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Once upon a time, a human and a dragon met in a field and struck a deal. The dragon offered shelter and the human offered knowledge.
Dean has always known he’s unlucky. In the beginning, everyone scoffed and told him he was just imagining things, but, well. His mother’s dead, in a fire that decimated their house and crops. His father’s probably dead, or drunkenly wandering so deep into the forest that he’ll be dead soon enough. And his brother just got chosen to be sacrificed to the dragon that just happened to take up residence. If that isn’t evidence enough, Dean will eat his boots.
Well. If he had boots, anyways. The townspeople took them, to make sure he wouldn’t run away.
Dean doesn’t exactly blame them. He traded himself for Sam, signed over his life and property, let them put chains on his wrist and ankles, but when faced with a fire breathing drake the size of a mountain, his word doesn’t mean squat. And yet, if they don’t have a sacrifice, it’s likely the whole town will be bathed in flame. So the tale goes anyways.
Dean just sighs and hopes for the dragon to show up before the sun goes down and he freezes. And that Sam won’t be an idiot and try and follow him up the mountain. And that the dragon will kill him quickly.
Dean just wants a lot of things. Sadly with his luck, he’s pretty sure he won’t get any of them.
The sun is just starting to sink below the horizon when Dean hears it: the startled cries of birds flushed out of branches. This is shortly followed by the sounds of massive gusts of air, stirring up rocks and making trees bend. The rays on sun dance and flicker as the dragon’s wings cut through, casting frankly terrifying shadows that dance all over the clearing.
Dean sucks in a deep breath and looks up.
And up.
And up.
“Oh my god,” he says faintly, because he’d known that dragons were huge – everyone knows that, because whenever they take cattle or sheep they take dozens and dozens – but it’s one thing to know and another entirely to see.
And what Dean is seeing, well. The dragon Dean is seeing is so massive it’s a wonder it fits into a mountain at all.
The scales are pitch black, like fire ready coal, like fertile soil, like the middle of the night when Dean can’t even see his hand in front of his face. The wings are large enough to cover most houses in shadow, dotted in scales that shimmer faintly in the setting sun. When it lands, its hind legs hit first followed by its forelegs, and the earth shakes like an rockslide both times, enough that were Dean not chained up he might have actually fallen and cracked his head open like an egg on the offering rock.
The chains rattle as he pulls himself back to his feet, because he’ll be damned if he dies lying down, and the dragon’s head snaps in his direction at the noise.
“Uh. Hello?” Dean says, for want of anything better.
Steam billows from the dragon’s mouth when it opens. Dean braces for the burn of fire – but all that emerges is the dragon’s tongue, surprisingly pink, like a cat. It licks at its jaws, and its sides heave as the dragon inhales, sniffing and sniffing.
Dean wonders, a bit hysterically, if he’s about to be rejected as a sacrifice because he wasn’t given time to bathe.
A thunderous noise rolls across the clearing, painful enough that Dean recoils and tries desperately to cover his ears. He’s usually good with loud noises, since they live next to the forge, but this is different, this is so different. It’s like a crashing storm, but right next to his ear, and he half expects to see blood when the noise stops and he takes his hand away.
Then the dragon does something Dean does not expect. It sits on its hindquarters, almost like a dog, and tilts its head and stares at him.
Dean maintains eye contact for approximately two minutes. Then it becomes too much. “All right, that’s really creepy,” he shouts. “Cut it out, will you?”
The dragon blinks. That long pink tongue flickers out again, as if its tasting the air.
And then the dragon starts moving, and that is not what Dean wanted.
“Hey now,” Dean says hastily, “why don’t you, um, keep your distance, I really wasn’t – that wasn’t an invitation to get up into my personal space, I really liked you over on the other side of the clearing – ”
With each word, the dragon snakes closer, prowling surprisingly elegantly for such a large creature. It stays close to the ground, slinking along, casually pushing aside all the other offerings on the rock until it’s right next to Dean, with a head larger than Dean is tall. It could literally swallow him in one gulp.
Dean stares at his own reflection in one giant eye and swallows hard. His reflection, slightly tinted blue due to the dragon’s enormous bright blue eyes, mirrors his action.
The dragon’s jaws part, revealing jagged white teeth and that pink tongue. It keeps opening further and further, like it’s going to swallow him whole snake-style. Not exactly the kind of death Dean was hoping for, to be honest.
Dean makes a face. “Oh, come on!” he complains. “Why can’t you roast me like any normal dragon, huh? Why do you have to chew me up alive?”
Talking is a mistake. Dean coughs as a terrible burnt smell invades his nose and mouth.
“Your breath stinks! What the hell have you been eating – hey, that was not an invitation!”
Those giant jaws descend on his head, and Dean closes his eyes tight and prays to a god he doesn’t really believe in anymore, and he waits for the worst pain he’s ever felt in his entire life to begin and –
Nothing happens.
The dragon keeps its jaws perfectly spaced apart above his head. No tongue winds around his neck to strangle the life from him. No sharp jagged tooth rips into his shoulder. Not even a single drop of saliva falls on Dean. It’s almost like the dragon is . . . waiting.
And, yeah, that’s enough for Dean. “Just get it over with!” he yells.
The dragon’s sides heave again, and it inhales. The wind is so strong Dean feels like he’s going to be picked off his feet. His clothes pull painfully at his skin and the chains clank and rattle as the dragon keeps pulling in air, as if the dragon is trying to suck his soul out.
It’s a terrifying thought, and the second the dragon stops and moves away, Dean frantically pats at his head and chest, wondering if he’d even know if he just lost his soul. After ascertaining that at the very least his heart still beats, he raises his head and glares at the dragon sitting in front of him, once again perched like a dog.
“Hey! What did you just do to me? You were supposed to eat me, not – ”
“Eat you?” says the monstrous fire breathing lizard the size of a mountain. “Why would I want to eat you?’
“You talk?” Dean says, because they’ve got lots of tales about dragons and in absolutely none of them is it mentioned that these things are intelligent and can talk.
The dragon lies down fully, resting that massive head upon its forelegs. It blinks placidly at Dean. “I can talk now,” the dragon rumbles. “I had to learn your tongue first. Apparently, my tongue is too painful for you to comprehend.”
Dean opens his mouth. Closes it. “That – that thundering? That was you . . . talking?”
The dragon’s head goes up. The dragon’s head goes down.
Dean throws his head back and groans. “Oh, great, you even nod like a dog, just wonderful.” He glares at the dragon. “Hey, little tip for communicating with humans, buddy – next time, turn down the damn volume.”
“It is not my fault that human ears are unable to tolerate the tongue of my kind.”
“Are you . . . sulking?”
“No,” the dragon says, too quickly. It sounds a little bit like Sam when he’s pretending he didn’t eat the last cookie.
“Rightttt,” Dean says. “So, uh. What now?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that the sun has gone down and it’s probably way past your dinner time.” The dragon doesn’t respond to that, so Dean sighs. “Okay, so can we just get this over me? And fast? None of this inhaling for ten minutes to taste me thing.”
“I was not tasting you. I was acquiring your tongue.”
“You what?”
“You know the human tongue. Now, I do too.”
“You went into my head?”
“Only briefly.”
“Okay, this is too weird,” Dean declares. He rattles his bound hands at the dragon. “Would you just eat me and get it over with?”
“But I do not want to eat you.”
Dean stops. Turns. Stares. “But . . . all the stories . . .”
“Inaccurate,” the dragon says lazily, licking at its chops again. “We do not eat human flesh unless there is nothing else to eat. Your kind taste awful.”
“Hey, I’m delicious.”
“You stink,” the dragon says flatly. “Frankly, the cooked meat smells more appealing, and I like my meat raw.”
“That’s just rude.”
“Your own kind chained you to this rock and expected you to die a horrible death at my jaws, and you are calling me rude? I think you are mistaken.”
“So. . . If you’re not gonna eat me. Uh. What then?”
“I am going to eat the offerings your people have left here, and then I am going to fly home, and then I am going to sleep.”
“And what about me?”
The dragon rolls its head back to focus on Dean. Even though the tone of its voice is bored, its eyes are still alert, like it’s just waiting for Dean to make the wrong move so it can pounce and bite him in half.
“I do not care about you. You may go home,” the dragon tells him.
“What? No, I can’t!”
The dragon’s nostrils flare. “I can smell a town down the hill. It is not so far that you cannot return in less than a day’s walk, and from there find your way to your home.”
“No, I can’t,” Dean says. “You don’t understand.”
“Then explain,” the dragon orders, a hint of impatience in its voice.
And sparks. Not something Dean really wants to see.
“Uh, well, okay. So the stories say that any dragon who lives near a town takes an offering every year, right? A share of the harvest, a share of the livestock, a share of the treasure. And . . . And one person. Preferably young. Sometimes, uh, a virgin too, but that ship sailed a long time ago for me. Sorry.”
“Why would I care if you were a virgin?”
“I dunno, apparently they taste better.”
“What nonsense,” the dragon scoffs. “I do not want a human to eat any more than I want your harvest. You may take it back to your home.”
“It doesn’t work like that. If you send me back, they’ll think I wasn’t right and then they’ll send another person, and then another person, and then another until you finally take one. And they’ll – they’ll kill me, for being, well. Not right. And, uh, offending you.”
The dragon stares at Dean for so long he has to break eye contact and blink. The sun sinks fully below the horizon, leaving Dean squinting in the dark for the vaguest outlines of the dragon, following his approximate guess of its size based on the eye Dean can see.
“That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard,” the dragon says, finally. “Why do humans make things so complicated?”
Dean scowls. “Why don’t you dragons explain?”
“Would you listen, if we did?”
And, well, the dragon kind of has a point there. Dean’s pretty sure even if he managed to convince this dragon to come home, he’d still be killed the second he was spotted, because that’s how it’s always been. And that would even be worse of a death than dying by dragon, because then they’d send Sam up next.
“Okay, fine,” Dean grumbles. “But still, can you help me out?”
“How?”
A dangerous idea sparks in Dean’s mind. It’s kind of stupid, but then again, stupid is what got him here, and he’s somehow still alive and talking with a god damned dragon. And how much worse can it get, really?
“You said you’d fly home, right?”
“Yes.”
“Well, what if you took me with you? I could stay for the night and then find a new town to call home.”
“You want to . . . stay. With me. In my home.”
“Just for a night. I wouldn’t get in the way. And I wouldn’t steal anything. I just need somewhere warm so I don’t freeze to death.”
The dragon regards him for a long, long moment. It doesn’t move or breathe or blink. Just stares, like the weird lizard thing it is. Probably going into Dean’s head again, but at this point, he’s too cold to care.
Finally, the dragon stands up. “You have given me knowledge of your tongue,” it says, the words oddly stilted, like some kind of tradition. “I will give you shelter, Dean Winchester, to honor this exchange. It is only right.”
Dean’s so busy being relieved that it takes him a few moments to realize: “Hey, how did you know my name?”
“I took it from your mind, of course.”
“Okay, step one of giving me shelter: no mind reading.”
“As you wish.”
The dragon’s name, as it turns out, is utterly unpronounceable. Well, maybe smarty pants Sam could, but Dean tries twice and after seeing the dragon’s lip curl in amusement, he gives up. The dragon then concedes to tell Dean that he can call him Castiel as a shortened version of his true name.
Dean, because he can, goes, “Sure, whatever you say, Cas.”
Castiel’s eyes narrow, but he doesn’t do anything more than crunch menacingly on some sheep bones from where he’s cleaning up the feast left for him. He also doesn’t say anything when Dean very casually and very carefully grabs some chicken meat, so at least they are both well fed by the time the moon is high in the night sky.
Dean burps, and then, because Castiel looks at him, says, “Uh. Excuse me?”
Castiel heaves himself upright and points his jaw at the moon. His burp sounds like an avalanche, but also fire spurts out, making his scales gleam. It’s weirdly cute.
“Do you have everything you need to travel?” Castiel asks.
Dean shrugs. “Didn’t exactly bring anything but me. Why – hey!”
The ground lurches away from beneath his feet as Castiel raises himself to his full height on his hind legs. Dean is confused for a moment from where Castiel has him clutched tightly in his front claws, but then he sees the shadows of massive wings stretch out, and, oh, right. How silly of Dean to think that Castiel meant anything other than flying when he said travelling. Because he’s a dragon. A flying dragon. Who flies.
“Oh no no no – ”
Castiel’s entire body tenses and then he leaps forward, like an arrow being shot from a bow. The wind brushing along Dean’s face goes from a gentle breeze to invisible hands trying to rip his clothes off. The ground fades away at a dizzying rate until it blends into the trees, which is when Dean realizes that he is in fact so high up that the trees themselves look like black dots. He’s never seen them from this angle before.
“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Dean moans.
That’s when Castiel banks hard to the right. Well, perhaps to a mountain sized lizard it’s a gentle turn, but for Dean it’s like being kicked in the gut.
The chicken comes back up. Dean really hopes it doesn’t land on anyone.
Dean is too busy trying to keep the rest of his dinner down to take much note of Castiel’s home. Well, the enormous cave he calls a home, anyways. Castiel just slowly angles downward, and between one blink and the next, they go from outside in the freezing wind to inside, where the air is warm and smells a little bit like metal. There’s no light – Dean has no idea how Castiel can see – but Castiel flies without pause, twisting and turning until he finally, finally deigns to stop.
The great claws clutching Dean abruptly release, and Dean has one terrifying moment where he thinks he’s going to die –
But when he hits the ground, it’s soft. And even compresses to take his weight, like an expensive city bed.
Castiel rumbles above him, and a jet of flame shoots from his mouth. It lands into a little hollow in the wall, spreading along the cracks like water flowing downstream. When it’s done, the entire chamber is lit by flickering dragon fire. He’s not Sam, who would flip out, but even Dean has to admit it’s pretty cool.
“Nice place,” Dean says as Castiel lands with a thump that is fortunately cushioned by whatever soft thing Dean is on. “You, uh, like soft beds?”
“Does not every creature like a soft, warm place to rest?” Castiel replies. He rests his head upon his forelegs and looks at Dean with one glowing blue eye as his tail winds neatly around him. He looks a bit like a giant cat, honestly. “Enjoy the shelter I have granted you, Dean Winchester. Tomorrow you must leave.”
“How kind of you.”
Castiel opens his eye again. “I could still eat you.”
“Weren’t you saying that you were full?” Dean asks. But just in case, he hastily grabs some of the soft blankets and makes his own nest, tucking them around his legs and shoulders and rolling up others into a soft rest for his head. No need to tempt fate, and hopefully Castiel will be reluctant to set fire to his own bed while he sleeps in it. Hopefully anyways.
Then again, Dean does remember Sam blabbering one time that dragons were hatched in fire, so, maybe not.
“I believe you humans call it a midnight craving,” Castiel says, but that great blue eye is closed again, and even that thunderous voice sounds . . . softened, somehow. Dean might even call it sleepy. “Good night, Dean Winchester.”
“G’night, Cas.”
The human offered company and the dragon offered treasure.
Dean wakes up the next morning to an empty chamber and a growling stomach. Well, more accurately, he flails awake after remembering the whole terrible flying ordeal and then goes instantly still upon the thought of accidentally waking a dragon who might be an angry sleeper, but it all turns out to be for nothing. Aside from heaps of blankets and robes, the chamber is silent and still and, now without a giant dragon, rather empty.
“I guess that’s my cue to leave,” Dean mutters.
As he fights his way free of the blankets, he keeps an eye out for any gold or jewels. It’s not like he’s stupid enough to steal from a dragon who was his host for the night, but, well, Castiel did say he would kick him out this morning, which means Dean can come back when he isn’t a guest and –
Honestly, probably be barbecued.
Dean does not find gold or jewels or any kind of treasure. However, when he gets close enough to the still faintly glowing walls, he sees that the blankets and robes he’s been clambering all over are no mere peasant robes. They are fine indeed, woven with high quality wool and cloth, and some even have expensive gold filigree and delicate handmade lace. It makes Dean feel a little bad for tracking mud all over them, but it’s not like he can stash them in his pocket. And he’d likely be arrested as a thief if he tried to sell them. At least gold can be melted down.
A rush of air and a thump signals the return of Castiel. When Dean looks up, the dragon is licking at his leg. He is also –
“Are you wet?”
“I took a bath,” Castiel replies, sounding extremely unconcerned.
“There’s no way you fit in any stream around here.”
“Then it’s a good thing that I do not use a stream.”
Dean waits for a few minutes, but Castiel keeps just licking at his leg. When he finishes, he arches his neck and starts nosing at his closest wing, as if he doesn’t care at all that Dean clearly was engaging in the conversation because he wanted an answer.
Dean sighs. “Okay, I’ll bite. Where does a giant dragon bathe?”
Castiel lowers his wing, his blue eye glinting at Dean like he’s smirking. “Why, in an underground spring, of course. Would you like to see?”
“Oh, I’m going to do a little more than just sightsee, Cas, even if I end up freezing.”
“It’s heated.”
“Then by all means lead the – hey! No more flying!” Dean shouts, dodging the giant claw that swipes in his direction. He barely misses too; Dean can feel the coolness of bone sliding over his hair as he ducks.
Castiel grumbles. “But you humans walk so slowly.”
“Unless you want me to vomit some more, we are walking.”
The heated spring is amazing. Gorgeous. Out of this world. Dean may actually coo at it as he hastily shucks his shirt and shoves down his pants. Castiel probably gets to see a bit more of human anatomy than he wants, but, well, he just stared unblinkingly when Dean tried to gesture for privacy, so it’s not his fault.
“Oh my god,” Dean moans after dipping his hair. “This is the best thing that has ever happened to me.”
Castiel lays down next to the pool, clearly amused. “I thought I was the worst thing that ever happened.”
“Oh, you are. But this? This almost makes up for it.”
“Hmm.” Castiel yawns, giving Dean another glimpse into that massive maw of death, and then flicks his tail until it lands in the pool with a splash. Over Dean’s splutters, he says, “This spring is why I chose to make this cave my nest. It is convenient, to say the least. And it keeps everything rather warm, even in the dead of winter.”
“Do you know where the source is?”
“Yes.”
“ . . . Are you going to enlighten me?”
“Does it matter?”
Dean shrugs. “Not really. But I bet Sam would go nuts trying to wring every little detail out of you.”
“And Sam is?”
Castiel’s voice is curious and lazy, like a well fed cat sunning in warmth who is curious what the smell is. It still makes Dean stiffen a little bit, though, to hear his brother’s name on a dragon’s tongue. He didn’t even mean to say it; it just slipped out. Too late to take it back now.
“Sam’s, uh, my brother.”
“Brother? Ah, yes. Hatch-mate, we would call them.”
“You have a lot of them?”
“A dozen or so. A standard clutch for a dragon,” Castiel explains, noticing the way Dean’s eyes pop wide open. “Is that not so for humans?”
Dean laughs. “Uh, definitely not. Hazel, the butcher’s kid, she had twins last winter. That was a lot to handle. Although I heard some poor lad’s wife in Riverside popped out three kids, once.”
“Only three? So few.”
Dean dunks his head again, just to feel the delicious spill of warmth over his shoulders, and then he paddles to the edge of the spring. He rests his elbows on the edge, staring at Castiel’s giant eye, and says, “Don’t dragons only breed like . . . once every ten years, though?”
“I thought you said you knew little of my kind.”
“I don’t. Sam knows a lot, though, the little snot. Sometimes it rubs off on me.”
Castiel huffs. “Yes, we come into season very rarely. And only upon maturity. Why? Do you humans breed more often?”
“Uh, yeah. Like all the time. I mean, a kid usually takes like a year or so to . . . I dunno, bake or something, but Sarah had a baby last year and she’s about to have another in the fall.”
“How very interesting.”
The conversation veers away from babies and breeding before they get any further, much to Dean’s relief. The mention of baking gets Castiel’s interest, and although Dean rarely has the goods necessary to bake, he can shift the conversation to cooking, which he has far more experience on – and, apparently, opinions.
“No way, Cas, a little bit of pink in the meat is definitely the way to go.”
“But aren’t you concerned about illness resulting from uncooked meat?”
Dean rolls his eyes. “You’re a dragon, what illness can you possibly get?” he points out. “And also, I’m still alive, so clearly I’ve been doing okay on the meat front.”
“Or you have a particularly strong constitution.”
Dean levels a finger at the dragon. It’s probably not at all menacing, given that one of Castiel’s teeth is bigger, but after butting heads so many times with Sam, it’s instinct. “Listen, you, we’re gonna settle this here and now. You got meat?”
“I am a dragon.”
“You got someplace I can cook?”
“I do not always eat outside.”
“Then I’m about to blow your mind,” Dean declares smugly.
Dean puts his hands on the ledge and heaves himself up – and then just as abruptly drops back down, sending a wave of water on the floor. The water splashes up against Castiel, who snorts. On the bright side, the resulting smoke from the flame meeting water does make Dean feel better about tiptoeing back while naked and sopping wet to find some clothes. On the other hand, he coughs the whole way.
He’s actually still coughing a little bit when Castiel unceremoniously dumps a huge hunk of meat in the room that he apparently usually drags extra kills back to. The floor is covered in bones and ash, and Dean determinedly doesn’t look too closely at any of them.
Dean looks at the hunk of meat, which is bigger than his entire torso, and then back at Castiel. “I’m gonna need a smaller piece, buddy.”
Castiel grumbles and stalks forward. He extends one giant paw and slices a claw through the middle, as efficient as a sword. Using his teeth, he drags one part closer to him, but he uses his paw to push the other towards Dean.
“I will cook mine,” Castiel tells him, “and you will cook yours. Then we will decide.”
Dean is pretty sure the contest is rigged, mostly because all Castiel has to do is open his mouth and barbeque the crap out of his section of meat. Dean has to sadly stare at his bloodied section until Castiel takes pity on him, wanders off, and returns with wood that he helpfully sets aflame and a giant spear, which Dean sharpens into a spit.
“Why do you have a spear?” Dean asks, carefully turning the meat over the fire.
Castiel blinks. “Knights have come after me before. They do not realize their weapons cannot pierce my scales, but I admire their attempt.”
“What, uh, happened afterwards?”
“I eat them alive, of course.”
Dean stops and stares. He’s pretty sure his mouth is open wide enough to catch several flies.
Castiel laughs so hard that he starts sneezing, and Dean has to yelp and dart away as sparks fly all over the place. He doesn’t set anything on fire, fortunately, but by the time he’s stopped huffing and puffing over his little joke, Dean’s meat is a little more cooked than he intended. He has to rescue it, cursing as the hot spear burns his fingertips until Castiel reaches past him and paws it onto the ground.
“It is . . . passable,” Castiel judges, after taking a bite bigger than Dean’s head.
“It is amazing,” Dean retorts, stuffing his mouth with the piece Castiel had helpfully sliced off off him. “I mean, usually I put seasonings, but your piece is burned, Cas, admit it.”
“That is how dragons eat.”
“Or maybe that’s how you eat.”
They both have a good laugh at that. And Dean definitely notices that Castiel devours Dean’s cooked meat faster than he eats his own, but he manfully resists pointing it out. No sense poking a dragon too many times, after all.
When they’ve eaten everything and are sprawled on the ground, Castiel says, “This was most enjoyable. I thank you, Dean.”
“Good food, good company,” Dean replies. “That’s what I live for.”
“I must thank you properly,” Castiel says, and promptly belches loud enough to wake the dead.
“Uh, if that’s a thank you. . .”
“No. But this is.”
Castiel shuffles his wings and flicks his paw, and something sparkly rolls across the ashen floor towards Dean. It bumps gently into his elbow. Dean grumbles and twists and picks it up, which is when he realizes it’s a diamond the size of his fist. It’s roughly cut but it’s sizeable; Dean has no doubt it would fetch an amazing price at any market.
“Cas, I can’t – I can’t take this.”
Castiel tilts his head. “You have given me the pleasure of your company. You have taught me about your kind’s ways and cooked me a meal. I must offer you something in return.”
“It was just a conversation, Cas.”
“This is the most I have conversed with another creature in a long time.”
And, well, Dean doesn’t need to know a lot about dragons to read between the lines of that. He props himself up on his elbows, looking at Castiel again – at his large blue eyes, his sharp gleaming claws, his relaxed wings. He’s a fearsome dragon, for sure, but now Dean sees that he is also a lonely one.
“This is the most I’ve talked to someone in a long time too,” Dean admits, because one truth deserves another. “I, uh, normally people like Sammy better.”
“I do not wish to converse with Sam. I like conversing with you.”
An idea sparks in Dean’s mind. It’s reckless and stupid and probably going to get Dean killed, but –
“How about we make this conversing thing like . . . an arrangement?” Dean asks.
Castiel lifts his head. “In what sense?”
“Well, I can’t go back home, cuz I’d be killed,” Dean says, miming a sword blow across his neck. “And I’m not really looking forward to trying to set up a new life in a new town. And you apparently haven’t had a decent person to talk to in ages. So . . . well . . . what if I stayed, and kept talking to you?”
“In exchange for?”
“One day I will make you concede that my cooking is better,” Dean threatens. “But, uh, also my brother wants to go to university in the capital and that’s really expensive. And this gem here? It could probably get him off to a good start.”
Castiel pushes himself to his feet. He pads over, silent despite his weight, until he is standing right over Dean. His giant blue eyes bore into Dean’s, like he’s measuring the weight of his soul, and that pink tongue flicks out again, tasting the air. Dean holds his breath, but he doesn’t break eye contact – mostly because he doesn’t want to be eaten for a sudden movement, but more importantly because he means it and he wills Castiel to see that.
A rumble thrums through Castiel’s chest. “You are sincere in this.”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Your heated spring is awesome,” Dean says. Then he sobers up. “It seems like a win all around for me. You get to chat with something other than thin air. I get a nice warm home. And my brother gets to chase his biggest dream. Not seeing any downsides, here.”
“I am not exactly the easiest creature to live with, I am told.”
“I think you’re a nerd with wings,” Dean says, remembering how Castiel had perked up with interest over any human fact Dean could provide, “and I’ve survived living with my nerd brother for all these years. Plus in my opinion, you’re pretty cool, Cas.”
Castiel rears back, confusion written all over his face. “I am a fire-breathing dragon. How could I be cool?”
“Yeah, we’ll get along just fine.”
The dragon offered the sky and the human offered the earth.
Dean isn’t really sure what Castiel does with the gems he picks out and the letters Dean writes. It’s not like Castiel can wander into the nearest trading post and send the letter, because he wouldn’t even fit in most of them, but every month, like clockwork, Dean writes Sam a note and rolls it up around whatever precious gem or hunk of gold Castiel picks up and Castiel takes it in his claws and returns with a letter for Dean.
The letters start off threatening to beat Dean silly for pretending to his definitely dead brother, but Sam starts believing Dean real quick when he mentions a few embarrassing childhood stories. Then they veer towards begging Dean to run, anger and confusion when Dean refuses, and finally, at last, to some tentative interest about what it is like living with a dragon.
Like today’s letter, for example, which asks Dean how Castiel steers while flying.
Dean looks at Castiel, who is currently sunning himself at the cave entrance and snoring loud enough to wake a hibernating ice troll, and decides Sam can wait for that answer.
On the whole, though, Castiel is a very nice housemate. Unlike someone Dean could mention, Castiel does not demand rabbit food greens at every meal and scowl if Dean refuses; Castiel is a carnivore through and through, and is always pleased to bring Dean new meat to try. Castiel does snore, but Sam did too, so that’s not a change. And Castiel is perhaps a little bemused by Dean’s habit of singing possibly off-key tunes as he wanders around, but he never complains. One time he even started thumping his tail to keep the beat.
That doesn’t even cover the amazing thing that is Castiel’s house. For the hot springs alone, Dean would sell his soul, but the bedroom – a giant nest of blankets and robes and pillows that covers the whole floor – is a close second. Plus Castiel has treasure scattered everywhere, so Dean has been able to poke and marvel at new things every day.
And Castiel is just, well. Interesting. He has the driest sense of humor Dean’s ever come across, he has no concept at all of human society or rules – Dean once had to explain in awkward and intense and very embarrassing detail that no you do not watch when your friend uses the privy, Castiel, why do dragons even do that – and he sometimes forgets that Dean is a squishy, flammable human being, but he’s warm when he curls around Dean in the nest to sleep, and he always answers Dean’s questions, and whenever he laughs so hard that he snorts fire, Dean is filled with a sense of pride and awe.
Mostly pride, though, because Castiel is still startled enough whenever he laughs about the whole “fire coming out with laughs” that Dean knows he rarely laughed before Dean came around.
A loud snort echoes through the entry. Dean smiles as Castiel uncurls from his repose and pads off, scales sparking in the sun.
“I’m telling you, you look just like a cat when you sleep,” Dean tells him, because it’s their most recent and most fervent debate.
“I am not a cat,” Castiel says, flashing his fearsome teeh. Or, they would be fearsome, if Castiel hadn’t gotten a sheep bone stuck in them two weeks ago and Dean hadn’t spent an hour swearing and sweating to lever it out. “I could swallow a cat whole.”
“You’d hate the fluff.”
Castiel grumbles as he settles around Dean, curling back up like a damn cat again. He can’t argue, because he truly does hate eating fluff or feathers, which is why Dean usually takes on the duty of skinning whatever they’re eating. He’s gotten several really nice caches of furs and feathers from it.
“What does Sam wish to know this time?” Castiel asks.
He also nudges Dean’s free hand, in a move he probably thinks is subtle. Unfortunately, there really isn’t much a giant dragon can do subtly, but Dean still raises his hand and scritches at Castiel’s crest until those glittering blue eyes slide shut with contentment.
“How you steer yourself while flying.”
“Hmm. It’s . . . not something I’ve thought about.”
“You don’t think when you’re doing sky acrobatics?”
“Do you think when you’re running or walking?” Castiel retorts, which is fair enough. “I just. Know where I wish to soar and do so.”
“Sam won’t be satisfied with that.”
“Sam is your brother, not mine.”
Dean snorts. Castiel’s tone is dry and irritable, but he also spent two months pawing through his massive library to find the one book Sam was hunting down and used Dean as a scribe to relay his firsthand experience at some battle Sam was learning about, so he has no room to talk. Nerds, the both of them.
He dips his quill in some ink and begins to write down Castiel’s answer, and a few pleasant moments pass in silence, Castiel rumbling at his side and the cool breeze ruffling Dean’s hair.
Then: “Perhaps – Perhaps if you flew with you, you could give your brother a firsthand account.”
Dean, in the middle of going for more ink, misses entirely and stabs himself in the thigh. He swears.
“I didn’t think that suggestion warranted such foul language.”
“It absolutely does,” Dean says fervently.
Castiel raises his head, dislodging Dean’s hand and fixing him with one brilliant sapphire eye. It’s ceased to be terrifying, being the focus of Castiel’s attention, but it still takes Dean’s breath away when Castiel does it.
“Why?”
“What, you’ve forgotten how I vomited and passed out the last time we flew?”
Castiel blinks slowly. Huh. Maybe he has.
“But that was when I carried you, so you had nothing supporting your legs. If you ride on my back, you may not feel the need to decorate my home with your half-digested dinner.”
Or not.
Dean levels his quill at Castiel’s eye. “First off, that’s rude. Second off, still no.”
“I wouldn’t let you fall.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Dean takes a deep breath. He thinks back to that first night: the sheer blinding terror that had swallowed him, the moment when Castiel had flown off and the ground had fallen away from Dean’s feet as though an earthquake had crumbled the very foundations of the world, his legs dangling about in the wind as his mind conjured images of just how badly it would hurt if he plunged back down the countless feet and shattered every bone in his body. At that point, he had almost wished that Castiel had eaten him.
Castiel makes a soft sound. “You smell strange.”
“Excuse you, I bathed this morning so – ”
“You smell scared,” Castiel interrupts.
Dean looks back down at his half written letter. There are ink droplets splattered all over from the quill he’s got half-forgotten in one hand, and the bottom is wrinkled from where he’s worried at the parchment. He’ll have to redo the whole thing.
“I need to go find more parchment,” Dean says, and pushes himself away from Castiel’s warm protective circle to do just that.
Castiel does not bring up the flying thing again, thank the gods. The next time he finds Dean, he has two elk dangling from his jaws, so Dean can get out his aggression at skinning them and tanning the hides and hacking apart sections of meat to be salted, dried, or eaten tonight. It’s hard work, but it’s just what he needs.
Castiel doesn’t even comment that he isn’t humming. He just curls up in the back and rumbles a wordless melody that slowly, gently settles the roiling pit of unease in Dean’s stomach.
Because fear is not something a hunter should feel, Dean knows this, John beat fear out of him when he was still young enough that a dagger took up his whole arm – but Dean was afraid, when Castiel showed up; he was afraid, when Castiel opened his great jaws above his head; and he was afraid, when Castiel plucked him up and spread his wings and flew.
Fear had paralyzed his limbs, upset his stomach, and wrecked havoc on his mind.
John would have beaten him.
Dean lifts a heavy hide and drapes it carefully over the cord he’s strung up. Castiel obligingly shifts his tail out of the way, still rumbling.
John would have beaten him, Dean knows, moving onto the next hide, but Castiel – Castiel has shown him nothing but acceptance and kindness. He hasn’t pressed Dean at all. He has laughed at Dean and teased him, but one time Dean tripped and nearly fell down the stairs to the hot springs, and Castiel had whipped around and grabbed him with one swipe of his tail and held him steady and close until his heartbeat steadied. He’d even followed Dean down like a puppy afterwards, and watched him bathe to make sure he was okay.
Dean knows that Castiel is not John, but still, sometimes . . . he has to remind himself.
“I’m scared of flying,” Dean says, pointedly not looking at Castiel.
He hears the telltale shifting of scales as Castiel moves. Castiel replies, “That is sensible, given that you cannot fly.”
“Fear is not sensible for a hunter. We have to master our fear,” Dean says tightly, “or we end up dead.”
“The first step to mastering fear is to acknowledge it. Is that not what you have done?”
“That’s not enough,” Dean says, although he’s sure Castiel can hear the unspoken truth: I’m not enough.
“You were scared of me, when we first met; I could smell it in your sweat, hear it in your heartbeat, see it in your eyes.” Castiel’s voice is calm and even, as if he is counting treasure and not prying Dean’s very being apart to peer in the cracks. “Yet you still held your head high. And you even insulted me.”
Dean sighs. “What’s your point, Cas?”
Castiel unwinds himself and pads closer, soft as he is capable of. He nudges at Dean’s shoulder until Dean turns around, and by instinct Dean cradles his massive jaw and scritches, igniting a rumble of contentment. Castiel licks at his still bloody hands.
“My point,” Castiel says quietly, “is that you were already enough. Being afraid does not make you less, Dean. It just makes you alive.”
Dean isn’t sure how long he stands there. But Castiel never breaks eye contact, and he never stops purring, and maybe, just maybe, Dean might even start to believe him.
Maybe.
Sam doesn’t mention flying again. Castiel doesn’t either, and Dean definitely doesn’t.
Still, he catches himself trotting up alongside Castiel whenever he leaves to go flying, and he finds himself making excuses to be there when Castiel lands. His eyes are caught on the way Castiel heaves himself upwards, wings churning up gusts of air, tail lashing until it steadies out, the graceful turns and whirls as he seeks prey. His dreams are full of disjointed snippets of the ground falling away and the clouds brushing his skin, but he feels no fear; only raw joy and amazement.
At first, he tells himself every day that he has no interest in flying, that he’s only being polite and welcoming Castiel home.
The words grow a little less convincing with every day.
And then Castiel gives him the cloak.
Dean gapes, when Castiel spreads it on the floor. It gleams in the fire light, colors rippling as though it is alive, and Dean would know that color anywhere, after months spent sleeping under Castiel’s wings and, sometimes, scrubbing blood off of Castiel’s sides.
“These are your scales?”
Castiel shuffles his front paws, as if embarrassed. “I shed them fairly regularly,” is all he says.
The scales are arranged like the finest feather lined cloak, each overlapping to form one smooth length of material. The scales are hard on one side – Dean thinks, distantly, that they could probably deflect a direct sword blow – but softer and more malleable on the inside of the cloak. And they’re warm, even though Castiel fished his gift out of some strange little hole in the wall Dean didn’t even notice existed, high above his head where only a dragon standing on his hind legs could reach it.
“Cas,” Dean says, and then nothing else. What can he say?
Castiel’s tongue darts out, a flash of pink in the dark. “I wove it for you,” he says, painfully earnest. “Do you . . . like it?”
Dean’s gotten gifts before, of course. An amulet for protection, his first sword, a fruit laden cake. He’s never gotten a gift that someone literally spent what must have been weeks gathering pieces of himself to fashion Dean a gift that might not exist anywhere else in the entire world, not even for Dean’s nameday, just because he wanted to.
“It’s the best thing I’ve ever gotten,” Dean tells Castiel, and if his eyes water, well. It is a little smoky, sometimes, in the caves.
Castiel lights up. It’s adorable. “The scales will deflect all but the hardest blows,” he says. “And it will keep you warm even the harshest of winters. And . . . it has one other . . . benefit.”
“Which is?”
“Put it on, and you shall see.”
“I don’t like it when you’re cryptic,” Dean says, but he grins and dons the cloak anyways. It is unfairly warm and utterly silken on the inside, and when Dean threads the knot around his neck, he finds it is the perfect height and length. He twirls a few times, causing an appreciative rumble to emanate from Castiel, and then stops. “So, what’s this special benefit?”
“Say these words.” Followed by an avalanche of sounds in what Dean suspects is the dragon speech.
It takes Dean a few tries, but he manages it. And when he does –
When he does, the cloak goes cold as ice, for a second, and then turns blistering hot. Not enough to burn, just very, very warm, and when Dean turns his head to see if he should be concerned, he finds that the cloak is a little bit bigger than he remembers. And a little differently shaped. And also that the cloak is now –
“Are those wings?”
“You were scared of flying on me,” Castiel says. “I thought, perhaps, you would be less afraid if you were in control of the flight.”
Dean barely registers Castiel’s words. He stares in awe at the wings now stretching from his shoulders. They aren’t the pure black of Castiel’s scales; they are a little softer, right in between the silver of steel and the opaque cloudiness of dark fog. But they obligingly shift and twitch as Dean thinks about moving them, and when he raises them both and flaps, the papers behind him go fluttering into the air.
And, well, there’s only one thing Dean can say about this gift.
“You’ve been holding out on me if you could magic this whole time,” he tells Castiel, who snorts so loudly in laughter that he nearly sets Dean’s new wings aflame.
Flying is, in fact, absolutely amazing when Dean gets to be the one in control.
Landing, on the other hand . . .
“God, Cas, imagine if you’d gouged a hole in my new cloak on day one,” Dean says, turning it over and searching for any sign of damage after Castiel had had to hastily snatch him out of the sky before Dean became a Dean-splat on the mountain face.
Castiel snorts. “As if my scales could be so easily damaged.”
Castiel is, as usual, correct. Dean finds not even the slightest scratch on the woven scales, and so he sets it aside with a grateful pat and sinks deeper into waters of the heated spring. Flying with his cloak is mostly powered by magic and will, so it doesn’t exactly require physical effort, but Dean is still a squishy human meant to get around with his own two legs and perhaps a horse, so he is finding new and interesting aches as he scrubs off every single fly that went splat on his face during his brief flight.
Eventually, though, he is clean and warm and comfortable, so he leans back against the wall of the spring with a contended groan. Castiel, who is submerged at the deeper end of the pool, looks equally content, his eyes half-lidded and his tail lazily swishing in the water. In his current state, he looks more like a dozing cat than an enormous fire-breathing lizard who could bite Dean in half without blinking.
Dean wonders, absently, when he stopped being afraid of Castiel. When he stopped flinching and cringing and hesitating, and when he started admiring and desiring.
When he started loving.
Because the thing is: Dean doesn’t get presents a lot. They don’t have a lot of money to spare, and Dean usually encourages Sam to spend what little they have on gifts for Jessica, because their romance is super sweet and Sam is an old-fashioned romantic at heart. Castiel’s gift is beyond anything Dean could have ever dreamed of, but he knows Castiel wasn’t intending to dazzle him. Castiel simply just wanted to give him joy.
And, well, Dean’s a simple man.
“Hey, Cas,” Dean says, waiting for one big blue eye to focus on him.
“Yes, Dean?”
Dean hesitates for a moment before he pushes off the wall and wades deeper. The pool is deep enough for Dean to drown, if he didn’t know how to swim, but Castiel moves his tail over and Dean uses that to propel himself close. Out of habit, Dean scritches under Castiel’s jaw, and the resulting purr sends ripples spreading throughout the water.
“Thank you,” Dean tells Castiel, trying to imbue everything he feels in his chest into those two words.
Castiel presses against his hands and purrs louder. “I am glad you liked it,” he says. “I disliked seeing you afraid. Of anything.”
“Aw. Are you going to fight all my nightmares for me?” Dean teases.
“I’ll burn anything that threatens you,” Castiel replies, and his tone is serious as his flames are hot. His tail winds around Dean’s waist and one of his wings flares open, half warning and half protection. “You will never have anything to be scared of again.”
Dean opens his mouth. Shuts it.
He thinks of Castiel’s gentle grip when he carried Dean home, how he gave him food and clothing and a warm bath, his endless tolerance for Dean’s commentary on how he eats and his home. He thinks of how Castiel shared the feast meant to accompany Dean’s own flesh. He thinks of how Castiel gathered up his own scales and wove them into a cloak for Dean so he could fly.
He looks down at Castiel, curled warm and protective around him like a living fire, purring under Dean’s hands, and how he never lies because he thinks the human habit of doing so is silly.
Dean says, “You can’t – You can’t promise that.”
“Can’t I?” Castiel rumbles, flashing sharp white teeth and a hint of sparks.
Ever since his mother died, Dean has been the protector, the caretaker, the maker of promises. To hear Castiel vow so casually to do the same for him –
Dean kisses him, before he can stop to think, and learns two things.
One, dragon sparks taste rather like spices, sharp and tangy.
Two, when a human loves a dragon – truly, deeply, wholly loves a dragon – a kiss can have unexpected side effects.
Like giving a dragon human form.
“Oh,” Castiel says, blinking at Dean as he wobbles in the pool, with two long legs brushing against Dean’s and two hands with claws clutching at Dean’s waist and two gorgeous blue eyes squinting against the light, “you love me.”
“Yes,” Dean says dumbly. “Of course I do.”
Castiel smiles at him, and his teeth are just as sharp and white in human form as they are in dragon form. “I’m glad to know my love is reciprocated,” he tells Dean, casual as the summer breeze, and kisses him some more.
Epilogue
“Do we . . . really need all of that?” Castiel asks, poking suspiciously at the bundle of furs and clothes Dean is trying to squash into the pack he’s sewn out of various bolts of cloth he’s found around the cave. “This seems like a lot.”
Dean rolls his eyes. Castiel has asked this question at least ten times over various different supplies, almost like he’s forgotten that they’ll be traveling on foot instead of by wing.
“Yes, Cas,” he says patiently, finally succeeding in his quest to stuff the pack full. “Going on foot takes a lot longer than flying, so we’ll be spending lots of nights camping outside. Therefore, we are going to need and want lots of stuff to keep us warm.”
Castiel huffs. It’s strange to hear that familiar sound without seeing the accompanying sparks or smoke, but in his human form, Castiel doesn’t have the ability to make fire.
“I still don’t understand why you won’t let fly you down,” Castiel grumps, trailing after Dean like a duckling. “Then this journey would take minutes instead of weeks.”
“Because people do not like dragons.”
“I don’t look like a dragon in this form.”
Castiel isn’t wrong, of course. He looks like any other normal human man: blue eyes, tousled dark hair, skin only slightly tanned by the sun. But Dean also knows that in the dark, Castiel’s eyes reflect the light like a cat, and his dark hair hides tiny spiraling horns, and his skin bears a few patches of shimmering dragon scales. And, of course, Castiel can’t talk like a normal human to save his life.
“I would like to visit Sam without causing an incident,” Dean says patiently. “So. We’re going to do it my way, okay?”
Castiel grumbles, but when Dean nudges his shoulder, Castiel sighs and obligingly picks up the packs Dean shoves at him. At least his dragon strength carried over to his human form, although this does mean that Castiel has a tendency to rip his clothes if he isn’t careful.
“We’ll do it your way,” Castiel agrees. “As I showed you the sky – ”
“ – let me show you the earth,” Dean finishes, and kisses him sweetly. “Now come on, husband mine.”
Once upon a time, a human and a dragon met in a field. The dragon gave shelter and the human gave knowledge. The human gave company and the dragon gave treasure.
The dragon gave his human the sky and the human gave his dragon the earth.
And they lived happily ever after.
FINIS