Forest of Illusions (The Broken Prism) (9 page)

Now he was watching Mistress Razelle in a towering rage, something he had never seen before and could never have imagined. She was holding Masters Asher and
Laurren by the ear with each hand, tugging them towards the door while shouting at them so loudly they’d both probably go deaf, though Hayden couldn’t make out the words.

The last thing he saw before he faded into blackness was Bonk biting his hand in the pen to claim him as a master.

6

The Test

When Hayden woke up, it was to find himself lying in bed in the infirmary with no clear idea of how he’d gotten there. Bonk was curled up on top of the covers beside him, warming his side while he slept. Other than that, there was no one in the room except for a mastery-level student of Mistress Razelle’s, who noticed he was awake and hurried from the room, presumably to get his mentor.

Hayden yawned and gave himself a cursory examination. Nothing felt broken, there were no strange bruises or wounds on him, and other than being really confused as to why he was here, there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with him at all. He strained his memory, trying to call up the most recent thing that happened to him, but all he could think of was that he was running through a jungle with Tess, Zane, and Lorn for some reason.

His movements woke Bonk, who stood up on the mattress and examined Hayden closely for a moment, like he was trying to see something behind his eyes. Apparently satisfied, Bonk flopped onto his back with his belly in the air and wriggled in that way that meant he wanted to be played with.

“Lazy dragon,” Hayden said more out of habit than anything, reaching out and stroking Bonk’s warm stomach affectionately.

When the door opened, he was surprised to see not Mistress Razelle, but Master Asher sweeping into the room. The Prism Master took a long look at him and then nodded, pulling up a chair beside his bed and sitting backwards on it.

“How are you feeling?”

“Fine, I think. Just confused about why I’m here…” Hayden trailed off invitingly.

“Ah, you don’t remember then. I suppose that’s not surprising, though it is a bit ironic, given that it was a memory elixir that did this to you.”

Hayden raised his eyebrows and said, “The Mnemora? What happened?”

“You were in the challenge arena with your teammates when it hit you. I had no idea the effect would be
that
delayed in you, nor did Laurren.”

The memory of the jungle came back to Hayden then. He remembered the cockatrice and then fighting off the eerie human constructs, wondering what they were supposed to be doing.

“It took us a few minutes to figure out that something was wrong,” Asher admitted softly. “One minute you were fighting alongside your friends, and the next you were just standing there, staring off into space while the others battled for their lives. We couldn’t figure out what happened to you.”

Hayden frowned and said, “I didn’t stop fighting, it’s just that everyone else disappeared. I was all alone in the jungle, except for this image of myself when I was ten…”

The Prism Master shook his head and said, “No, Hayden. No one disappeared; your mind simply removed you from the present, at a very dangerous time I might add, given that you were in combat. If those had been real assailants you all would have been killed, as your team wasted valuable time trying to help you while we Masters debated whether to interfere. Sark seemed to think you were just messing with us to make yourself appear interesting.”

Hayden rolled his eyes at the mention of his least favorite Master.

“So the Mnemora worked then?” Hayden frowned. “I was really seeing what happened on the day my mom died?”

Master Asher looked startled and said, “You saw Aleric?”

“Well, no, but I heard him,” Hayden admitted. “It was weird, but the only thing I could see properly was myself. Everything else just looked like jungle, but I could hear my mom talking to him in the kitchen.”

Asher looked pensive and said, “
Huh, that
is
odd. By our best reckoning, when you took that strengthening elixir it clashed badly with whatever residual Mnemora was still in your system. Maybe that’s why it didn’t work properly.”

Hayden nodded, toying with Bonk’s wings to give
himself something to focus on, which didn’t seem to bother his familiar at all.

“So now you know the truth of that day?” Asher prodded gently, his expression an odd mixture of
compassion and a hunger for knowledge.

“Not really,” Hayden admitted, meeting his eyes. “I only saw the first part, where he turned up in the kitchen and asked my mom where I was.”

“So we’ve been correct in thinking he knew about you before he came to see your mother that day,” Asher said lightly. “Though I’ve no idea how he found out about you if your mother was as careful as you say she was.”

“He said that he could feel my presence or something, but I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.” Hayden sighed. “He just kept telling her he wanted to see the boy—me, I mean. When she wouldn’t help him he hit her, and I ran out into the kitchen and grabbed a knife.” He admitted the last part quietly, embarrassed at how stupid he must have seemed to the omnipotent Dark Prism, a scared boy of ten with no magical prowess facing him down with a kitchen knife.

Asher looked mildly surprised and asked, “You attacked him?”

“I don’t think so…or not that I saw, at least. I told him I knew who he was and that I wouldn’t let him hurt my mom again.” Hayden was silent for a long moment before adding, “He said I was brave,” in a small voice.

“Yes, well you were certainly that.” The Prism Master looked sympathetic. “Even in madness Aleric retained some of his fundamentals, and he always respected courage, even in his foes.”

“I wasn’t brave, I was terrified and stupid,” Hayden mumbled, fidgeting with Bonk’s small arms now.

“It doesn’t count as bravery unless you’re frightened,” Asher objected mildly. “You’ve no idea how many fully-trained, adult mages cowered and sobbed at your father’s knees, begging for their lives. For you to face him like you did, as fruitless as it was…I’m sure that in his detached sort of way he was quite proud of you in that moment.”

Hayden swallowed a lump of emotion and took a deep breath.

“It ended soon after that, but I’m not sure why because there seemed to be more to the memory. I just remember seeing a lot of strange images, like Zane carrying me and my mother feeding me hot cakes…”

“Memories,” Asher explained. “You probably fell out of the memory with your father when you lost consciousness; you were bleeding profusely at that point from both nostrils.”

“I was?” Hayden asked in alarm.

Asher grimaced and said, “Oh yes, yo
u were quite sick with the side-effects. We had your group pulled from the arena and Kilgore and Reede took you from Zane and carried you here, while I went to get Laurren and Razelle.”

“So I was just seeing random flashes of memories every time I woke up for a second?” Hayden frowned thoughtfully. “But that doesn’t make sense, because I thought I saw Mistress Razelle screaming at you and Master
Laurren, dragging you all out of the infirmary by the ears.”

“Oh, no, that wasn’t a memory…that was actually happening when you
flitted into consciousness,” Asher admitted unabashedly.

“What?” Hayden asked in amazement. “But why would she do that? I’ve never seen her get that angry before about anything.”

Asher grimaced and said, “She is pretty hard to anger, but if you ever do get her riled up then watch out.” He smirked. “She was livid that Laurren and I had allowed you to take Mnemora, knowing the possible effects, and she expressed her displeasure with a mixture of spells and admonishments. It was awesome.”

Hayden occasionally had cause to wonder whether his mentor was entirely sane, and the admiration in his tone as he described being attacked by a colleague made him consider it again
now.

“So she actually dragged you two out of the infirmary?” he suppressed a laugh with difficulty.

“Oh yes,” Asher admitted brightly. “Then she screamed at us to go to our rooms for the night or risk annihilation.”

This time Hayden did laugh. “She tried to send you to your room
like she’s your mother or something?” he asked in disbelief. “What did you and Laurren say back to her?”

Asher gave him a funny look and said, “Nothing. We went to our rooms,” like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Seeing the look on Hayden’s face he added, “At that point there wasn’t much else for us to do, and there was the vague possibility
that Razelle would actually try to murder us if we refused. Besides, I’d never been grounded before, so it was an interesting experience.”

Hayden had no idea what to say to that, so he changed the subject.

“How come it’s you that came to see me instead of her? I was sure her apprentice was going to get her when he saw I was awake.”

Master Asher’s expression darkened momentarily when he said, “She isn’t here right now. I asked to be informed when you woke up, and no one thought to argue the point.”

“Am I alright to leave the infirmary, or do I have to stay overnight?”

“You should be fine by now. We’re pretty sure the
Mnemora has left your system entirely, and you’ve already missed one day of school.”

“Wait, I missed an entire day?” Hayden grimaced at the thought of how much homework he was going to have to make up. “And no offense, but you were
pretty sure
I was clear after lunch the other day, and look how that turned out.”

Asher grinned evilly and said, “Well, I’m much more likely to be righ
t this time around. Come on, let’s get you something to eat and you can be on your way.”

They stopped by the empty dining hall and knocked on the door to the kitchens. The last time Hayden had come here at night for a meal, the cook on duty made him recite poetry for his supper. Apparently having the Prism Master alongside him kept anyone from making a similar request this time around, and he was given a pot roast sandwich and sent on his way, parting company with Master Asher in the pentagonal foyer.

He made his way upstairs alone, cramming his mouth full of sandwich as he climbed and offering Bonk the scraps. He opened the door to his room to find all three of his roommates within, though for some reason they stopped talking and looked almost guilty as soon as they caught sight of him.

“About time you woke up,” Zane greeted him with a wry smile.
“Thought you were going to sleep until the summer holiday.”

“Hey, now that’s a plan,” Hayden rolled his eyes and sat down at his desk.

“What in the world happened to you, anyway?” Tamon prodded curiously. “It seems like there’s always something crazy going on with you.”

Hayden frowned and said, “It’s no big mystery. I took an experimental elixir earlier today to try and call up a certain memory, and nothing happened until the chal
lenge arena when I used Tess’s Strength elixir. Apparently the two shouldn’t be mixed.” He shrugged.

“After I lost my arm I was pretty offended that you were just standing there like an idiot
instead of defending me,” Zane observed dryly. “But after you started spraying blood out of your nose like a fountain and collapsed, I forgave you and helped haul your flailing corpse out of the arena.”

Hayden chuckled and said, “Thanks for that. You know that under normal circumstances I would have at least thrown a shoe at the person who cut off your conjuring hand, maybe spoken sternly to him as well.”

“Good to know I can count on my friends.”

“Speaking of the arena, I forgot to ask Master Asher about the scores,” Hayden remembered suddenly. “How did we do?”

“Pretty well, considering I still have no idea what that arena was even supposed to be about,” Zane brightened. “You pulled a nine for whatever reason, and so did I. Tess and Lorn got eights.”

Hayden frowned. “How did we manage a nine? All we did was run through the woods from people who were trying to kill us for no good reason.”

“Like I said, beats me.”

Conner was leaning against the wall, looking almost hesitant as he asked, “Have you seen Tess since the arena?”

Hayden gave him a funny look and said, “No, I was busy dying of blood loss and whatever else that stuff did to me. Why, was I supposed to?”

“I was just wondering,” Conner said in an offhanded way. “She said she was busy tonight after dinner, and I thought she might be going to sit by your sickbed and just didn’t want to say.”

“No, she wasn’t with me—or at least she wasn’t when I woke up.” Now that he thought about it, he wished she
had
been there when he woke up. It would have made a nicer sight than being greeted by Bonk.

Conner looked almost awkward when he said, “Oh, cool. Um, can I ask you something, Hayden?”

Zane immediately picked up a book, opened it to a page at random, and began focusing on it intently. Tamon gave his friend a look of warning and shook his head ever-so-slightly, like he knew what was coming and thought it was a terrible idea.

Confused by the behavior of his friends and wondering what he was missing, Hayden said, “Uh, sure. What’s up?”

“I was just wondering…are you…you know…is Tess your girlfriend or something?”

Hayden was completely unprepared for this line of questioning, and as a result he just stared blankly at Conner for a moment with his mouth gaping open, feeling like he’d been clubbed over the head.