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srs2012_r3Summary: In all of history, there have only been three heavenly civil wars, and Castiel has taken part in all of them. By now, he thinks he knows their cost, but doing what is right always comes at a price.
Word Count: 2031
Characters: Balthazar, Castiel, Anna Milton(Ananchel)
Pairings: Balthazar/Castiel
Tags: Allusions to character death.
The home was more opulent than Cas expected it to be; Balthazar had always been whimsical but not to the extent of extravagance. His brother was a soldier, through and through, like he was, but this was not the home of a soldier. There was nothing that suggested Balthazar had ever been there and Cas was beginning to worry that Raphael had used the memory of his brother to lure him into a trap. Weariness settled into his bones, brittle and human, just one more thread fraying and pulling him asunder; he wasn’t sure how many more pieces he could afford to lose before he came apart all together.
A low thrumming beat vibrating through the floorboards guided Cas to the only room with any sign of inhabitance. Lights flashed to the beat of the music, bathing the room in garish colours that glinted off the polished wood floor. Absurdly, Cas remembered the woman Dean had paid for him and stood frozen at the remembered embarrassment.
The door shut behind him in his split second distraction and Cas didn’t bother feeling for the grace of whoever closed it, reaching for his blade instead. On instinct, he turned to the door, but the voice came from behind him.
“Cas. You’re here.”
It was not the voice he recognized; it was the tone, the lilt in his speech, the affection in the way his name was spoken. There was no way Raphael could duplicate that.
“Balthazar.”
Their reunion was not what Cas wanted. He wanted to shed the skin that held him in place, pull Balthazar from his, to wholly feel his brother’s grace radiating all around him. But war made that impossible, and hedonism had twisted his brother, and Cas could feel one more piece starting to fray.
“What is all this? What are you doing?”
“Whatever I want. This morning I had a ménage à -- what's French for 12?”
Cas tried not to think too hard on what Balthazar had been doing while he mourned, changing the subject instead.
“You stole the Staff of Moses?”
“Sure, sure. I stole a lot of things.”
Balthazar gave him a significant look and Cas felt himself twist inside his vessel.
“You were a great and honourable soldier. We fought together.”
“Yes, too many times to count.”
The last time he, Balthazar, and Raphael had been involved in a civil war, it had taken place on earth.
Cas could remember the taste of the sand in his mouth after Raphael buried their brother Azazel beneath the sands, where he would later twist his way into hell. They stayed in tents in the desert, careful not to allow the Grigori or their children out of sight, all of them longing for home.
“I hear the sun will burn you if you stay outside for too long, Cassie.” Balthazar’s teeth shone white against the dark skin of his vessel.
“Whatever injuries I sustain from the elements are healed easily enough.” Balthazar’s laughter was deep and booming and he pulled Cas into their tent in spite of his protests.
“Save your grace for the war and sit with me for a while. Ananchel is still with Raphael, planning our next move.” Their sister was the only one who could reason with the archangel; Cas never quite knew how she got along with Raphael so well, when he was so rigid and cold and she was brilliant and inviting.
Balthazar opened a container of water that had been half-buried by the shifting sands and poured it over his head, closing his eyes and sighing in satisfaction. He turned to Cas, then pulling him closer. “I noticed you were bleeding earlier. Let me see.”
In all honesty, Cas never realized he had been injured. It wasn’t a serious wound; none of the Nephilim they’d been fighting had the proper blades, but their Grigori fathers taught them how to use sigils that would render an angel incapable of healing certain wounds, like the one he’d sustained earlier. Balthazar picked at the torn tunic and frowned.
“You’re lucky it wasn’t a blade, Cas.” The elder offered no other comment, letting the sun-warmed water wash away the blood and sand. It stung, but the pain was not enough to merit using his power to deaden it.
The scent of ash was still in the air, and the blade felt heavy where it was strung on his belt, as though the blood of his brothers weighed as much as his guilt did. Even with Balthazar beside him, Cas longed for nothing but home.
Something soft and cool pulled Cas from the thoughts of his dead siblings, and he looked to find Balthazar’s lips pressed against his side. “It shouldn’t become infected; I would hate for you to have to find a new vessel.” He could feel each word against his skin as his brother spoke, sending a shock of goosebumps all the way down his arms.
“…thank you.” Something about Balthazar’s dark eyes glinting up at him rendered Cas speechless, so he just leaned into him and fixed his gaze back outside the tent. The distance was nothing but a haze, clouds of dust tinted black, darker where the wind spread the ash of a brother’s wings through the sand. Cas had been jealous of the Grigori once, for their proximity to the humans; he never imagined loving the mortals so much, as his siblings did, would earn the same punishment as the one brother who reviled them above all else.
Thinking on that previous war, Cas remembered thinking nothing of the queer methods of affection Balthazar had picked up from watching humankind. He knew better now, and his heart ached for all the time they had lost.
As much as he loved Balthazar, betrayals and the cruelty of his own kind made Cas too suspicious to trust him, and they each went their own way; Balthazar to his hedonism, Cas to his war.
It wasn’t until weeks later, exhausted and falling to pieces, that Cas sought his brother out.
“I need your help.”
Whatever Balthazar was drinking was strong enough to be smelled across the room; Cas wrinkled his nose in distaste. It reminded him of Dean.
“Cas. Of course; what can I do for you?” He looked tired, though it really only showed in the lines around his eyes.
“Aside from giving me the weapons? I need to distract Raphael.”
Balthazar’s background in coming up with daring tactical plans worked out in their favour; an alternate realm that rendered Virgil powerless bought them enough time to secure the arsenal in Cas’ favour right under Raphael’s nose.
“You should be celebrating, Cassie. It’s not every day one of us bests an archangel. Why not let your hair down a bit, hm? You should try the scotch, it’s vintage.” A crystal glass sloshed amber liquid near his face, but Cas shook his head.
“I have no time to celebrate, brother.”
Balthazar shrugged and swallowed the contents of the glass in one gulp.
“…thank you. For your help. It means a lot to me, and the weapons will be crucial.”
“I only wish it didn’t have to come to this. This war, Cas… it’s not going to end well. You could have just come with me. We could have been happy.” Reaching out, Balthazar cupped Cas’ cheek, his thumb following the line of stubble the younger hadn’t bothered to clean away. “I can make you happy.”
After watching countless old movies with Dean, Cas knew what was coming next before Balthazar could close the gap between them. Holding up his hand, he pulled back, turning his face away from his brother.
“I can’t. Not now.”
The only other time Balthazar looked at him the way he was now was when Ananchel told them Gabriel had fled; he masked it better this time, but the deep, crushing pain of the rejection was clear in his eyes.
“…I see.”
“No, Balthazar, listen to me. I have to end this, the world isn’t safe. If Raphael wins, everything I have sacrificed will have been for nothing. I don’t have time for anything else.” Feeling both bold and guilty, Cas mimicked his brother’s affection, taking his face in both hands. “I have learned a lot, being on earth. And just because I can’t right now, doesn’t mean I don’t want to. Can you understand that?”
Slowly, the hurt in Balthazar’s eyes faded, melting into a soft smile. “Of course. I’ve waited this long, I’m sure I can hold out. But Cas… don’t get yourself killed, all right?”
Bolstered by Balthazar’s support, the arsenal, and the promise of a future with his brother, Cas felt the tide of the war turning. He told himself it had nothing to do with Crowley’s breakthroughs, or the souls the king of hell offered, preferring to forget his deal and carry on by focusing on winning the war through his own merit and Balthazar’s tactical mind.
But given his track record, Cas told himself he shouldn’t have been surprised when it all came crumbling down. Suddenly, he knew how Lucifer must have felt when the brothers he loved turned their backs on him.
Heaven’s first civil war started as a rumble that evolved into quaking that would not stop. All of heaven shook from the force of impact between Michael and Lucifer, and all of heaven seemed to be in the Garden; heretics and virtuous alike, brother against brother, barely with any awareness of who was friend or foe or even what they were fighting for in the first place.
Cas was separated from his garrison, but he fought on anyway, struggling to make sense of the madness. When the tide of rage and sorrow he felt as strongly as his own grace suddenly vanished, he was allowed to mourn the passing of the Morningstar for just a moment before the next wave of Lucifer’s followers fell upon those still loyal to heaven.
It wasn’t until the war was almost over and he had been reunited with his garrison that Cas was able to make sense of it all. He stood with Ananchel while she prepared the bodies of those who had perished to be burned, staring at the ruin of their wings and feeling his own twitch in response, reminding him he was still alive.
“What happened, sister? I don’t understand, these are our brothers… why would they do such a thing?”
Ananchel never stopped her work; from the way she was shaking, Cas knew if she did, she may not be able to begin again.
“Some could not stand to see Lucifer suffer such an injustice alone. Their love for him blinded them to the truth, so they fought."
His older sister was exuding such sorrow that it was difficult to continue questioning her, but Cas had to know.
“But why? Lucifer’s crimes were well known to us, but no one said he was to be punished like this. Why would Michael do such a cruel thing? Why would any of them allow this to happen?”
Cas didn’t know the words to describe the hollow, haunted look his sister gave him then.
“Because sometimes we must make great sacrifices to do what is right.”
On the night of the eclipse, Cas stood alone in Crowley’s laboratory, facing overwhelming uncertainty. After all his careful planning, Dean had figured out his location anyway; he knew the Winchesters would either die or kill him to stop this, and he could not let either of those things happen. The stench of blood and the echoes of pain that still lingered in the air weren’t enough to distract him from what he would have to do unless, impossibly, he was wrong.
And never before had Cas prayed so hard to be wrong.
Balthazar arrived only minutes after he was called for. Cas reached out and bathed himself in his brother’s presence, promising himself he would never forget what his brother felt like.
“You rang, Cas?”
And then, he knew. In that instant, everything Cas had been came undone, and all he felt was emptiness.
”Sometimes, we must make great sacrifices to do what is right.”
Word Count: 2031
Characters: Balthazar, Castiel, Anna Milton(Ananchel)
Pairings: Balthazar/Castiel
Tags: Allusions to character death.
The home was more opulent than Cas expected it to be; Balthazar had always been whimsical but not to the extent of extravagance. His brother was a soldier, through and through, like he was, but this was not the home of a soldier. There was nothing that suggested Balthazar had ever been there and Cas was beginning to worry that Raphael had used the memory of his brother to lure him into a trap. Weariness settled into his bones, brittle and human, just one more thread fraying and pulling him asunder; he wasn’t sure how many more pieces he could afford to lose before he came apart all together.
A low thrumming beat vibrating through the floorboards guided Cas to the only room with any sign of inhabitance. Lights flashed to the beat of the music, bathing the room in garish colours that glinted off the polished wood floor. Absurdly, Cas remembered the woman Dean had paid for him and stood frozen at the remembered embarrassment.
The door shut behind him in his split second distraction and Cas didn’t bother feeling for the grace of whoever closed it, reaching for his blade instead. On instinct, he turned to the door, but the voice came from behind him.
“Cas. You’re here.”
It was not the voice he recognized; it was the tone, the lilt in his speech, the affection in the way his name was spoken. There was no way Raphael could duplicate that.
“Balthazar.”
Their reunion was not what Cas wanted. He wanted to shed the skin that held him in place, pull Balthazar from his, to wholly feel his brother’s grace radiating all around him. But war made that impossible, and hedonism had twisted his brother, and Cas could feel one more piece starting to fray.
“What is all this? What are you doing?”
“Whatever I want. This morning I had a ménage à -- what's French for 12?”
Cas tried not to think too hard on what Balthazar had been doing while he mourned, changing the subject instead.
“You stole the Staff of Moses?”
“Sure, sure. I stole a lot of things.”
Balthazar gave him a significant look and Cas felt himself twist inside his vessel.
“You were a great and honourable soldier. We fought together.”
“Yes, too many times to count.”
The last time he, Balthazar, and Raphael had been involved in a civil war, it had taken place on earth.
Cas could remember the taste of the sand in his mouth after Raphael buried their brother Azazel beneath the sands, where he would later twist his way into hell. They stayed in tents in the desert, careful not to allow the Grigori or their children out of sight, all of them longing for home.
“I hear the sun will burn you if you stay outside for too long, Cassie.” Balthazar’s teeth shone white against the dark skin of his vessel.
“Whatever injuries I sustain from the elements are healed easily enough.” Balthazar’s laughter was deep and booming and he pulled Cas into their tent in spite of his protests.
“Save your grace for the war and sit with me for a while. Ananchel is still with Raphael, planning our next move.” Their sister was the only one who could reason with the archangel; Cas never quite knew how she got along with Raphael so well, when he was so rigid and cold and she was brilliant and inviting.
Balthazar opened a container of water that had been half-buried by the shifting sands and poured it over his head, closing his eyes and sighing in satisfaction. He turned to Cas, then pulling him closer. “I noticed you were bleeding earlier. Let me see.”
In all honesty, Cas never realized he had been injured. It wasn’t a serious wound; none of the Nephilim they’d been fighting had the proper blades, but their Grigori fathers taught them how to use sigils that would render an angel incapable of healing certain wounds, like the one he’d sustained earlier. Balthazar picked at the torn tunic and frowned.
“You’re lucky it wasn’t a blade, Cas.” The elder offered no other comment, letting the sun-warmed water wash away the blood and sand. It stung, but the pain was not enough to merit using his power to deaden it.
The scent of ash was still in the air, and the blade felt heavy where it was strung on his belt, as though the blood of his brothers weighed as much as his guilt did. Even with Balthazar beside him, Cas longed for nothing but home.
Something soft and cool pulled Cas from the thoughts of his dead siblings, and he looked to find Balthazar’s lips pressed against his side. “It shouldn’t become infected; I would hate for you to have to find a new vessel.” He could feel each word against his skin as his brother spoke, sending a shock of goosebumps all the way down his arms.
“…thank you.” Something about Balthazar’s dark eyes glinting up at him rendered Cas speechless, so he just leaned into him and fixed his gaze back outside the tent. The distance was nothing but a haze, clouds of dust tinted black, darker where the wind spread the ash of a brother’s wings through the sand. Cas had been jealous of the Grigori once, for their proximity to the humans; he never imagined loving the mortals so much, as his siblings did, would earn the same punishment as the one brother who reviled them above all else.
Thinking on that previous war, Cas remembered thinking nothing of the queer methods of affection Balthazar had picked up from watching humankind. He knew better now, and his heart ached for all the time they had lost.
As much as he loved Balthazar, betrayals and the cruelty of his own kind made Cas too suspicious to trust him, and they each went their own way; Balthazar to his hedonism, Cas to his war.
It wasn’t until weeks later, exhausted and falling to pieces, that Cas sought his brother out.
“I need your help.”
Whatever Balthazar was drinking was strong enough to be smelled across the room; Cas wrinkled his nose in distaste. It reminded him of Dean.
“Cas. Of course; what can I do for you?” He looked tired, though it really only showed in the lines around his eyes.
“Aside from giving me the weapons? I need to distract Raphael.”
Balthazar’s background in coming up with daring tactical plans worked out in their favour; an alternate realm that rendered Virgil powerless bought them enough time to secure the arsenal in Cas’ favour right under Raphael’s nose.
“You should be celebrating, Cassie. It’s not every day one of us bests an archangel. Why not let your hair down a bit, hm? You should try the scotch, it’s vintage.” A crystal glass sloshed amber liquid near his face, but Cas shook his head.
“I have no time to celebrate, brother.”
Balthazar shrugged and swallowed the contents of the glass in one gulp.
“…thank you. For your help. It means a lot to me, and the weapons will be crucial.”
“I only wish it didn’t have to come to this. This war, Cas… it’s not going to end well. You could have just come with me. We could have been happy.” Reaching out, Balthazar cupped Cas’ cheek, his thumb following the line of stubble the younger hadn’t bothered to clean away. “I can make you happy.”
After watching countless old movies with Dean, Cas knew what was coming next before Balthazar could close the gap between them. Holding up his hand, he pulled back, turning his face away from his brother.
“I can’t. Not now.”
The only other time Balthazar looked at him the way he was now was when Ananchel told them Gabriel had fled; he masked it better this time, but the deep, crushing pain of the rejection was clear in his eyes.
“…I see.”
“No, Balthazar, listen to me. I have to end this, the world isn’t safe. If Raphael wins, everything I have sacrificed will have been for nothing. I don’t have time for anything else.” Feeling both bold and guilty, Cas mimicked his brother’s affection, taking his face in both hands. “I have learned a lot, being on earth. And just because I can’t right now, doesn’t mean I don’t want to. Can you understand that?”
Slowly, the hurt in Balthazar’s eyes faded, melting into a soft smile. “Of course. I’ve waited this long, I’m sure I can hold out. But Cas… don’t get yourself killed, all right?”
Bolstered by Balthazar’s support, the arsenal, and the promise of a future with his brother, Cas felt the tide of the war turning. He told himself it had nothing to do with Crowley’s breakthroughs, or the souls the king of hell offered, preferring to forget his deal and carry on by focusing on winning the war through his own merit and Balthazar’s tactical mind.
But given his track record, Cas told himself he shouldn’t have been surprised when it all came crumbling down. Suddenly, he knew how Lucifer must have felt when the brothers he loved turned their backs on him.
Heaven’s first civil war started as a rumble that evolved into quaking that would not stop. All of heaven shook from the force of impact between Michael and Lucifer, and all of heaven seemed to be in the Garden; heretics and virtuous alike, brother against brother, barely with any awareness of who was friend or foe or even what they were fighting for in the first place.
Cas was separated from his garrison, but he fought on anyway, struggling to make sense of the madness. When the tide of rage and sorrow he felt as strongly as his own grace suddenly vanished, he was allowed to mourn the passing of the Morningstar for just a moment before the next wave of Lucifer’s followers fell upon those still loyal to heaven.
It wasn’t until the war was almost over and he had been reunited with his garrison that Cas was able to make sense of it all. He stood with Ananchel while she prepared the bodies of those who had perished to be burned, staring at the ruin of their wings and feeling his own twitch in response, reminding him he was still alive.
“What happened, sister? I don’t understand, these are our brothers… why would they do such a thing?”
Ananchel never stopped her work; from the way she was shaking, Cas knew if she did, she may not be able to begin again.
“Some could not stand to see Lucifer suffer such an injustice alone. Their love for him blinded them to the truth, so they fought."
His older sister was exuding such sorrow that it was difficult to continue questioning her, but Cas had to know.
“But why? Lucifer’s crimes were well known to us, but no one said he was to be punished like this. Why would Michael do such a cruel thing? Why would any of them allow this to happen?”
Cas didn’t know the words to describe the hollow, haunted look his sister gave him then.
“Because sometimes we must make great sacrifices to do what is right.”
On the night of the eclipse, Cas stood alone in Crowley’s laboratory, facing overwhelming uncertainty. After all his careful planning, Dean had figured out his location anyway; he knew the Winchesters would either die or kill him to stop this, and he could not let either of those things happen. The stench of blood and the echoes of pain that still lingered in the air weren’t enough to distract him from what he would have to do unless, impossibly, he was wrong.
And never before had Cas prayed so hard to be wrong.
Balthazar arrived only minutes after he was called for. Cas reached out and bathed himself in his brother’s presence, promising himself he would never forget what his brother felt like.
“You rang, Cas?”
And then, he knew. In that instant, everything Cas had been came undone, and all he felt was emptiness.
”Sometimes, we must make great sacrifices to do what is right.”
