Project Muse

Chapter One

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Tuesday 12 March, 1996

“Sam? Open your eyes.”

The voice cracked through the solid wall of darkness engulfing him, reaching across the abyss, and attempted to drag him back to the waking world. Try as he might, Sam couldn’t make his exhausted body comply with the request.

“Sammy?” the voice tried again, a hint of desperation layering the command. “C’mon, wake up, little brother.”

Sam wanted to do as he was being asked, but he couldn’t find the strength to prise his gritty eyes apart. He was exhausted, and he hurt in places he didn’t know he could hurt. His body throbbed and felt too hot, and his skin prickled fiercely as a cold chill clawed up his arms and legs. Even swallowing was torture. His throat was raw, like he had swallowed shards of jagged glass and the dark solitude that existed behind closed lids dulled that pain. Sam welcomed it, letting his mind empty as he sought darkness once more, hoping to escape from his external pain. His brother, unfortunately, had other plans – plans that definitely did not involve sleeping.

“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean’s voice urged, fingers gently ghosting over his hair in an attempt to rouse him. “I know you feel shitty, but you gotta open your eyes, man.”

The renewed insistence – and the onset of panic in Dean’s voice – was enough to drag Sam out of the reverie of sleep. He forced his eyes open, managing nothing more than slitted lids as he struggled to latch onto something solid amongst the swirling vortex that was consuming his vision.

“Sam?” Dean pressed. “You back with me?”

Sam rolled his gaze, following the sound of his brother’s voice, and squinted at the silhouetted figure looming over him, his brow furrowing. Something wet was running down the side of his face and it took him a moment to realise it was sweat. He wasn’t sure how he could be sweating when he was so cold, but his hair was uncomfortably plastered to the side of his face.

“Dean…?” His own voice sounded raspy, as if he hadn’t made a sound in months, and his tongue was glued to the roof of his impossibly dry mouth.

“In the flesh.” His older brother’s face wavered and splintered momentarily before coming back into focus. Sam blinked sluggishly, trying to hold his vision still and keep the cough that was tickling the back of his throat at bay. Miraculously, he managed both. “Hey! Keep your eyes open, narcolepsy boy. You can sleep once we’re inside the cabin.”

Sam hadn’t even realised his eyes had slid shut again, and shifted his heavy lids towards his brother once more, confused.

“Cabin?” Sam shuttered his eyes slowly, testing the word on his wooden tongue, blinking salty sweat from his stinging eyes.

“Yeah, we’re in the Black Hills.” Dean replied. “Can you sit? We need to get out you of the car. You’re ruining the upholstery doing your human faucet impression.”

Sam frowned deeply. It took him a moment to realise that he was curled across the backseat of the Impala. Dean was bent down, his head and shoulders inside the car. Outside the vehicle, nightfall hung heavily to the silhouetted outlines of the trees. It gave his surroundings an almost eerie look.

Shifting his legs a little, Sam groaned at the knots that had settled in his muscles. He was going to have a hell of a problem moving. His limbs were sluggish, and not responding at all to his commands. He gave up trying to move after a moment and merely stared glassy eyed at his sandy haired brother, hoping his body would become more responsive in a moment.

“The Black Hills?” Sam repeated, blinking owlishly at his brother.

“South Dakota.” Dean replied softly. “Not far from Deadwood.” The older man grunted. “Speaking of which, you sleep like frigging deadwood.” There was a pause as Dean took a moment to rove a scrutinising eye over his younger brother. Judging from the twist of Dean’s lips, the older boy obviously thought Sam looked as crap as he felt.

Sam groaned, dragging a hand over his clammy brow, his gaze settling on the ceiling of the Impala. It was tempting to give into the need to close his eyes once more, but Dean’s anxiety was enough to stop Sam from doing so. The last thing he wanted was his brother going into overdrive.

“I thought you were feeling better, Sammy.”

Swallowing thickly, the younger boy managed a nod. “I was.”

Sam had a chest infection that stubbornly refused to shift. A full week of hot sweats followed by chills that had racked him for hours had seemed to be clearing up with the aid of super strength antibiotics. Sam had started to feel better a few days ago, but right now he felt worse than he had at the height of his infection. Every breath was like inhaling barbed wire and his torso ached as if he had gone ten rounds with a pneumatic hammer.

“You’re really burning up.” Dean said, placing his hand on Sam’s forehead, a trace of worry in his voice. The touch of skin on skin burnt like acid and Sam hissed, pulling back from Dean’s fingers. The older man frowned, his brow pulled down into a v. “You take your meds before we left Toledo?”

“Who are you – Dr Quinn?” The twelve year old boy grimaced, stifling a groan as he struggled to sit up.

Dean reached out and helped his younger brother straighten, curling his hands into Sam’s damp t-shirt. Even with his brother’s assistance, Sam’s limbs still trembled under his own weight. He felt as weak as a newborn kitten.

“Dr Quinn ain’t got shit on me, kiddo.” Dean said with a grin, before frowning once more. “So, did you take them?”

He didn’t relinquish his hold on his younger sibling, but one hand moved to the small of Sam’s back, supporting his weight as he struggled to find equilibrium with his surroundings. Sam let out an exhausted breath.

“Yeah, Dean, I took the antibiotics.”

His head was pounding, pain gnawing against the bones, trying to burrow its way out of his skull. Squeezing his eyes shut, Sam waited for the sharp throbbing to recede before he dared to open them again.

“You ok?” The worry was back in Dean’s tone.

“I feel like crap.” Sam admitted, brushing shaky fingers through his sweat-drenched hair.

“I gathered that.” Dean replied, glancing over his shoulder out of the open car door. “You ok to walk? It’s not far.”

“I’ll be fine, Dean.” Sam said, not wanting his brother to fuss. Now that he was fully awake, he felt more than a little embarrassed at how needy he was acting. He’d seen his dad and brother deal with wounds ten times worse and barely complain. Suck it up. That was the Winchester way. And Sam was trying to suck it up, but it was hard; he felt wretched. His brother obviously shared the same sentiment.

“Yeah, well, you look like shit, Sammy.”

Sam gave him a dark glare. “Thanks.”

Dean grinned.

“Don’t mention it.” His expression sobered. “You sure you can walk?”

“I’ve got a chest infection, Dean.” Sam snapped irritably, feeling like a little kid being mollycoddled – despite the fact he probably needed mollycoddling. “I’m not dying.”

Dean snorted. “In that case, you can help me unload the car. You have more bags than me and Dad combined, princess.”

Sam ignored his brother’s jibe as he attempted to stifle a yawn to little avail. Shivering against the post-sleep chill that seemed to invade his vulnerable body, the younger boy allowed Dean to help him to the edge of the bench seat. In all honesty, Sam wasn’t sure he could have moved his body on his own just yet. He was stiff and sore.

Draping his legs out of the car door, he remained seated, leaning his right shoulder against the back of the chair. The cold air prickled his skin, seeping through the thin material of his clothes, chilling him to the very bone despite the raging inferno that seemed to be engulfing his entire body.

“What are we doing in the Black Hills?” Sam asked, his teeth chattering together, arm wrapped around his middle as he tried to warm himself. “I thought we were heading to Bobby’s.”

“We were,” Dean answered, his worried gaze still locked on his younger brother. “Change of plan. Joshua Turner called en-route – said he needed Dad’s help so we took a detour.” Dean frowned at him, reaching over the seat and grabbing Sam’s coat. Gently, he draped it around the younger boy’s shoulders, rubbing his hands up and down Sam’s arms. Sam welcomed the warmth. “You must have really been out of it, dude. I told you this.” He appraised him suspiciously. “You feeling drowsy?”

Sam mirrored his brother’s frown, shifting his shoulders.

“I… guess.”

Dean’s brow wrinkled further.

“The doc said those pills were strong. Didn’t realise she meant they were the equivalent of horse tranquilisers. You’re spaced, dude.”

Sam gave his older brother what he hoped was a glare and not a squint.

“I’m not high on antibiotics, Dean.”

The sandy haired man grunted.

“Yeah, well, you look pretty out of it to me.”

The younger boy planted his sock covered feet on the hard ground, wondering when the hell he had removed his sneakers. He didn’t remember doing so. With a sigh, he twisted on the seat and tried to locate his shoes. Every move seemed to irritate his sensitive body even more.

Dean finally took pity on his younger sibling, reached into the foot well and rummaged under the seat until he found one of Sam’s sneakers.

“Thanks,” Sam murmured, carefully bending to pull his left shoe on. His entire torso felt like it was engulfed in flames and the motion had him grimacing.

“Need some help?” Dean asked, but Sam brushed off his brother’s ministration.

“I can put my own shoes on.”

“‘Cause you’re a big boy now, right?” Dean said with a hint of humour, watching as Sam slowly stuffed his right foot into the other sneaker.

“Shut up, Dean,” Sam said but without any bite. He was too tired to bite. “Where’s Dad?” Sam asked, finally getting his shoes secured.

“Inside the cabin.”

Sam nodded sluggishly.

It was their usual routine. John would secure the building first with salt lines and various other charms before either of his sons were even allowed near the place. It was something that annoyed Dean to no end and often led to arguments about the fact he was now seventeen and should have been able to lay out the protections needed – especially considering how often John had left Dean to look after Sam when he had been off on a hunt somewhere. Not that he ever said so to their father.

Sam pushed his hands underneath him and levered himself to his feet, his hand fastening onto the rim of the car door as he tried to find traction. Every inch of him hurt and his body felt borrowed, like it was not his. He swayed a little, but Dean’s strong grip fisting into his damp t-shirt gave him the time he needed to regain his balance. He wasn’t dizzy or seeing double, but his head was muzzy and the simple shift of altitude made him waiver like a leaf in the breeze.

“Easy, Legs,” Dean said gently.

Sam brushed him off after a moment, once the world had righted itself again. He didn’t want his father to see him like this – weak. Although it was a foolish want. If Sam had been out of it since Toledo then there was a pretty good chance that John already knew that his youngest was suffering.

“Joshua’ll be here within the hour.” Sam glanced up through hot eyes and sweat-soaked bangs as his father appeared from the shadows, tucking his cell phone into the inside pocket of his jacket. It was as if thinking of the man had conjured him. John stopped suddenly, glancing at his youngest son with a frown. “You look like hell, kid.”

“I’m fine, Dad.”

The reply was instantaneous, so ingrained that Sam hadn’t even realised the words had left his mouth until his brother snorted.

“Yeah, one step from spontaneous combustion, but he’s fine.” Dean retorted.

Sam gave his brother a dark glare, but John was already shouldering passed his eldest son. John placed a gentle hand on his forehead and frowned at the heat radiating from the twelve year old boy.

“Dean, unload the car. I’ll help your brother inside.”

John slipped his arm around Sam’s waist, but Sam pulled back feeling even more weak than he already did. It was different with his brother. Dean didn’t expect Sam to suck it up and deal. John… John expected miracles.

“I can walk.”

John gave the twelve year old a hard look, but relinquished. Slowly and carefully Sam moved forward on rubbery legs, trying to ignore the fact that his father was following him closely. It pushed Sam on to move more quickly. He wanted to sit down and he didn’t want to ask his father for help.

The cabin was directly in front of the Impala. It was a single storey building, completely encased in wood slats, and three long windows were streaming light from inside the building, casting murky orange glows across the driveway. A porch ran around the circumference, three steps leading up to the front door. Sam didn’t even want to think about how he was going to manage those. His legs were protesting enough as it was. By the time he reached the front door, Sam was shaking and sweating even more. Wordlessly, John pushed the door open and let his youngest enter the cabin first.

The main living space was a through-room that housed the kitchen, dinning room and lounge all in one area. There were two comfortable looking navy blue sofas and a recliner that was near the fireplace. Sam made a beeline towards the couch, gently lowering himself back against the cushions and raising his legs. Letting his head fall back, Sam felt his eyes closing. He was tired and he couldn’t decide if he was boiling or freezing.

Something draped over him and it took Sam a moment to realise his father had covered him with a heavy throw rug before his calloused hand came to rest on his forehead once more.

“You’re really hot,” John murmured with frown.

“That’s what all the girls say,” Dean injected as he stepped over the threshold. “Right, Sammy?”

Sam opened his eyes to half-mast slits and scowled at his brother, but his attention was snared by his father.

“Dean, get the first aid kit.”

His older brother came over to them, kit in hand, passing it to John. His father pulled out the bottle of antibiotics and pressed two pills into Sam’s hand. Pulling a bottle of water from his pack, he handed it to the young teen. Swallowing was painful as hell but somehow Sam managed to take the pills.

“Just two more, Sam, and then you can sleep.”

Sam groaned as his father pushed two more tablets into his hand.

“What are these?” Sam asked, glancing up through wet bangs.

“Tylenol.” His father said, relinquishing the tablets to his youngest. “It will help with the fever.” John assured him.

Once he had swallowed them both, Sam let his head fall back against the cushions and closed his burning lids. His whole body felt like it was on fire. His shirt was stuck to his skin, sweat seeping through the material. He shivered uncontrollably, wishing his body would stop hurting.

“Get some sleep, Sammy.”

Sam wanted to protest that he wasn’t tired, but the tempting lull of sleep was inviting him into the darkness, and Sam gave into it.

---

Dean watched with a level of uncontrollable trepidation as his brother shifted on the couch. Dean could tell the kid was uncomfortable and the deep frown lines marring his forehead even as he slept had the older Winchester matching Sam’s expression. His overly long, brown hair was darker and clung to his scalp like he had just stepped under a shower, and he had thrown one leg outside of the blanket, sweat pants rolled up to the knee as if he couldn’t decide if he was too hot or too cold.

It was only a chest infection, but Dean had to keep reminding himself of that fact. It was never easy seeing his little brother in distress – even if it was nothing more than a run of the mill illness. Sam seemed so much more vulnerable than Dean had ever been at his age and at times that frightened the seventeen year old considering their lifestyle.

“He’s not gonna pull a Houdini, Dean.”

Dean started and flicked his head around as his father moved further into the room, dropping the rest of their belongings onto the round table.

“I wasn’t –“ Dean frowned deeply. “He’s pretty sick, Dad.”

John waved a nonchalant hand and he pulled back the zipper on the weapons bag. “He’s fine, Dean. The doc checked him out before we left Toledo.”

“Yeah, I know but… shouldn’t he be getting better? Not worse. It’s been over a week since he came down with this thing… A week, Dad.”

John stopped unloading the guns and turned to his eldest son.

“Give the damn antibiotics a chance to work.” John slid his gaze towards the restless sleeping form of Sam. “I get that you’re worried, Dean, but it’s a chest infection. He’ll be fine. Bed rest and plenty of fluids and the kid will be back to normal in no time.”

Dean nodded slowly. He trusted his father’s judgement, and if John said he would be fine, then Sam would be fine. Still, it didn’t stop him from worrying. Finally, tearing his eyes from his younger brother’s supine form, Dean moved into the kitchen area and sank onto an empty chair that belonged to the dinning table. He let his eyes wander over the arrangement of guns and knives that had been carefully laid out across the surface by his father and scrubbed a hand over his face. He wished he had pushed his father to take his brother to Bobby Singer’s before they had headed to the Black Hills. It hadn’t been that much of a detour and Dean had the feeling that what Sam really needed wasn’t medication, but some TLC. Pushing that from his mind, Dean raised green eyes to his father.

“Why’d Joshua call you on this?” Dean asked finally.

John shifted his shoulders.

“Not sure kiddo. He just said that it was important.”

For John, that was enough. Dean knew his father didn’t have that many people he considered friends in the hunting world, but Joshua Turner was one. Dean had met the man on a couple of occasions – usually in passing, and usually when they were staying at Pastor Jim’s or Bobby’s – but he knew his father hunted with the twenty-six year old frequently. Scrubbing a hand over his face, Dean reached for a Taurus, and began to disassemble it, even as his father moved towards the fridge to unload the groceries they had bought in Deadwood.

Joshua Turner arrived forty minutes later. The man hadn’t changed much since Dean had last seen him. His chestnut hair grazed the nape of his neck, stray strands flicking out giving him a more youthful appearance and he was attempting to grow a beard. As John let him in, the hunter pulled off his beat up leather jacket and slung it over the coat rack near the door, straightening his navy blue t-shirt over his jeans.

“Johnny.” Joshua held his hand out and John shook it with a grin. “Glad you came.”

Joshua returned the grin with full dimples, his southern drawl giving him a slightly rougher edge.

“You said you needed my help,” John replied, following the younger hunter as he moved towards the kitchen. “And the fact you footed the bill for this place was a good incentive for me to drop what I was doing.”

Joshua snorted. “You’re all heart, old man.”

The kitchen itself was made up of a series of wooden cabinets, a relatively new stove and gingham. There was a hell of a lot of gingham every where. Joshua pulled a face.

“Man, I feel like one of the Walton’s,” he muttered. “This shit hole really is the back of goddamn beyond. Can’t believe how friggin much it cost.”

“Well, John-Boy, the motel down the road would have sufficed.” John told him, earning a scowl from the other man.

“Information that would have been useful hours ago, John – before I abused my damn Gold Card.”

John ignored the disgruntled man and continued to talk. “You know my son, Dean.”

Dean jutted his jaw at the man by way of greeting. Joshua offered Dean his hand and the teen took it.

“The damn rugrats are gettin’ bigger every time I see them, Winchester.” Joshua said. He noticed Sam on the couch and gave John a puzzled look.

“Sam – he’s not feeling too good.”

Joshua gave him a contrite look.

“Dammit, John, if you’d said your kid was sick, I wouldn’t have asked you to haul ass.”

John shifted his broad shoulders. “Sammy is ok. Nothing a couple of days rest won’t cure.”

Joshua snorted. “I know your idea of ok, old man.” The southern man leaned against the kitchen counter and folded his arms over his chest. “Even with limbs missin’ you’re still expected to keep damn well movin’.”

“Saved your ass on more than one occasion following that rule, Turner.”

Joshua shrugged, waving a negligent hand. “Semantics, man.”

Dean felt suddenly pushed out, like there was a whole part of his father that he didn’t know about. He had always felt close to John, but listening to him and Joshua bantering, Dean realised he didn’t know his father as well as he thought.

“You wanna tell me why you’ve dragged me to this back road hellhole then?” John asked. Joshua’s expression darkened and John gave him a knowing look. “Let me guess – Russell?”

“None other than the esteemed parent.” Joshua snorted, dropping onto the empty sofa opposite Sam. He draped an arm over his eyes and let out a weary breath. “Swear to god the old man thinks he’s twenty-one again.”

“What’s he hunting?” John asked.

“Werewolf,” Joshua growled heatedly. “He’s gonna get his dumb ass killed. Series of murders started in the area about six months ago. Dad figured out it was a wolf so he hightailed up here around the last full moon.”

“Did he find the wolf?” Dean asked curiously.

He hadn’t come across a werewolf before and he had to admit the thought of seeing one was pretty damn exciting. It was good old fashioned horror movie stuff – all that was missing was the b-movie bimbo, although Dean could probably rustle up one of those at a moments notice.

“Yeah, he found the fucking thing,” Joshua rolled his eyes. “Nearly killed him in the process.”

John sucked on his bottom lip. “Let me guess, Russell decided to play round two solo?”

“Round two? He’s in for the final showdown. He’s up here intendin’ to nuke the little shit, but there’s no way in hell he can take out a fully grown wolf alone.” Joshua brushed his fingers through his dark hair. “The man is a goddamn pain in my ass, but he’s my father. He’s gonna get himself killed and, as much as that shit would be his own damn fault, he’s the only family I got left, John.”

The issue of family didn’t need reiterating for John. Everything the older hunter had done had been for his family. He understood all too well that responsibility – as did Dean.

“Full moon’s not till Wednesday, Josh.” John laid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. “If Russell is here, we’ll find him.”

Joshua gave him a smile that was filled with relief and gratitude. “Knew I could count on you, Johnny.”

“Always.” John replied sincerely. “I’m going to hit the hay. We’ll start researching this thing tomorrow – and looking for Russell. Don’t stay up all night, and don’t corrupt my son.”

Joshua grinned at the warning. “Would I do that?”

John rolled his eyes, but said nothing.

“Night, Dad,” Dean said.

John moved towards the hallway off the main living area that led to the bedrooms. Left alone with Joshua, Dean watched the older hunter as he moved towards the fridge and began rummaging. After a moment, he came out empty handed.

“Christ, is this what your Daddy classes as damn food?” Joshua demanded.

“Your body is a temple.” Dean smirked then added, “it’s Zen according to John Winchester.”

Joshua snorted, closing the fridge and moving over to his own bags. “Yeah, well it sucks.”

Dean’s expression faded into a frown.

“Your Dad’s in real trouble, huh?” He asked after a moment, watching as Joshua pulled back the zipper and rummaged through his belongings.

Despite only meeting the man on a handful of occasions, Dean found he liked the older hunter. There was something about the unruly brown-haired southern that was familiar. Joshua, Caleb, Pastor Jim, Bobby and Jefferson were the few constants in his life – that and the Impala, his brother and father. In his nomadic lifestyle, people and objects were the only roots Dean had, and he clung to those things fiercely.

Joshua raised his gaze and let out a weary breath, halting his searching.

“The man thinks he’s immortal.” He lowered his gaze back to the bag and let out a grunt of satisfaction as he pulled a bottle of soda from his bag. He unscrewed the cap with a grin and took a long swig. When he had finished, he dragged his forearm across him mouth before his expression turned sombre. “He’s too damn old to be playing Rambo, and the stubborn asshole doesn’t have a goddamn clue how to hunt in the field. He’s been out of the game for too long.”

Dean knew all about parents and stubbornness. John Winchester had invented stubborn. Picking up a Beretta from the table, Dean quickly dissembled it, placing the parts on the surface as he reached for the oiled rag that was balled up in the weapons bag. As he caught Joshua’s gaze, he smirked. The demon expert was staring wide-eyed at him.

“What?” Dean asked innocently.

“You’re…” Joshua shook his head, swallowing hard. “How in the hell did you take that damn thing apart so quick?”

Dean glanced down at the disassembled gun with a grin. “Helps having an ex-marine as your father.”

Joshua grunted and slouched into the nearest empty dinning chair, brushing dark hair off his face. “Yeah, Johnny’s a real hard ass. He’s one of the best in the field though – ain’t no denyin’ that.” He slid his eyes back to the disassembled gun, frowning deeply. “Still, dude, that shit was friggin’ freaky. I ain’t never seen someone do that.”

Dean shrugged, returning his gaze to his weapon and continued cleaning it, the rag whipping through the barrel in a blur of motion, but his eyes occasionally straying to the couch were Sam was sleeping. Joshua glanced over his shoulder, following Dean’s line of sight.

“You worried ‘bout the kid? “ He asked.

Dean pulled a face and lowered his eyes to his gun.

“He’ll be ok.” He wasn’t sure if he was saying that for Joshua’s benefit or his own. Dean suspected it was the latter. He’d never seen Sam so sick before and it had all his protective urges on overdrive. “So uh, how’d you get into this?”

“Into what?” Joshua asked, taking another sip of his drink.

“Hunting.” Dean replied, even as he reassembled the gun and reached for a shotgun. When Joshua pulled a face, Dean shrugged. “C’mon dude, everyone has a reason for doing this shit. No one chooses this life.”

The older hunter shifted uncomfortably.

“My story ain’t exactly bedtime readin’, kid.”

“Neither’s mine,” Dean replied with a wry smile.

Joshua’s expression contorted painfully, his fingers picking at the label on the bottle. Dean found himself grimacing at the older man. A myriad of emotions were flickering across his face, but Dean couldn’t help but pick up on the overwhelming sense of grief radiating from the demonologist.

“Didn’t mean to put my foot in it, man,” he apologised.

Joshua shifted his shoulders, visibly shaking himself as if he could throw off his painful past with the gesture.

“Nah, you didn’t. Don’t worry about it, kid.” He pushed a piece of hair behind his ear before he scrubbed a hand over his bearded chin. “The past is the past. Can’t change it.”

Cursing his big mouth, Dean fell silent and focused on the shotgun in his hands as the stillness grew in the room, becoming unbearable with each passing second. Most hunters got into this life because they had seen something or been affected by the supernatural world that existed side-by-side with the ‘real’ world. Joshua’s reasoning for getting into hunting was probably no different from John’s, and like Dean’s own past, it was probably painful as hell. Dean wished he hadn’t said anything and so he was a little surprised when Joshua spoke again.

“It was a demon,” the hunter said quietly, his eyes dark. “I musta been about seven when it happened. My dad… he’d hunted his entire life – was younger than you when he started – but he’d hit the road for months and then turn up at my mom’s beat to hell. She’d patch him up and he’d hit the road as soon as he could. I thought he was a crazy sonuvabitch. He was always talkin’ bout friggin’ demons and spirits, but I guess crazy’s relative.”

He paused taking a shuddering breath, his face lined with pain.

“Dude, you don’t have to-“ Dean started, but Joshua cut him off with a wave of his hand.

“It’s ok.” He brushed a stray strand of long hair behind his ear once more before he continued, his voice hitching a little as spoke. “Anyway, he’d exorcised this mean sonuvabitch a few years previously. The bastard crawled outta the abyss and came lookin’ for my dad. He found us instead.” His lips twisted. “It killed my mom, my sister…”

Joshua broke off for a moment and Dean felt his stomach clench painfully. He tightened his grip on the shotgun until his knuckles were white.

“My older brother, Jeremy… he hid me. I heard him – I heard him… die. Thought I was a goner too, but then Russell…? He turned up like the fucking angel of mercy. He stopped long enough to exorcise that bastard and then we hit the road. Never looked back either.” Joshua rubbed at his eyes, his brow pulled down into a v. “I’ve spent my entire life looking into demons. What I know about those sadistic fuckers, you could fill a book with, kid. I’ve exorcised more of them than I could count and every single one makes me feel that little bit better.” He cleared his throat uncomfortably and sniffed as he reached for his bottle once more and took a drink. He cleared his throat, shifting uncomfortably and he rubbed at his nose. “But I don’t know jack about werewolves – which is why I called Johnny in.”

Dean’s brow wrinkled as he studied the older hunter. Losing his mom had been hard enough, but losing his entire family like Joshua had…? Dean couldn’t even wrap his head around that. He couldn’t imagine what he would do without his younger brother. Without meaning to, he found his eyes straying towards Sam’s supine form once more.

“I’m sorry, Josh,” Dean said as much sympathy as he could muster. There were no words that could ever make Joshua’s history better, but Dean didn’t know what the hell else to say. What did you say to a guy who had lost so much? He knew nothing anyone said to him was going to make him feel any better about his mom’s death. Shit like that was impossible to put into words, and it was impossible to forget.

The older hunter shrugged listlessly, but there was still a tenseness in his bulky frame that belied his feelings.

“Like I said, it’s in the past, kid. Ain’t much anyone can do about it now.”

“We’ll find your father. Dad’s good at what he does. And we’ll even get the damn wolf,” Dean assured him earning a smile from Joshua.

“Yeah, well I’m not worried about the wolf. The wolf I can handle. Russell on the other hand…?” He grimaced. “Well, let’s just say he’ll make the damn thing look like Lassie.”

Chapter Two

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Tuesday 12 March, 1996

Sam awoke to an empty room. It took him a moment to orientate himself in the unfamiliar surroundings and to remember where he was. The details of arriving in The Black Hills in the early hours of Tuesday morning were hazy, but Sam vaguely recalled his brother and father helping him inside the building. That was about all he did remember.

Sam was sprawled on the couch, a thick blanket tangled around his legs. Someone – he assumed his brother – had removed his sneakers and socks, placing them at the side of the sofa. Turning his head to the side, Sam glanced around the cabin, trying to get a better look at where they were staying this week.

Logs were crackling in the hearth adjacent to were he was lying, orange flames licking the back of the fireplace, throwing a pleasant heat into the room – at least it would have been pleasant if Sam didn’t feel like he was already on fire. The through room that housed the kitchen, dinning area and living space was empty, but there were dishes on the drainer, and a stack of books were perched precariously on the edge of the round table. Thick rugs covered the bare wooden floors sporadically throughout the room, and along the length of each wall were framed photographs of certain landmarks within the area. There was a homely feel to the cabin, and the smell of coffee that permeated the air only added to that, reminding Sam of his father. Clearly John was up and about. No one could drink coffee that strong apart from his father. The man was addicted to caffeine.

Wincing, Sam pushed trembling hands underneath him and sat up with a groan. That was as far as he got before he was sagging back against the cushions once more. His body didn’t seem to want to comply with his requests. He felt awful. He was uncomfortably hot, but at least his headache had receded to a dull, bearable throb. Obviously, the Tylenol his father had forced into his hand last night had helped a little.

“Sleeping Beauty arises.” Sam twisted his head in time to see his brother emerge from one of the doors off the main room. He assumed it led to the bedrooms. “How you feeling, Sammy?”

Dean looked sleep rumpled, and absently Sam wondered what time it was as his sandy-haired brother moved over to the couch. Without waiting for an invite, Dean clamped a hand over his kid brother’s forehead.

“Dean!” Sam complained, pulling back from his ministrations, the touch irritating his burning skin. “Cut it out!”

“You’re still warm,” his older sibling noted, roving scrutinizing eyes over his younger brother.

“I feel better,” Sam lied, combing his displaced, sweaty bangs back into place with his fingers.

Dean arched his brow, moving to the edge of the couch so he could perch on the arm rest.

“Really? ‘Cause I gotta tell you, you’re doing a great impression of a human radiator right now.”

Sam scowled and stared at the ceiling. Whilst he appreciated Dean’s concern, his worrying was getting old – really fast. Sam didn’t want to draw attention to how crappy he felt. He didn’t want to disappoint John – or Dean for that matter – by showing such weakness with nothing more than a damn chest infection.

Shifting his shoulders to push out the aching bloom that had settled over his muscles, Sam scooted to the edge of the sofa and attempted to rise once more. His legs, however, had other ideas. They shook under his weight and it took all of Sam’s will to stop them folding beneath him. It didn’t help that the room was rolling around him either or that the walls, floors and everything in between, were also dripping into one another.

Sam didn’t even see Dean move, but his brother was suddenly at his elbow, lowering him back onto the couch gently.

“Shit, Sammy,” Dean muttered, easing the younger boy back against the cushions. “More haste, less speed. You ok?”

Sam nodded, but wished he hadn’t. His vision splintered and his head gave a violent throb of pain against his left temple. Squeezing his eyes shut, he rubbed trembling fingers over the area, trying to diffuse the pain – not that it helped. His receding headache was back in full force now.

“I think standing up might be off the cards, little brother.” There was a pause. “You sure you’re ok?”

The apprehension in his older brother’s tone had Sam prising his lids open. Green eyes were appraising Sam’s supine form carefully.

“I just stood up too quickly,” Sam murmured, his voice croaking as he spoke. God, he hated being ill. He hated being dependent and needy. He hated relying on his brother for assistance. His body gave a violent throb of pain as he tried to shift on the couch to get comfortable.

Dean gently brushed sodden bangs out of Sam’s eyes as the younger boy winced and sighed.

“You ain’t tall enough to get altitude sickness, dude.”

Sam mirrored Dean’s exhale and let his head sink back against the cushions as his brother pulled the blanket back over him, tucking the edges tightly around his torso. Sam wanted to stop his ministrations, but he was too tired to argue. Besides, it wasn’t an argument he would win. Dean was in full protective older brother mode, and there was no stopping him when he was.

“How you really feeling – and no bullshitting, Sam,” Dean warned with a tone that suggested lying would not be tolerated. Sam let out a long, suffering sigh.

“I feel awful,” Sam admitted reluctantly.

His head hurt, but that wasn’t the worst of it. His chest felt as if elastic bands had been wrapped around his ribs and were being slowly tightened. The chills that were racking his body were nothing more than the icing on the cake of just how crappy Sam felt.

Dean merely snorted at Sam’s revelation, “I guessed as much.” He squeezed his brother’s arm and gave him a warm smile. “Get some sleep.”

Sam frowned at his brother.

“I’m not tired.”

“Well… try.” Dean scowled at his younger brother’s stubbornness.

Sam’s frown deepened, but the conversation was halted by the front door opening. A rush of cold air swept in from outside, icy fingers caressing the room as it moved through the space swiftly until the door was finally shut. Sam was a little surprised that the figure who entered was not their father. He immediately went on alert, stiffening. Sam cast a glance at his brother who had raised his gaze the moment the door handle had jiggled.

“It’s Joshua,” Dean said softly, green eyes locking onto the younger boy’s face. His fingers gave a gentle, reassuring squeeze of Sam’s forearm, letting him know it was ok, that there was no danger.

Sam hadn’t seen the man in a long time and it took him a moment to recognise the rangy hunter. Even if he hadn’t recognised Joshua, his brother’s assurance was enough. The twelve year old trusted his brother completely. His body relaxed, the tension draining out of him, as the realisation set in that it was a friend and not a foe.

“Shit, it’s damn cold out there.” Joshua’s chestnut hair was bedraggled and plastered across his face from the wind. A light dusting of snow was sprinkled across the shoulders of his heavy jacket, his cheeks rosy from the chilly March air. Joshua stomped his feet on the welcome mat before toeing his boots off and placing them by the side of the door. His jacket followed suit, finding its way onto one of the hooks after a moment.

Dean was studying the man with a weighted gaze.

“Where’ve you been?” He inquired.

Joshua shrugged. “Snooping. What about you, Poindexter? Get much work done?”

Dean smirked. “I just woke up.”

Joshua gave him a hard glare. “Your father drags me outta bed at the ass crack of dawn to question a bunch of superstitious old crones with wandering hands, and you get to lie in?”

The sandy haired teenager merely shrugged. “What can I say? He loves me.” He gave Joshua a shit eating grin. “Besides, this is your gig. We’re just supervising.”

“We’re just supervising,” Joshua snarked with an eye roll, speaking the words in a droll, sing-song tone of voice.

Dean raised a brow.

“It’s hard to imagine you’re nearly ten years older than me at times, man.” Dean shook his head with mock disappointment. “Sammy’s more mature then you are – and he’s twelve.”

“I’m more mature than you too, Dean,” Sam countered with a faint smile before adding, “- and I’m nearly thirteen.”

“Hold your tongue, traitor!” Dean scowled at him. When he turned back to the older hunter, his tone was serious. “So, did you find anything – aside from the next notch on your bedpost?” A grin cracked across his face as he rose from the sofa, joining Joshua at the dining table.

The older man merely shot him an irritable glare.

“Just bits and pieces – which is incidentally all they found of the victims this thing’s been snacking on.”

Sam wrinkled his nose at the graphic description, but his brother merely grunted.

“Nice, dude.”

Joshua pulled a folded wad of paper from his jeans pocket and smoothed it out on the table before handing it to Dean. The younger hunter flicked through the sheets, briefly pausing to perusing each one.

“These are the missing hikers?” Dean asked after a moment.

“Yeah,” Joshua replied, pulling a face. “The ones that just ‘walked off’ into the woods one day and supposedly never came back.” He snorted, slumping into a chair, and swung his feet onto the table top. “And – get this – they date back further than six months. The first missing persons case in the area was four years ago.”

Raising his eyes from the paper, Dean arched his brow.

“So this isn’t a new thing. Cujo’s been dragging victims off the beaten path for a while.”

Joshua nodded, rubbing wearily at his eyes. “The mauled victims that turned up dead more recently are towards the back of the pile. Hikers might well have been goin’ missin’ for years, but they only wound up dead in the last six months. Before that…? No bodies. Just a handful of relatives wonderin’ what the hell happened to their loved ones.”

Dean nodded thoughtfully, lowering his eyes back to the papers once more.

Sam watched the exchange with a frown. It would have usually been him and Dean doing the leg-work on a hunt. It was strange having a third wheel. Sam knew it was stupid to feel that way, but he was so used to it just being his small family unit. The added extra person was a little hard to handle. It was different when Pastor Jim or Bobby helped them out; Sam had known both men for years – and he knew them well. Joshua was practically a stranger, and Dean liked him. They had similar humour, humour that was very different from Sam’s. Watching them laughing and joking made him feel… uncomfortable.

“Where’s Dad?” Sam asked, suddenly wanting his father here, although he wasn’t sure why.

“You know your Daddy, Sam,” Joshua’s gaze settled on the twelve year old boy as he leaned further back in the chair, his fingers locking behind his head, “he’ll come back once he’s bled the entire town dry of info.”

Dean turned to his brother.

“You want something to eat?”

Sam wasn’t really hungry, but Dean was already moving towards the cupboard. Evidently it hadn’t been up for debate; Sam was eating whether he was hungry or not. Dean returned a moment later with a bowl of cereal and waited whilst Sam pushed himself up onto shaky elbows.

“Thanks, Dean,” Sam mumbled, taking the bowl from his brother once he was sat upright. Dean relinquished his grip once he was sure Sam had a firm grasp of it.

“Yeah, well, I’m not carrying your malnourished ass around.”

Sam rolled his eyes. It was crap, and they both knew it, but Sam didn’t contest it. Instead he dug his spoon into the bowl and took a tentative mouthful of food. He wasn’t sure he would be able to stomach anything, but Dean was hovering, and probably would continue to do so until Sam got something solid into his system. Rather than waiting for his brother to decide to spoon feed him like a kid, Sam complied with Dean’s request to eat. It was easier in the long run.

“Where in the hell did you find cereal?” Joshua demanded, eyeing the boys suspiciously. “Last night there was nothin’ but some kind of goddamn health food shit.”

“Dean hides the good stuff from Dad,” Sam said quietly.

“Only ‘cause you’re a nightmare on sugar – and I get the blame for giving it to you, dude.” Dean countered with a grin.

The older man scowled, casting a glare at Dean.

“You held out on me,” Joshua accused, pointing a finger at the older sibling.

Dean merely shrugged, moving over to the fire and tossing a few sticks into the flames. It crackled happily at the new source of fuel.

“You’ve got a Gold Card. Buy your own cereal.”

“Speaking of Dad, how the hell did he afford this place? He win the lottery and not tell us?” Sam asked, hesitantly pushing the cereal into the milk with a frown as his stomach gave a rebellious lurch. Maybe eating wasn’t such a good idea.

Dean waved a hand in Joshua’s direction, “You can thank Flash for that.”

Joshua scowled.

“Actually, you can thank Utah State University.” When both Winchester siblings gave him a puzzled look, the twenty-six year old man continued to explain. “I teach there sometimes. Gave a lecture a week ago that’s payin’ for the penthouse suite you’re currently enjoyin’.”

Dean snorted, but didn’t say anything else. It beat the hell out of most of the crapped out motels they stayed in. It made a change to spend a few days in something half decent. Most of the time, they were faced with questionable sheets, dirty bathrooms and gaudy carpets. This place was practically The Hilton in comparison.

“Did you find any info on Russell while you were being groped by little old ladies?” Dean asked, rising from the fire side and wiping his hands on his jeans.

The southern man pulled a face, picking at the edge of the table, and ignored Dean’s jibe.

“The old man seems to be doing a good impression of a needle in a damn haystack.”

“What about the wolf?” Dean reached for the box of cereal on the side and poured a large handful into his palm. He shoved the whole lot into his mouth and chewed slowly around the bulging mass, but he was unable to fully close his mouth. Sam rolled his eyes at his brother’s lack of manners.

“Found enough to locate its hunting ground,” Josh said, brushing his hair out of his eyes. “It shouldn’t be that difficult to track.”

Sam blinked.

“Wolf? You’re hunting a werewolf?”

He knew they were savage and dangerous as hell. One bite and it was all over. Sam’s stomach wasn’t the only organ doing somersaults. His heart was doing a pretty good impression of the energiser bunny within his chest.

“Yeah,” Dean shrugged nonchalantly. “Go figure. Years of hunting ghosts and we finally get the big one.”

“Dean-“ Sam began, unable to keep the apprehension out of his voice, but his brother cut him off.

“Don’t worry, Sammy. Cujo doesn’t stand a chance. Besides, Dad knows what he’s doing with this thing. This ain’t exactly the first wolf he’s hunted.”

Sam trusted his father to keep his brother alive, but he couldn’t help but worry. Werewolves weren’t a simple case of salting and burning. There were too many unknowns, too many things that could go wrong. It wasn’t a walk in the park, and Dean’s blasé attitude worried the younger boy. Sam didn’t like this. He didn’t like it at all.

“It’s just the one?” Sam demanded, flicking his gaze between his brother and Joshua.

“Looks that way,” Dean replied, but Sam found himself frowning.

“You’re sure it’s a werewolf?”

“Yeah,” he said, taking another handful of cereal and shoving it into his mouth again. “Why?”

Sam frowned, putting the bowl down on the small table at the side of the couch. He’d lost his appetite – not that he’d had much of one to begin with, but he suddenly felt sick to his stomach. An uneasy sensation had taken root and was sending chills up his spine that had nothing to do with his illness.

“Something about all of this seems… wrong.”

“What d’ya mean?” Dean asked around a mouthful of dry cereal.

“Well, it just seems weird behaviour for a wolf. I mean… the whole hunting in the forest thing…?” Sam arched a dubious brow at his brother.

Werewolves tended to dwell in cities where there was an abundance of people, ripe for the picking. Sam wasn’t sure he had ever heard of werewolves living wild.

“Yeah, go figure,” Dean said, scratching absently at his cheek before shrugging. “American Werewolf in London this ain’t.”

Sam’s forehead pulled into a v, his apprehension growing.

“It doesn’t make sense, Dean.”

“The research is pretty solid on this, Sammy. Twelve people have gone missing in the last six months – all of them wound up mauled to death. Local authorities hacked it up to hikers straying off the path and wandering into bear territory,” Dean added with a slight shift of his shoulders. “Sounds classic werewolf to me.”

“All around the full moon?” Sam pressed.

Even with his fevered haze something about this just didn’t sit right. Joshua said the first missing person case that related to this hunt was four years ago, but no bodies were found until six months ago… It was odd, and Sam didn’t understand why Dean couldn’t see that.

His older brother nodded, moving back into the kitchen area and hiding the cereal in the back of one of the floor cupboards.

“Like clockwork,” Dean replied as he straightened. “All of them tourists – no locals have gone missing at all.”

Sam frowned.

“Ok, so assuming this thing is a wolf… Why all of a sudden has it started killing openly? It doesn’t make sense. Why keep a low profile for years and then leave an obvious trail?”

“Maybe it got sloppy, maybe it got bored – who knows, who cares,” Dean said with a shrug. “Either way, Cujo’s going down.”

Sam shook his head. “It’s changed its M.O.”

“You been reading the dictionary again?” Dean asked with an amused twitch of his lips.

Sam scowled at him. “Something about this isn’t right, Dean. Why the woods? And why has it changed its usual method of hunting?”

Dean shrugged again. “I dunno, Sam. Either way, we’re going up to the mountains tonight. The first night of the full moon is tomorrow and we’ve gotta find Russell before that.”

Joshua, who had remained silent throughout the conversation, suddenly spoke.

“I don’t know much about wolves, Dean, but maybe the kid’s on to something here.” He folded his arms over his chest, and ran his tongue over his lips. “These things are predators, right?”

Dean nodded, and Joshua continued.

“It’s been smart about this whole thing – up until the last few months that is. It ain’t raised the attention of the authorities and it was only the brutality of the murders in the last few months that caught Russell’s attention. Hikers go missin’ all the time, but maulings…? That’s classic wolf – any idiot hunter with half a brain cell was bound to notice after a while and come lookin’. Why risk exposure?”

Dean rolled his eyes and rubbed a hand over his face.

“Ok Mulder, for a start this is nothing more than a simple wolf case. If there is anything more to it than that, then Dad’ll find it. Secondly, whatever Lassie’s playing at, it doesn’t matter. This is the last full moon it will see again.”

Sam wanted to believe that, he really did, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more to this and that made him uneasy as hell.

---

John returned an hour later, snow dusted just like Joshua had been, his hands shoved in his jacket pockets, his cheeks red with cold. He didn’t say anything as he moved over to the fire and rubbed his arms in an attempt to warm up.

Sam had been ordered to remain on the couch under Dean’s ‘instructions’ to rest. Instructions… Sam almost laughed, more like orders. Sam had the feeling that his older brother wasn’t above tying him to the damn couch to make him stay put – not that he was planning on moving. He was tired and throughout the morning he had drifted in and out of sleep, despite trying to remain awake. His body wasn’t exactly being receptive to his wants at the moment, and that was frustrating.

The last time Sam had tried to get up to help Dean and Joshua research, Dean had shoved a book in Sam’s hands hoping that it would keep his younger sibling occupied. He probably hoped it would also stop Sam from worrying. In fact, it had resulted in the opposite. Sam was convinced now that something more was going on here. In everything that he had read, werewolves were creatures of habit. They stuck to the same hunting ground. They killed in the same ways. The change in its behaviour had Sam fretting, but his protestations to Dean and Joshua had fallen on deaf ears. They had explained everything away with oddly logical arguments that Sam hadn’t been able to counter. He couldn’t say what it was exactly, but Sam had such a bad feeling about this hunt. However, he knew that his father was bound to be less receptive to his fears than Dean. He’d probably get more response out of the damn wall.

Dean and Joshua were sat at the dinning table, mapping out the previous attacks, trying to get a general location of the wolf’s usual territory. It looked like something out of a war cabinet meeting. Books littered the table top and articles were pinned to the wall behind them, red circles surrounding information of importance. Both men halted their discussion at John’s arrival, but the eldest Winchester’s gaze was locked on his youngest son.

“You look awful,” John said after a moment.

Sam gave him a smile that was laced with exhaustion. Lying to his father was pointless. He was like a human lie detector. He’d see through whatever crap Sam spouted and so he sought solitude in silence.

John studied him for an uncomfortably long moment. “Did you take your antibiotics?”

Dean spoke before Sam could answer. “Don’t worry, Dad, he’s been a good boy.”

Sam flipped his brother off with a scowl as soon as John’s gaze was averted.

“Did you boys find anything out?” John asked, moving over to the dinning area. He paused at the table, pressing his palm onto the top, his eyes roving over the masses of research littering the surface.

“Found out a helluva lot about the damn wolf attacks,” Joshua replied, leaning back in the wooden chair, but there was a hint of frustration in his tone. “Not so much about my father.”

“Good thing I’m persuasive,” John muttered, stripping his coat off after a moment and hanging it on the back of an unoccupied chair. The melting snow that had lightly covered the shoulders of his jacket was starting to melt and water drops dripped onto the floor creating a small puddle beneath the garment. “Russell bought a load of camping equipment from the store in town – enough stuff to suggest he was going up there for a while.”

Joshua dragged a hand over his bearded chin and frowned.

“Russell friggin’ hates camping – and for the record, so do I,” Joshua replied sourly. “Swear to god, if he ain’t dead when we find him, I’ll kill the stupid old bastard myself. I mean, what the hell is he playin’ at? He ain’t got a damn clue how to hunt a werewolf – never mind the fact he’s up here solo.”

“He’s… uh… not exactly solo.” John interrupted Joshua’s tirade quietly. The southern hunter’s head snapped up.

“What?”

John’s eyes tightened a little, but that was the only reaction he gave.

“Caleb’s with him.”

“Caleb?” Josh’s eyes narrowed. “As in Caleb, Caleb? Caleb, arms dealer, Caleb?”

“Yeah,” John replied, scrubbing a hand over his face. “That Caleb.”

Joshua’s lips twisted angrily.

“I’ll kill them both,” Joshua snarled.

Sam frowned deeply. He knew Caleb, knew him pretty well in fact. John had always said Caleb was a good man, a good hunter and an expert shooter. Surely Joshua should have been pleased that his father was with someone with at least a little experience. However, the man seemed anything but pleased. In fact, he looked furious.

“Well before you go in all guns blazing, Rambo, just try and remember that you called me here to help you get your father out of this in one piece.”

“I called you here because I’m not a hunter, John. Traipsing through the fucking forest ain’t exactly part of the goddamn job description.”

“And what job description is that, Josh?” John looked amused.

“I track demons – demons and ghosts, John – that’s about as far as my huntin’ skills go.” Joshua pushed his fingers through his hair, “I don’t know how the hell to track a werewolf. I wouldn’t even know where the hell to start. Give me a kid with a spinnin’ head, puking pea soup and I’m your guy, but huntin’ Cujo –? Ain’t my goddamn thing.”

John almost rolled his eyes.

“Do you want to hear what I found out, or do you just want to rant all day?” John demanded. Joshua managed a sheepish look and indicated for him to continue. “The girl in the camping store said he bought a map for the Deadwood Trail.”

“Most of the missing hikers disappeared along that route, around the most northern part,” Dean confirmed, pointing to the map and tracing his finger along the area that was circled in red pen.

Joshua got to his feet, his gaze focused on the map. Sam listened from the couch, wishing he could be a part of their discussion. He felt pushed out, alone, useless. His family didn’t need his help and he suddenly felt worthless, like he was nothing more than baggage that his father and brother were forced to drag around. He couldn’t help track creatures like Joshua had. He couldn’t hunt like Dean. He couldn’t do anything. All he did was slow them down. He forced his eyes closed, trying to push the self-pitying thoughts out of his head, but Sam felt the truth of his own words weighing down on him.

“So, likelihood is that Russell’s gonna be around that area somewhere,” Joshua was speaking again and Sam forced his eyes open. If they wouldn’t listen to his worries, at least he hoped they would come up with a decent plan of action.

“It’s a start,” Dean nodded, “but even if we head up after him, there’s almost twenty square miles of parkland within that circle. How the hell are we going to figure out exactly where Russell and Caleb are?”

John sucked thoughtfully on his bottom lip, his eyes gravitating to the map.

“Track the wolf,” John replied. “Odds are we’ll meet them around the area.”

He glanced at his eldest son and Joshua, dropping his hands onto his hips, his expression pensive. After a moment he shook himself and took a deep breath.

“Pack up the supplies, Dean. The full moon’s tomorrow night so we’ll need to leave ASAP if we want a chance of catching up with Caleb and Russell.”

It was spoken quietly but there was no mistaking the command. Dean was already moving towards the bedroom, complying without question to his father’s demands, but Joshua had yet to move.

“Anyone ever tell you that you’re a friggin’ killjoy, Winchester?” Joshua asked mildly, tearing his eyes from the map and glancing over his shoulder.

“You called me in on this gig, Turner. You don’t get to sit on the sidelines.”

Joshua rolled his eyes looking more like a petulant teen than a twenty-six year old man.

“I paid for the damn accommodation,” he countered, but John gave him a lopsided smile.

“The cost of doing business, Josh.”

The demonologist scowled.

“I hate camping,” he muttered even as he started towards the bedroom to pack his belongings together.

Left alone with his father, Sam glanced up at the older man. John was reaching for his own backpack even as he let out a long breath. He looked tired, wearier than Sam had seen him in a long time. Sam sighed.

“So am I staying at the cabin tonight?” He resisted adding alone.

Sam was pretty much used to staying in motels alone. John allowed him to help on the research, but that was about as far as Sam ever got. He would wait in whatever dump John had left him in for days, praying and hoping that his father and brother would come back in one piece. Sam hated being left behind. It scared him. And not because he was frightened of what was out there – although that was scary enough – but because he was afraid of what would happen if his father and brother didn’t come back. They were all he had, and as a twelve year old kid, the thought of being alone was terrifying.

More often than not they returned with nothing more than bruises, but on the odd occasion there had been more serious injuries that had required stitches and days of bed rest. Sam never slept properly the whole time his family were gone. It was too hard to sleep knowing that there was a chance one of them wouldn’t come back. Sam wasn’t stupid, he realised how dangerous their lives were. He also realised that there was no second place; second place was dead, and that wasn’t an option as far as Sam was concerned.

John glanced over his shoulder briefly before returning his attention to checking the guns he had already loaded into his pack.

“Yeah, kiddo.”

“I could help, you know?” Sam muttered.

John rubbed his eyes wearily. “Please, Sam – don’t start.”

Sam thought about pushing it further, but decided against it. Pushing John Winchester was about as clever as poking a bear with a tazer gun; it was bound to end in tears.

“Look, I get that it’s frustrating being left behind, kiddo, but this thing is dangerous and you’re still running a fever.”

Sam sighed again. He knew his father was right, but his brain heard what it wanted to. John thought he was a liability. John thought he was weak. John didn’t think he could do it. Sam hated the way his family looked at him. Even Dean treated him with kid-gloves half the time. He was tired of being babied.

“I don’t like leaving you here, Sammy,” John said quietly, “but trust me – you’re safer.”

“Safer?” Sam demanded irritably. “You think I want to be safe while you and Dean are risking your lives?”

John winced a little at the abrasive tone of his youngest son.

“Your brother and I will be fine, Sam. We’re good at what we do.”

“And I’m not.” The words slipped unbidden from his mouth before he could stop them. Sam could have put his loose tongue down to his fever, said he was delirious or something, but the truth was he’d felt it for a while now. He just didn’t measure up to the standards his father required. He wasn’t as tough, or as fast as Dean. Sure, he was smart, but that didn’t count for anything in their world, and Sam felt inadequate most of the time. He was tired of walking in the shadows of others.

Dean had been a few months older than Sam when he had gone on his first hunt. Sam felt at times that his father and brother would never allow him to grow up. Being the youngest had its perks, but it also sucked at times. This was definitely one of those times when it sucked. His father didn’t seem to grasp that Sam didn’t want to be safer. He didn’t want to be left behind to wonder if John and Dean were hurt – or worse, dead. Sam was hardly weak, he spent hours sparring with Dean, and he could shoot any gun that John put in his hands, but still he felt like he was doomed to be left behind for the rest of his life.

“Sam-“ John started, but broke off, his mouth moving soundlessly as he tried to find the words he needed to reassure his youngest. He never found them however. He never did. Shaking himself, John sighed.

“There’s enough food for four or five days, but if we’re any longer than that there’s money in trunk of the car.” John grabbed his bag, slinging it over his shoulder. “This shouldn’t take longer than that, though. If we’re not back in seven days, call Jim Murphy or Bobby Singer – Singer’s closer, but Jim’s only an hour further out.”

Sam gave his father a sullen nod which John didn’t even register.

“Take your meds, and keep warm. Don’t go traipsing around town – in fact, stay in the cabin. Tell your brother I’m outside. I need some extra supplies,” John added as he headed towards the door.

Sam knew his father probably had everything he needed in his pack already and that his removal from the room was probably more so he could avoid the argument that was brewing.

Joshua and Dean emerged from the bedrooms within seconds of one another. The older hunter headed outside to talk with John, but Dean lingered.

“What’s wrong with you?” Dean questioned suspiciously.

“Nothin’” Sam grouched.

“It sure as hell looks like something.” Sam scowled as his brother moved over to the couch and perched on the arm of it. “Is this about you staying here?”

Sam shifted his shoulders with as much nonchalance as he could muster. “Don’t see why I can’t come. I’ve read loads on werewolves. I can help.”

He gave his brother his patented kicked puppy look, hoping it would soften his resolve, but Dean remained unwavering as he gave his younger sibling a patient look.

“Sam, it’s not about what you know. Werewolves are dangerous. You could get hurt.”

“So could you,” Sam countered angrily.

Dean shrugged. “Yeah, but I won’t.”

His haphazard attitude only fuelled the pre-teen’s anger further.

“You’re not immortal!”

“Never said I was,” the older boy shot back, the beginnings of irritation bleeding into his voice. “Besides, you’re still ill. You should rest up, get better.”

That was the last thing Sam wanted to hear. It only added to his own insecurities that he was nothing more than a burden, a liability, useless baggage.

“I’m not a kid, Dean,” Sam growled. “I don’t need my brow mopping!”

Dean frowned at him. “What’s this really about?”

Sam gave him a heated glare. “Why the hell does Dad bother teaching me how to use weapons, how to fight, if I’m never going to come along?”

Dean rubbed a weary hand over his eyes and scowled. “Jesus, Sam. Are we gonna have this same damn argument every time me and Dad go on hunt?”

Biting down on his lip to stop the overbearing emotions that were turmoiling around his head from overspilling, Sam clung fiercely to his anger, hiding behind it.

“It’s not you who has to wait behind, wondering if-“

Dean raised green orbs to study his brother for a moment.

“Wondering what?”

Sam pulled a face, hiding behind his overly long, unruly hair, and shifted his shoulders. “Forget it, Dean.”

His older sibling let out a low breath.

“Sammy…?” Dean’s voice was unusually gentle. “Me and Dad…? We’re not going anywhere. Don’t worry.”

Sam hated that his brother could read him so well. He hated that Dean knew every expression, every emotion, every thought Sam had before he’d even articulated it. He clenched his jaw tightly, forcing himself to calm down, knowing his anger wasn’t directed at his brother, but at the situation. Sam was worried, and he was hiding behind his irritation, hoping the sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach was just nerves and nothing more untoward.

“We’ll be back before you know it, brat,” Dean said.

Sam wanted to believe his words. He wanted to hold onto them and never let the assurance go, but in his short life Sam had realised one thing. Fate was a mean bitch, and if she chose to take his remaining family from him, Sam wouldn’t be able to do a damn thing to stop her. Slowly, he slid his eyes towards his older brother, blinking away the veiled mist that was starting to blur his vision.

“Promise?”

It was an unfair thing to ask, but Dean didn’t miss a beat as he replied, “I promise.”

The teen squeezed Sam’s shoulder and gave him a small smile.

“Now, d’ya think you could lay off Dad? He ain’t gonna be much fun in the wilderness if he’s pissed before we even start.”

Sam forced a smile, but he still felt uneasy. He had a really bad feeling about all of this. He couldn’t say why, but Sam knew this whole hunt was screwed from start to finish. He had the feeling that his father had bitten off more than he could chew, and that scared the boy. He watched his brother turn and leave the cabin with a level of trepidation that seemed unnatural. It didn’t stop him from praying to whoever the hell would listen that his family came back in one piece.

Chapter Three

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Tuesday 12 March, 1996

Dean hated leaving Sam behind. He hated it more than he would ever admit to his younger brother – or his father for that matter. Every time he walked out of a motel room, a hundred scenarios ran through the seventeen year old hunter’s head. Would Sam be ok? Would he know what to do in an emergency? Would he still be there when they returned? The list was endless, and it made him sick to his stomach at times.

There was more to worry about than perverts, freaks and whack jobs getting hold of his kid brother. In their lives, there was also the added threat of demons, ghosts and other creatures that supposedly only existed in the overactive imaginations of children and Hollywood directors. Dean despised not being there – in case something did go wrong. His whole life had been geared towards protecting his little brother. Leaving Sam behind didn’t exactly fall under that job description in Dean’s mind.

He jumped the steps of the cabin porch, not bothering to walk down them, and headed over to the Impala sullenly. Joshua’s Ford was parked up behind the classic car, the driver’s door open as the older hunter gathered together his own supplies.

It had snowed all morning and drifts were piled against the side of building, covering everything in a serene white blanket. Dean pulled a face. It was going to be hard enough trekking into The Hills, but with the adverse weather conditions…? It was going to make hunting this wolf a pain in the ass.

The trunk was open and John was rummaging around, shoving additional supplies into his already too full pack. His heavy leather jacket was fastened to the neck, and his jeans were tucked over the top of stout boots. His dark hair was cut short and he was currently sporting a thick beard that gave him a hardened appearance – well, more so than usual.

Dean shifted his gaze to his father as he moved towards the imposing man and dumped his duffle bag on the ground next to the rear tyre.

He let his gaze wander over the assortment of guns and knives, the surreal sight catching him off guard for a moment. Sometimes, he wondered what it would be like to have a normal life, a life where ghosts and werewolves weren’t considered standard conversation.

“You packed?” John asked, briefly casting a glance at him before returning back to the arsenal hidden in the trunk.

“Ready to go when you are,” Dean replied quietly, looking over his shoulder to check where the other hunter was. Joshua was now sitting in the driver’s seat of his own car, one leg hanging out of the open door, rummaging in the glove compartment. Satisfied that he wouldn’t be overheard, Dean turned back to John resolutely. “Dad… don’t you think someone should stay with Sam?”

He wished his father had called Jim Murphy or Bobby Singer. He would have felt a lot better knowing one of them was with the kid. The fact that Sam was going to be left completely alone and suffering didn’t sit well with the seventeen year old at all.

John didn’t look up, and for a moment Dean wondered if he was even listening.

“I mean, he’s putting on this dumb ass ‘I’m ok’ routine, but the kid is in bad shape. He shouldn’t be left alone – not like this. What if he gets worse?” Dean let his eyes meander around the secluded landscape with a frown. “This is the back of frigging beyond. He’s kinda screwed if anything happens up here.”

John sighed and pulled his head out of the trunk, shutting it with a resounding thunk. He squinted against the glare of the suns rays on the snowy ground before focusing his hard gaze on his eldest son.

“Sam will be fine, Dean, but if we don’t find Russell and Caleb…?” He broke off with a shift of his shoulders and slid his gaze towards Joshua’s car. The hunter was just emerging from his vehicle, his arms wrapped around his torso in an attempt to keep warm. “I’ve known Josh a long time, kid. I trust him, and I like the man. He’s helped me out more times than I can count, and I’m repaying that favour now.”

Dean understood all too well about loyalty. He only had to look to his own small family unit to know the meaning of the word. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for his brother or father – nothing. They were his world. Dean also knew his father better than anyone. There was no arguing this. Whether he wanted to go or not, this hunt was happening. Dean scrubbed a hand across his mouth, his brow pulled tightly down.

“Let’s get going,” John said finally, more than confirming Dean’s own thoughts, “we’re burning daylight.”

Dean gave a curt nod of his head as his father strode over to Joshua, but his eyes gravitated towards the cabin momentarily. Sam would be fine. It was just a chest infection. He would get better. He didn’t need a babysitter. He just needed rest.

It didn’t ease his apprehension. Sam could also find trouble in an empty room.

Dean sighed resignedly, forcing his eyes from the building, and followed after the two older men.

The hike into the mountains itself was exhausting, and was made harder by the snow fall that seemed to pick up momentum the further into The Hills they got. It crunched under Dean’s boots, making the climb more difficult than it should have been. By the time John called for a rest stop, Dean’s legs were burning with liquid acid.

Shrugging his rucksack off his shoulders, Dean dropped it onto the ground and sank wearily on top of it. Three hours… they had been walking for three hours. It felt longer. He was cold, and tired. There was no wind, but the air was charged with a bitter chill that seemed to seep through his coat as if he wasn’t even wearing it. Rubbing his hands up and down his arms, he glanced at his father and Joshua.

His father seemed unfazed by the long walk, but Joshua’s cheeks were red with exertion – and probably the cold. Turner shook his legs out as he came to a stop, then pulled a bottle of water from his pack and uncapped it, taking a long swig. He offered it to John who took it with a smile.

“How much friggin’ further is it?” Joshua complained. “I feel like we’ve been walkin’ for a damn week.”

The trees were tightly packed together were they had stopped and the trail they were supposed to be following was hidden underneath the white snow. Not that it made any difference. Dean knew without a shadow of a doubt that John knew exactly were they were heading.

“Missing home comforts already, princess?” Dean’s smirk elicited a growl from the tall southern man.

He wasn’t sure how to take the older hunter. On the one hand, he knew he was good at hunting – his father had told him as much – but his constant whining was irritating. Even so, Dean found a strange connection to the man. They had similar histories, and they had both spent their childhood being dragged across country by an obsessed driven parent. Absently, he wondered how Joshua had dealt with that. It was different for Dean – he had Sam. He could only imagine how lonely it must have been for the older hunter growing up with no one but Russell for company.

“You can’t tell me this is your idea of fun, kid,” Joshua shot back sourly, digging a booted foot into the snow covered ground as if it was somehow offensive.

Dean shrugged nonchalantly, but his mind turned to his younger brother. He felt uneasy leaving Sam like that – especially considering how ill the teen was. Not that Sam would admit to either him or their Dad that he was suffering. The kid took stubborn to a whole other level. Sometimes Dean found it hard to say who was more pigheaded – his father or his brother. It was a close call.

“Russell’s a lunatic,” Joshua muttered irritably, holding a hand out to catch the snow flakes that were falling steadily from the sky. “Who in the hell goes hunting in this friggin’ weather?”

“You finished complaining?” John asked mildly, but there was a hard look in his eyes. Dean understood that look. He’d had it directed at himself over the years. It was one that said stop whining and get on with it. Frankly, Dean agreed with John. They were only out here because of Joshua. He would have rather been back at the cabin with his brother.

Joshua let out a long suffering breath. “Christ, Johnny, you ain’t tellin’ me that you don’t wanna throttle the pair of them? I mean, Russell, I can understand actin’ like an ass – he’s pretty much got ass down to a T – but Caleb…? I thought the man had more damn sense.”

John scrubbed a hand over his bearded chin, pulling a face. “Caleb’s good at this, Josh. Your father is in good hands – at least be thankful for that small mercy.”

The demonologist scowled, but seemingly deflated under John’s words. “Any idea how in the hell we’re supposed to hunt this thing?”

“Carefully,” John said wryly, handing the recapped bottle of water back to Turner. “This isn’t going to be easy.”

Joshua snorted. “Like I expected it to be.”

“You sure this is a simple case of werewolf?” Dean asked, his mind wandering back to what Sam had said.

His kid brother might have been young, but he was clever as hell. Dean had seen Sam pull some astounding stuff out when they were researching, stuff that men twice his age wouldn’t be smart enough to figure out. The kid was a frigging genius and his protestations that something wasn’t right had the teen worrying.

John slid his gaze towards his eldest son, his face impassive.

“It’s a wolf, Dean,” was all he said, but his tone told the young hunter that question time was over.

“The sun will be going down in a few hours,” John glanced at the sky, “we need to keep moving if we’re going to reach them by tomorrow.”

Letting out a long sigh, Dean rose to his feet a beat behind his father and swung his bag back onto his shoulders, securing the straps in place. As he made to step forward, something caught his attention. A stray noise, a movement – he wasn’t sure, but the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. Sharp green eyes flicked around the dense wooded area, a sense of unease weighing heavily on him. Dean wasn’t sure what the hell it was, perhaps it was nothing more than paranoia, perhaps it was something more. Even so, he recognised the sensation after a moment.

He was being watched.

His gaze shifted again, his eyes seeking out what had caused such a feeling, but everything was still – too still in fact.

“Dean?”

He glanced over his shoulder and shrugged at his father’s questioning look.

“Thought I heard something,” Dean replied by way of explanation. John’s own gaze swept around the area, but Dean was starting to wonder if he had imagined it.

John evidently shared the same sentiment. “Probably just a deer or something.”

Dean nodded in agreement, and followed after his father and Joshua. Yet the feeling of being watched did not leave him.

---

Sam had watched his brother go with a heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t say why, but something about this hunt just felt… wrong. Very wrong. Sam’s instincts were screaming at him, and that was enough to make him disregard anything John had said to him.

He took a quick shower, ignoring how much the water prickled his skin, ignoring the tremble in his legs from standing up. He figured going into town looking one step from a vagrant was only going to draw attention to himself – attention that he didn’t need. Wandering around alone was bound to do that anyway and for once Sam resented the fact he was short for reasons other than his brother’s constant teasing. He looked every inch his twelve years.

By the time he was dressed and garbed in sufficient outdoor wear, he was exhausted. He dropped onto the edge of the couch, dragging painful breaths through his burning throat. Sam had no idea how he was going to do this, he was already sweating through the chilled tremors that were assaulting his body with renewed ferocity, and yet he had to try. He had to do something – even if it was just for his own peace of mind.

With grim determination, the boy pushed his hands underneath him and rose onto weak legs. His head spun, the room rolling around him, the walls and floors dripping into one another. Latching onto a nearby sideboard, he ducked his head, pulling air in through his nose as he tried to force the nauseous sensation down. God, he felt like shit.

It didn’t deter him, though. The safety of his family was more than enough incentive to push his aching body and swirling vision aside and get moving. He had no idea why he felt so weird about this hunt, but something wasn’t right, and Sam couldn’t ignore that instinct. He just wished his brother had listened to his fears. He should have pushed it more, he should have made them all listen, but in all honesty, Sam couldn’t even explain why he felt this way. Dean probably thought he was just throwing a tantrum over being left behind, but it was more than that. Sam couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but there was something else going on here, and whatever it was, his father wasn’t prepared for it.

Steeling himself, he took a deep breath and pushed the cabin front door open. The cold hit him like a concrete block. It was bitter and bit at the exposed skin on his hands and face with tenacity. Shivering, Sam buried his face deeper into the neckline of his coat, shoved his hands into his pockets and stepped outside.

Sam had to admit that this place was beautiful. The tranquil stillness was framed by the snowy topped peaks of the mountains themselves that rose onto the horizon like formidable sentinels. Even the chill in the air seemed to lose some of its bite in the peaceful white-blanketed landscape. He trudged through the fluffy drifts, his sneakers sinking with each step, and headed towards the town.

Soft flakes dusted the top of his shoulders, and clung to his shaggy long hair as he ducked his head, blinking the falling debris from his eyes. He was freezing. Colder than he had ever been in his entire life and after ten minutes slogging through the snow covered ground, his legs were vibrating with pain and exhaustion.

Dean had said they weren’t far from Deadwood, but Sam had to wonder what his brother’s idea of ‘not far’ consisted off. This felt like miles. Each step hurt like he had been burnt and his skin was prickling fiercely by the time the town came into view.

Deadwood itself practically thrummed with history, seeping from the old buildings so much so that if the cars and modern appliances were removed, Sam could almost imagine he was in some kind of Spaghetti western. He knew Dean would think it was geeky as hell, but Sam felt a little tingle of excitement as he walked down the main high street. This was the final resting place of Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok… Smiling to himself as he imagined Dean’s reaction to that little piece of information, Sam dug his hands further into his pockets and let his eyes rove around the buildings.

A number of bars and cafés lined the wide road, some with brightly coloured canopies, some with flashing neon signs that reminded Sam of a smaller scale Vegas. Most of them had names that told of the city’s past and he found himself smirking as he wandered passed the Wild Bill Bar.

The Hills themselves were visible on the horizon, appearing between the buildings in a mixture of green and white, depending on how the snow had fallen, but the streets were surprisingly busy. A number of people moved from shop to shop, no doubt stocking up supplies for the snow storm that was coming. Sam didn’t know much about this area, but he knew enough to know that the snow fall could get pretty deep in the mountains. He just prayed that his father and brother would make it back before that happened. Sleeping in a tent in minus temperatures was never going to end well. Without even worrying about the werewolf, there was the very real threat of hypothermia. Sam hoped his father had enough sense to be mindful of that.

Coming off Historic Main Street, Sam found the library just around the corner on Williams Street. It didn’t look that much different from most other public buildings, and he barely glanced at the ionic columns as he climbed the steps slowly, leaning heavily on the railings.

The change in temperature within the library was such an abrupt difference from outside that Sam shivered violently, his teeth chattering together as he let his gaze meander around the inside of the building.

“You need any help, honey?”

Sam glanced around as a buxom woman in her late forties wandered over, a stack of books piled in her hands. Her dark hair was pulled into a tight braid, but a few strands had escaped and drifted across her porcelain white face. Sam gave her a full dimpled smile.

“Well, you see, I have this project I’m doing – for school…”

Within minutes he was sat in the archive section of the library, microfiche in front of him, a book of old news cuttings that hadn’t made it onto the system yet next to him. God it was too easy – embarrassingly so. Sam had learnt from an early age that there wasn’t much that would ever be denied to him with a flash of that smile. Add what his brother referred to as ‘the puppy dog eyes of doom’, and both were assured to get him pretty much anything he wanted. Only his father seemed to be immune to that look.

Settling into the hard-backed chair, Sam began the arduous task of wading through old papers. He left his coat on, despite the fact the library was warm, his body chilled to the bone, shivering with each draft of air that passed as the main doors were opened.

It took him the best part of three hours, but finally he had compiled a list of potential victims and dates for the last four years. At this point he was forced to wade through the book of old cuttings.

They were slipped into plastic wallets, which made it easier to read, but his eyes were beginning to sting, wanting to close. He blinked and forced himself to continue reading. The full moon was tomorrow night. Time was something he didn’t have the luxury of wasting.

Sam wasn’t a stranger to researching. In the last year or so he had become instrumental in pulling together information for a number of hunts, however he usually had the help of his father or brother. Trying to make sense of what he was finding alone was exhausting and slow work. Even so, he was surprised when the brunette librarian popped her head around the stacks and informed him that she was locking up shortly. He hadn’t realised it was so late.

He rifled through the pages of notes he had made, glancing at the clock. It was quarter to five. He wanted to sleep, but he forced his gritty eyes back to the hastily written scrawls. He had fifteen minutes to use the resources in the library before it closed and he intended to make use of that time.

He’d found a number of hikers that had gone missing in the last four years, and he’d also found the articles on the ones who had been mauled to death in the last six months. It was the same research the older hunters had come up with, but Sam had found something else… The library archived the local paper for the county and Sam had found a couple of articles that sounded like they could be related to their case. A town a few miles over had a string of mauled hikers turn up a year ago in similar circumstances. As he began tracking the movement of this thing, Sam realised from his notes that every six months or so this thing moved onto a new town around the Black Hills area. He also realised that the manner of deaths were different from the missing hikers around Deadwood in the last four years. Something else was going on here, but Sam couldn’t put his finger on what it was.

He shifted hazel eyes to the clock and let out a weary breath. It was almost five and the last thing he wanted was the librarian to discover him rifling through old stories on murders and maulings. That kind of thing really didn’t go down well with adults.

Gathering his notes, Sam folded the papers and shoved them into the inside pocket of his jacket. Once he had tidied up the table were he had been working, he left the library, sparing a wave for the librarian and started the long walk back to the cabin.

The sky was starting to darken as dusk settled around the town, stealing the last remnants of any warmth that had existed from the air. Snow was still falling, and the streets and sidewalk had completely disappeared underneath the blanket of white.

He was exhausted and his legs were a little rubbery underneath him. In fact, he was feeling hot and cold all over, all at the same time. For the hundredth time, he cursed the damn chest infection. He felt miserable. He was aching from head to foot, and his chest was so tight that by the time the cabin came into view, Sam felt as if he was breathing shards of glass.

Letting out a relieved sigh, he started towards the building, nestling further into the neckline of his coat. He just wanted to sit down. He was cold, hurting, and –thanks to the snow – wet. The Impala and Joshua’s car were buried under a layer of white, as was everything else for that matter, and the ascent up the small driveway towards the porch was slow going. Slower than it should have been. The ground seemed unstable and slippery beneath his feet, and each step burnt.

The thought of his brother and father up in The Hills unprepared made his feet keep moving, despite the fact he wanted to collapse in a heap and sleep. Sam was under no allusions that there was a werewolf involved… the maulings around the full moon were all typical wolf, but there was definitely something else going on. The secondary patterns of missing hikers – rather than dead hikers – suggested that much. He just wasn’t sure what the hell it did suggest.

He didn’t make it to the porch. He didn’t even make it part way up the driveway. One minute he was stumbling forward on trembling legs towards the cabin, the next he was on the ground, his side aching. He went down hard and heavy, his elbow tingling with electricity as it slammed into the snow covered ground. Coughing weakly, Sam pressed his palms into the cold white dust and tried to push himself onto his knees. It was easier said than done. His whole body thrummed with pain. It was like he had been hit by a car, only it hurt more.

Disorientated and confused as to what had happened, Sam raised his heavy head, searching the darkness that was now fully enveloping the landscape. Unable to see what had attacked him, he forced himself off the ground, and pushed himself onto shaky legs. His jeans were soaked through, clumps of snow caked onto the knees, slowly melting into nothing more than wet patches. His legs hurt with the cold, but he ignored it, his eyes still scanning the area. There was nothing there, nothing but the slight shift of the leaves in the breeze, and the pitter-patter of falling snow. Sam’s lungs ached with the need to take a breath, but he was straining his ears, trying to hear anything. His heart pounding fiercely beneath his ribs made it difficult to focus. Dean and his father had taught him to fight, had taught him what to do in an emergency, but facing some kind of supernatural attacker right now…? All that training went out of the window. He was scared and unarmed, and he wanted his family to come back and save him from whatever the hell this thing was. However that was not an option and Sam knew he was alone.

He dragged the sleeve of his coat over his face and was surprised when it came away blood stained. Gingerly, he ghosted his fingers over his cheeks and hissed. He was cut – deeply. He had no idea how it had happened, but crimson drops were staining the blanket of white beneath him. His breath was coming out in thick rags now and no amount of self-control could stop Sam’s laboured breathing. He was scared, and his chest ached with each inhale. New bruises seemed to be already forming along his ribs, but Sam ignored it all. Bruised was better than the alternative.

He ran – as fast as he could manage on wobbly legs – towards the cabin. John had left weapons inside, weapons for Sam to use to protect himself. Sam wanted those weapons more than he had ever wanted anything in his entire life.

He’d barely taken three steps when he saw it.

A shadow…

He caught it in his peripheral vision, just out of sight. He shouldn’t have stopped running, he should have kept going, but fear, shock and exhaustion made his legs fold beneath him like a bad hand of cards.

Sam groaned as pain splintered through his pelvis, unable to prevent the face dive into the cold snow. He tried to move, tried and failed. His entire body seemed to have stopped responding to his commands to get the hell up and move. In fact, it had stopped responding to anything. His vision fractured momentarily before flickering back online.

A snarling growl and a looming shadow over him forced his gaze upwards. Sam wished he hadn’t looked. Ice, colder than the snow he was lying face down in, settled in clumps in his belly, his heart freezing in his chest.

The last thing he remembered before darkness stole him was a set of amber eyes staring into his face, and the putrid stench of rotting flesh.

Chapter Four

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Tues 12 March/Wed 13 March 1996

Darkness had settled around the area, clinging to the trees and hillside like a funeral shroud – oppressive and bleak. The black was broken up by flickering orange flames, dancing happily as they licked the thick branch John placed into the embers. It was freezing and Dean shifted closer to the fire, ignoring the fact it was practically burning the skin off his face in his attempt to get warm. He should have moved further back, but he was savouring every last ounce of heat he could get. Thankfully, it had stopped snowing, but the air still shivered with cold.

Through the canopy of dense leaves, the pregnant moon could just be seen. It was almost full, a tiny slither missing from the silver orb. Shivering, Dean pulled the heavy blanket further around his trembling frame. This sucked. Pitching the tent had been hard enough in the snow, but the thought of sleeping on the cold ground with nothing more than a sleeping bag and a groundsheet for insulation wasn’t exactly filling Dean with joy.

Underneath his blanket, he was clutching his gun, his finger lax, but ready, on the trigger. Dean wasn’t sure what the hell he had sensed earlier, but the feeling of being watched had set him on edge. His father had dismissed it as nothing, but Dean couldn’t help but think something else was going on here.

John shifted over to the far side of the fire and sat in the doorway of the tent, his long legs pulled up to his chin, his eyes lost in the flames. He was thinking over the details of the hunt. Dean didn’t need to be a mind reader to know that. He knew his father inside out. He knew how he worked, he knew the routine John followed on every hunt. He also knew John’s mind never rested. You could take the man out of the Marines… but you couldn’t take the Marines out of the man. John still thought like a soldier – not that Dean was complaining. It had kept their asses in one piece on more than one occasion. Dean saw more than that though. He recognised his father’s regimented lifestyle was nothing more than a way of blocking out the pain of their past. Hiding behind routines and commands was easier than dealing with the shit they’d been through. Dean knew his father used hunting as an excuse to forget… well, not forget because what had happened to Mary would never be forgotten, but it gave his father something else to think about, something to release his pain into. A cause higher than his own life – probably higher than both his sons’ lives.

Dean had to admit it made him feel better. Putting other families back together and saving their loved ones made Dean feel something other than angry. It was too easy to get swept up in the hatred and become warped by it. Hunting gave him an outlet. He figured it was the same for his father, although John was looking for answers too.

Dean wondered if John would take the supernatural world apart piece by piece until he discovered what the hell had pinned his mom to the ceiling thirteen years ago. Sometimes, he wondered if his father’s crusade mattered more to him than Sam and Dean did. Not that he doubted his father loved them both – he never doubted that, not for a second – but John’s obsession was consuming him – and their little family unit. He wondered if it would be at the expense of them all.

He wouldn’t let that happen. Not now, not ever. His family was all Dean had and he refused to let it go. What had happened to his mom was terrible – Dean would never deny that, nor would he deny the thirst for revenge he felt at having her taken from him – but he had to wonder if it was worth it. She wasn’t coming back, and Dean thought it was more important to deal with the now, rather than the then. The now was his father and brother and he would do whatever it took to keep the three of them together.

Sighing, he dragged a hand over his face before tucking it back under the blanket, resting it back on the cold barrel of the gun.

“You want some of this?” Dean glanced up as Joshua dropped down next to him, shaking with cold, his face oddly distorted in the flickering firelight. He eyed the bowl the older hunter was offering him with a puzzled frown. “Its soup – at least I think that’s what it’s supposed to be. Johnny tried to tell me it’s nutritious, but I ain’t buyin’ it. It tastes like someone died in it.” Josh poked the plastic spoon into the bowl and grimaced. “I think someone did.”

Dean raised a brow.

“Yeah, you’re really selling it to me, dude.” He shook his head, his breath steaming in front of his face as he spoke. “I think I’ll take a rain check. Paying homage to the porcelain god isn’t my idea of fun when it involves leaves and a cold breeze.”

“Missin’ home comforts, princess?” Joshua threw Dean’s earlier comment back at him with a smirk. The younger man rolled his eyes.

“I like to see where I’m parking my ass before I park it,” Dean replied. “Besides, I’m not that big a fan of au naturel.”

“I ain’t exactly Jane Goodall, man.” Joshua raised blue eyes to the dark sky, and sighed. The clouds had dissipated into piebald patches and hundreds of stars shimmered like pinpricks of light on a black satin backdrop. If it hadn’t been so damn cold, it actually would have been a really pleasant night.

Dean glanced over his shoulder towards the tent. John was still sat in the same position, his gaze unfocused and yet seemingly preoccupied. Dean could practically hear the cogs turning in his father’s head.

“You think we’ll find Caleb and Russell before the full moon?” Dean found the question slipped unbidden from his lips before he could shove the words back in.

He had no idea what kind of relationship the hunter had with the older man, and he didn’t want to add to the apprehension Joshua had to be feeling. Dean could imagine how he would feel if the shoe was on the other foot. He would have torn the county apart stone by stone to find his father or brother.

Joshua shifted his shoulders with nonchalance, but Dean noticed the tightness around his eyes. He was worried – and trying to hide it. “Guess that depends on Johnny’s skills to track the stupid bastard down.”

“Dad’ll find him,” Dean assured him firmly.

Joshua snorted softly, his eyes lowering to the fire.

“I don’t doubt it, kid.” He followed Dean’s gaze, studying John for a moment. “I didn’t exactly call your father in on this for his damn charm and personality. Sayin’ that, Johnny makes Russell look like a damn kitten.”

He deposited the uneaten soup on the ground in front of his crossed legs with a final distasteful glare at it before he pulled at his own blanket, wrapping it further around his shivering frame

“You and your Dad don’t get on much, huh?”

Joshua gave Dean a confused look, his brow wrinkling.

“What makes you say that?”

Dean shrugged.

“The way you talk about him.”

“Who are you – Dr Phil?” The southern man raked his long hair out of his eyes and laughed under his breath, affection momentarily bleeding through his crooked smile. “Russell… he don’t exactly think like normal folk, but I get it – I get him.” His expression became distant. “He’s lost everything he ever gave a shit about. Kinda makes it hard to care about your own mortality at times.”

The hunter twitched uncomfortably, but he didn’t need to explain further. Dean knew he was referring to the murder of his family. Taking a shuddering breath, he continued talking.

“Me and Russ, we ain’t ever gonna be the Huxtable’s, but he’s still my father – which is the only goddamn reason I’m freezing my ass off in sub-minus temperatures in the middle of nowhere.”

Dean saw the levity for what it was. Joshua didn’t want to talk about this crap. He dropped the subject immediately and let out a weary breath. However, Joshua spoke before Dean could think of a way to break the tension that had settled around them, colder than the snow the layered the ground.

“You ever hunted a wolf before?”

“Nope,” Dean replied. “You?”

Vampires, werewolves… they were the stuff of legends, the holy grail of the supernatural world. Dean had to admit he was a little excited at the prospect of seeing a werewolf up close and personal.

“This shit’s a little far outside my jurisdiction, Dean,” Joshua admitted. “Like I said, puking girls and rotating heads, I can handle. Playin’ Doctor Doolittle…?” He pulled a face. “Well, I’m hopin’ Johnny knows what the hell he’s doin’.”

“You expecting him to talk to the animals?” Dean raised a brow, favouring the demonologist with a grin.

“John? Jesus, no. He’s a ‘shoot now, ask questions later’ kinda guy. Talkin’ don’t exactly feature highly in his list of priorities.” Turner swivelled his gaze to the older hunter before turning back to Dean. “Why the hell d’ya think I keep him so friggin’ sweet?”

Dean cast a side long glance at Turner and grunted.

“He’s all bark and no bite.”

Joshua flicked his brow sceptically.

“You say that kid, but I’m guessin’ you ain’t ever been on the receiving end of John’s tongue lashings.” He rubbed at his nose, sniffing. “It ain’t exactly my idea of fun.”

Dean shrugged. John could be cagy as hell, especially when hunting, but Dean knew he only did so to keep them safe.

“So, silver bullets really work on these things?” Joshua asked, shifting on the ground to get comfortable. It wasn’t easy. Despite the blanket, and warmth from the fire, Dean could feel the cold seeping into his own legs, settling deep within the bones.

“Yeah, silver works,” Dean replied softly. “About the only thing the movies got right.”

It was kind of hard to watch horror and not find it funny. Dean found it ironic that people would pay money to see films that weren’t realistic – or scary for that matter – considering real monsters existed.

Dean sighed and trembled against the chilled night air that seemed to caress icy fingers up his spine.

“Hope you rented that cabin for a while, dude,” Dean said. “Would kind of suck if you didn’t get to enjoy it – considering how much it’s costing you.”

The older man pulled a face. “What’s more annoying is that we’re sleepin’ in the snow and your little brother’s enjoyin’ the home comforts of a hundred and fifty dollars a night luxury cabin.”

“Are you still complaining?” John demanded.

Dean started. He hadn’t heard his father move at all, but the older man was now stood over both him and Joshua. John gave Turner a long look before sinking down next to him, fingers extended towards the fire.

“Yeah, because you’re usually sweetness and light, Johnny,” Joshua replied dryly.

John shrugged, cupping his hands together and blowing on them. Dean shifted a little, unsure how to take the banter between the two men. He felt a little jealous. The two older men seemed completely at ease with one another.

“I do what has to be done.”

“Just like you did what had to be done with that damn poltergeist in Tucson?” Joshua cocked his head to the side, his brow arched.

John shot the man a warning look that had Dean itching to know what the hell was going on.

“What poltergeist?” He asked, flicking his gaze between the two hunters.

“Nothing,” John replied before Joshua could open his mouth, but the southern man was grinning.

“Oh, it was nothing? C’mon, Johnny, don’t be so damn coy.” Joshua’s tone was serious despite the smirk that was smeared across his face.

John scowled, dragging a calloused hand over his beard. “You want to live to see twenty-seven, kid, I suggest you shut your damn mouth.”

“I spend most of my days exorcisin’ demons. I didn’t expect to reach twenty,” Joshua shrugged, “twenty-six ain’t too bad for a hunter, old man.”

“Josh-“ John didn’t bother to finish the barely veiled threat that hung in that one word.

Joshua shot John a wicked smile before turning back to Dean. “Well, you know your Daddy is a stubborn bastard. He called me in on this damn hunt – salt and burn of some pissed off granny. It shoulda been easy, but she ain’t about playin’ nice…”

Joshua laughed as John rolled his eyes, but Dean had stopped listening.

He wasn’t sure why but his stomach clenched and an uneasy feeling settled over him. Frowning, he shifted his gaze around the clearing, but nothing moved. It was different to the sensation of being watched. It was a gut-wrenching feeling of impending disaster and he had no idea where it had come from. Suddenly, Dean wished Sam was here. He wanted nothing more than to see his kid brother in the flesh. He knew it was ridiculous because Sam was safe in the cabin, but Dean couldn’t shake the feeling that his little brother was in trouble.

---

Sam’s first waking thoughts were muddled. His head was fuzzy, his brain felt loose within his skull, and his entire left side was one big bruise.

Slowly, he prised gritty eyes open and was met with more velvet darkness. Panic settled in the base of his stomach, liquid acid churning in his guts. Where the hell was he? Why the hell was it so dark? And what… what was that smell? It was musty, earthy and it filtered through the stagnating air, mixing with the coppery iron stench of blood and decay.

Sam grimaced, shuttering his lids, trying to glimpse through the curtain of black, but it seemed to wind tighter around him, sucking him further into the darkness. He tried to move, but immediately regretted it. A sharp pain lanced through his torso, like an ice pick sliding between his ribs. Panting, his chest heaved as he sagged back on the cold, hard ground and sucked air in through his constricted airway. Each breath seemed to pull his chest muscles tighter until it felt as if his lungs were being crushed. He wasn’t sure if it was the infection or if he was hurt. Slowly, and carefully, he raised a laden hand and ghosted fingers over his ribs.

Hissing at the contact, he winced. He was bruised – badly. He didn’t think anything was broken, but it didn’t mean it wasn’t painful as hell. Pushing his hands underneath him, he levered himself off the ground. The sound that escaped his lips was more a whimper than a groan as he felt the ligaments and skin tighten like an elastic band being stretched too far. Making it to his knees, he squeezed his eyes shut, leaning on shaky hands to stop himself from face-diving. He had to give it to his father and brother. How the hell they managed to drag their asses around after taking a beating on a hunt, Sam had no idea. He just wanted to lie down and sleep. That wasn’t an option however. Whatever had attacked him could still be around, and that was incentive enough to push his pain aside and move.

And then he heard it.

It was nothing more than a low growl, barely discernable, but it was there nevertheless. He desperately tried to see what was lurking in the shadow, but the stubborn blackness remained. He figured that whatever the hell was snarling at him wasn’t exactly planning on making friends. Curling one arm around his ribs, he used the other to scoot back from whatever was hiding in the dark. He’d barely moved a couple of feet when his back hit something hard. Hands fumbling, it took him a moment to realise it was stone. A wall of stone. Cave… he was in a cave. He didn’t know whether to be scared or relieved that he had figured out his location. It explained the earthy smells. He didn’t even want to know what was causing the stench of decay.

“Precious…” The hissing voice, laced with sickly sweetness, had his heart skipping beats. It didn’t sound friendly. “Precious one.” It snarled again and Sam couldn’t help the ragged breath that tore from his throat. His fear was palpable and taking over his ability to reason. All his training, all his brother’s advice, all his father’s instructions dribbled out of the base of his skull along with any sense. He had no idea what the hell to do.

Sam pressed against the wall, barely breathing, silencing the gasp that had moments ago escaped from his frightened lips. The thing must have known he was here – after all he had gotten to the cave somehow – but Sam wasn’t about to let the thing know he was awake. Unfortunately, the thing that had attacked him had other ideas.

Orange flickered and sparked in the darkness before melting the shadows away completely, filling the space with its warm glow. Sam blinked rapidly against the stark brightness, shielding his burning eyes as they adjusted to the change in light.

He had been right about the cave. The stone walls seemed to push against the darkness of the tunnels that led off the main area themselves, sucking the air out of the atmosphere. The mouth of the cave blended into the ebony sky outside, only visible now due to the spluttering flames that were dancing in the small oil lamp that had been lit moments before.

Wondering if he had a concussion, Sam struggled to make sense of what he was seeing. The cave was filled with furniture. There was a small wooden bench and a threadbare high-backed chair. Various other mismatched pieces adorned the small space, and there was even a heavy looking fur rug covering the main floor. There were also several sheets of what looked like leather hanging from the walls. Sam wasn’t really sure what they were but there were no patterns or designs on them. It was the most goddamn surreal thing he had ever seen, but Sam ignored all of it. His eyes were locked on the figure stooped over a furled legged table.

A long, leather patchwork cloak hid the bulk of her frame, tangled silver hair cascading down her back, knotted and unkempt. She was muttering something under her breath, hissing and snarling like a feral animal, but Sam couldn’t hear her words. Maybe she was just crazy… a crazy old woman who lived in a cave. Ok, that was pushing it, even considering the weird shit that happened in his life. Sam was pretty sure this woman was the one who had attacked him – although there was no way in hell he was admitting to his brother that grandma got the drop on him. Dean would never let him live it down.

His entire body tingled with adrenaline and fear as he carefully climbed to his feet, ignoring the tremble in his lower limbs. One hand on the wall for support, he struggled to gain traction in his legs for a moment.

As he straightened, he got a good look at the table and wished he hadn’t. His heart literally stopped and his stomach turned inside out, bile rushing up his throat. It took all the will in the world not to throw up. He had no idea how he stopped himself from doing so. On the table was…

Shit…

Sam gagged again, his entire body going cold.

She was… flaying… someone. At least Sam assumed it had been a someone; it was hard to tell. Most of the skin had been removed leaving clumps of clotted blood in its wake. Acid burnt the back of his throat as he realised what the leather on her cloak and hanging from the walls was. It was skin. Human skin. His head was rolling, his vision winking on and off as he tried to wrap his mind around what she was doing.

He had to get out of here. He had to get away from the scene he was seeing. He wanted to curl into a ball. He wanted his father and brother to save him from this… thing. But John and Dean weren’t here, and Sam knew that his only chance of surviving was him.

The woman stopped, stilling suddenly.

“Wakes… it wakes…” She hissed excitedly, her back still to him, but she shivered with anticipation.

He could feel his heart pounding beneath his abused ribs, practically bursting out of his chest. It was loud in his own ears, thumping like a marching band, drowning out all other sounds. He flicked his gaze between the woman and the cave itself, searching for a weapon, but there was nothing he could use.

His search was halted abruptly as she twisted her neck, her body following after a moment, and turned fully towards him. If he could have sunk into the walls of the cave and disappeared, he would have done so. As it was he had nowhere to go, and nothing to do other than stare wide-eyed at her.

She was transforming before his eyes from an old woman into… something else, and god, she was hideous. Amber irises vanished and all that remained of her former appearance was the cloak and her grey hair.

One eye was now glaring at him through a milky white film, the other was sewn shut, a grotesque scar running from the temple across the lid and down the side of her long, pointed nose. Needle pointed teeth emerged from underneath thin lips, stained black, and her skin was a deep blue colour. But that wasn’t the worst of it. Long metal claws jutted out from the tips of her fingers, blood dripping from the ends. Sam could see strips of flesh hanging off the knife like nails and his breakfast almost made a return visit.

Not a werewolf… definitely not.

He had no idea what the hell she was, but god, he hated being right sometimes. If it would have done any good he would have cursed his father’s stupidity, and his brother’s ignorance.

“Bony… bony, but good skin.” She stepped towards him slowly, her clawed fingers extended towards him in some kind of disturbing parody of Johnny Depp in Edward Scissorhands. “You make good.”

Sam didn’t bother to stick around to find out what the hell he was going to ‘make good’. He picked up a nearby chair and flung it with all the strength he could muster at the thing. It hit her fully in the chest, eliciting a grunt from her. She staggered back one step, but that was all. Sam didn’t care. He was too busy running.

A glancing blow caught him on the shoulder, fire erupting down his side, but he didn’t stop.

The cold night air hit him like a physical blow as he barrelled out of the cave entrance and propelled forward towards freedom. The ground dropped below him into a steep incline, the snow covered ground making it difficult to keep his footing. He slid several steps, his hands lashing out to grab passing tree branches to keep his balance as he pelted down the slope, not daring to look back. His chest was aching, his entire body depleted of oxygen as he hurtled further into the darkness. His palms stung as wood cut the skin, but it was all ignored. All that mattered was putting distance between himself and the creature. All that mattered was staying alive.

His legs burnt, feeling impossibly heavy, and his breath was heaving out like a steam train trying to pick up speed, but he didn’t stop running. At least he wouldn’t have stopped, but something caught his ankle.

And then he was careening forward, the ground hurtling closer to his face. He threw his hands out to soften the fall, trying to roll into it, but a mixture of fatigue and surprise made his limbs uncooperative and slow to respond to his commands. Sam hit the ground hard, winded as his chest slammed into the snow covered ground. His vision rolled like he was on the waltz’s and pinpricks of white light flickered behind his lids as he squeezed his eyes shut, biting back the pain. However, he barely let his body settle before he rolled onto his back, ignoring the pull on his torso and shoulder. Pain was better than the alternative. The alternative…? God, he didn’t even want to think about it.

The blue-faced hag was looming over him, snarling, teeth visible even in the darkness.

“Like a chase,” she practically crowed, “like a chase.”

Sam backpeddled on his bottom, scrabbling in an attempt to get away from her. His mouth was impossibly dry as she matched his movement. He was screwed. Weaponless, alone… god, he was going to die. He was going to die and his brother and father had no idea this thing was out here.

“Precious thing…” the hag hissed, sliding closer to him, clawed fingers reaching for him. Sam’s heart skipped a beat.

Yeah, he was so totally screwed.

Chapter Five

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Early Hours of Wed 13 March 1996

Sam understood two things.

Firstly, that monsters were real – no matter how much other people tried to deny the fact or ignore it. Secondly, that there was no such thing as giving up. If you still had breath in your body, you fought. And Sam could still breathe – just about.

The blue-faced hag leaned further into him, her knife-like fingers piercing the tender flesh of his thighs. He arched his back, his mouth open in a wordless scream, bucking against her suffocating weight. It was an exercise in futility, however. She didn’t move a goddamn inch, and Sam’s leaded limbs were tiring quickly, his movements becoming increasingly sluggish. It didn’t deter him. This was a fight for survival, a fight for his life, and Sam wasn’t rolling over and letting her kill him. Not like this.

He managed to find the strength to push a hand under her chin and attempted to shove her savagely away from him. In reality, all he achieved was a glancing blow, an exhausted swipe, a pitiful nudge. The creature barely noticed the action, and within a millisecond her fetid breath was hot against his cheek once more, her claws digging deeper.

Sam’s legs were burning, flaring with angry, white, hot pain. A small amount of warm blood was trickling down the sides of his frigid legs, and the twelve-year-old barely managed to stifle the cry that raced up his throat, bypassing his ability to maintain control of his pain receptors. She didn’t relinquish her hold as she threw her head back and let out an eerie wail that could have come right out of a horror movie.

It made his entire body go cold, icy fingers tracing up his spine. If he could have covered his ears, he would have done so. As it was, Sam wanted to curl into a ball and block the inhuman sound out. Unfortunately, he could not move, and he was a little too preoccupied with trying to stop the hag from tearing his legs off to give the matter much attention.

Aware of the fact his attempts to fight back were getting him nowhere fast, Sam frantically tried to recall his training, tried to remember all those sparring lessons with his brother that had seemed so pointless at the time.

Pointless…

He almost laughed, on the verge of hysterics. Right now he was clinging to those lessons with grim hopefulness, wishing he had paid more attention, wishing they could offer him the life-saving driftwood he desperately needed to stop himself from drowning in the river of defeat.

What had Dean told him to do when facing a stronger opponent? How did you break their hold? What had he said about fighting someone bigger?

Sam tried to drag the information out of the vaults of his mind, but he couldn’t think straight. His brain was oddly absent of anything resembling a coherent thought, and the only thing running through his befuddled mind was that he was screwed. In fact, it was becoming increasingly difficult to focus on anything other than the needle pointed teeth trying to rip chunks out of his throat, and the clawed knives tearing into his thighs.

One hand still forced under the blue-faced creature’s chin, holding back her razor sharp incisors, Sam tipped his head back, his neck hyper-extended to the point of being more than just uncomfortable. He shifted his gaze across the length of the snow covered ground, his heart pounding wildly beneath his abused ribs. There was no way he could unseat her using brute strength. At twelve, he was scrawny and short for his age. Not only that, but his injuries and his infection were quickly draining his energy. He couldn’t fight her much longer.

Blindly, he threw his free hand out to the side of his supine body, fumbling in the murky darkness, ignoring the fact his fingers and hands were starting to go numb. Frost bite wasn’t really at the forefront of his mind at the moment; staying alive was more important.

His hand ghosted over a thick, half-buried branch as the creature pressed closer against his body, sucking the last vestiges of warmth from his skin – and his soul. She was lying fully on top of him now, colder than the snow, heavier than a grown man. Her clawed nails were still pinning his thighs down, stopping him from moving. He had tried to pull free of her grip, but every shift of his legs sent an agonising wave of electric pain through his limbs. It was more than enough incentive to keep the lower half of his body immobile.

Sam’s chest ached under her freezing weight, and he was struggling to pull air into his constricted lungs. The hag tilted her head to the side and barred needle pointed teeth, her smile salacious as she flicked her fat, long tongue over his cheek. Shuddering, Sam curled his fingers further around the branch, the mix of splintered wood and frosty slush burning his palm. She was tasting the blood… the blood that was running down the side of his face. The thought made him sick to his stomach.

“Precious taste,” she purred, moving towards the rips in his coat were she had slashed him in the cave.

In his panicked state of mind, Sam hadn’t even realised she had caught him so badly, but his coat was shredded on the left shoulder, black shiny blood soaking through the material.

He tried to twist away, comprehending what she was about to do at the last moment, repulsed by her actions. He could do nothing, however. He was her prisoner, and she was in full control of the situation. Instead, he was forced to watch with grim horror as she ran her icy, coarse tongue over the rivulets of crimson bubbling from the wound.

“Honey sweet. Good taste.”

Sam tightened his grip on the branch, closing his eyes briefly as he muttered a silent prayer that this would work. It was a dirty tactic, but if it kept him alive, Sam didn’t care. He didn’t know what the hell else to do. At twelve-years-old he was hardly big; in fact, Dean often joked that Sam was the runt of the litter. He was always the smallest kid in his class, no matter where they moved, and he didn’t have muscle on his side. Sam would rely on whatever techniques he could – even if it wasn’t fighting fair.

He pulled his arm up and, with every last piece of strength he possessed, he smashed the gnarled, heavy branch into the side of her head. The reaction was instantaneous, completely surprising, and it momentarily caught the boy off guard. He hadn’t expected the blow to affect her at all.

She shrieked an ear-piercing, blood-curdling sound that echoed into the darkness like the last vestige of a fatally wounded animal. Sam didn’t care. It was enough – more than enough – to gain his freedom. She reared, head thrown back as knife-like hands fisted against the side of her head. Sam helped her the rest of the way, shoving her viciously off his legs, barely noticing that she crumpled at the side of him like an old rag.

Without giving his injuries a second thought, Sam rolled onto his front and pushed himself onto shaky knees. She made a last desperate attempt to keep her victim, latching her clawed finger into his coat, trying to drag him backwards. Sam had tasted freedom, tasted a second chance at life, and he wasn’t ready to give that up. Numb hands fumbled with the zipper, and in a potentially lethal game of tug of war, the coat lost, half sliding, half ripping off his frame. Sam couldn’t care less about the torn garment, or the fact he was now only wearing a thin t-shirt. He was alive, and more or less in one piece. In his eyes, that was nothing short of a miracle considering ten seconds earlier he had been on a one way trip to the afterlife.

Staggering drunkenly to his feet, Sam flicked his gaze over his shoulder as she howled with rage. It was enough incentive to haul ass.

He didn’t know where the hell he was going, or which direction took him back to the town, back to safety; it didn’t matter. The only thought in his head was putting as much distance as possible between himself and the hag; a request that he was more than happy to comply with.

His breath was ripping through his lips raggedly, his chest heaving as trees whizzed passed him in a shadowed blur. Sam may not have had strength on his side, but he could certainly run, and he was running faster than he had ever run in his entire life.

Thick branches flicked back as he pushed his way through the foliage, hostile wooden fingers trying to stop his escape. The snow beneath his feet made it difficult to gain any real speed, but Sam ploughed through the sea of white regardless, stumbling and sinking into the deep drifts. His legs hurt and his shoulder was a solid wall of pain, but he ignored it all. Running on nothing more than adrenaline, he was able, for the moment, to block all of that out. There was no way he was dying at this thing’s hands, and that thought gave him the push he needed to keep going.

He had no idea how long he ran for, but finally, his exhausted legs gave out.

The rubbery limbs lost traction suddenly, folding beneath him like soggy tissue paper. Sam pitched forward, hitting the frozen ground heavily, the impact jarring his entire body. He was already soaked, his jeans clinging to him like a second skin, and his shirt was damp enough that it had stopped repelling the elements and was now acting like a huge sponge, seemingly drawing water from the air itself. The material hugged his torso, moulding to his frame like wet cellophane, cold penetrating through skin and muscle, settling deep within his bones.

As he lay in the dark, breathing in the icy snow that was inches from his face, frustrated tears brimmed in his eyes.

For the last year Sam had strove for independence, for the removal of the label of ‘baby of the family’. He’d wanted to go on hunts with Dean and John; he’d wanted to feel useful. Right now, he didn’t care if he never went on a hunt ever. Sam wanted his brother and father to appear and fix this mess. He had no idea how either of them did this. Sam was scared, tired and hurt, and the mixture of the three emotions was draining him more than his injuries or his infection. He wanted to disappear into the ground itself, praying that he wouldn’t be found, praying that someone would save him. He couldn’t keep fighting the creature. His strength was waning, and the blue-faced hag was too strong. His initial relief at escaping her clutches was suddenly dissipating, and fear was settling into the pit of his stomach once more. It was only a matter of time before she found him again, and Sam was too exhausted to fend her off.

Feeling useless and pathetic, Sam closed his eyes and let his aching body relax. It was all too tempting to stay in this position and sleep, and Sam was too tired and too hurt to force himself to move.

Two minutes... that was all he needed. Just two minutes and then he would run again.

The crunch of snow underfoot to the left of him took that decision firmly out of his hands. Heart pounding fiercely beneath his bruised and cold ribs, Sam dragged his face across the ground, clumps of snow clinging to his skin. The moon was peeking from beneath the clouds, but it wasn’t enough light to burn the shadows from the landscape and let him see what he was facing. He wasn’t entirely sure if he was grateful for that or not.

Sam gave a strangled whimper as a dark figure moved towards him, melting out of the blackness like a magician’s trick – now you see it, now you don’t, only the other way round because with Sam’s shitty luck there was no way this thing was disappearing.

He could only see legs and feet, but it didn’t matter; Sam was already pushing himself onto trembling hands and knees. He might have been tired, but he was still a Winchester, and he wouldn’t give up. Not while his family needed him.

A snarling, feral growl from behind him had Sam pulling his eyes from the figure and flicking his gaze over his shoulder. It was the blue-faced hag.

Two attackers…

The colour drained from his face, his heart spluttering over several beats. He could barely fight one, let alone two.

Like a cornered animal, Sam shifted his gaze warily, eyes flitting frantically between the creature and the shadowed figure. It was too dark to see anything other than silhouetted forms, but Sam wasn’t going down without a fight. He steeled himself and took a shuddering breath. If this was how it ended, then he would give these things hell – try and take them out for his father and brother so they at least had a chance of survival. He’d go down swinging – wasn’t that what Dean always said? Sam tried to draw courage from his absent brother, and readied himself for his fate, ignoring the fear that was engulfing every fibre of his body.

The hag behind him lunged. He expected to feel pain, sharp claws and smell the fetid stench of death, but it didn’t quite happen that way. Simultaneously, as she moved, the sound of a gun fired over his head. Sam instinctively curled his body towards his knees, arms thrown protectively over his head.

The shriek that followed was so loud and so raw that it tore at his oversensitive nervous system, making his teeth ache and his brain reverberate in his skull. Sam fisted his hands over his ears, wanting to block the sound out, wanting her to stop.

A second shot erupted into the air, and the creature screamed again. This time she took the hint that the trigger-happy gunslinger wasn’t playing games. She ran, her courage failing in the light of modern technology, her wails becoming nothing more than a distant, muted sound as she vanished into the darkness.

Sam allowed himself the briefest moment of relief. It didn’t last long. He was now left with an unknown enemy, armed and potentially hostile, while Sam was injured and bone weary. He wasn’t sure if he had jumped into the frying pan or was still in the fire. Either way, both scenarios ended up with being burnt.

Still on his knees, Sam’s hand strayed to his shoulder, clamping over the area. It was throbbing, his entire arm tingling with pins and needles. He winced, not bothering to prevent his exhausted, heavy head from dropping onto his chest. He was bleeding. He couldn’t see how badly in the cloying darkness, but he could feel the warm slickness of blood pooling behind his palm, trickling through his fingers. That in itself suggested it was more than a graze. He didn’t even want to think about what shape his legs were in.

“On your feet,” a voice snapped, unfamiliar and male. Human. Sam guessed that was a bonus, but he wasn’t really sure anymore. At least this guy was less likely to make him into a fashion accessory… he hoped.

Sam raised bleary eyes in time to see a set of thick hands reaching for him. They fastened around his arms and dragged him off his knees with alarming strength. Sam struggled against the iron-clad grip, twisting and tugging in his panic, but he couldn’t get free. Fatigue and pain had left him weak, and all he really managed was a lot of half-hearted flailing.

He almost rolled his eyes petulantly. Like it wasn’t enough that a blue-faced grandma wanted to flay him and make him into the latest clothing line, now some guy was trying to do God knows what to him. Christ, couldn’t the world cut him a goddamn break?

“Stop struggling, kid,” the voice growled, but there was a hint of urgency in his tone that gave Sam pause, made him hesitant even in his hazy state of mind.

For a moment Sam merely stared at the shadowed figure, confused and unsure. His brain couldn’t quite make sense of what he was saying, couldn’t work out if he was trying to kill him or help him.

“Who are you?” Sam demanded, trying to sound cocky and self-assured – like he’d heard his brother do a thousand times. He didn’t manage it – not that he had expected to. He could still hear the tremble in his voice, the pitiful shaking fear that refused to release its hold over him.

“She’ll lick her wounds and be back. Trust me, you don’t want to be here when that happens.” The finality of his tone should have made Sam’s heart flutter, should have elicited some kind of response, but he was too tired to weigh the severity of the stranger’s words. “You stay here, kid, you’ll die.”

As if to accentuate the point, another piercing, shrill scream echoed through the night. It sounded close still, but she was moving deeper into The Hills, her voice becoming more quiet as she ran, no doubt returning to her lair to patch herself up before she returned for round two. Sam had no intention of being out in the open when that happened.

“You get her?” Another man, a deeper voice but human too, moved through the shadows, melting out of the trees in a similar fashion as the first man had.

Sam’s chest knotted painfully, his fear jumping up another notch. He knew he should have been running, but he couldn’t make his brain and feet co-ordinate. Rooted to the spot, his hazel eyes scanned the oppressive darkness, terror rolling over him in heavy squalls.

The man in front of him snorted, hands still fisted into Sam’s wet t-shirt. It was the only reason Sam was on his feet at all. “I’m not completely useless, kid. I was doin’ this shit when you were still in friggin’ diapers. One shot… she ran like a friggin’ coward.”

“If you are so adept, then why on earth am I freezing my ass off in the middle of nowhere?” The newcomer demanded tersely. “Shit, it’s darker than a Black Hole out here.”

Sam heard the distinctive rustle of material from the newcomer’s direction as he searched his belongings for something. The boy didn’t care what he was looking for; it was taking all of his energy to stop his heavy legs folding beneath him.

“Save your Star Wars trivia for someone who gives a crap, Dr Spock,” the man holding Sam growled.

“It’s physics, asshole, and Spock was Star Trek – not Star Wars.”

“You’re one weird sonofabitch.”

“Pot and kettle spring to mind, man.”

The figure tightened his grip, hauling Sam back onto his feet as his knees almost grazed the ground.

“Stand up straight, kid.” Sam almost laughed. Yeah, because he hadn’t tried that already.

A beam of silver light lit up the trees, casting eerie dancing shadows beyond its reach. The aggressive clawed branches of the trees suddenly seemed less dangerous, the darkness less scary as the landscape showed its true form. Sam didn’t want to see his attackers and so he lowered his gaze.

“You picking up strays now, Russ?”

“Picked up you, didn’t I?” The man holding Sam snapped.

“Actually, I agreed to come with you on this crazy assed camping trip. I should have told you to shove it.”

The newcomer was stood directly in front of Sam now, the flashlight beam roving over the torn and bloody kid barely holding onto consciousness.

“Holy shit…” the man murmured. “Sammy Winchester?”

At his name, Sam blinked, raising his head. He should have found it weird that this guy knew his name, but Sam just wanted to lie down and sleep. He tried to squint passed the beam, half-heartedly attempting to see who the mysterious stranger was, but the man was dark behind it.

“Winchester?” The man holding Sam upright was saying, his gaze transfixed on the short kid in front of him. “As in John Winchester?” His voice was deep and gruff, hardly portraying friendliness.

“One and the same,” the second man muttered, moving closer to Sam. “Hey, kiddo, what are you doing in the middle of the woods? You and your brother haven’t joined the Boy Scouts, have you?”

Sam snorted sluggishly, his eyes wanting to slip shut of their own volition. His entire body was trembling with cold, and yet his skin felt like it was on fire. The wet shirt plastered to his chest wasn’t exactly helping the matter, making his skin prickle angrily. Sam couldn’t discern between his injuries and his infection. Were his legs hurting because he had a fever – or because grandma had tried to turn him into a shish kebab? Not that it mattered what the cause was, Sam just wanted the cure.

“Hey, Sam?” The man tried again, “what you doing out here?”

“W-what?” Sam wasn’t sure how these men knew his father, or who these men were. He was confused, and his brain wasn’t really functioning the way it should be. He couldn’t make sense of the events unfolding in front of him.

“Sam? Look at me.” The twelve-year-old complied, raising heavy lidded eyes towards the figure. It took his addled brain a moment to connect the dots and recognise the figure in front of him.

“C-Caleb?” Sam tried to keep his emotions under check, but his relief was overwhelming. Salvation had never tasted so good.

“In the flesh.”

Sam wanted to laugh, feeling a little hysterical, wondering if he was imagining the familiar man, if all of this was in his head.

“You real?” The question slipped unbidden from barely parted lips, his brain to mouth filter on vacation.

“Yeah, Sam, I’m real.” Caleb moved behind Russ, rummaging in his backpack for a moment.

When he stepped around the man he was clutching a small three-legged fold-down camping stool. He opened it out behind Sam. “Russell, sit him down before he face plants.”

Sam was gently lowered onto the stool, his legs trembling at the change in altitude. The chair had no back, in fact it was nothing more than a square of material pulled between three two-foot long legs, but Russell’s strong hand in between Sam’s shoulder blades kept him upright, his other was clutching the shotgun he had fired at the hag. The weapon reassured Sam that he was – for the moment at least – safe.

The arms dealer handed his flashlight to the other man and crouched in front of Sam, seizing the sides of his face with gloved hands.

“Shit, kid, what the hell are you doing out here?”

Sam shivered, glancing up at the silhouetted familiar frame. He didn’t even know where ‘here’ was. He was grateful when the older man answered for him.

“She was tryin’ to make him into her next goddamn rug.”

“Christ, Russell,” Caleb snapped, his eyes flashing with irritation. “Tact just bypasses you completely, doesn’t it?”

Russell shrugged. “Life’s too short for bullshit.”

Sam was starting to push through the fog clinging to his brain, was starting to make sense of the situation. He wasn’t sure if he found it ironic or just plain funny that he had found Russell and Caleb before his father. Not that John would be pleased Sam was running around The Hills. His express command had been to stay in the cabin. The fact he hadn’t exactly had much choice in the matter wouldn’t count for a lot. John would, no doubt, find a way to make this whole mess Sam’s fault. He’d disobeyed orders; forget the fact that a homicidal, cannibalistic creature had dragged him into the woods to eat and flay him. John wouldn’t take excuses.

“You’d probably live a lot longer if you kept your mouth shut,” Caleb deadpanned, his eyes still roving over Sam’s face.

Russell must have been in his fifties, possibly older, Sam wasn’t sure and it was too hard to tell in the fragmented light. His face was heavily lined with crow’s feet and webs, and his dark hair was flecked with grey, receding a little at the temples. He was tall, broad shouldered and formidable looking; a man shaped tank. He looked a lot like Joshua apart from his colouring, but his tongue was a lot sharper than the twenty-six year old southern man.

Caleb, on the other hand, was the complete opposite. He hadn’t changed much since the last time Sam had seen him. He looked older and more careworn, but he was as tall and broad as Sam remembered. The hood of his coat was pulled up, hiding his usually shaved head. He looked like a convict, an image only removed when he opened his mouth. Caleb was well spoken, and clever as hell. Sam knew he had studied at Yale, had a sack full of qualifications to his name, and, surprisingly, a pretty well paid job. He did something with weapons designs, selling his inventions to the US Army – amongst others. John got the majority of his arsenal from the man – as did most of the hunting world.

Sam couldn’t believe he had found them – or rather they had found him. Not that it made a jot of difference. Saved was saved, and Sam had never been so relieved, so grateful to be saved in his entire life. It wasn’t his brother and father, but hell, it would suffice.

Caleb grunted irritably at Russell, but kept his attention on Sam, wincing as his gaze halted near his temple. Sam curled his fingers into Caleb’s jacket, not willing to let him go. He couldn’t believe the man was here.

“Hey, Sammy, don’t zone out on me.”

Sam blinked and attempted to focus on the man’s face.

“Sorry,” he muttered groggily.

“Just keep your eyes on my face, ok?”

Sam nodded slowly, careful not to rattle his brains too much; his head was already aching.

“What’s wrong with the kid?” Russell asked.

“Nothing we can’t fix, right Sam?” Caleb said softly, injecting reassurance into his voice, but Sam didn’t fail to notice the slight tightness in the man’s brow. He was more worried than he was letting on. “You hurt anywhere else?”

“My shoulder… legs… Got a chest infection too,” Sam responded, a little embarrassed by the wretched tone in his voice.

“One problem at a time, little man. Where is John?” Caleb asked as he gently tipped Sam’s head back. “Russ, light.”

The older man grumbled something under his breath about bossy assholes, but complied, shining the light on Sam so that the arms dealer could see what he was doing.

“Dad, Dean and Josh are in The Hills – looking for you two,” Sam swallowed thickly. His relief at finding help when he had seriously considered the fact he was a goner wasn’t doing much for his injured body. Adrenaline had fled, leaving him feeling every ache, bump, bruise and cut afresh.

“What?” Russell snapped, his hands tightening around the shotgun he was holding. “What the hell are they doin’ up here?”

“Josh’s worried ‘bout you,” Sam murmured, a little afraid of the gruff older man. Everything seemed to piss him off.

Russell snorted. “Typical! It’s bad enough you don’t have any goddamn faith in me, Miller, but now my own son thinks I’m friggin’ useless.”

Caleb glanced over Sam’s head at Russell. “You’re a grumpy sonofabitch, you know that?”

Shrugging his rucksack off his back, Caleb rummaged through it and pulled out a small first aid kit, opening it out on the snow covered ground. He pulled his gloves off with his teeth before he probed the wound to Sam’s temple, eliciting a hiss of pain from the boy. It stung badly, flaring angrily at the touch.

“Sorry, kiddo,” Caleb muttered, “I’ve got to clean this. Your Dad will tear me a new one if I leave you bleeding all over the place.”

“So why exactly is my goddamn son up here?” Russell demanded.

“Thought you were in trouble,” Sam replied, grimacing as Caleb cleaned and began to pack the wound.

“I taught that boy all he knows, and he still thinks I’m a goddamn rookie.”

Caleb paused mid-ministration, his eyes hard. “You think you can actually shut your mouth for two minute, Russ? Your constant moaning is giving me a headache.”

Sam couldn’t see the older man’s reaction, but he could practically visualise the expression marring his face at Caleb’s words. The arm’s dealer barely gave Turner a second glance, his attention already back on Sam.

“It’s not too deep,” Caleb said after a moment, letting out a long breath as he folded a piece of gauze in half, pushing it against the cut. “It won’t even need stitches. Head wounds always look worse than they are.” He pressed Sam’s hand over it, securing it in place as he reached into the kit for the surgical tape. “What about your shoulder?” he asked as his continued his treatment of the young boy.

“I don’t mean to piss on your parade, Florence,” Russell said, “but can’t you hurry this up? In case you’ve forgotten there’s a friggin’ dangerous predator out there baying for blood.”

Caleb ignored him, rolling his eyes over dramatically. “Let me see, Sam.”

The twelve-year-old hadn’t realised his hand was still clamped on the joint, and was a little surprised at the white-knuckled grip he was maintaining.

“I’ll be careful,” Caleb promised when Sam showed no sign of relinquishing his hold.

Gently, Caleb peeled his hand away. The boy hissed at the movement, fire ripping through the joint. He wanted to suck it up in true Winchester fashion, but the entire area throbbed. Sam pulled his bottom lip between his teeth and breathed through his nose, trying to control the pain that was flaring up his arm and side.

Morbid curiosity had Sam’s gaze lowering to his torn shirt. Even in the small beam of light he could tell it was a mess. The shirt was saturated with a mixture of fresh and dried blood and the flesh was torn in ragged strips. She had only hit him with a glancing blow in the cave. He didn’t even want to think how much worse his shoulder would have been if she had managed to catch him fully. He winced, forcing the urge to vomit down. He’d seen his father and brother injured in the past, but seeing his own tattered flesh made his vision roll. It was the most surreal – and disturbing – thing he’d ever seen.

Carefully, Caleb prised the wet material from the cuts, the fabric sticking to the clotted fleshy gashes. Sam bit on his lip as he finally freed the wound from the shirt with precision and pulled it over the young boy’s head, discarding it on the ground. In his panic Sam had barely given his shoulder or head a second thought, but now that his adrenaline levels were empty, the limb felt hot and painful, and his head throbbed.

“It’s not too bad…” Caleb murmured reassuringly. “You’ll have one hell of a scar, but girls apparently dig scars – at least that’s what your brother says. Personally, I’m not convinced that works. Brains, Sammy, that’s what girls want. Smart assed geeky guys who won’t cheat on them with their best friend.”

Sam wasn’t sure if Caleb was talking to comfort himself or Sam anymore. He couldn’t focus properly on what the man was saying so he fell silent, fighting the urge to close his eyes.

Caleb picked up another roll of gauze from the kit and pulled the outer packaging off.

“So you want to tell me why your Dad is here like the cavalry?” Caleb asked as he worked.

“Joshua thought Russell was up here alone,” Sam said between shivers, his teeth chattering as the cold air clung to his bare chest. “They think they’re hunting a wolf.” It seemed important to tell him that, to let the man know that they were running on bad intel.

Caleb grunted.

“Oh, it’s a wolf all right – at least one of the things we’re hunting is.”

Sam frowned deeply, struggling to make sense of the sour words, wincing as Caleb pressed the gauze firmly against his shoulder. “One of the things?”

It was one thing suspecting it, but having it confirmed by a seasoned hunter was something else entirely. Sam wasn’t sure if he was proud of his own intuition or afraid that his father had bitten off more than he could chew – both figuratively and literally.

“It’s called a Black Annis,” Caleb said quietly, his hands moving quickly as he dealt with the wound. “I’ve never heard of one this side of the Atlantic, but I’m pretty certain that’s what we’re dealing with.”

Sam racked his brain, trying to recall if he had ever read about the creature, but he couldn’t remember. If it wasn’t native to America, it was likely his father hadn’t mentioned it in their studies. Even if it was, Sam was having a hard time trying to make his brain function on basic tasks, let alone something complicated.

“They don’t know she’s here.” Sam wasn’t even sure his father would know what ‘she’ was.

“Yeah, we realised a little too late ourselves.” Caleb glanced sullenly at Russell.

“How in the hell was I supposed to know there was more than one thing up here?” Russell snapped.

“It’s called research, Russ – look into the concept,” Caleb shot back.

“I did the goddamn research, jack-ass,” the older man growled. “I fucking survived an attack from this wolf. I know my monsters, Miller.”

Caleb sighed, the gesture laced with frustration. “If you had done the research, we wouldn’t be up here facing a fully grown wolf in less than twenty-four hours and a pissed super-predator.”

“What’s a Black Annis?” Sam broke in before Russell could shoot his mouth off again. Their arguing was giving him a headache.

“I’m not really sure what you would classify her as,” Caleb answered, as he applied the last piece of tape to the gauze on Sam’s shoulder. “She’s corporeal, as real as you or me, but she’s a near perfect hunter, sharp, fast and lethal.”

“She’s been here for a while… at least four years,” Sam told him, recalling the information he had found out at the library earlier.

He hadn’t had a chance to look any further back than that. He wished he could have spent longer researching this thing. At least then he might have had a better idea of what they were dealing with, and he could have told Caleb more. Sam wasn’t relishing the thought of running blind with this thing.

Caleb nodded slowly, roving an eye over the finished bandage. Seemingly satisfied with his handy work, he closed the first aid kit. “You do the research on this hunt, Sam?”

“Some,” Sam admitted, leaving out the fact that he’d done so against his father’s wishes. That tid-bit of information wasn’t really necessary.

He relayed all the facts about the murders over the last six months and the disappearances going back further than that. Once he had rehashed every detail he could remember, Caleb let out a low breath, rooting in his rucksack once more.

“John should have got that the other creature wasn’t a werewolf from that alone,” Caleb said with an irritated snort as he pulled out a clean t-shirt. “Your old man’s getting sloppy in his old age.”

“From what?” Sam asked, letting the other hunter pull the dry garment over his head, wincing at the tug on his shoulder. His eyes were heavy, gritty and just about ready to close, but Caleb’s ministrations stopped him from giving into that basic need to sleep.

“The fact they never found any bodies from the attacks going back four years.” Caleb’s lips twisted into a grim line. “Black Annis’ don’t leave leftovers. Werewolves are a little more picky about what they will put into their stomachs.”

The arms dealer was guiding Sam’s arms into a sweatshirt as he spoke. The fact he was no longer wearing wet clothes against his chest made Sam feel instantly warmer, more alert, more awake. Caleb gave him a sympathetic glance as he laid a towel from his pack on the ground.

“Jean’s too, Sam. Sorry.”

Sam wasn’t exactly a stranger to stripping off in front of his brother and father. It was hard to live in such confined spaces and be prudish, but he was a little embarrassed at doing so in front of Caleb and Russell. He blushed, hoping the poor lighting would hide the colour in his cheeks.

“You’ll feel better once you’re in dry clothes,” Caleb assured him. “It’s too cold to be running around The Hills wet.”

Knowing the man was right, Sam let the arms dealer help him onto his feet and steady him whilst he toed his sneakers off, stepping onto the towel. Even in the torch light the dried blood on his thighs was stark against his pale skin when he removed his jeans. Caleb glanced at him before lowering his gaze to the wounds.

“Jesus, Sam. Did you fight the thing bare handed or something?” Caleb quickly examined the puncture marks, trying not to touch them again when Sam flinched in pain. “Well, they aren’t deep, but I’m guessing they hurt like hell anyway.”

“She probably didn’t want to ruin the packaging,” Russell muttered. “Hard to make rugs and wall coverings if the flesh is a damn mess.” Caleb shot him a dark, hard glare.

“Are you quite finished?” When the older hunter didn’t speak again, Caleb returned his gaze back to Sam. “They look worse than they are, kid, but I’ll bandage them anyway – just to stop infections. No need to invite trouble when we’ve got enough as it is.”

Caleb made quick work of wrapping Sam’s thighs, and within minutes he was dressed in a pair of Caleb’s sweatpants, and socks. His shoes were, thankfully, dry enough to put back on. They were about the only part of his wardrobe that had managed to escape the weather.

“Better?” Caleb asked. Sam was infinitely warmer in the dry clothes, but he was still shivering. He wasn’t entirely sure how long he had been exposed to the elements, but Sam’s body wasn’t fooled by the change of clothes. The older hunter shrugged out of his own jacket, wrapping it around Sam.

“I can’t take your coat,” Sam argued between trembles as Caleb secured it into place, zipping the thick parka up to his chin.

“You can, and you are.” Caleb pulled another sweatshirt from his rucksack and dragged it over his own head, shrugging it into place.

“Caleb-”

“You’re wounded, suffering from exposure on top of a chest infection. You’ll wear the damn coat, Sam.”

Sam wanted to argue with him. He didn’t want to take his jacket, but he was so cold that he couldn’t help but snuggle into the material. Caleb closed his rucksack and swung it onto his shoulders, glancing at the ebony sky.

A piercing howl reverberated around the hillside suddenly. It sounded a fair distance away, but it still made Sam’s heart freeze in his chest.

“That’s our cue to get moving,” Caleb murmured, settling the straps in place even as his eyes darted around the darkness.

“What about her?” Russell asked.

“What about her?” Caleb replied, wrapping his arm around Sam’s waist and helping him onto shaky legs.

After a moment, Russell took his other side, careful to avoid Sam’s injured shoulder. The change in altitude made Sam’s vision wobble a little, but it righted itself after a moment.

“We’re just gonna let her go?”

“Yeah, we are,” Caleb said.

With the two men’s help, Sam was able to gain traction in his limbs, testing his weight before he took a tentative step forward alone. Caleb hovered near his side, ready to catch him if he faltered.

“The plan was to-“

“Plans change, Russ,” Caleb told him. Sam didn’t fail to notice the tense bite in the man’s tone.

“So what the hell are we doing now?”

“Finding your son and John.”

“She’ll follow us, and you know she will,” Russell said quietly. Caleb shot him a glare that was colder than the snow. “I’m just saying. I’m being practical.”

Caleb shrugged, but his shoulders were set, his jaw tightly clenched. “Screw practical. Practical has gone to hell in a hand basket.”

“What’s going on?” Sam asked, shifting his gaze between the two men.

Their stances were edgy. Sam was reminded of a nature programme him and Dean had watched a while back. A crocodile hiding beneath a calm lake, unseen by the bird treading the surface, oblivious of the dangers beneath it. This situation felt similar – and Sam was the bird.

“Nothing, Sam,” Caleb said reassuringly, shooting a glare at the older man. “Do you have any idea where your Dad is heading?”

Sam frowned, not sure what was going on, but realising he wasn’t being told everything. He was too exhausted to push the point, however, and he knew Caleb wouldn’t let anything bad happen to him.

“Yeah, I know,” Sam replied with a low breath. “They plotted the route before they left. I’m pretty sure I can remember the trail they were planning on taking.”

“Then let’s go find your old man. I don’t know about you, kid, but I’ve had just about enough of camping as I can stand.”

Sam couldn’t have agreed more.

---

The howl that pierced the air sharply woke Dean immediately. He sat bolt upright in the tent, reaching for the gun under his pillow before he was even properly awake. Disorientated, it took him a moment to realise he was in the tent, sandwiched between his father and Joshua. It took him a second longer to figure out that the howl he had heard could not have been a werewolf. The full moon wasn’t for another twenty hours or so.

A chill raced through him at the realisation.

He flicked his gaze around the black tent, trying to get his bearings, trying to see. The silver moon seemed to have vanished, probably behind the clouds, and the air was heavy with the darkness.

As his eyes adjusted, Dean noticed that John was already awake; his sleeping bag neatly laid out, indicating the older man had been awake for a while. He was sat in the open tent door, silhouetted against the sky.

“What in the hell was that?” Joshua’s voice sounded scratchy and hoarse, but there was a note of fear in his tone.

Dean started. He hadn’t heard the demonologist stir. He should have known Joshua would rouse. That scream was enough to wake the dead.

Dean kicked his sleeping bag off and pulled the safety back on his gun, but John held up one hand, halting Dean’s actions. The shriek sounded again, reverberating around the hills, but it sounded a fair way from where they were camped – thankfully.

Dean glanced towards his father expectantly, his heart racing. John turned to face them both.

“Well,” John said softly, “it’s not a werewolf.”

Chapter Six

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Early Hours of Wed 13 March 1996

Dean wasn’t sure if he wanted to laugh at his father’s statement or scream. Either seemed viable, not to mention highly appealing at the moment.

‘It’s not a werewolf…’

Talk about stating the frigging obvious. Dean wasn’t exactly an expert on werewolves, but even he had figured out that the screaming creature wasn’t a wolf. He almost opened his mouth, almost let the sarcastic retort slip out, but managed to shove it back down at the last moment. Getting into a spat with his father was not a good idea – not if he wanted to see his eighteenth birthday.

Instead, Dean took solace in silence, ears strained, attempting to listen for the agonising wails that had filled the air just moments before. The two gunshots that had accompanied its shrieking had increased Dean’s anxiety even further and he felt an uneasy sensation settling in the pit of his stomach.

Everything was quiet now, but there was a tenseness underneath the silence. Every minute sound had Dean on edge, made his heart beat a little faster. Even the darkness seemed more oppressive than it had before. Dean shifted his grip on the silver Beretta clutched in his right hand, reassured by the weight of it, and slid his gaze towards the shadowed form of his father.

John was still in the entrance of the tent, crouched on the balls of his feet, his left arm draped over his knee, his right hand covering his mouth. His head did not move, but Dean knew his brown eyes were scanning the hillside, looking, searching.

“What in the hell d’ya mean it’s not a wolf?” Joshua demanded, breaking through the stillness like a cracking whip. Inwardly, Dean groaned, knowing this was not a conversation his father was going to appreciate.

John shifted his head towards the younger hunter, his face silhouetted against the canvas of the night sky.

“Full moon isn’t until tomorrow night,” was the only explanation John gave. Joshua evidently wasn’t happy with that response.

“I’m well aware of that, John, but if that ain’t a frigging wolf, then what the hell is it? I ain’t never heard anything sound like that.”

Dean wasn’t sure if there was fear in the man’s voice or merely apprehension at the unknown thing running around in the dark. It had sounded… Dean wasn’t sure how to describe it, but whatever it was, it had sounded tortured. Dean had no idea what could make that kind of noise. Either way, he had to admit that he had felt scared hearing the gut-wrenching scream echoing around The Black Hills.

John spoke quietly, “A Wendigo, maybe, or a banshee. Of course, it could just be an animal.”

It hadn’t sounded like any animal Dean had ever heard. Joshua shared the same sentiment.

“What animal you ever heard, Johnny, that screams like that?” Joshua said, crawling out of the sleeping bag and rubbing his fingers over his eyes. Blindly, he groped for his own weapon, and was pulling back the safety catch when he spoke again. “Well, silver bullets ain’t gonna work on this thing if it ain’t a wolf, so these,” he lifted the gun and gestured with it, “are pretty damn useless.”

Even in the darkness, Dean knew John was shooting daggers at the southern hunter. Not even nightfall could cloak one of those patented looks from the esteemed John Winchester. It could probably tear through the space-time continuum.

“We’re still dealing with a wolf, Josh,” John snapped. “I did the leg work; I know what the hell we’re involved in here.”

Joshua ignored the snipe, fumbling in the darkness. After a moment there was a soft clicking sound, and the tent filled with milky light. Joshua pulled the camping lantern off the hook hanging from the roof of the tent and placed it on the ground sheet.

“Ok, but we’re dealin’ with something else too.” He grunted, raising his gaze towards John. “So you wanna tell me what the hell that something else is?”

John let out a frustrated breath. “I don’t know.”

“Truth is we bowled into this hunt half-cocked and with substandard research,” Joshua muttered irritably, dragging his rucksack towards him and pulling back the zipper.

Dean held his breath, his eyes shifting cautiously towards John. His father’s expression was darker than the navy sky, his lips pulled into a tight line as he appraised the southern hunter. Dean wanted to say something, he wanted to stick up for his father, but he couldn’t bring himself to do so. The fact was, they were unprepared, and they had come into this half-cocked – no matter what spin John tried to put on it. Sam had known there was something wrong about this hunt without even studying the background of this case in depth; John should have known better. What was worse, Sam had tried to tell him and Joshua that something else was going on and they had both dismissed every point the twelve-year-old had made. Guilt stirred deep within Dean’s stomach, his jaw clenching with barely repressed guilt. He should have listened to his brother.

“I found out everything I needed to know, Joshua.” It was said in a level voice, but Dean heard the bite nevertheless; barely veiled, and laced with an unspoken threat. John was nothing if not a perfectionist, and having his skills challenged wasn’t something the older hunter was going to take lying down. Dean inwardly cringed, hoping Josh would have the sense to keep his mouth shut. Unfortunately, the southern man didn’t seem to have that internal danger warning system.

“Yeah, well, what you ‘needed to know’ left out the psychotic wailing creature of the night, John.”

John growled a curse under his breath and Dean was sure he was momentarily weighing whether to punch the man or strangle him.

“You got something you want to say to me, kid, then fucking say it!” John growled.

Joshua raised his head, his dark hair failing to curtain his furious eyes. Even in the fractured lighting the rage was unmistakeable. The air in the tent seemed thinner suddenly.

“I brought you in on this hunt because you’re one of the best in this field. I told you I don’t know shit about huntin’ in the wild! Now my father is out there, god knows where, facing this friggin’ thing – and don’t try and tell me it’s a goddamn animal, John. Russell’s a damn ass, but he ain’t stupid – or easily frightened enough – to waste two rounds on a something that belongs in the zoo. Kinda suggests he’s running scared.”

“It might not have even been your father shooting,” John countered. “Don’t jump to conclusions.”

“I didn’t jump to anything!” Joshua gave a sceptical snort. “How many assholes do you think are wanderin’ around the damn wilderness in the snow tonight? The place ain’t exactly burstin’ with people.”

“Look,” John gave a frustrated sigh, “we’ll figure this out, ok?”

“We need to come up with a goddamn plan, John.”

“We find the others. Numbers are going to become important if we are dealing with something else.”

“And how in the hell are we supposed to find them? In case you’ve forgotten, these hills are nearly a hundred square miles of woodland.”

Scrubbing a hand over his face, John let out a weary breath. “We’ll find them, Joshua, we will. And we’ll figure out what this thing is. This hunt isn’t unsalvageable. It’s still fixable. Even if there is something else up here, we can still kill it.”

Joshua grunted.

“You know, that almost sounded like a goddamn apology, Johnny. You’ve grown as a person.”

John’s expression was impassive, but Dean noticed the slight tightening around his father’s eyes that belied his true feelings.

“I can admit when I’ve made a mistake, kid,” he said, clenching his jaw.

“Can… just don’t. I think this might be a first.” Joshua brushed his dark hair off his face, tucking the poker-straight strands behind his ears. “So lets find Caleb and my father, waste whatever the hell this damn thing is, and get the hell out of The-goddamn-Hills. Dunno bout you guys, but I ain’t exactly partial to this camping bullshit, and I’ve had about as much as I can stomach of sleeping in the frigging snow.”

---

“Whoa, easy, Sam.”

Hands tightened around Sam’s waist, hoisting him back onto his feet as his heavy legs folded beneath him once more. Sam was exhausted and standing upright was taking all his energy. Not that he was doing a good job of that anyway. He’d already sagged onto the snowy ground twice in as many minutes and he was finding it increasingly difficult to get up each time it happened. The last hour or so of walking through the snow was certainly taking its toll.

His adrenaline had fled pretty quickly after the Black Annis attack, leaving Sam cold, scared, and feeling every ache anew, but Caleb had been insistent about putting distance between them and the creature. Sam had forced his pain and suffering aside and soldiered on. In all honesty, he was amazed he had stayed on his feet for that long. Each step was agony, and he was so cold he could barely feel any part of his body any more. In fact, he could barely focus on anything. Even the beam of light from the flashlight Russell was holding kept melting into a blurry white haze, and the landscape was completely lost to his fuzzy vision.

“Just get your balance,” Caleb continued in a soft voice, taking most of Sam’s weight as he shifted his shoulder further under Sam’s armpit. The arms dealer was the only reason the twelve-year old was still upright.

Sam shifted between his aching legs, trying to find traction, but neither limb seemed willing to stay firm. His ribs were bruised, the scratches to his cheek and shoulder burned, his head wound stung and his thighs ached. He gave a tremulous shiver. His entire body was cold down to the bone and yet his skin prickled with an impossible heat. He wanted to lie down, wanted to sleep for a month, but Caleb’s fixed hold made it impossible for Sam to give in to that demand.

“Caleb,” Russell’s voice sounded from in front of them, and Sam glanced through sweaty bangs at the older hunter, his chest aching as he took ragged breaths, coughing painfully as the cold air tickled the back of his throat. “We keep stoppin’ every damn two minutes she’s gonna come back and friggin’ well put us on the dinner menu before we catch up with the goddamn others.”

Despite that, the greying man was shrugging his rucksack off his shoulder, his gun and flashlight placed on the ground at his feet. Pulling back the zipper he dragged the small stool from his supplies and folded it down behind Sam.

“What do you propose, Russ? That we just leave him here?” Caleb snapped, still maintaining his grip on Sam.

The young boy’s heart gave a tremulous twitch at thought of being left behind, to face that thing alone. He was too tired, too hurt, and too sick to fight her. He didn’t want to fight her. It took his fuzzy head a moment to realise it was said with sarcasm. Caleb’s words, however, elicited a scowl from Turner.

“Of course not, you dumb sonuvabitch! That’s not what I’m sayin’ and you know it.”

“Just be quiet, please,” Caleb muttered, turning his attention back to Sam.

The younger boy was really struggling to keep it together. He was trying to be strong, trying not to be a burden, but he was so exhausted. His lungs were burning, and each breath was like inhaling shards of glass. Sam wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep walking.

“He ok?” Russell asked finally. Sam was sure he heard veiled worry in his tone.

“No, Russell, he’s not ok,” Caleb bit, gently lowering Sam onto the camping stool. “The kid’s hurt, freezing and fucking sick – and he’s still whining a hell of a lot less than you.”

Sam phased out their talking, grateful to be sat down. The instant removal of the pressure on his weary limbs was a relief. He shivered uncontrollably, his skin tingling every time the material of his borrowed shirt moved. He felt wretched, and he was uncomfortably hot underneath the chill that seemed to caress his body.

“Sam, open your eyes.” Caleb’s sharp tone brought Sam’s eyes fluttering open. He hadn’t even realised he had shut them.

“Sorry,” Sam mumbled through barely parted lips.

“Just stay awake, ok? I know you’re tired but you can’t rest yet,” Caleb replied gently, rubbing his hands up and down Sam’s arms. He wasn’t sure if the gesture helped or hurt him more. His skin felt so sensitive, but he could push the electric tingling sensation aside in favour of the brief moment of warmth it gave him.

“He can’t keep goin’ like this, Caleb,” Russell said quietly, shifting his hands on the shotgun he was carrying so he could push his other hand against Sam’s back, keeping him upright on the stool. “The kid needs a damn doctor.”

“Do you have an MD behind your name that I’m not aware of? Or maybe a doctor hidden in your pack?” Caleb muttered derisively, pulling the first aid kit out and opening it out on the ground. “In case you haven’t noticed, Russell, we’re a little bit far from the nearest hospital.”

“Shit, Caleb,” Turner growled, “you think you could just hold off the damn sarcasm for a second?”

The arms dealer snorted. “That statement is so many levels of ironic that I don’t even know where to start with it.”

He had a penlight in his hand and was shining it in Sam’s eyes. Blinking the brightness away Sam tried to cover his eyes, but Caleb placed a restraining hand on his arm.

“I know… I know, kiddo, but I need to check your pupils.”

Sam complied, wincing at the burning sensation as the light hit the back of his eyes. It was painfully uncomfortable, and he struggled to keep the lids from closing.

“Well?” Russell demanded, his tone sharp but anxious. Sam had definitely heard apprehension in the man’s voice. He frowned at that information, not entirely sure what it meant, or even if it meant anything.

“Both equal and reactive – he’s not concussed. I think its exposure making him drowsy; his wounds aren’t bad enough to warrant the sudden onset of narcolepsy.” Caleb sighed, sinking back onto the balls of his feet, sucking thoughtfully on his bottom lip as he appraised Sam carefully. “I know you’re tired, and I promise when we get out of here you can sleep all you want, but for now you need to keep walking – just a little bit further, ok?”

“Maybe we should set up camp, Caleb.” Russell sounded dubious. “I mean, the kid’s in bad shape and he ain’t exactly gonna be able to fight if that bitch comes back.”

Caleb glanced up at the sky. It was starting to lighten a little, the blackness fading into bruised purple.

“It’s a couple of hours ‘til sunrise,” Caleb said quietly. “We just need to get some more distance between us and her before it comes up.”

“Why?” Sam asked woodenly, his tongue feeling too thick. His mouth was so dry, stuffed full of cotton wool as he tried to swallow. Unable to get moisture that way he tried to wet his cracked lips to little avail. Caleb gave him a sympathetic wince before digging into his pack once more and pulling out a bottle of water.

“She sleeps through the day and hunts at night,” Caleb explained as he unscrewed the cap. “She’s weaker when the sun is up.”

The arms dealer pushed the bottle to Sam’s lips, one hand curling around his neck and helped him drink. The liquid was cold, but completely satisfying. Sam took greedy gulps, hastening to slake his thirst.

“Small sips, Sam,” Caleb cautioned.

Once he had drunk enough, Caleb removed the bottle and shoved it back into his bag. Sam wetted his lips, feeling one step closer to human again.

“She comin’ for me… isn’t she?” Sam asked, slurring a little as he spoke, raising his gaze to the arms dealer, hoping he didn’t look as scared as he felt. He wasn’t an idiot; he’d figured out something was going on after the men had found him. Their clipped conversations, their guarded anxiety… Sam knew something was wrong.

Caleb licked his lips, his brow furrowing. “Sam-“

“Just tell me the truth, Caleb,” Sam muttered listlessly, “I can handle it.”

“Everything’s going to be fine. We just need to-“

“Caleb.” Sam put as much force behind the man’s name as possible. “Please, tell me.”

In truth, Sam needed to know. He had to deal with what was coming, what he was going to face. He had to somehow find the strength to be brave and not afraid. Sam was a practical thinker; he liked to have all the problems laid out in front of him so he could figure out the solutions. Even in a situation were his own ass was potentially on the line, Sam still needed that knowledge.

“Caleb…” Sam repeated.

Frown deepening, Caleb ran a hand over his chin and sighed. “Yeah, Sam, she is.”

“Why me?”

“She caught your scent, I guess,” Caleb said slowly, his penetrating gaze locked on Sam’s face. “She usually hunts kids, drags them out of their beds, right from under their parent’s noses. I doubt she’s had many children out here though which is why she’s taken hikers in the past.”

Coming across Sam must have been like finding the freaking Holy Grail for her.

“And she skins them alive?” Sam asked, unable to keep the waver out of his voice as his mind recalled the image of the flayed person in the cave. It was an image that wasn’t going to leave him for a long-assed time, and Sam was sure it was going to cause more than a few nightmares over the next couple of months – well, if he lived past tonight.

Caleb pulled a face. “That’s not going to happen to you,” he said firmly, squeezing Sam’s uninjured shoulder, trying to inject as much assurance as he could into the gesture.

Sam nodded slowly, trying to digest the information. “She can follow me, can’t she?” He glanced at Joshua’s father. “That’s what Russell meant when he said she would come.”

Even in his fuzzy mindset, Sam was still putting the pieces of the puzzle together. He wished he wasn’t; the picture didn’t look exactly great for him.

Caleb cursed with a scowl. “Nothing’s happening to you, I promise.”

“Is Dean in danger too?”

Russell snorted. “We’re all in danger, sonny. This thing is hungry and she ain’t exactly well stocked on snacks up here in the winter. She’ll take what she can get.”

“Christ, Russell!” Caleb snapped. “If you’re trying to scare him, then you’re doing a bang up job!”

“I’m just tellin’ it how it is!” Russell ground out. “This shit ain’t goin’ away just because you sugar-coat it, Miller. We’re up the fucking creek, and no amount of beatin’ ‘round the goddamn bush is gonna change that.”

“How do we kill it?” Sam asked quietly, pulling his borrowed coat further around his shivering body. He had surpassed cold right now and was just numb. He didn’t think he would ever get warm again.

Caleb shifted his gaze to the young boy and pulled a face. “You don’t kill it. You leave this to Russell and me.”

What happened next was kind of a blur. Russell had fired three rounds before Sam even registered what the hell was going on.

“Sam! Look out!” Caleb yelled as Sam’s head snapped up at the gunshots.

She literally came out of nowhere, snarling and hissing like a feral beast, her teeth barred. There was more shouting, but whatever was being said was drowned out by the ringing in Sam’s ears. His blood was pounding through his veins, adrenaline pumping rapidly around his body. He couldn’t fight her again. Not like this.

Sam barely saw the flash of blue as she lunged towards him. He flinched, too exhausted to make his body move, and too exhausted to do anything other than watch her close the gap between them. Sam anticipated the feel of her sharp claws, he expected her putrid breath against his clammy skin, but it never came.

Caleb threw himself between her and the youngest Winchester, pulling her up short. One hand latched onto her knife-like hand as she swiped at him; the other swung back and aimed a blow at her face. She took the hit full on, but barely flinched. Sam saw her claws rake down the arms dealer’s side, but couldn’t see how bad it was as the pair of them collapsed onto the ground, locked in a deadly battle of strength – one that Caleb was bound to lose.

Russell tried to aim the shotgun, but the rolling pair made it difficult to get a clean shot. He growled a curse, tossing the gun aside and pulled a knife seemingly from thin air. The firearm was no use in such close confines, and even Sam could tell that Caleb’s movements were becoming slower. She was too strong, even for the well-muscled hunter, and he was struggling to stop her from tearing chunks out of his flesh. Sam wasn’t sure how much longer he could hold out against her. Russell obviously had the same thought.

Without hesitating, the grizzled hunter thrust his blade into the Black Annis’s back. She reared, screaming, her milky eyes snapping to him and clawed at the older man, missing him barely.

Sam watched in horror, transfixed by the struggle. He wanted to help, to do something… anything. There was the sound of breaking bones followed by an anguished scream from Caleb. Sam wanted to block the sound out but he couldn’t move to cover his ears. He knew what she was capable of and he was terrified.

Lifting off Caleb, the Black Annis staggered to her feet, her head cocked as she appraised Russell with twisted lips. Now facing the thing alone, Russell scrabbled back from Caleb’s writhing body and half-ran, half-fell towards were his shotgun lay on the ground. He almost made it, but the Black Annis moved with alarming speed. She was on him before he even got a hand to the weapon, her heavy knife-hand swiping across the back of his head. Russell went down instantly, his face planting into the snow covered ground as he lost consciousness.

Not willing to watch his friends die, Sam was moving – albeit slowly – towards Caleb’s pack. He knew there were more weapons concealed within the bag, and he knew they were his only chance of survival. Unfortunately, his body had other ideas. He slid onto his knees, his legs unwilling to bear his weight as soon as he attempted to stand.

The Black Annis was on him before he even managed to rise. Her heavy frame slammed into him, pushing hard against his back, forcing his face further into the cold ground. His already hurt body didn’t just jar with the force, it practically exploded with pain. The moan that escaped Sam’s lips was as wild as the Black Annis’s screaming. His ribs creaked under her weight, his abused lungs struggling to pull in air. Putrid breath, warm against his freezing skin, made him gag as she moved towards his ear and whispered into it.

“Mine,” she hissed, “you’re mine.”

Sam gulped, his heart pounding beneath his ribs as she grabbed his leg and began dragging him across the ground. He kicked out pathetically, trying to unsettle her grip, but she held firm, unwilling to release him. Strength fading quickly as she pulled him further away from Russell and Caleb, Sam could do nothing but let his dizzying sight focus on the lightening sky above him. He was too tired, and his vision was wobbling too much to fight her. His entire body was screaming at him for a reprieve from his pain, but it never came. All he could do was endure each agonising bump on the ground as she dragged him deeper into the trees, her clawed fingers digging deeper into the flesh until he was sure she was touching the bone. He closed his eyes, nausea racing through him, and prayed. Prayed that he would be found, prayed that she wouldn’t make him her next victim, prayed that he was dead before she tried to tear the flesh from him.

This time, Sam knew she wasn’t letting him go. This time, she intended to see her plan through, and unfortunately for Sam, he was a huge part of her plan.

Chapter Seven

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Wed 13 March 1996

Russell’s head was pounding.

As he drifted back into consciousness, he realised he was lying face-down in the snow, breathing the cold powder that was inches from his face. The skin on his left cheek was burning and the bones in his jaw were numb with the biting cold.

Slowly, he tried to shift heavy limbs and instantly winced as a sharp pain spiked through his skull. Moving, evidently, was not an option. Everything above his neck was thrumming with excruciating agony that made the world tilt around him – even with his eyes closed. Blindly, Russell carefully probed his head with fumbling fingers and was unsurprised when he felt something matted into his hair.

Blood.

Frowning, he ghosted over the gash, air hissing through his teeth as he touched the sensitive broken skin and let out a small sigh of relief. Thick clots of blood were easily identifiable underneath his fingers, but he couldn’t feel anything warm or slick. The wound hurt like a bitch, but at least he was no longer bleeding. The fact his head felt like it was spinning on his shoulders suggested he was concussed, but at least it was still attached.

Certain that his brain wasn’t about to dribble out of his head, Russell shifted slightly on the ground, attempting to find the strength to move. His body didn’t want to cooperate, however. He barely managed a feeble tremor in his arms before his face was crushed back into the snow once more.

What the hell had that bitch done to him?

The last thing he remembered was the Black Annis coming at him… and… and Caleb…

Shit.

He forced his eyes open, only managing to prise one lid open to half-mast and slid it frantically around the clearing.

Dawn was rapidly approaching, the sky a murky blend of bruised reds and light blues as the pale sun peeked from behind the rolling hills. Grimacing, Russell forced his hands underneath him and pushed himself up on shaky arms, snow crunching beneath his weight as he managed to get onto his knees.

His body instantly listed to the side with the change of altitude and he had to dig his palms into the snowy ground to keep himself upright. Closing his eyes as the world tilted around him, Russell took a clipped breath and swallowed the bile that was threatening to erupt up his throat.

“R- Russ?”

Blinking the haziness from his sight, the older hunter slowly rolled his eyes towards the voice. Like a fog lifting from open fields, things gradually came back into focus. Russell wished they hadn’t.

There was blood in the snow. It reminded him of red roses against white porcelain, and it sent a chill colder than the elements racing through him.

Following the macabre trail, Russell’s gaze finally came to rest on a figure slumped against a large tree trunk. Even with his fragmented vision he recognised the man.

“Caleb…” He barely breathed the arms dealers’ name, fear and panic settling in icy chunks in his belly.

Russell staggered to his feet, half-running, half-stumbling towards his downed friend. He had no idea how he managed to move, let alone run, but somehow he did both. His heart was thrumming frantically beneath his ribs, his head rolling as he sank onto his knees next to Caleb.

Russell roved his eyes over the man, trying to triage his injuries, but everything was swimming around him, making it difficult to focus on anything for too long. He shuttered his lids, trying to clear the haze, and finally, after a moment, it cleared enough for him to get a good look at his friend.

The shaved-headed man looked like shit. He was sitting up, his back resting against the trunk, his legs thrown haphazardly in front of him. From the marks in the snow, it looked as if the man had dragged himself across the ground before coming to rest here. Caleb’s skin was pallid and clammy; his sweatshirt was also torn on the left side where she had gotten a swipe in. Small nicks and cuts marred his face and neck, none of which were serious, but they looked nasty – and painful.

Without waiting for an invitation, Russell pushed the hem of the hooded sweatshirt up and probed the gashes on Caleb’s side, ignoring the sharp intake of breath from the younger man. They were deep and they were bleeding profusely, blood bubbling from the wounds like a mini-fountain.

“Where else you hurt?” Russell croaked, ignoring the kid’s pitiful attempt to bat his hands away as he applied firm pressure to his side. Blood pooled behind his palms and trickled between his fingers, but Russell barely gave it a glance as his mind raced. This was bad. In fact, he wasn’t really sure how it could get much worse.

“My… my leg…” Caleb’s face contorted into an agonised grimace as he let out a low, shaky breath that sounded more like an aborted attempt to drag air into whichever lung would take it. Neither sounded willing.

“Hold here,” Russell ordered firmly. Pulling the younger man’s hand over to his side, Russell pushed it onto the wound harshly.

“Shit, Russell,” Caleb hissed between clenched teeth.

Russell murmured an apology. He didn’t mean to hurt the kid, but his own shaking limbs and apprehension were making it difficult to maintain any kind of control over his motor functions. He was as clumsy as a newborn foal on spindled-legs.

Dragging his hand over his temple, ignoring the bloodied smear it left in its wake, Russell grimaced. The wound to Caleb’s side was bad, but his leg was a frigging disaster.

His jeans were ripped, tattered navy-blue material frayed and ragged, and there was a dark stain from the base of his kneecap stretching all the way to his ankle.

It was blood – and there was a hell of a lot of it. Russell barely managed to suppress the dour expression that was trying to crawl across his face. He didn’t need to let the kid know how fucking bad this was, but he felt all control of the situation slipping through his fingers.

Carefully, ignoring the tremble in his hands, Russell peeled back the tear in Caleb’s pants and glimpsed the lower leg. He didn’t need to do more than a quick scan; he could tell instantly it was broken. The limb was oddly distorted and swollen like a balloon.

“Well, I don’t think you’re gonna be walkin’ out of here,” Russell muttered sourly.

This complicated matters a hell of a lot. The Black Annis was frigging homicidal and hungry; Caleb’s injury made it a lot easier for the bitch to put them both on the menu. In all honesty, Russell wasn’t entirely convinced he could fight her in his state either. His vision was still wobbling and his head felt stuffed with straw.

Glancing over his shoulder at the blood spattered snow, Russell’s body tensed of its own volition. Even in his worry for his friend, Russell hadn’t failed to notice the absence of John Winchesters youngest son, Sam. He didn’t want to think worst case scenarios, but Russell was a realist. He’d dealt with too much shit over the years not to be. He knew the kid’s absence meant one thing; that bitch had him.

He frowned, returning his attention back to the injured man before him. Caleb needed a doctor, but Sam…?

Russ didn’t know what the hell to do. He couldn’t leave his friend, but he wasn’t willing to leave John’s boy to face that thing alone either.

“You couldn’t have broken a friggin’ arm, could you?” Russell muttered as he scanned the clearing for their packs.

Locating Caleb’s rucksack a short distance from where the man himself was slumped against the tree, Russ staggered to his feet and grabbed the strap and dragged it across the ground. His own bag was as absent as John’s youngest son.

“You’re all heart,” Caleb murmured back, but his voice was apathetic. It was enough to bring Russell’s attention back to the younger man.

His lids had slid shut and he was shaking visibly. Russell scrubbed a hand over his mouth, praying that Caleb was simply cold and not in shock. Shock wasn’t something Russell could deal with easily out here. Caleb needed intravenous fluids, a blood transfusion, an orthopaedic surgeon and probably a laparotomy. None of which Russell could offer the arms dealer.

“Hey,” Russell sank onto his knees next to Caleb once more and patted his face, “eyes open, asshole. You ain’t in that fancy-assed house of yours now, and we’ve got work to do. No sleepin’ on the damn job.”

Caleb pried his eyes open, his lethargic gaze withering as Russell removed his jacket, draping it over the younger man’s torso. The chilly air hit him like a house falling onto his chest and, for a moment, Russell’s breath actually caught in his throat. When he finally was able to take a lungful of air, his entire respiratory system seemed to splutter momentarily before he was able to pull in a proper breath. The action left him dizzy, but Russell shook himself physically, pushing it from his brain. He didn’t have time to play the wounded solider.

“Your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired, Turner.” Caleb’s words slurred together, but Russell didn’t give a shit. Slurring was a hell of a lot better than the alternative.

“Yeah, well, you ain’t exactly sweetness and light yourself,” Russell replied dryly, pulling the first aid kit out of the arms dealers’ rucksack. He was grateful that Caleb was biting back. At least if he was sniping then there was hope the man was ok. Sniping implied that Caleb was still capable of coherent thoughts.

“You know you’re bleeding, don’t you?” Caleb murmured listlessly, his heavy eyes settling on Russell’s head.

“Yeah, it’s just a flesh wound, kid, I’m fine.”

The younger hunter arched a tight brow. “That’s why you look like an extra from Carrie,” he grunted.

Russell probed the side of his face and realised there was sticky, almost dried blood on his cheek too.

“I’m not the one whose leg looks like it went through a friggin’ tree shredder,” Russell said finally, not willing to get into a debate about who was hurt worse.

Pulling the gauze pack out, he carefully unravelled it and covered the gashes as best he could, taping it to the crimson stained skin.

Caleb gave him a wan smile. “It’s just a flesh wound.”

Snorting, the older hunter rolled his eyes. “I’ll remind you about that when they’re pinnin’ the bone back together, huh?”

Caleb shifted glassy eyes around the trees before locking his rolling gaze back onto Russell. “Where’s Sam?”

The older man didn’t speak. He didn’t know what to say. There was nothing either him or Caleb could have done differently, but Russell still felt responsible. They should have prevented the Black Annis from taking Sam. He’d seen too many children die over the years; from possessions, where the demon held the host too tightly, to his own children… Russell didn’t want to add Sam’s death to his conscience as well.

“Russell?” Caleb pressed, rheumy, pain-filled eyes searching his face for answers. “Russ, where the hell is Sam?”

Scrubbing a hand over his face, Russell tried to think of a way to soften the blow, but he’d never been any good at this sort of thing. Caleb was right, he did lack tact, and he had no idea how to deal with people.

“If you don’t answer me, so help me God-“ Caleb left the barely veiled threat hanging, attempting to move, struggling with uncooperative limbs. “Where is he?”

Russell frowned deeply at the feeble attempts from the man, noting just how much effort the minute movements were costing him.

“Sit goddamn still, will ya? Before you hurt your damn self.” Russell said curtly, latching his hands onto the arms dealer’s shoulders to prevent him from moving. Caleb still attempted to fight Russell’s grip but his struggles became weaker until he finally ran out of steam, sagging back against the trunk.

“She took him, didn’t she?” his body slouched exhaustedly, his tone defeated.

Russell met Caleb’s half-lidded eyes unwaveringly.

“Yeah, she’s got ’im,” he admitted quietly.

Caleb blanched.

“We’ve got to find him, Russell.”

Caleb tried to rise again, his arms shaking underneath him. His legs didn’t even manage a twitch.

Russell placed a restraining hand on his chest, afraid Caleb would cause more harm to himself by trying to move. He didn’t mention the warm slickness of blood underneath his palms that was soaking through Caleb’s shredded sweatshirt. The arms dealer was already edgy enough as it was.

“One problem at a time, idiot,” Russell snapped. He knew Caleb well enough to know the asshole would go after the kid, broken leg or not. He wouldn’t stand a frigging chance against the Black Annis, and Russell wasn’t letting anyone else die at her hands. “Let me patch your damn leg up first – before you get gangrene. Then we’ll deal with Johnny’s boy.”

Caleb gave him a hard stare but relented, his shoulders wilting dejectedly. His skin, although already clammy, was now also covered in a sheen of perspiration from the added exertion.

Quickly, Russell found the supplies he needed in the first aid kit and carefully examined the wound. The blood was coming from a thick gash on the thigh, but it wasn’t life threatening – thankfully. Russell cut through his jeans to get a better look at the injury and then bandaged the leg tentatively, trying to ignore the flinches of pain from the younger man. Once he was done, he searched for something he could use to splint the limb with. In the end it was nature that helped him out. He found a long thick branch and carefully tied it to the leg with strips of bandages.

“That should hold ‘til we get back into town,” Russell told him gravely. “You’re gonna be off your feet for a while though. This is a pretty bad break.”

Caleb frowned, running his tongue over his cracked lips. “Help me up.”

Russell gave the man an incredulous stare.

“Did ya miss the part where your leg is fucking broken?”

Caleb’s glare was scornful. “There’s nothing wrong with my hearing, Russell.”

“Yeah, well, I wish I could say the same about your goddamn brain.”

“Did it slip your mind that Sam is currently playing victim to a creature that likes to flay children?”

“No offence, but what the hell are you plannin’ on doin’? Beatin’ the bitch to death with your splint?”

The look on Caleb’s face was murderous. “We really do not have time to argue this. Help… me… up.”

No,” Russell replied, shaking his head. No way in hell was he letting Caleb go after her – not in this state.

“No?” There was a dangerous timbre to the arms dealers’ voice, but Russell ignored it.

“You think you’re gonna be any use to anyone?” Russell snorted. “You’re a mess, kid. You couldn’t fight a goddamn cold at the moment.”

“So what the hell are you suggesting?” Caleb demanded, irritation bleeding into his expression.

Russell didn’t say anything. He knew what he had to do but he wasn’t an idiot. He knew how dangerous the Black Annis was. He really couldn’t think of another alternative, however. Caleb could survive his wounds until John arrived… at least he hoped he could. The odds were better for Caleb than Sam anyway and, in a game were all the hands dealt were bad ones, Russell figured it was a case of taking the lesser of two evils.

Caleb evidently realised what the older hunter was leaving unsaid. He shook his head fervently.

“No! No frigging way! You can’t go after her alone, Russell! She’ll kill you!”

Russell let out a frustrated breath. He had no idea why everyone suddenly thought he was incapable of taking care of himself. First Joshua, and now Caleb. It was annoying. He was hunting when the pair of them were in frigging training pants.

“I’m gonna pretend that’s the shock talking,” Russell muttered tetchily.

“It’s called being realistic. She’s a vicious predator, Russell.”

“Well, it ain’t exactly my idea of fun,” the older man snapped, “but I ain’t really seein’ another option here, Caleb. You got another plan – and one that doesn’t involve you hobbling through the goddamn wilderness – then please, by all means share it with me. That kid’s got no more than a coupla hours before she starts ripping his skin off his bones and making him into the latest wall covering for whatever hole she’s fucking hidin’ in.”

Caleb winced at the harshness of his words, but Russell didn’t have time to sugar-coat this. Time was running out, and Russell knew what he had to do. He didn’t have to like leaving Caleb behind, but there really wasn’t any choice in the matter.

“Wait for John.” Caleb made a desperate, fumbling grab for Russell’s arm as the older hunter stood on unsteady legs. He glanced at the trembling fingers circling his wrist and sighed deeply.

“By that time she will have done God knows what to that boy,” Russell said quietly. “Believe me, I don’t like this plan, but what the hell choice do we have? She won’t keep the kid alive long, and she’s already got a good head start. We need to find Sam – fast.” Russell paused momentarily, steeling himself for his next words. “You’re just gonna slow me down and get Sam killed.”

Caleb’s expression was unreadable. Russell wasn’t sure if he saw anger briefly flicker across his face; he suspected he had. Russ found that most people were angry with him most of the time – not that it bothered him. It was easier to deal with people that way. It stopped them from forming attachments to him and, more importantly, stopped Russell from getting close to people. He’d learnt a long time ago the heartache that came from letting people into his life.

“This is a fucking nightmare.” Caleb’s voice brought Russell out of his maudlin thoughts.

Russell gave him a half-smile that didn’t reach his eyes as the arms dealer finally relinquished his grip on his wrist, his shaved head sinking back against the tree. Wasn’t that just the understatement of the goddamn century? A nightmare? This was a disaster of epic proportions.

In fact, nothing about this hunt had gone right. The wolf was going to be bad enough when the full moon finally appeared, but the added problems the Black Annis brought were nothing short of catastrophic. Russell knew they had to kill her before the wolf turned. There wasn’t a chance in hell they could fight both creatures. Shit, they were barely keeping it together with just her. She wasn’t exactly a kitten – unless she was a kitten with huge teeth and frigging claws.

“I think I can track her,” Russell said, glancing up at the sky, “as long as the snow holds off.”

If the storm started up again the trail would be lost beneath the new fall. Russell just hoped he could reach the boy before that happened.

Caleb’s brow wrinkled pensively. “I might have an easier way. Do you have the GPS I gave you?”

Frowning, Russell rummaged in his coat pocket and pulled out the palm sized device. At the beginning of this hunt Caleb had handed him the electronic compass and tried to show him how to work the damn thing. Russell wasn’t big on technology. He liked to do things old school. He liked to see and touch his surroundings. He didn’t trust these new fangled computers that could do everything short of wiping your damn ass. Nevertheless, he humoured the younger man and handed the GPS to the arms dealer, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What the hell is that piece of junk gonna do?”

“Find Sam,” Caleb told him softly, taking the GPS from him with a bloodied hand.

“What?” He snorted. “You programmed the kid into the machine? What did you do, tag him when I wasn’t looking?” Russell demanded, unable to keep the scepticism out of his voice.

Caleb raised a brow. “Don’t be ridiculous.” He returned his sluggish gaze to the device, pushing a couple of buttons. “I left my GPS in my jacket pocket.”

“So?” Russell asked, not really following the arms dealer.

“So,” Caleb said with an impatient exhale of breath, “if Sam’s still wearing my coat then you should be able to track the other GPS.”

Russell blinked, surprised by the revelation. “You can do that?”

“In theory.”

“In theory?” Russell rolled his eyes like a petulant teen. “Theory ain’t really gonna do us a lick of good here, Caleb.”

“It’s no different from tracking cell phone signals,” Caleb replied, glancing heavenwards. “It won’t work under the trees, but get a decent shot of the sky and it should point you in the right direction.” He smiled suddenly, “And voila – got him.”

Russell’s eyes widened. “Just like that?”

“Just like that.” Caleb looked so frigging smug. Russell was tempted to wipe the smirk off the man’s face, but his mouth and eyes were still tight with barely veiled pain.

Instead, he let out a tired breath. He’d never understand this crap, but as long as Miller did, it didn’t matter.

He took the device back from the arms dealer and frowned, his eyes moving over the electronic map and the blinking circle at the top left corner of the gadget.

“So just follow the blinking dot?”

“Yeah,” Caleb swallowed hard and nodded slowly, his eyes closing momentarily. “Should lead you practically to that bitch’s doorstep.”

“What about Winchester and my son?”

Caleb gave him a small smile. “In my pack… there’s flare guns.”

John had been a marine, Russell knew that, and suspected the man was used to field work of this nature. He guessed Winchester wouldn’t have a problem finding Caleb with the aid of flares.

Russell snorted. “You don’t happen to have a friggin’ tank in there, kid?”

“I’ve got a mini-RPG.”

Russell didn’t even want to know where the hell Caleb had gotten that from. Evidently, his work with the US military had some perks – RPGs being one.

“Ok, Rambo, you got anythin’ that’s a little easier to carry?”

“Got about half a dozen handguns in my pack.” Caleb nodded towards the rucksack on the ground. “There’s a silver barrelled gun – it’s a Desert Eagle. Take that. It shoots like a rifle. It’ll put a hole through that bitch the size of Texas.”

Already unzipping the bag, Russell paused mid-search to give the arms dealer a long look.

“Don’t mean to piss on your parade, Caleb, but I shot her with a friggin’ shotgun and it didn’t even dent the paintwork.”

“This will,” Caleb assured him. “There’s additional rounds in the front pocket.”

Rummaging in the bag, Russell found the described gun and rounds. He quickly loaded it, and got to his feet. He handed Caleb the rucksack, and then wrapped the arms dealers’ hand around a revolver.

“Shoot anythin’ that moves. I’ll come back for you, Caleb.” He didn’t add ‘I promise’. There was no need to. Russell wouldn’t leave the younger hunter behind.

Caleb let his head relax against the tree, his eyes unfocused on the sky.

“Did I mention I really don’t like this plan?”

Russell’s lip curled upwards. “A few times.” He tucked the Eagle into the back of his jeans. “Keep pressure on your side. You see blood comin’ through pack some more gauze around it.”

Sighing, Caleb met his gaze. “Just find Sam, Russell. I’ll be fine.”

Russell nodded slowly, and then, before he could change his mind about leaving his injured friend behind, he turned and started in the direction of the blinking dot on the GPS.

---

John had ordered the tent and their belongings to be packed up immediately. Dean had complied instantly to the request. There was no way in hell he was going to be able to sleep now anyway. The scream followed by the gunshots was enough to push any haze from his brain and put him on alert.

His father still hadn’t offered any explanations about what the hell the thing was that had made that sound… and Dean wasn’t even sure he wanted to know. It wasn’t the stuff of nightmares, but shit, it came pretty close. It was more than enough to raise the heckles on the back of his neck anyway.

The rising sun was barely pushing any heat through the atmosphere, and Dean shivered in the early morning chill. It was frigging freezing and the several layers he was wearing didn’t seem to be doing a damn thing to ward off the cold. He had hoped that walking would have made him warmer, but it hadn’t. Even his sweat seemed icy against his skin.

Joshua had retreated into a sullen silence, walking some distance behind John, who had taken the lead, his hands shoved into his coat pockets. Their argument, whilst not overly serious, had left a tension that Dean was struggling to break through. Instead, the seventeen-year-old had taken Turner’s approach and kept his mouth firmly shut.

They hadn’t been walking long when a bright red light erupted in the lightening sky. Dean’s eyes were immediately drawn to it, his brow narrowing. That sure as hell looked like a flare. He glanced towards his father who had also stopped walking.

“What was that?” Josh asked, shielding his eyes, his gaze firmly locked on the sky.

“That would be Caleb and your father,” John replied softly.

Joshua pulled his eyes from the flare and directed his stare at John.

“How the hell do you know that for sure?”

“Caleb’s an arms dealer, kid; you think he hasn’t come up here loaded with all sorts of shit? The guy works on the side for the military; it wouldn’t surprise me if he had a frigging radar system in his backpack.”

Joshua merely snorted, evidently unimpressed. Dean surmised he was still pissed with the man for agreeing to help his father on this insane crusade – not that he blamed him. Dean was cold, wet, and just about as miserable as he had ever been.

“Come on, it came from this direction,” John said, pushing further up the incline they were currently ascending.

They walked in the general direction of the flare for what seemed like days, but had in fact only been an hour. Legs burning with exertion, feet aching, Dean had no idea what the hell his father was following. They had taken so many twists and turns through the dense trees that Dean had lost all sense of direction. His father didn’t hesitate however, and continued on sure-footed.

Another flare fired into the air suddenly, just visible through the leafy canopy. It was closer than the last one, much closer.

“How much farther?” Dean asked, unable to gauge how far away the flare was being fired.

“Not far,” John replied evasively.

“Well that was specific,” Dean grunted, earning a glare from his father. Not that he cared; all he could think about was his brother.

There was some kind of unknown, potentially dangerous thing running around The Black Hills, and Sam was alone in the cabin. Dean wanted to tell his father to shove this hunt, he wanted nothing more than to get back to his brother and make sure he was ok. Not that his father would allow that, but Dean sometimes wondered about John’s priorities. He knew the man loved both his sons, but really, it seemed like he was more willing to help out others than his own family. Sometimes, Dean felt like he and Sam got shoved on the back burner. That thought rolling around his head made him sour and sullen.

They continued walking further into The Hills, the sun rising higher on the horizon with each step they took. Dean’s aching limbs wanted to fold beneath him, but he pushed on, ignoring the tremors, ignoring the acidic blood pumping through his arteries as he forced his feet to keep moving at the gruelling pace John had set.

As the trees thinned out, Dean saw the slumped figure first. He recognised Caleb immediately and was moving before he even thought about it. John and Joshua were less than a beat behind him.

Caleb was slumped against a tree wearing nothing but a hooded sweatshirt and jeans, his hand loosely covering a piece of crimson stained gauze on his side. His face was pale and clammy, and his leg had been splinted with what looked like a branch. Dean frowned at the blood on his jeans, before raising his gaze to his father. John was already carefully peeling back the material to examine the wound to his side.

“Caleb?” Dean tried, shaking the hunter gently, hoping to get some kind of response from the man.

He was grateful as hell when eyes fluttered and opened slowly to reveal glassy irises.

“Dean?” Caleb licked his lips, his lids shuttering. “That… that really you?”

“Yeah, Caleb, it’s me.” Dean gave him a sympathetic look as the man shifted, wincing with pain at the slight movement. “Some mess you’re in.”

Caleb’s eyes slid shut, his ribs collapsing inwards with each laboured breath.

“Yeah, it looks worse than it is,” Caleb muttered sluggishly.

“Looks pretty bad,” John finally spoke having concluded his examination of Caleb’s side. “What the hell did you do?”

“Got into an argument with something bigger than me,” Caleb murmured, prying one eye open. “Needless to say it won.”

“Where’s my father?” Joshua’s questioning tone startled Dean. He’d been that focused on Caleb that he had forgotten the southern hunter was even with them.

Josh was kneeling in the snow, his eyes locked on a bloodied trail that marred the white blanket. Dean hadn’t noticed it before but the sight of it now made his stomach roll. Where the hell was Russell?

Caleb raised his head. It lolled on his shoulders slightly, like a rag doll, before he managed to find enough equilibrium to hold it upright.

“He went after the Black Annis.”

John’s breath hitched, but Dean had no idea what the hell a Black Annis was. He’d never even heard of one before. Clearly, Joshua knew whatever John did because his face turned whiter than the snow on the ground.

“A Black Annis?” Joshua pushed the words through seemingly unmoving lips. “You’re hunting a Black Annis?”

“You’re sure?” John asked Caleb softly. There was something in his father’s tone that scared Dean. He wasn’t sure what the hell it was, but Dean knew the stakes in this hunt had just risen to a whole new level; he just wasn’t entirely sure why.

“Seen the bitch with my own eyes,” Caleb assured him, tugging his lower lip between his teeth as John continued to ghost his fingers over his leg. “Found out the first night we came up here.”

“Didn’t you do any research on this damn hunt?” Josh snapped. Anger – and fear – evident in his tone.

Caleb shot him a contemptuous glare, only slightly undermined by the pained lines marring his clammy skin.

“Your father assured me he had done it,” Caleb ground out. “I came into this hunt expecting to provide nothing more than the artillery. I didn’t expect her.”

Joshua snorted, his face enraged. “C’mon, dude, you know Russ. He ain’t got the damn patience to research. It was lack of research that got him into this friggin’ mess the first time round.”

“Another reason why I took what Russell said at face value, Josh,” Caleb hissed as John continued his ministrations. “Christ, Winchester, I’m kind of attached to my leg!”

“Sorry, Caleb,” John rubbed a hand over his chin and sighed. “You’ve got a nasty break there.”

“It’s the only reason I’m still sitting here,” Caleb said, shooting daggers at Joshua. At the demonologist’s sceptical grunt Caleb’s eyes flashed dangerously. “You think I’d leave Russell to face that thing alone? I’m not a coward, Josh.”

“Never said you were,” Joshua countered, but his tone clearly indicated otherwise.

“You didn’t have to.”

“Will you both shut up?” John interrupted, scowling at both men, “Arguing isn’t getting us anywhere.” He turned back to Caleb, ignoring the sullen glare from Joshua. “Why the hell did Russell go after this thing alone? Why didn’t he wait here with you?”

Caleb’s gaze instantly averted. He licked his lips, his shoulders tensing. Dean didn’t have to be a mind reader to know that the arms dealer was hiding something.

“Caleb?” John’s tone demanded answers.

“He didn’t have a choice,” Caleb responded reluctantly. “He had to go. Believe me; he didn’t leave me here lightly.”

“What the hell was so important that Russell left you behind, bleeding like a pig, to go hunt a psychotic hag with a penchant for removing flesh?” Joshua demanded.

Finally, Caleb raised his eyes, but it was John’s gaze he met, and not Joshua’s. Dean’s heart seemingly froze before the arms dealer even opened his mouth. He knew instinctively that something awful had happened.

“Because…” Caleb hesitated, running his tongue over his lips, “…because she has your son, John.” Caleb let out a ragged breath, swallowing hard. “She has Sam.”

Chapter Eight

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Wed 13 March 1996

John heard the words, heard them clearly but didn’t really comprehend them at the same time.

She has Sam…

How the hell was that possible? It wasn’t possible, John told himself firmly. He’d left Sam in the cabin. He’d left his twelve-year-old son behind to keep him safe. There was no way in hell Sam could be in that things clutches. It just wasn’t… possible.

He blinked, a thick fog of panic drawing over him suddenly. Chunks of ice settled in his belly, his heart spluttering over several beats before it finally seemed to quiver to a halt beneath his ribs. He’d thought he was doing what was right, what he needed to do in order to protect Sam, and yet Sam wasn’t protected. In fact, Sam was up to his neck in shit – shit that could have been avoided if John had simply taken the time to drive a few hours out of his way to drop the kid off at Bobby Singer’s. That thought speared through his chest painfully. God, what the hell had he done?

No… Caleb must have made a mistake… he must have. His entire body tingled with gut-wrenching fear, cold sweat standing out on his skin making him shiver.

It was Dean’s voice that finally broke through the numbness and dragged John back to reality.

“What?” His eldest son demanded, pulling away from the arms dealer and staggering to his feet.

Dean’s eyes were wide and his lips were parted slightly. He looked just about as shell-shocked as John had ever seen him – not that he was dealing with the information much better. His own stomach was turning inside out, and his heart was beating so quickly, he could hear his blood pumping in his ears. He felt sick, his head rolling as the gravity of the situation sank in.

“That’s not possible,” Dean murmured, shaking his head fervently. Every inch of the seventeen-year-old practically vibrated with barely veiled anguish. “We left Sam in the cabin, he’s safe.”

There was that word again… possible. It wasn’t really a word they associated with their lifestyle. Every day they dealt with shit that was impossible. It didn’t make it any less real. John could see his world sliding into the mud before his very eyes and he didn’t know how to fix this, he didn’t know if he could fix this. Was it too late already? Had John lost Mary and now Sam? The thought left him feeling empty. How much was too much? How many more people did John have to lose before the cosmos cut him a fucking break? Was he destined to be alone for the rest of his stinking existence? He dragged a hand over his chin and let out a low breath. Once again he was up shit creek and the boat was taking water fast.

“I wish to God that was the case, Dean, but it’s not,” Caleb replied, shifting a little with a grimace.

The man looked like shit. How the hell he was still conscious, John had no idea. His skin was pallid and clammy and he was struggling to keep his eyes at half-mast. Christ, that thing had really taken a chunk out of Caleb, and if she could do that to a fully-armed, grown man, what the hell could she do to a sick twelve-year-old?

“No,” Dean growled, stepping back from the injured man. “It can’t be Sam.”

“I’m sorry,” Caleb said softly, his head dropping back against the tree, his eyes closing momentarily as he swallowed hard, his body trembling with cold. “I wish I could tell you differently, kid.”

John wanted to say something, wanted to assure his eldest that Caleb was wrong, but the grim expression on the arms dealers face told a different story, and, judging from Dean’s own expression, he knew it too. Dean was many things, but naive wasn’t one. He’d seen too much shit in his short life to be.

“You want to tell me how the hell my youngest son ended up with a Black Annis?” John hadn’t meant to snap, hadn’t meant to say anything at all in fact, but his mouth and brain didn’t seem to be connected. It was easier to blame Miller than it was to deal with the fact his negligence could cost the Winchester family a lot more than they ever wanted to pay.

Caleb’s glare – as John expected it would be – was withering. Even bleeding and in pain the man could still communicate pissed better than your average teenager. He rolled his sluggish gaze towards the older hunter, his eyes hard. John was pretty sure he saw hurt flash momentarily in the man’s face that had nothing to do with his injuries, but it disappeared quickly.

“I was under the impression that you are his father, John – not me,” Caleb growled.

John scowled. His fear was growing with each second that passed and his anger at Caleb, whilst misplaced, seemed justified. He couldn’t control the rage that had settled inside him and frankly, he wasn’t sure he wanted to try. There was a silent relief in his anger, a brief solace that helped John to put things into perspective.

“You know how the fuck to hunt, Miller, you suddenly decide that research wasn’t necessary?”

Caleb studied him for a moment, disgust washing over his face. John was sure that if Caleb had been able to get up, he would have thumped him. He probably would have done a hell of a lot of damage too – even injured. Caleb was hardly small.

“That’s funny,” Caleb snarled, his tone scathing, “I’m sure Sam said the same thing about you.”

If Caleb hadn’t been bleeding already, John would have knocked his teeth down his fucking throat. Rationally, he knew none of this shit was Caleb’s fault, but the irrational part of his brain was feeding poison into his mind. He needed an outlet for all that fear and rage. What was it they said? The messenger always gets shot.

Joshua moved before John could even growl a curse, his strong arms wrapping around his torso, pulling him back from the injured arms dealer.

“I did the fucking research, Caleb,” John snapped.

Caleb gave him a dark glare. “Evidently.”

“You bastard!” John was moving before he even thought about it, before he even considered that Caleb was bleeding and hurt – probably bleeding and hurt trying to help his son. None of that mattered. John couldn’t see past the cloud of red that had enveloped him, blocking out all ability to reason.

He didn’t get far, however.

Josh shoved John savagely away as he darted towards Caleb.

“Back off, John,” Joshua warned, his gaze locked on the older man. “I’m sure pummellin’ Caleb will make ya feel better, Winchester, but it ain’t gonna save Sam – or my damn father,” the demonologist snapped. “Pull your goddamn self together and get your damn head in the game.”

John opened his mouth to retort but he didn’t get the chance to speak.

“Yeah, well, we wouldn’t be in this frigging mess if someone had just listened to me.”

Dean’s voice brought all three adults eyes towards him. John recognised the tight set of the seventeen-year-old’s jaw, the defiant stance, the fear barely hidden behind the tight lines of anger.

“Watch your goddamn tongue,” John barked. He knew this shit was his fault; he didn’t need reminding of the fact.

Dean ignored his father, his eyes firmly locked on the arms dealer.

“This Black Annis – what the hell is it?”

Caleb shifted his leaded gaze towards Joshua before resting on John.

“What is it?” Dean repeated, his voice crackling with obvious tension. His stance radiated his apprehension even more so.

“I don’t really know,” Caleb murmured. “It’s some kind of corporeal creature – probably on the same scale as a Wendigo.”

“Wendigos ain’t even in the same league as this thing,” Joshua disagreed, still stood between Caleb and John. “She’s right up there with your xonan’s, boggarts, monsters under the bed, kid, only she’s a helluva lot more dangerous,” Josh explained with a grimace, “she’s fast, she’s devious as hell, and –“ Joshua broke off frowning.

“She likes kids,” Dean finished, his jaw tightening till the muscles in his neck looked like they might snap. Dean knew more monsters than most hunters twice his age; John had taught him well, so it didn’t surprise him that his eldest had put two and two together. He just wished he hadn’t. The truth was not pleasant.

“Dean, we’ll find him,” John assured his son, not entirely sure if he believed that or not. He knew how Black Annis’ worked. She would get it over with quickly. She would want the skin…

God, his boy’s skin…

Nausea crept up his throat at that thought. No… failure was not an option here. John would not lose Sam to this creature.

“This shit is your damn fault!” Dean growled, his face filled with accusation. “I told you not to leave Sam alone, I told you the kid was sick, and now some freaking monster is going to do God knows what to him!”

John could take recrimination from anyone, but not from his children. He missed the days when a simple word would have them both looking at him with wide-eyed reverence. Sam… Sam was growing firmly out of hero worship, and whilst Dean still saw his father as infallible, the expression he was wearing now was disdain, and that hurt more than he wanted to admit.

“Dean, this isn’t my fault-“

Dean held a hand up, cutting his father off.

“Just… don’t. You care more about hunting than you do about us Dad, and God forbid we don’t act like one of your army buddies. Sam’s sick! He’s fucking sick! And we left him alone – alone to face this… this thing.”

John felt his anger slipping like the side of a glacier falling into the sea. It was easy to be angry with Caleb – far too easy – but the dejected, fearful look in his young son doused all the fire in him. He’d brought his boys up to look after each other, in fact, he’d practically shoved Sam’s upbringing onto Dean’s lap from the night of the fire. He couldn’t be angry with his eldest for acting how he had taught him to act, but it didn’t make the rage directed at him any easier to deal with.

“We’ll get your brother back,” John muttered under his breath, scrubbing a hand over his face, but Dean wasn’t ready to listen to false assurances.

“Sam told us there was something else going on up here,” Dean murmured, his expression haunted. “He told us and we didn’t listen.”

John frowned at the words. This was the first he had heard of his son’s doubts. “Sam told you that we were dealing with this thing?”

Dean snapped his gaze towards John, fire behind his normally light green eyes. “Yeah, he told me something was wrong and I didn’t listen to him, and now-“ Dean broke off, running his tongue over his lips. “And now he’s being held by…”

John ached seeing his son so broken. He would protect them both from everything if he could, but the world did not work like that and so John had done the opposite. The best offence is a good defence, and John had trained his boys well. He didn’t know what else to do. Ignorance would only lead to death. Hadn’t Mary proven that? No, preparation was the key; he just hoped that he had taught his youngest enough to stay alive until they could pull him out of this shit.

“Dean, you couldn’t have known this thing was a Black Annis. You couldn’t have known this would happen-“

“How do you kill this thing?” Dean demanded, glancing between Caleb and Joshua, completely ignoring John.

That he could be brushed aside so easily wounded him. He wasn’t ever going to win any awards for best father of the year, but he had hoped his sons would at least look at him with that wide-eyed respect for at least a little longer. The look Dean was giving him made him feel completely inadequate.

“Dean, this bitch… she ain’t a walk in the damn park, you can’t kill her alo-“

“This bitch, has my brother, Josh,” Dean snapped, “and I’m not sitting by and waiting for her to-“ He trailed off, unwilling to say what they were all thinking, as if speaking them gave them truth. “Just tell me.”

“Fire…” Caleb answered finally, his voice thick. “She doesn’t like fire… Don’t know if it will kill her though.”

Dean nodded, his jaw tight, his eyes resolute. As he started to move away from the three hunters, John made a grab for his arm.

“You’re not going after that thing alone, Dean.”

His eldest son gave him a glare that could have melted polar ice caps, shrugging out of his grasp. It was colder than the weather and sent a shiver racing up John’s spine.

“We don’t have time to argue this,” Dean growled.

John was losing control quickly and he didn’t like it. He scowled, tightening his grip on his son’s arm.

“This is not a discussion, Dean. It’s not happening.” He wouldn’t risk both his sons. He wanted his eldest where he could protect him. “We’ll patch Caleb up and then we’ll move out to find your brother.”

“Sam could be dead by then!” The finality of the words made John flinch. He closed his eyes, wishing that when he opened them he was somewhere else, his youngest son beside him, but the scene was still the same. The Black Hills felt oppressive and vast, a maze of trees and jagged rocks that served only to hide Sam from sight.

“She sleeps through the day,” Joshua said quietly, “Sam’ll be ok.”

Till the sun sets…

The southern hunter didn’t say the words, but he didn’t have to. John heard them clearly.

Cautiously, John released his hold on Dean and held his breath, waiting to see his son’s reaction. Dean didn’t move, but his eyes were still dark, still accusing. With a suffering sigh, John strolled back over to Caleb and crouched beside the injured man. He’d apologise later for his behaviour. Maybe Caleb would accept it; maybe he wouldn’t, either way it didn’t matter. John wasn’t about to let anyone die on this frigging hunt.

“How you feeling, Miller?” He asked softly, his gaze roving over the bloodied and torn clothing.

“Go find your son, John,” Caleb said tiredly. “Pick me up on the way back.”

John shook his head firmly. “I’m not leaving you behind, Caleb.”

“Dean’s right, the longer you wait the more chance that-“

John cut him off with a snarled curse. “Not happening, kid. Once the sun goes down, the Black Annis isn’t the only thing out here.”

Caleb winced, his eyes sliding shut. “The wolf?” John nodded grimly. “You think it will be in The Hills tonight?”

John shifted his shoulders. “I don’t know, but I’m not gambling your life on it.”

Straightening from his crouch, John turned to his son and Joshua.

“We need two lengths of wood and the ground sheet from the tent.” Caleb couldn’t walk, of that there was no doubt, but they could carry the man out of there. The marines had taught John to never leave a man behind, and it was one lesson John intended to follow.

---

The sun was high in the sky, just visible through the leafy canopy overhead. Despite that, there was no heat in the air, the chill still clinging to the air itself. Russell glanced at the GPS and scowled. Just follow the blinking dot; it should take you right to that bitch’s doorstep…

Yeah, that might have worked if the blinking dot hadn’t upped sticks and taken off. Russell shook the handset irritably, resisting the urge to sling it into the snow covered ground in a fit of rage. God, he hated technology. Glancing up through the tree branches, he recalled that Caleb had said the thing needed a clear view of the sky to work… which might have been ok if they weren’t in the goddamn woods. Closing his eyes, Russell counted backwards from ten in his head, trying to rein his emotions in. he should have done this the old school way – tracking. Find the markings, follow them, simple. More time consuming no doubt – although at the moment that was debateable – but definitely simpler. Blinking dots and clear skies was just a little too finicky for Russell’s liking.

After a moment, he continued walking forward, ignoring the pain in the back of his skull, ignoring the way his peripheral vision wobbled every now and again. None of that shit mattered. What did matter was finding Sam and pulling his damn ass out of this mess in one piece.

The snow was deeper here and crunched underfoot. Russell shivered in the cold, rubbing one hand up his arm, attempting to warm his aching bones. He’d given Caleb his coat to keep the injured man warm, but the plaid overshirt he was wearing was barely keeping the biting chill from sinking through the thin material. His old bones hurt with the cold.

Losing his footing in the drifts, he stumbled, throwing a hand out to catch himself just in time. He would have liked to blame the unsteady ground for his near fall, but the truth was Russell was having difficulty keeping his balance. He knew he was concussed, knew his head injury was causing him more trouble than he needed, but still he pressed on, forcing the dizziness aside, forcing the nausea away. He had a twelve year old kid to find, and Russell wouldn’t be too late. Not this time.

---

Sam awoke with a dull headache and a dry mouth. As his senses slowly rebooted, he realised he was lying on his stomach, something cold beneath him. Gingerly, he unfurled his fingers, and brushed the tips across the ground, trying to make sense of where he was. It was stone beneath him, not snow that his skin touched and he frowned at the realisation. He tried to open his eyes, tried to force the heavy lids apart, but the wave of dizziness that assaulted him made him feel sick to his stomach. Sam squeezed his eyes tightly shut and tried to mentally bargain with the bile crawling up his throat. After a moment, the sensation dissipated, and Sam took a relieved breath.

Shivering uncontrollably, his skin prickled with unbearable heat, his bones ached to their very core. Sam tried to mentally catalogue all his limbs, and was grateful as hell when he realised they were all where they should be. There were new injuries on top of his old ones, but he was still in one piece – more or less.

That wasn’t to say he wasn’t in pain, however. Sam’s left forearm was burning fiercely and his previously bruised ribs were now agony. Each breath was akin to having a truck dropped on his torso. His head ached so badly that every minute movement sent spikes of violent pain racing through his brain. There was also a blooming pain across his back, no doubt caused by the Black Annis dragging him through the trees, over the hard ground. The skin felt shredded and his t-shirt was stuck to him, glued no doubt by his own blood and sweat.

Suddenly, something snarled at the side of him. Sam dragged his face across the cold ground so quickly, it made his vision reel.

It was her… the Black Annis.

She was no longer the crone-like blue-faced hag, but looked like she had the first time Sam had seen her; a serene faced old lady. Shit, she could have been anyone’s grandma. It was only the amber eyes that suggested something about her wasn’t quite right.

Sam scrabbled off his front, his arms shaking beneath his weight and pushed himself onto his knees, his breath ripping out in fearful rags. He also quickly realised that he was back in the cave she had brought him to last time, but he was now locked in a small cage like a wild animal. Sam ignored that. He would deal with his imprisonment in a moment. For now, his attention was focused on the Black Annis.

She was sat in front of the cage on a low backed chair, her amber eyes wide and staring. Sam flinched, flattening himself against the back bars, his heart pounding. He could smell stale blood, urine, and vomit. There were other smells… half-rotted flesh and the murky, oppressive stench that came with that. He wasn’t sure what the hell he could do against her with his injuries, but Sam’s sluggish gaze was already sliding around the cave looking for something he could use for a weapon. It was then he realised that the Black Annis hadn’t moved, nor had she attempted to move. She hadn’t moved an inch, but her amber orbs still focused on him. She was… asleep…? Sam’s frown deepened. Caleb had said she was weaker after sunrise… did she have to sleep to regenerate? Or was it a more primal instinct? Did she have to sleep to… change into the hag or to eat? Sam wasn’t sure he gave a shit what the answer was. Either way, it was a saving grace. Maybe he could get out of the cage and escape whilst she slept. Certain that he wasn’t about to be attacked, Sam took a moment to scan his surroundings.

The cage was about four foot long and wide with thin horizontal bars. Sam didn’t recall seeing it last time, but then again he’d been a little too busy running for his life. He hadn’t exactly had time to take in the décor and what he had seen had been enough anyway. His gaze split between the Black Annis and his imprisonment, Sam ran a hand over the bars. The door itself was secured with a large rusty padlock. There was no way Sam could get his hands through the bars to reach it which put picking the damn thing out of the picture and Sam was a little afraid of using brute force to try and break the cage door on the hinges side. She was asleep now, but she was hardly going to sleep through that.

Letting out a fearful breath, Sam felt his desperation mounting. It was only heightened further when his gaze fell across the mutilated body still on the table. Sam didn’t want that to be him. He was so scared of what this creature was going to do to him. Flaying… It wasn’t exactly how Sam imagined his life ending. He didn’t doubt that his father and brother would do what they could to save him; the problem was that neither John nor Dean knew Sam was in trouble. He was supposed to be safe – in the cabin – and he wasn’t counting on Russell or Caleb for help. The last thing Sam had seen before the Black Annis had dragged him off into The Black Hills was Russell unconscious on the ground and blood on Caleb’s pale skin.

Sam whimpered uncontrollably. He was going to die and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Trembling, the twelve-year-old scrambled back against the far side of the cage and drew his bruised knees to his chest, wrapping his arms around them. His borrowed sweats were caked in dirt and were wet from being dragged through the snow at an alarming speed. Sam hoped Caleb wasn’t too attached to them because they were pretty much ruined. Caleb’s coat was history too. Sam didn’t remember where he had lost it or how but the thin t-shirt he had also borrowed wasn’t doing much to keep him warm. The air in the cave was thin and laced with ice. Every breath hurt and was like swallowing lungfuls of arctic water.

Like the frigid air wasn’t enough, his body was also racked with tremors, his muscles aching with cold. He felt awful, and he wasn’t sure how much of it was his injuries and how much was his illness. Either way, he wanted to curl into a ball and sleep for a month.

At the cave entrance, Sam could see sunlight and wondered how long he’d been here. Was it the same day or days later? He wasn’t sure. He let his head drop back against the bars, his entire body aching with a mix of fever and injury. His arms were a mass of nicks, cuts and already forming bruises. There was a deep gash on his right arm that was bleeding, trails of crimson spider-webbing down his forearm before trickling through his fingers and dripping onto the ground.

God, he was totally screwed.

Chapter Nine

The Black Hills, South Dakota

Wed 13 March 1996

The world was moving, swirling on its axis, muted colours dripping into one another. Russell lowered his head further onto his chest, his chin practically grazing his torso, his knees sinking further into the snowy ground and tried to breathe through the bile coating the back of his throat. If he moved he was going to throw up. Even if he didn’t move he still might.

Closing his eyes to everything, he exhaled shakily, swallowing the excessive saliva pooling in his mouth. He didn’t dare to open his eyes. He was too dizzy. His ears were ringing and there was a frantic pounding behind his lids.

He didn’t have time for this. Each moment he sat in the snow was another minute the Black Annis had with Sam. It was a moment longer she had to torture the boy. Russell wasn’t prepared to let that happen and his resolve to protect the kid overshadowed his injuries. Christ, he’d survived worse. The last time he’d been up in these hills hunting he’d been close to death. He’d dragged his battered ass miles down the hillside towards safety before Joshua had found him. A little thing like a concussion wasn’t going to stop him here, not when there was so much at stake. Painfully, the dry voice in the back of his mind reminded him that Sam was around the same age as Jeremy had been when the demon had killed him. It was no age to die. His son had the rest of his life ahead of him; a life to explore and make his own, a life in which to accomplish anything. He’d never had that chance. The kid had been murdered before he’d even had the chance to experience life, and Russell wasn’t about to let that happen to Sam. Not if he could help it.

Wincing, Russell cracked one eye open and took an experimental breath. He didn’t heave and so he took that as a sign to try the other. Both eyes now open, he blinked the fog from his vision and swallowed hard as everything wavered. God, this was going to be harder than he first thought.

“C’mon Russell, move your goddamn ass,” he muttered to himself through clenched teeth.

Russell pushed his hands into the snow, ignoring the chill that burnt into his palms and managed to climb onto wobbly legs. Staggering a little as he tried to find equilibrium with his own roiling consciousness, the grizzled hunter shook himself mentally and pushed through the fog clouding his mind.

He hoped Caleb had managed to contact John, prayed that the hunter wasn’t too far behind him. Russell would be able to at least hold off the Black Annis long enough for the youngest Winchester to escape, but he wasn’t at all convinced he’d be able to do that for long. The hope that John and Joshua could soon be treading the path he was walking was all that he had to cling onto.

Rubbing his hands up and down his freezing arms, Russell glanced around the snow covered ground and frowned deeply. The hillside was a pale mirage of trees spanning as far as the eye could see, thick needled conifers standing tall like sentries, watching over the valley below The Hills. Russell sighed, breath steaming in front of his face. It looked nice enough, but it didn’t help him with his current predicament.

Shaking himself out of his musing, he slid his gaze around the clearing, searching for the GPS Caleb had thrust into his hands earlier. When he’d collapsed into the snow, Russ had dropped everything. The small handset was lying in the blanket of white directly in front of him. Russell carefully, and slowly, bent down and fished it off the ground, brushing the dust off it. He snorted, his brow raising. At least this thing was strong enough to withstand being dropped. The dot was still blinking on the screen, a rapid frantic winking black spot that was supposedly John’s youngest son. Not that Russell was entirely sure he trusted this goddamn thing to lead him anywhere. The insistence of the youth of today to rely on technology for everything freaked Russell out even more than demons and monsters.

One unsteady foot in front of the other, he continued on the path indicated by the GPS. He might not trust it, but he didn’t really have any other option but to follow it. This thing had taken him on the most direct route through The Hills to find Sam; there was no guarantee that he could even pick up the kid’s trail again anyway and Russell didn’t have time to go traipsing through the trees searching either. Time was a luxury that he could not afford right now.

Glancing up at the murky sky, Russell frowned deeply. It was past noon, heading into late afternoon. He probably should have stopped and eaten but he couldn’t bring himself to do so. Instead, he soldiered on, ignoring the throbbing in his head and the aching in his chest from the Black Annis’s attack. However, Russell was finding it increasingly difficult to concentrate on anything other than the cold. His bare arms were goose-bumped and his body was shivering. He’d given his own jacket to Caleb, not wanting the younger man to go into shock. He wished he’d at least thought to replace the garment with a sweatshirt or something before taking off into the back of beyond to go hunting a rabid, crazed hag with a head injury that could have floored a bear.

Trudging through the deep drifts, Russell glanced up through the thick canopy of needle covered branches overhead before lowering his gaze to the GPS. The dot had disappeared, the signal weakened under the trees here. He resisted the urge to throw the piece across the ground, instead readjusting his course slightly. Breaking the damn thing wasn’t going to help him – or Sam for that matter. He needed a clear shot of the sky, but he wasn’t likely to get it here.

Russell continued to stumble across the uneven ground, his teeth chattering together, checking the handset every now and again. The dot appeared sporadically, letting him know he was at least heading in the right direction, but it disappeared just as often. He had no idea how far or long he’d been walking, but his legs were aching almost as much as his throbbing head.

The handset suddenly gave a startled yelp that made Russell jump. The dot was blinking frantically and beeping simultaneously. Frowning at it, he raised his eyes and glanced around the trees dotting the side of the hill. He couldn’t see any sign of the boy – nor the Annis in the immediate vicinity. His other hand moved towards the back of his jeans automatically and his wooden fingers circled the butt of the Desert Eagle, pulling it out of his waistband. He couldn’t see her, but that didn’t necessarily mean she wasn’t here. The Black Annis was not only fast, but she could melt in and out of sight better than any frigging magicians trick. Houdini had jackshit on this old hag.

The GPS gave another shriek that brought Russell’s attention back to the immediate issue.

“I’m guessing that means I’m on the right track,” he muttered to himself.

Pushing his way through dense underbrush and thick, gnarled arm-like branches, he followed the dot on the GPS, the device clutched in one hand, the Desert Eagle in the other. It was bulky and heavy as hell. Russell silently cursed Caleb. This thing might have been capable of bitch-slapping the Black Annis’s ass all the way to Timbuktu, but it wasn’t exactly designed to be easily carried. Russell wasn’t sure how useful this thing would be in close combat.

Gun raised, his gaze flicking between the handset and the landscape in front of him, Russell slowly moved through the trees, forcing his eyes to be more alert and focused than he felt. It was taking a hell of a lot more energy than he had.

As the trees thinned even more, the beeping got closer together. Russell edged forwards, scanning the small clearing that emerged between the trunks. The snow was disturbed here and Russell’s gaze was instantly drawn to the only hint of colour on the blanched ground. Even from a distance, he knew what it was.

Caleb’s coat was snagged on a branch, the material frayed and ripped as if it had been brutally torn off the wearer. It wasn’t the coat that had snared his attention, however, it was the splatter of crimson that stained the white ground beside the garment. Swallowing hard, Russell slid watchful eyes around before crouching down besides the marred snow. He knew it was blood – of that he had no goddamn doubt – and he was certain it was Sam’s. Scrubbing a hand over his mouth, he tore his gaze from the ghastly stain and carefully untangled Caleb’s coat from the tree. He found the other GPS in the pocket and sighed at the shrieking desperation coming from his own device. It had worked, just as Miller had said it would, the problem was Sam wasn’t with the coat. The question begged where the hell was the damn kid?

Slowly rising from his crouch, Russell noticed that none of the trees here were evergreens and all had lost their leaves. The majority of the branches were stripped bare, the landscape a greying graveyard of skeletal branches and winter-induced death. The clawed branches bent back and forth in the breeze, talons seemingly reaching for Russell. He shuddered, suddenly feeling chilled to the bone, his anxiety hitching up another notch. Nothing about this place felt right. In fact, it felt decidedly creepy.

Unable to shake the feeling, Russell twisted in a circle on the spot, his hard eyes split between searching the ground and looking for anything that could be considered hostile. Caleb’s technology had worked, but Russell couldn’t help but think that it would have been a hell of a lot easier to follow the bitch the old fashioned way from the frigging start.

Thankfully, it didn’t take a lot of effort to find the tracks he was looking for. Drag marks disappeared into the trees, lined with blood for the first few meters before fading into sporadic splashes. Russell sighed deeply, his stomach twisting into knots of fear.

“I hope to hell you’re ok, kid,” he muttered, shoving both GPS’s into his jeans pockets and following the tracks of the twelve-year-old boy.

---

Joshua Turner wasn’t sure who he was more pissed off with at the moment; John for being… well, John, Caleb for helping Russell on this hair-brained scheme, or Russell for dragging all these people into this goddamn mess. It was too close a call, and Josh wasn’t sure it was fair to try and measure his annoyance in such a clear cut way.

Shifting the long wooden supports of the makeshift litter between his grip, he glanced down at the semi-conscious arms dealer and frowned. Caleb wasn’t doing too well; Josh didn’t need a frigging MD after his name to realise that. John had redressed the wounds on the twenty-three year old’s side and bandaged the leg further with professional precision but Caleb was pallid and kept sliding in and out of consciousness. John assured Joshua that the man was fine, and that he would be fine till they got back to town, but Josh wondered if John was just saying that to reassure them all that this mess wasn’t that bad.

“You want a picture, Turner,” Caleb’s voice slurred, “it’ll last a helluva lot longer.”

Making a face at the younger man, Joshua resisted the eye roll, just grateful that the man was talking.

“Don’t flatter your goddamn self, Miller. You’ve got a face only a mother could love.” The gibe was said with false cheer that Joshua didn’t feel. Caleb was hurt badly. Russell was out there playing the hero, and Sam… God, he didn’t even want to think about how the hell that kid was doing.

Shifting his gaze around the sombre group, he realised it was the first time anyone had spoken since they had loaded Caleb onto the litter over two hours ago. John was at the front of the stretcher, holding the lengths of wood as if they were made of feathers and not the support for a hundred and seventy pound guy. Dean was walking at the side of the litter, his pack and Caleb’s slung over his shoulders. The kid looked despondent as hell. Not that Joshua blamed him. He barely remembered much about his own siblings, but Russ had always drilled into him how important family was. He’d do anything for Russell, despite all his griping about how irresponsible an asshole his father was and he knew Dean was the same with his little brother.

Joshua’s chest ached.

This shit was his fault. He should never have brought John in on this – or he should have insisted he took his kids somewhere safer. Christ, a cabin in the middle of fucking nowhere wasn’t exactly the most ideal environment for a twelve year-old. Not only that, but Dean was too frigging young to be playing hunter. Joshua swallowed the bitterness that collected in the back of his throat. He’d lived a life similar to the one John was giving these boys. It wasn’t fun being dragged across country, flung into hunts and facing crap that most adults would have shit themselves at seeing. Sometimes he resented Russell for the life he’d led, but at the same time there hadn’t been any other choice. His mother had been murdered, his siblings too. Russell couldn’t have left Joshua alone, and he couldn’t give up his work. With age, Josh had come to realise that his father did the best he could. The man had no idea how the hell to raise a seven year old. It didn’t stop the childish side of him from wanting to lash out about how goddamn unfair life was and he doubted it would keep Sam and Dean from doing the same either.

“Josh?” Caleb’s cold hand snagged his wrist, bringing Joshua’s blue eyes down to his face. “I’m… I’m sorry…”

Joshua sighed. It was all too easy to blame Caleb for this shit, to blame the man for coming on this hunt, but Russell wasn’t some rookie kid. He’d been doing this crap for a long assed time. It wasn’t as if the arms dealer had led the older man astray. Russ knew what the hell he was doing – well, supposedly.

“This ain’t your damn fault, man,” Joshua assured him softly, his eyes straying towards Dean. The seventeen year old was still trudging on, resolve written in every tight line in his face.

“Tell that to him,” Caleb said following Joshua’s gaze.

Joshua’s face wrinkled as he pulled his eyes from Dean. The kid had lost so much over the years, he just hoped that he wouldn’t have to lose Sam too. Frown deepening, Joshua shook the cobwebs from his mind and pushed his own dark past back into the box he kept it locked in. Now was hardly the time for a trek down memory lane; especially considering how frigging dark his own past was. Instead, Joshua brought his attention back to the injured man he was carrying.

“He doesn’t blame you either, Caleb,” Joshua assured him softly, averting his gaze. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe the words, but more that Joshua blamed himself. He should never have called John in on this. He should have dealt with this crap on his own.

Warm fingers latching onto his wrist brought Joshua’s eyes back to the arms dealer’s face of their own volition.

“Thought your father did the research, Josh,” Caleb slurred, his eyes sliding shut to less than half-mast, “I’d never have agreed to this whacked out crusade otherwise. I wouldn’t bowl in half-cocked and unprepared.”

Joshua closed his eyes briefly, expending a weary breath. Back to that again. Whichever way it was cut, Russell was the spark that lit the fire. The catalyst… the goddamn explosion.

“It’s ok, dude,” Joshua said quietly, unsure if anything about this was going to be ok. Worst case scenario in this instance was going to fuck all their lives completely, leaving Dean and John without Sam and Joshua an orphan and alone. “We’ll figure this shit out.”

John stopped suddenly, lowering his end of the litter onto the ground. Joshua followed suit, glad to be rid of the burden for a moment. His arms and shoulders were aching with burning acid-like pain. Stretching the blooming ache from his back, Joshua absently watched John as he moved forward across the forest floor, his head lowered to study the snow tossed ground. There’d been a lot of shit said about Winchester and the way he did things, but Joshua knew the man was an exceptional hunter. Methodology was irrelevant when he got results.

Joshua flicked a guilty gaze in Dean’s direction once more, quickly glancing away when green agate eyes met his blue ones. He swore that boy could see into his frigging mind when he did that.

“Tracks lead this way,” John said after a moment, moving to pick up his end of the litter once more.

“Hold on,” Dean growled, making a grab from John’s arm, “how the hell do we know we’re following Sam and not Russell’s tracks?”

John shifted his shoulders, his expression tight. Evidently he’d thought the same thing himself. “We don’t, but if Caleb’s GPS is doing its job, then even if we’re following Russell, he’s following Sam. The destination is the same, Dean; even if the route is different.”

“What if that thing doesn’t work?” Dean demanded. “Russell could be walking around in frigging circles for all we know and every minute we waste, Sam’s life is-“ Dean broke off, his expression cutting right through Joshua’s heart. God, the kid just about killed him. Dean steeled himself, his emotions fading into impassive. He definitely had John Winchester stoicism down to an art form. “Not to mention the sun’s gonna set soon.”

The wolf…

The gravity of the situation suddenly hit Joshua like a collapsing building. There was no way in hell they were all going to get out of this shit in one piece. If, by some miracle, they managed to save Sam and defeat the Black Annis, they still had a frigging werewolf to deal with. The odds were not on their side.

---

Sam was drowning in an ice filled lake one minute, the next he was smothered in flames. His skin was so hot he could barely stand anything touching it, and yet the shivers that racked him physically hurt his chest and abdominal muscles. Curled on his side, his legs drawn up to his chin, Sam wrapped his aching arms around his limbs and squeezed his eyes shut, trying to breathe through the tremors.

His hair was plastered to his face, sweat dripping off his chin. He had no idea how long he’d been here, each minute seemingly dragging by like a full turn of the hour hand, but Sam’s muscles felt atrophied and useless.

His senses were being assaulted by the stench of blood and decay. Sam tried to ignore it, tried to breathe through his mouth but it was so repugnant he couldn’t push through it anyway. It practically coated the back of his throat with its acridity. He could hear water dripping from somewhere within the cave but hadn’t figured out what the hell it was. The air was thin and tinged with a weightless chill that seemed to wrap around him, stealing any warmth he had.

Cracking one lid open, Sam let his hazy gaze shift around the cave and felt cold settle in his belly. The Black Annis still hadn’t moved from her statuesque pose on the chair in front of the cage, and that unnerved Sam greatly. What the hell was she doing? What was she waiting for?

Slowly and carefully he pushed his hands underneath him and sat up in the cage, his shoulders hunched to avoid smacking his head against the roof of the all too small space. The world momentarily rolled around him and he had to shut his lids to stop it. His mouth was so dry that his tongue was glued to roof of his mouth and he couldn’t generate enough saliva to even moisten his lips. Moving brought problems of its own. The ripped skin on Sam’s back tightened and pulled painfully and his chest ached. Leaning back against the cage, Sam was able, just about, to straighten his throbbing legs. Blood rushed into the no longer constricted limbs sending waves of pins and needles that made his face twitch. It was probably the most uncomfortable sensation Sam had ever experienced.

Something caught his eye suddenly. His heart skipped a beat and spluttered over the next couple as he snapped his gaze towards the Black Annis. She moved. He was certain of it, despite the fact she was in exactly the same position as before. Sam blinked and rubbed a grimy hand over his eyes. Perhaps he had imagined it. He was exhausted, hurt and suffering from the exposure to the cold.

He had almost managed to talk his brain into believing that when she moved again. And this time, she not only moved but twisted her head to the side and zeroed her amber gaze on Sam.

Sam couldn’t stop the gasp that escaped his lips as he slammed back against the cage walls, unmindful of his injuries. His only thought, aside from the blind panic thrumming through his brain, was putting as much distance between himself and her. Unfortunately, that was a difficult task to achieve in a cage.

His own laboured breathing was drowned out by the pumping of blood in his ears as she continued to stare at him. It was frigging unnerving as hell.

Grey tendrils of hair cast over her wrinkled face as a wide smile cracked across it.

“’Tis said the soul of mortal man recoiled to view Black Annis’s eye, so fierce and wild,” she laughed, a short sharp hysterical sound as she rose to her feet, her skirt of human skin crinkling as she moved towards the cage, crouching beside it. “Vast talons, foul with human flesh, there grew in place of hands.” She turned her palms over, wiggling normal fingers. “You fear me?”

Sam swallowed hard, but didn’t answer. It was hard to reply when your mouth was so dry you could barely move your tongue. It didn’t seem to deter her, however.

Her sanguine smile grew as her eyes roved over Sam, appraising him.

“Such pretty flesh…” Sam’s skin crawled, her tone liquid desire. She flicked her tongue out a little and ran it across her plump lips. “You’ll taste good.”

She rose off the balls of her feet and closed her amber eyes. The transformation was swift. She melted from homely granny into blue-faced psycho hag in less than a heart beat. Her hair grew more matted, her teeth yellowed and pointed, and the colour bled from her eyes until they were milky white. Sam pressed himself against the bars; his lung constricted so tightly he could barely breathe as her fingers became elongated knives.

In a motion so fluid that Sam barely saw it she had the cage door open and was dragging him out by his ankles. Stone scraped against the tender skin of his abdomen as he clawed the floor, trying to latch on to something… anything.

Sam barely gave her a chance to release her grip on him. Free of the cage, his only thought was escaping. She let him reach the entrance of the cave, let the sunlight brush his skin, let him breathe in the fresh air. She gave him the brief taste of freedom, and then cruelly yanked him back. Clawed fingers dug into his ankles and dragged him back towards the table were the flayed body was still strapped down. A horrifying thought crawled into Sam’s mind suddenly. She would not let him escape this time. Not after the trouble she went to in order to get him back. She would give him hope, let him think he stood a chance, but she’d never let him leave this cave again – at least, not in one piece.

Lying on the stone floor face down, Sam’s overwrought mind tried to formulate some kind of plan but he couldn’t think of a damn thing to do. She was quicker and stronger. Unarmed, Sam was helpless.

He didn’t have time to dwell on that, however. She rolled the body off the table and it unceremoniously dropped onto the ground next to Sam. He yelped and shuffled backwards, hitting the wall of the cave, stone digging into the ripped flesh of his back. Chest heaving, Sam couldn’t help but look at the thing, transfixed by the horror of what he was seeing.

The skin had been removed from almost every inch of the body leaving a bloodied mess in its wake. Underneath the smears of crimson and clotted lumps, the person was completely unrecognisable as human. Only the face had been left intact and Sam wasn’t entirely sure if that was a good thing or not. Glazed, glassy unseeing orbs stared at nothing and blood was crusted around the mouth, nose and ears.

The Black Annis crouched down in front of him, her breath hot on his face, her skirt of human skin crinkling as she bent. Her white filmy eyes studied Sam, her tongue licking her lips hungrily.

“It’s time…” she hissed, her gaze shifting towards the table. Sam swallowed hard as he noticed the blood and bits of ragged flesh staining the wooden top. He raised fearful eyes back to her as she moved closer, her head tilting to one side. “Time to play.”

To be continued…