Russell finds her in the stables the next morning, gone before he even opened his eyes. He swore he smelled sadness on the pillow, felt it sour his stomach the moment he woke.

"Hey, Blondie," he chirps. She's standing at the stall of an Andalusian, dark gray lips ghosting across her palm in search of the apple she holds in her right hand. In her left, hanging at her knee, she's holding a half-deflated beach ball. She wears a white tank top and blue jeans, flared a little at the leg. His eyes trail down her figure, and come to a screeching, sticking halt at brown leather lace-up work boots. He recognizes the pair from the wendigo, when he laid her on the bed and took them off, dropped them to the floor...stewing in rage and worry.

"Hi," Katherine hums.

His eyes are stuck on those practical, well-worn boots. Remembering his hands sliding them from her ankles as she was unconscious...from stress, perhaps. Seeing them has such an odd, visceral reaction...

Russell tears his eyes from them, practically grimacing, as he looks at the horse with winter coloring. "Who's this?" He chokes out. The horse turns to look at him, almost like she's wondering the same thing.

Katherine pats her snout, and the mare jumps slightly. "Her name's Luna. She was two the last time I saw her."

"Luna," Russell hums, considering her snowy white face, the gray-spotted snout, shock of black mane. "Beautiful old girl."

Katherine smiles a little, running her hand down the beast's neck. "The big 1-8," she hums.

A horse in the stall to Russell's left chuffs, and heavy hoofs clop to bring a massive golden bay stallion to the door. It angles its burned gold head around the post, and snaps its soft brown mouth at Russell's shoulder.

"Hey!" He cries, glaring at the horse. It must be sixteen hands. Big boy.

"Fucker," Katherine mutters. "That's Bear. He's eight. Mitch told me he's sassy."

"Apparently," Russell mutters. Katherine smirks, running her palm down Luna's black mane.

"You wanna go for a ride?" She asks. Russell looks at her with surprised eyebrows, a hint of a smile on his lips.

He'd thought about taking her out on a horse before...swinging by the ranch he worked at, borrowing a couple. They wouldn't mind.

"Tack up," she says, and opens Luna's stall. He looks to the Golden Bay stallion, and its near-black eyes twinkle, almost like it knows it's gonna be a delight to fuck with him.

Russell points a finger at the horse. "Behave." He's done far before Katherine is. She looked to him to remember how to do it...it'd been so long. Maybe when she was eleven.

Russell watches Katherine grab a silverbelly hanging from a hook he hadn't noticed before, settle it onto her head, and she swings her leg up over her mare. It looks...good. Two feathers, one gray and one black, stick from the left side, tucked underneath three ribbons of silk—cream, crimson, and rainforest green. She turns over her tall shoulders to look at him, eyebrows raised in teasing, eyes glimmering underneath the felt.

"I didn't know you owned a hat," Russell says, smiling a little. He remembered seeing one in her car earlier in the summer, when she came to his house that first time to retrieve her old clothes. But he could've sworn it was dark...not silver.

"It's from my wedding." She's looking down at her hands, sorting the reins between her fingers. Sadness, the muted despair in her voice, bloomed underneath Russell's sleeves, up his arms. His mouth is dry. Katherine's shoulders lift with a deep breath, and sit tall still with an equally heavy sigh.

She barely glances over at him. "Come on, cowboy," Katherine chirps, and squeezes her legs around her horse. Luna sets off into a clopping walk through the barn, out into the dewy grass, still misted with morning fog. "How'd you know I'd be down here?"

"Uh..." Russell sighs, tugging on the reins to get Bear to shift around to Luna's right. "I don't know, really...it was just a feeling...kind of like I was being tugged here, almost."

"Hmm."

"I felt it here." She turns her head, watching his hand splay wide over his navel. His eyes are on the morning grass ahead, the lilac sky.

"I was thinking a lot about you," Katherine admits. "Maybe that's how...an answer to a call."

"Maybe," Russell agrees. He turns to look at her, eyes lingering on the gray feather poking out from the other side of her silver hat. "Whatcha thinkin' about?"

"Too fuckin' much," she mutters, lifting her eyes from her saddle, out to the sweet smell of morning ahead. "I had a lot of dreams last night." Dreams, not nightmares. "I think my d—" Katherine swallows around the rest of the word. "I think Clay somehow took some memories...Glen said as much yesterday." Her voice goes hollow when she says her uncle's name. Her father's. Russell looks down at her chest, where a circular necklace catches and throws the rising sunlight. "I think I'm getting them back...thinking maybe it's part of claiming my power, being claimed by my ancestors." Katherine sighs. "And then I'm wondering if every witch has to be claimed, and what happens if they just wake up with powers one day...and I'm thinking about how horrible it was to be raised hunting monsters like me."

"You're not a monster," Russell tuts.

"We didn't usually care about a monster's deeds," Katherine continues. "When he was teaching me how to hunt, he said they were all bad. Even witches. And that I should be glad he didn't have magic, because that meant I didn't, either." She chuckles, shaking her head, a twisted smile pulling at her lips. "Everything he ever said to me...lie after lie, deceit, hypocrisy. It's a lot to untangle. Figure out what else he lied to me about, because it can't just be this place." She gestures to the house with her left hand.

"I can't imagine," Russell admits. "How old were you?"

"When he started teaching me?" She offers him a gaze of molten iron blue. He drinks it like a man parched. Katherine's jaw tightens. "I was six," she says. Russell's fingers tighten on the reins  in surprise.

"Six," he repeats.

Katherine nods. "We all drove to California to see one of mom's...his friends...I think he was getting married. Anyway, I remember Mitchy was throwing a fit...he was so tired, and it was late...and Clay wanted to stay for a little while longer. I was a daddy's girl when I was little, so I wanted to stay, too." Russell's chest tightens, unsure where her story will lead.

"So we were all in the garage...and I would go inside to make beer trips for them." There's a smile on her face, remembering how they cheered and high-five'd her as she came running with five cans at a time. "And I went inside to...go watch cartoons, I guess. And then I smelled something funny." Russell doesn't look away from her, and her eyes are glued to the lilac-pink horizon ahead, casting a warm, pastel glow over her face in the fog.

"It wasn't 'Mom burned the turkey' funny, or even 'there are a bunch of burping guys' funny." She swallows hard. "It smelled like a sewer," she whispers, barely heard over the hoofbeats and chuffing. "So I got off the sofa and I went to see what it was. I checked the big room first...it wasn't in there. Then a small room...it wasn't in there, either. When I got to the last room...the smell was terrible. I was scared, felt...darkness." Even now, she can see the shining black eyes, the wicked, bloody grin.

"I saw the eyes first...and then it said my name. Hello, Katherine...and these...clawed shadow-hands grabbed me so tight, I thought my arms would fall off...and when I screamed, it threw me across the room." She remembers crashing into the dresser, feeling the pop in her shoulder before the world went dark. "I dislocated my left shoulder, and the dresser I landed on cut my back, cracked the back of my hip, my head...I was in a coma for a week from the brain bleed. I don't think anyone expected me to come out of it."

Katherine sighs heavily. "I remember waking up and seeing my dad sitting by my bed...he had a rosary in his hand. I'd never seen him do that before—pray. But when they took the ventilator out and they asked me what happened...the doctor didn't believe me, the case worker didn't believe me. My mom and dad and Mitchy came in when they were allowed to, and I told my dad what happened..." She shakes her head, eyes searching the horizon, as if for answers. "He was never the same. It was rare for him to smile, to laugh...

"So CPS was called in, of course...everyone there that night was questioned, and we had a case for a while. A woman would come to our house and sit in randomly, ask me questions about what it was like to live there. But it went away quickly, I wasn't an emergency room frequenter." She shrugs a shoulder. "And when CPS stopped coming, when I could walk again...he sat me down and he told me what I had seen in that bedroom...and childhood as I knew it ceased to exist. My mom...she tried, but she didn't have a say in anything."

Katherine clears her throat. "But...if he wasn't bad before that incident, I don't know what would've driven her to Glen." She frowns a little. "He came to my dreams last night. Glen. Showed me things from his perspective...how he'd scream at my dad, watching him do the things he did to train me...and no one heard him. It's a wonder he isn't some kind of vengeful spirit."

Katherine looks up from her hands, a frown all over her face. "Jesus, Russ, stop letting me ramble."

"You're not rambling," Russell murmurs. His throat is thick, swelled with anger and grief. "I'm glad you're talking to me." A moment of silence passes. "Tell me more?"

"I told you a lot. Your turn." She offers him a small smile. I'm trying.

Russell purses his lips as he thinks. "I don't know how I'm ever going to rival you," he says, half-hearted. Katherine chuckles.

"Do you miss baseball?" She asks.

Russell quickly nods, adjusting the grip on his reins. "Every day," he sighs. "It was so fun...I hated losing. And when I got the call...after Anna was born, it was the second-best day of my life." Katherine watches a grin light his face. "I always felt bad, thinking..." He's going to admit a horrible, ugly truth. But Katherine had laid herself before him, so bare, so many times before. He could do this. "Feeling that when I got the phone call...I was happier than I was on my wedding day."

But Katherine barks out a laugh. "Lots of guys don't particularly enjoy their wedding day. So I've heard."

"No, I didn't mean it in that sense," Russell says, shaking his head. "I loved Heather to bits...but baseball was my first, you know?"

Katherine hums. "No one ever gets over their firsts," she says.

"Who was your first?" He asks. Blue eyes dart to his, so quickly that he almost felt bad for asking.

"First what?"

"Love."

She tilts her chin up and heaves a massive sigh, eyes scanning the sky above.

"I was engaged once, before Charlie," she says. "His name was Nick. I met him when I was seventeen...we had microbiology together..." She smiles and laughs a little. "I...growing up smart, and a girl, you get treated a little differently. Boys are afraid of you because they know you're smarter than them, and they don't even know how to talk to you when you're pretty, so...imagine my surprise when a boy older than me chose to sit next to me and started talking.

"Anyway, we were friends for a while...I'd go to his apartment and we'd study, we'd watch movies...I had a crush on him, but I was surprised when he kissed me, because I didn't expect him to like me, too. So we started dating...he was nineteen then...and I thought the world spun because he said so." She's still smiling...reflecting on an age that really wasn't so long ago, but feels like light-years away.

"And a month after my nineteenth birthday, he asked to marry me. I said yes." The smile disappears. "I came home one day to find him naked on the couch with a girl from one of our labs...beauty queen, old money, older than he was." Katherine looks down at her hand. "I threw that ring pretty hard at him. Of course, there was that sting of betrayal, but I think what it did for me was just...affirm that I didn't want any part in marriage. That I'd seen my mom and dad enough, and...how he'd been with other women while they were together...and I didn't want it to happen to me." She shrugs. "I thought I loved Nick, but...now, I think it was more just the idea of someone wanting me when I hadn't felt wanted by anyone for a really long time. And then I met Dean, and..."

"And that was love," Russell murmurs.

Katherine nods. "But it wasn't...the good kind of love. You know?" Russell frowns. "There was a lot of, um..." Her hands move. "This need to protect. To keep me safe. A little controlling. And I hated it, but I loved him more." Katherine nods again. "He's my first real love. And if he didn't...if he didn't send me away, when we were looking for his dad...I think I would've happily married him."

"But he did," Russell says. "And you found Charlie."

At first, her smile is brilliant. Warm. But it fades quickly, washes away into stone. "And then I found Charlie," she sighs. "There was always this sense of panic when I was with him, in my bones...like something bad was going to happen. 'No way I could have anything good,' right? He was...beautiful, and so good. Just good. You know those people?" Russell nods.

"Paula was good," he says. "Too good for me. Too sweet."

Katherine hums. "I don't think anyone is too good for you, Russ. I think no one is good enough for you."

"You are."

"Hmm-mm." The response is quick, and her head is shaking. "I think I'm the worst thing that's going to happen to you."

"That's hardly fair," he breathes.

"I'm selfish and I'm mean," Katherine says. "I...said I hated cheaters, because I saw what my dad did to my mom, and now I guess what my mom did to my dad...and I said I'd never do it, and I turned around and did it to the best thing to ever happen to me." She shrugs. "Charlie never asked anything extraordinary from me. He accepted my decision to stay with the Winchesters, and he was never so much as jealous. And I turned around and..." She gestures forward limply before letting her hand hit her thigh. "I got pregnant with another man's baby, and all three of them died."

"You...don't think that was punishment...do you?"

Katherine sighs. "I don't know," she admits. "I know I used to think it, that God was punishing me...but I don't think I believe in God anymore."

"Well..." Russell sucks his teeth. "I don't care if you think I'm too good for you. I want you."

She throws him a look. "Still?"

"What, you tryin' to get rid 'a me?"

"Not...actively. I guess I'm just waiting for what I think is inevitable." You leaving.

"Do you think you'd ever marry again?"

"Nope." Her response is immediate, and she pops the 'p.' "Too much damn paperwork to change your name, it's fuckin' expensive to get a divorce, and I didn't want to do it in the first place."

"So why did you?"

"Because Charlie wanted to." She shrugs. "And...horribly enough." A sour scoff escapes her lips. "Dean was dying, and I knew there wasn't going to be a future with him, so I ran to something else. I should've said no. It would've kept him alive."

"They were looking for the Book of the Damned," Russell says.

Katherine nods, looking down at her horse. They've walked far past the house, now...down through the rolling acres of land. "I told them the truth and they didn't accept it. They killed him to send a message to me. And I'll never forget it."

"Should we look for them?"

Ice in her veins. Blue eyes snap up to Russell. She doesn't see any fear in him. Just self-assurance, an obvious cockiness she once knew in herself, something that seems so foreign for Russell. He was more of the quiet confident type. Sizzling fury in his dark eyes.

"You're not going anywhere near those monsters," she promises.

"I go where you go, remember?" Silence sits between the two for a moment. "And I've been inside your head. You want to kill them, do to them what they did to you and Charlie." Her fingers tighten in the leather reins, teeth mash together. "Why haven't you done anything yet?"

"Why are you provoking me?" She asks.

"I'm not. I'm stating what you won't. I know you think I'm...afraid of all of this...but fear doesn't make you weak, Katherine. It reminds you to be better.

Katherine frowns. "But after the wendigo—"

"You were in a dangerous place. Hell, you probably still are...and I knew if we continued on that path, I wouldn't trust you on any kind of hunt to not intentionally get yourself killed. Neither of us would survive it." There isn't a lie in his earthy eyes. A warning. "I can't survive another Heather and Anna."

"I can't survive another Charlie and Genevieve."

Genevieve.

Giving her a name...it makes her real. It makes it all real. Russell watches the pain freeze in Katherine's steely eyes.

"I won't," she amends.

"So train," Russell says. "Be better than them, and fucking kill them."

She wasn't used to Russell being so malicious. Even after she'd beaten his bartender friend, he'd never said an unkind word to her, or about his friend, or anyone else. He spoke gentle truths and love.

It lit a fire inside her, a dull roaring of what she used to be. Vengeance.

But she's broken, and wind sweeps through all of her cracks and extinguishes it.