Magi and Djinn World Tour Student of the Dark Arts

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Chapter 37: Reflector Shields and Summoning Circles

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Raku expected John to show. He wanted him to see what Raku had to face, what he'd been warning the elder about all this time. About if he could. To find a weakness in the vamp's armor and to expose the cracked chip in the armor he carried.

"Here." The droll way Atticus acted was not unlike other villains, uet it too was a mask as Raku's childish curiosity stayed away from this battle to come.

In the center of this chamber was a magic circle. Around the circle were hooded members with masked face plates which were entirely face – less. As alabaster as white could be, they must have been shields of some sort.

The room was lit by torchlight, a perfect weapon he deduced. By the head of the room, Lothos stood with his arms behind his back in military fashion, a smile to his face and his attire truly diabolical. His red hair, sharp and charmed eyes at Raku's arrival were flushing of the glee he had upon sacrificing a soul to his causes.

In the past, Raku was forced to witness events like this. Yet he was only a bystander. Today, he'd be participating with both eyes staring in at his enemy's next move.

"Raku, sweet child. You've come."

John saw the disgust in the child's lip twist has, yet he cleared his throat, covering up his emotions. "What is this, Lothos? You have me, yet you're teasing the issue of my capture so simply. I want to know what it is you plan to do when the school holds its feast."

"To feast, of course." Sniffed the demon vamp. "What a question, so lacking in the imagination yet ….you are here, and we do need an extra hand in powering up the circle. Care t –

"You'd likely have those participating, killed! They've been brainwashed, Atticus? Is your aging soul the only thing you can –

"I'm not entitled to talk. As aren't you, boy."

Chas bit his lip at the sneer Atticus gave before walking backwards and leaving Raku - only his toes outside of the circle. It was prepped, but not alive yet. They weren't chanting to get him inside it, but when they did…

John and Raku relayed the same fears back to one another.

Run.

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Absinthe ground her teeth as she picked up her cell and swapped back to Amber's form. "Ahuh…yeah. We can always wait….sir? Yello?"

"You're not a very good monster, are you?" Zee said a spell as Absinthe was tied up by her own tail. "Aah!! Sorceress!?! I will gut you red…. and feast on your –

"Hush, and talk to me about where they are…!" Zee snapped back. "I've come to break up this underground summoning ring, and you are going to take me there."

/

Atticus moved back quickly when he'd sensed trouble. His nose turned to the wall, as John and Chas were cloaked in invisible espionage. As soon as he'd given it a second, Chas went after Atticus while still invisible to use brawn over the weak and scrawny professor.

John stayed and waited for someone to betray their reasons. If Raku intended to trick a trickster, then John hadn't taught him how to lie well enough at all.

"He took his time deciding which devil to summon, and you know how competitive we fae can be if given the chance to see that sweet relief of another chance granted. So, I contracted him. Told him back then that immortality would make him a better actor in all he did. A professional magi, you'd think summoning was beneath a man like that, yet ." Hummed Lothos. "He did as I wanted again, yet do you know who helped him to escape his chains, dear pet?"

"That was not my question. The role of sacrificed lives by this week. Those students cannot help you regain what was removed from you."

"Nay, yet this summoning of it may just do that. The dark magic locked in those lands in my time…the excess power YOUR gods hid away. And whilst we're talking of take overs on one's home soil …I have a proposal."

"So do I." Raku let his hand glow up in hold to perform a spell to dictate his reasons. "I challenge you, Lord Lothos, to a duel of magi, not gods. Nor demon. If I win, you are to remove your influence and curse from every being on this plane you have so far infected. You are also to quit your plans and face us all in a final fight to banish or defeat your power, presently. If this –

"AND, what if I win?"

Raku's throat went a little dryer as Lothos's cape billowed from behind as he dropped it to the ground. His gloves came off as dark nailed claws upon pale skin reminded Raku of his assaulted body by those same hands.

"You return to me, give up your fight and tell your little magi to stick to him detective work elsewhere. I return with you to my kingdom and you help me to reclaim what lands were stolen by your new allies. You will no longer revoke all you were, Raku. Roku was a fool to deny that to the golden dawn, as are you to a lowly, drunken magi…I will again train you to seek only destruction and it shall sustain us for many centuries. I so long to feel as this, and…whence my power is at its zenith, I will claim the title of GOD. You will grant that wish. As a djinn, a master's wish is mandatory to your kind, is it not?"

Raku thought not about why Lothos even wanted the powers he'd loathed of real gods. Raku had stated that he'd never known what it was he was after until Aiden brought him back to literal "life. If Lothos could steal away his hope, maybe…under the misery of a mad man he could bargain the exact same narrative.

"You recall also," Raku rolled his shoulders as stardust fell with his cloak. A white and black street style outfit and dark boots suited the long haired near – adult half djinn. "I've since been seventeen, yet on this plane, my age is forever waning. Your servant was Amber and she did help you to have your own kill Adam to enter this school by taking over Atticus. You also didn't bring that she was a fae that had been blackmailed into killing off her own kind by the ancient ancestor she claims kept her and then shipped her off into your arms as a trophy. I wasn't to be that exact sort of person, because you were not only envious of Lilu, you loathed that she knew the real reason why gods were birthed and how to become one. You had no family except your own mother who was branded a witch, like me. You had a father who was rarely aware and the true man that took their lives did as you tried to do. Turn me into your own, plaything or object. It does not matter. You've treated me as he did in that history-

"That archivist in you is, impressive!" Clapped the vamp. "How ever did this come to you, child?"

"My actions, my visions. The one in pain, I had imagined it as…someone other. You. You took to the role as every tortured offender, just as Lilu's vanity corrupted her own god hood. Just as she had to trap and curse me and experiment on me to have me partly turned INTO Roku. Well, no more!"

Raku felt his body lift from the earth. Yet, Lothos had a red whip of energy bind his wrist down, face into the dirt. "If I make the little deal more interesting. I'd like to be kept entertained…"

Raku lifted his cheek to the mad monster as it chuckled down. "If I succeed in throwing you in this circle, you have fifteen seconds to escape and each time I will. Fefeat me in no less than twelve minutes or lower my power, I will give you five more handicap minutes to erase me. If you cannot do that?"

Raku's arm was tugged as even before, the circle lit up light and dark, crackling as Raku dragged back his arm and got into a crouch. "Ah!...You…they were not casting??"

"A trick. You walked through it, yet because I am the only one that may without being harmed, only a true devil may do so! You are alive as a half God. A demi – child. Of course I wouldn't let you simply stop my plans, yet you were this way in the bedroom too, my pet. So willing to pity the oppressor –

"I've seen enough of that, Raku!" John burst forth as two if the faceless masked cultist shot whips of light at him. He danced around them, yet a wall hit him. An invisible force field …

"John!!"

"Oh? He did show up. And no way I can call him, why not summon your simple human to die first?"

"I'm facing you!" Raku shot his eyes directly at the demon as another whip landed to tug his other arm into the circle. He pulled this time as lettering in gold appeared and Raku's dragon fire escaped from his lips in a puff to defend himself.

Instead of seem angry at all, Lothos was laughing. Grinning; as if he'd given the boy a reason to show him even more of that power.

Roku's.

"Raku….you need to hold back. He'll not be –

"No." Raku shook his head, his hair falling from a very loose ribbon tie. "He has to know how much he's hurt us. I don't want to leave knowing I lost my chance."

"Chances come, this one you shouldn't –

"It's our war, Constantine." Growled the vamp. "Why don't you let the poor son make his own desires worthwhile…or, would you have kept him this hopeless all along. Grounded, like a statue of the former lord!" Lothos moved through the circle as Raku understood. It was not a snare for a devil, but a deity. He….he couldn't win this. That was a trap, a way to capture and cage his power. .

A God's.

"Heh, you see his face right now, my followers? Devoted this one, was never. It seems, he seeks revenge, yet it is his own reflection which he so seeks to end…."

Raku puffed as his chest felt like smog. Ugly, unable to-

"Quiet, this….madness –

"AFH!" Raku was shoved by a person in that alabaster mask, his eyes gone from gold then right to red as he blinked back to amber brown. Gasping, his…his power over them…

Another masked cultist shoved as he pushed back this time, spells landing him steps back into the solid circle of light.

Countered??

"It's your duel? Shite it is, Lothos!" John snarled as his Latin had a tongue of fire to it tonight.

"I had forgotten to mention. Those drones are quite good at what I tell them treading into this life to support my own, and to save you, my little whore king."

"CALLED IT!"

John shattered the glass like barrier as Raku shook his head, shouting that John should let him fight his own battles.

"I'LL be your referee, Peter Pansie." Quipped John. "Ah, and I say that you keep this one on one. The magic circle your mates drew up, is the arena. If either of you go into it – even if ed and scary can't be hurt by the circle's power, you will still automatically lose. Any questions?"

Raku grinned as Lothos snapped his fingers, making the child choke onto his knees.

Raku saw a blurred floor as hos eyes lifted to adjust.

"There. Now it's an even match." Smirked the demon back, John clenching his fists at the sight of such abuses wrought onto his pupil. "Raku is like you. Like me. He's has no god strength as long as the curses over his body stay; you forget, I was second only to mark that pretty a palette…"

Raku panted, coughing as his throat was glowing by what looked to be marks John hadn't seen before. "He can heal wounds over himself. Not curses." Cackled Lothos. "That was why you should have listened to Auntie, boy. You can't win your soul BACK " His mocking lessons were not forgotten as John sighed to Raku, seeing the boy shy away.

"You…lied, and…."

"Raku –

"I CAN…." Raku kept breathing as the bodies started to burn around the circle. His fire, as Lothos kept laughing. And Laughing with arms outstretched. "That's it! Know his power! And here I thought that fire was done?..."

"What are you after? Why won't….you give up?" John snarled as Raku seemed to fall to panic over his maddening transformation. His clothing even turned to the colors of sand and dust. The boy's looks hardened out with the appeal of a fae, not a god.

Raku fought back tears that turned from clear to glittering gold, his body morphing with those ears as Ignito, and his eyes now redder than before. His hair grew out as Lothos moved close away from the circle. "It wasn't required. The curse has you. The curse to seal that power." Lothos grinned as he watched while stepping over the circle. John wasn't a god, so he ran in to grip Raku's arm and ran with him in tow. "We're done here. Find yourself another chew toy, bloke."

Snarling out, Lothos's own mask less army swept out the door after John; they were phantoms without feet so they had to be summoned to simply wear those clocks to scare the rest. The circle wasn't started by Lothos, yet Raku's presence. It absorbed his power, like that.

Lothos turned back to the circle and took a bit gulp of air in his nose, high on the essence of that Eternal child. "You're progressing as before…wouldn't our departed, lovely Lil be so proud of you, my pet…?"

/

They'd failed, and Raku was losing control like before. John smothered him with his coat, the boy shaking and panting harder, his eyes and fire as fire crackers on the man's back as he piggy backed the kid a few steps. Chas called the man over as they three found their way outside. This had failed, right? Lothos's plan…what was it? To stare a seventeen year old in the face and scare him witless into remembering being molested by an ancient beast of burden?

John clubg to the kid as both men came to find Zee and the car out front. "Hop in." She ushered them to her as they took off, barely stopped as the sun had just started to rise in the sky. Raku was shivering in the coat John had lent him, his tears turning back to their normal mortal shade. "C – call….call Aunt….S….s- s – Sara…." The boy rasped painfully with a wince to his wrists. "I wasn't ready….I'm sorry…."

"Hush, hush it…" John cling close as he had on the first day he'd had the kid stay in Chas's London flat. "You're scared and I can tell why. Scars do heal, some…are still hard not to see again. You're no different than-

"I'm….I'm…like them…..I'm sorry…."

The kid was a weepy mess as John tried to coax the kid a bit until they were to the door. He wallowed up the steps to his room and was done, even when he walked past the Room

He turned to John, wide eyes shaking harshly as he rushed to the knob and turned it instead.

"Raku –

The door shut a bit quick, louder for all to know. He was still weeping as John heard it.

Scars….but this was way different. It was pain, honest pain that would break skin, harm one's memories.

John didn't know how to fix this, but in a way

…

Time was up.

"Johnathan."

At the door to his exit, Astarte stood with one other. A male god of Egyptian features, middle eastern. He was tall, wore white and had long braided dreds on his head while being taller than the door. "Tell him to come out. He is coming where he will be safest. We shall also handle Lothos."

"It's a bit of a scare, but the boy…you can't just –

"Constantine." She stopped him. "Look at my nephew and tell me, tell his family that. You are not blood." She grunted, the tall male of her party going to the door with a golden ankh pendant in his grasp.

"John? What is she doing, hey!" Zee went after the man as he seized her by his eyes of a wolf. "That….can't…move?"

"Ra is strong in me, he guides my passage. Just as you must lose to allow one of our brothers to thrive in his realm. A realm where we may heal what hath been committed." The male chanted softly a phrase as the ankh began to glow.

"He's not ready. Let him rest, you're going to-

"He can return unconscious if he must." The hard headed woman said. "Ani? Open it."

"What? Was that –

"A truth seeker, a guide." Nodded the male as the door creaked open with a click.

"The boy is going to our world to be cured. That curse he stole from you is not in his power to seal, nor to diminish. You have risked his life over your own, Constantine. Your post is relieved."

"Then let me see it." John scrambled to force his way up to her eyes. "Let me go along, one last time to see that he's alright. Your kin are going to protect us? Get rid of Lothos?" John raised a brow in her tall face. "Then, you should know, he has connections to YOUR council."

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