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“I ran to the rock to hide my face,
But the rock cried out No Hiding Place…”
“Are you sure about this, Cas?” Dean asked. He shifted slightly watching as the angel rose from the bed pulling the blankets back. Dean grinned as Castiel’s slender feet hit the floor and the angel began scrounging around the bed looking for his discarded clothing.
Dean all but glided across the stubby gray carpeting of the modest hotel room he had booked, rubbing a towel through his hair. He slid into a chair pulling his boxers out of the duffle laying open on the tabletop and lifted a leg hustling the garment over his legs then lifting his hips to pull it fully on.
“Shower’s free if you want…”
Castiel merely shook his head, “That will be unnecessary.” He quietly gathered his clothes together then blinked slowly offering the human a cocky little grin. And in the next moment the angel was standing beside the window, squeaky clean and smelling faintly like rain. He was also fully clothed, hair messily spiked but freshly groomed.
Dean blinked, “That still freaks me the hell out, dude.”
“What?” Castiel asked distractedly as if he couldn’t quite focus on the afterglow the way his human lover could.
Dean jerked his chin in the angel’s direction, “When you do that.”
“I fail to see why. You have seen it multiple times now.”
“Yeah,” Dean said pulling on his jeans and t-shirt, “Every time I take a little bite of angel food cake.”
“Dean,” Castiel said sharply, but any threat in his voice was completely negated by the soft, warm glow in his eyes. Dean grinned stalking to the angel’s side and wrapping one arm around his waist.
“Dean,” Castiel repeated and the human shivered at the slight edge to his voice, “Try to concentrate. We need information on where Lucifer will appear next.”
The angel slid his fingers down the length of Dean’s arm, wrapping them around his hand. Castiel pressed his thumb to the underside of the human’s wrist, digging into the pressure point hard enough to cause the muscles in Dean’s bicep to jerk. He winced.
“Ooooh, I love it when you get all masterful on me, Cas.”
“Dean try to focus. This place that I am taking you is dangerous. But it’s necessary. You must listen because you’ll be held accountable for your behavior, and I will be as well.”
“Oh yeah?” Dean asked as he slid back into the chair tugging his boots on. He cast a quick glance up at the angel and Castiel rolled his eyes. “So lay it out for me.”
“The place is called Sanctuary. It is a meeting place…”
“A meeting place?”
“Yes, I’ve never been there. I have never had the need before but it is a place to seek information. If we are to defeat Lucifer, send him back to hell, we need to be able to confront him. As of now we haven’t been able to track his movements.”
Dean shrugged nodding, “Yeah this whole Hell on Earth thing seems to be taking its dear sweet time.”
“Which is to our advantage. We need a means of forcing Lucifer to move where we want him, place him somewhere that will get us within striking distance when the time comes for that confrontation. Sam’s doing all he can to research this, but it’s slow going. I believe that the proprietor of the place will be able to provide us with a means of tracking down Lucifer and destroying him.”
“Okay then let’s get this show on the road.”
Sanctuary turned out of be a bar, of course, a moldering old building of rough gray planks and river rock. It was located on the banks of a dark, murky looking river somewhere outside of Shreveport, Louisiana. The parking lot was dirt and gravel as was the road. And Dean had been cussing a blue streak for the last fifteen miles at the rough patches in the road and what they must be doing to the suspension on his baby.
Finally, Cas made a vague gesture with one hand and Dean took that as a sign to pull into the lot. He cut the engine and opened the door, pausing with one foot in the lot and one under the steering wheel watching as the angel climbed out of the car and shrugged out of the ever-present trenchcoat and blue suit jacket underneath.
He watched in silent fascination as Castiel walked to the driver’s side door and held out a hand palm up.
“Do you have a knife?”
Dean cocked his head at his companion and shrugged in an ‘Are you kidding?’ gesture. Smiling Castiel tugged his tie off tossing it into the car. Then he pulled the hem of the dress shirt out of his slacks. Turning the angel made a brief gesture over his shoulder at his own back.
Dean hauled himself out of the car pulling the demon killing blade he had stolen from Ruby out of the sheath tucked into the waistband of his jeans. When he was behind Castiel he patted the angel on the ass, and Cas hitched his breath in a deep sigh.
“Not there,” he said snippily, and Dean grinned. “Cut my shirt from the shoulder blade to the hem. Two cuts …one on each side.”
“What?”
Cas half-turned glaring, “Dean please, time grows short.”
“Okay, okay don’t get your drawers in a knot.”
Taking the knife in his hand Dean grasped the hem of the shirt in the other and made a quick cut vertically from the angel’s left shoulder blade to his palm. He cut a little too deep and must have nicked Castiel but the angel didn’t wince. A few drops of blood seeped through the shirt, but it cleared up immediately and Dean knew the angel had healed himself as well. He made the other cut in the shirt without any collateral damage to the angel’s body, and Cas smiled gratefully at him. So it was all good.
They walked up the gravel path to the door way and pulled on the brass knob of the massive old oak door. The thing swung outward completely silently and then the buzz of voices washed over Dean like a wave.
Music filled the air, and Dean walked inside. Before he could get three feet from the door a man blocked his path. Or at least Dean was sure that he was a man, human anyway. Well over six feet of solid muscle and bulk wrapped in an Armani suit and a black bowler hat. His chocolate colored skin gleamed with a faint sheen of perspiration in the golden overhead light.
“We don’t serve their kind in here,” he hissed making a brusque gesture to the right and behind Dean.
Dean frowned then turned to glance at his companion and was struck absolutely motionless. Castiel was standing behind him, dressed in the navy slacks and white shirt but instead of hanging loosely as it had done in the parking lot the white fabric was wrapped around Castiel’s body and emerging from the slits in the back were two magnificent wings. The tops of the wings rose a head taller than Cas’s body and the tips of the long flight feathers stirred the dust on the floor. They were dappled gray like a dove’s wings along the bony ridge of the upper edge and cream colored farther down. Dean gasped.
The bouncer stepped forward but the angel merely bowed his head slightly, “I come to speak to the mambo, and to make a trade.”
That caused the other man to pause casting a quick glance between the angel and his human companion. The bouncer frowned cocking his head and his eyes glazed over snowy white.
It was just a matter of seconds when a woman appeared. She smiled at the dark skinned man and he nodded fading into the shadows of the wall beside the door. Dean frowned, wondering if she was the Voodoo priestess. She was tall, almost as tall as Dean and slender. Although her hair was bound in a paisley print turban she was dressed in a cream colored silk blouse and linen dress trousers. She might have been a business woman if not for the bulky leather-clad Vampire on one side and the even bigger human muscle on the other. The human smiled toothily at the angel before his eyes went inky black. Castiel flinched but made no overt movements toward the demon.
Dean scrambled to defuse the situation, “Ah…look…mambo why didn’t the bouncer want Cas in here?”
“Cas…Castiel,” She hissed and the angel shivered, “Angel of solitude and tears, patron saint of martyrs. I can see why he’s with you, pretty boy…no one martyrs himself quite like you do, eh?”
Dean stiffened frowning, “That didn’t answer my question.”
She smiled waving her bodyguards aside and motioning the two of the them into the room. “This is a place for the free exchange of ideas, where things are bartered or traded. Angels are absolute, they don’t negotiate and they don’t make deals.”
Castiel shifted as he walked through the tables and Dean wondered at the angel’s staggering progress until he realized that Cas was moving in a way so as to not knock things over with his wings. They reached a table toward the back of the room, in a corner between what was apparently the kitchen doors and the bar.
The bar itself was a wonder, running the entire length of the room, wooden-topped fronted by brass and leather barstools. Behind the bar was a wall of mirrors and glass shelves lines with a multitude of bottles of all hues, shapes and sizes.
There were six bartenders of various species behind the bar although four appeared to be human. One was clearly a vampire and the other was something Dean had never seen before. Still it, he, knew his way around a bar.
“Can I get you boys a drink?”
Castiel lifted an eyebrow at the endearment, and smiled. “A glass of red wine please.”
Dean started then grinned, “Jack and coke.”
Dean watched as the angel pulled his chair out swinging it around and straddling the seat, arms coming to rest on the head rail. Dean settled into the seat against the wall, keeping his back covered and the mambo chuckled, “That’s unnecessary in here. My patrons understand that no violence is allowed. What ever grudges anyone holds outside, all that gets put on hold when you step through that door.”
She cocked a head at the angel and Castiel bowed his head in return. “We seek information.”
“Well, information we have, in abundance.”
Castiel nodded, “We seek out a certain presence, one who wishes to do ill in this world. The worse kind of ill…”
The mambo shivered, “You don’t have to tell me, boy. Armageddon is bad for business.”
Dean hefted his glass, “Then you understand our…concern.”
“Yes, but what can I do for you?”
Castiel took up the spiel again, “This certain presence has followers who wish to aid and abet. We need a means to locate them.”
“That’s walking a fine line. I have to do business with all sort of persons, and I don’t want to put the finger on anyone.”
The angel shook his head, “Of course not, I’m not asking that. These persons tend to congregate around the convergences of ley lines. What we need is a map of these convergences.”
“Maps I have. And I do believe that there are several which show convergences.” mambo said smoothly. “Now what do you have to trade?”
Dean shifted, “We have skills…”
“This ain’t a brothel boy,” she grinned and Dean growled. Castiel held up a hand, and the mambo turned to him, “However…virgin’s blood has powerful mojo.”
She leaned forward grasping the angel’s hand. Quickly she tugged a small dagger out of her trousers and pricked his finger watching as a ruby red drop beaded on the pale skin. Lifting Castiel’s hand she slipped his finger into her mouth . Eyes wide she sat back dropping his hand. Lifting a perfectly shaped brow at Dean the mambo chuckled again, “Well my my…You must have skills, pretty boy.”
Pulling his hand back across the table Castiel reached behind him and winced. Then he laid a handful of feathers on the table. The mambo looked at the plumes greedily, and nodded. “It’s a deal.”
The door closed behind them and Dean and the angel walked to the Impala. Dean had been disappointed when they had left Sanctuary. Castiel’s wings had faded from view. Clutched in the angel’s hand was a wooden tube which contained a map of all of the ley lines in North America. Dean had wanted one with lines all over the world but Castiel had said it was enough. That the Winchesters and one solitary angel could only cover this country. They would have to trust the angels not loyal to Zachariah to do the rest.
Dean stopped at the first hotel that he could find that was on the highway back to Sam, and he and Castiel took a room. Once inside the angel unfurled the map, and began looking over the glowing green dots littering its surface.
“There are many convergences. It will take us sometime to reach them all.”
Dean frowned, “Yeah about that…just what the hell are we gonna do?”
“We are going to seek out each one of Lucifer’s followers at each one of these places. When we find them we are going to send the demons back to hell and consecrate the ground so that he cannot use that place again.”
“Wait you want us to kills all these demons. Cas you’re talkin’ about killing hundreds of people.”
“And if we do not billions will die in their stead.”
Dean swallowed looking at the righteous anger glowing in his companions blue eyes. He grimaced. So much of the time it was so easy to look at Cas and not remember that he was Castiel, that he was in no way human. But now…Dean flinched. “Cas can’t we find another way?”
“What other way, Dean? Lucifer will destroy humanity, without mercy. We must stop him at all costs, and the lives of these demons…that is a small price to pay.”
“Now you’re talking like one of them.”
Castiel sighed, “Because I am one of them. Dean, all I know is that I gave up everything I have ever known for the service of mankind, for you. If we fail at this task then that is a waste.”
“Okay, we can’t fail, but to kill hundreds of people.”
“Lucifer will seek to work his will in hidden ways, Dean. And all I know is that we must consecrate these places so they are of no use to him.“
“Yeah but at what cost. Do we become the thing we hate?”
The angel sighed, “If your enemy seeks to hide, Dean, then you must leave him no hiding place.”
The End