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Dean poured himself another drink. Perks of an evil bitch clearing out a bar: lotsa free booze. “What is it, huh? Why’re you letting Mummy Dearest tie you into knots?”
“Because … we’re family. We’re blood.” Well, it didn’t sound half so noble when a demon said it.
“That’s not the same thing. A wise man once told me, ‘Family don’t end in blood, but it doesn’t start there either.’” And that wise man would be spitting blood, if he knew who Dean was giving advice to. “Family cares about you. Not what you can do for them. Family’s there. Through the good, bad, all of it. They’ve got your back, even when it hurts. That’s family. That sound like your mother?”
Crowley twirled the red trident cocktail-stirrer idly. “Guess I’m out of luck, then.”
Dean sipped his drink, swilling the whiskey over his teeth, feeling the burn on the back of his tongue. How real was he willing to get with this son of a bitch …
“Oh yeah?”
“It may have escaped your notice, Dean, but it’s not exactly the Brady bunch down there. Or even the Adams family. My mother is, quite literally, a heinous witch, and given this latest drop-in, I suspect that she may have slaughtered the closest … things … I had to friends.”
Dean watched Crowley slurp his cocktail delicately. Here he was, heaven and hell’s worst nightmare, getting dewy-eyed over demon scum. Fuck it.
“What am I, chopped liver?”
Part of Dean really wished that Crowley wasn’t taking time with his next sip of drink, staring into the distance as if to let the words settle. Wished that Crowley had snorted, maybe flicked a knife out from his sleeve and carved him a good one. But when the king of hell eventually turned to him, he’d be damned if that son of a bitch didn’t look emotional.
“Friends? A Winchester? With the king of hell?”
“Well, what do they say? Keep your friends close, your enemies closer. Since you’re a mix of both, I’d say that makes us pretty damn close to …” He couldn’t say it. Stared back down at the bar instead, swirling his drink around the glass.
“Why, squirrel. That was practically a declaration of love, coming from sharp and pointy.”
“Well, you know. The kind of … family … you’d stab.”
“Is there any other kind?”
Dean snorted, and raised his glass. “I’ll drink to that.”
Crowley had already gone.
Dean sighed, and put his drink down. He shrugged on his coat, and grabbed the bottle to go. Twenty seconds later, he was back, glancing from side to side.
He plucked the devil’s pitchfork out of Crowley’s glass, and put it in his pocket.
***
“Why were you anywhere near Dean Winchester?” Hot anger bubbled through his meatsuit. He tapped the cocktail stirrer against the side of his glass, killing a few cats in Westchester. That took the sting off. Three hundred years old, and she was still babying him.
“It’s just a curse … the first curse, but still, it can be removed.” “How?” “I’ll find a way.” “You do that.” If she wanted to meet a grizzly end doing the Winchesters a favour, that was her prerogative. If he could just work out how to get her to remove the mark without killing Dean afterwards …
Because if she had killed Dean … well, he wouldn’t be here now, sucking up this delicious drink.
“’Family don’t end in blood, but it doesn’t start there either.’” Rowena would have it do both, he knew. Use their bond to claw her way to the top, then rake her talons across everything he’d worked for until it ran in red, red rivulets. Her standing above, eyes joyful, staring at the sky or her queendom but never at him, at the bottom of the pile of bodies, at her feet. “They’ve got your back, even when it hurts. That’s family. That sound like your mother?” That sounded like no-one Crowley had ever known. Well. There were only two bastards who’d stuck around through thick and thin, over the past few years … He wondered who owed whom, at this point? Who’d last bent the other over a desk and got their way without so much as a by-your-leave? It didn’t seem to matter. Because after all of it, here he was, sipping a cocktail, and his closest friend was his worst enemy.
“Guess I’m out of luck, then.”
“Oh yeah?”
“It may have escaped your notice, Dean, but it’s not exactly the Brady bunch down there. Or even the Adams family. My mother is, quite literally, a heinous witch, and given this latest drop-in, I suspect that she may have slaughtered the closest … things … I had to friends.” It dawned on him as he sat. All the betrayals, the whispering in his ear … he’d thought his followers might be leaving him, but they hadn’t left. They had been taken. He sucked on his straw, wishing the drink was stronger.
“What am I, chopped liver?”
He almost choked. Instead, he continued drinking, blinking slowly until there was no danger of moisture in his eyes.
“Friends? A Winchester? With the king of hell?”
“Well, what do they say? Keep your friends close, your enemies closer. Since you’re a mix of both, I’d say that makes us pretty damn close to …” Ha. He’d made the same excuse to his mother earlier. He wondered who had rubbed off on whom.
“Why, squirrel. That was practically a declaration of love, coming from sharp and pointy.”
“Well, you know. The kind of … family … you’d stab.”
“Is there any other kind?” He vanished before things could get any more gushy. Restored the cats in Westchester to life. He didn’t need that manipulative old hag. He had a Winchester. And somehow, that always came up trumps.