The Schism (The Broken Prism Book 4) Read online

  Zane must have read something of his feelings on his face, because he said, “Maybe make sure he’s unarmed when you mention it, just in case.”

  “Thanks, pal, you always know how to cheer me up,” Hayden said sarcastically, elbowing him as they entered their dormitory.

  “Anytime,” Zane replied with a grin.

  6

  The Apprentice

  Tess didn’t return to Mizzenwald until the night before school started. Hayden had been starting to wonder whether he ought to go searching for her on the road from Mizzenwald, and was debating writing a letter to her formidable father, asking if everything was alright. The sight of her cheered him immensely, not the least of which because the other girls lurking around him seemed to vanish when she was present, like she was a talisman for warding off unwanted attention. Hayden assumed that word had gotten out about her hunting skills.

  “Where have you been?” he asked her after a cursory hug before breakfast on the first day of classes. “I was terrified that you’d been eaten by a hydra or something on your way to school this year. I even considered checking with your dad to make sure you were okay, and you know how much your father terrifies me.”

  Tess raised an eyebrow and said, “Being eaten by a hydra would have been tricky, as there aren’t any lakes on my way to Mizzenwald.”

  Zane and Conner laughed, and Hayden rolled his eyes.

  “I’ve never pretended to be good at geography.”

  “I was helping my dad fight off monsters around our neighbors’ farms, and then we got roped into getting them out of the nearby town too. We made a lot of extra money this winter, but it was exhausting work. Not enough mages are willing to risk themselves fighting all these monsters these days; they want to stay holed up where it’s safe, doing their research.” She said the last part with an uncharacteristically scathing look.

  “Oh good, now that I know you were in mortal peril during the winter holiday while I was off training to be a snob, I feel much better about things.” Hayden scowled.

  Tess smiled, which somehow made her look even prettier, and said, “Oh yeah, I heard you won your stuff back. My roommates were so excited about it I wondered whether you’d started handing out money in the Pentagon.” She rolled her eyes.

  Hayden groaned.

  “I’ve been trying to pretend I don’t notice all the girls staring at me ever since I sat down and started eating honey cakes this morning,” he confided to her. “I intend to stay near you as much as possible in the hopes that you act as a shield against unwanted attention.”

  “So now that you have a huge mansion, when are you inviting us over for the party?” Tamon interjected, shoveling oat paste into his mouth.

  “Probably sometime after I’ve hired a basic support staff and made sure there aren’t any evil prisms or booby traps still lying around. It would kind of dampen the festive atmosphere to have my guests tripping over the Black Prism while visiting my new house.”

  Conner raised his eyebrows and said, “I thought the Council of Mages spent years searching the place, especially for the infamous Black Prism. What makes you think you’re going to find anything they missed?”

  Hayden hesitated before answering, because no one but Master Asher knew that his blood could open hidden secrets in the house because it was similar to his father’s. It didn’t seem like a good idea to make that public knowledge, especially since his mentor thought he’d be bled dry by the Council in their fervor to find the legendary Black Prism, which had been missing since Aleric Frost met his unpleasant fate.

  “Well, none of them are natural prism-users,” he said at last. “Since my father was also a prism-user, there might be something I notice that the others missed, especially since they wouldn’t let Asher take a stab at it.”

  The others seemed to accept his explanation at face value, though Zane shot him a brief glance that suggested he thought there might be more to the story, but mercifully he didn’t press the issue.

  Bonk diverted everyone’s attention by submerging his head so deeply into the communal jar of honey that he had trouble getting it back out. Hayden had to rescue his familiar before he drowned, and spent the remainder of breakfast wiping the dragonling’s face clean while muttering scathing admonishments about Bonk’s intellect under his breath.

  He spent so long cleaning one of his familiar’s ears that he was nearly late to his Abnormal Magic class, and took off running through the school and out the back doors, taking the stairs down to the basement at a jog.

  The classroom was laid out the same way as last year, with the entire floor space cleared and all of the chairs pushed up against the walls. Hayden took the closest empty seat, and was interested to note that there only appeared to be seven people in the level-two class this year. The Absorber that had stood in the center of the room last year was gone, though the fire pit was actually lit for the first time Hayden could remember.

  As they were in a basement and the area around Mizzenwald was climate-controlled, he expected the room to be stifling, but it felt no different than it had outside. He also swore he could detect a faint breeze moving through the space, though that should be impossible, being underground.

  Master Laurren entered the room just as Hayden was unpacking his bag and preparing to take notes, looking as pale as ever, his strange, blue-violet eyes providing stark contrast to his black hair. As he swept past Hayden in his metallic green Mastery robes, a student to Hayden’s left asked, “Is it windy in here, sir?”

  “Of course it is, Carl—otherwise we’d all be drenched with sweat with the fire going,” he replied automatically, as though it was a completely ridiculous question. Hayden was just glad that someone else had asked it instead of him.

  “How is that possible?” Carl continued, apparently deciding that it was worth any slight on his intelligence to know the answer.

  In response, Laurren reached into his robes and extracted a mastery-level elder wand, holding it up briefly for them to see before replacing it in his pocket.

  “You’re keeping it cool in here with magic?” Hayden blurted out, surprised.

  “One might surmise that, yes. Alternatively, I could have been ignoring

  Carl’s question entirely and just decided to flash this elder wand about for no apparent reason.”

  Okay, I probably deserved that…

  Ignoring the jab, Hayden pressed on. “But doesn’t that take an enormous toll on your magic? Holding that kind of spell—something strong enough to change the climate—for an entire class period has to be draining your Source even faster than it will deplete your wand.”

  Master Laurren stopped his pacing and gave him an appraising look, clearly pleased that Hayden understood the enormity of what he was doing so casually.

  “It does take considerable effort to maintain, yes—which is partly why I chose the elder wand, as it greatly reduces the magical backlash one might expect to see with other woods.”

  Hesitant to push his luck, Hayden paused for a moment before asking, “Do you have the energy to do that and still teach and do other magic?”

  Master Laurren flashed a toothy smile and said, “We shall see. If I pass out before the end of the lesson, then the answer is probably ‘no’.”

  And with that he changed the subject and began their lesson before anyone could question him further.

  “After our unwanted guests from the north visited last year, I thought it might be appropriate to begin the term with an overview of some of the more abnormal aspects of sorcery—what little I know of it, at least.”

  The level of interest in the room heightened palpably. Hayden leaned forward in his chair; he had a personal interest in learning more about how the sorcerers worked their magic, on the off-chance he ever found himself battling any of them again. Given his terrible luck, it seemed likely, especially if any of them had survived the battle in the Forest of Illusions; there were probably posters with his face on them littering the northern continent, offer
ing a reward for his head. Whether it was still attached to his body when presented was likely optional.

  “Given the strained relations between us and our northern counterparts, we know almost nothing about the workings of their magic. We can only hope that they are similarly blind to the intricacies of ours.” Laurren paused for a moment to allow this to sink in. “What we do know is that a lot of their spells involve an external conduit, like fire, or blood.”

  Hayden narrowed his eyebrows at this. Apparently Master Laurren knew what he was thinking, because without even glancing at him he said, “Go ahead, Hayden— ask your question.”

  Frowning at his predictability, he said, “Why do they need a conduit to channel their magic? Don’t they have Foci like we do?”

  Obviously hearing what he expected to, Laurren smiled and said, “In fact, no, we don’t believe that they do. Actually, there’s been some recent debate around that, given our new…” he stopped himself and changed tracks. “The popular opinion right now is that they do have Foci that connect their Sources to the outside world, but that they purposely break that connection with the siglas they draw on their hands.”

  A girl to Hayden’s right said, “Why would they do that? Doesn’t it just make things harder for them?”

  “I truly have no idea,” he shrugged inconsequently. “But a few of us believe that it’s because their siglas are infused with a different sort of power that amplifies their magic—once they find a conduit—so they believe the benefit is worth the inconvenience. It’s also a way for the Magistra to control his or her subjects, by limiting access to conduits if necessary, handy in the event of a civil war.”

  “But that doesn’t make sense,” Hayden raised his hand while speaking. “Last year I ended up with siglas on both of my hands, and I could still use my magic, even with my Focus-correctors on.”

  The Master spared him a thoughtful look and then said, “You weren’t just wearing any sigla….You bore the Magistra’s own symbol. I doubt she would have limited her own power in any way, which is probably the only thing that saved you.”

  Hayden grimaced at his foolishness for so casually donning the unknown sigla just before heading into battle. Now that he considered all of the horrible things that could have gone wrong—and the fact that if magical creatures in the Forest of Illusion hadn’t been pleased with him and helped him remove them, he might be stuck magic-less forever—he was horrified at his blasé attitude towards using them back then.

  “Anyway, the point is that we believe the sorcerers utilize conduits to make up for their lack of Foci. This is why they often draw their own blood when casting spells, or why they carry portable fire-starters.” He gestured to the fire pit in the center of the room. “Now, most blood-based spells are forbidden teaching material in the Nine Lands—”

  “How come?” another student interrupted. “I’ve heard that using blood—especially if you’ve still got your Foci intact—gives you huge power amplification. You all might have had better luck defeating the sorcerers when they first showed up if you’d been fighting like them.”

  Master Laurren’s frown was so ominous that it almost made Hayden shiver.

  “Opening such a powerful magical connection between your body and the environment has very dangerous consequences.” His voice had grown eerily soft, so that Hayden found himself leaning forward to hear better. “The risk of magical backlash and distortion is enormous.”

  “What do you mean?” the classmate asked, confused by the Master’s grim attitude.

  “I assume you know that magical backlash occurs to some small extent with every spell you cast, though normally not enough to be bothersome,” he addressed the class in general, raising his voice back to normal volume. “Some of the more complex spells you’ll ever attempt may produce a large amount of backlash if performed incorrectly, which can lead to disastrous consequences—like irreparable damage to your Foci, for instance.”

  Or colorblindness, Hayden thought to himself as he met Laurren’s eyes, and he knew that he and the Master were thinking the same thing in that moment.

  Laurren broke eye contact first and continued. “Obviously we don’t want our mages crippling or killing themselves after all the effort we exert training you up. There are few enough of us as is, in proportion to the staggering monster population these days.” He avoided Hayden’s eyes when he added, “And magical backlash is about the best you can expect from messing with blood-magic. Mental distortion is exponentially worse. If you can’t remember the side-effects of distortion, ask Hayden how it worked out for his father.”

  An uncomfortable silence filled the room as people turned to glance at Hayden and then look away awkwardly. Truthfully, Hayden was just surprised that there was more than one way to get driven nuts by magic, though now that he thought about it properly, he supposed it must be possible with each of the major and minor arcana in some way. That wasn’t a reassuring thought.

  “I feel compelled to warn you that after the fall of the Dark Prism, the Council of Mages made the punishments much more severe for violating the prohibition on blood-based magic. If proven, it carries an automatic death sentence, whether you show symptoms of distortion or not. I might also add that they get pretty jumpy at the thought of another Dark Prism wreaking havoc on the world these days, and that their definition of ‘proven’ is pretty loose.”

  That was just the sort of thing Hayden could imagine the Council trying to accuse him of to get rid of him as a nuisance.

  Great. I’m really glad I got on their bad side last week…

  There was nothing to be done about that now, and he knew it. He simply resolved to make sure he didn’t do anything that might look shady to the Council members, determined not to give them any reason to move against him.

  “Moving on to the types of magic we can discuss in more detail,” Master Laurren caught his attention once more. “Conduits like fire, glass, and ice are more benign, and have varying degrees of power. Fire provides the most readily-available energy, which makes it the most powerful and the preferred media of the sorcerers when they can manage it. Channeling your Source power through a conduit other than your own Foci can be both a good and bad thing, depending on the strength of the conduit. For instance, if you have a weak Source, but are channeling through a large fire, the fire can act as an amplifier to your natural power. The down side of this is that the corollary is also true: if your conduit is weaker than your Source, it will act as a dampener.”

  Given that he had been told that he had the largest Source that most people had ever encountered, it sounded like a terrible deal to Hayden—almost anything would act as a dampener on his power.

  Well, maybe not a volcano…

  He imagined trying to convince his enemies not to fight him until they could relocate to the nearest volcano so that he’d have unimpeded access to his magic and had to suppress a laugh.

  He spent the rest of his time in class taking notes on the few things that Master Laurren was able to tell them about sorcery, all of which would have been good to know a year ago.

  That seems to be my luck—I learn everything important in life about two months after I need it.

  His next class was Elixirs. As much as he liked Master Kilgore, it only took him twenty minutes to realize that this would likely be his last year of studying his subject, as it was much more difficult than he remembered from previous years and he wasn’t able to produce a proper level-four Strength Elixir by the end of the lesson, despite his best efforts. This wasn’t terribly surprising news to him, since he had been struggling horribly on and off for the last year, and had already considered that he might be nearing the limits of his potential for the subject. He had really only signed up for it again out of defiance, not wanting to give up on a third subject in the major arcana unless he had to.

  His level-five Healing class went much more smoothly, and Mistress Razelle even praised the wormwood-infused bandage he produced. Charms and Wands were difficult but m
anageable, as he had always proven fairly adept at both, and his last class of the day—and the one he looked forward to the most—was mastery-level Prisms.

  Hayden entered the classroom with Bonk on his shoulder, though the dragonling quickly left him in favor of greeting his counterpart, Cinder, who spit fire into his face and then flew out the door towards the grounds to play.

  “Dragons,” Hayden muttered, shaking his head as he took a seat at random in the middle of the room.

  Master Asher was a few minutes late to class, and when he shut the door behind him he glanced at Hayden and then took a seat right next to him at one of the student desks.

  “So, you’ve finally made it to my first ever mastery-level class. Congratulations, and all of that,” he greeted Hayden with a lazy wave of the hand to acknowledge this feat.

  “Thanks. Before we start, there was something I wanted to ask you…” Hayden said without preamble, to keep himself from chickening out. If he didn’t ask now, he might never be brave enough to try again later. Then again, if the Master said ‘no’, the rest of this lesson could be very awkward…

  “Fire away,” his mentor said, raising an eyebrow in interest.

  “Well, I don’t know if you remember, but back in first year I asked if I could someday apprentice to you and help with your research, and you...um…”

  Asher’s features momentarily darkened as he said, “And I grossly overreacted and terrified you? Yes, I remember.”

  They sat in silence for a moment. Hayden was sure the Master knew what he was getting at, but he apparently wasn’t going to help him get there.

  “Well, I was wondering if you’d changed your mind, or if you still don’t think it would be a good idea for us to work together,” he said as calmly as possible, drawing on his newfound skills from working with Magdalene Trout.

  Asher considered him for a moment and then shrugged. “I suppose the situation has changed since then. You’ve more than proven yourself to be different from your father, and there’s no denying you have a good mind for research. After I recovered from having my Source bled dry for months on end, I got around to checking your work on the array you were plotting last year.”