Chapter 25: Faith — Part 2
[Le Grange Residence — November 16, 2005, Night]
Sue Ann Le Grange stared at the three men in her sewing room, her expression shifting from surprise to calculation to something that looked disturbingly like peace.
"You broke into my home." Her voice was calm, almost pleasant. "I should call the police."
"Go ahead." Ethan stepped forward, his eyes still glowing faintly orange. "Explain to them why you have black magic binding sigils hidden behind your fabric collection. Explain why people die every time your husband performs a healing. Explain why a Reaper does your bidding."
Sue Ann's composure cracked—just slightly, a flicker of fear crossing her features before she mastered it. "You can see it? The angel?"
"It's not an angel. It's a Reaper—one of Death's servants. And you've enslaved it to murder innocent people."
"Sinners." Sue Ann's voice hardened. "I choose sinners. The immoral. The undeserving. Drug dealers. Adulterers. People who contribute nothing to society and take everything from others." Her chin lifted with righteous conviction. "God gave us the power to save lives. I simply decide who pays the price."
Dean moved to flank her, cutting off her path to the door. "Lady, you're insane. You've been killing people—"
"I've been SAVING people!" Sue Ann's calm shattered. "My husband was dying. Cancer, stage four, eating him alive. I prayed for a miracle, and God answered. He showed me how to bind His servant, how to use it to heal the faithful." Her eyes glistened with fervent tears. "Roy has saved hundreds of lives. Hundreds of people who would have died now walk and breathe and praise the Lord. What are a few sinners compared to that?"
"The man who died for me," Dean said quietly. "What was his sin?"
Sue Ann smiled—the expression of someone who believed absolutely in their own righteousness. "Gambling addiction. He'd lost his family's savings, driven his wife to attempt suicide. The world is better without him."
"You don't get to make that choice."
"Someone has to." Sue Ann spread her hands, encompassing the room, the house, the legacy of death she'd built. "The Reaper takes what I tell it to take. Without my guidance, it would simply collect souls at random. At least this way, the deaths mean something."
Ethan's chest burned. The Urge screamed at him—this woman had murdered dozens, maybe hundreds, all while believing she was doing God's work. She deserved judgment. She deserved the Penance Stare, deserved to experience every death she'd caused in a single devastating moment.
But transforming now would accomplish nothing except terror. They needed to break the binding first.
"Sam." Ethan didn't take his eyes off Sue Ann. "The basement. The Reaper's anchor is down there—I can feel it. Find the binding altar and destroy it."
"You can't!" Sue Ann lunged toward Sam, but Dean caught her, pinning her arms. "If you break the binding, Roy loses his gift! He'll go back to dying—"
"Roy's cancer has been in remission for years," Sam said. "We checked the medical records. Whatever the first healing cost, it worked permanently. He doesn't need the Reaper anymore."
"But the others—the people who need saving—"
"Will have to find another way. One that doesn't involve murder."
Sam disappeared through the basement door. Sue Ann struggled against Dean's grip, screaming curses and prayers in equal measure, her composure completely destroyed. Ethan watched her with something that might have been pity.
She believed. That was the tragedy of it. Sue Ann Le Grange genuinely believed she was doing the Lord's work, saving the worthy by sacrificing the unworthy. In her mind, every death was justified, every murder a necessary price for the miracles she enabled.
The road to Hell, as they said, was paved with good intentions.
THE BINDING WEAKENS.
Ethan felt it too—a shift in the spiritual pressure, the chains holding the Reaper growing thinner as Sam worked below. The entity's presence intensified, cold and patient and utterly inhuman.
"You have no idea what you're doing," Sue Ann hissed. "The Reaper will kill you all. It's been bound for so long—"
"It won't kill us," Ethan said. "It's not interested in random death. It only takes souls whose time has come."
"How could you possibly know that?"
"Because I understand judgment better than you ever will."
The basement door flew open. Sam emerged, covered in dust and chalk residue, holding a shattered wooden cross wrapped in rusted chains. "Done. The altar's destroyed."
The temperature in the room dropped twenty degrees.
The Reaper manifested.
It was visible only to Ethan—a tall figure in dark robes, its face a void of shadow, its presence filling the room with the weight of inevitability. The others couldn't see it, but they felt something: Dean's grip on Sue Ann tightened, and Sam backed against the wall, eyes searching for a threat he couldn't perceive.
SPIRIT-BEARER.
The Reaper's voice resonated in Ethan's mind like a funeral bell, deep and sonorous and utterly without emotion.
"I see you," Ethan said aloud. Dean and Sam exchanged confused looks.
WE ARE COUSINS, YOU AND I. AGENTS OF JUDGMENT. YOU BURN THE GUILTY; I COLLECT THE DEAD. DIFFERENT METHODS. SAME PURPOSE.
"I didn't bind you. She did."
AND YOU FREED ME. A DEBT EXISTS BETWEEN US NOW. The Reaper's void-face tilted, considering. THE ONE YOU HEALED—THE ELDEST WINCHESTER. HIS SOUL WAS MINE BY RIGHTS, TRADED FOR ANOTHER'S LIFE.
"Can you spare him? The man who died for his healing—can that exchange be undone?"
WHAT IS DONE CANNOT BE UNDONE. BUT FOR FREEING ME FROM BONDAGE, I WILL TAKE NO WINCHESTER TODAY. A pause that stretched like eternity. YOU WILL CALL UPON THIS DEBT SOMEDAY, SPIRIT-BEARER. WHEN YOU DO, I WILL ANSWER—ONCE. REMEMBER THAT.
The Reaper turned to Sue Ann.
Her eyes went wide—suddenly she could see it, suddenly she understood what she'd been controlling all these years. Not an angel. Not God's servant. Something older, colder, more absolute than divine mercy.
"No," she whispered. "No, please, I served—I did your work—"
YOU BOUND ME. ENSLAVED ME. FORCED ME TO VIOLATE THE NATURAL ORDER FOR YEARS BEYOND COUNTING. The Reaper's presence intensified, cold and terrible. BUT MORE THAN THAT—YOUR TIME WAS BORROWED LONG AGO. THE FIRST HEALING ROY PERFORMED WAS FOR YOU. YOUR CANCER. YOUR DEATH.
Sue Ann's face went white. "I... I never..."
THE DEBT COMES DUE.
The Reaper reached out with a hand that wasn't quite solid, wasn't quite shadow, and touched Sue Ann Le Grange's forehead.
She screamed—once—and then simply stopped. Her body crumpled to the floor, eyes open and empty, heart no longer beating. The Reaper had collected what was owed.
Dean released her lifeless arms, stepping back with horror on his face. Sam stood frozen, unable to see what had happened but understanding the result.
The Reaper turned back to Ethan. UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN, COUSIN. MAY YOUR FIRE BURN TRUE.
Then it was gone, leaving only the cold and the silence and the body of a woman who'd believed too strongly in her own righteousness.
Outside, the Nebraska night was crisp and clear, stars scattered across a sky unmarred by city light. Ethan breathed deep, letting the cold air fill his lungs, letting it wash away the memory of death and judgment and borrowed time.
Dean sat on the porch steps, head in his hands. Sam stood beside him, one hand on his brother's shoulder, offering comfort he didn't know how to express.
"Did you just negotiate with Death?" Dean asked without looking up.
"Something like that. One of his employees, anyway."
"And it owes you a favor now?"
"One favor. One time. For freeing it from the binding." Ethan sat down on the steps beside them, joints aching, exhaustion settling into his bones. "It also said it won't take any Winchester today. That's the best I could get."
"Today." Dean's laugh was hollow. "So tomorrow's fair game?"
"Tomorrow's always fair game. That's how it works." Ethan stared at the dark farmhouse, at the window where Roy Le Grange was probably still sitting, blind and confused, waiting for a wife who would never return. "He doesn't know what she did. Roy. He really believed he was doing God's work."
"Ignorance doesn't excuse—"
"I know. But there's a difference between evil and misguided. Sue Ann was evil—she knew exactly what she was doing and believed it was righteous. Roy just wanted to help people." Ethan shrugged. "The world's not black and white. It's just gray all the way down."
Sam sat on Dean's other side. "What did the Reaper mean? About you being cousins?"
"The Spirit of Vengeance and the Reapers—we serve similar purposes. Judgment, in different forms. They collect the dead; I punish the guilty. Different methods, same general job description." Ethan's chest burned faintly—the Spirit acknowledging the connection he'd described. "I didn't know that until tonight. John's research mentioned the Spirit being old, predating Hell. Apparently, it predates a lot of things."
"And now you've got Death's number on speed dial."
"One call. For emergencies." Ethan stood, brushing dust from his jeans. "Let's get out of here. The cops will find Sue Ann eventually—heart attack, natural causes, nothing to investigate. Roy will grieve. Life goes on."
They walked to the Impala in silence. Dean drove; Sam rode shotgun; Ethan took the backseat for once, staring out the window at Nebraska farmland passing in the darkness.
"Thank you." Dean's voice was quiet, almost lost in the engine's rumble. "For Dean. For—for not just letting him die."
"You're my partner. Both of you. That means something."
Dean nodded once—acknowledgment, gratitude, acceptance. The Impala pushed west, leaving the Le Grange farm and its secrets in the rearview mirror.
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