by Jade Alters
“Hoster! Wake up!” I scream. The volume of my voice, coupled with the psychic resonance of my trick, pops his eyes right open. His Astral body zips back into his physical one. The blue horror within my portal blinks out. I don’t waste a second before I swirl my hands around to close it, and this time it works. Those still in the classroom freeze at the abrupt silence while I help Hoster to his feet. Those that fled start to creep back in, cautiously.
“That,” Fey Hartgen breathes, “was an example of a cooperative cast that should be done outdoors. And also, never again. Unless your goal was to permanently alter our Realm.”
“I…I’m sorry,” I sigh. I want to give her a sharp quip. I want to defend myself, but I know better. Accepting the consequences is what a Dalshak must do.
“It’s only the first day, dear. I’m sure we’ll jeopardize the fabric of reality at least thrice more before the term’s over,” Fey Hartgen manages to grin, despite all the students shivering at the memory of those horrendous, shrill screeches.
“What…in the hell just happened?” Hoster whispers once I get him fully upright again. I feel even worse about the whole situation when I look at him. He’s half-deflated. Whatever just happened - whether or not he caught a glimpse of it - it took a toll on him.
“We…opened a gate to somewhere alright. Not sure it was the Blue Plane and…it almost came through,” I give him the honesty I should have beforehand. Sure, he seems like a total airhead, but I’ve got no room to judge anymore. Maybe things would have gone smoother if I told him before.
“Oh,” Hoster grumbles. He scratches his arm and looks out at all the students who are terrified of him now. I can stand to see him defeated for only so long.
“But…hey, we’re a pretty scary team,” I smirk, borrowing from what helped him before. Sure enough, he can’t help but smirk back, even if it’s just with his lips. His eyes are still puzzled, upset, but he does lift his hand for a weak high-five when I offer. The rest of the classes demonstrations go off without such grievous hitches.
“Be careful with him,” Helena whispers to me after Fey Hartgen dismisses us.
“Hoster?” I ask. “Oh, he’s harmless. That was…all me, what happened with the portal. I should have told hi-”
“Not that. I mean be careful being so friendly to him,” Helena corrects, “Unless you want something more with him. He’s got a huge crush on you. Stared at the back of your head all through the rest of the demonstrations.”
“What?” I wave her off. After the experiences we shared? Not a shot. “He was stuck in my head all last night. Then I used him to open up some sort of horror-movie dimension. That’s all. I’d look at someone funny if that stuff happened to me, too.”
“Stuck in your head, huh?” Helena swoons.
“Oh, shut up,” I laugh as we head out of the room. “I’ll tell you later.”
By then, I’ve had some time to think about it. After all the experiences we shared? Memories. Horrors… No, it couldn’t be. Believing the first boy I met at the Academy fell for me would just be Dalshak arrogance…right?
A Good Day
Hoster,
Emery’s Memory Trap
In the weeks after my first Cooperative Casting class, my sole focus is control. Well, that, and Emery Dalshak, but mostly control. I still don’t know exactly what happened that day she opened a portal using my Astral link, but…whenever I ask anyone about it, I get little more than a mortified stare. Even Fey Hartgen isn’t entirely sure what she saw. As far as what I remember, that’s precious little. I thought I was in the Blue Plane, but some darker, unfamiliar corner of it. I couldn’t even see what was happening around me. All I heard was the lightest wail, like a high violin note. Then I woke up to a class divided. Half of them had fled the room. The other half regarded me like a rabid animal. I haven’t talked to anyone from class much since then. None of them except the partner that the class was equally terrified of.
Fey Hartgen has been careful not to pair us up often since then. But she doesn’t know just how hard I’ve thrown myself into my studies in my other classes. She doesn’t know Emery and I don’t need to be sitting next to one another to talk anymore. Not with all the new skills I’ve been practicing.
It never made sense to me, what Fey Rorelia said the night I came to the Academy, that I’m somehow gifted as an Astral projector. Yeah right. Practicing these gifts is nothing but a headache. Then I heard in another class how most Astrals need to perform certain rituals before bed to leave their bodies in their sleep, as beginners. Not me. I shoot up out of my body every night whether I want to or not. The trick is staying in my body, to actually sleep… It remains to be seen if that will ever happen. Some would see this as an advantage. Literally endless waking hours to learn, study and potentially become one of the greatest minds to inhabit this Realm and the next. I see it as a huge pain in the ass.
I spend most of that time floating around the Academy, talking to Emery or practicing how to be what I am. In just a few weeks at the Broken Academy, I’m able to commandeer both of my forms, to a diminished extent, at once. I can perform actions as simple as jotting a note or answering yes-no questions while also floating above my body in my Astral form. I guess it makes a certain amount of sense for me to be in an advanced class like Cooperative Casting in my first term, despite no previous mystical education. I can hardly believe it. I’ve never been this adept at, well, anything. Yet here I am sneaking messages to Emery through a different Realm while I take notes. Visiting her in her dreams a few nights a week.
There’s still so much about the Blue Plane I don’t understand. I need to spend time there, utilizing my gift. It’s like a thirst no drink will quench. There’s quite a bit about my only friend here I don’t understand, either. But it’s a force very different from thirst that drives me to her room in the dead of night. That pulls me close to that storm raging around her mind. I enter like usual, by way of a lightning strike into the pond in the middle of the Clearlake Academy.
“Can’t you make some sort of Astral-only backdoor for me to get in here?” I smirk to Emery as she looks up from her stony bench. She shakes her head into a sigh.
“You’re not the only Astral in the Academy, Hoster. That would defeat the purpose of setting a trap,” Emery scolds. She stands up from her bench and strolls over, but there’s a devious look on her face. Her eyelids hang down half-closed while she flutters them at me. She circles my little orb of imprisonment. “Besides. Maybe I like you there. A nice ornament to stare at.”
“Then put me on a Christmas tree or something, geez,” I chuckle, which puts a crack in her hard mask. I wonder if she ever gets tired of wearing it all the time. “Don’t you ever get tired of this place?”
“Well. On nights that pesky Astrals don’t stumble into it, I don’t usually remember these dreams. So no. Besides…this was a good day for me,” Emery tells me. With a wave of her hand, she dissolves the watery orb from around me. It falls away back into the pond, but I remain afloat. Emery’s eyes flit back to me once I’m free, noticing my new features. “Hey, you’re almost a complete body! What’re you missing, a foot and a hand?”
“Changing the subject, huh?” I tease her instead of answering, regardless of how proud I am of my developing Astral appearance. My hair is a little shorter too and almost the right length. Emery tilts her head in a silent question of what I mean. “You almost sounded like you were about to open up just then.”
“That was me opening up,” Emery pouts, arms crossed. I snort at her just to flush out some emotion.
“Emery Dalshak has good days?” I give her the best mock surprise I can muster. At first, she looks as if she’s going to finger-snap me into spectral dust. Then I throw my head back, hand to my forehead, and proclaim, “Why, I never!” Then she cracks up right along with me. “Come on, Em. I’m already inside your head. Why put up walls now? I’m sure if you wanted to keep me out, you could. You’re too talented for anything less.”
“Y
ou…have a very odd way of giving compliments,” Emery tells me. She squints at me hard enough that I feel like she’s in my head.
“As do you,” I bow, “And thank you. So tell me. Why was this such a good day for you?”
“I… This was the day…” Emery gives an admirable effort at being human, at feeling something. The only time I’ve seen her more animated than this is when she talks to Helena. “You know what? Why don’t I just show you.” Emery springs up from her bench. I’m astonished to see that, in a sense, she also doesn’t spring up from the bench. Early-twenties Emery stands and walks over to me while a younger version of her stays put right on the bench.
“How old were you on this day?” I ask.
“Twelve,” Emery tells me. I stare at the little girl on the bench, then the fully-grown one standing next to me. I’m astonished to find the same cold glare of intrigue on both of their more or less developed faces. Little Emery stares at some kind of mind-bending puzzle my brain is simply not equipped to understand. It’s a semi-clear box with an endless series of smaller boxes contained within it. Big Emery stares at me with that same look, waiting for me to get it, which I don’t.
“I’m sorry, I think I’m missing at least part of the point here,” I tell her. Emery follows my eyes to the puzzle in her tinier rendition’s twiddling fingers.
“It’s called a prismatic cascade. There’s really only two boxes. The one in my hands, and one inside that box. All the other boxes are mirror tricks. The object of the puzzle is to find the real box, an-”
“Emery. Not the puzzle. I mean I don’t understand that either, really,” I chuckle, “But I mean…I think I’m missing the point of why this was such a great day for you.” I look back to the little version of her, who turns the glassy cube around in her fingers on the verge of a breakthrough. I wait for big Emery to explain, to expand, but she doesn’t. She doesn’t say a word. “Are puzzles really…that important to you?”
“Would that surprise you so much?” Emery asks. A hand crosses her chest to clutch her other arm. An immediate pang of guilt courses through my Astral body.
“No, actually,” I tell her. It’s partially true, but part of me still suspects it’s just another mask under the layers of others Emery wears. Every time I ask her a pointed question, I expect to find the warm gooey center under all that hard shell. Every time, I flatten my nose on another wall.
“That’s good,” Emery tells me. “Not everything is so complicated, but…there is a little bit more to this particular day.” I wonder if the whole focus on the puzzle box was just to divert me. Again, I’ve made the mistake of thinking before that I had some kind of advantage, seeing into the intimate world of Emery’s head. Even here, she maintains the misdirection of a master Magician.
“So…what is it I’m not seeing?” I ask her after a few more seconds of silence.
“The woman by the backdoor to my classroom,” Emery tells me. She points to the woman with the tip of her nose, just long enough for me to spot her. The dark-skinned woman with black pearls for eyes and silky black hair wears a long skirt and sports jacket. She covers her mouth, watching little Emery from across the gardens. “That’s my mother.”
“I see the family resemblance,” I nod. The tiniest little smile dances across the woman’s lips as little Emery holds the puzzle cube aloft, close to identifying the real one inside.
“She came to pick me up early this day. You see how happy she looks? My mother?” Emery asks.
“Barely,” I tell her the truth without thinking much of it. The word seems to injure Emery, like I’ve just stabbed her right in the spine.
“Well…she’s never looked at me that way. Not when I was looking back. Not once. That’s why…I pretended not to see her,” Emery explains.
“You knew she was there?” I ask.
“I did. And I couldn’t look. Not directly. I knew her smile would disappear…but I saw her face in the reflection of my cube. I saw something she never wanted me to…that she was proud of me,” Emery explains. I watch little Emery struggle to suppress the giant grin she wants to wear. She tilts her face down to grin at her mother’s reflection for all of three seconds. Then she re-adopts her usual scowl and uses a trick to tear the real cube from inside the puzzle. When she’s finished, she stands and brings the two separated crystals to her mother.
“Completed another puzzle?” her mother says, lips flat as an ice shelf. They have been since little Emery stood back up.
“Yes, Mother,” little Emery tells her. Her mother nods then offers her hand to walk the girl through her classroom to her car. Wow, I almost blurt. Then I remember how a single word stabbed at Emery just seconds before.
“So you were always a natural,” I say instead.
“I guess I was,” Emery mutters.
“I’m jealous, honestly. I’m confused by every little thing I learn at the Academy, but you… You seem to have everything figured out,” I say, to distract her.
“It comes at a price,” Emery reminds me, as if I need it. Long as I live, I don’t think I’ll ever forget such powerful restraint in the heart of a child.
I want to say something, do something, but I can’t imagine a remedy for this kind of hurt. A kind word? A hand on a shoulder? I don’t know if Emery even appreciates gestures like that. It can’t be a secret to her now that I have…some kind of feelings for her, even if I don’t quite know what they are. Emery’s my only friend here - the last thing I want to do is scare her off with my weird mixed signals. Then I feel a gentle impact on my shoulder. I look over and feel my Astral body shiver with surprise. It’s Emery’s cheek, leaning against me. The top of her head touches the side of mine. She leans into me just slightly. Not enough to actually let me support her, just enough to make a connection.
I spend the next five minutes sliding my spiritual hand up her back, to wrap my hand around her shoulder. I hold onto Emery for as long as she’ll let me, without saying a word.
Meetings and Secrets
Emery,
The Broken Academy, Room B-22
I close the door to our room behind me and wheel around at the sound of a sharp hiss. I put my hands up, ready for some kind of covert assault from the Council, who must be onto me. What I find, however, is Helena sitting cross-legged on her bed, dabbing her eyes with a tissue.
“Oh, Emery. How- um… how was your Low-Light Trick test?” Helena sniffles. She swipes an arm across each eye in a hasty attempt to hide the tears. I toss the test out on my desk while I tell her:
“Eh, not bad.” Helena leans over the edge of her bed to read the perfect score - plus extra credit - for herself.
“Not bad? What does good consist of, taking the professor’s job?” Helena laughs as a diversion. I walk right through it to the side of her bed. I turn around and hop up to the edge of it.
“Helena, what happened?” I ask her outright.
“No-no-nothing. I’m just a little sick,” Helena tries to cover up. She even draws up her sheets for authenticity. I hook my fingers around the edge of her blanket and pull it down to show her puffy, flushed face.
“You’ll get sick if you hold all that in,” I tell her. “Out with it, before you explode.” Helena’s eyes dart around the room, to the door and even the window. I fear what lengths she’ll go to, to escape this conversation, and ponder what the hell it could be in equal measure. “Come on, Helena.”
“It’s my parents,” Helena says, then hits an insurmountable wall. She stares right through my head, into the wall behind me, or some dimension I’m not aware of.
“Are they alright?” I prompt her, when I see that she won’t, in fact, continue on her own.
“Physically, yes…but they’re under a lot of pressure from the other Core Lines,” Helena just barely manages to get out without breaking. I slide off the bed to swipe up the second box of tissues our Wing Supervisor left for us. I bring it back with me before I dare to say:
“This is about your transition.” The instant
I do, the faucets in Helena’s eyes spin wildly out of control. Tears froth over in waterfalls that stain her cheeks with her previously perfect makeup. I offer her the box of cloth, little as it can do to fix what’s actually wrong.
“I’m getting to be an age where…normally…I’d be considered for a spot on the Committee of Core Lines. The…the…Committee asked my father what new candidate they would put forward for the induction later this year and…they had no other children, so…” Helena’s words are clogged by a flood of mucus she expels into an unlucky tissue. I lay a tender hand on her shoulder.
“They’re fools to pass up a Committee Member so gifted,” I offer to her through the whimpers and wheezes.
“Thanks,” Helena smiles through lines of tears and snot. She takes a few seconds to blow the turmoil out her nose and replace it with deep breaths of calm. I wait without saying a word. I only lay my hand on her shoulder every couple of seconds, a physical reminder of my presence. A silent, I’m here. “Most days…I’m so sure I made the right decision. Transitioning, I mean. When it’s just me, I feel great. I feel free.”
“But other days?” I prompt her when the rest of the sentiment gets lodged somewhere between her heaving chest and her lips.
“Other days…I get calls from my parents. They tell me about the Committee Meetings. It’s not their fault. They don’t control what the other Lines think and say, and it does affect my future, so they have to tell me…the things they say,” Helena’s eyes stare blankly into space. I’m not sure what she imagines is there, but it drains the color right from her face.
“What kinds of things are those?” I ask. “So I can tell you it’s bullshit.” The sound of profanity from my pure, Dalshak mouth makes her snort. It always does, when we’re free to speak freely.