Cave of Nightmares

by V. St. Clair

  Three more days and it’ll all be over…

  His first exam was in Wands, immediately following a frenzied breakfast where all of his friends were attempting to do a bit of last-minute reading before they took their first test. Even Bonk was subdued on his behalf, remaining quiet and still while Hayden tried to skim sixty-seven pages of notes about wand-based magic.

  Their normal rows of seats had been broken up and spread out considerably in an effort to prevent them from cheating. Hayden took the seat closest to the door, just in front of Master Willow’s desk, and instructed Bonk to go off into the next room with the other familiars until the exam was over. He had no idea what forty animals would do for entertainment for the next two hours, but suspected that Bonk would fall back on his favorite pastime and take a nap.

  Laziest dragon I’ve ever seen.

  Master Willow walked between the tables, depositing a stapled stack of papers in front of Hayden that was worryingly-thick. Hayden flipped it over and saw that it ended on page twenty-two. He began immediately, speed-reading the first question in the desperate hope that he would be able to make it through twenty-two pages of questions in two hours.

  1. What spell and which wand would you use to transform a frog into a tadpole?

  Ha! Hayden knew this one. It was the Reversion spell (not the Shrinking spell, as that would just make the frog smaller), and would work best with a maple wand. He filled in the answer and moved on to the next question, relaxing slightly when he saw that the first several pages were all short answers like this.

  He was slightly less enthusiastic when he got to the three short-essay questions, but only had difficulty with one of them: Describe how you would light a candle given nothing but an elder wand, an acorn, and a pint of water.

  Elder wands weren’t able to create heat, which he explained, so the water was obviously supposed to be a conduit between the elder wand and the candle to light it, but for the life of him he couldn’t think of how he was supposed to start a fire with an acorn, so he made something up and went to the next page.

  He put down his pencil with ten minutes to go, flexing his cramped fingers and trying not to imagine how much they would hurt after four more hours of this. When Master Willow called time he heard a few horrified gasps from his neighbors (who clearly hadn’t finished), and relieved sighs from the others at it finally being over.

  He went to find Bonk while his classmates muttered to each other about different exam questions they found difficult and consulting to see if they got the answers right. As expected, Bonk was fast asleep on the floor, his little legs sticking up in the air like a dead animal. Hayden woke him up and let him fly behind him on the way to Conjury.

  The Conjury exam was set to take place in an unused classroom rather than outdoors, since there wasn’t a practical portion accompanying it. Hayden was relieved that he would be able to avoid the possibility of losing his conjuring hand in a moment of panic.

  The desks were spread out in much the same fashion as in Wands, and Master Reede was holding a similarly-thick stack of paper. Since they were near the rear exit to the castle, Hayden told Bonk to go play outside, wondering if the dragon would visit Torin while he sat his exam.

  Offering up a silent apology to his aching hand, Hayden sharpened his pencils and started on the first question: Name the basic components of the drawing below.

  It was a sketch of a circle with a double-pairing of crosshatches drawn through the top and bottom (Hayden noted with delight that Master Reede had taken the care to specify which end was considered the bottom with a directional arrow). Hayden listed all of the components in the blanks provided and moved on to the next question: Give an example of what the above configuration could be used for.

  Most of the Conjury exam followed this pattern, with lots of drawings he had to identify and label, and asking what sorts of magic they were used for. There were also several pages where Master Reede listed what magic he wanted to perform and asked them to draw the configuration they would use to accomplish it. Hayden struggled a bit with these, but thought that with any luck he might have gotten at least half of them correct.

  There were a couple essay questions he fumbled through, but once he was back on the fill-in-the-blanks and multiple-choice he did much better. He finished his exam with less than a minute to spare, immensely relieved that it was lunch time because his hand was going to fall off if he had to do any more writing in the next hour.

  Lunch was fairly subdued, as all of his friends were taking the chance to read through more notes for their last exam that afternoon. Hayden felt like his brain was oversaturated as is, and didn’t think he would retain an ounce of information even if he tried. Besides, since he had dropped Powders he only had five classes right now, and his next period was free. Bonk flew into the dining hall towards the end of the meal, alighting on his shoulder and smelling of bacon.

  “So you visited Torin after all,” Hayden smirked. “Even convinced him to feed you, I see.”

  Bonk belched in response, a small jet of fire nearly singing Hayden’s hair in passing.

  He wished his friends luck with their third exam and decided to get some fresh air. With Bonk on his shoulder, he made his way out to the obstacle courses and coached the little dragon through a series of progressively-smaller metal rings (Bonk nearly got stuck in the last one, bloated from bacon as he was). He collected a few of the shed scales that fell to the grass, eager to show them to Tess so she would be able to make something good with them before their last arena.

  He was a little surprised when Cinder the dragon flew past him and dive-bombed Bonk, which was apparently their favorite way to greet each other. The pair of them locked claws and spit fire at each other as they tumbled to the ground and rolled around in the grass. Reflexively, Hayden looked around for Master Asher.

  And there he was, strolling over casually with Horace the hawk on the shoulder of his bright red Masters robes. He seemed surprised to see Hayden there, one of the only people out on the front lawns right now, but approached anyway.

  “Don’t tell me you were booted out of class in the middle of your final exam?” Asher greeted him pleasantly.

  “No, I don’t have a third-period class since I dropped Powders and moved Healing to the slot after lunch.”

  “Ah, yes.” The Prism Master smiled and watched the dragons rolling around in the grass, trying to incinerate each other.

  “Don’t you have an exam to give this hour?” Hayden ventured.

  “I don’t teach nearly as many classes as my colleagues, since no one has qualified for better than third-level prisms since I began teaching,” he shrugged cheerfully. “Though I also teach the greatest number of first-level classes for that same reason, because people just don’t know when to give up and try something else. I expect that grading your class’s exams will be quite as painful as the rest.” He sighed. “It’s times like these I wish I had a mastery student to delegate these unpleasant tasks to.”

  Hayden was very careful not to bring up the subject of his last attempt to feel Asher out for a sponsorship.

  “Anyway, how did your first two finals go?” he changed the subject abruptly.

  “Fine, I think. Wands was better than Conjury, but I’m hoping to make it to the second-level in both next year.”

  Master Asher nodded. “Willow’s been debating bumping you into his level-three class next term. I think he’s waiting to see how you do on your final exam first.” He shrugged as though this shouldn’t be news to Hayden.

  “R-really? He thinks I’m good enough to skip level-two completely?”

  Asher shrugged. “Apparently. That will put you into another class with your peers, who will be able to help you catch up on what you’ll miss from the second-year class,” he explained. “Unless you fall asleep and forget to complete your Prisms exam, I expect you’ll move into the level-three class for it as well, though that will put you with mostly sixth and seventh-year students.”

 
Hayden grinned. He had been worried that Master Asher was going to refuse to move him into a higher-level class because of all the trouble he got into throughout the year, claiming he wasn’t mentally ready for such responsibility.

  Thank heavens he’s not holding that nighttime debacle with Oliver and Jasper against me.

  Master Asher made a clicking noise with his tongue and snapped his fingers at the dragons, who were still locked in battle.

  “Cinder, stop chewing on Bonk’s head before you hurt him, or I’ll put a leash on you the next time we come outside.”

  Cinder seemed to understand his master perfectly, and released Bonk’s head from his jaws. He spit fire in Bonk’s face as a courtesy (in case he needed healing), and took flight in the direction of Torin’s cabin.

  Bonk seemed completely uninjured, which was a miracle given how hard they were chewing on each other, and shuffled over to Hayden on foot.

  “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow I suppose.” Master Asher waved at him and walked off in the direction of his father’s cabin.

  Hayden was tired of being outside with no one but the older students who were studying for their exams later in the week, and made his way back to his dormitory so he’d be there to celebrate with Zane and Conner as soon as they finished their last test of the day.

  His Healing exam went well the next morning, but Elixirs was a bit of a challenge. Hayden had no illusions about qualifying for the level-three class next year based on his performance on the final, and simply hoped to avoid repeating the level-one.

  Prisms was the only exam he wasn’t nervous about at all, and with good reason. He finished half an hour earlier than anyone else, and was absolutely certain that he’d gotten all of the questions right, even the essays. Meanwhile, his classmates looked like they were being subjected to a cruel and unusual form of torture, sweating profusely and grimacing, resting their heads in their hands and muttering wearily to themselves. Master Asher seemed to enjoy watching their agony, because he sat with his feet propped up on his desk, eating popped corn with a pleased look on his face.

  Hayden was hoping to have the night off to relax, but Tucker insisted on them getting together for one last team meeting before their final arena challenge the next night.

  “Okay, so everyone remembers the rules for the final, right?” He asked for the third time, scowling at a group of second-years who were being raucously loud on the other side of the common area.

  “Yes, we remember,” Zane said in agonized tones. “It’s going to be really difficult and we’re going to be timed.”

  “At the very least,” Tucker grumbled.

  “And we’re only allowed to bring one instrument into the arena with us this time,” Tess added with a frown. This was the part of the challenge that was going to be the most…well, challenging.

  Hayden had never entered an arena with only one weapon before. Usually he had a choice of wands, prisms, and even elixirs or conjuring chalk if he wanted to bring them along. For the finals they were being restricted to one item each, and they had spent the last twenty minutes arguing strategy on what to bring.

  “It just makes the most sense for each of us to bring our most versatile instrument from our major of focus,” Zane said for the second time. “I’m a natural conjurer; there’s no reason for me to waste time bringing a wand into the arena if I only get one weapon. I’ll bring a fresh piece of level-three chalk and if we need any conjuring done then that’ll have to do.”

  Tucker nodded. “It’s hard to know which wand I should bring though, not knowing what the arena will be ahead of time. If I bring maple and need to do earth-based magic then we’re screwed, unless the rest of you are able to cover for it. On the other hand, if I bring birch and need elder…”

  “And what about me?” Tess frowned. “I’m a double-major. Do I bring a powder or an elixir?”

  “Look, we can drive ourselves crazy guessing what we’ll need, but it’s going to come down to luck in the end,” Hayden interrupted. “Our best bet is to balance ourselves as well as possible. If Tess brings a defensive elixir, then Tucker can pick his most offense-heavy wand in case we need to fight monsters. Zane’s chalk will either be able to conjure what we need or it won’t, and I’ll bring my clear prism because it’s got the best balance of offense and defense. Between all of us we shouldn’t be totally doomed no matter what they throw at us.”

  He certainly hoped that was true, because they were near the top of the third-year rankings, and despite the fact that none of them dared express the desire out loud, every one of them wanted to ace the final arena and come out number one on the rosters. Right now they were tied for third with one other team, and were only trailing first place by a half-point average.

  “That sounds like as good a plan as any,” Zane shrugged agreement. “Besides, Hayden’s our fearless leader. If it all goes wrong we can throw him under the carriage during the review and save ourselves.” He grinned, and Hayden smacked his friend in the side of the head.

  “Alright, elder it is,” Tucker nodded, clearly relieved to have the decision made for him.

  “I’ll bring Need along since you gave me enough dragon scales to make it,” Tess said to general astonishment.

  “What the heck does Need do?” Zane asked the question the rest of them were obviously thinking.

  “It uh, gives you what you need most.” Tess looked like she was trying to think of a way to explain it without making them feel like idiots. “It’s like a free spell, basically. If you need a spear, it will turn into a spear. If you need to breathe underwater, it’ll do that too.” She sighed. “The one I made will probably only last a minute or two, but it seems like a good idea to have a wildcard in case we get into trouble.”

  Hayden was thoroughly impressed with her skill at elixirs and made a note to give Bonk extra apple pie tomorrow night for shedding scales at such an opportune time.

  “Okay, yeah.” Tucker looked enthusiastic about their prospects. “We might actually pull this thing off.”

  On that hopeful note they returned to their rooms to get a good night’s sleep.

  Well, no matter how badly we do, we’ll still be pretty high up in the rankings, and then we’ll have two months off for winter break before we start the next school year.

  Hayden sincerely hoped that this time he wouldn’t encounter any angry dragons.

  It was raining heavily the next night. They could hear it hammering against the walls during dinner, adding to the general cacophony of noise in the dining hall. Hayden tried not to take it as an ominous sign of things to come, but the dark gloom and occasional thunder claps did nothing to relax him. He’d gotten a brand new clear prism earlier in the day so he’d be at full-charge, but accidentally left it in his dorm room before lunch and had yet to retrieve it.

  He had to leave dinner a few minutes early to jog up to his room and snatch the prism from his desk, twisting it into his eyepiece preemptively but keeping the monocle raised so he could see normally until he was inside the arena.

  He was drenched within a minute of leaving the castle, running towards the circle of barely-visible lights even though there was no cover there to shield him from the rain. The others were already waiting for him, along with a group of thoroughly annoyed mastery-level students who were manning their usual posts around the circle to translocate them.

  It’s not our fault it’s raining. Tell the Masters to use more specific climate control next year.

  He’d learned long ago that they allowed it to rain inside the boundaries of Mizzenwald to keep all the plant-life from dying partway through the year, but it was still a bad night for a storm.

  “You four ready to go?” The mastery students looked like they were eager to send them on their way and seek shelter while they waited for Hayden’s group to finish the arena.

  “We’re ready,” Hayden answered after making sure each of his teammates had their one allowed weapon on hand.

  The mastery students placed their wet
palms against the rectangular blocks and closed their eyes to focus. The world began to blur around them as expected, but a thunder clap that was loud enough to shake the ground and nearly deafen them sounded partway through the translocation, startling half of the mastery students mid-cast. One of them lifted his hands to cover his ears reflexively and Hayden felt a strange tug, accompanied by an unsettling change in the blurring world, as though lots of different places were trying to share the same space.

  He blinked hard and a wave of nausea hit him. The world was so blurred around him that he was barely able to see the mastery students’ looks of horror as one of them yelled, “Put your hand back down, QUICK!”

  Suddenly the world stopped blurring and everything came into jarring focus, like a rubber band that had just been recoiled. Hayden blinked again and they were gone.

  19

  Cave of Nightmares

  Hayden wasn’t the only one who staggered upon landing in the pitch-blackness of wherever they were. He heard a horrible retching sound coming from Zane as his friend leaned over and puked on the ground.

  “Where are we? I can’t see anything,” Tucker asked in a low voice, presumably because he didn’t know if they were alone here.

  “I don’t know, but I think something went wrong with the translocation…” Hayden blinked a few times to get his bearings, straining his eyes to see through the blackness. “They might have still sent us to the right place though; someone start a light.”

  “Hold still, I’ll get it,” Tucker lit the tip of his elder wand. “It’s a waste of resources, but this wand is strong enough that it won’t drain very fast and maybe we can find a better light source later.” He held it up over his head so they could take in their surroundings.

  It looked like they were in some sort of cave, though they couldn’t see an exit from where they were standing. There were spider webs all over the ceiling above them, trailing down the sloping walls where they came together. The floor beneath them was hard-packed dirt and they stood in a little cul-de-sac, the ground sloping upwards on one path and downwards on the other.