by V. St. Clair
Frost Prisms
The Broken Prism, Book 5
V. St. Clair
Asher,
This is the last letter I will ever send you.
That you would even give me such an ultimatum shows that you have turned against me. You, who I always counted as a friend, who I trusted beyond all others, and now it has come to this? I will not turn back from the road I’m on—the road to true greatness. I have discovered new depths of magic that you could never even fathom.
I am content to leave you to your own path, out of respect for the friendship we once shared. But if you are determined to die for your betrayal, then so be it. I will meet you in battle, and I will prove that you are still—and forevermore—the weaker of the two of us, as you have always known in your heart, even at Mizzenwald.
There are no prizes for second-best, old friend.
A. Frost
1
A Fair Exchange
“Aleric?”
Asher’s voice was so soft that for a moment Hayden could convince himself that he had misheard, or that the Prism Master was playing some horrible joke on him, or that he was still stuck in the schism going insane after all…
The man Hayden knew as Hunter was standing upright now, still looking a little disoriented from the effect of moving from the realm of anti-magic back to this one. His eyes focused on Asher in that moment, taking in the red metallic Mastery robes and the details of his face.
His expression transformed from confusion to delight in the span of a heartbeat, and he grinned when he said, “Who did you steal Mastery robes off of, Ash? That’s one way to get women, I suppose…”
For a horrible moment the tableau was frozen like that: Hunter grinning, Asher still staring at him in silent terror, and Hayden standing in the no-man’s land between the two.
Then the moment ended.
“Hayden, get away from him,” Asher found his voice at last, motioning Hayden towards him without taking his eyes off of his old friend.
Hayden was still too stunned to move.
He’s wrong—Asher has to be wrong. There’s no way that Hunter can be the Dark Prism…that he could be my father. My father’s been dead for years, ever since the day he showed up at my mother’s house…
A little voice in his head pointed out that the Dark Prism’s body had never been found after the explosion.
Neither was my mother’s—they were both vaporized in the blast.
With the force of the explosion, it would have been easy for a schism to open up. Maybe his father had been propelled into it before the magical backlash in the area could incinerate him.
A schism would still be open there if that was the case…
But he knew that wasn’t necessarily true; he had seen schisms snap open and shut within the span of a second as a result of powerful magic being used.
He’s tall and broad-shouldered and has blond hair; he doesn’t look anything like me!
Everyone had always agreed he had his mother’s hair and eye color, but there was something similar about the shape of their faces, now that he was looking for it….He had felt a sense of familiarity with the man from the moment they met that was hard to explain. He had chalked it up to being lost and half-nuts inside of the other realm, but maybe…
It can’t be true!
While he was still struggling with the insane possibility that the man who had just rescued him from the schism was actually his infamous father, Asher said, “Hayden—come here,” a bit more emphatically, drawing a prism slowly from his belt.
In the moment it took Hayden to shake himself from his stupor and realize that—if this was the Dark Prism—he was standing right in front of the man, Aleric Frost seemed to snap out of his joyful mood and grabbed Hayden roughly by the shoulder, pulling him closer.
“Leave it or the boy dies,” Aleric commanded with his powerful voice, one strong arm wrapped around Hayden’s torso, holding him in front of his body like a shield as he drew a knife and pressed it lightly against Hayden’s throat. Hayden had seen him fight monsters with that knife only hours ago in the defense of his life, and now he was threatening to end him with it.
Asher froze with his hand halfway to his circlet, expression stony.
“Leave Hayden out of this,” he said calmly, with the air of one who was trying to soothe a wild animal.
“Toss me that prism or I’ll cut his throat,” Aleric returned coldly, pressing the knife a little deeper into Hayden’s flesh for emphasis, until he could feel a trickle of blood oozing down his neck. Hayden tried not to swallow, for fear that the motion would cause him to cut his own throat on accident.
“That boy is your son,” Asher pointed out, expression still scarily neutral, though Hayden could tell he was doing some fast thinking; he could almost see the thoughts spinning around his mentor’s brain as the man weighed his options.
This is the best chance Asher will ever have to defeat him, Hayden realized abruptly. My father doesn’t have any prisms on him right now and he’s just come through the schism—he’s still a little dazed, possibly vulnerable while his Source recovers from the shock…
That was when he knew that he was going to die.
Asher had to kill the Dark Prism right here, right now, or there might never be another chance when he could get the upper hand in battle. And where was Hayden? Standing directly in the line of fire because he was too slow on the uptake to move when Asher first instructed him to.
“And you think that matters?” Aleric answered his former best friend’s question with icy indifference. “Give me the prism or the boy dies.”
“Don’t do it,” Hayden interjected, speaking for the first time and causing the Dark Prism’s grip on him to tighten painfully.
“Shut up, Hayden,” his mentor informed him without taking his eyes off of Aleric. After another moment of consideration he said, “Let the boy go.”
Hayden could hear the derision in his father’s voice and guessed that he was smirking.
“You always were weak, Asher. We could have remained friends, if not for that little character flaw.”
“Funny, I was thinking the exact same thing about you,” the Prism Master responded coolly.
Their attention was momentarily diverted from the question of Hayden’s mortality by a small, dark-purple dragonling that was gliding towards them from the castle, casting shadows over the grass as he flew closer.
Cinder, Hayden realized with a pang of understanding.
Cinder had been his father’s familiar before he disappeared five years ago. Now the dragonling alit gracefully onto his master’s shoulder as though he’d never been gone, the shadow of his wings falling over Hayden’s face.
It was that, more than anything, that convinced Hayden that his father was truly alive and standing right behind him with a knife pressed against his throat. Cinder was reclusive by nature, and only liked Hayden because he carried his father’s blood. He would never perch on a stranger’s shoulder like this.
“I tire of waiting for you to decide whether the boy’s life is worth more to you than my death,” Aleric informed Master Asher. “You have three seconds to decide whether this boy is more valuable to you than your vengeance, and then I’ll make the decision for you.”
Asher tossed him the prism before he could even begin counting, and Aleric caught it with the hand that was holding the knife. In one fluid motion, Hayden was shoved forward, hard, so that he stumbled and fell to his knees in the grass. He saw Asher snatch another prism from his pocket and bring it up in front of his eye, not bothering with the eyepiece, and Hayden flattened himself against the ground to avoid getting caught in the crossfire. Before the P
rism Master could successfully get a spell off, he lowered the prism and said, “Damn—he’s already gone.”
Hayden turned his head and confirmed this. They were alone on the lawn right now; Cinder and his father were nowhere to be seen.
Asher helped him to his feet, which felt surprisingly wobbly and unsteady at the moment, like they didn’t want to hold his weight anymore. Hayden narrowed his gaze at the Prism Master and said, “You let him get away,” without inflection.
“I did,” he admitted with a frown. “You look like you’ve been through the wringer, but unless you think you’re bleeding internally, your injuries will have to wait until we’ve had a chance to inform the others about this new development.”
Hayden wasn’t quite ready to change the subject yet, and as the two of them began walking back towards the castle he said, “You could have killed him. You’ll never have a better chance at finding him weaponless and defenseless than you did just now, and you let him get away.”
“That’s probably true,” Asher allowed, slowing his pace to match Hayden’s limping gait, even though it was obvious that he wanted to sprint inside as fast as he could to warn the other Masters.
“Then why didn’t you take your chance?”
Asher gave him a funny look and said, “Do you really have to ask? I would have had to go through you to get to him, and if my magic didn’t kill you, he certainly would have before I could stop him. There was only one way to get you out alive and I took it.”
Hayden swallowed a lump of emotion and didn’t bother asking the next obvious question: you think my life is more important than all the people he’s going to kill now that he’s free?
The answer was obvious, or he’d be a corpse on the back lawns right now. He was thankful to be alive, but not sure if Asher had made the best choice for the Nine Lands.
If anyone finds out he let the Dark Prism go free, he’ll be murdered by the Council for sure.
Hayden opened his mouth to say, “Thank you,” but the words never quite made it out. Instead, they walked in silence across the back lawns until they were at the entrance of the castle.
He realized that classes must still be in session or else there would be more people in the hallways. As it was, they passed no one as they walked through the corridors, which was at least one bit of good luck, because Hayden really didn’t want to deal with his gawking peers right now. They made it all the way to the Prism Master’s office without encountering anyone else, and Asher motioned Hayden inside and said, “I’ll be back in a minute. Don’t open the door for any reason.”
And with that he shut and locked the door with them both inside, grabbed his Mastery Charm, and vanished.
Momentarily alone and safe, Hayden felt the full weight of his weariness settle over him, and he slumped over in Asher’s most comfortable chair and rested his head on the desk in front of him. His nose was pressed against their most recent research notes, and for a few seconds Hayden simply stared at the streaks of blue and green beneath his eyes that he had drawn only days ago; it felt like much more time had passed since he did that work.
He closed his eyes in an attempt to ward off the throbbing in his head, without any real effect. Dimly, he wondered why Asher had locked him in the office and told him not to open the door for anyone.
Surely he doesn’t think I’m going to be attacked here…not so soon, at least.
Hayden found it extremely unlikely that his father would come back to storm the castle in search of him—especially as he had let Hayden go free only minutes ago, but Asher obviously wasn’t taking any chances with his safety right now.
His teeth were chattering obnoxiously, and try as he might, Hayden couldn’t stop the unwanted movement. He wasn’t sure why they were being so uncooperative; he wasn’t even cold, but now that he thought about it, his entire body seemed to be racked with shudders at odd moments.
Cyclical convulsions, symptomatic of a level-three state of shock. Administer warm blankets and fluids until symptoms subside…Mistress Razelle’s voice came to him then, from one of their Healing classes years ago.
The sound of rustling papers prevented him from dozing off, and he snapped his head upright in time to see Master Willow materialize into the office, the motion causing some of the loose papers on Asher’s desk to cascade to the floor.
“Hayden—you’re back,” the Master of Wands looked surprised to see him there, but before he could say anything more than that, Masters Kilgore, Sark, and Laurren appeared. As they each looked at each other and then at Hayden, even more Masters materialized in the office: Razelle, Graus, Reede, Dirqua, Potts—the Master of Herbalism, and finally, Asher himself.
The office was hardly large enough to contain them all, which was the first comment out of Master Sark’s mouth as he stumbled into Graus in an attempt to put his back to the wall.
“You mind telling us why we had to abandon our classes to cram into your office like sardines?” he snapped at Asher.
The Prism Master was in no mood for sarcasm—which might be a first, now that Hayden considered it—and opened his mouth to explain, only to be cut off by Kilgore, who caught sight of Hayden and said, “Frost! You made it back in one piece!”
This brought the attention of the other nine Masters to him as well, and Hayden nodded wearily and said, “The schism is closed.”
There was a collective clamor of approving noises at this news, though Sark said, “While that’s excellent to hear, I still don’t see why we had to stop teaching just to celebrate…”
“Don’t celebrate just yet,” Hayden mumbled, though somehow everyone in the room seemed to hear him perfectly. A few of the Masters now looked confused, and Hayden had no intention of being the one to break the terrible news to them that their number one enemy was back in action because of him.
Thankfully, Master Asher did it for him.
“Aleric’s alive,” he blurted out before anyone else could interrupt again. “He was inside the other realm all this time, and he crossed back through with Hayden and escaped from the grounds not five minutes ago.”
You could have heard a pin drop in that cramped office.
After an uncomfortably long silence, it was Reede who said, “Please tell me that this is a terribly distasteful joke you two are playing on us,” to his colleague.
“Afraid not,” Asher sighed. “I saw him with my own eyes—spoke to him, briefly. As everyone is keen on reminding me, I was the man’s best friend for most of our lives, so if anyone would recognize him after a five year hiatus, it would be me.”
Another horrible pause, while the others digested this information in silence. Hayden was surprised that none of them were gaspers or shouters—there was usually one in any given group of people.
Finally Master Willow said, “Where is Aleric now? You said he’s left the grounds…”
Asher shook his head.
“He caught me off-guard and took one of my prisms. I have no idea where he went to, but if he’s been stuck in the other realm for five years then he’ll probably need time to set up base again and reestablish his magic.”
So that was to be the official story: Asher was surprised by the Dark Prism’s unexpected appearance and got overpowered. Hayden committed it to memory so he wouldn’t be the one to say otherwise.
“Does the Council know?” Willow prodded.
“No, not yet,” Asher replied.
“Someone needs to tell them immediately, or we’ll be brought up on charges for withholding information,” Master Dirqua pointed out pragmatically.
“As soon as Hayden tells us—succinctly—how in the world he happened to bring the Dark Prism back through the schism with him, we will inform the Council,” Laurren responded, weighing Hayden with those strange, blue-purple eyes.
Once more, everyone turned to him, waiting for an explanation. Trying to ignore his throbbing headache, he gave the best overview he could manage right now and hoped it was enough.
“I have no idea how
long we’d been in the other realm before I met up with him. Harold was already dead, and Tanner and I were attacked by hyenas after we cleared the swamp. Tanner died saving me, but there was still one hyena left. That’s when Hun—when my father showed up. He finished off the hyena and said he saw the flash bomb I’d set off in the swamp, and came to investigate. He told me his name was Hunter and offered to help me find the schism aperture, once I told him what I was doing.”
“And you didn’t recognize him on sight?” Master Sark seemed unable to interject at this point.
“I’d never seen him before, other than the time he blew up my house, but I don’t have most of my memories from that time. It’s not like I look exactly like him or anything, and I was well on my way to losing my mind by the time I met him, so I wasn’t at my mental peak anyway.”
The others frowned at this and Master Kilgore made an impatient motion with one hand to wave him on.
“Anyway, we traveled together for the rest of the way. He kept me talking because it helped keep my mind focused, so I ended up telling him my entire life’s story, including all the stuff about him…”
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Reede interrupted. “If Aleric spent five years inside the other realm he should be a slobbering pile of drool by now. Hayden has the worst Foci the world has probably ever seen and he barely lasted two days in there.”
Wow, I was only gone for two days? It felt like a week had elapsed inside the schism.
“He’s obviously found a way to use magic inside of the other realm, probably with that accursed Black Prism of his,” Sark scowled. “He duped Hayden long enough to get free of the schism and then showed his true colors.”
“I don’t think that’s true…” Hayden interjected softly. “I mean, I don’t think he was pretending not to know who I was. He was much stronger than me and much better at surviving—he could have just taken my prism from me and followed the ley lines for himself. Heck, I gave him the void-prism to hang onto because I was afraid I’d lose my mind and accidentally use it too early,” he explained to general astonishment. “He didn’t seem to understand magic at all; I had to tell him how Foci and Sources work, and what prisms even were. I don’t claim to know him very well, but surely he can’t be that good of an actor, especially when there was just no reason for it.”
