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amberdreamsBack to Part 3a
The Vikings had decided to have a feast. Sam wasn’t sure if they were celebrating his capture or merely looking forward to seeing his blood shed the next day. At the centre of the Vinlanders’ settlement, nestling within its wooden palisade, was a miniature version of the great halls that Sam had seen depicted in his friend Josh’s archaeology textbooks back in Stanford. This one was barely larger than Bobby’s biggest car workshop, and some of the settlers had to sit outside, as the hall couldn’t accommodate everyone. Fortunately, it was a mild summer night. Sam was wishing he’d been allowed to join the exiles from the hall round the bonfire they’d set a few paces from the entrance, as the interior was over-crowded, noisy and stuffy-hot.
êengill Karlsefni had waved away the men who’d tried to bind Sam. It seemed there was some sort of honour-code about the hólmganga challenge having been flung down and accepted that had raised Sam’s status from stranger to guest. In spite of that, for a brief moment Sam thought that he might have a chance to slip away unnoticed at some time during the night; but that was before the entire population of the settlement turned out to gawp at the tall stranger. At that point he realised the odds of him escaping were about as good as finding a fish riding a bicycle down Wall Street. Or an honest investment banker.
All he could do was hope that the Native Americans who had taken his brother into the forest harboured no ill will towards him and would take care of him. He hoped Dean hadn’t been as badly hurt as it had appeared from a distance as he had no idea how well equipped people of the native tribes might be in treating injuries, this far back before recorded history.
There was no sign of Loki, and Sam took that as a good sign, as while the Trickster wasn’t there he couldn’t stir up any more trouble. He wondered where Loki might be hiding, and why, but was soon distracted from that little issue among the many by the start of the evening’s entertainment.
Barrels of ale were rolled out, what looked like a half a cow was spitted and roasting on the central hearth, and Sam couldn’t help thinking how Dean would probably have felt right at home here, as the night drew on and the carousing grew more chaotic and raucous. The entertainment consisted of one man after another standing up and bellowing what might have been some kind of bad singing or maybe poetry, it was hard to tell. At one point, two men stood on either side of the fire yelling back and forth, and Sam thought this might be flyting (a kind of insult competition Josh had told him about), a guess which seemed to be borne out by the scuffle that broke out after one particularly heated exchange.
He couldn’t fault the Vinlanders’ hospitality, considering that he was effectively their prisoner, but he couldn’t help wishing they had a more modern sense of personal space as he was squeezed tight against a rough hewn wall on one side and several hairy, somewhat pungent men on the other. Not only was the hall crammed full of humanity, but the space (such as it was) was also being shared with several dogs, a handful of chickens and once Sam was sure he saw a sheep put its head through the doorway. His hands were kept busy with a constant traffic of drinking horns brimming with the most malty ale he’d ever tasted, lumps of hot greasy meat which he was expected to eat with only his fingers as his knife had been confiscated, and some warm crusty wholemeal bread which, he had to admit, tasted awesome.
In spite of his best intentions, and the hard wooden bench he was perched on, at some point during the early hours of the morning, the combination of the heat, the lack of fresh air and a stomach full of beer and food sent Sam into the deepest sleep he’d had for months, if not years.
And this far into the past, he was beyond the reach of Lucifer, even in his dreams.
Dean had taken LSD once when he was nineteen. The rich college student he’d been fucking around with had offered him a tab, and he’d figured what the hell, he’d try anything once. This was nothing like the trip he’d had then. This was ten times, a hundred times weirder.
The earthen walls melted into a rainbow of colours that ran together then vanished like mist. He was sitting exposed to the air in a vast desert of red sand and rock, where gleaming silver fish swam through the clear blue air in the place of birds, and the sand sparkled like diamonds, dazzling him. The sun and moon were sharing the sky, both as bright as each other, and he could see stars dripping through his fingers when he cupped his hands over his eyes.
“Hey, Nosawbuttface whatsy’name, whatthefuck…” He mumbled as his body, suddenly boneless and melting like the walls, slipped sideways until he was half resting on his back, eyes open and his pupils blown, staring unseeing at the ceiling of the bothy.
Nonosabawsut gently lifted Dean’s head and slid a pad of fur under it to make the stranger more comfortable for his spirit walking. Then he threw a handful of the dried moonflower onto the last embers of the fire, and inhaled the fragrant smoke deeply. It was time to follow the foreigner into the dreamscape, and see what spirit guides would honour his presence.
Sam woke up on the earthen floor with the mother of all headaches and a dog’s tongue slobbering over his face, seeking after the gravy and grease that smeared the day old stubble on Sam’s chin. He spluttered and tried to shove the hound away only to find that there was a rather large and smelly Viking lying on his arm, which had gone to sleep under the pressure almost as soundly as the snoring Viking.
After some wriggling and shoving of dead weight around, Sam managed to extricate himself from the heap of humanity and sit up. He was conscious that his hair must be standing on end, his breath probably smelled foul as Dean’s after an all-night binge, and that he had probably never had a more urgent need to take a leak in his entire life. Fortunately for Sam, precedence was already being set in that department. As he looked around the hall, there was the êengill Karlsefni himself, relieving his bladder into the central fire-place.
“Well, if he doesn’t care about pissing inside his own house…” Sam muttered as he staggered to his feet and joined the êengill in anointing the burning embers, heaving a huge sign of relief. He felt the êengill’s curious gaze as he tucked himself away and zipped up his jeans, and the memory of the previous day and the impending hólmganga came rushing back. He turned reluctantly to look at the Viking chief, half expecting the guy to start whaling on him right away, and was surprised to find a smile greeting him.
Really, this wasn’t going to make fighting this man any easier, him being so freaking friendly. Or so freaking huge. Sam didn’t have to look down too far to meet the êengill’s eyes, and the guy was all muscle underneath that wolfskin cloak he wore. The Vinlanders’ leader might be a farmer first but he was also a warrior. All Vikings were warriors after all. When they needed to be.
Karlsefni said something and clapped Sam on the shoulder. Sam grimaced a smile in response, the best he could do in the circumstances. He had a moment of regret that he was going to have to take this man out, one way or another, but he had to find Dean, and they had to find a way home.
Loki appeared out of nowhere, virtually tucked up under Karlsefni’s elbow, making both Sam and the êengill start.
“Nice to see you boys getting acquainted,” Loki crooned, smiling slyly in response to Sam’s death glare. He flung an arm around each of the big men, laughing when Sam tried in vain to pull away in disgust. Loki might inhabit a small man’s shape, but he was still a god, and was a lot stronger than he appeared. There was no way Sam was breaking free of that grip unless Loki wanted him to.
Karlsefni said something again, that sounded like a question, and Loki sighed dramatically.
He danced free of the two humans and stood in front of them, arms crossed.
“Do you know something? I’m getting a little tired of acting as your interpreter. Why don’t I do something about that language barrier and maybe you two can entertain me with some witty flyting before Karlsefni kills you, eh?”
Loki snapped his fingers. Sam glared at the small god, arms folded in an attempt to control himself. The temptation to take a swing at that smug face was almost overwhelming.
“I don’t know how I could ever have mistaken you for Gabriel. He might have been a dick at times, but he never pouted like a girl.”
Loki’s expression took on a dangerous cast and Sam wondered if Loki was going to try and smite him or something, when suddenly Karlsefni’s laugh broke the tension. The êengill clapped Sam on the back again, nearly sending him staggering.
“So you do speak our tongue then, stranger. We had been wondering why you did not, and my wife was afraid that you were not right in the head. I would have hated to have been forced to fight a fool. There would be no honour in killing an dullard.”
“Um, right, thanks. I think.” Sam hesitated, avoiding looking at Loki’s mocking face. “Look, you know I never said anything bad about anyone here – well apart from Loki, of course. So there’s not really anything for us to be fighting over, you know?”
“Perhaps that is true, but the challenge has been made and accepted now, and as true warriors we cannot walk away and still hold our heads up high.” Karlsefni sounded regretful.
Sam didn’t think he really cared much any more about holding his head high, having managed to set Lucifer free and start the Apocalypse on the back of misplaced overconfidence, but he wasn’t going to tell the Viking leader that.
“I don’t want to kill you.” Sam said, trying one more time, but the êengill just clasped his shoulder and smiled.
“Nor I you, but the hide is spread, and at noon we will fight.”
“This is very touching. I am moved to see such brotherly bonding between you two. I am sure it will break my heart to watch one of you spitted on the other’s spear, but…” Loki gave an exaggerated sigh. “I’m sure I’ll get over it eventually.”
Sam turned on the Norse Trickster, a hot wave of anger washing over him.
“You self-centred, manipulative bastard, you are really getting a kick out of this, aren’t you? Don’t you realise while you keep me and my brother trapped here in the past, back in the future the world is being torn apart by Lucifer and the angels?”
Loki spread his hands in a universal gesture of ‘do I care?’.
“Your goddess Kali saw fit to send this anachronism back where I belong, why should I worry what happens in the future?”
“Firstly, she’s not my goddess. And secondly, are you telling me it doesn’t bother you to know a thousand years from now Lucifer is slaughtering the complete pantheon of pagan gods, Asgard included? Baldr and Odin are dead, and he won’t stop there.”
“And yet somehow you survived, my brother?” The deep voiced query came from behind Sam’s shoulder, causing both Sam and Karlsefni to jump, while Loki’s face acquired the most ridiculously sulky expression ever seen on a grown man. Or grown god for that matter.
Sam’s jaw dropped as he spun round and took in the outlandish new arrival, and it seemed Karlsefni was having a similar reaction. The voice emanated from a striking figure who was taller than either of the two humans and outshone the weak sun with the splendour of his armour. But Sam’s gaze had gotten stuck on the weapon the gleaming newcomer was cradling in his arms more tenderly than a baby. It appeared to be a huge squared-off hammer.
“Holy shit,” Sam blurted without thinking. “You look like Thor.”
Dean wasn’t sure what was expected of him in this drugged up dream, so he walked. Desert and all that crazy Lucy in the sky with diamonds stuff had quickly given way to a softer, more domesticated landscape that he half recognised. He was surrounded by woods and gravelled paths that looked like they were part of a National Park or similar tamed wilderness. Part of his consciousness retained the fact that he was hallucinating, but this was lodged somewhere deep in his brain where most of the time it couldn’t bother him. Everything else was telling him this was real, and that this was his chance to find Sam and go home.
He had been walking for several minutes before he became aware that a presence was shadowing his every step. Beside him he could hear the click, click, click of claws on the pebbled path and a soft panting. For once his first thought wasn’t black dog, or even hell hound. He felt no anxiety or fear as he turned his head to check out the creature following him, and wasn’t surprised to find a grey wolf padding its way along, half a step behind him. The wolf stopped when he did, and cocked its head. Its eyes were a deeply piercing blue against the dark rings of black around its sockets, striking amidst its ruff of pale grey fur. It was a handsome beast, standing taller than Dean’s waist, heavy and solid.
Dean moved without thought, stretched out a hand and buried his fingers deep in the wolf’s warm pelt, never doubting it would be allowed. He scratched behind the wolf’s ears as if it was an old family friend, as if the dream-wolf was Rumsfeld. Or Bones. Remembering Sam’s stray dog from Flagstaff jerked Dean’s chain like nothing else probably could, and the wolf growled low in its throat in response to his sudden agitation.
“He’s your guide.” A voice said and Dean whirled around, a knife in his hand quicker than thinking. The wolf merely sat down at his feet, alert but calm, ears pricked.
A young man stood in the shade of the trees, on the edge of the path. His hands were empty, relaxed by his sides, but Dean had seen too much to trust that empty hands equalled harmless, even in a vision. Neither was he willing to just take it on face value that this man was what he seemed to be – an Indian (It’s Native American, Dean, corrected Sam’s voice inside his head), dressed like the people who’d taken him in and tended his cracked skull. Remembering his injury, Dean’s hand went to his head expecting to find a bandage or something, and was slightly puzzled to find his scalp smooth and unbroken. Had he been here longer than he’d thought? Or was someone messing with his mind? He’d momentarily forgotten how he’d come to be here and the loss of memory scared him into anger.
“Oh yeah? And who are you then?” he challenged, not letting the knife waver. He was obscurely comforted when the wolf moved close into his side, its presence warm against his leg. A breeze ruffled its fur and caressed the short hairs on the back of Dean’s neck.
“I’m Nonosabawsut of the Beothuk.” The young man said. Dean scoffed.
“Nonosabawsut is an old man, you can’t be him.”
“This is how I move through the spirit realm, clothed in the memory of my youth.”
Dean stared at the boyishly smooth skin, the earnest dark brown eyes. He thought perhaps he could see vestiges of the old man he’d just met, but then again, it could just be wishful thinking. Then he sighed. Did it really matter? He had a spirit wolf sitting on his foot and leaning on his leg like a soppy Labrador, and no idea where (or when) he was. What difference did it make if this was Nonosabawsut the freaking Indian or not?
He sighed. Might as well be polite about this, again. At least this time they seemed to be speaking the same language.
“Dean Winchester,” he said, completing the introductions.
“What is it that you seek, Dean Winchester?” The young Nonosabawsut asked. At last, an easy question with an easy answer.
“My brother, Sam.” Dean said. Always Sam.
“This is your dream walk, Dean. Where does the dream say that you need to go to find your Sam?”
Dean looked around again, not sure what he was expecting to see. Then he remembered how it had worked in Heaven. Maybe it would be the same here, in this vision.
“I think I need to find a road.” He said, and shoving the wolf with his knee to dislodge it, started off down the path again.
“Well you don’t look much like Toto,” he murmured to the wolf, who pricked up his ears again at the sound of Dean’s voice, “And sure as hell I ain’t Dorothy, but a Yellow Brick Road to take us home wouldn’t hurt.”
Home. The concept was lodged in his heart, even though his head always told everyone they didn’t have a home.
When he crested the rise of a gentle slope he didn’t find it strange that there, stretched out in front of him, was a long straight road. He didn’t look back to see if Nonosabawsut was following. He was too busy fighting the lift of his spirits when he recognised the dark gleam of the Impala waiting for him on the smooth blacktop, and leaning against her passenger door, a figure he knew better than his own face in the mirror.
“Hey Dean,” Sam said.
Dean opened the car door and slid into the driver’s seat. Yeah, this was home. He half expected to wake up then and there, after all, he’d succeeded in his vision quest. He’d found Sam so the dream should be over, shouldn’t it? Wasn’t that how these things worked? He looked over his shoulder. Toto (yeah, Dean was going to run with that. A dog – wolf, whatever – shouldn’t be without a name, right?) sat in the backseat of the Impala, ice-pale blue eyes staring at him, pink tongue sticking out as he panted in the growing heat. Nonosabawsut sat next to the wolf, seemingly as inclined to infinite patience and trust in his waiting around for something to happen as was Dean’s new canine friend. In the way of dreams, Dean had no idea how his two exotic companions had managed to get into the car.
Dean supposed this was all no stranger for his baby than having an angel and a demon side by side on the backseat. Or a pagan goddess for that matter. That thought felt like déjà vu. Sam’s grin distracted him before the memory of the missing Castiel or the late unlamented Ruby could bring his mood down, or the vague spectre of Kali could disturb him, and he couldn’t help grinning back. Dean turned the key in the ignition. Putting his foot down on the gas, he listened to his baby roar.
“Where to, Sammy? Any ideas what we have to do to get out of here?”
“I don’t know Dean. Just drive, eh? Let’s see where we end up.”
Dean drove.
It didn’t take long, a few minutes, maybe, for Dean to conclude that this Sam wasn’t the real Sam, and only a few more minutes more to puzzle over the fact that Sam not actually being Sam was more annoying than disturbing. When Dean raised the issue of his lack of substance, Dream Sam managed a passable bitch face, but Dean could see the edges wavering, as if solid matter was made of translucent cellophane, painted over with a Sam-like picture.
“Christ, my imagination sucks.” He said in disgust, glancing in the rear-view mirror at his other passengers. “You’d have thought I could have dreamed up a couple of busty Asian beauties instead of a smelly dog, an escapee from the Wild West and a Sam who doesn’t know any more about what is going on here than I do.”
Toto was resting his head on the edge of the open window, tongue out, tasting the air, ignoring Dean and enjoying the ride. The young Nonosabawsut seemed to be taking this modern mode of transport in his stride, which made Dean wonder if the Native American too was simply a construct of his own mind. Though why his brain would introduce into this messed up scenario a younger version of an old shaman he’d only met five minutes ago, Dean had no clue. He gave it up and turned to check out Toto.
“Huh. For a spirit guide, you don’t do much by way of guiding,” he said to the wolf, feeling somewhat aggrieved. “Guess I’ll just have to find our way out of here on my own then.”
Dream Sam just smiled, leaned back in the seat and stretched his long legs out as best he could. In disgust, Dean flipped a tape into the deck and turned the volume up loud. It didn’t seem like there was going to be much chatting going on, and besides, what was the point of trying to strike up a conversation with people who were merely aspects of your own psyche? He’d just be talking to himself.
The landscape was changing, the forest giving way to wide flat grasslands that reminded Dean of Kansas, or Iowa, where the wide-open sky dominated everything with its vast expanse of cerulean blue. It was like the Mid-West, except where it wasn’t. This land had no sign of people. No big square fields of corn, no pylons or telegraph poles, no wind farms, no buildings. The only signs of humanity were the Impala and the straight smooth blacktop with its totally redundant centre yellow line; redundant because it looked like he could drive for eternity and there would never be another vehicle sharing this piece of road.
It was lonely, and so empty that the words of Zeppelin’s Kashmir booming from the speakers were too close for comfort. He was getting heartily sick of being an unwilling traveller in both time and space. Dean leaned across and switched the tape off, then thought that maybe the ensuing silence might be worse.
For some unknown reason, the dreamlike quality of this journey was fading, and Dean’s short term memories were starting to reassert themselves. With them was a growing sense of urgency.
“Hey, Nono, I don’t suppose you know where the real Sam is?”
“Now that I have seen this Sam, I think that the very tall man who chased Kiim into the forest may have been your brother.” The young shaman replied.
Dean slammed on the brakes, sending Dream Sam flying into the dash with a muffled shout of protest and a faded echo of the emergency stop that had ultimately brought them here. Toto growled his disapproval but Dean was oblivious. He flung open the car door and scrambled out. Nonosabawsut exited the Impala, followed by Toto and Dream Sam, who was rubbing his sore arm and looking dishevelled.
“Son of a bitch!” Dean yelled at the empty sky, before rounding on Nonosabawsut. “Are you telling me you’ve known where Sam is all this time and only just thought to tell me? Why are we even still fucking here?”
He grabbed the young man’s arms as if he could shake the answer out of him. However, whatever Nonosabawsut might have said in reply to the irate Winchester was swallowed up in an almighty clap of thunder. Out of nowhere, lowering storm clouds had gathered on the horizon, and the vague outline of mountains Dean had been driving towards moments before were lost under the heavy pall. Behind them to the east, the sun still shone, lighting the foreground in extra vivid colour against the dark grey backdrop.
And where the road was swallowed up by the advancing curtain of rain was the largest, brightest rainbow Dean had ever witnessed. Not only was it large and bright but utterly impossible, as it wasn’t bowed but perfectly straight, and seemed to rise up into the sky in a colourful flat ribbon-like continuation of the road itself. Dean’s hands dropped to his sides as he gaped in astonishment.
Beside him, almost forgotten, Nonosabawsut seemed equally awed, if a little more articulate.
“Remarkable. I have never seen such a thing.”
Dean rubbed at his forehead unconsciously as the atmosphere seemed to grow denser and the pressure build up behind the bank of dark grey clouds was replicated inside his head. A trickle of sweat ran down his face and he ran a finger round his shirt collar that suddenly felt too tight.
A jagged line of lightning tore across the clouds closely followed by another deep rumble of thunder. Distracted by the coming storm, it was a few moments before either man noticed something dark and possibly man-shaped was moving on the surface of the rainbow.
As the figure reached the junction between the shimmering rainbow and the dull surface of the tarmac, it became more distinct. Dean’s eyes widened. He knew this was a dream but this was ridiculous.
“You have gotta be kidding me!”
“Your dreams are very interesting, Dean Winchester.” Nonosabawsut remarked.
“You could say that.” Dean swallowed.
Dean wondered if it was a good sign that Toto didn’t growl, though truth be told, he was too busy freaking out to take much notice of anything but the armour-clad vision coming towards them.
“Fascinating! I do not know how this is possible, but this person is real, he is not part of your dreaming,” the Beothuk added, almost as an afterthought, but before Dean could react to that bombshell, the new arrival had halted a few steps in front of them, legs akimbo.
The huge man sported a red beard divided into two plaits and long red hair worn loose in dramatically flowing locks. He was resplendent in armour that looked as though it had been liberated from a Lord of the Rings movie set, and his head was crowned by a helmet Dean thought looked familiar from one of Bobby’s books about ancient artifacts, except this one was gleaming and new, its cheek and helm panels chip carved with war-like scenes, and the crest topped by a stylised wild boar. (No wings; if Dean hadn’t been so generally gobsmacked he would have been disappointed). The figure shone like the sun with all his burnished steel, silver, gold and garnets.
The crowning glory of the newcomer’s outfit, however, was the dull steely-grey and very large hammer he held in his right hand. The least gaudy item somehow drew the eye with its promise of a power barely held in check, straining to be unleashed.
Dean couldn’t resist it.
“So. Thor, eh? Where are the rest of your Avenger buddies?”
Thor looked blank and tilted his head in a painfully familiar way.
“Forgive me, stranger, but I do not understand that reference.”
Dean swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat at the reminder of another friend gone missing from the fray.
“Never mind,” he said. He refused to go there right now, if ever.
“What brings four such mismatched companions to the foot of Bifrost, and why were you calling to me?” Thor asked.
Dean looked down at Nonosabawsut and the wolf, but the Beothuk just shrugged as if to say this is your dream, son, if there was any calling going on it was down to you. Great. He dreaded to think what is said for the state of his mind that he was sending dream summonses to giant comic book characters. With long bright red hair and beards.
He cleared his throat. Come on Winchester. He’d survived Hell, shot Lucifer, and killed an angel while armed with nothing but a silver spike. He could cope with talking to a crazy vision of a Viking god.
“I’m Dean Winchester, this is Nonosabawsut of the Beothuk and the wolf is Toto. I am looking for my brother because we need to get back to our own time so that we can stop the Apocalypse.” Dean flapped a dismissive hand at Dream Sam. “This is a copy of my brother I dreamed up. The real Sam is even more annoying.”
“Hey!” Dream Sam protested, then rapidly deflated into silence when nobody paid him any attention.
Thor gave Dean a considering look.
“Your time?”
“Yes. I – we - my brother and me, got blasted back in time by the goddess Kali. I think it was an accident, really. She was aiming at the archangel Gabriel. Or at least at the thing that looked like Gabriel.” Dean would have explained further but Thor shook his head, silencing him with a glance.
“This apocalypse. It is not Ragnarok?”
“No. This is Lucifer fighting against God’s angels who are led by his brother Michael, and any other gods that get in the way are being taken out, one by one. Lucifer means to destroy humanity, cleanse the earth.”
“And you and your brother; how are you, mere mortals, going to stop this?”
Dean shifted uncomfortably. Here in the past, these ancient gods were closer to their followers and were therefore ten, no, a thousand times more powerful than any of the gods he’d faced only hours ago and a thousand years hence. The thought was making his skin itch. Yet this could be his chance to gain a formidable ally, and he wished more than ever that it was the real Sam standing by his side instead of a useless dream construct. His little brother would know exactly what to say to get the Viking god on their side. Fuck it, he’d just have to make do with his own words and hope for the best.
“In a nutshell, angels need strong and willing vessels, and Archangels need even stronger ones. Sam and I were marked down to be meat suits for Michael and Lucifer, and apparently they need us to fight each other here on earth. Well, they need Sam anyhow. I think Michael has decided to go with alternative arrangements, and take our other brother Adam instead of me.
Which means Sam has to keep saying no to Lucifer while we find the rings of the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Once we have the rings we have the weapon we need to stop this thing.”
“What would happen if you could not return home?”
Good question, Dean thought. He hesitated a moment before answering.
“Honestly? I don’t know. But one thing’s for sure, it would be very bad for us ‘mere mortals’. Lucifer without Sam as his vessel might lose in a fight with Michael, but none of those douchebag angels care about mankind any more. They just want to crush us mud-monkeys into the ground, make the earth some sort of empty echo of their crappy Heaven. And if Lucifer wins, he will wipe humanity off the face of the planet because he hates us worse than he hates the angels. Either way, all we can look forward to is war, death, disease and extinction.”
Thor was silent for a moment, absently tapping his fingers against Mjölnir. Behind him, there was a low grumble of thunder in response.
“And where stands Asgard in this battle?”
“Lucifer just killed Odin and Baldur, and I can’t see Michael negotiating with pagans, so I don’t know. I guess you old gods are on your own against the rest.”
Thor’s grip on his hammer tightened until Dean could see his knuckles whiten, and coruscations of blue-white light gathered around the squared off head. The Viking god was frowning and the thunder in the background grew louder and more ominous, clearly echoing the Norse god’s worsening mood.
“So in the future this Lucifer has killed my father?” Thor didn’t wait for Dean’s nod before continuing. “In the Northlands across the ocean the servants of the White Christ grow stronger and more numerous every day. Already Asgard is weaker, less potent than it was but ten or twenty years ago. I have heard stories from the White Christ’s book; I know of these creatures of which you speak – these angels and the nameless god they serve. I have pleaded with the All Father to take whatever steps we can to survive, but he does not see the danger.”
Dean could feel the air like a solid thing, close and hot against his skin. He wiped a hand over his forehead as warm liquid ran down his face and back, his shirt sticking to him. It was getting hard to breathe, and Toto had started to growl his disapproval in a low counterpoint to the continuing rumble of thunder Thor’s anger was generating. Dean could feel the growing pressure inside his head, rationalised it as the effects of the concussion headache leaching through into this drug induced dream. He tried to swallow but his mouth was drier than the desert they had walked through to get here.
“Tell me about this Gabriel who came back to this time with you and your brother.” Thor demanded.
Dean coughed and swayed slightly, his legs trembling. What the fuck was wrong with him? He was relieved and grateful when Toto nudged closer to him, and he grasped a fistful of the large wolf’s fur to steady himself. He could see Nonosabawsut looking up at him with a concerned expression, but he figured it was expedient to concentrate on the angry Thunder god right now, just in case he hadn’t totally cocked up their chance of getting Thor on their side.
“I don’t think it was the Archangel Gabriel who Kali attacked, I think it was someone who looked like him, but I don’t know who it was.”
“Describe this person.”
“He’s kinda short, got shaggy brown hair, brown eyes and a long face…”
Thor made a gesture with his hammer and the lightnings that had been coalescing spun off into the air and hung there. Thor flicked his wrist and for a few seconds, the light gathered into a form that Dean recognised.
“Is this he?”
“Yeah.”
A strange expression crossed the Viking god’s face – a mixture of sadness, exasperation, fear and fondness – all there and gone so quickly Dean was hard pressed to name them. Thor raised Mjölnir above his head and gave Dean one last look before he called down the lightning from the skies.
“I will find your brother, Dean Winchester, and return him to you. Farewell.”
Lightning completely enveloped the Norse god, so bright that Dean and Nonosabawsut were forced to cover their eyes. Just like an angel’s grace, Dean thought. When they dared to open them again, the god was gone and Dean had other things to worry about.
Like his too rapidly racing heart and inability to breathe, for one. He was burning up like he had a fever, and his face and shirt were soaking wet, though his mouth felt desert-dry and he had a thirst that raged like a bushfire in his throat.
“What’s goin’ on? What’s happening to me?” He croaked, sinking to his hands and knees as his wobbly legs had decided they would no longer support him. The drips that fell onto the ground beneath his outspread hands were viscous and red; not sweat at all but blood.
“You are reacting badly to the moonflower draft. I need to wake you immediately.”
Nonosabawsut said, and Dean didn’t like the note of anxiety he detected in the Beothuk holy man’s voice, nor the fact that Toto was whining.
“No shit Sherlock,” he grunted, as the ground came up to greet him like an old friend.
continued in Part 4