The Mystic's Apprentice

Summary: Ra's al Ghul wants a weapon that can kill anyone, and so he turns to magic. Damian does not care for the mystic arts, but what Grandfather wants, he gets, even if the former Robin has to die several times to attain it. Damian never wishes to be a magician, but he will have to be one if he wishes to survive.

Disclaimer: I don't own Batman, Superman, or any of the characters in either franchises.

Damian woke up without a sound.

Something soft and furry was pressed against his left cheek. Eyes still closed and breathing even, he tried to remember what happened before his consciousness failed him. The whispers of the Pit and the murmurs of another world. His soul ripped form his body for the third time, the pain still as raw as having a chunk of flesh ripped out despite being familiar now. An indigo light, compassionate and kind; soothing his pain and lulling him to sleep.

None of that told him what the furry thing against his cheek was though.

Slowly, he opened his eyes, hands slowly reaching for the blades hidden in his sleeve, and saw a sleeping white kitten.

It's just Aurora.

Breathing out a slow exhale, Damian allowed himself to relax slightly, but tensed immediately when he glanced at his surroundings. Pushing himself up to a sitting position on the plush red velvet bed, mindful of his sleeping pet, the teenager frowned at the seemingly comfy, yet unfamiliar room.

The first thing he noticed was its size. It was nowhere near as large as the apartment given to him by his grandfather; just enough for a single bed, a desk, a chair, and some shelves pushed up against one wall. The sconces attached to the walls glowed a warm orange against the plain, brown walls, mimicking firelight on dirt structures. Damian couldn't see the light's actual origin though; there were no bulbs or actual fire, so it must be caused by magic. The Mystic, he realised, frowning thoughtfully as he slid his feet off the bed and onto the green-carpeted floors, this must be her doing.

(The room reminded him of Scheherazade's One Thousand and One Nights that Jason once read to him, a long, long time ago.)

There was an opened window next to the bed. The red curtains fluttered slightly in the breeze, allowing a glimpse of the world beyond. He pushed them aside, noting that there was no glass pane in the window, nothing that could stop someone from throwing knives into the room or slipping in except a bunch of flimsy fabric. A security risk, he thought, reminding himself to fix that soon if he was going to stay there for an extended duration.

A starless full moon greeted him as he placed his palms on the sill and leaned out. A dark ocean spread out to the horizon, almost pitch-black if it weren't for the silvery glints of the moon on the crests of its waves. High up on the tower, he could see where the lifeless land meets the crashing of the black waves, barren of any life save for grass. Something caught his eye, however. Far ahead, at the base of a cliff that rose up to greet the sullen moon, was a field of light. It was too far for Damian to make out any details, but the fact that it was the only other large source of light in this otherwise empty area was enough to pique his interest.

Where am I?

Did Ra's sent him away to a solitary island while he was unconscious? But he couldn't be out for that long could he? And if he did (and he was certain Ra's would have to drugged him or had the Mystic magicked him to knock him out for that long) why couldn't he see the stars? Their absence was telling for the lack of smog that characterised pollution or the glare of a city's light. As far as he could tell, there wasn't even a cloud in the strange night sky, so why were there no stars?

It's as if someone ripped the stars from the sky.

That observation was not comforting for the teen, even if he knew logically that it was unlikely. Something of a scale that massive would alert the Justice League at the very least. His father and his colleagues could take care of whatever crisis that landed on Earth, and the stars would soon return to its proper place. He knew that from experience (and simple faith).

He waited for a moment, but the stars did not appear.

So perhaps he could rule out extra-terrestrial intervention. Maybe there was a barrier of some sort that blocked out the stars? He could imagine someone like the Mystic capable of doing so. Perhaps she did that to keep their location a secret…

As he was mulling over his location, he heard a knock from the door. Pushing away from the window, he turned to face it. He approached the door with one hand fingering a hidden knife.

(Just in case.)

Damian opened the door and saw the Mystic on the other side.

The bald Asian woman stared at him blankly, her milky white eyes as expressionless as ever. She simply glanced at him, before turning away with a single word. "Come."

Damian frowned, not moving from the doorway. "Where are we?"

The Mystic glanced at him wordlessly once more but didn't speak. She walked away calmly, as if expecting that he would keep up with her. With a quiet grumble, he followed her.

No matter how much he tried, his new magic teacher refused to speak. Instead, she stared blankly ahead, walking down the winding stairs that made up the tower. Damian tried to get answers, but her continual lack of reply eventually dissuaded him. He looked around instead, trying to get his bearings through context clues.

There wasn't much he could put together though, save for the fact that the owner of the tower (most likely the Mystic) was very, very strange. There were doors that opened only to reveal walls, suits of European and Japanese armour that craned their helmets to watch them go, paintings with moving pictures, a large room with a bubbling, noxious-smelling pot in the middle of an elaborate circle and a desk laden with glittering gems and jeweller's tools, a library with flying books. It all felt like something out of Hogwarts, if there were no students and ghosts and you replace the friendly headmaster with an apathetic, stoic mentor.

And everywhere Damian looked, there were opened windows that showed the gaze of the bright, cold moon.

The Mystic led him down the stairs, past twisting corridors and labyrinthine hallways, so twisted and numerous that if it weren't for training and his eidetic memory, Damian would have gotten lost. As it was, he was mildly disgruntled by the many turns and twists, already plotting the best way to escape if necessary (the answer was: jump out of the window). Eventually, the Mystic slowed and stopped once they reached a grand hall at what Damian presumed to be the ground floor. A large, locked double-door in front of them led to what he assumed was outside.

I wonder what it'll take to break it…

The Mystic stopped and turned to face him.

"Tell me what you know of magic." She said bluntly, almost ordering him if it wasn't for her bland tone and apathetic expression.

Startled, Damian frowned, crossing his arms. "It's the power to alter and manipulate reality to the caster's desires."

"How do you do that?"

His brows furrowed. "You need to speak backwards, do some movements, and perform certain rituals."

She stared at him. "Every word of what you just said was wrong."

The small woman began to pace around him slowly.

"Magic," she began, voice steady as a lecture, "is more than some cheap parlour tricks and altering reality. Magic is belief."

She raised a hand, and flowers began to bloom in the air.

"Faith in the impossible."

The flower hardly resembled anything Damian could name in real life, with its rainbow, heart-shaped petals spiralling open in crackles of blue electricity. Rather, it looked like a bright, multi-colour imitation of the concept of 'flower'. Something literally ripped from one's imagination.

"The will to replace the reality you see with the one you desire."

Her hand formed a fist, and the flower burst into fireworks.

Damian stared at the space where the flower once was as the Mystic continued.

"Magic is not just some power you wield as you would your gadgets and weapons. It is more than a tool, it is a way of life." She calmly continued to pace around him, her white stare somehow piercing despite the blandness of her gaze. "Once you have stepped onto this path, forever will it dominate your life. For make no mistake…"

She stopped and looked at him in the eye.

"Magic is life."

All he could do was stare at her, trying vainly to grasp the enormity of it. Magic was life? What did she mean by that? As if knowing that he didn't understand yet, the Mystic began pacing once more.

"You do not have to understand it yet," the words almost sounded kind, if it weren't for who it was coming from and what followed after, "but in time, you will. We all did, in the end."

Damian quietly swallowed and made sure his voice was steady when he asked, rather haughtily. "That's great and all, but you still haven't answered one thing. Where are we?"

"We are in my Paracosm." She answered, then elaborated when Damian continued to only stare at her. "A Paracosm is a 'small' magical dimension created by a magic-user. Everything you see here, I either created it out of my own magic or brought over from the real world."

She stopped at a window and gazed out at the moon.

"Time flows differently here," the Asian magician explained, the moonlight bathing her with its cold light. "You can spend years here but only a second outside. If you choose to condense the time you spent here into, say a minute of the real world for a decade in the Paracosm, then when you exit this place, all the additional hours and days you spent here will be taken directly from your lifespan."

The Mystic tilted her head at him. "Of course, it won't be a problem for you."

The Lazarus Pits, Damian thought with a scowl. Unbidden, memories of the haunting green waters came back, its insidious whispers crawling at the back of his mind. He had to suppress a shiver.

"And how long will I be staying?" He asked, trying to keep his heart rate steady, even as a sinking feeling began to appear in his gut.

The Mystic looked at him, and he wished he could decipher anything from that blank gaze. "For as long as it's necessary."

Of course, he scowled at her. "Tt," he clicked his tongue against the back of teeth. "Fine then. When will we begin?"

"Now."

She grasped his hand. Startled at her sudden approach, Damian tried to pull back. Her grip was like steel cuffs on his wrists.

Piercing white gaze locked onto his surprised green ones.

"The source of magic comes from your soul," her free hand touched his chest, right at the spot where his heart beat wildly, "and your soul has already been awakened. Now it is time to awaken your senses."

She reached out to cover his eyes, and the world fell to darkness…

And silence.

FUN FACTS

'…sconces…' – a device that is attached to a wall to hold electric lights or candles (from the online Cambridge Dictionary)

'It's as if someone ripped the stars from the sky.' – It's both incredibly funny and sad that Damian can make that sort of observation without hyperbole. This is just a quick reminder that they live in a comic book world. Also, it really tells a lot about how Damian has come to believe in heroes (like his dad and siblings) that he believes they can deal with anything.

'She stared at him. "Every word of what you just said was wrong."' – Is this familiar to anyone? It's a quote from Luke Skywalker in The Last Jedi. I know that it's quite controversial to some, but I rather enjoyed it. Fun movie, and one I would like to watch again sometime.

'…Paracosm' – A paracosm is a detailed imaginary world. Paracosms are thought generally to originate in childhood and to have one or numerous creators. The creator of a paracosm has a complex and deeply felt relationship with this subjective universe, which may incorporate real-world or imaginary characters and conventions. Commonly having its own geography, history, and language, it is an experience that is often developed during childhood and continues over a long period of time, months or even years, as a sophisticated reality that can last into adulthood – Taken from Wikipedia

Originally, I thought of naming it something like Subspace Pocket/World, but then I stumbled on this word and I thought 'Oh! This is more fitting."