by V. St. Clair
She frowned and drummed her fingers lightly on the table as she said, “Nothing helpful.” Hayden could tell that this was a considerable thorn in her side right now, as she rarely fidgeted. “Preliminary reports have him setting up at his old estate—well, legally it is Hayden’s estate at the moment.”
“I doubt he’ll see that as an impediment,” Hayden interjected with a wry smile, and Magdalene tilted her head slightly in acknowledgement. “And here I just got control of the place,” he sighed. “I’ve only gotten to visit it once on my own since winning my suit against the Council, and now we’re going to have to search it for booby-traps all over again once he’s gone.”
Several of the others lifted their eyebrows at the bold assumption that they would defeat the Dark Prism a second time and he would get his house back. Hayden was simply being optimistic because he didn’t think that anyone would appreciate pessimism at this point. There was no choice but to go forward, and openly casting doubt on his abilities was hardly going to make things any better.
“Yes, well, we do know that while he’s setting up his old base, he’s spending a lot of time away from it, but none of our numerous contacts have been able to figure out where he’s going or what he’s doing,” Magdalene continued glumly. “It’s not like we’re able to get anyone close enough to place a magical trace on him—and even if we did, he’d surely know about it immediately and use that infernal Black Prism to unravel it.”
“He has to turn up eventually,” Asher stated pragmatically. “He’s hardly going to become a hermit and remain inside the Frost estate for the rest of his life; he wouldn’t be such a threat if that were the case. Like last time, he’ll eventually need to move into the open and we’ll get a sense for what his goals are.”
There was a collective shudder around the table as they imagined what kind of horror that might entail. Hayden was hoping they could stop him before it got to that point.
“No one has asked the important question yet, so I’ll take the initiative,” Master Kiresa said bluntly, shooting Hayden a brief glance before focusing on Asher. “Is the boy actually skillful enough to take down his father, or is he truly only a mascot to our movement?”
Total silence followed his question for almost a full minute, while everyone looked at Asher and Asher in turn stared at Kiresa. Finally he said, “I doubt Hayden will be alone when it comes down to it. The rest of us aren’t going to shove him into a closed room with Aleric, wish him luck, and wait outside to greet the victor.”
“I realize that,” Kiresa answered in a level tone, “but you’re avoiding the question. If push comes to shove, and Aleric manages to isolate the boy from us, can he win?”
Hayden’s mentor shrugged and said, “You’re asking me to predict the future, a tricky business at best. There are too many random factors to take into consideration—Aleric could sneeze at the wrong time and lose for all we know. Added to the fact that I have no idea what level Aleric’s skill is at since the last time we battled, almost six years ago…”
“We realize that you haven’t kept in touch with the Dark Prism in recent years,” Laris interrupted, though he looked like he wasn’t sure he really believed his own words. “But based on what you do remember of his talents, what do you think?”
Another moment of silence, and then Kiresa snapped in annoyance, “Well? Can he overpower his father or not?”
After another contemplative moment, Asher replied.
“Honestly, I’m not sure. In terms of raw power—yes, I believe Hayden is stronger than Aleric. I’ve been gauging his Source power for years, and I have yet to find the limits of it. The more practiced he becomes with magic, the more fully he is able to draw on his Source, and I expect that to continue for some time before he reaches the absolute extent of his power.”
Hayden was a little surprised to learn that his mentor had been trying to analyze him this way for years, though he supposed he shouldn’t be. The others looked mildly cheered by this testimonial to his skills.
“Raw power—while important—is not everything,” Master Mandra pressed gently. “What about speed of casting?”
Asher frowned.
“Aleric has him there,” he admitted truthfully. “Hayden has taken enormous strides to improve, and he has come a long way, but unless Aleric got rusty during his five-year hiatus, he will be at least twice as fast as Hayden.”
Hayden thought this was actually good news, since when he began his one-on-one combat lessons with Master Asher two years ago, he was estimated at five times slower than the Prism Master, who was still slower than Aleric Frost. The others didn’t look wholly pleased with his enormous amount of improvement in such a short time though, and he couldn’t entirely blame them. Being half as fast as the Dark Prism would still likely get him killed.
“Endurance?” Willow prompted gently, not commenting on the issue of speed.
Asher made a wavering motion with one hand.
“I’m not sure. Hayden has more endurance than anyone I’ve ever seen—and it increases as he gets more practiced tapping into his Source directly, so I’m inclined to give that one to him.”
“Then why the uncertainty?” Kilgore put in curiously.
“Honestly, I haven’t seen anyone challenge Aleric sufficiently to really test his endurance, not since he started messing with broken prisms. At the very least though, I believe we could call them evenly matched on that front.”
“And force of will?” Magdalene prompted.
“Another tricky one, though I might give it to Aleric,” Asher admitted. “Hayden can drum up an impressive amount of willpower, but typically only when he—or someone he cares about—is on the very brink of annihilation. Aleric is all willpower, all the time, and alarmingly self-disciplined.”
Hayden felt like it was necessary to interject at this point. “To be fair, I and everyone I care about will likely be on the brink of annihilation when we’re fighting him, so that should help.”
Asher frowned. “Even then, he may still have you trumped on willpower.”
“Hmm, two out of four isn’t terribly reassuring,” Magdalene pursed her lips, “though admittedly better than most others could manage.” She tilted her head to Hayden in acknowledgement.
“Are you sure you aren’t overstating his abilities?” Kiresa asked bluntly. “If you hadn’t insisted on sheltering him all these years, he might be further along in his studies by now, but even so—”
“Test him for yourself, if you’d like,” Asher cut his counterpart off, quite rudely, before another argument could ensue.
“Oh, I intend to,” Kiresa smiled nastily.
Great, something else to look forward to, Hayden thought joylessly. This day just gets better and better.
“For what my opinion is worth, I’ve seen him in action for years now, and Master Asher’s not overestimating his power or endurance,” Oliver, of all people, interjected on his behalf. “His major flaw is that he sometimes chokes under pressure, but after everything that’s happened in the last couple years he’s probably gotten better about that too.”
“Thanks, I think,” Hayden said quietly.
“How is he with the other arcana?” Laris pressed on during the silence that followed this. “Ever since Aleric went dark he has almost exclusively relied on prisms.”
“And why not?” Kilgore scowled. “With that blasted Black Prism of his never depleting, what need does he have of secondary instruments?”
“Yes, but that is an advantage that Hayden does not share,” Magdalene intoned mildly. “He’ll need every weapon he can get—we all will, in the event of a prolonged battle.”
Master Willow said, “He has always had a good mind for Wands, which are probably his second most-powerful weapon,” without prompting. “Dirqua has reported similar success with Charms, where his Source power gives him an obvious advantage over others.”
“We should load him up with the most powerful charms we can get our hands on before engaging Aleric.�
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“But we’ll have to make sure not to bog him down so much that his charms are consuming all of his Source strength and fatiguing him,” Kilgore countered. “He’ll need enough power left over to perform magic.”
The image of himself weighted down with dozens of charms, wands, and other magical weaponry so that he could barely walk, let alone fight, filled Hayden’s head and he suppressed a chuckle, despite the grim context. He would take what small amusement life had to offer, these days.
“Even with all of that, I don’t like our odds,” Master Mandra spoke up, fidgeting with his thumbs on top of the table. “We’re all in agreement that Hayden is likely the only one who can overpower him in a straight-out battle, and even that is uncertain. We’re going to have to attack him on so many fronts at once that he simply can’t overwhelm us all, and hope that one of us can break through the standing spells he has sensing magic and protecting his person.”
“Aleric is not a god, nor is he invincible,” Asher pointed out softly, staring down at his hands in contemplation. “It’s true that he is incredibly fast, skillful, and has spells that we aren’t even aware of, but in the end he is just a man. He is not omnipotent, and he can be beaten.”
A thoughtful silence followed this. Hayden found himself heartened by the Prism Master’s words, since it was easy to forget that his father was only human during these discussions.
“Let’s leave it at that for the night,” Magdalene rose to her feet, and perforce, everyone else followed suit. “We will reconvene here four nights from now, to give a status update on our various pursuits. Hopefully by then we’ll have made headway, either with Calahan, or with locating the Dark Prism and tracking his activities.”
Maybe we’ll all get lucky and he’ll have a heart attack or something, Hayden wished privately.
The others mumbled various levels of agreement to this plan, and began vanishing from the room, clasping their Mastery Charms as they went. Hayden just realized that he and Oliver were the only ones in the entire group that lacked Mastery Charms, and of how odd it felt to be a part of something all of these important mages were working on.
Asher stayed behind when most of the others left and said, “I’ll walk you to your room,” to Hayden.
Half expecting this, Hayden nodded and led the way out of the formal dining room. He was a little surprised when his mentor seemed to know exactly where they were going, following the turns along their path without hesitation.
“How do you know your way around the Trout estate so well?” he asked curiously when passed the library.
“It’s not my first visit,” Asher answered simply.
“Well, I figured that much, but you seem to know your way around the house pretty well. The only reason I don’t get lost is because I lived here for five weeks last year.”
Asher gave him a wry smile and said, “I’m actually quite well-connected, you know, despite the hit my reputation took after Aleric lost his marbles. Oh sure, people shun me in public or mock me openly about the association, because popular opinion says it’s a bad thing to associate with me, but privately, there are few people I am not connected to.”
“And that doesn’t bother you?” Hayden asked with raised eyebrows. “It would drive me nuts if people were horrible to me in public but then wanted to be buddies in private.”
Asher smiled again.
“Actually I find it quite useful. Few people know how well-connected I truly am, or how many people owe me favors, which makes it very easy to surprise them and appear more enigmatic and powerful than I actually am. It pays to be underestimated by people—especially my enemies.”
Hayden considered the idea for a moment and then grinned.
“To be fair, sir, you’re pretty enigmatic all on your own. I don’t think I’ve ever been able to predict what you’ll say or do, and at this point, nothing would surprise me.”
“I take that as the highest of compliments,” Asher said with amused dignity. “Now, there’s something I wanted to warn you about—though perhaps you got a sense for it during the meeting,” he changed the subject abruptly, the smile dropping off of his face.
“Oh yeah?” Hayden prompted tiredly.
“You’re going to be getting a crash course in magic—even more than you already have been with me,” he amended, acknowledging Hayden’s look of horror. “We’re all going to be working with you individually as much as possible to bulk up your magic in all aspects, because we need you as good as you can be before we tackle Aleric.”
Hayden’s mind was overcome with the image of the entire group of them lunging at the Dark Prism and piling on top of him until nothing stuck out but his feet. Sometimes he cursed his vivid imagination.
“Even Kiresa?”
“Even him,” Asher nodded. “And I know that neither of us are particularly fond of the man, but as much as it pains me to say it, he is adept at prisms, so you should try to learn whatever you can from him. He’ll doubtless have a different approach than me, but that is a good thing, as it will give you another perspective.”
Hayden tried to think positively about the experience instead of focusing on how much pain he was going to be in, because he very much doubted that Master Kiresa was going to pull any punches during their lessons.
“Not that I mind getting some advanced learning, but why does everyone seem to think I’m the crux of this whole thing? I know everyone on our side wasn’t here tonight—the other Masters at Mizzenwald, for instance—so we’ve got to have at least a dozen or two highly-skilled mages to send against him. If we all attack him at once, he won’t be able to overcome our sheer numbers; like you said, he’s only human, and he can only cast one spell at a time through his Black Prism—as far as we know.”
Asher frowned, stopping outside of the door to Hayden’s bedroom and meeting his gaze.
“Yes, but we tried that same tactic last time around, and he always managed to prevent himself from being cornered by more people than he could defeat in battle. It’s also worth mentioning that he keeps a few spells permanently cast around himself, to heighten his perception and grant him basic protection—where others might use charms for the same purpose. Our plan is to force him into a large confrontation, but we have to be cognizant of the fact that he might break us into smaller groups and take us down.” He hesitated briefly before continuing. “Popular opinion right now is that at some point, your father is going to come for you, which is the only bit of him that is predictable at this time, and therefore makes you the lynchpin of this entire thing.”
Hayden raised one eyebrow and said, “Why is everyone so sure of that? He had me in his grips when we came out of the schism and he let me go.”
“That was only because he was unarmed and needed to escape Mizzenwald before anyone else showed up to attack him. Once he’s back on his feet, we believe that he will come after you for the same reason he tried to find you when you were ten.”
“And that is…?”
Asher shrugged. “You know I don’t know the answer to that. Either he’s curious about your similarities to him—magically speaking, or he wants you to join his cause, or he wants to kill you personally for all I know. The point is, he clearly didn’t get what he was after when he showed up at your mother’s house and got blasted into that schism, and he probably knows you are the biggest threat to him right now, so it is likely that he will try and isolate you from everyone else to make you easier to take.”
“Great, something else to have nightmares about,” Hayden grimaced. “I guess it’s a good thing I have all of you Masters of the arcana on hand to teach me everything you know before that happens.”
Asher tilted his head at this, glancing at his chrono.
“I need to return to Mizzenwald. Now that the term is about over, we’ll have more time to dedicate to preparing for a fight with Aleric, so you and I will see each other soon. In the meantime, do the best you can to learn whatever our allies are trying to teach you, keep Bonk with you a
s much as possible, and never go anywhere unarmed, even in this house.”
“You think he’ll come here?” Hayden made a face. He certainly hoped that the Dark Prism wouldn’t come storming into the Trout estate in the dead of night to capture or kill him.
Great, my nightmares just got even scarier.
“We’re doing all we can to make sure that no one knows you are here, but better safe than sorry. If Aleric grabs one of our allies and tortures him or her sufficiently, they may give away your location.”
“It seems like every time we part ways, it’s over some horribly depressing news like this,” Hayden pointed out. “You never pull me aside to tell me a joke or offer me ice cream or anything.”
Asher snorted in amusement.
“You’re right, it does seem that way. My apologies. Once this is all over, I’ll be sure to end all of our conversations with a bad joke or some sort of baked dessert. For now though, I must go.”
Hayden nodded and watched the Prism Master take hold of his Mastery Charm, narrow his eyebrows in concentration, and vanish into thin air.
5
The Duel
Receiving one-on-one training from some of the greatest mages in the Nine Lands wasn’t nearly as glamorous as Hayden might have imagined, if someone had told him years ago where he would be right now. It actually involved a lot more muttered swear words and healing elixirs than he might have guessed.
“Get up, Hayden,” Master Willow said from somewhere nearby. “We only have a few more minutes together before I need to depart.”
Great, then one of my other allies will take up the job of beating me to a pulp in your stead.
Groaning, Hayden spit out the mouthful of grass he’d recently acquired after landing face-down on the far side of the arena in the Trout’s back yard.
And to think, just one year ago I was mildly envious that I’d never gotten to practice my magical weaponry out here with the Trouts.
He decided that he should really be more careful with his wishes, since they had a nasty way of coming true in ways he didn’t expect.
