HARRY POTTER: Witchcraft and Devilry

"Yes," Harry said.

"Just what kind of portrait was this?" Rias asked.

"Nude, dear," Venelana replied, looking amused by how her daughter bristled. "I was summoned by a magician back in the sixteenth century who had managed to master magically capturing images on vellum. I can't recall his name."

"That's besides the point, dear," the man next to her said. With his crimson hair and goatee, Harry guessed he was Rias' father. "I expected you to try and connive a way out of the arrangement with Riser, but to stoop to sullying yourself with a random human. I expected something with a little finesse, darling."

"Wait, you expected me to try to find my way out of this?" Rias asked, confused.

"Of course," Venelana said, like it was obvious. "You'd be a poor devil if you just succumbed to a fate you didn't want. Did Lucifer just accept the role that the Tyrant created him for? Of course not. He rebelled, stole enough of the book of creation to make his own army, and rocked the very foundations of the heavens. I expected you to try to find a way out of this. I just hoped that you'd be a little more...creative."

Rias just stared at her mother in shock, as though she couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"I suppose the human will appease the Phenexes enough," her father said nonchalantly.

"No!" Rias said. "Harry's not going anywhere."

"If you didn't want him to be handed over, why did you not make him your servant?" her father asked, looking puzzled.

"Apparently she tried, Zeoticus," a voice came from the next room.

A man walked in then who radiated power like no one Harry had ever seen. He was young, though everyone he'd met so far looked young. Even Venelana, who had apparently been alive for centuries, looked barely any older than her own daughter. The man had green hair, which he kept slicked back, and was wearing an expensive-looking suit. His blue eyes were exceedingly calculating, as though he were mentally breaking down everything that he beheld to understand the parts. When he focused on Harry, he looked deeply interested, and the young wizard didn't know whether to be relieved or scared to be of interest to who he assumed was Ajuka.

Grayfia walked in then, with another man at her side, and this one Harry couldn't help but shiver at the sight of. He was also young, and looked a lot like Zeoticus, though he was clean-shaven, but looks were where the similarities ended. Zeoticus felt no different from the other devils he had seen so far, and only Ajuka had truly felt palpably powerful, but even he paled next to this one.

Beholding the face of Voldemort sticking out of Quirrell's head had been terrifying, as even in his diminished form, he had felt powerful, but he too had nothing on this man. Looking at Voldemort was like looking at a mortal threat, but looking at the young, crimson-haired man was like looking at the face of death itself.

"And I fucked his sister," Harry thought to himself, a shudder going through him.

"My darling wife tells us that the evil pieces failed," the crimson-haired man said, his voice deep but light and nonthreatening.

"Wife?" Harry asked the first thing that occurred to him.

"Sirzechs," Grayfia complained. "Not when I'm working."

"Sorry, darling," Sirzechs said, sounding not sorry at all.

"Failed?" Venelana asked.

"Yes," Rias replied. "I tried a bishop and a rook, and both just popped right out. It wasn't like it is when the piece isn't strong enough. I felt that when I tried to give Akeno one of my rooks."

"My scar also burned," Harry added.

"Curious," Ajuka said, walking right up to him and hovering a hand over his forehead. "I assume you mean this one."

"Yes," Harry said. "I've had it since I was a baby when a wizard tried to kill me and blew himself up instead."

Ajuka just blinked. "Zeoticus, do you mind if I make use of your study for a couple hours?"

"Not at all, my lord," Zeoticus replied.

"Good," Ajuka said. "Come. You're going to explain to me everything you know about the incident and your scar, and then I'm going to run some tests."

"Be aware that he's hyped up on an energy spell," Grayfia said.

"Then we'd best be quick," Ajuka said.

Harry gave Rias one last look, feeling a little better when she smiled at him and followed Ajuka.

"Why do we have to be quick?" he asked.

"I assume that Grayfia came upon you two as you were finishing?" Ajuka asked.

"Probably just after," Harry replied, trying not to look embarrassed.

"She hit you with a spell meant to refresh you so she didn't have to carry you two in here," Ajuka said, "but it's temporary. Think of it like sugar."

"So I'm going to crash," Harry said.

"Indeed," Ajuka said, opening the door to a small, richly decorated room. He turned the high-backed chair at the desk around and pointed to a smaller chair off to the side as he sat down. "Now tell me more about this attempt on your life when you were a baby."

"There was a terrible wizard who called himself Lord Voldemort," Harry said. "He tried to take over magical Britain and nearly succeeded. There were plenty who opposed him, my parents among them, but he was as powerful as he was brutal. On Halloween night of 1981, he came to the cottage where my parents were hiding from him and killed them. When he tried to kill me, though, something went wrong."

"What happened?" Ajuka asked.

"No one really knows," Harry replied. "His spell hit me, but he was the one destroyed. For some reason, I lived, with only this scar to show for his attempt to kill me."

"So the scar is over a decade old and hasn't faded at all," Ajuka said, tapping his chin. "Does it hurt?"