Frost Prisms (The Broken Prism Book 5) (24 page)

The look his father gave him suggested that he was losing points for allowing himself to be caught unprepared. Hayden was tempted to ask if he was expected to sleep in his circlet and belt, armed to the teeth at all times despite the discomfort of having to sleep on prisms, wands, and phials of elixirs. He refrained from asking the mocking question only because he expected his father would answer, “Yes” in perfect sincerity.

“Learning that you possess some of my stolen Source power seems to have given you a sense of overconfidence,” the Dark Prism returned to the previous topic. “Surely you were taught that Source power is not everything, especially when one does not know how to use it properly.”

“Actually, I
have
been taught that,” Hayden countered, betraying some of his annoyance. “I’ve also been training for years on just how to optimize my magic usage.”

A brief silence fell between them as they stared at each other. Hayden was determined not to be the first to break eye contact, though he suspected that his father could stare intimidatingly at things for hours on end without even blinking. For all he knew, the man stood around doing just that whenever his thoughts grew too blurry.

Finally, Aleric blinked and broke eye contact, reaching into his pants pocket and extracting a wad of something thin and silvery. Before Hayden could ask what it was, his father tossed the ball of fabric to him one-handed, and Hayden caught it reflexively.

He glanced at his father, unsure what this was all about.

“Put them on,” Aleric instructed. When Hayden actually looked down at the silky material he was holding, he realized what it was and became even more confused.

“Prism-handling gloves,” he said softly, recalling other pairs he had seen before. The ultra-thin, close-fitting silk gloves were used by jewelers like the one at Mizzenwald, who needed to handle prisms extensively but didn’t want to smear them with fingerprints. Hayden had even seen Asher use them a time or two during their research sessions together the year before. Hayden had never bothered having a pair made for himself yet, though he had been considering it at one point.

“Put them on,” his father said once more, less patiently than the first time, and Hayden realized he was staring at them for too long.

Not knowing what his father was up to, Hayden pulled on the Dark Prism’s custom-made gloves. As expected, the fit was a little loose, as he had smaller hands and a smaller frame than his father, but Hayden wiggled his fingers inside of the gloves anyway, appreciating how smooth and thin the material was.

Without explaining himself, Aleric reached up to his own circlet and began unscrewing the Black Prism from his eyepiece. Hayden could only stare in confusion and silent terror, because his last involvement with the Black Prism had resulted in his childhood home blowing up, his Foci warping, his brain nearly melting from light-sickness, and his mother becoming atomized in the explosion that nearly killed him.

Hayden felt his mouth drop open dumbly when his father tossed the prism to him. Again, Hayden caught it by sheer reflex, staring down at the sinister diamond in his hand.

This is the weapon that made my father nearly invincible, that killed thousands of people. This is the infamous Black Prism—the instrument that is so corrupt that it doesn’t follow the laws of magic and is never consumed no matter what is cast through it, that allegedly shows every color in the spectrum, including black. This is what killed my mother, and Tess’s mother, and most of Jasper Dout’s family…the prism that warped Asher’s left Focus and nearly killed him as well. The most notorious weapon the Nine Lands has ever seen, and I’m holding it in my hand.

On the surface it looked like any common prism. There were no distinguishing features visible to the naked eye. Hayden didn’t know what he had been expecting, maybe a different tint? Or perhaps the words ‘BLACK PRISM’ etched into the glass, so that the world would know its terrible and awesome power?

It was fortunate that Hayden was wearing gloves, because his hands were becoming cold and clammy, sticking to the silken material.

An effect of the prism, or is it just that I’m terrified and fascinated to be holding it?

With effort, Hayden tore his gaze away from it and looked back at his father. Aleric Frost was watching him with no visible sense of interest, as though he was watching a newly-painted wall dry.

“You are now armed with the greatest weapon this world has likely ever seen, and I stand before you with nothing.” He opened his hands as though to illustrate the point. “If you are indeed so powerful, then attack me.”

Hayden just continued to stare at the closest living relative he had, wondering how a father and son could be so fundamentally different.

Is he joking? Did he really just give me his primary weapon and challenge me to use it against him?

Even in insanity, Hayden was fairly certain he would never have made such a bold move, but then again the Black Prism was supposed to be the most corrupt prism in existence. For Hayden to use it even once would probably ruin him beyond recovery.

This might be my only chance though. He’s calling my bluff; he thinks I’m too scared to use it because he knows I don’t want to be like him—if he remembers anything I told him inside the schism he’ll know that much.

That raised another uncomfortable thought. Just how much
did
Aleric Frost remember from his time inside the schism with his son? Hayden had told him his life’s story, including all of his less-than-charitable thoughts about his notorious father.

Stop avoiding the real issue.

He knew his mind was trying to put off the decision that was now before him: to use the Black Prism against his father or not. If he did, it would be the end of him; there could be no coming back from that kind of distortion. He would have to hope that he remained level-headed long enough to kill his father and then himself, or else he might simply replace his father as the Dark Prism. Well, he’d need a new name of course, there couldn’t be
two
Dark Prisms….The memory of Oliver and Jasper jeering and calling him the Broken Prism—way back in his first year of school—came to him then.

Well, the name would still fit…

It meant certain death, but at least it would be an honorable death…wouldn’t it? Asher would understand why he did it, that it was the only way to rid the world of the Frosts once and for all. Tess and Zane…would be less forgiving.

The hand that brought the prism up to eye-level was trembling slightly, but there was no helping that at this point. Even while confronting his impending death, he felt a strange fascination by the abhorrent thing in his hand. He had always idly wondered what it would be like to look through the Black Prism, what kind of alignments would open up to him—things that didn’t exist in any other prism, or maybe they just weren’t as easy to find…

He stopped with the Black Prism directly over his right eye, turned so that he was facing his father directly, and looked through it.

Colors and alignments burst to life before him, more than he could immediately process. He barely had time to register the alarming streaks of black that shot through the other bands of color before he was struck blind with a searing headache.

He cried out in unexpected pain and felt the Black Prism drop from his hand as he hit his knees, overcome with the wrongness of the alignments. He had looked through an imperfect prism once before, at the end of his first year, and recalled feeling a slight sense of unease—but that had been a prism with only mild distortion. Blinking tears from his eyes, he cursed himself as a fool for not having anticipated this: the Black Prism was a complete sin against nature, more distorted than anything he had ever attempted to look through; of course he couldn’t see through it without the stupid thing making his brain hurt. It had probably taken his father years of working with increasingly distorted prisms before he was even able to build this monstrosity, let alone
use
it.

Even thinking of those alignments—red, blue,
black
, green—made him so sick that he clutched blindly for the nearest object and ended up vomiting into the bowl of a potted plant. He had no idea what his father was doing right now, other than watching the spectacle of his agony. Was the man pleased? Alarmed? Mildly amused? Angry that all of his potted plants were going to die now, since Hayden kept puking on them?

The sound of slow, deliberate footfalls approaching made Hayden aware that his father was coming towards him, and for a wild moment he thought his father was going to ask whether he was alright. But no, he was simply picking up the Black Prism where Hayden had so carelessly discarded it, casually returning it to the eyepiece of his own circlet.

When his brain stopped hurting and the urge to vomit finally passed, Hayden turned to face his father, expecting to see the man standing near the worktable. He almost shouted when he blinked and realized that his father was standing almost directly over him, staring down with pitiless blue eyes.

“It seems that you have overestimated your abilities,” he said without emotion. “You had the greatest weapon of all time in your possession, and yet here you lie, in a heap on the floor.”

Too annoyed to be properly frightened, Hayden snapped, “That’s hardly a fair test and you know it. I doubt even
you
could have used that prism when you were my age. Give me one of those normal ones off of your table and then we’ll see what happens.”

Rather than get angry, his father simply tilted his head slightly, still staring down at him. Hayden wished he would step back a few feet so that he could at least sit up without knocking the man over; lying on the floor made him feel weak—but then, that was probably the point.

“All of the prisms on my worktable have some degree of distortion to them, though I suppose you could still use them, if you’re willing to risk your principles,” he allowed, gesturing back at them.

Dismay colored his tone when Hayden said, “You mean you
only
keep broken prims lying around the house? There aren’t
any
normal ones here?”

“Oh, there are a few lying around, but you’re a fool if you think I would allow them to come into your possession.” His father frowned down at him now, finally openly acknowledging the threat that he posed.

“So you
are
afraid me,” Hayden smiled, though nothing about the situation was humorous. If it was true that there were only imperfect prisms lying out the open, Hayden would either need to follow in his father’s footsteps—something he swore he would never do—or find a way to strangle the man in his sleep.

The dangerous look flashed briefly across the Dark Prism’s face once more, and Hayden braced himself for some sort of physical pain, tensing against his will. His father noticed, of course, and then the look was gone.

“I fear nothing—not even you,” he informed Hayden coldly. “You may have latent power, but you are nothing to me. If you did not hold something important to me you would already be dead, and the carrion birds would have picked your corpse apart wherever I left it to rot.” He said all of this without breaking eye contact with Hayden, voice growing lower and softer as more contempt crept into it.

Hayden clenched his teeth, biting back whatever stupid, unhelpful thing he was probably about to open his mouth and say out of sheer habit. How had he ever convinced himself that he was prepared to deal with this man? Somehow, in all the stories Asher had told him to prepare him for this, he had never managed to convey just how monstrous the Dark Prism had become.

Thankfully, his father seemed to think he’d made his point, because he finally backed away from Hayden and returned to his worktable, turning his back to him as though pronouncing him entirely unworthy of attention.

Fine by me.

Hayden got to his feet and was about to leave the room when he realized that it would be an admission of defeat, a sign of weakness. Even if he was simply returning to his room to regroup, it would be a loss of face, and appearances were clearly extremely important where Aleric Frost was concerned.

So instead he stayed, swallowing the cowardly voice in his head that was screaming,
You idiot! Run and hide while you still can, and smother the man with a pillow when he sleeps!

He returned to his position by the window, unlatching the panes and swinging them open to let the cool air blow across his face. In another hour the sun would set completely behind the mountains in the distance, but for now the orange and pink light still cascaded across the land, as if the world were a giant prism.

In a way, I suppose it is.

“Why are you still here?” his father asked without looking up from his worktable, looking through a magnifying glass while making bold slashes of color with a red pencil. Even in a moment like this, Hayden could envy his ability to sketch alignments so rapidly and precisely, without need of a ruler.

“You never told me why you wanted to see me.”

Aleric waited until he had finished his work with the red pencil before answering. Hayden was beginning to understand that this was one of the many tactics he employed to control a conversation—forcing others to conform to his sense of timing.

“I’ve concluded that one of the primary reasons my last attempt at extracting your Source failed was because of your active opposition.”