Disclaimer: I do not own the original canon nor am I making any profit from writing this piece. All works are accredited to their original authors, performers, and producers while this piece is mine. No copyright infringement is intended. I acknowledge that all views and opinions expressed herein are merely my interpretations of the characters and situations found within the original canon and may not reflect the views and opinions of the original author(s), producer(s), and/or other people.

Warnings: This story may contain material that is not suitable for all audiences and may offend some readers. Please utilize understanding of personal sensitivities before and while reading.

Author's Note (Generic Note for the Houses Competition): All my works should be considered to be Not Epilogue Compliant and I treat everything that is not the HP books and the Hogwarts Library Collection as apocrypha (supplementary to canon but still outside of it) and treat it as such (including ignoring it unless it suits me). I also make a policy of not ignoring abusive and distasteful actions/decisions of characters and not handwaving the effects of trauma experienced by characters. If you feel that a character isn't acting like their "canon self" chances are good that it's because of one of these two things and they are merely displaying a more realistic response than they did in canon.

Author's Note: Brief recap in case the contextual clues in the piece get missed or misunderstood, this takes place in Season 3 of Supernatural, in the immediate aftermath of the episode where the Winchesters saved Bela Talbot from the spirit who drowned people who had spilt the blood of their own family. She pays them ten grand and they head to Atlantic City. Dean is still on his kick of "one year to live, so gonna make the most of it" because Sam won't give him the riot act for another few episodes. On the HP side of things, it's post-canon but as always, ignores the Epilogue of Doom. Oh, and Harry is the Master of Death, which conveys just as much BAMFness as one would expect. It's okay, though, because he's traveling with a veela with some BAMFness of her own.

Challenge/Competition Block:
Stacked with: Houses Competition (Term 3); Monthly Challenges for All
House: Hufflepuff
Role/Year: 6th
Category: Bonus (1000 – 3000 words)
Prompts: Supernatural (Crossover); Gabrielle Delacour (Character); "You're going to be trouble, aren't you?" (Speech)
Representations: Dean Winchester; Hunters; Delacours; Gabrielle Delacour
Bonus Challenges: Misshaped Pods; Second Verse (Nontraditional); Second Verse (Found Family); Second Verse (Not a Lamp); Second Verse (Ladylike - Sexually Aggressive); Second Verse (Odd Feathers);
Word Count: 2098

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La Sirène
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"Right or wrong, I can hardly tell. I'm on the wrong side of heaven and the righteous side of hell."
– Five Finger Death Punch, Wrong Side of Heaven
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Atlantic City was awesome when you actually had money to spend on things without needing to worry about getting busted. Bela was a horrible excuse of a person, but damn if her money wasn't good. The bills weren't even sequential. Sammy might not like taking the money for saving the thief from her own mistakes, but Dean was more than willing to enjoy it a bit.

He was dead man walking. He was allowed to get his perks as they came.

Speaking of perks, Dean thought he saw the blonde on the other side of the room. Her cropped hair was so pale that it glowed under the neon lights of the club. Her skin almost matched. She wore a black tank top tight enough to pass for painted on and after a very tempting few inches of bare skin, a dark wrap around skirt loose enough that she could easily move in a variety of interesting ways. Dean couldn't tell if the skirt was blue or purple in the light of the club but it sure did sway around her knees well. She moved like smoke as she danced to the heady Euro-pop music pounding throughout the club. She had a sleeve of what looked like butterflies and flowers on both her arms, covering from dainty wrist to where the tank obscured the view.

Dean wasn't the only one to have noticed her. She was surrounded by a flock of admirers, both male and female. Occasionally, one of them would shout something at her. Dean couldn't hear the words over the music, but every single time, the blonde would shake her head and continue dancing. It was hypnotic to watch her losing herself to the music. He recognized some of her moves, from various katas as well as the ballet that he refused to admit (especially to Sammy) that he liked to watch he could catch on TV. He could have easily watched her dance for days and be perfectly fine.

If he was going to hell, he might as well enjoy things while he could, right?

It happened almost too fast for Dean to track the sequence. A man from the crowd around the blonde grabbed her wrist, using it to yank her closer to his much larger frame. In what had to be the bendiest move that he had ever seen (including the stuff that Lisa Braeden was capable of), she twisted the guy around and flipped him onto the floor. Then the woman pinned him in place with a foot to the chest. Dean felt his mouth water a little when he noticed that instead of some flimsy heel or fancy boot that was more style than substance, she was wearing actual combat boots.

He was a little bit in love.

He was a lot in lust.

He was even more in trouble because she was headed his way.

She slapped the bar right next to him to get the bartender's attention. The dark-haired man lifted his chin in acknowledgment before continuing the Risky Business maneuver he was doing to serve a customer's drink down the way. Bored, she looked around herself. Dean froze as her eyes landed on him, all his gibe charm disappearing as something electric seemed to pass through him. She stared back for a long moment before she spoke.

"You're not being boring," she said, the lightest trace of an accent around the words. Dean had spent enough time down around New Orleans to recognize that it was French, even if it wasn't the exact same as the creole spoken there. It sounded more refined than that, and despite how often refinement had always made him itchy (and lately, twitchy in the trigger finger due to Bela), it was just another layer of hypnotic draw when carried on her voice. The bartender broke the moment by placing a shot glass in front of her and filling it with straight tequila. Without saying another word, she threw it back.

"I'm cutting you off, Gabby," the guy warned. He had an obvious British accent, even if it sounded much different than Bela's. "Any more and I'll be pouring you into bed. And who do you think Bill and Fleur will blame if something happened?"

"I doubt that they'd blame you, Harry," the blonde replied as she rolled her eyes. "Even you are serving tonight, they would understand that two shots isn't enough to get me drunk."

"What happened to the little girl who thought I was her personal savior and didn't sass me?"

"She grew up and realized just how much of an overprotective dork you are," Gabby replied. Then she jerked her head towards Dean. "Is he one of yours?"

The bartender looked him over in a way that could easily be checking him out, but something about it felt differently. It felt more like how a demon looked at him when it was determining how to best make a deal. Dean certainly felt like he was being thoroughly examined in that simple look. Whatever the guy was looking for, he must not have found it because he shook his head.

"Self-inflicted fate," Harry stated evenly, "and you know the rules about those."

"Blah, blah, blah," Gabby complained. "You're being boring, Harry."

"And you're pushing boundaries," Harry countered, "the same ones that made this little sojourn necessary. You could be a little bit more respectful of the old man who agreed to babysit you."

"One, twenty-seven is hardly old," she said, holding fingers as she continued to count off her points. "Two, I'm twenty-three. I hardly need a babysitter. Three, I'm not the one running away from a harpy of an ex. Sister-in-law or not, Ginny is an absolute—"

"Hey, don't talk about Ginny like—"

"That's the Stockholm Syndrome speaking—"

"It's just rude, is all."

"Yeah, well, maybe that's the point!" The blonde crossed her arms and stuck her tongue out at the guy. Harry's response was to reach out and ruffle her short locks, which made her pout the same way Sammy used to, back when he believed that it would get him what he wanted. Harry then turned towards Dean again to give him another uncomfortable once-over.

"I've seen you around, I think." Dean found himself sinking into the greenness of Harry's eyes as the man continued to speak. "Look, I'm sorry for Gabby. She's a bit excitable, and really, she has been for as long as I've known her. Be happy that nothing has been set on fire yet."

"One time! It was one time!"

"I feel like this is suddenly more intense than I really signed up for," Dean said, forcing himself to get off of his stool. He had every intention of leaving, hot chick with bendy moves and combat boots or not. "So I'm noping out of whatever this is. Y'all have a nice life now."

"How long until they come to claim it?"

Dean slowly turned back, a sudden silence roaring in his ears. He barely noticed that the room around them had frozen in mid-everything. Stopping time barely even registered on his weird-o-meter compared to these two. Gabby had her elbows on the bar, as she leaned back against it to watch him with that same electric stare she had used to first assess him. But it was Harry who drew Dean's attention. The man stood differently, too much like a demon willing to stop hiding its power for Dean's comfort. His eyes burned with a bright green flame, and not in the figurative sense either; Harry's eyes were filled in the same way a demon's did except instead of darkness, it was flickering flames the color of grass.

"What are you?" Dean demanded, numbly surprised he wasn't already reaching for his holy water.

"Probably your best bet for living longer than—" Gabby made a thoughtful humming sound before continuing. "—I'm guessing a year at the outside. What do you say, Har'?"

"I say that I hate that nickname," Harry replied, still not breaking eye contact with Dean, "but your guess is probably right. Though Fate has her sticky fingers there, too, so who knows?"

"Does that mean I can keep him?"

Both men broke their stare down to look at the small blonde between them. Gabby gave them both an unrepentant grin. She shrugged as well as she could leaning on her elbows like she was. The motion made the butterflies on her shoulders seem like they were flapping their wings.

"What? I like him. He's not boring."

"You can't keep people like they're pets, Gabby, especially not just because they don't take one look at you and start spouting lies about their achievements. Besides, the guy was stupid or desperate enough to make a deal with a demon. Might I remind you of your very scary sister who would literally make me eat my heart if I let something happen to you?"

"Please, like Fleur would do that to you. You're her favorite pet."

"I'm not a pet, and she didn't even like me at first."

"You are totally her pet. I've seen her do that kissing thing on Mere's cats."

"She's also done it with you," Harry reminded her. Gabby gave another shrug.

"I don't deny that I'm a pet as much as a sister. It's kind of how things work. Don't worry about it overly much. Bill had to have it pointed out to him, too."

"What if I don't want to be a pet?" Dean asked, still trying to process the rapid-fire conversation the two were having. "I've got a busy life and as you've spookily pointed out, a bit of a time crunch. That doesn't leave much time for whatever kinky shit you're implying."

"Oh, I like this one," Gabby said. Her smile was the kind Dean normally loved on a hot girl making eyes at him. But all this talk of being a pet and their knowledge of demon deals was pinging his weirdo radar. Even still, it might be a good way to pass the time. "He's sassy."

"You still can't claim people, Gabrielle," Harry said drily. "What are you going to do when his demon owner comes to claim their due? Because if you're planning to fight them, I will tell Fleur faster than you can say 'Quidditch'."

"Oh, so you'll help then?"

"Wait, you guys know a way to cheat a crossroads demon?" Dean asked, feeling something like hope sparking in his chest. "Without completely negging the deal? Because if your way puts Sammy at risk, I want nothing to do with it. As long as my brother lives, I don't care what happens to me."

"Aw, Harry, now we have to help," Gabby said as she spun around to fully face the bartender. "It had nothing to do with greed or material needs. A noble sacrifice means that you can interfere!"

"I can't just tell Death to spare someone you've met in a club. If I interfered for him, I would have to interfere for any who asked. Balance must be maintained."

"But I like him," Gabby whined. "Did you see how his reaction when I flipped that guy earlier?"

"I'm not letting you walk out of here with a hunter, Gabby. Fleur—"

"Which do you think is more immediately dangerous, O maître de la mort? The witch across an ocean asleep next to her husband or the one right in front of you thinking of flambéing you?"

"You're horrid."

"And we both know you're going to help, so why are we still arguing?"

"Damn it, Gabby." Harry met Dean's eyes again. "Congratulation, Dean Winchester. You're officially a pet of the most annoying little sister in existence."

"You know what? I'm already a dead man walkin' so that doesn't sound so bad actually. Can we talk about what all that entails, though? 'Cause Sammy's already a bit pissed with me over the whole deal with a devil thing. I don't think trading one devil for another is gonna make him any happier."

"Oh, darling," Gabby purred as she moved closer to him. She walked her fingers up his chest. "It can entail anything you want it to."

"You're going to be trouble, aren't you?"

"I don't deny that either," Gabby quipped back, "but you'll love every minute of it."

Dean thought he could get used to the perks of being someone's pet.

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An Ending
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