Cave of Nightmares (34 page)

Bonk tried to roll himself into a standing position but moaned feebly and abandoned the attempt. Hayden scooped him up gently in his arms.

“Don’t you try to walk or fly until you’ve he
aled up; I can carry you around until you’re better,” he insisted, not caring that his familiar was still covered in soot and ash that was smudging his shirt. “Are you still hungry, or do you want to come upstairs for bed?”

Bonk made an excited noise that Hayden had no idea how to interpret, so he carried the dragon into the kitchen and offered him a bit of stuffing before taking him upstairs to
Zane’s room.

Hayden set Bonk down gently on top of the sheets and went to wash up and put o
n his pajamas. When he returned his familiar was still awake, watching his progress around the room. He wasn’t sure whether he should let the dragon sleep with him tonight—what if he accidentally rolled onto him and injured him again?—but Bonk let out an indignant squawk when he tried to move him somewhere safer.

Hayden sighed and let his familiar curl up against him, deciding that if Bonk felt squ
ished he could just bite him until he moved. Bonk made a contented noise and went to sleep.

***

They returned to Mizzenwald a few days before the start of term, Zane’s father accompanying them so he could lead their borrowed horses back to Calypso after dropping them off. Bonk was still healing steadily from his encounter with his much larger counterpart, but couldn’t fly for more than a minute or two without resting. He seemed content to sit on Hayden’s shoulder for most of the journey north, eating morsels of food from his hand whenever they were offered.

Hayden was surprisingly happy to return to school, his first sight of the castle bringing a smile to his face.

I’m home.

He thanked Mr.
Laraby for letting him stay the summer with them, and then left him and Zane alone for some last father-son farewells. He was pleased to see that many students had already returned to school and were preparing for the fall term, and dozens of them sat near the obstacle courses coaching their familiars through them.

On a whim
he decided to see if Torin was back yet, because there was no one he trusted more to examine Bonk and make sure he was healing properly.

His search was rewarded
when he saw the front door propped open, and he would have broken into a jog if not for fear of jostling Bonk from his shoulder. He strode into the log cabin without knocking and stopped dead in his tracks when he saw that Torin wasn’t alone.

Master Asher was with him.

Of course, just what I need…

He and
Zane had carefully decided not to mention any part of their episode with the dragon around Mizzenwald, because if the Masters found out they might demand a true account of what happened, and besides…they weren’t actually positive that they were allowed to perform magic outside of Mizzenwald at their age, and didn’t want to find out the hard way.

Torin looked like he’d been home for a few days, but the Prism Master was wearing dust-covered casualwear and carried a knapsack over one shoulder as though he’d just gotten in. They both turned around at the sound of his footsteps, and Asher gave him a mischievous grin.

“Ah, good, there’s our famous dragon-slayer in the flesh,” he greeted him cheerfully, and Hayden felt his mouth drop open in shock.

“How—how did you know about that?”
he demanded. All of his carefully-crafted plans with Zane were suddenly useless.

“Oh come now, you must
realize that I have friends,” he looked mildly offended by Hayden’s slowness. “Besides, we mages are a tight-knit community, especially locally. You can’t be surprised that word got out after two twelve-year old mages slew a fully-grown dragon.”

“But how did you know I
was one of them?” Hayden pressed, still off-kilter from the Prism Master’s prescience.

Master Asher smirked. “Your and
Zane’s names were mentioned in the encounter, and coupled with the fact that you left Mizzenwald with two prisms and are returning with none, it seemed a pretty safe guess.”

“Oh, darn.
Zane and I were hoping no one would hear about it outside of Calypso,” Hayden mumbled.

“You mean you didn’t come here to brag to us about your success?” Asher looked slightly surprised.

“No, I was actually hoping Torin could take a look at Bonk,” Hayden explained. “He was eaten by the other dragon and got some bad bites from it. A local healer did her best with him, and I let him play in the fireplace as much as possible since then, but he still can’t fly much.”

Torin and Asher looked absolutely stunned by this announcement, the former holding out his arm for Bonk, who took flight and coasted over to him
without being asked.

“Back up
to the part where Bonk was consumed by another dragon,” the Prism Master narrowed his eyebrows. “He looks surprisingly well for it, by the way.”

“Umm…
what have you heard about what happened in Calypso?” Hayden asked tentatively, wondering how far-fetched the story had become in the retelling.

“A load of waffle, I suspect, though I took care not to say so at the time.” Master Asher gestured for him to sit down on a closed barrel near the wall, picking one nearby to settle himself on while his father began examining Bonk through a
magnifying glass. “Something about you and your classmate engaging in an epic mage-battle and calling down lightning to smite your foe.”

“Oh, uh…” Hayden winced, “y
eah, that’s not what happened at all.”

Asher chuckled. “With level-one prisms and level-
three conjury chalk, I should think not.”

Hayden frowned and shared an
(embarrassingly) honest account of what happened that day.

“
Zane and I were walking through an apple orchard while Bonk flew around to get some exercise. We’d heard there was a non-magical dragon harassing Calypso, but no one knew where its lair was.” He sighed. “Of course we ran into it, because I have absolutely terrible luck. Anyway, it passed over us at the orchard and we took off running, but it gave chase.”

“Most monsters do have that annoying tendency,” Master Asher pointed out brightly.

“It got ahead of us and we couldn’t pass it, so we tried backing away slowly but it still attacked us. We had to dive out of the way for the first couple passes. Zane wanted to conjure a weapon, but there was nothing to draw on because we were out in a field.”

Despite the fact that Torin was checking the inside of Bonk’s mouth and mixing herbs together in a mortar, Hayden knew he was listening intently as well.

“Then I…well, I panicked.” He scowled, hating to admit it. “I had my glass prism equipped, and I cast—um, fire at it,” he mumbled the last part.

Asher clapped a hand over his mouth that didn’t entirely stifle his laughter.
Even his shoulders shook with it. At the look on Hayden’s face he said, “I’m sorry, it’s only funny because you survived.”

C
heeks burning, Hayden went on. “It attacked us again and I dove out of the way, and when I looked back it had Zane in its claws. It lifted him into the air like it was going to eat him, so I did the only thing I could think to do…”

He was watching the Prism Master’s face very carefully when he finished, “I
compounded my prisms.”

Asher didn’t look terribly surprised to hear this, nor angry. He frowned thoughtfully and asked, “What did you cast?”

Relieved, Hayden continued. “The first thing I saw that might be useful was Break. I tried it, hoping to break the leg that was holding Zane so it would let go and give us a chance to run. It sort of worked…I mean, I don’t think its leg actually broke, but it did roar and let go of Zane, so I must have hurt it a little.”

Torin glanced up at him, clearly impressed.

“That’s quite a feat, injuring a dragon by yourself, especially at your age.”

“And with level-one prisms at that,” Master Asher added.

“Thanks. Um, after that I was fresh out of ideas though, and Zane’s leg was hurt so we couldn’t run very fast. The dragon was going in for the kill and then Bonk came out of nowhere and flew straight into its mouth.”

Asher leaned back in surprise and turned to his father, who was giving Bonk an admiring look and said, “You clever little devil.”

“Clever? Really?” Asher’s skeptical eyebrow suggested otherwise. “It sounds ridiculously stupid.”

“T
hat’s what we thought, at first,” Hayden explained. “But the big dragon took a few steps towards us and then just keeled over dead. We pried its jaws open and found Bonk alive, so we hurried home with him because he was gasping for air.”

Torin began feeding Bonk the crushed paste he’d just completed, which must have tasted terrible because the little dragon shook his head emphatically while he ate it
, like he was trying to shake the taste.

“I assume he poisoned his counterpart?” Torin asked with professional interest, and Hayden nodded. “You clever boy,” he added to Bonk.

“Next thing I know, the town is holding a festival in our honor and we’re heroes.” Hayden frowned. “I tried explaining what really happened, but no one wanted to hear it.”

Master Asher chuckled in amusement.

“Did you get any spoils off of the smote dragon?”

“Yeah,
Zane and I each got one of its teeth.” Hayden opened his bag and held it up for them to see. Torin whistled in appreciation and even Asher looked impressed.

“Is Bonk going to be alright?” h
e asked the former, who nodded.

“He’
s healing up fine. Whoever worked on him obviously wasn’t a mage, but did a pretty fair job, all things considered,” Torin explained. “Looks like they used alemnis and acacia on him. Probably cost you a hundred credits to have him treated, am I right?”

“A
hundred credits
?” Hayden’s mouth dropped open at the staggering number. That was a fifth of his yearly allowance from his father’s accounts. “I—I don’t know how much it cost; they waved the charges since Bonk killed that big dragon.”

Torin looked pleasantly surprised.

“Oh, well that was nice of them. The town must have chipped in to cover the expenses.”

“Does it really cost that much just for some paste?” Hayden asked, aghast.

“Not here, because we have the materials readily available courtesy of the Forest of Illusions,” Torin explained. “But in an ordinary town where they don’t treat a lot of magical creatures, they’ll be paying premium prices for the ingredients and probably have a hard time getting them at all. It’s lucky they had any alemnis on hand or he would be a lot worse off.”

Hayden suddenly wished he could go back to Calypso to thank the townspeople for their kindness.

“Am I going to have to explain to all the other Masters about what happened?” he addressed Asher, not relishing the prospect.

“Oh, I suppose I could tell them something on your behalf…especially since Sark is so edgy about you
compounding prisms.” He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Though I’d love to see the look on Kilgore’s face when he hears you used fire against a dragon.” He chuckled at Hayden’s embarrassment but made a placating gesture at a scowl from his father. “I’ll take care of it.”

Hayden exhaled in relief.

“Can I ask you something else?” he didn’t wait for a response before continuing. “How would you have gotten rid of the dragon, if you were in my place?”

The Prism Master gave him an appraising look, followed by a pensive stare.

“Given my superior prisms, I would probably compound my violet-tinted crystal with my clear diamond and cast Stop.”

Hayden frowned thoughtfully. His prisms were capable of casting Stop, but he didn’t see how it would have helped him at the time.

“You would…freeze it long enough to run away?” he speculated.

Master Asher chuckled. “No
, no, though I can see where you’d be confused. Compounds done with diamond or crystal are the most powerful, probably strong enough to penetrate even a dragon’s thick hide. I would target its heart, specifically.”

“Oh.” Hayden thought that over for a minute. He hadn’t ever considered being able to use Stop for such an ominous purpose, only for freezing something in motion.

“It’s extremely difficult to stop a heart with that spell, especially on a dragon, and would only work with advanced compounding and a ton of power and will behind it,” Asher explained, apparently sensing his unease. “Life is the most difficult thing to remove with magic, as it should be.”

A heavy silence fell
while they all digested those words.

Torin broke it first. “Leave Bonk with me for a bit and I’ll speed up his healing. He should be back to normal by the time term starts.”

Hayden nodded gratefully and stood up, tucking the dragon tooth back into his bag. For some reason Master Asher decided to leave at the same time as him, and the two walked side-by-side towards the main entrance of the castle.