Black Magic

AN: Please see my profile if you're curious about the status of my WIP series Thalien. For now, I hope you enjoy reading this story as much as I did writing it.

Daisuke Oda was a simple, almost commonplace young man. Like his peers, he had run the gauntlet of exams and cram school to get into a prestigious high school, and then had slaved to keep his grades high enough to gain entrance into a prestigious college. His first year of college had quickly turned into little more than a weekly routine of slacking, interrupted with the odd party or date. Daisuke found it a welcome change, but also disquietingly aimless. Occasionally he felt as if nothing he did there mattered, and as a consequence, his own existence became somehow insubstantial.

To escape that feeling, he had found himself leaving the campus and his peer group ever more frequently over the past month. He blended easily into the streets of virtually any part of Tokyo he chose to visit, but preferred to haunt the shopping districts in Shibuya and Akihabara. There he could watch the high school students, still shackled to their uniforms, swirl around him as if he was invisible.

His own sense of dress heightened his feelings of invisibility, as it was so completely what was expected of a man his age that it drew no comment or notice from anyone. Dark leather jacket to fight the bite of the autumn chill, black canvas sneakers, white t-shirt, rust red denim pants. Daisuke did not dye his dark hair or wear any jewelry that might set him apart as a man who was rebellious or trendy. Only his eyes drew notice, when someone bothered to look closely at his face; they were a highly unusual yellow-gold, a trait his parents claimed he inherited from a distant uncle. His father said it was a dreadfully unlucky trait, but Daisuke had found it handy in attracting attention to himself at parties. Had he picked his personal favorite trait, it would've definitely been his eyes.

Daisuke could have done many things to act out against his feelings of invisibility, but drew a perverse sort of enjoyment from melting into crowds and observing people as if unseen. In the Tokyo crush, people often ended up acting as if they were the only humans who really existed, and their small mannerisms could speak volumes about who they really were. Daisuke had lost days to finding a comfortable location and returning there to watch people, constantly. It was on one such trip in Shibuya that he saw, for the first time, something truly unusual.

He had been following a group of students who were awkwardly trying to flirt with some female classmates, when he found his gaze drifting toward an alleyway that ran next to the second-hand bookstore he was hovering outside. He had no idea why he suddenly felt compelled to glance there, as it was just the same line of vending machines and garbage cans that stood there day after day. As his gaze lingered, though, he was overwhelmed with a creeping, tingling sensation. The world's sense of unreality heightened, adding clarity to Daisuke's sudden vision of a man appearing from the bleak shadows at the end of the alleyway. No one had entered the alley in the entire time Daisuke had been there, and he knew that alley to be a dead end. To appear where he did, the man would have had to have appeared out of thin air, or walked through the wall itself.

The man's appearance was unusual, as well. The rest of the crowd seemed to melt away as Daisuke watched him round the corner and enter the bookstore. He was tall, his head and shoulders emerging over most of the crowd, with sharp features and a long, almost Grecian nose. His complexion was fair, which heightened the impression of the dark eyes that peered over the flat rims of his spectacles. Long hair, more like a woman's than a man's trailed down his back, in a dark and clearly unnatural shade of blue. The man was dressed in flamboyant black, a tight shirt that was more fine mesh than cloth with shiny pants worn beneath a garment that seemed almost like a leather, frontless skirt with thick belts hanging loosely where its front should be. It would have given the stranger a feminine look if not for the fine muscular definition in his broad-shouldered upper body. He also wore boots with a thick, vicious tread, and studded with metal.

Daisuke stared after him for a few moments after he entered the bookstore, then found himself standing up to follow him. He'd never been in that particular bookstore before, despite all the times he'd haunted the area. It had seemed to deal in stuff a bit too antique and obscure for his tastes, and frankly still did. His interest was purely in seeing the striking stranger who emerged from the alleyway again.

Snaking through the winding passages between the bookshelves, Daisuke finally found the stranger leafing through a volume bound with bright red leather, the pages gilt-edged. Once the man was within his sight again, his resolve faltered. What had he meant to ask this stranger to begin with? Daisuke felt himself take a step backwards, just as the strange man noticed his presence. He cast a glance back at Daisuke over the rims of his glasses, dubious and cold. In that glance, Daisuke felt a warning and a command, an order to leave his presence and never return. For the first time in his life, Daisuke's spirit rebelled against the command. It felt too much like a confirmation of his suspicion that something about this stranger was profoundly unusual.

The man closed his book and turned to face him, expression bemused, as Daisuke took the final few steps of his approach. He made a point of meeting the stranger's eye. “Excuse me,” Daisuke said politely, “but I noticed you entering the store earlier, and I'm not quite sure how you got here. You walked out of a dead end.”

“Yes I did,” the stranger agreed. He arched an eyebrow at Daisuke, and seemed amused in a way that made him feel somehow diminished. “You noticed?”

“Yes.”

“How unfortunate for you.” The stranger spoke in a rich, cultured voice, tinted with an accent that Daisuke could not place. It was a far cry from his own boyish tenor, soft from weeks of disuse.

Why Daisuke was paying more attention to the man's voice than his thinly-veiled threats, he didn't know. He remained rooted to the spot. “I don't know what you mean,” he said.

“I mean, that you really shouldn't have been able to notice at all. Even if you did, you should've dismissed it as your imagination.” The man peered closer at Daisuke, and he felt his heart beating faster. “Those eyes... I suppose you can pierce the veil.”

Daisuke's voice remained firm, but the encounter was making his skin feel hot and cold in intervals. It felt as if it shouldn't be happening. “I don't know what you mean. Please explain.”

The stranger slid the book back onto the shelf, smiling thinly. “Oh, why not. It's been awhile... here, boy, I'll do a bit better than explain. I'll give you a demonstration. But bear in mind, there's a price.”

“Price?” Daisuke's voice faltered.

“Yes.” The man's voice seemed somehow cruel. “A terrible price. Are you willing to pay?”

Daisuke nodded, if slowly. He felt no sense of danger as yet. “If I can...”

The sense of cruelty lingered when the man smiled. “Oh, yes, you can. Now, would you agree that most people are dreadfully stupid?”

The question startled Daisuke. “Um. I don't know about that....”

“An optimist,” the stranger sneered. “Let's try this again... would you agree that, by all rights, more people should've taken notice of me when I walked into this store than actually did?”

“I guess I can agree with that,” Daisuke said.

“But they didn't, because they are dull and therefore easily fooled. Now, before you get any ideas in your little head, I suspect you're also quite dull... but not so much as they are. So, you wondered how I could possibly explain myself, and sought me out. Right?”

Daisuke nodded.

“Now, how did I fool that crowd into the thinking there was nothing odd about a man walking out of a dead-end alley? The same way I walked out of the alley, of course.” The stranger grinned, and his gaze settled on Daisuke's, cat-like, as if stalking his mind for its very thoughts.

Daisuke was sure his thoughts would be found lacking. The explanation made little sense to him. “So what way is that?” He asked his question hesitantly, as if he knew it would be displeasing.

Indeed, the stranger frowned at it. “My, you are dull, you don't even know what you're seeing through. Power, dear boy. 'Magic', to use a crude term.”

“What?” Daisuke could hardly accept such a ridiculous explanation. Something about it angered him. “Are you just messing with me?”

The stranger stroked a long finger, a piano-playing finger, across his chin pensively. “Mm. Not a bad idea. You do seem slow on the uptake.”
“I don't like being insulted.” Daisuke scowled, his brows knitting.

The stranger was not in the least bit put off by Daisuke's hostility. Instead he smiled, as if delighted, and placed a hand on Daisuke's shoulder. The gesture had the appearance of something friendly, but the man's grip was tight. “There, that's a good place to start. You say you don't like being insulted, and I imagine you don't. But what if I decided I wanted you to feel differently?”

Daisuke was suddenly acutely aware of the fact that his back was up against one of the bookshelves. He felt somehow trapped, and lacked any response for the man's strange question. Even worse, the man seemed to enjoy Daisuke's baffled silence.

“Let's suppose I decided that... oh, I don't know... you should feel horny around me.” The stranger's voice became something like a tiger's purr, silky and dangerous. “You should want me, and so badly that you can't restraint yourself. You need me right now.”

A rush of heat flooded Daisuke's body, as he felt his knees weaken and his cock twitch ever so slightly. His eyes widened in panic. He could feel himself begin to experience all the physical symptoms of intense desire, right down to hardened nipples. The feeling was strangely external, as if it was someone else's feeling he happened to be experiencing. His intellect felt free of it, but his subconscious was not. As the stranger stepped back to give him a little space, Daisuke felt himself drop to his knees, his jacket pooling around his shoulders. His jeans began to grow tight and uncomfortable around the hips.

The man crouched before Daisuke, his smile cool but his eyes hot with interest. He was following Daisuke's every move now. “See? I decided you should feel it, and since I have the power for it... you do. Of course, don't think I'm turning you into some sort of puppet. I couldn't make you feel it, if some small part of you didn't want to. And how you express yourself is entirely up to you.” The stranger grabbed hold of Daisuke's shoulders and leaned in close to him, so that his breath was hot against Daisuke's ear when he spoke. It sent chills rushing along his skin, raising goosepimples in its wake. “But wouldn't you like it if I fucked you right here on the floor. Right here, where the little old man at the counter could walk back at any time... where anyone could walk in and see us.”

Daisuke's erection grew tighter against his jeans. His intellect was horrified, both at the proposition and the stranger's sheer unnatural power, but his base emotions were so much clay for the strange man – the sorceror? - to mold as he saw fit. Daisuke felt his hands rise, trembling. “Yes, I would,” he breathed, incredulous.

“You know what's really amazing? If I did, no one would see us. That little old man would step over our rutting, fucking bodies as if we didn't exist. I could fuck you in the window, and no one in the crowd would look twice.” The stranger's breath in Daisuke's ear was driving him wild. There was excitement in the sorceror's voice, as if he loved to describe what he could do almost better than he might like doing it. “That's what I mean when I say that most people are stupid. They didn't see me walk in this store at all, but for some reason you did. Now, what should I do about such a troublesome creature now that I have him?”
“Fuck me,” Daisuke heard himself beg. He had never said anything so desperate before; he had never even taken sexual interest in another man before. Regardless, he felt a hand begin to unzip the fly of his jeans.

The sorceror watched Daisuke's hand move the zipper downward through half-slitted eyes. “Why should I?” he sighed as he sat back on his haunches, back resting against the shelf opposite Daisuke. “For all I know you're common and average. Not worth it at all.”

Daisuke's body was burning with need to impress the sorceror. He undid his jeans, which loosened and began to droop around his hips, and pulled his shirt up to reveal a smooth stomach and tight, sensitive nipples. The tip of his cock peeked from the fly of his boxers, almost hard enough to begin curving upwards. “Please,” Daisuke begged again, pinching a nipple. “Please... I'll do anything...”

“Play with yourself.” The sorceror's eyes met Daisuke's as he gave his command, far more intent than his casual tone of voice might suggest. “Show me how much that pretty cock wants me touching it, and stroking it...”

Daisuke could stand the stranger's teasing no longer. He fumbled to pull his waistbands underneath his cock's lower curve, and spread his knees as wide as he could. His eyes closed, and he pinched one of his nipples sharply as the other hand closed around his shaft. His hand was warm against himself, and felt good. When he could hear the man across from him take a sharp breath at the sight, it began to feel even better.

Ordinarily, Daisuke did not masturbate. He had tried, of course, but the sense that he was only fucking himself inevitably caused his cock to shrink and his desire to extinguish regardless of how aroused he had been to begin with. This time, though, was completely different. His own hand stroking his own smooth shaft provoked feelings as intense as anything he'd ever experienced with a woman. He could feel himself grow harder and thicker underneath his grasp. A soft moan escaped his lips. He arched his back began to stroke himself more quickly. He braced himself with his other hand.

The sorceror's gaze had somehow become a tangible thing to him, like the caress of invisible fingers. Just the thought of it fueled his desire, and made the feeling of his fingers against his cock more intense. Daisuke stroked himself faster, but only a little harder; his skin as it was had become so sensitive that the pleasure was already intense. He could feel his testicles swelling as his thumb brushed his glans. He was already so close, and in such a short period of time, that his intellect felt a strange sense of humiliation. It grew every time Daisuke flexed his thighs and rose slightly upward with the roll of his fingers, drawing out the pleasure, the twist of his hips bearing more of his dark cock for the stranger to see and judge. He panted and begin to feel the strange need to cry. His heart was rent, torn between sadness and a sense of need that was now so strong it stole the breath from his lungs. Daisuke wanted to, needed to come.

Fortunately, he was in such a state of heightened arousal that climax came to him far more easily than usual. He took his breath in great long gasps, mouth open, every exhale a plaintive cry. His face flushed, a shade nearly as pink as the deep pink of his engorged cock. Daisuke could feel his muscles tense and the wind catch in his throat. His hand moved more quickly over his erection, the fingers teasing the mushroom cap of the head. The world fell away except for his straining body and the stranger's hot eyes upon it, the man's gaze somehow mastering him completely. His orgasm began as a hot rush in the pit of his abdomen, and then soared upwards as the muscles in his hips and thighs contracted involuntarily. His body trembled, his cock pulsing beneath his hand as he ejaculated into the bookstore's open air. Daisuke was not sure if he was screaming or not; he felt like perhaps he was, but the sense of unreality he experienced at the height of his orgasm was so intense that he could have simply imagined it. Jism fell down upon him in heavy droplets, spotting his stomach, his clothes, and even the bookstore's fading carpet.

After Daisuke felt himself finish, he also felt the magic compulsion laid upon him ease a bit. He was not free of the man's spell, but when he opened his eyes to look around at himself, he felt a sense of shame at the wet spots on the floor. He didn't have the presence to pull up his jeans and cover himself, though, so his softening cock was still fully displayed for the still-watching wizard. Daisuke did not dare to meet the other man's eyes, or even to look at him. His cheeks burned too much at the thought, and the spell wasn't strong enough to overcome that sense of humiliation.

The stranger moved toward him on his knees, one hand seizing his shoulder to pull him closer. The other took hold of his chin and tilted it upward. He was close, so close to the wizard's strange but beautiful face that he felt himself blushing and shaking again. The other man's eyes were smoldering with desire, but it was painfully clear that he was the master of his own passions. Daisuke experienced a strange sense of vertigo as he gazed into those hot, dark eyes, as if he was falling into them and might never escape.

“I don't think we were properly introduced. My name is David Konno, and I'm afraid I'll have to keep you now.” The stranger – David – then tilted Daisuke's head upwards and kissed him. It was a hungry, possessive kiss, unlike anything Daisuke had experienced before. Women kissed more demurely in his experience, yielding even at their most wanton. This was a conqueror's kiss, imperious and demanding. Daisuke's shoulders trembled slightly as he gave way into it, his tongue responding to David's deep caresses. It felt as if it would go on forever while David held him with his mouth and arms, and then had seemed far too short when David pulled away from him.

David stood up, and Daisuke felt the impulse to follow him. A sharp glance from David sent him back to his knees. “Don't move. We're just going to take you home and clean you up a bit.” David stretched his hands out over Daisuke, and closed his eyes. Daisuke could feel a rush of power building around them, as if David was mentally digging a tunnel to somewhere else right beneath him. He felt the urge to close his eyes, and did so.

“It's for your own good. You wouldn't really understand the visual stimuli...” Daisuke through he heard a crack like thunder, before he and David disappeared from the world he had known entirely.

No one had seen or heard anything of their encounter, and few people even remembered seeing Daisuke walk into the man's bookstore. Once he was reported missing, the police closely scrutinized the mysterious spots they found on the bookseller's carpet, but the discovery of dried semen there only served to embarrass the bookseller. After a slow investigation, the police arrested the bookseller for lack of any other suspects, but could not get him to confess to doing anything dire to the missing young man. The bookseller didn't even recognize him. The case was sad, but ultimately left unsolved. It became the stuff of urban legends, but that's another story entirely.

Daisuke's story was far from over, but it had become part of the story of another place and time completely. It was inextricably linked with the story of David Konno, one of the great wizards who walked the broad reaches of the universe, wielding great power to do as he pleased. Daisuke's part in the story was far from the greatest or most important, but it grew with time to be more than either man might have dreamed from their first encounter alone.