H A Z E

by Bandy

Chapter 10

While a team of monastery ponies moved Hypha’s unconscious body to the infirmary, elder Prairie Sky turned his attention to Red and Blue. “Thank you for bringing him to me. I don’t think he could have made it on his own.”

Red hastened to swallow the piece of bread she’d been chewing on. “We’re just relieved to know he’s safe.”

“You must be worn out from the trip. Where are you from?”

“We came from Median.” She tapped her saddlebag. “Official government business.”

“Well, I’m grateful you made the effort to help my friend. Let me return the favor. If you’d like, we have a massage parlor in the building next door. And a full cloudsteam bath. Take as much time as you need to rest and refresh. You can even stay the night, if you’d like.” He smiled knowingly. “Unless, of course, your government business is urgent. ”

Blue’s eyes went starry. Red coughed and said, “Well, it’s not that urgent. Which way did you say the spa is?”

---

The sleeping spell wore off all at once. One moment, there was nothing. Then Hypha’s ears filled with the awful squeal of metal against metal and a deafening animal roar.

Fight or flight took over. Thinking he was still in the cafeteria, he threw himself into the air only to slam head first into a low ceiling. He landed with a whump on a soft mattress. Small mercies.

This new room was small and spartan-kept. He saw no trace of his old clothes. A clean and pressed robe sat folded at the foot of the bed, rumpled slightly from his attempted flight. The color was different than what Hypha remembered—lighter, almost peach. It felt thinner too, but it fit his spindly frame perfectly.

“Hypha!” Cheetah Prints was waiting for him outside. She went to take his hooves but paused at the last second. “We’re so sorry we had to put you to sleep. Elder Prairie Sky was worried you’d hurt yourself on accident.”

Hypha wiped the last bit of sleep from his eyes. “Where is he now?”

“He’s waiting for you downstairs. I’ll take you to him.”

They passed a dozen rooms on their way to the stairwell, each one identical to the one Hypha had just been in.

“Is this where the monks live?” Hypha asked. “I shouldn’t be here. I’m just an acolyte.”

“No, not at all. This building’s for our guests.”

Guests? Hypha’s mind raced. No way they needed this many rooms just for visiting monks. What kind of guests were they housing?

Down a few flights of stairs, they found Prairie Sky waiting in the lobby pacing nervously back and forth. When he saw them, he made a beeline over to them and wrapped Hypha up in a crushing hug.

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Hypha said into Prairie Sky’s shoulder. “We don’t have time to waste.”

The smile dissolved from Prairie Sky’s face. “Right. Let’s find a quiet place to talk.”

The Canary’s Cage temple wasn’t much to look at from the outside—literally. Where most of the other buildings in the complex soared five or six stories into the air, the temple rose barely five or six yards. It was set in jointless tan bricks and bowed slightly at the edges, like a lost contact lense.

“It’s very. Uh. Minimalist.” Hypha squinted. “There’s more, right?”

Prairie Sky chuckled and gestured to the other side of the mound, where a staircase descended down into the earth. “Wait and see.”

The stairs went down ten stories. The ceiling grew taller as they descended, until the torchlight couldn’t even touch the top. The path grew wider, the echoes longer, until the staircase finally deposited them into a soaring central chamber. Colossal square stones formed the base of a massive dome stretching up two hundred yards. The top part of the dome must have been the mound he’d seen outside, Hypha realized. A massive fire pit was sunk into the very center of the stone floor, casting flickering shadows around the dias.

Prairie Sky paused for a moment to let Hypha soak it all in. Then he led him down one of several arterial hallways to a cluttered but brightly-lit office. A wooden nameplate on the door read, Director.

“Sorry about the mess,” Prairie Sky said. He hopped up and glided a few inches above the ground, settling at a wood desk on the other side of the room. He flew just like elder Cumulus. Hypha had to remind himself to breathe.

Prairie Sky motioned to a chair across from him. Flying was still out of the question for Hypha, so he picked his way through the mess, flinching at the sound of parchment crackling beneath his hooves.

“We’ll need to get those taken care of,” Prairie Sky said, pointing to Hypha’s hooves.

“Later.”

“Of course.” He tapped the wall behind him. “There’s about a hundred tons of stone between us and everyone else. Start at the beginning.”

Hypha took a few deep breaths before spilling everything. He made it as far as the moment Wrender got hit by a spear before his emotions got the better of him and he had to stop.

Prairie Sky flew over his desk and knelt beside Hypha. “Shhh. You’re okay.” Hypha hugged his shattered hooves to his chest and took slow, deep breaths while Prairie Sky held him. “You’re okay. You made it out. You’re safe.”

“Am I?” Hypha’s voice cracked. “The Derechans are still out there. They must have come through here—I don’t know how they missed you, but eventually they’re gonna run out of monks to kill out there and they’re gonna come back here.” His eyes flashed from Prairie Sky to the ten million tons of rock boxing him in. “We have to do something.”

“Are you an orphan, Hypha?”

The question took Hypha by surprise. His thoughts piled up. “I’m not supposed to say.”

“Everyone finds out eventually. I think that’s the real test—knowing and not judging.”

“Do you know?”

“Yeah. I’m an orphan.”

Hypha hesitated. “Me too.”

“You said you were from Roseroot, right? I was raised in Yangshuah. The order gave me everything. It gave me food when I was starving, love when I was unlovable, and guidance when I was on a dark path. Everything I’ve ever done, I’ve done with the sole intention of keeping it alive. Today, that mission includes keeping you safe. Do you believe me?”

Hypha straightened up and nodded.

“I need to hear it.” His voice got lower. More direct. “Say you believe me.”

“I believe you.” The sudden intensity of Prairie Sky’s voice rooted Hypha to the spot. “What’s going on?”

“The Stonewood mountains are a paradise of isolation. The monks out there are idealists. And because they’re so far removed from the rest of the world, they don’t have to make compromises. But we’re not in the mountains anymore.”

Something clicked in Hypha’s mind. “Why did you leave Yangshuah?”

Prairie Sky stood up. “I want to show you something.”

“No. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Hypha, please.”

“No!” He leapt onto his chair. Papers stirred. “You’re not telling me something. Do you want to get us all killed?”

“Little bird,” Prairie Sky said, “you’re so far away from your nest.” He floated over the chaos on the floor and landed in the doorway. “Let me show you one thing. Then I promise, I’ll tell you exactly how I’m going to keep everyone here safe.”

The two ponies locked eyes. For a moment, only the papers between them moved.

Hypha nodded and followed him out.

---

They went deeper into the monastery, until the walls wept moisture and scraped Hypha’s shoulders. They turned an abrupt bend to find the hallway partitioned off by several thick wool curtains.

Without turning around, Prairie Sky asked Hypha, “What’s the most important thing to you?”

“Keeping the order alive.”

“Me too. Do you believe me?”

“Just show me what you want to show me.”

Prairie Sky pushed the curtains aside. Hypha followed him into a converted meditation chamber. Harsh purple light emanated from several dozen ultraviolet crystals dangling from the high ceiling. They reminded Hypha of the one Red stole from Median, though these ones were wired.

But it wasn’t the light that made his breath catch in his throat.

Large square stones, each one roughly belly-height and just as wide, formed half a dozen rows stretching the length of the long room. Loose earth had been scattered over the top of each stone. Plastic tubes connected a series of automatic misting devices to a water barrel in the corner.

Sprouting from the rocks were hundreds of mother sky mushrooms.

Hypha took a step forward, his face frozen in awe. He reached out and ran his hoof over the closest row of mushrooms. Then he leaned down and inhaled. An earthy smell, almost garlicy, tinged with the faintest hint of sulfur, tickled his nose.

The blood rushed to his ears. He pulled his head away. He tried to speak, but nothing came out.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Prairie Sky said. “They’re every bit as magically potent as the mountain variety. When I left Yangshuah, I took a sample batch of mother sky with me. I was down to the last seeding bundle before I found the ideal growing conditions.”

“This is impossible,” Hypha finally said.

“This is how we survive.” Prairie Sky hunched over and stared at the little caps. His eyes overflowed with pride and reverence. “They do so much more than keep us connected to the earth’s magic. They’re going to preserve our order for the next ten thousand years.”

Questions swirled through Hypha’s mind. Perhaps he had misjudged Prairie Sky. If he could pull off one miracle and grow mother sky mushrooms hydroponically—something that no monk had ever managed to do in the mountains—maybe he could pull off more.

“Did you document what you did to make them grow?” Hypha asked, his eyes still locked on the little mushroom caps. “We’ll need to know how to restart operations after we evacuate the monastery.”

In a soft, fatherly voice, Prairie Sky said, “We’re not leaving.”

Hypha looked up, confused. “Well, we can’t live underground. They’ll starve us out of the caves.”

“You don’t understand. We’re not leaving because we’re not in danger.”

Something about the way Prairie Sky said that set Hypha on edge. “They killed my friends in front of me. They almost killed me, too. We’re definitely in danger.”

“No,” Prairie Sky shook his head, “you don’t understand. These mushrooms are keeping us safe. Are. Present tense.”

Hypha stuck his mangled front hoof in Prairie Sky’s face. “The mushrooms don’t make you invincible.”

“No. They make you indispensable.” Prairie Sky’s eyes glowed in the ultraviolet crystal light. “The order’s mission is to help those in need. For you and I, that meant getting taken in as orphans.” He pointed at the ceiling. “Those ponies up there? They’re orphans too. Life damages them. They’re in desperate need, as desperate as any foal left out in the cold.”

“But they’re not monks.” The gears started to whir together in Hypha’s mind. There were so few ponies in orange up there on the surface. This harvest alone would last them half a year, if not longer.

The truth aligned in agonizing clarity. “You’re selling mushrooms.”

“I’m buying a shield. A shield that no spear can break. Rich ponies from the cities will throw obscene amounts of gold at me to relieve the torture this world inflicts on them. We give them the same reprieve the order gave us when they took us off the streets. Money and mushrooms buy our safety.”

“You’re working with Derecho.”

He let out a barking laugh. “The fifth legion marched through here last month. They didn’t touch us. I bought that freedom.”

Hypha’s eyes flickered from the mushrooms to Prairie Sky. Anger boiled him from the inside out. This went beyond disrespect. He felt his broken front hooves, gauging a punch.

Prairie Sky seemed to sense this. “They expelled me from Yangshuah. Is that what you wanted to hear? Look at where their idealism got them. They’re all dead.”

Hypha’s voice grew dark. “That was your family.”

“And I weep for them. But it’s too late to ask them to change.” He paused, something sharp on the tip of his tongue. “If you’re here... that means the legion’s already in the Stonewood mountains. The other monasteries are all gone.” He looked away. Shadows masked his face. “It’s just us now.”

Hypha stood absolutely still. The buzz of the crystal lamps rang in his ears. His hooves ached. A vision of Cumulus accepting a meager mushroom haul with a smile flashed through his mind.

With a roar, Hypha surged forward and ripped out the closest clump of mushrooms with his teeth. Before Prairie Sky could stop him, he’d chewed it up and swallowed it.

“Hypha, stop—”

“They’re not yours!”

Hypha went for the next bunch of mushrooms, but his legs seized up. His whole body shuddered. His pupils dilated. The ultraviolet light coalesced into mist, and the mist coalesced into rows of teeth like jagged rocks.

These mushrooms, it seemed, took effect much faster than the other ones.

His front hooves phased through the stone floor. He tipped forward. The earth swallowed him up. A moment later, somehow, he was outside, clutching onto Prairie Sky for dear life, choking on the syrup-sweet summer air of the mountain that was not a mountain, sobbing into his unfamiliar peach-colored robe.

Comments

[hehelover]

Figured something like this was going on. I doubt this approach would keep the monastery alive for much longer however. Why pay if you can get what you want by force?

[Lexiebommel10]

This stallions gone mad