Castiel
Castiel sat on the window ledge overlooking Yggdrasil. The stars shone down on them and in the moonlight, they saw a figure climbing the branches. They straightened themself, squinting at the approaching figure. They smiled to themself, realising who it was. It was about time. Morpheus, the god of dreams.
“Come out of your room,” he teased.
“You know I can’t do that or I would be lost in the branches of Yggdrasil forever,” they laughed.
“Maybe,” Morpheus sighed, “but we could be lost together.”
Cas folded their hands together. “One day.”
Morpheus looked disappointed. Cas frowned.
“Look, you knew what I wanted when we first met. Why can’t you just be happy with this?”
“I am happy,” he protested weakly. “I just thought we could move a little faster.”
Castiel scowled and walked away from the tree. “I don’t want to talk about this. Just…stay with me.”
Silence. Cas turned around. Morpheus was gone.
They marched over to the tree, seething. “That’s it? Just leaving?”
When the emptiness of the World Tree didn’t respond, Castiel’s anger boiled over. They yanked the leaves off the closest branch, ripping them up into tiny pieces.
“Fucking coward.”
**
Lying in bed hours later, Castiel was still upset. They’d been seeing Morpheus for months now. The first night, they’d been staring into the tree when he’d materialised before their eyes. Naturally, they’d gone to throw the nearest object at him, a tall lamp. But his presence made everything feel so…calm. Castiel rarely felt at peace, and soon all they looked forward to was his nightly visits.
He could only visit in the middle of the night; at least, that’s what he’d told Cas. So their sleep schedule started revolving around his arrival. They couldn’t remember the last time they’d been awake when the other residents at Hotel Valhalla were. So now, even though there was nothing left for them to do at one in the morning, they were wide awake.
The issue with being wide awake at this time, Cas thought, was that for the first time in months they didn’t have any distractions. They fell back into old habits – like thinking about their childhood.
Most of the memories were bad ones: memories of war, of being abandoned, of fear. But there were bright spots – two, to be exact. Their two friends that had gone through it all with them.
Castiel had tried to leave the hotel countless times. They wanted nothing more than to find their friends, even if they were all grown up and adult by now. Castiel hadn’t aged a day since they’d died – one of the perks of Valhalla – and it made it hard to remember how much time had passed. Castiel was pretty sure it had to have been at least 20 years. But if Castiel ever got out, they would go straight to the underworld if it meant finding their friends.
After Castiel had died, they had at first hoped to find something in Valhalla that made all of it worth it. Maybe if they had been able to make new connections they would have been content letting go of their old friends. But instead they were surrounded by idiots and assholes 24/7. It wasn’t surprising they’d basically become nocturnal.
A noise from the atrium in their room roused them from their doze. They grumbled a bit; it had taken so long to get that close to sleep. But the sound became more clear and they stopped worrying about sleeping. It sounded like someone yelling.
Cas jumped out of bed, grabbing a knife from the table by their bed. Normal people shouldn’t be able to get into this room from the tree - at least, that’s what everyone had told them. If Magnus had lied to them they were going to relocate his spleen out of his body.
“Hello?” They crept to the tree. There was nobody there, or at least, nobody visible. Cas had been enough places to know that invisible people were never out of the question.
Cas reached the closest branch and poked it with their knife. Nothing happened. They leaned closer to the trunk to peer up into the branches above their room. Nothing there.
As they turned to look down, a fierce wind blew from behind them, sending them toppling over the edge. They fell flailing through the branches of Yggdrasil.
I am going to FLAY Morpheus alive. That was all Cas had time to think before they landed on a pile of warm, fluffy material. And then, before Cas had time to wish curses on anyone else they were going to blame for this, the stuff they’d landed on started moving.
“WOOOF!” Cas flinched at the loudest bark they had every heard. Is this a gods-damned dog? They looked closer and noticed their landing pad did, in fact, seem to have ears and a tail.
“WHAT?” They scrambled in a direction, hopefully the direction that would get them off of this thing. The massive black dog stood up, and Castiel stopped scrambling and, for the second time in a short period, began falling. They landed on metal grating. A quick glance told them they were no longer in valhalla. There were more metal stairs going up and down from the landing they were on, and one of the windows in the building the landing was attached to was opening.
“Mrs. O’Leary?” A teenage boy stuck his dark-haired head out the window. At the sight of Castiel he promptly hit his head on the top of the window. “Jesus! What are- Who the hell are you?”
“Who the hell are you?” Cas realised they still had their knife out. They stowed it safely away. This seemed to help the boy’s mood. He disappeared for a second and then the door to the landing opened.
Cas hesitated, but then they noticed a necklace he was wearing. It was a leather cord with several unique beads on it.
A Camp Half-blood necklace.
“You’re a demigod?” They asked.
The boy blinked. “N- I mean, what’s that?”
“Don’t lie to me, idiot, you’re wearing the necklace.” Cas scowled. When the boy kept fumbling for an excuse, they rolled their eyes. “Good god, ok, hi. Fellow demigod here. Mind answering a few questions?”