#theactualpiemaker

In every situation, Laurent found an advantage. There were whispers—from Pallas, from Lazar. To Akielons: the blond prince smiled for Damianos when he would not smile for another. To Veretians: the barbarian king protected Prince Laurent with his life, even with his own kingdom on the line. The long enmity between one country and another dissolved, in their two heads bent close together, in the gentle words they exchanged. To the smallfolk, and the servants, and the soldiers low in rank—was it not something to hope for? Love, they said it was. Love that could stop a war.

Not as easy to sell a love-match to the lords of Vere, to the kyroi of Akielos. That had to be done with diplomacy, with displays of advantage. Look what we gain by having the barbarians on our side. Most of Damen’s conversations became about trade routes. Wiser heads understood there was more to be gained from diplomacy than from war. A whisper, passed from servants to Vannes to Laurent, who lay half-dressed in Damen’s great bed at Ios and whose mouth curled, recounting it: if wheat tariffs will go down as Damianos goes down, then all hail the ice-cock of the Prince of Vere.

The Council of Vere had returned home after a chilling and deliberate series of meetings, in which they were closeted with Laurent and Laurent alone. Laurent said little of them, except that he had made his points clear. Damen kissed his jaw, when he said it, and didn’t ask. When Laurent left later with the Veretian ship Damen held him, on the harbor, in front of anyone who cared to look, and Laurent gave him that small unexpected smile and touched his cheek, and when the ship left his bright head was visible for a long time, glinting gold in the sunlight.

Damen’s ship followed, after a month. Time for each of them to rule, for a little while. To be seen as competent, apart. An official invitation was extended for the King of Akielos to attend the coronation of the King of Vere, and it was all the excuse he needed to get Laurent back in his arms. It was also a very public journey, with public stops publically planned, and they were—Damen can’t believe it—too confident.

In the spirit of that first allied campaign, they were to meet on neutral ground. Barbin, with its rolling hills, its farmland, the orchards heavy with apples. A festival in the Veretian style, to greet a visiting monarch, but away from the shadow of the looming castle at Arles. Damen moved more slowly, as king. His entourage was small, but he’d brought advisors, diplomats. Guards, and he never knew relief as he did when he remembered the decision to ride ahead with half of them, to get to the meeting grounds early. That they were there when the fighting started. If they’d been later—if they’d stopped—

The melee wasn’t brief. A planned attack, in three stages. Damen understands the details later, through a fog. What’s stuck in his mind, the detail that matters, is the way he’d seen Laurent’s pennant, the starburst on blue, stagger in the distance and then fall. He’d stood in his stirrups and shaded his eyes, and when he realized—when it was happening—

He’s told that he killed—many. Many. He stands in a tent, one of the brightly pennanted gaudy Veretian things that hadn’t been destroyed in the fighting. He’s attended by a low-ranked soldier who’d been a servant, he said, before he joined the army. He lets the boy remove his armor, carefully, and lets the boy wash the blood from his hands and arms and face, and he stands with his eyes pinned to the blue-silk wall and thinks of Laurent. Riders have spread throughout Barbin and the second there’s word he will be told. He knows this and can’t think past it. He’s waiting, to receive word, that after all their trials and the cruelties of the last year, that here in this godforsaken stretch of muddy farmland, the prince—his prince—

A noise, at the tent-flap. A muffled discussion. The boy-soldier disappears, reappears. “Exalted,” he says, softly, and Damen closes his eyes.

He can’t make the words come out of his mouth. The boy seems to understand—he’s clever, Damen thinks, the thought very distant as though it is all the way back in Ios, and when they finish here he will recommend that the boy be promoted—and there’s a pause, while Damen stands with his clean empty hands, half-stripped to his leather skirt, waiting to be told that Laurent is dead.

“Not how I wanted our reunion to go,” he hears.

His heart’s cracking, in his chest. He sways and there are cool fingers on his wrists, a strong grip, keeping him upright. Blue eyes, above a half-scarf of rough grey wool, and a wink of gold, on the hand matched with his.

“Steady,” Laurent says, his voice gentler, and Damen grabs him, crushes him close. His name is on Damen’s lips but he can’t say it. It’s—it was too close. The pennant falls, behind his eyes.

“I thought,” Damen says, finally, and Laurent says, “I know,” very softly. His fingers curl against Damen’s throat and Damen presses his lips to Laurent’s hair, the foolish disguise of the scarf pulled away. Damen says, “I can’t leave you again,” and Laurent’s slower, that time, to respond, and Damen pulls away to find Laurent’s eyes somber, and he says, “No,” but of course Laurent says, “Yes, you must.”

A plot, he explains. He’d seen shifts. A lord, loyal to the Regent. Whether because he believed the lies the Regent had told or had helped to sow them, Laurent doesn’t yet know. The love-stories and the wisdom of the alliance hadn’t swayed him and he’d thought to lop the head from Vere, to blame the visiting barbarian king. The timing of the attack was a surprise but the fact of it wasn’t, and he’d hoped they would have more time. Still, it could be fixed. But: “This time,” Laurent says, and Damen’s chest aches to hear how carefully he says it, “I really must go alone. I must. You’re too important now to scramble under the trees with me. If the King goes missing, at the same time that the Prince is dead—”

It’s logical. Damen hates it. “Take a guard,” he says, and Laurent shakes his head. “Please—please, for me. I can’t—”

“You can,” Laurent says, with a ruthless sort of compassion. “And you will trust me, and I will be back. Two hours. I swear it.”

It is a genuine, physical pain to end their embrace. Laurent’s hair is mussed from where Damen had gripped it, too tight. Longer, now—to his shoulders, nearly. He tucks it behind his ears, pulls the scarf again over his head. He’s in stolen clothes, somehow—grey woollens, like a farmhand. The jacket makes him shapeless. He lifts the scarf over his face, and then pauses, and lifts on his toes to grip Damen’s hair and pull him into a kiss—a kiss, their first kiss in more than a month, and it’s hard with Laurent’s teeth behind it but Damen clutches him, breathes him, before Laurent wrenches away and turns his face to the side, breathing out, the air shaking. “Two hours,” he says, after a moment, and tucks the scarf over his face again, tucking it back so the only way to recognize him are those remote, cold-sky eyes. Damen clenches his jaw, and lifts the tent flap for him. He watches Laurent disappear between the soldiers trying to organize themselves in the churned-mud battlefield that had been a parade ground, and then closes the flap, and settles to wait.

*

It rains. Damen listens to the patter on the tent, watches the brazier with its dark orange coals. He has left Meniados and Lycaeus to manage the camp. Everything is paused. The only order he gave was that no one was allowed to leave—no riders for distant forts, no word sent back to Arles. He lies on the pallet made for him in the tent and is alone, to think. To hope.

When he comes it isn't through the flap. There's a rustle, against the other side of the tent, and when Damen turns his head he sees a knife slice through the thick silk, a slice carving through just enough to admit a slim body. Damen sits up, heart in his throat. Laurent slips through and in an instant pins the flap of fabric back into the earth with his knife, and crouches there on the far side of the tent, just for a second, breathing hard.

"Is it done?" Damen says.

His voice sounds strange, thick. Laurent looks at him, sharply, and there's a pause while he pulls the scarf from his head, his hair tumbling out pale and shining in the glow from the brazier. "Yes," he says, simply, but he's frowning.

Damen has one foot on the bare earth but can't seem to stand. Laurent drops the scarf to the ground, slips off his wet shapeless jacket, and comes across the tent to him, and puts his fingertips to Damen's jaw. His eyes searching, his brow furrowed. "Damen," he says, and it's soft, and Damen turns his face into Laurent's palm, hiding himself. Behind his eyes the pennant falls and it isn't enough, that Laurent's here in front of him. These two hours—three, nearly, because Laurent is a liar—they haven't—he's trying to drag up words, but he—

Laurent's other hand touches his hair. "Quiet, now," he says. Calm, but firm. That tone, when he's giving orders and is confident they'll be obeyed. Damen sits, quiet, and Laurent drags his fingers through Damen's hair, gently untangling the curls. "Let me," he says, and Damen nods, his eyes closing. He'd agree to anything, if Laurent's hands stay on his skin. If he just stays and doesn't leave, again.

Laurent unpins the chiton Damen had half put on as a ward against the Veretian chill. The cloth slips away, to lie with Laurent's jacket. He unbuckles the leather skirt and Damen lifts his hips just enough that it can be dragged away, too. He's left naked, other than his golden cuff, and Laurent urges him down to his back with soft touches, and when he's flat on the pallet Laurent sits beside him, and leans over, and kisses him on the mouth, very gently.

Nothing like their kiss, before. He opens his mouth and Laurent licks inside, his hand on Damen's jaw, but when Damen lifts a hand to touch Laurent's hair it's stopped, and pressed slowly but firmly back against the pallet. He's left to lie there, to be kissed. Laurent kisses as he always has, with simple affection, and it's making the heat rise behind Damen's eyes, his chest slowly turning into a complicated, sore tangle.

A shift of weight, a slide. Laurent straddles Damen's hips, still wearing his damp trousers. His thumbs drag over Damen's cheekbones and Damen's fingers curl against Laurent's thighs, holding. He's allowed that, at least. The warmth of Laurent, through the damp wool. The flex of the slim muscle, the confident seat of a rider, as he leans over, carefully shielding Damen from anything outside the heat he's so-slowly stoking between them, here on their shared pallet.

The rain beats hard, above. He can still hear Laurent's breath. A slow touch, over his shoulders, his chest. Massage, he realizes after a moment, his brain working at some lower speed. Laurent carefully working the muscle, gentle circles. His hands frame Damen's ribcage, his thumbs smearing slow over Damen's nipples, which were half-budded but tighten further at the touch. Not as sensitive as Laurent's, not nearly, but he breathes out heat at the tent's canopy when Laurent's mouth touches one, liquid furl, and then the other. His abdomen, then. His hip. Laurent's weight and touch shifts, easy, and when he moves away enough that Damen can no longer hold his thighs his hands curl empty on the pallet, waiting. He feels—drugged. His heart thuds slow and heavy in his ears as a drumbeat.

Laurent's mouth, on his cock. His thighs are spread, easy confident hands on his knees. He drags in air and somehow it isn't even a surprise, when always before Laurent had approached this act as a challenge. Damen had been honored by it, before. Now he melts, into the thin down pad, his mind swirling away. His cock had been half-roused, just by Laurent's presence and the fact of his touch; he rises fully, now, and Laurent's easy, meeting it. Not teasing, not the practiced skill of before. He licks into the slit at Damen's cockhead and then sinks down immediately, sucking steadily, his head bobbing. Damen's thighs flex and his hips lift, thoughtless reaction, and instead of pushing him back down Laurent allows it. Encourages it, one hand under Damen's arse and the other holding his balls, rolling them soft and warm, the touch tender. Damen's fingers curl against the mattress and his hips lift, and again, and Laurent makes the smallest sound, some chest-noise, and stays still while Damen fucks helplessly upward, fucking into the wet liquid heat of him, his mind drained away and all that's left this simple physical pleasure, this knowing that Laurent is here with him, has worked him to this place, has opened himself so that Damen's cock smears the back of his throat. Laurent doesn't choke, doesn't move, only holds Damen's hips in the lightest grip and makes himself soft, and when Damen comes he doesn't expect it. His balls clutch, his heart thudding. He grips the mattress and makes some sound, says something he hardly hears. Laurent's mouth holds him, through it, suckling softly to prolong the pleasure, and prolongs it far enough that Damen's cock hardly softens, just pulsing gently against Laurent's tongue, in his throat. A minute—longer—Damen doesn't know. Time is something outside of him. He drags in air and it feels cold, inside his overheated body. He pools empty, on the pallet.

When Laurent finally pulls his mouth away Damen's heart has slowed, quiet as a sprawling sluggish river. A kiss, to his hip, to the stretch of stomach under his navel. He feels the sensation of Laurent crawling upward, his body stretching out over Damen's, and he expects to be kissed but instead Laurent lies on him, and draws his fingers through Damen's hair, and tucks his face in close, by Damen's ear. He's talking, Damen realizes, after too long. Very quietly, but he's talking.

"You did so well," he's saying, when Damen finally hears him. "You did just as I wanted. You're perfect. I'm so glad of you."

He's speaking Akielon. His accent better, but still with that exotic lilt of Vere. Damen never wants him to smooth it away. "I," Damen says, and feels Laurent's attention sharpen, his body shifting. Damen licks his lips and yet no more words come.

Laurent lifts up, enough that they can see each other. His hair falls over one shoulder. In the low light from the fading brazier his eyes are very dark, enough that Damen can hardly see the blue. "You're here," Laurent says. Damen blinks at him. "Damianos. Here, with me. We're safe. The danger has passed."

Damen comes back to himself in stages. Laurent waits with him, patient. He lifts a hand, at last, and brushes his knuckles against Laurent's fine ivory jaw. "I saw the pennant fall," he says. His voice sounds as rough as if he hadn't spoken in days. "I thought…"

Laurent doesn't answer. His eyes are enough. He holds Damen's neck, his throat, very gently. Damen could lie here for a week, just like this. With the fact of Laurent's heart, beating in his chest. With the body-warm press of the gold they share against his skin.

The rain slackens, against the roof of the tent. The world turns. Damen licks his lips and tries to be a king, and not just a man whose world nearly ended. "What happened?" he says. There are dead to deal with. Orders to be given. He touches Laurent's chin. "Can we—"

"Later." Damen's mouth shuts. Laurent's mouth curls, just a little, at how quickly Damen obeys. He slips slightly to Damen's side. Damen immediately misses his weight. "There's—half an hour, perhaps. We have time, for this."

“From what you’ve told me of your mother,” Cas said, “She sounds very nice.”

“I mean, if I keep my GPA up at school and visit her at least once a week, but, she wants to know everything. I can’t lie to her.”

“Just not telling her things, isn’t really lying,” Meg suggested, starting on the second coat.

“Oh, she would know.” Kevin insisted.

“Then tell her that you have a boyfriend and a girlfriend,” Cas said. “It’s not that complicated.”

Meg rolled her eyes, thought about how many years Cas and her had been together in some way. Her benchmark for a relationship was sex, which they never had, but Cas defined it in some other weird, emotional way. She supposed that the off-again-on-again D/s thing they had occasionally - between Cas’ attempts at dating other people which usually crashed and burned - that that was some kind of something beyond friendship.

Adding Kevin into the mix - a boyfriend of Cas’ that didn’t leave after finding out about the whole no sex thing or the hey this is my friend Meg who ties me up and whips me on the weekends - after he had moved in with the two of them when the last semester ended, instead of going back to his mom’s for the summer, and they were all… something more than roommates. Plus, he and Meg were banging now. Come to think of it, Meg hadn’t had sex or scened with anyone outside of Kevin and Cas since the start of summer.

Meg concentrated on painting Cas’ nails. “It’s pretty complicated.”

Kevin groaned and dropped his head against the book.

-

Every single day for the past week, Meg had had to listen to Kevin worrying about the dinner his mom had insisted on that Saturday. Over breakfast, it was the ‘Should I tell her about the bdsm thing, that’s not something you tell your mom right?’. And coming home from work it was ‘Meg please don’t talk about sex at dinner’.

Cas didn’t get scolded.

The box fan in the bedroom window whirred steadily, blowing hot air from outside across the three of them sprawled in bed. The laptop was open on the foot of the bed, Orange is the New Black playing episodes back to back on Netflix as they ate ice cream. Meg felt like she was ice cream, melting in the goddam heat.

Cas sat in the middle, propped up against a mound of pillows with the ice cream in his lap. Mint chocolate chip, one of Meg’s favorites.

Over the music of the intro, Kevin asked, “Is it too much to put on her?”

“What do you mean?” Cas humored him.

“I mean, I came out as bi my freshman year, then trans my sophomore year, now it’s hey mom I’m in a polyamorous relationship.”

“She’s taken everything else well so far, hasn’t she?” Cas asked.

“Yeah. But I mean. Is that even something you come out as. Polyamorous? That’s not like a … an orientation or anything. How do you come out as polyamorous?”

“It’s a lifestyle choice,” Cas said, “but it can be difficult to explain. Given that it’s not the default setting of a relationship, in a sense one can ‘come out’ as polyamorous.”

When he used air-quotes, Cas spattered chocolate chip ice cream on Meg. She picked it off her boobs and ate it.

“Hey, the next episode is starting,” she warned them.

“Oh my god it’s almost Saturday. Why did I tell her we could come this Saturday? I need more time.”

Meg reached across Cas to slap Kevin on the thigh. “Kev, your mom is going to love Cas. Everyone loves Cas. I’ll bring dessert, I’ll make my gluten free devil’s cake. She’ll have to like me. Everyone likes a person that can make cake.”

Cas hummed his agreement. “Do you really think that your mother will have a problem with it?”

“I don’t know, I mean she’s my mom. All she does is work and clean and worry about me.”

Meg told him, “You might be surprised what your mother gets up to when you’re not around.”

“Oh god, please don’t make me think about that.”

Laughing, Meg scraped the soft stuff off the sides of the carton. “Hey, did you tell her Cas has Celiac’s?”

“Yeah. She’s probably spent the last week researching it and what to cook.”

“Everything will be fine,” Cas reassured.

-

Meg leaned against the doorframe to their bedroom, watching Kevin pacing between the closet and dresser.

“What do I wear? Jeans or slacks?”

“If you don’t put something on, we’re going to be late.” Meg told him.

Grabbing a pair of jeans, Kevin pulled them up and looped a brown leather belt through the waist. Wearing a tan binder, he put a white tank over it and got a white button down out of the closet.

On the bed, Cas was already dressed in a perfectly respectable button down and black pleated skirt, hairy legs on display. The cat sat on Cas’ belly, nudging against his hand, purring, shedding all over his nice outfit.

Fuck that, Meg was wearing jean shorts and a spaghetti strap, it was too goddam hot for anything else.

Holding up two ties, one a striped green and one solid green, Kevin stopped in the middle of the room and gaped at Meg.

“You are not wearing that.”

“Yeah, I am.” Meg rolled her eyes.

“Meg you can’t meet my mom looking like that! No cleavage. Please.”

His big brown eyes looked utterly panicked.

“It’s summer, and I’m hot.”

“My mom’s house has A/C.”

“Hey, I am who I am, your mom can take it or leave it.”

Kevin groaned, scowled at her, and went back to agonizing over ties. Cas stood and went to the closet, came out with the one fancy blouse that Meg had for work interviews.

“Please put this on.”

Standing in front of her, Cas held the shirt up to Meg.

“I made dessert, I don’t have to get dressed up,” Meg protested.

“Put the shirt on.”

Cas glared at her. He could be an implacable, stone son of a bitch when he wanted to be. Meg was not going to make it out of the house dressed as she was.

Kevin sounded like he might be hyperventilating on the other side of the room.

Huffing, Meg grabbed the shirt roughly and pulled it on.

“Fine.”

-

Kevin did not shut up the whole way to his mom’s house, rehashing every doubt and everything that could go wrong while Meg steered through sedately winding suburb roads. The houses here were nice, well-kept, big but not mansion sized. All the lawns were neatly trimmed and there were people out jogging on the sidewalks.

Fucking jogging. In summer.

“Pull in here,” Kevin gestured at a driveway.

Bright hydrangea bushes framed the doorway to a tidy house, backyard fenced in, not a weed in sight.

“Your house is lovely,” Cas commented.

Neighborhoods like this kind of gave Meg the creeps. She grabbed the cake dish from the footwell after pocketing the keys and followed the others up the walkway.

Kevin took the lead, knocking on the door. His mom was even shorter than him when she answered, swooping forward to give him a crushing hug before stepping back to appraise Meg and Cas.

“Hello, welcome, I’m Linda Tran.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you Ms. Tran,” Cas said, stepping next to Kevin to shake her hand.

Meg lingered in the back as they were ushered into a wide entrance hall, staircase sweeping up to the right, photos of Kevin all over the walls.

“It’s nice to meet you too. You must be Castiel. And this is…”

“Hey,” Meg waved, “I’m Meg.”

Ms. Tran blinked at her, nodded politely.

Kevin shuffled awkwardly, “So, this is Cas, my boyfriend, and Meg, my girlfriend.”

“Oh!” Ms. Tran exclaimed. “Are you swingers then?”

Kevin made a noise like a wounded animal. Cas was busy studying a bowl that had some kind of woven balls or something in it on a side table.

“Yeah, the kids these days are calling it polyamory.” Meg told her. “Why, were you a swinger in the seventies?”

Kevin’s face was bright red.

Ms. Tran moved them along the hallway back to wide kitchen with big windows, full of sunlight and gleaming counters.

“In the sixties actually. I know, I look a lot younger than I am.”

-

The three of them were practically pushed onto stools while Ms. Tran fussed and served them drinks - wine, Meg could not believe that she actually had a small wine fridge set into the cupboards. She moved around the kitchen swiftly and purposefully, taking out containers of prepped food and measuring spices into little glass bowls that she lined up beside the stove.

“Kevin told me you have a gluten allergy?” Ms. Tran asked.

“That’s right,” Cas answered.

“Well, I’m making a rice and vegetable dish, but there is gluten in the kitchen and I understand that cross contamination can be an issue, so I won’t be offended if you don’t eat.”

Kevin, for his part, sat quietly looking shocked that bringing home a boyfriend and a girlfriend seemed to be a non-issue, taking backseat to Cas’ dietary needs.

“Thank you, that’s very considerate.” Cas smiled, looking around the kitchen curiously.

“The cake I brought is gluten free,” Meg said.

“Really? What kind of flour do you use?”

“It’s a mix of a few, actually. There’s sorghum flour, tapioca flour, potato starch.”

“You know,” Ms. Tran talked over her shoulder as she cooked, “I was surprised by some of the things I read, about the effect that gluten can have. I was thinking about trying a gluten free diet myself.”

“It can make a difference,” Cas said, “whether you’re severely allergic or not. I have a lot of books you could borrow, if you like.”

“I would love that.”

Pulling a pan bigger than her head off the stove, Ms. Tran dished out something like a stirfry.

“Really, Kevin, you should have brought your partners over sooner. You know I’ll expect them here for dinner every week.”

“Mom.”

“That would be so great, Ms. Tran.” Meg told her.

Family dinners were usually awkward, but Ms. Tran was pretty cool and more than anything Meg was enjoying the intense wave of embarrassment coming off of Kevin. She did take an immense pleasure in other people’s discomfort, after all.

This wasn’t his job. He’d sworn it off. John Winchester and his boys and all the terrible crap that came along with them. He’d nearly killed John, near-on a year ago, and it would’ve been well deserved if he’d followed through. Bastard. The boys followed with John, though, of course--although it turned out that Sam hadn’t. Then, damn him, if John didn’t start sending his other boy out on hunts on his own, like hunting alone wasn’t a surefire way to get hurt or killed no matter how many years of miserable training had been crammed down the kid’s throat, and that meant that when Bobby was in the area just investigating, wondering if there was any truth to what he’d heard about winter at Kabetogama Lake, he found Dean Winchester on his own, fighting off two shadows in the dark, and once those were taken care of he got himself saddled with a bloody kid, who never should’ve been out there in the first place.

He explains this to the shivering lump in the backseat--mainly talking so there’s something to keep Dean awake, because it’s colder than a happy hell and sleeping in that that plus bleeding out surely isn’t a good combination, in Bobby’s inexpert medical opinion. He further expands on his opinion of Minnesota in general, on the damn frozen lakes and the spirits that idiots dredge up out of them, and on boys who can’t wait for some damn backup before wading out into danger, and it turns out Dean is awake after all because he shifts at that, grumbles woozy: “Wasn’t like I had a choice.”

“Oh, yeah, that fight was just set in stone from time immemorial,” Bobby says, and in the rearview of his Chevelle he sees Dean’s eyes close, pained, and he bites his tongue against the other things he could say and steps on the gas, instead.

The cabin’s small but it’s got a good gas fireplace, and a wooden table that can hold a man’s weight--or a boy’s, when Bobby gets Dean’s ass settled on the edge and then makes him tip back. “I’m not going to lie to you, kid,” Bobby says, tearing at Dean’s jeans to show up the wounds in the firelight. Damn, that’s nasty. “This is going to suck. Royal-ass suck.”

“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Dean says, smiling brief and pale, and Bobby rolls his eyes but pats Dean’s belly, too, proud of him despite everything, and then there’s nothing for it but needle and floss and grain alcohol and holding Dean’s hand against the squirming when the holy water sluices out the wounds, and making him comfortable when he passes out, after.

Bobby carries him to the bed. Doesn’t seem right, even if he was a fool, to make him sleep on the table after all that. He strips off the bloody coat, the too-big flannel shirt, the boots and socks and jeans. His boxers are torn only on the one leg and his t-shirt’s black and if it’s stained Bobby doesn’t know about it, and he’s all paleness there in the bed--bloodloss and his face drawn, even sleeping, and his lips pale too. That amulet, the one Bobby let Sam have years ago, still slung around Dean’s neck. He touches the sharp little horns, lightly, and then presses his fingers to Dean’s throat, checking his pulse. There, steady. That’s about as much as Bobby knows to check for. He drags over the chair, settles down. This boy. All the things Bobby had hoped for him, had known he was a damn idiot for hoping for. Well. Bobby can look after him, at least. For now. For as long as he can.

A fever, the next day. Not unexpected, but a pain in the ass. “You Winchesters,” Bobby says, laying snow-wet t-shirts at Dean’s forehead and chest, trying to bring the temperature down. “Never giving me rest.”

“Sorry,” Dean says, shivering, and Bobby shakes his head.

“It’s no fun to tell you what’s what if you actually believe it, kid,” he says, and Dean blinks at him heavy-eyed, doesn’t understand. Just as well. He has to help Dean to the toilet, and tries to give him privacy for that and the cleaning up, and he pours a slug of the good whiskey down his throat later and, hey, Dean doesn’t hurl it right back up. That’s progress.

Dean talks, when he has a fever. Bobby’d forgotten that. When he was a little boy it was all cartoons and monsters, and talking to Sam whether or not his brother was there. That part’s not different.

“Sammy,” Dean mumbles, when Bobby touches his forehead. Sammy, when he wakes up, and Sammy when the middle-of-the-night gets too strange, and Bobby touches him then, too, and lays a heavy hand on Dean’s chest when he weeps, feverish and confused and overcome. He fall asleep with no fuss, when that’s done, and Bobby chews the inside of his lip and wonders. These two kids, and their dad. He never meant to get into the middle of it but it wasn’t like he had much of a choice.

Like it’s immutable? he thinks to himself, and shakes his head. He always had choices, and he made them. No matter what an idiot it made him. No matter what it cost, sometimes, when he sat awake in the middle of the night with a bottle in his hand, thinking of days that could’ve been.

Fever breaks in the middle of the night, on the second day. Dean wakes up soaked in sweat, shivering for other reasons. “I feel like ass,” he says, raw-voiced, and Bobby helps him up, takes him to the bath again. Enough water in the tank for a wash, and Dean strips down shakily, sinks down into the warm water with his bad leg propped over the rim. Bobby hands him soap, shampoo, lets him get on with it. Goes out into the main room and strips the sheets off the bed that smell like blood and feversweat, and then stands in front of the fire and tries to put the image out of his head. The things he could’ve done, and chose always not to.

Dean needs help, getting out. He struggles, splashing, trying not to ask--Bobby can hear him, from here. He goes to the doorway and finds Dean with his weak arms braced on the edge of the tub, his face miserable. “Your lungs not working, dumbass?” he says, but as kindly as he can, and Dean slumps back, defeated.

“Tired of this,” Dean says. He flicks his knee, above the line of the dressing that he’s managed to at least mostly keep out of the water. “Sorry, Bobby. Didn’t mean to--”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bobby says, and Dean ducks his head. Bobby finds the other towel, flaps it out. “What’s your daddy thinking, anyway. Sending you out like this.“

Dean shrugs, awkward. “Gotta get used to being on my own,” Dean says. “I mean, with Sammy--”

He bites it off, like the name wasn’t supposed to pass his lips. That amulet’s still right in place, the leather black from the water. Bobby doesn’t respond but only offers his hands, and for the second time they lever Dean up to his feet--naked, shining, shaky. He shivers, in the cooler air, and Bobby wraps the towel around his shoulders and helps him step over the lip of the tub, and he’s closet and wet and just--sad, all the parts of him sad, from his feet to the damp crown of his head. Too young--that’s always been Bobby’s thought, with Dean. Too young, for everything that happened, and too young to be hunting, and too young for the weight of lives on his shoulders, and too young for--

Dean leans in against his chest. Like he did in the snow, only this time he’s warm. Bobby wraps an arm around his back and Dean curls his hand in Bobby’s shirt, and ducks his head under Bobby’s chin. He shifts his weight and the towel slips, swinging down to Dean’s hip, and Deans hand slides down Bobby’s chest to his stomach. He takes a breath. “Dean,” he says. Question, warning.

The hand pauses, holding there. The tips of Dean’s ears have gone real pink. Bobby holds for a second, and then puts his hand on Dean’s jaw, and forces it up so Dean has to look at him--and he does, to his credit, even if his face is red and his mouth’s a pursed disappointment. “I just miss--” Dean says, and bites that off too. All these things he says and doesn’t say. Bobby wants to know what means and simultaneously never, ever wants to go there. Dean’s eyes cut down, his jaw stiff in Bobby’s hand. He snorts, after a second. Bitter. “Wanted to not feel like shit for a second, I guess.”

Petulant. Sometimes he really is a kid. Bobby squints down at him, wondering--if it’s worth it, to be a sop-up, a second-best. Ports in a storm. He drags his thumb over Dean’s chin, presses up to his bottom lip, and Dean looks up at him. Bobby kisses him. Brief, more a brush of their mouths, his beard on Dean’s softer skin. He pulls back to see the look in Dean’s eyes and it’s--not shock, not regret. He looks blown-open. Like acceptance was the last thing he expected.