dean had thought that Castiel was going to make things easy for him just because he’d managed to get through one freakin’ door, then he had another thing coming.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” came a voice from behind him.
“’Beautiful’ wouldn’t exactly be the word I’d go for…” said Dean, scratching his head, and looking again from left to right in the hopes that he had somehow missed something.
He turned around.
“You comin’ in or not?” he asked the demon, but Meg shook her head.
“Oh, no, I can’t go in there,” she said, looking a little flustered. “I have to stay out here.”
“What use are you out there if Castiel’s kingdom’s inside the Labyrinth?”
Meg only shook her head again.
“I have to stay by this door,” she said. “It’s my job, you see? Very important, like.”
Dean smirked.
“What use are you guarding a door that no one goes in or out of?”
This angered the demon, and she crossed her arms hotly, and turned around.
“You came through, didn’t you?”
She huffed, and then muttered to herself. “Couldn’t even open the fucking thing…”
Dean couldn’t help but feel a little bad, even despite his situation and the fact that he was talking to a demon.
“Sorry, lady,” he said. And he meant it. Ignoring Meg’s sarcasm and discourteous attitude, she had helped him open the door and start his quest to save Sam. Although, he still needed one more thing from her.
“Hey, um, Meg,” he asked cautiously, remembering to call her by her name, and trying his hardest to sound polite. “You wouldn’t happen to know which way leads to the castle, would ya’?”
Meg snapped her head around, seething. Dean’s attempt at chivalry had obviously failed. God, his wooing abilities were really slacking.
“How the fuck should I know?” she barked. “All I do, day in and day out, is stand outside this fucking Labyrinth with nothing but a few rocks and an easily offended door for company!”
The Labyrinth’s door made a loud, grating noise, and closed by a few inches. Meg looked rueful.
“Listen, Dean, go whichever direction you want; you’re screwed either way.”
Dean smiled sarcastically. “Gee, thanks,” he said.
“Whatever…” mumbled Meg, and began to turn around. Dean held out a hand.
“Wait,” he said. She stopped.
“What?”
“Are you sure you don’t wanna’ come inside?”
Meg rolled her eyes.
“I can’t, shit-for-brains, I already told you! I’m the door guard—my job is to stay here.”
“Well, then quit,” said Dean. Meg laughed harshly.
“I can’t quit. This isn’t that type of job.”
Dean frowned. “What kind of job is it, then?”
Meg sighed.
“You know in your world when instead of going to prison, your criminals are forced to pick up used condoms and beer cans from the side of the road?” Dean nodded. “Well,” Meg said sullenly. “This is that kind of job—minus the orange jumpsuit.”
Dean laughed, quite accidentally. Meg glared at him.
“What did you do to get stuck on door duty?” he asked. Meg crossed her arms.
“I don’t wanna’ talk about it.”
Dean shrugged. He’d wasted enough time talking with Meg. Now that he was actually inside the Labyrinth, he needed to go save Sammy before his three days were up.
“Well,” Dean said, beginning to walk down the path to his right. “Thanks for the help, I guess.”
After a few more steps, Meg said his name. Dean stopped.
The girl fingered at her black coat uneasily, and she looked down at the floor for a moment, then back at him. Her brown eyes glittered in the half-light.
“Don’t think this journey will be easy, Dean Winchester,” she said, speaking with tenacity. “There are many creatures in this Labyrinth who do not want you to reach your brother, and they will do anything to stop you.” Her voice quickened, and the door of the Labyrinth made an uneasy sound, and began to close.
“Good luck, son of Mary,” said Meg, who was now disappearing behind the mighty door. “Because you’re gonna need it.”
As the door finally slammed shut, and the sand particles settled on the ground, Dean swallowed, and found that his throat was dry. He looked in the direction that he was walking down, and he saw nothing but an endless path, going on and on down a thousand miles of nothingness.
Dean thought about what Meg had just told him, about the creatures that would do absolutely everything in their power to stop Dean from reaching Sammy.
Being afraid had no purpose here, he realised. He had to be strong. He had to fight every son-of-a-bitch who crossed his path. He had to reach Sam. He had to.
Walking down the endless pathway, Dean had only one thing on his mind:
Save Sammy.