The Witch and The Hunters

CHAPTER TWO

Page count: 8

"Dean!" Sam yelled before slipping his handgun back into the waistband of his jeans and he ran over to the woman bleeding out on the floor.

"What? I panicked!" He yelled back, a slightly hysterical tone to his voice, which would've made Sam laugh if it weren't for the circumstances that were surrounding them.

"You idiot!" Sam snapped.

"Don't yell at me!" Dean replied, the hysteria in his voice rising a little more as he gripped the gun in his hand tightly.

Sam lifted the woman's hood back from her face and untied her robes to see where the blood was coming from.

"Whoa! She's hot" Dean muttered, before shaking his head, reminding himself that he shouldn't be making that observation about someone he'd just shot, especially after what he'd just witnessed. But he was still a man and he could appreciate the beauty of a woman.

Hermione had grown over the years. Her once frizzy hair fell in soft ringlets to the middle of her back; her ivory skin was soft and unblemished except for her arm and torso, and everything else that she glamoured. Her long, dark lashes touched her high cheekbones and she had freckles on the bridge of her small button nose and a heart-shaped face. She was approximately five-foot-six and wore converse, blue skinny jeans and a short-sleeved white t-shirt. Sam lifted her eyelids to see the pupils of her soft and large chocolate brown eyes dilated.

"Why'd you shoot her? She likely just saved our lives."

"She's obviously a witch, what with all that shit," he gestured around him madly. "Only dark magic could do that."

"Dean?"

They both looked up to see Castiel walking towards them with his usual emotionless expression and the light brown trench coat he seemed to be so fond of, that they hadn't actually seen him without it.

"A bit late now, I got the witch," Dean replied.

Castiel reached them and looked down at the woman, his eyes widening and he dropped to the ground on his knees beside her. It was the most emotion he had ever shown and it surprised them.

"Hermione?" He said quietly, a deep frown pulling at his forehead as his eyes searched her face.

"You know her?" Sam said stunned and Dean stared, unable to form a response to Castiel's reaction.

Castiel carefully lifted the woman into his arms –which more than surprised them both- and he rose to his feet and made his way towards Bobby's house, stepping through the door and heading straight to the kitchen where he placed the woman on the kitchen table and retrieved a pillow to cushion her head.

"She's a witch, Cas, just let her die," Dean said after having followed after him.

"She's under my protection," the angel replied.

"Are you crazy?" Dean struggled to contain his outburst.

"No," he frowned.

"Let her die."

"She's under my protection," he repeated firmly before he lifted his hand to heal the woman when Bobby walked into the kitchen, carrying two brown paper bags filled with groceries and a confused expression held on his face.

"Why is there an unconscious man wearing a skull mask outside? And why the hell is my railing smashed up and blood covering the ground?"

"I shot a witch," Dean shrugged his shoulders as if it were an everyday occurrence.