The Soul Burns Brighter Than The Sun

Chapter 21: Fiddle of Gold

tw's: gore. violence. fighting etc.

Castiel burns. He spent hours with Dean just moments ago, and yet he mourns them like the memories they now are. He loves touching Dean, not even in those innocuous ways—oh, the way Dean keens for him—but just a hand on the shoulder, a tracing of Dean's freckle, feeling Dean's hand in his, feeling Dean's chest move with each of his breaths that keep the man alive. Castiel is blessed to feel him, to know him at all, to touch him, however, fills him with such blasphemous joy that the very earth shakes with it, that his body is not equipped with containing.

Sweetheart is what Dean calls him, and every time it falls from Dean's lips like honey, something unfurls inside Castiel. It's bloodthirsty, and foreign, and sugary, and everything that Castiel fought against feeling. It's ravenous and it tugs at Castiel's chest and grace, pulling him forward. One touch more, one more kiss.

Their love is exactly what causes Castiel to live, just as it is exactly what brought about God's destruction.

"You know what every other version of you did after 'gripping him tight and raising him from perdition?'" Chuck shouts, voice like blades in Castiel's chest. "He did what he was told."

For a while after hearing those words, Castiel could not understand the swirling of emotions inside him. He is grateful that his love for Dean allows him freedom, he is gloriously full of gratitude that he is given the chance to. But is it chance? Is it choice? Castiel cannot tell.

If Castiel was destined to fall from the beginning, he would've fallen in every universe, in every version that exists a Castiel and a Dean Winchester, Castiel would have loved him, and it would've been enough to save them all, like Castiel once saved Dean.

But Castiel did not come off the line with a crack in his chassis. He was forged by God's hands, destined to be a soldier, to follow Heaven's orders and never question. He thinks of his Apocalypse Universe self, with blood on his hands, much like Castiel's own palms. He remembers his eyes, blurry with needles and an accent that sounds less like talking and more like he's forgotten how to speak, how to form words of his own that aren't planted there. They had cut off his wings, grounding him, putting him below the rest of the angels, a grunt, a torturer, a soldier. Castiel had killed him, but not without pitying him. This was a being without love.

In a way, Castiel feels honored to be able to love Dean in this universe. He knows that a universe where he is allowed to love Dean openly is a universe he never imagined that would exist, and he is grateful above all else, and he will not squander it.

Castiel is familiar with the unyielding darkness of The Empty. He knows it well, the heavy sliding of darkness over his skin and wings, the suffocating thick and nonexistent air that Castiel doesn't need to breathe but does anyways because it calms him. Castiel knows The Empty, he resided here after his deaths for long enough that the weight of nothing on his shoulders and the sand of abyss under his shoes fails to disorient him as he steps through the vast nothingness.

This is not The Empty that Castiel knows. This Empty is broken. There is a sickening smoke wrapping around Castiel's wings and invading his lungs. It is... it is warm here, and yet, still cold.

He looks down at himself, expecting to see his soul glowing in his chest, but there is no light. For a moment, Castiel panics, but no—his soul is still there, etched and wrapped through his grace. It seems that Castiel can control it now, that he has mastered it's call.

He chose his trench coat for this occasion, not for the fashion statement that Dean tries to make it out to be, teasing him with talk of how Castiel resembles a "holy tax accountant," but because it wraps around his shoulders and back like a hug. In this realm, where there is nothing to feel but deprivation of every sense, Castiel can shift his arms and feel the starchy fabric of his longest friend.