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Love and Duty	By : rae_roberts Category: Supernatural > AU - Alternate Universe Views: 3443 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural and make no profit from this story. Just borrowing Papa Winchester and his boys for fun.

Chapter List
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The vengeful spirit’s attack had left Sam with a lingering ache in the center of his chest. He shivered as they rode back to the stables and cared for their horses before finally heading back to the main house.   He was still shivering when Dean led the way into the kitchen.
“You boys are too late for dinner,” Ellen pointed out dryly as they entered. She and Jo were putting clean dishes away in the big whitewashed cupboards. “Might be able to scrounge up some biscuits and apple butter for a cold supper.”
“Come on, Ellen, it’s not our fault we’re late,” Dean argued.
“Is there any leftover coffee?” Sam had to suppress a shudder as Ellen voiced the word ‘cold’, his voice taking on a pleading tone in spite of himself. If anything he felt even worse than he had before, weak and achy as if he was coming down with a fever.
“Joanna Beth, pour Sam a cup of coffee,” Ellen ordered. “What’s your excuse for being late, Dean?”
“I took Sam out to the swimming hole—” Dean began, but Ellen broke in with a frown.
“On a day like today, with an ill wind blowing?”
“The weather cleared up,” Dean scoffed. “Perfect for swimming. Sam had never been before,” he added, trying to deflect Ellen’s attention.
“I don’t care. You’ve got the whole summer to go swimming. What if you’d met a ghost out there, just the two of you?”
“Sam looks like he met a ghost, all right,” Jo said.
“J-just caught a-a chill.” Sam sat at the table, muscles tensed to try and keep himself from shivering, but his hand shook, sloshing lukewarm chicory coffee over the edge of his mug.
“No wonder. You’re sopping wet. What’d you do, go swimming with your clothes on?” Ellen’s eyes narrowed as she looked him up and down. “Joanna Beth, get a blanket. I’ll make a fresh pot of coffee. One cup with a shot of whiskey to warm you up, and then it’s off to bed with you, Sam.”
“We got caught in a cloudburst. And he’s not sopping wet, just a little damp. And he was fine after we ganked the ghost,” Dean protested
“I’m f-fine,” Sam agreed through chattering teeth, but Ellen had rounded on Dean.
“So you did meet up with a vengeful spirit!” She snatched the blanket from Jo’s hands as her daughter returned and wrapped it around Sam’s shoulders. “Dammit, Dean, how could you be so careless?”
“What did you want me to do, Ellen?   Let it wander the estate? Sam and I took care of it.”
“Looks to me like you let Sam take care of it.   Joanna Beth,” she barked before Dean could offer a retort, “didn’t I tell you to fix a fresh pot of coffee?”
“No, you didn’t.” Jo and Dean exchanged a bemused look at the petite woman’s show of temper.
“Well, I’m telling you now.”
Rolling her eyes, Jo moved to do as her mother had ordered.
“You’re just having a bad reaction to the attack. It’ll wear off,” Dean reassured Sam, laying a hand on his blanket-clad shoulder. “That spirit got her claws into you good.”
“You should never have let it get close enough to attack him.” Ellen wasn’t done scolding. “Even if you don’t care about Sam, you should have considered your father’s investment,” she spat.
“Hey,” Dean said, indignant, “it wasn’t like I just stood there and let her attack him.” His cheeks flushed red.
“Did I hear Sam got attacked by a ghost?” Rufus Turner nudged open the screen door with his foot, his arms loaded down with wood for the stove. “Did you gank it?” he asked Sam keenly.
“Dean d-did,” Sam said, glad for once to see Rufus. Maybe he would distract Ellen from her tirade.
“We both did,” Dean told the older man, the approval in his voice warming Sam more than the blanket wrapped around him.
Rufus grinned. “Good for you, Sam.”
“Great,” Ellen said, sarcastic. “Now you’re encouraging him.”
“Well, why not?” Rufus flared. “You’d rather the boy stay ignorant? That’s your plan for keeping him safe?”
“Come on, Sam,” Dean said in an undertone. “I’d sooner face a whole horde of vengeful spirits than stay around Ellen when she’s riled up.”
“Good idea,” Ellen said, overhearing. “All of you, just get out!”
The other occupants of the kitchen were quick to comply.   Rufus and Jo escaped out the back door while Dean hastily led Sam out into the main house and up the stairs.
Left alone, Ellen dropped down into the chair Sam had just vacated and slumped over the table, her head cradled in her hands.

Sam got out of his damp clothes, fumbling the buttons on his shirt open with trembling fingers, and pulled on a pair of pajama pants. The sheets felt chill against his body as he slid into his bed, setting off another round of shivering.
“Drink this.”   Dean returned from his own room and sat down on the side of the bed with a flask which he pressed into Sam’s hand. When his fiance didn’t immediately respond Dean tousled his hair. “Come on, drink up, Sammy.”
“W-what is it?” Sam raised up on one elbow, lifted the flask to his lips and took a cautious sip. “Ugh,” he grimaced, holding it out for Dean to take back. “That’s vile.”
“That’s Bobby Singers best home brew. Trust me, it’ll warm you up better than coffee.”
“It’s disgusting.” Reluctantly, Sam took another sip of the strong liquor, letting the alcohol burn its way down his throat.
Dean smirked. “Don’t be a baby. Bottoms up.”
Sam glared, but forced down a healthy swallow, egged on by Dean’s taunting. Finally, Dean took the flask back.
“I’m still cold,” Sam complained.
“Give it a minute,” Dean chuckled. He got up and moved out of Sam’s field of vision. A few seconds later the covers rustled as he slid into the bed, spooning up close behind him. “Better?” he murmured, wrapping an arm around him.
Under any other circumstances Sam would have tensed, but the warmth of Dean’s body was more than welcome and he snuggled into it instinctively with a wordless grunt of approval.   For just a moment Sam was struck by the potential awkwardness of the situation.   They’d kissed for the first time just hours earlier. Would Dean expect to kiss him again when he stopped shivering? Would he be content to stop at kissing? The doubts didn’t plague Sam for long as Bobby Singer’s homebrewed liquor did its work and he found himself too drowsy and comfortable wrapped in his fiance’s warm embrace to care what might happen next.   In no time he was fast asleep.

“You all right, Ellen?”
Ellen startled as John Winchester came in through through the screen door. She stood up as he moved to the stove, selecting two mugs from a shelf and pouring fresh, hot coffee as if he owned the place. Which, of course, technically he did, but John rarely set foot in the kitchen. That part of the house was Ellen Harvelle’s domain.
“Just wool-gathering,” she admitted, flustered. “I have to take a cup of coffee up to Sam. Did you hear, he and Dean tangled with a restless spirit?”
“I heard.” John indicated the seat she’d just left with a tip of his chin as he carried the mugs to the table. “Sit back down, Ellen. I’m sure Dean can take care of Sam just fine,” he chuckled.
“Take care of him? Take advantage of him, you mean,” Ellen flared.
“You’ve been the closest thing to a mother Dean’s known since his own mother died. You ought to know him better by now than to think he’d take advantage of anyone. Now sit down,” John snapped. He gave Ellen a hard stare until she dropped back into her seat. Still frowning, he sat down across from her. “Dean ganked his first ghost when he was barely Jo’s age. You know that, Ellen. What’s got you so riled about the restless dead, anyway?”
“I’m not riled,” she protested.
“Not about ghosts, maybe, but I’m not blind, Ellen. Something’s not right and I mean to know what it is,” John said bluntly. “Don’t you even think about lying to me,” he added when she avoided his eyes, staring down into her coffee cup.
“I thought I was doing a good job covering it,” she said shakily after a minute. “Who all knows?”
John shook his head, exasperated, but her comment had confirmed his suspicions. “You’re doing fine. Nobody knows.”
“Except you.   What tipped you off?”
“Everything and nothing. You just haven’t been right since we brought Sam out from Lawrence.” John stifled a wry chuckle. He was sure no one else on the estate suspected a thing… But then, no one else was lovesick for Ellen Harvelle the way he was. John silently berated himself for his foolishness.   “The boy’s arrival was too much of a coincidence.” He watched, concerned, as she leaned her head against her hand, hiding her eyes. To anyone else, the cook would just appear weary after a long day of work and the troubling weather phenomena, but John could tell she was holding back tears. “Tell me,” he pleaded. “Let it out, Ellen.”
“Sixteen years ago this very month, Bill and I welcomed our first child. We named him Sam. They kept his name—” her voice broke.
John wanted to sweep her up in his arms and hold her close, but her grief for her lost son was a private thing, he told himself, like that for her husband. He had no right to try and comfort her. He settled for reaching across the table and taking her hands. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me?   Why hide it?”
“He was raised a slave, John! The boy must hate me for giving him up.”
“Did you turn the baby in for the bounty?” There was no accusation in John’s tone, but Ellen recoiled as if he’d slapped her.
“No! Never! As soon as we found out I was pregnant, we lit out west to avoid the bounty hunters.   But when Sam was six months old a group of them rode up, all armed. You know how they travel.”
“Ellen, there was nothing you could do.”
She nodded. “I know.”
She’d pulled her hands away, but now, as her eyes welled with tears, John took them back, enfolding them in his. “There was nothing you could do,” he repeated, but Ellen went on as if she hadn’t heard him. Probably, John thought as the rush of words spilled out, she hadn’t.
“They rode up and asked to see the baby, and I froze. Bill had to pry him out of my arms. He had to; they had their guns trained on us.   When he handed Sam over—they had a breeding male with them, a stud—and that man touched him, Sam’s little arm just lit up, and they knew. They promised he’d be well taken care of,” Ellen said bitterly.
“Breeders are too valuable not to,” John said, knowing his words were cold comfort.
“It was November second, six months to the day after Sam was born.”
“The same day Mary died,” John murmured, amazed by the coincidence.
“Oh, John.”
Before he knew it, Ellen was out of her seat, flying around the table to throw her arms around him.   He stood within the circle of her arms and wrapped his arms around her in return. This wasn’t how he’d ever imagined embracing Ellen, but all the same, it felt so right to hold her in his arms that John never wanted to let her go.   “I’m supposed to be the one comforting you,” he managed after a long moment.
“What should I do?”
“Tell him,” John urged.
“I’m afraid,” Ellen admitted in a small voice.
“Ellen, take it from a boy who barely knew his own father. Whatever Sam might have thought of you over the years, he’ll be so thrilled to meet his mother. You’ve got nothing to be afraid of.”
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Love and Duty