Forest of Illusions (The Broken Prism)

by V. St. Clair

  “Slasher isn’t as close to Cinder as Bonk is,” Torin stated simply. “It would explain why other familiars have been showing similar symptoms for no other clear reason.”

  “But—” Hayden stammered, opening and closing his mouth several times, determined to prove that they were overreacting, “—but the Fias keep telling us how the mayor’s been getting word from the front again, that our forces are doing better! Cinder wouldn’t be suffering if we were winning! He would have healed by now!”

  Torin finally looked up from his hands and met Hayden’s eyes, his own expression skeptical as he said, “And why are you so sure the Fias are telling you the truth?”

  Aghast, Hayden had nothing to say to that.

  “I think the mayor is trying to hold back a full-scale panic amongst the people in Junir, and that he would do anything necessary to prevent that from happening for as long as possible. He only has to hold out until he actually does get word on the outcome of the fight, one way or another—and then it won’t matter what he told people before.”

  Hayden was shaking his head, though he wasn’t sure why. He motioned Bonk to take his usual perch on his shoulder and asked, “What will happen to Bonk if Cinder keeps getting worse? Will he—could he die?” he asked the last part very quietly.

  “He might, if he continues to decline or goes off eating,” Torin answered regretfully. “It depends on how much longer Cinder can go on suffering before he himself dies.”

  Hayden wasn’t aware of saying goodbye to Torin or leaving the cabin, but he was suddenly walking back towards the castle, taking long strides and clenching and unclenching his hands at his sides. Bonk was perched patiently on his shoulder, looking around with mild interest and gauging Hayden’s mood.

  By the time he entered the dining hall the meal was nearing completion. Fia Eldridge was standing in front of his usual seat, still wearing the blue business suit that was common to the accountants. He seemed to be making an announcement to the room, since everyone else was quiet, and Hayden caught the last bit of it from the doorway.

  “…driven the northern sorcerers away from the border with Osglen and are hoping to bottleneck them at the coast.”

  Hayden frowned and remained standing in the threshold of the dining hall, unnoticed by anyone, as all attention was turned towards the Fia at the back of the room.

  Lorn Trout was sitting at the table nearest to the Fias and asked, “Has there been any news on confirmed deaths from our side?” His voice rang out oddly in the silent hall, and Hayden knew he was hoping for word of his mother. Oliver’s face remained stony and expressionless.

  Fia Eldridge gave him a sympathetic look and said, “The High Mayor has not permitted the release of names yet, either living or dead. He feels it would complicate things at this point while the fighting is still going on, though he hopes that discretion will not be needed for much longer.”

  “You’re lying,” Hayden said very calmly and steadily, which didn’t explain how his voice seemed to echo powerfully through the hall so that every head turned to face him. He seemed to have stumbled upon Asher’s trick of capturing an audience by complete accident.

  Fia Eldridge narrowed his eyes fractionally at him and said, “Excuse me?”

  “You’re lying,” Hayden repeated, more loudly this time. He knew he was being foolish, confronting the Fias like this in an open forum, but the blood was pounding through his head and he felt very close to attacking them. “There has been no news from the front. We are not winning the war, and you know it.”

  A horrible silence followed his words, and Hayden glanced briefly at his friends to gauge their reactions. Zane winced and was shaking his head slowly back and forth, as though warning him to shut up and sit down before he made things worse. Tess was wide-eyed but otherwise calm, Conner and Tamon looked poleaxed, and even Oliver was studying him with guarded interest.

  “I don’t know what rumors you have been listening to, Hayden Frost, but I think it is safe to say that my colleagues and I know more about the situation than you do.” Fia Eldridge’s voice had assumed a dangerous, low tone, which normally would have made Hayden shut up and sit down like a good boy.

  “I’m sure you do, or you wouldn’t be standing here, lying for the High Mayor to keep all of us from worrying.” Hayden tried and failed to relax his jaw as he spoke. “You people will do anything to keep the population under control and to keep the school making money, even though you know we’re going to lose in the end. By the time everyone else figures that out it won’t matter because the mainland will already be under attack.”

  Several of the other Fias stood up now as well, though it was Valay who spoke to him.

  “Hayden, you don’t know what you’re talking about. It is a very serious thing to accuse the High Mayor of willfully misleading the public—”

  “Lorn wants to know if his mother is still alive, and you can’t tell him—not because you don’t have permission, but because you have no idea if she’s alive or dead. Communication has been cut off this whole time and you’ve all been lying about it to keep everyone in line!” he shouted the last part, temper flaring as worry and panic and adrenaline continued to pulse through him.

  Lorn’s pudgy face blanched as he glanced between Hayden and the Fias.

  “Enough of these lies; I’m placing you in solitary confinement until your temper has cooled.” Eldridge motioned to his colleagues and three of them came forward, approaching Hayden with what he immediately recognized as lead-Binders, having been forced to wear them for two years after his mother died.

  Hayden gripped his remaining prism and prepared to equip it, having no intention of being deprived of his magic again, when Master Sark surprised him by barking, “Leave it, Frost!”

  The Master of Powders had a strange look on his face that Hayden couldn’t interpret, but in the absence of the other Masters he supposed he had to trust him. Hayden returned the prism to his belt as the Fias approached him and cuffed his wrists.

  “You can’t keep up this act forever!” he shouted at the ones who remained at their table, while the others began to drag him backwards from the hall. Bonk took flight and soared away before anyone could grab him, and Hayden silently cheered his familiar on and hoped Bonk was smart enough to go to safety before they could try and chain him up too.

  “Get him out of here!” Eldridge shouted with purple-faced rage, and his colleagues tugged Hayden so hard that they lifted his feet from the floor, nearly wrenching his shoulder out of socket.

  Hayden looked Oliver Trout in the eye and shouted, “Ask him why all the familiars are getting sick! Ask him why Bonk and Slasher haven’t been eating or sleeping! They know Cinder’s dying!”

  Then he was around the corner and out of sight; the image of Oliver turning to Slasher in surprise was the last thing he saw from the dining hall. He stopped resisting as the Fias pulled him down the main hallway and past the bursar’s office, filling his ears with dire warnings about how foolish it was to challenge their authority in the middle of dinner. Hayden walked in stony silence, refusing to speak to them or react in any way at all. They shoved him into an unused classroom on the ground floor that was entirely empty of furniture and closed the door on him, locking him inside.

  For a few minutes Hayden paced back and forth, venting his rage and occasionally kicking the wall when the mood struck him. He knew he had been hot-tempered and foolish, but he didn’t care about anything except the fact that his mentors were out there dying in the Forest of Illusions while the stupid Fias stood around and lied about it with straight faces, making them fill out those stupid Material Request Forms and whining about overhead costs.

  At least now everyone knows the truth…if they even believe me. Maybe everyone just thinks I’ve finally snapped.

  He heard a cacophony of noise in the hallway and knew that dinner had been dismissed. Given how soon the area quieted down afterwards, Hayden assumed the Fias had called an early curfew and forced everyone into the
ir rooms for the night to keep the gossiping to a minimum.

  Fia Eldridge unlocked the door and stormed into the room after about half an hour, slamming it shut behind him and glaring at Hayden.

  “You do not understand the enormity of what you have just done,” he greeted him angrily. “But you will, Hayden Frost. I don’t care if you’re the last living scion of a so-called Great House, nothing will save you from the mayor’s wrath in this.”

  “What are you going to do, sell me off to the sorcerers?” he snarled back disdainfully.

  “If I thought it would help things, believe me, I would,” the Fia assured him. “You’re going to go the same way as your father before this is said and done, mark my words.”

  Hayden put on a mocking frightened expression and said, “What, you think I’m going to blow up the building with myself still in it? Go ahead and see how much money the school makes after that.”

  Eldridge stalked over to him, invading his personal space and standing offensively close as he said, “You are hereby expelled from Mizzenwald, Hayden Frost. You will remain in this room until I can have someone escort you from the grounds for the last time, and then you can starve on the streets for all I care.”

  “Fine by me,” Hayden retorted, almost blind with fury. “This place has really gone downhill since you idiots took over anyway.”

  “The first thing I intend to do once you’re gone is have your little friends shipped off to the Forest to fight for our cause, since you’re so certain that you children could be running things better than we are. We’ll see how smug you feel when you’re all alone in the world, enjoying a cozy stint in Kargath with lead-Binders permanently attached to your wrists.”

  Hayden didn’t remember planning it, but suddenly his fist drew back and he punched the Fia as hard as he could, slamming into his face with so much force that he nearly broke his hand. The Fia cried out in surprise and moved to the door before Hayden could hit him again, turning to face him with one hand covering his bruised cheek.

  “I’m so glad you did that, Frost. Now I can arrest you.” He smirked nastily and left the room, slamming the door behind him and locking it again from the outside.

  Hayden massaged his sore knuckles and slumped down against the wall, bringing his knees to his chest and resting his forehead on them. Now that he was alone again, some of his rage was being replaced by fear. No matter how he looked at things, he had never been in a worse position than right now.

  Great, I’ve landed myself in Binders and gotten my friends committed to the front lines of a war that we’re sure to lose. Oh right, I’ve also been expelled and placed under arrest, all within the span of an hour, and all of my allies are already missing or dead.

  Somehow he didn’t think this was what Laurren and Asher had in mind when they told him to keep a low profile.

  Yeah, well they’re gone, so I don’t guess it matters anymore what they wanted…

  That morose thought plagued him continuously, as there was nothing to distract him from his solitude. Bonk would have been a welcome companion right now, but there was no telling what they would do to his familiar if they caught him, so he hoped Bonk had the good sense to stay away.

  He had no idea how long he sat there before a quiet rustling could be heard on the other side of the locked door. Only vaguely curious, Hayden glanced up and stared at the solid wood until it began to ripple in front of him like a mirage, and then suddenly Zane and Tess stepped through the door and into the room, the wood solidifying behind them.

  “What are you guys doing here?” Hayden forced himself to his feet, ignoring his sore muscles and bruised knuckles. “It isn’t safe; if they know you’ve been to see me they’ll arrest you too.”

  “You’ve been arrested?” Zane raised an eyebrow.

  “And expelled,” Hayden grumbled, avoiding Tess’s eyes and feeling ashamed of himself.

  “I didn’t think they could do that just for speaking your mind in the dining hall,” Zane grimaced.

  “Well, probably not, but then I punched Eldridge in the jaw.” Hayden shrugged as Tess gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth.

  Zane sighed in resignation and said, “I thought you vowed to not shout at authority figures and get into fights this year.”

  “I’m a work in progress,” Hayden smirked humorlessly. “They threatened to send my friends out to fight just to punish me, and I snapped.”

  Tess scowled and said, “Well then it’s a good thing we came to get you first.”

  Hayden graced his friends with a confused look and said, “What?”

  “Oh come on, we’re not stupid.” Zane rolled his eyes. “As soon as you got mouthy in the dining hall we knew you meant to leave school and go to the Forest to get our teachers back.”

  “Yes, and we’re coming with you,” Tess nodded, as though all of this had already been settled. “So it really doesn’t matter if the Fias want to banish us to the Forest or not, since we’re headed there anyway.”

  Hayden paced the room in front of them, his mind grinding back into action. Had he been intending to leave school and go to the Forest of Illusions all this time? He wasn’t aware of thinking about it consciously, but a part of him recognized that it was probably a part of his plan since the moment Torin told him the others were suffering.

  “Well, yes, I was going to go check it out, see if I can save Cinder at least…but there’s no way you two are coming with me.”

  Zane rolled his eyes and said, “Not this again. How many times do we have to tell you we’re with you before you just accept it?”

  “I don’t doubt your bravery,” Hayden argued, “but I also don’t want you all dying along with me while I do something stupid.”

  “And you think we want to just sit here worrying about you while you go off on your own?” Tess demanded hotly. “You’re powerful, but you still need us if you have a hope of getting out alive.”

  Hayden frowned at her and said, “Please, Tess. You’re too important for me to risk you like this—you have to stay behind…” he insisted in his most pleading voice, desperate to make her understand.

  Tess pursed her lips and said, “If you really value me then you’ll respect my decision. I’m coming with you.”

  Zane rolled his eyes and said, “Good to know that you don’t really care if I come along and die with you,” to Hayden, who glared at him in response.

  “Look, it doesn’t matter anyway, because I’m stuck in Binders so I can’t fight anyway,” Hayden insisted.

  “We can find a way to get you out of those, if we can only get our hands on some decent weapons,” Zane assured him. “That’ll be the real problem, since all our supplies are being kept under lock and key these days, and the material vendors won’t risk the wrath of the Fias and slip us any instruments.”

  “I wondered how you planned on getting around that obstacle,” Oliver Trout said quietly, startling all of them so badly that they nearly shouted. Oliver was leaned against the closed door as though he’d been there for ages, but Hayden didn’t remember seeing him come in.

  “How did you get in here?” Zane demanded.

  Oliver gave him a haughty look and said, “I’m a mastery-level student, and you think I can’t translocate myself with magic?”

  “Okay, so why are you here?” Hayden massaged his temples, trying to allay a headache.

  “You’re leaving to go to the Forest, aren’t you?” Oliver asked as though it was obvious. “Well, I’m going with you.”

  Hayden threw his hands into the air and said, “Did I accidentally post a sign in the Pentagon announcing my intentions or something?! Why does everyone know I plan on going to the Forest?”

  It was Zane who answered. “Uh, you’re not really the kind to sit around while bad things are happening. It was kind of easy to guess what you were planning, for anyone who’s known you for more than five minutes.”

  “And why would I take you of all people with me?” Hayden ignored his friend and addressed
Oliver.

  “Because I want to know what happened to my mother, and unless you’re an absolute idiot, you’ll remember that I’m much better at magic than you and your friends, so you need my help.”

  Little though Hayden wanted to admit it, having someone as well-trained as Oliver would be an asset to him right now…

  “I thought your mom didn’t want you to fight,” Zane broke the silence. “You’re the lord of the Trout House now, aren’t you?”

  A muscle twitched in Oliver’s jaw as he said, “I don’t recall reading any such announcement. Besides, Lorn will still be here to carry on the Trout name if something happens to me.”

  “You’re risking the survival of your house on Lorn?” Zane grimaced.

  “As Frost is risking the extinction of his house by entering a war zone,” Oliver shrugged. “Time is wasting, and you have yet to convince me you have the firepower to make this anything but a suicide mission.”

  Hayden frowned and removed the key that Master Laurren gave him from his pocket. “This opens a cache of mastery-level magical weaponry that Laurren had stashed away. All the Masters have one, and he gave me his key before he left in case of emergencies.”

  For a moment the others stared at him in stunned silence, and then Zane said, “Why do all the weird teachers like you?”

  “You have to ask?” Oliver grumbled, before changing the subject. “You know how to access this cache, I assume?”

  Hayden nodded.

  “Alright, then here’s what we’ll do. I’ll break the locks on the door and get you out of here—”

  “Why can’t I just pass through the door with Zane’s magic or translocate with you?” Hayden interrupted Oliver mid-sentence.

  “Because, idiot, you’re wearing Binders. Magic won’t work for you until we can get them off of you, which means we need to break open the door the old-fashioned way.”

  “The Fias are patrolling the hallways,” Tess pointed out. “That won’t give us a lot of time once they see the door’s been opened.”

  Hayden frowned. “We split up. You guys go pack whatever you need while I get the weapons. We’ll meet behind the obstacle courses in the front lawns in twenty minutes. If you get caught, you stay behind.”