Demons

Bakura heaved a sigh and shoved his chair back. They'd been at this for hours and he still hadn't found anything that seemed as though it could apply to the presence that still lingered at the back of his mind. Myrtle had scrounged up a huge pile of books and they were going through them one by one. Some of the things he had learned were interesting, but none of them were useful.

Seeing that Myrtle had stopped her own work to look at him, he smiled, feeling the expression pull generally unused muscles, and stretched. "I think it's about time to stop don't you?" He asked mildly, gesturing at the windows, which showed just how late it was. "If we leave now we can probably get into the common room before curfew."

Myrtle nodded, eyes wide, and scrabbled the books into a neater pile before grabbing his hand and bolting from the library. Bakura snatched the book he had been working on and took it with him, hoping that he would be able to find something useful before he snapped and killed someone.

They did indeed reach the common room in time, and Bakura leaned against the wall as Myrtle collapsed, breathing heavily, obviously winded by their sprint through the castle. "Sorry about that," he said quietly after a few moments. "I didn't realize just how late it was. Are you all right?"

The girl smiled at him, the expression transforming her face from rather plain to quite pretty, and so familiar that he felt a sudden rush of vertigo. She looked more like she belonged in Kemet than he did. "I'm fine," she responded, then yawned. "I probably should have realized what time it was myself." Bakura didn't know what to say to that, since he felt it would be rude to agree, but he couldn't exactly argue with what she'd said. Instead, he settled for shrugging again – something he was doing a lot of recently – and heading for his room, book tucked under one arm.

He slid into bed and opened the book to the place where he'd left it. He might have been wrong, but it had looked as though it was close to talking about something useful when he'd realised how little light was coming in the windows. Turning his attention to the page, he began to read.

'The higher demons can sometimes penetrate the barriers between the realms and come through into our realm in a physical form. As detailed earlier in this book demons feed on the death energies of humans and animals. For this reason a massacre or natural disaster can allow a demon to thin the barriers between the realms enough for them to influence mortals to do their will.

'Demons gain more energy from a murder than from an accidental death, and magical rituals which involve death are so likely to catch the attention of a demon that they have been outlawed for this very reason. Before this information was discovered criminals who were sentenced to death were often used in these rituals, but there is so much danger inherent in the killing of other humans, especially those with magic in their blood, that such rituals are no longer used except in situations of last resort.'

The next few paragraphs were detailing the types of rituals most likely to call a demon to touch the mortal plane, and Bakura skimmed over them, seeing that most called for the death of only one or two people. If even killing one person could summon a demon what would the death of a hundred do? Putting the book away and closing his eyes, Bakura fell asleep thinking of Zoku, the one who had called himself a dark god. If he was a demon, then maybe…