FIC: Of Forgotten Lore

[nilchance]

Title: Of Forgotten Lore
Author: nilchance
Rating: Adult
Pairing: JDM/Misha Collins
A/N: Sequel to If Bird or Devil. Jeff's a dom, and Misha is his boy.



Apparently, there's only one solution to a world of secrets opening up in Jeff's living room: Misha starts the kettle for tea and pulls out his best bottle of scotch. If he had the time, he'd probably be kneading bread dough for the oven. Stress-baking is practically an Olympic sport in his family, Misha's aunts buying out stock in flour and pushing cookies on whoever will hold still.

"We've got food," Misha says, his words a careful construction of calm that will topple if it's touched. "Milk, iced tea. Beer?"

It's been minutes since Jeff's world flipped. He can't even think about what 'seer' might mean, or why Misha is doing everything he can to dodge giving an explanation. All he can think, uselessly and repeatedly, is that they should've talked in the car. They should've talked when the worst secret between them was that Jeff took Jensen on as a project without clearing it first.

Jensen paces circles around the couch, arms crossed, looking trapped. It's making Bisou tense under Jeff's hand, her attention following Jensen as he wears a new track in the floor. Jeff wants to grab him by the scruff and pull him down on his knees, make him sit still for a minute, but it's not worth getting bitten for his trouble.

"I could heat something up," Misha continues.

"Mish." One word and it snaps Misha to attention. Jeff swallows back the urge to make him crawl back to the couch. Being a Dom won't fix this. He needs to be a boyfriend, just Jeff Morgan, and he's never been as good at that role. "C'mere. Talk to me."

"So I can leave," Jensen adds.

"So you can go kill somebody for a little rough trade?" Misha shoots right back. "Or get yourself killed?"

Jensen pauses in his steady track, looking more interested than worried. "Is that what you see?"

Glaring at him, Misha doesn't answer. Instead, he comes to the couch with a half-rind of cheese from the fridge. He hesitates a few steps away from Jeff, a silent question: am I still welcome?

Jeff stretches an arm out over the back of the couch, making room for Misha beside him. Misha sinks down and leans against Jeff's side, their bodies slotting together. Jeff gives in and puts his arm around Misha's narrow shoulders, pretending for the moment that he doesn't feel Misha shivering.

"Would you sit?" Jeff asks Jensen. "You're making my dog nervous."

"Your dog is on tranquilizers." But Jensen stops pacing and settles on the edge of an armchair, looking like he'll ricochet out of it with the slightest provocation. When Misha tears off part of the cheese and tosses it to him, Jensen catches and holds it, uneasy. "What?"

"It's cheese. You eat it." Misha shrugs. "I'm hungry."

"Yeah, this is real cozy. Morgan." Jensen looks to Jeff for help, finds none, and tears grudgingly into the cheese. He eats mechanically, just refueling, and somehow Jeff finds that sadder than anything else he's seen from Jensen. "Fine," Jensen says around a mouthful, "I'm eating. Explain the basics to your boyfriend."

Misha winces and looks down. Pulling away from Jeff a little, Misha sighs. "I was going to tell you."

"I know you were," Jeff murmurs, even though he's not sure that's true. "But tell me now."

"Okay. Uh." Misha fidgets, still studying his hands. "You know I've been having nightmares. Hard not to notice. Well. I mentioned it to my mom, because she's usually good for some disgusting tea that'll fix anything short of a gunshot wound. Except she got serious, like I haven't heard since... well, since Sasha was little and kept trying to play with the stove. She asked me what I was dreaming about, and--" Misha glances at Jensen, "-- I told her everything. I told her I dreamed about a man with green eyes and a raven on his shoulder. About knives. The way skin peels back and the inside's so red--"

Misha stops a long few seconds, his breathing suddenly much louder. Jensen is very still, watching Misha with a glint in his eyes that Jeff doesn't like.

Without thinking, Jeff drops his hand onto Misha's shoulder and grips him tight. It feels important, as if Misha'll disappear if Jeff lets him go. As if he's headed somewhere Jeff can't follow.

"She said to come see her," Misha says distantly. "That I should know some things. So I went home, and she met me at the door. All my aunts were there, and they looked at me like I was a stranger. And Mom, she said, 'if you want the nightmares to stop, we can stop them. Nobody here'll think any less of you.' Except I couldn't stop thinking about those women. I couldn't leave. Not until I knew if I was going crazy."

Fuck. No wonder Misha had been waking up in the night for weeks, pacing the apartment, pressing his hot face into Jeff's neck. Jeff can't help it, he cups Misha's neck and pulls him close, kissing the top of his head. For a minute Misha stays stiff, then shudders and melts all at once, letting Jeff hold him. His voice has thawed when he starts the story up again.

"They took me down into Mom's root cellar and drew a circle in chalk. Aunt Rosemary started burning this incense that clouded up the room. Aunt Sage gave me a cup of tea that tasted awful, and I didn't even get half of it down before the room started spinning. I passed out. I saw things. Godawful things. Blood. A car windshield fracturing like a spiderweb." Misha pushes against Jeff like he would crawl inside him, like he would climb on his lap if Jensen wasn't still watching them. "I saw him hunting. I saw what he'd done."

"Who?" Alert like a live wire, Jensen stares at Misha. "Who'd you see?"

Raising his head to meet Jensen's eyes, Misha says, "The man who killed your wife."

This isn't right. It's crazy, too much stress and the guilt of Renee's death wearing on Misha. It can't be right. But Misha's looking at him, pleading for him not to break in and ask if he needs medication.

Jensen closes his eyes. His voice is colorless. "Where is he?"

"I don't know," Misha says. "They only let me follow him for a few minutes before they pulled me back. I--"

Vibrating like a hunting dog on a new scent, Jensen snaps, "Then give me his name!"

"I don't know," Misha repeats, frustrated. "I'm sorry, Jensen, I don't. I couldn't follow him for long. I woke up."

Jensen's fingers dig grooves into the arms of the chair. He inhales sharply like he's about to rage at them both, then sinks back into the chair and covers his face with his hand.

"Jeff?" Misha peers at him, tries to crack a smile. "You still with me?"

Jeff sighs. "It's a lot. And I don't know that I'm ready to buy it. But go on. Is that when we talked?"

"Yes." Misha touches Jeff's other arm, coaxing it up and around him. "I woke up, and they were all there. Watching me. They said it was my initiation as an oracle."

Jensen snaps to attention, his hand falling from his face. He stares at Misha like he's a weapon in a museum, some endangered predator in a zoo. Instinct makes Jeff pull Misha a little tighter against him, protectively, and that only has Jensen turn that considering, dangerous look on them both.

"What?" Jeff asks, the question mostly directed at Jensen. "What does that mean? What's the difference between that and a seer?"

Misha answers. "It's just a different form, I guess. Jeff, you're squishing me."

"The one at Delphi was an oracle," Jensen says. "Cassandra was a seer. Seers talk to state leaders. Oracles talk to emperors."

"Sorry," Jeff says, "must've skipped that history class. Why do you know this anyway, Jensen? Masters degree in mystical shit?"

Jensen's only answer is to narrow his eyes, half-lidded as a cat.

Squirming an arm free, Misha strokes Jeff, trying to soothe him down. "Apparently there hasn't been one in a long time, and there hasn't been a male oracle for longer. So there's that, me seeing Renee's killer, plus Jensen turning up, plus a few ritualistic murders, plus the ravens--"

"Ravens?" Jensen demands. "You've seen more of them?"

It's been a long damned night, long enough that Jeff can actually feel Misha's fraying patience snap. "Will you let me finish a goddamn sentence?" Misha says. "Either shut up or start saying something useful."

Jensen glares at him, but gestures sardonically for Misha to continue.

"Yes. We saw ravens. They were reenacting The Birds at LAX." Misha turns his attention to Jeff, almost entreating. "That's a lot of weird shit to happen at once. There's a pattern in it somewhere, right?"

Jeff doesn't answer.

Why does there have to be a pattern? What if it's just chaos? Scatterpoints on an infinite graph. Starving kids in Africa and LA excess, Renee's murder and Strom Thurmond's long happy life. Spoiled playboys coming to Jeff so they can cry and call him daddy. Jeff's stepdad hitting him hard enough to break his jaw.

Shit happens.

But Misha needs there to be a pattern. Misha needs it to make sense.

"Okay," Jeff says. "I believe you. What do we do now?"

"You two don't do shit." Standing, Jensen brushes imaginary dust off his clothes. "It's war, Oracle, your dreams didn't tell you that?"

"War." Misha looks at Jensen. "With who?"

"Better question," Jeff says. Gently disentangling Misha, Jeff stands. "How do you know any of this?"

Jensen quirks a smile, as if he doesn't back up a step away from Jeff. "You've heard enough stories today, Morgan." The name seems to amuse him, because he repeats, softer, "Morgan. No. You don't need to know."

Jeff raises an eyebrow. "Protecting me again?"

"Do you plan to teach me your tricks today? Teach me how to kneel?" Jensen glances over Jeff's shoulder at Misha, then shakes his head. "No. So I think I'll be going. I've heard what I need to."

"You can't just drop a word like 'war' and expect us to take it," Misha says. "And I'm not your damned nightly news. Even if it's your war, we could become collateral real fast."

"Not yet. He didn't catch you, Oracle." Jensen takes another step towards the door. "He's happy for now. Killing."

"He only killed once," Jeff says. "Renee."

But Misha's already shaking his head, sorrow in his eyes. "There've been others. Nobody's found them yet, that's all."

"Then shouldn't we call the cops?" Jeff asks.

"Ha. For what, a dream I had?"

"He's right," Jensen says. "Better he doesn't know I'm coming."

"And if he figures out that you are?" It comes out sharper than Jeff intended. "What do we do then, huh? Will you protect us then?"

Jensen meets his eyes and doesn't answer, which is answer enough. "Get better locks," he says. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Jeff lets him go, sitting down hard on the couch. Misha reaches for his hand and twines their fingers together, small comfort.

"I'm just a guy, Mish," Jeff murmurs.

Leaning his head on Jeff's shoulder, Misha says, "A guy I love."

"I don't get all of this. Hell, most of it." Playing absently with Misha's fingers, Jeff says, "But I protect you. I swear I will."

Misha nudges up under his arm and kisses him. As Jeff leans back on the couch, gathering Misha up on his lap, he tries not to remember that his protection wasn't enough to save Renee.