Forbidden Ground
[ loosely inspired by Doctor Strange (Vol. 5) #18)]
"You're an idiot, you know that?" you shout just as he closes the door.
"Oh, thanks for reminding me, actually I was the best neurosurgeon in the world." he mocks you a little, waving his hands in the air.
"Why did you have to do it? Why did you perform that spell for him?" you wave your hands back at him, stepping closer.
"Because I knew that you wouldn't be able to do it!"
"Because it's dangerous!" you shout back, not caring if anyone might hear you, although New York Sanctum has been pretty empty lately.
"Because you lack strength!" he harshly pushes a finger to your chest, and you swing a little.
"Oh, I lack strength? Then you lack brain! We're never supposed to perform spells like these, Stephen!"
"There was no other way! What, you wanted that poor boy to die? I had to do it!"
"So could hundreds of other doctors in that hospital."
"They're not like me, they don't know things that I know, y/n." Stephen sighs, hands aggressively raking his hair, that became more white than ever.
"What if he doesn't survive? And you, you brought some big shit upon yourself! How are we supposed to break your promise with the fucking demon, huh?" you somehow control yourself from sweeping all the spell books from the table.
"I'll think of something." he grunts, opening and closing his hands, now fully healed thanks to the deal with the demon.
"You could've stopped them from shaking with another spell. Eldritch Magic spell." you plop on the bed, frustrated. He sits on the opposite side, backs turned to each other, you don't want to look at him now.
"I should've never brought you into this." he mutters under his breath, but you hear him perfectly.
"Well, too bad because I'm not leaving now."
Stephen scoffs loudly more to himself than to you but for some reason you take that personally. "Is this funny to you? Running around, making friends with demons and Keepers of FORBIDDEN spells?? I think the word 'forbidden' should be enough to keep you away from it."
"I swore an oath. To save lives. Not to let people die because I'm weak, y/n." he stands up, his cloak flying away in the corner and robes jumping at the sudden action.
"You're not a doctor anymore, Strange! When will you understand that? We are sorcerers now, we protect world from MAGICAL threats and don't interfere with humanly ones! Don't you remember anything that you were taught?"
You stand up as well, now both standing in front of each other, the only thing separating you from punching his face is the bed.
"You don't understand, that boy could've died."
"PEOPLE DIE EVERYDAY, STEPHEN!"
He rolls his eyes, and this is your breaking point. You rush towards the door, but his voice reaches your ears. "And where do you think you're going?"
"Somewhere to cool off before I seriously punch you." you say and reach for the handle, but the door is locked.
"You're not going anywhere. We have to talk it out." he sits on the chair and leans on the table with one hand.
"I can open a portal -"
"You don't want to do it. Please sit." he bosses you around.
You huff and frustrated sit at the end of the bed. "Well, speak, all mighty Sorcerer Supreme or should I say surgeon?"
"When I talked to Channok, I didn't promise anything like my soul or my 3rd baby or whatever shit demons ask, no. He uh... He told me that me getting back my normal hands, can give me a chance to live my previous life." he says, avoiding your eyes.
You raise an eyebrow, deals with demons don't end well.
"He said that... That I most likely will be relieved of my magical abilities."
"Most likely? Wow. Just wow... I pass out for half an hour in that fucking car accident, and he makes a deal to free himself from the magic." you shoot up, not able to sit calmly in one place.
"I couldn't let that boy die." he whispers.
"Either way, his parents are dead. And they were the ones who caused the accident in the first place." you say, not sure what has gotten into you now.
"I would've done the same for you." he says, eyes getting teary.
"I wouldn't want that to happen." you spit.
"Y/n, please"
"I'm leaving. For a while. Can't sleep in the same bed with you." you leave the room and loudly bang the door.
Whole week you avoided Stephen at all cost, leaving him alone exactly when he needed you the most. He felt his magic getting weaker and weaker every day, although the hands were nice to look at now. But life hasn't been the same since you walked out angry as fuck that day.
You on the other hand, were desperately trying to find a way to get Strange out of this insane deal. Reading books and surfing the internet even though the latter was as good as childish Bloody Mary myth.
Finally, you found a spell to summon the demon and thought of the craziest decision in your life, but Ancient One's words that 'Strange is our best hope in everything' were stuck in your mind on loop. Perhaps it was the thing that pushed you into the insane deal.
Hours 'till midnight were ticking slowly, and you were anxiously looking at the coming storm outside Kamar-Taj. A message sound startled you, looking at the screen you saw Stephen's message 'please return to NY, we need to talk'. You dropped the phone on the bed, no talking can fix the situation or change your mind now. Hopefully your plan will work fully, because if anything fails, your head is going to be on the table. No forgiveness from Stephen then.
The storm outside began, lightning illuminating your face from time to time. Finally, midnight struck, and you left your room, avoiding Mordo who still might not be sleeping and sneaked into the old room that was used for keeping the equipment and robes. Summoning candles and placing them in a weird form, you close the doors with a spell that's supposed to keep anyone from entering for about a good hour.
"Okay, dumb decisions, here I come." you sign and sit in the middle of the candle figure, crossing your legs and begin muttering the spell that you learned a couple of days ago.
A strike of lightning is heard outside, but you're already leaving your body, floating in the astral form in the unknown realm, home of Channok.
"This looks exactly how I think hell looks like." you say and look around the cave, illuminated by the sickening orange light.
"Who dares to disturb me?" a voice booms, and you crouch at the power of the voice.
"Y/n y/l/n, a sorceress from Earth." you answer, floating towards the brighter light.
"What do you want, Earth worm?" the disgusting figure asks, but you're not even sure that thing HAS a figure.
"I came here to bargain. To make a deal of my own and cancel another."
"I don't cancel deals, mortal."
"Please. This is important. Just listen to me." you beg, the demon falls silent, waiting for your miserable speech.
"About a week ago, Sorcerer Supreme Stephen Strange made a deal with you. A restoration spell that healed his hands and he was able to perform a surgery and saved that boy in a car accident that his parents caused. He said that you will relieve him off the magic, but I want to reverse it. Give him back the magic and take away the healed hands. Return his old hands. Please."
"What's in it for me? His magic made me stronger." he laughs at you, but there's no backing away now.
"I will do anything you want. Something of mine for Strange's old life." you say, feeling a tear running down your cheek.
"What could you possibly give me? Your magic is still weak compared to his. You're nothing." he laughs again, the whole cave shaking from the power of his voice only. "I am the Keeper of Forbidden Spells, I can give access to the most powerful spells in exchange for powers or lives. What I could receive from you in this unfair bargain?"
"I-" you fall silent not even sure what else you could offer.
"Here's the deal, mortal. You will give away your powers when you're at your strongest, remember that. No warnings or reminders. He gets back the old life. And the kid-"
"The kid lives. Leave him out of this." you interrupt, playing with fire with disturbing the demon.
"I can see you doing big things, in no time you'll become as strong as I want you to be. Although I might say, there was another way to solve your pathetic little problem. Too bad you already agreed to giving me your powers." he laughs and gets closer to you. You can feel enormous power and heat radiating from him, making your astral form shudder.
"Deal is a deal, oh great Channok." you say, bowing your head to the demon and already leaving the cave.
"Remember, your time is ticking. I'm sure as hell going to enjoy your powers." he says, voice running after you and chilling your body to the bones. You hastily return to your body, gasping for air and slumping down on the floor, candle almost burns your hair.
"Shit, I have to hurry" you shoot up and swing towards the cupboard, your vision getting black for a moment. Finally, you regain strength and push the candles near the wall with a wave of your hands, grabbing a book of runes. Flipping through the fragile pages, you finally find what you need.
"Ah, the Runes of Kof-Kol. Okay please don't let me down" you say looking at the ceiling and beginning the spell. "Stephen Vincent Strange will forget the deal he did with Channok, the Keeper of the Forbidden Spells, and about the boy he saved in a car accident." you make a rune spin around your form, and it begins floating above your head. "Stephen Vincent Strange will forget about getting his hands healed and will forget about our argument that day a week ago." you spin another rune and open one eye, to see them both disappearing into thin air. Candlelight goes out, and you're left in a complete dark.
"That's it?" you whisper to yourself, expecting to get an answer from runes or whatever. "Hm, okay, weird. Gotta return to Sanctum. Hopefully that worked." you shudder as the air gets colder and open a portal to the lobby of Sanctum Sanctorum.
Knocking on Master's bedroom, you hear a soft shuffling, and a moment later, Stephen, all sleepy opens the door.
"What? Where have you been? I fell asleep waiting for you." he says, and you try to look at his hands, but it's too dark to see anything.
"Oh, just did some things. Girl stuff, you know." you almost push him into the room and light up candles on the table. On the bed, you notice the computer showing something, and you turn to Stephen. "You watched CSI without me?"
"I can tell you who's the killer." he wiggles his eyebrows and as he fixes the collar of his shirt, you notice the old scars on his hands. Sighing in relief, you plop on the bed and turn off the computer.
"I'll watch it myself, thanks, spoiler-man."
"Okay, rude." he signs and gets under the covers. "You're gonna sleep in robes?"
"No, of course not." you scoff and get up to undress.
"You know, if I wasn't so tired, I'd probably have some others things in mind." he says, opening the covers for you. You get in the bed, tucked in and back flushed against Stephen's strong chest, his hands snaking around your waist, breath on your shoulder, you feel guilty about what you did. He looked sort of happy to get back his hands, to save that kid, perform surgery. You saw the sparkles in his eyes. And yet, you took it away from him. There's gotta be a special place in hell already waiting for you.
"Hey, what's on your mind?" he whispers.
"What? Oh... Nothing just... Tired." you lie.
"Yeah? Perhaps it's the storm. Never seen it so strong in years." he yawns and pushes you closer to him. In a matter of minutes, you hear his calm breathing, meaning that he's already asleep.
"Oh, I fucked up so bad." you mutter under your breath and fall into a restless sleep as well.
//About the demon and the deal in the comics:
Channok, Keeper of the Forbidden Spells was a demon who was visited by Doctor Strange who need to find a divine restoration spell to heal the nerve damage in his hands so he could perform brain surgery on a boy who was in a car accident. Channok gave Strange permission to search his library but he knew what spell was needed for such a thing, Uthurvan's Invocation.
Channok gave him the Book of Even Odds freely but told Strange that if he used it to heal the damage there was an equal chance that it would sever his bond to magic leaving his realm undefended from the supernatural. After Strange looked at the writings in the book he headed back to Earth but not before Channok warned him that there will be a price to pay for this gift.