Smoke

Bela frowned up at the chains, her body stretched in an attempt to reach them. Even balanced on one of the sturdier boxes, it was a push.

Dean couldn’t feel her fingers on his forearms, but that didn’t meant anything. Even his shoulders were floating apart from him now.

“This spell-work’s complex,” Bela said at last. “We might have to leave them on you for now. I think I can detach them from the wall.”

“Do it,” he said, even though Bela had clearly been talking to Hannah. “Just get us out of here.”

Bela raised her eyebrows at him, looking just as put together as she always had. If he hadn’t been able to see the smoke under her skin, he’d never had believed she’d been dragged away by Hell-hounds.

“Us? I don’t think your angel made it.”

Hearing her say it shouldn’t hurt, not like it did. It wasn’t as though Dean was stupid. He still wanted to spit in her face.

“You both need more faith,” Hannah said.

She knelt by Cas’ head, one hand curved over his forehead, and a look of calm concentration on her face.

“He’s not dead?” Dean asked, and didn’t even care how hoarse he sounded, how close to tears. No, not even with Bela right there, watching.

Hannah met his gaze. Her eyes were full of sympathy.

“Not yet. Not quite.” Her tone turned brisk as she looked at Bela. “Help me get his free of this. It’s limited his Grace.”

She tapped the collar of iron round Cas’ neck, a thin band that didn’t look like it should be able to hold him and which didn’t cover enough of his throat to have provided any protection from that knife-wielding demon.

Bela cast Dean a look he couldn’t read and joined Hannah, crouching a few feet away from Cas as though she didn’t want to get too close. She peered down at the collar.

“That’s just as bad as Dean’s manacles,” she said. “How exactly do you expect me to get it off?”

“The same way you get me off,” Hannah said. “With your fingers.”

Bela tilted her head, her hair falling smoothly as she did so. Smooth was almost always a word Dean could apply to Bela.

“That is not the only way I get you off,” she said. “And I’m not sure how even my fingers can remove this iron. That’s a sigil I’m amazed these grunt-demons even managed to etch, let alone keep under control.”

Hannah followed Bela’s gesture, tracing her own finger along the lines. She nodded, looking concerned.

“True. We might have to wait until we’re somewhere safer and better equipped. Which mean we have to remove both of them with the spells still in place.”

“Is it safe to move him?” Bela asked, sounding doubtful. “He looks about at Death’s door. Wouldn’t take much to usher him through.”

“I’ve locked in the Grace he has left,” Hannah said. “We need to do more, but we need to go. Those four can’t be the only ones involved in this.”

Bela nodded and within minutes the two of them had the chains holding Dean and Cas to the room ripped loose, cutting the metal close.

Dean landed with a bump, his legs aching and weak, and had to let Bela catch him. He had a blessed moment or two before the pain flared in his shoulders, and he bit back a curse as it spread to his arms. It would get worse, he knew. This wasn’t exactly his first manacle rodeo.

“I suppose you expect me to say thanks,” he said through his teeth.

Bela scoffed.

“You? Thank me? Have you even spared me a thought, Dean, over all these years?”

“Save that for later,” Hannah said. “Come on.”

She heaved Cas up over her shoulders, apparently not caring that his blood soaked into her shirt. Dean and Bela followed her, far more slowly than Dean would have liked, and he spent the entire trip out of there watching Cas, watching for any sign of life. Whatever Hannah said, Cas didn’t look any more alive than he had a few minutes back. At least now his eyes were closed. Hannah must have done that.

It was dim outside, with a few stars littering the sky, and Dean stumbled over a rock he didn’t spot in time. Bela stopped him from falling, but she complained about it.

“Not now, Bela,” Hannah said, and Bela fell silent.

A car waited ahead of them, a huge thing with four wheel drive and pretensions of carrying a full soccer team. Bela propped Dean against the side and opened the back door, helping Hannah to load Cas into the back seat like he was some kind of parcel. It didn’t make Dean feel any better than Bela had to help him in, too.

He sat with Cas’ head near his lap, itching to cup the side of Cas’ face and fine warmth there, but the mass of burning hurt in his arms wouldn’t let him control his hands. Not yet.

Besides, he felt weak. Weaker than he should do.

“You sure he’s alive?” he asked, as Hannah slid into the passenger seat.

She twisted to look at him, glancing at Cas with a look that seemed to intimate for Dean to be seeing it.

“He’s still alive,” she said, and sounded as though she’d be willing to tell Dean that over and over if needs be. “If he’s to stay alive, we need supplies.”

“We’re stuck in hicksville, Kansas,” Bela said. “No idea where to get supplies round here, even if my old contacts do still exist.”

“Where in Kansas?” Dean demanded.

Turned out, if Cas had died in that room, it would have been within two hours of the Bunker. He wasn’t sure if that made it worse, dying so close to home. He wasn’t sure about taking a dead angel and a demon there, either, but it was Cas…

“I know a place,” he said.

*******************************

Sam met them at the car, yanking open the door near Cas and freezing with his lips parted.

“He’s alive, Sammy,” Dean said, partly because he was still trying to convince himself. “Hannah swears he’s alive.”

That got Sam moving, even though he threw Dean a look that said he doubted what Hannah said on this. Dean’s arms had worked through the first pain and were now just stiff and aching. Still, he hadn’t got his energy, and from what little Hannah had told him on the drive that was likely the manacles.

Either way, he took it slow climbing out of the car, and let Sam get Cas into the Bunker. Bela hauled bags out of the trunk and followed, Hannah bringing up the rear.

Sam set Cas down on a table in the library, fetching a blanket and rolling it up to place under Cas’ head. It was so tender, so caring, that Dean had one of those moments where he felt he was watching from the outside. Cas and Sam had grown so close, and Dean sometimes thought he should back off and leave them to it.

“Sit over here,” Hannah said to Dean, patting the back of a chair near the same table. “I’ll see what I can do about those cuffs.”

“Cas first,” Dean said.

“This will help Castiel,” Hannah said. “You’re stronger just now. If I can work out how to remove the iron from you, I can apply it to the spell around his throat. Any missteps are far less likely to kill you than him.”

Less likely. Meaning there was a chance this could kill Dean. He sat and thrust out his arms.

“Get on with it.”