Title: He Once Rode
Author: Kat Lee
Fandom: Supernatural
Character/Pairing: Crowley/Dean, Dean/Sam
Rating: R/M
Challenge: #122: Flavor and comment_fic: tattooeddevil: Supernatural, Crowley /+ Dean Winchester, Crowley and his umbrellas in his drinks
Warning(s): Character Deaths, (W)Incest
Word Count: 1,122
Summary:
Disclaimer: All characters within belong to their rightful owners, not the author, and are used without permission.



Crowley leans back on his throne, stirs his drink with his little umbrella, and sips his favorite concoction. His eyes drift closed as he relishes the taste. It's always hot in Hell, but there are times he can forget the heat, forget his location and duties, forget almost everything. There are times he could lose himself in this flavor and one other.

He holds the sweet liquor in his mouth until the shaved ice melts on his tongue. Slowly, he swallows and lets his eyes drift open. One of his endless minions happens into his throne room at that time. The Demon starts to open his mouth, but Crowley simply waves his hand, exploding the Demon who dared enter his domain without his permission. The Demon's scream does not disturb Crowley at all -- it's just one of millions upon millions he'll hear today --, but it does serve as an apt warning to the rest of his minions not to disturb him.

He hasn't wanted to be disturbed for a couple of years now, but a year to him is merely a blink. Time has little meaning when you've been around since the very beginning, but time means too much in same cases. He tries to close his eyes again, tries to forget, but something calls him to look up from Hell.

He sees Dean smiling, hears him laughing again, watches him running, hand in hand, with his brother. Crowley cocks his head to one side, his drink slipping, forgotten, from his fingers. He's never really wondered what went on in Heaven after he left it not until time took from him the one thing, the one being, for whom he had dared to be foolish enough to come to care.

He knew, even in the beginning, it couldn't last. He'd thought then that the hunter would betray him, but Dean never had, not even to his brother. He had instead come to him for help in matters where he couldn't trust Moose. He had come to him even on nights where he didn't have as many problems. He'd come to him just to be with some one who would not judge him, some one who did not need him, but Dean had never understood that Crowley, in his own way, had come to need him.

He still yearns for him, and it is with an open mouth that the King of Hell sits and watches his wouldbe, mortal lover dashing off into the surf while holding to his true lover's hand. Crowley had had Dean a few times. They had shared much more than his favorite drinks and tiny umbrellas during times when Sam had hurt Dean and Moose had been off cavorting elsewhere. In those times, Dean had ignited a fire hotter than anything Hell had to offer in Crowley's body and had touched a soul in a way no other had or, Crowley knows, ever will. They had shared much, much more than anything of which Moose or any one else had ever known, and yet, it had never been enough.

It would never be enough, because Dean would never stay with him. Crowley considered and even schemed many times to bring Dean over to his dark side. It wasn't that he had never actually tried. He had tried several times, but in the end, Dean's love for his brother, Sam, had always won out. Crowley would have killed Moose long ago if not for the fact that it would have hurt Dean so badly that he never would have gotten him back again.

But now he can hear his laughter. Now he knows he's not hurt, not in pain, no longer ridden by the past. He's free, his soul sickeningly merry, or at least, it should be sickening, but Crowley smiles through the unshed tears that glitter in his red eyes. He'd once claimed to be incapable of crying, but on the night that Dean's life had been taken from him, he had learned again, quite swiftly, how to cry. His tears had poured, and with them, too, had flown the blood of one of Crowley's own top armies, the army who had gone against his commands and taken the one life in all the world for whom he cared.

He watches Dean playing with his brother in the water, watches him grab him and kiss him with such passion that Crowley's fingers curl around his goblet. The glass cuts his skin only because he wants it to, but still, he sits on his throne, transfixed by what he is seeing. It's been so long since he's seen Dean and longer, too, since he last heard his laughter. He watches until Dean's hands wander further down Moose's disgusting tall and slender body. Then, at last, he turns away, his tears hidden from all of Hell and from the world above.

His fingers twirl in the air, and the shards of glass become his goblet once again. His umbrella is intact, and his drink refilled. He sips it, but he can not forget what he has seen. One after another, he drinks all his favorite beverages down. A second Demon enters his domain. Crowley flicks the umbrella from his drink. The tiny piece of wood with its umbrella on top flies across his throne room and delves into the eye of the Demon who dared disturb him. Like the one before him, he explodes with a scream, and Crowley's umbrella returns to his drink.

Still, he drinks, but he can not forget now. He can not forget what he is seen or every moment in the past he has spent with Dean. Never has he encountered a more worthy warrior; he looks even upon their fights with a sad smile. What he wouldn't give to feel his meager, mortal fist slam into his face one more time, just to share a drink with him again, to feel his body against his -- ! He'd give his entire kingdom without a second's hesitation just to have Dean in his arms one last time.

But all he can do is watch him from afar. Again, he lifts his gaze to Heaven and sees Dean frolicking in the waters of Eternal Life with his beloved brother. He can watch him. He can hear him. But he can never have him, or even just the small peace of his attention he held while he was still on Earth. Crowley watches in desperate longing while an Angel, unseen by Heaven's clouds, laughs at his torment, and elsewhere, the true spirit of Dean Winchester twists restlessly in his piece of Heaven, searching desperately and fruitlessly for his brother or the Devil he once rode.

The End