Hellblazer / The Books of Magic #2

The concluding chapter of this 1998 DC Vertigo crossover, "Book Two: Descent," wraps up the collision of John Constantine's world with that of young Tim Hunter — and the cover by Paul Lee sets a genuinely unsettling tone. A skeletal, shadowy figure looms at center, wreathed in fire, holding an open book whose pages frame two smaller figures — one with distinctive white hair suggesting Constantine, the other a dark-haired youth — as though their fates are literally contained within its grasp. It's a haunting, painterly image that captures the sense of two very different magical lives being scrutinized by something ancient and dangerous.