Cave of Nightmares

by V. St. Clair

  Hayden nodded and the other boy stood up and came over to shake his hand.

  “Cool. I’m Zane Laraby, and before you can ask…yes, I am descended from Farrah Laraby, celebrated pioneer of the six-part crosshatch.” He sounded mildly annoyed by that fact.

  “Sorry, I’m new to all this magic stuff…so I don’t know what a six-part crosshatch actually is,” Hayden admitted, feeling stupid.

  To his surprise, Zane grinned at him.

  “Oh, excellent. I’m tired of people always asking me about my great-times-ten grandmother anyway.”

  I’d better get this over with.

  “I’m Hayden Frost, and before you can ask…yes, I am descended from that Frost,” he tried to mimic Zane’s airy tone, waiting for the boy to run away screaming or make evil warding signs at him.

  Zane blinked in surprise but didn’t look upset.

  “Oh, wow, that must suck,” he summarized the situation admirably in Hayden’s opinion.

  “Yeah, it does.” He exhaled a breath he didn’t realize he was holding, thankful that for the first time he had met someone who wasn’t terrified of him. “People usually cringe and run away when they hear my last name.”

  Zane smirked.

  “I’ll bet they do.”

  “How come you’re not afraid of me?” Hayden couldn’t help but ask the question, wanting to clear the air before he started living here.

  Zane shrugged. “Should I be? You’re not secretly an evil overlord who wants to rule the world, are you?”

  “What? No, of course not!”

  “Well there you have it.” He turned towards the bunk beds. “As you can see, you’ve got the bunk right above me. Be warned, there is a creaky post, and if you toss and turn too much I will probably find a broomstick to jab at you with. You’ve also got the desk next to Conner, who is a complete slob. Don’t let him bum desk-space off of you for any reason because you’ll never get it back.”

  Hayden was so relieved at being treated like a normal person that his legs nearly gave out on him.

  “Are the other two likely to be alright around me, or do you think they’ll be the witch-burning sort?”

  Zane laughed at the joke, one of the first times since he went to live at the orphanage that someone thought he was funny.

  “Conner will probably be creeped out, but he’ll do his best to hide it until he decides whether you’re evil or not. Kayce will be…interesting.”

  Hayden grimaced. “Good interesting, or bad interesting?”

  Zane made a face. “I’m not sure yet.”

  Well, at least he’s honest about it.

  “Um, can I ask why you have a fox on your bed?” he changed the subject, sitting down in the chair by his new writing desk and trying to get comfortable. Zane returned to his seat on the edge of the bed.

  “Better a fox than a badger like Lewis; those things are just plain irritating.”

  “Someone has a pet badger here?” Hayden’s head was beginning to spin.

  “Well sure, we all have familiars. Oh, right, you said you didn’t know much about magic yet.” Zane looked apologetic. “You’ll get a familiar assigned to you soon enough. They’re like pets to us, but they also help us with our magic. They make elixirs and powders stronger for their master when you use your familiar’s materials.”

  “You mean you use your fox to make elixirs?” Hayden gasped at the thought of dunking a fox into a cauldron of brew.

  Zane laughed again.

  “Of course we do, but it doesn’t hurt them. Like Felix, for instance,” he pointed to the fox on his bed, “when he sheds fur I try to collect it, because it makes a mean elixir of stealth. Conner can use his owl’s shed feathers for a wisdom powder.”

  “Oh, that makes sense.” Hayden was just relieved to learn that they weren’t slaughtering animals here. “Do you get to choose your pet?”

  “Familiar, you mean. People will laugh at you if you call it a pet,” Zane explained politely, and Hayden made a mental note to remember it. “And no, you don’t exactly get to pick. The familiar chooses its master and binds itself to you. I will admit that I’m sometimes jealous of the lucky few who get falcons or dragons, because they just look so slick.”

  “There are dragons here?” Hayden’s mouth dropped open. He had never seen a real dragon before, though he’d heard tons of stories about them growing up in Merina, and Bil swore up and down that he saw one fly over the orphanage one day last year.

  “Not the big horse-eating ones, because they have no magic, but the smaller breed of dragonlings, yes,” he confirmed. “There are only a few people who get them as familiars though, because they’re powerfully-magical and very choosy about their masters.”

  “How big are they?”

  Zane brought his hands apart vertically.

  “About that big, maybe the size of a ferret with wings—or a bit larger,” he explained. “Have they tested you for your major yet, or do you have to wait since you’re late for the start of term? I’m a conjurer, which means I draw lots of cool patterns on the ground and summon other cool things with them.”

  Hayden laughed, his feelings about Mizzenwald improving greatly now that he had a friend who didn’t seem to mind explaining basic magic without embarrassing him.

  “I thought I’d have to wait, but they tested me just before I came up here.”

  “Oh, right, I guess with your last name the Masters would be chomping at the bit to get a look at you,” Zane reasoned out. “So, how’d you do?”

  Feeling proud of himself for having a major at all he said, “I’m a Prism major.”

  Zane looked floored by the news.

  “Really? You didn’t know anything about magic and you’re a natural prism?”

  “I guess so. I mean, I didn’t really know what I was doing when I picked it up, but I accidentally made this wall of fire and the Masters had to run in and put it out before the room burned down.”

  Zane let out an impressed whistle.

  “Wow, that’s serious stuff, though I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised. After all, your old man didn’t earn his nickname for nothing.”

  Hayden raised an eyebrow at that.

  “What do you mean? What was he called?”

  “You haven’t heard?” Zane looked a little guilty when he explained. “Hayden, your father was known as the Dark Prism.”

  3

  Focus and Distortion

  “The Dark Prism?” Hayden’s throat suddenly felt very dry.

  “Yeah, cause he was a Prism major, but then he turned evil, so people started calling him the Dark Prism,” Zane explained awkwardly. “A lot of the really powerful mages over history get nicknames like that…well, usually they’re a bit nicer, like Errol the Arcane, but—”

  “I didn’t know my father was a Prism major,” Hayden interrupted, not quite as enthusiastic about his new area of expertise as he’d been a few minutes ago.

  “Oh, well don’t let it get you down. There’s nothing that says you’re going to go the same way as him,” Zane offered consolingly. “Maybe you’ll grow up to be the anti-Aleric, yanno? Do good for the world and all of that, earn yourself a sweet nickname like the Super-freaking-awesome Prism.”

  That got a laugh from him.

  “You’re right, it’s just weird thinking that my father once sat in a room like this, talking to his friends about making a name for himself, and look how he ended up.”

  “Well, he probably didn’t have a conjurer friend who could do a triple-braided circle before his third year.” Zane gifted his confusion with a winning smile. “Really? That doesn’t mean anything to you?” He pretended to be exasperated. “We’re clearly going to have to teach you about conjury so that you can appreciate how awesome I am at it.”

  “I’ll put that on my to-do list as soon as I get a pencil and a piece of paper,” Hayden grinned.

  Zane glanced around at his lack of belongings. “I’m surprised your things haven’t been brought upstairs yet so
you can unpack, but I guess I can take you on a tour while we wait for them.”

  Hayden felt his cheeks burn with embarrassment when he admitted to coming from an orphanage with no appreciable belongings to his name. When he held up the one knapsack he’d brought with him to Mizzenwald, Zane looked horrified on his behalf.

  “That’s awful. But surely you inherited your dad’s money when he disappeared?”

  “Uh, I don’t know…did he have money?”

  “He was the freaking Dark Prism, of course he had money!” Zane looked amazed that he wouldn’t already know that. “Come on, let’s go see the bursar and we can ask about it.”

  Zane was already to the door before Hayden realized that he was serious about going to ask. He wasn’t sure whether it was worth the trouble just yet, but he followed anxiously behind his new friend all the same. Felix the fox didn’t stir from his position on the bed, but Zane didn’t seem bothered by it.

  Hayden made an effort to take in his surroundings as they walked, determined to learn his way around as soon as possible. There were gold numbers posted at the edge of the railing when they got to the main staircase, presumably marking the floors, because the one they passed had a large number six on it.

  “We’ll get your nameplate after dinner. If they enrolled you before lunch then it should be ready today,” Zane explained, motioning to the doors they passed with everyone’s names and majors on the outside.

  Hayden just realized that he hadn’t eaten since breakfast and his stomach grumbled traitorously.

  “When is dinner?”

  Zane smirked. “Whenever they finish cooking it, probably in the next hour,” he explained. “It’s not at a set time every night, though it’s usually pretty close. They’ll ring the bells though, so you can’t miss it.”

  “Why isn’t it at the same time every night?”

  Zane made a face. “Sometimes the cooks get ideas for crazy new dishes…and it doesn’t always work out so well so they need time to make something else. Last year they tried to make tuna-stuffed bear rolls; it smelled so disgusting that we had to evacuate the dining hall for an hour while the Masters went in to air the place out.”

  Hayden burst into laughter at the thought of the Prism Master using his impressive magical powers to get rid of fishy-bear funk.

  “You can laugh, but you didn’t have to smell it. I vomited all over Oliver Trout’s shoes before I made it out and he’s hated me ever since.” Zane shuddered at the memory.

  They were back at the main foyer with the major arcana etched into the walls. Zane stopped long enough to point at the different hallways leading to it for Hayden’s benefit.

  “That way goes to the dining hall, that stairwell leads to the Wands classrooms, that way leads to Powders and Prisms, and that door goes outside.”

  Hayden gave him a flat stare for pointing out the main entrance to the grounds, which was right in front of them and propped wide open.

  “I could have figured that last one out for myself.”

  Zane smiled good-naturedly and led him away from the main doors and in the direction of the dining hall. Hayden glanced outside and saw that the sun was beginning to set, but there were still plenty of people outside with their pets—familiars—he mentally coached himself.

  There were windows all along the hallway that let in rays of the setting sunlight, and Hayden couldn’t help but think of how nice it would be to have a prism right now to see it through.

  They stopped about halfway down the hall (which was much longer than he’d originally anticipated), in front of a window that was set in the wall with a whole room visible behind it. An elderly woman with snow-white hair was facing them through the glass, looking bored.

  Zane approached her without hesitation.

  “Hello there, this is Hayden Frost. He’d like to check his account balance.”

  The woman came to attention rapidly and stared at Hayden like he was a ghost.

  “Oh, my…yes, we received his paperwork from the Council of Mages yesterday.” She pursed her lips disapprovingly and went to pull a file from a nearby cabinet.

  “Is that the way people usually react to you?” Zane whispered sympathetically.

  “Quite a bit better actually,” Hayden mumbled.

  The bursar returned a moment later.

  “Hayden Frost is to be given a yearly stipend out of his—father’s—remaining accounts.” She said the word ‘father’ the way some people might say ‘pile of dog poo’.

  “And how much is that stipend for?” Zane asked unabashedly.

  “Five-hundred credits.”

  Hayden was quite impressed, because he’d never had that much pocket money in his entire life, and thought he could live quite comfortably on five-hundred credits a year here. Zane clearly disagreed.

  “Five-hundred? Don’t tell me that’s all his dad’s holdings were worth; the man had a mansion for crying out loud.”

  My father had a mansion?

  It was strange that everyone knew more about Aleric Frost than he did. The bursar frowned at Zane.

  “Of course that is not the entirety of his holdings, but most of his assets and money were seized by the Council of Mages to fund the rebuilding efforts in the wake of his destruction. They’ve allowed a reasonable yearly stipend to his son for living expenses while he is in school, until he comes of age.”

  “I guess that makes sense.” Hayden was just relieved that they gave him anything at all. Most of the materials for classes were supposed to be free of charge, but he would surely need to buy something eventually and didn’t want to beg off of his friends.

  Zane still didn’t look satisfied with the arrangement, but allowed Hayden to lead him away after thanking the bursar for her time.

  “Five-hundred a year is more money than I’ve ever had,” he explained, trying to make his friend feel better.

  “But you should be entitled to all of his money, not just what the Council wants to give you. That’s not how inheritance works,” Zane argued.

  “Well, yeah, that would have been nice, but if my father wrecked the world then he should be responsible for helping to rebuild it, so I’m not really mad about it.”

  Zane opened his mouth to say something else, but suddenly Hayden’s head was filled with the quiet ringing of bells, and he turned in all directions to try and locate the source of the noise.

  “Ah, the dinner bells,” Zane smiled. “Don’t bother looking for them, they’re magicked to sound in your head.” He continued down the hall past the bursar’s office to the large room at the end, where a set of wooden double-doors were propped open. There was enough seating for hundreds of people in here, and there didn’t seem to be a particular order to the seating arrangement. Dozens of long wooden tables were lined up across the dining hall, and many people had their familiars sitting on the benches beside them or on the floor behind them, which occasionally presented a tripping hazard for their neighbors and casual passerby.

  The tables were already stacked with heaps of food, which smelled much better than tuna-stuffed bear rolls, and Hayden eagerly followed Zane as he cut through the space between two tables and walked a weaving line around the familiars in his path. Hayden was surprised to see the Masters sitting amongst the students, instantly identifiable by their bright red robes, though there was also a sprinkling of green metallic robes that Hayden assumed belonged to the Masters of the minor arcana. Master Asher was at a table with some older boys who looked to be in their fifth or sixth years; one of them had a sleek black dragon perched on his shoulder and Hayden tried not to gawk at it.

  “Budge up, make some room.” Zane had stopped walking and was talking to some students that looked their age, and they managed to shuffle over enough to make space for the two of them at the crowded table.

  Hayden began loading up his plate with sausages and boiled potatoes while Zane made the introductions.

  “Hayden, this is Conner, one of our roommates.” He gestured to a dark-skinned b
oy with curly black hair who had a snowy owl perched on his shoulder. “Next to him is Tamon; his boa constrictor once ate an alligator,” he said impressively. “Across from him is Mira, the girl who had the honor of breaking Master Kilgore’s nose last year and not getting expelled for it.”

  The red-haired girl blushed indignantly.

  “I didn’t mean to break his nose! I don’t know how my elixir of warding turned to stone and exploded!”

  Zane grinned.

  “I wish I could’ve been there to see it. Kilgore once told me I had the brains of a goat, and all I did was skip line seven of the brewing instructions for Haste.”

  Hayden was beginning to wonder what kind of magical hijinks he was going to get involved in here and whether this sort of thing was normal.

  “You haven’t told us who your new friend is,” Mira changed the subject, giving Hayden an appraising look that made his face burn.

  “Oh, right.” Zane gave him a quick glance before announcing, “This is Hayden Frost.”

  Mira gasped, Conner flinched, and Tamon’s snake began swallowing the communal plate of sausages whole.

  “You’re joking,” Conner recovered first, looking sternly at Zane.

  “No, he’s not,” Hayden sighed, wondering how many more times he was going to have to go through this. Probably dozens.

  “Leaping lizards, are you really related to that Frost?” Mira asked quietly.

  “My father,” he replied tersely.

  As Zane predicted, Conner attempted an airy smile and said, “Well, hey, we’re not going to judge you based on that.” He looked over at Tamon. “Dude, tell your snake to stop eating all our food.”

  “I can’t help it that he’s hungry,” Tamon shrugged, but he did move the bowl of potatoes out of the snake’s immediate reach.

  “Where did you go to school before this?” Mira asked Hayden politely.

  “Nowhere. I wasn’t allowed to study magic until just now,” he explained.

  “Oh, well what’s your major?”

  He watched their reactions when he said, “Prisms.”

  Tamon was the only one who didn’t look surprised by that revelation. “Makes sense, since your father was the Dark Prism and all.”