Rock Salt And Feathers ~ Fly Above The Clouds

Black By Starkiller
Home ~ Fly Above The Clouds
Rating: R Disclaimer: I own nothing. I wish I did, but I don't. Summary: The brothers Winchester keep secrets. Spoilers: Season 4 Episode 1 Warning: Some Sam/Dean Notes: Betaed by corellian_sugar.
When Sam slips into the motel room late at night, long after Dean's asleep, he feels a twinge of guilt in the pit of his stomach. He tries to ignore it by sliding into bed with Dean, hands slowly travelling over his brother, more to reassure himself that Dean is real, that he's there, that he's solid and warm and alive. The guilt is ignored, weighed down by the knowledge that Dean is here, and Sam doesn't think about what he's doing with Ruby that he should be telling his brother and probably Bobby, too. Sam lies beside his brother and wishes he could tell Dean, wishes he knew how to tell him that he broke his promise. No more psychic mojo had been Dean's dying wish and Sam had ignored it in favour of the thrill of using it to kill demons and save people. He doesn't trust Ruby, he never will – she's been living with him for days before Dean reappeared – and Sam is certainly not telling his brother about that. Dean would get the wrong idea before Sam could explain nothing happened, and then things would go from bad to worse. Dean's skin feels different somehow, smoother, warmer. It doesn't feel like the body of someone who spent four months – that Sam knows of – in hell. It feels like Dean stepped from the shower and into bed, fresh and clean between sheets that are neither, and promptly fell asleep. Sam snuggles close. God, he missed this, missed the closeness, the feel of that hard body against his own. He wants to wake up his brother, kiss him, feel Dean fuck him, dig his nails into Dean's back, but Dean gets tired easily, and Sam doesn't want to cause his brother any more pain. If Dean needs to heal from what he can't – blessedly – remember, then Sam will wait. Hell, he's waited four months; he can wait a while longer. He breathes in his brother, pressed tip to toe against him and touches him with those gentle caresses that soothe and reassure both of them. Dean shifts in his sleep, feels Sam's hands on him and sighs. He's partially awake, the click of the door having pulled him from a deep sleep, and Sam's caresses are soft, tentative, almost as if he's afraid Dean will slip away from him. Dean reaches back, a sleepy pat on his brother's hip and lets out a long sigh and buries his face in the motel pillow, breathing in old sweat and cigarette smoke, stale beer and wine. Home sweet home. Sam's hands on him feel more like home than anything, and Dean is more relaxed than he's been for a very long time. He can feel his brother pressed against him, knows what Sam wants and god, yes, he wants it too, but he's so tired and sleep is so close…Sam isn't pushing, though, and Dean lets himself be drawn back deep into slumber, relaxing into Sam's body. His dreams are scattered, white-hot flashes of fear and pain and terror and blood then the soft, soothing sound of a voice he can't quite make out. The voice isn't Sam's, and Dean knows who it belongs to now. For all the time he was in hell, there was only one name Dean cried out, and that was his brother's. Now that he's back from hell, there are two that war for dominance in his mind – Sam and Castiel. He pulls a face in his sleep as he thinks about what he hasn't told Sam, the secrets that keep them so far apart even though they're so close. Sam’s got secrets, obviously. That chick in the motel, for one… but Dean’s not going to pry about his little brother’s way of dealing with his grief. If it finally gets Sammy laid, then good. Laid by someone who isn't him, that is, someone who can completely push his little brother past the grief of losing Jess. It still hurts, though, but Dean never wanted Sam to live his life as a monk, and he's glad his brother had a warm body at night. He’s glad he’s back, glad that Sam’s with him. He wants to tell Sam about Castiel, but he can’t. He won’t. They've always had secrets, all relationships have secrets, and even though they know each other better than anyone else, Dean isn't sure how to broach the subject of angels and God's plan to his brother. He remembers that Sam used to pray, does he still? In his sleep, his brow furrows as that thought wanders, haphazard, through his sleeping mind. What would Castiel make of Sam? For that matter, what would Sam make of Castiel? Fingers clench in the pillow, feeling old, worn feathers and Dean shivers slightly. These aren't the feathers he wants to touch, the feathers that brushed so briefly against his cheek. Those were dark, raven black, tinged with blue-green, hard feathers, designed for fast flight. The feathers of a bird of prey. Dean knows enough mythology that angels don't keep their wings when they fall to hell, so Castiel must, by that logic, be what he says he is – an angel of the Lord. The tips of those black feathers against his chin made Dean shiver and he wonders what Castiel saw when he looked at him, what he felt when he touched him. The wings of the angel felt like fire and ice, like skin and bone, like promise and salvation. Dean wants more. It's 5a.m. and Dean wakes up with a sudden need to go outside. Sam is fast asleep, and he slips carefully out of the bed to make sure his brother doesn't wake. Quickly and quietly, Dean dresses and then he leaves the motel room and jogs down to the parking lot. Beside the Impala, his girl, is Castiel, and Dean fancies for a minute he can see inky black wings caressing the shining steel of the car. But he blinks and the image is gone and all he sees is a man with tousled hair and bright blue eyes gazing at him quizzically. "What do you want now?" It's not the most gracious of greetings, but Dean's feeling a little out of sorts. Castiel regards him with that strange, unblinking gaze, and Dean can't help but shift, fidget beneath the weight of it. "Do you truly think such things, Dean Winchester?" Castiel's voice is honestly curious. Dean blinks. Then he shrugs, defensive armour up immediately. "Hey, a guy's got needs, y'know, and…" He's cut off by hands grabbing him, pulling him close, soft lips crashing on his and the sensation of being wrapped in a blanket of eagles feathers. Dean goes limp, his muscles turning to jelly while another part of his anatomy is instantly rock hard. He kisses Castiel back, threading his fingers through the angel's hair, then down his back, carefully seeking out the joints of wings on a back, of something that should, by all he knows, not exist. Castiel nips him, sharp teeth making Dean squeal quietly, and he's reminded again of the bird of prey, the sharp peck of the beak of an eagle. Do not push this creature. He pulls his hands back and lets Castiel kiss the air out of him, kiss the doubt away, lets those wings slide over his back, the tips of black feathers grazing over his bare neck and making him shiver. Then Castiel is gone, moved a few feet away from Dean and is looking at him with that same quizzical expression that, for one moment, makes Dean want to punch him. "Humans," the angel says thoughtfully, "are driven by their baser instincts and needs." Dean sneers, he can't help it. He's just been kissed – one of the hottest kisses he's ever had – and now he's having it dissected like a scientist with a dead lizard. "Yeah, well, remember we're made in God's image, Castiel. What's that say about God?" The angel stares hard at Dean and there's a disconcerting rumble coming from the nearby buildings that suggest that Dean's angered him. But then Castiel smiles, wide and bright and unfurls his wings and flaps them once, just once. "It says that God knows everything and humans know nothing," he answers. The tip of a wing brushes against Dean's lips as he opens his mouth to argue. "You'll see me again soon, Dean Winchester. Oh," and Castiel smiles again, "you will have to tell Samuel, your brother, about us." A flicker and he's gone, as silent as he arrived, with nothing to show for having been there at all except the hard-on in Dean's jeans and the tingling on his lips and skin from the touch of feathers. Dean trudges back into the motel room and gazes at his sleeping brother as he closes the door. The sky is beginning to lighten and he knows Castiel is right. He is going to have to tell Sam, and he's going to have to tell him soon. As he tugs off his jacket, Dean pulls out a single black feather. He holds it in his fingers, wondering again at the toughness of it. No, he thinks, looking from the feather to Sam, he'll tell Sam today.
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