Khara

KharaCreation

Khara was created by writer John Ney Rieber and artist Peter Snejbjerg in The Books of Magic issue 5 in 1994.

Major Story Arcs

Summonings

Khara was a Chaldean temple dancer; Chaldea was a country in about 600-1000 BC where modern Iraq is situated.

She had an affair with the angel Araquel, and they had a daughter, Nikki. However, due to the illicit nature of the affair, Araquel chains himself over a pit as punishment.

Khara does not respect the fact that Araquel keeps himself chained up for what she considers to be an overly dogmatic belief system. She tells him they are leaving for London, to stop Sir Timothy Hunter.

Khara and Nikki go to London and see Bill Hunter sitting inconsolately in his wrecked car, thinking of his dead wife. Khara reaches through the window and takes the photo of Mary Hunter out of his hands. She brings Bill back into his house to sleep it off. Nikki, meanwhile, shrinks the photo down to a few inches.

They find Sir Timothy Hunter, who is snooping on Tim Hunter. Khara throws the photo towards him and he catches it, and the literal weight of the memories drags him down to the ground. Khara says she likes Tim and warns Sir Timothy to stay away.

Later, Tim is being humorously chased by two girl friends of his, Molly and Marya. He can't handle it, and accidentally freezes time. Khara and Nikki, however, are unfrozen, and chat with him. Partly Khara just wants him to learn to relax, love, and live with his magic. She also lends him 200 quid, because he's broke and can't afford ice cream with the girls. Nikki takes his magic Stone of Opening, which he got from Tam Lin in the Arcana Annual, as collateral. Khara says he's better off without it for now, as it makes him release his power whenever he has high emotions, and he needs to plan more.

She also says that Nikki woke up his father from the coma he was in due to magical burns. Then she leaves Tim to figure out how to release Molly and Marya from his spell, which he does.

Reckonings

Later, she and Nikki sit after watching a musical act (seemingly Tori Amos). They go to swing in a playground, but are chased by some demons who look like pink Tyrannosaurs. Khara and Nikki hide from them by creating an illusion that they are trash cans. The Tyrannosaurs don't see through the illusion but the demon Barbatos does, and has them grab them.

Barbatos then has Sir Timothy, who is under his spell, interrogate them. He believes they are in a palace but they are really in a cardboard box in an alley.

Khara manages to turn them back into their normal shape, but they're magically chained. She accidentally drops the Stone of Opening, and Sir Timothy picks it up. It wakes him up out of the illusions Barbatos has placed on him. He releases Khara and Nikki and walks away, keeping the Stone.

However, she and Nikki go with him to her apartment. Sir Timothy apparently gives her the stone back. After Sir Timothy turns into a dragon, he tells Araquel where they are. Khara is still waiting to continue their affair.

Slave of Heavens

Much later, they are all living together happily. However, there is a war going on between angels and demons. They want Araquel to join but he refuses. However, he knows he needs to do something and leaves, leaving a note with Nikki.

Meanwhile, Khara is out, talking to Tim, who has gone nuts after Molly left him. He is really acting out, and also acting without empathy. Khara questions him, and discovers the tattoo Circe put on him. It keeps him from hurting Molly by keeping him from connecting other people--which is not good for him. She gives him back his Stone of Opening and explains that it can remove the tattoo, and thus get back in touch with himself.

She is crushed that Araquel has left, knowing that she and Nikki were all that kept Araquel grounded in the same way that Molly kept Tim grounded.

Powers and Abilities

Khara has various superhuman abilities, such as enough strength to lift a man above her head with one arm, the ability to travel interdimensionally, the ability to phase through a window, the ability to control her own timestream, and the ability to create illusions. The origin of her powers is unknown, as she is a real human. Presumably she learned magic as a sorceress of some kind.