The brown-haired boy followed them inside, and Mike heard the doors creak closed. Turning, he was surprised to see the stableboy already moving beside him even thought he doors could only have just shut. The kid moved fast! Aaron was bouncing on Mike's back in excitement. "He said he'd be my warhorse! I can grow up now!"
"Calm down, Aaron." The stableboy sighed. "You're acting like a 5 year-old."
That was an odd thing to say, since the boy looked to be about that age. But the bouncing stopped, and Aaron took a deep breath. "Sorry. It's been a long time."
The stableboy nodded. "I keep telling you to exercise your mind. Playing all day with little kids is not helping you keep your adult mind."
"But it's all I CAN do!" Aaron sounded exasperated. "I'm too little to do anything else."
Mike frowned and twisted around to look back at Aaron. The red-haired child was scowling, but there was something very different about his eyes, his expression. He looked... older? "Wait a minute. You mean you used to be a grownup?"
"Both of us did." The stableboy smiled slightly. "At least physically. I am the Green Wizard Landros. It sounds like you have already met Aaron of Hawthorne."
"Michael Simmons. Most people call me Mike."
Landros nodded his head. "Nice to meet you, Mike. How do you like being a centaur? Better than your human self?"
Mike was surprised, but not convinced. "What do you mean?"
The boy wizard grinned and made a gesture with one hand. A huge, brightly polished silver panel appeared in front of Mike - not a perfect mirror but certainly good enough to provide a good reflection. Except that the reflection was all wrong. He could see the stable doors behind him, but it showed him as his real self, a human teenager dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. Aaron was reflected as a copper-haired young warrior little older than Mike, dressed in leather armor. Landros moved in front of the panel, and the mirror reflected the back of a tall, dark-haired man in dark green robes, holding the same staff as the boy. "This is a Mirror of Truth. It displays your real self, no matter what you might look like on the outside."
Aaron stepped closer and scowled. "What has happened to me? I look like a boy! My muscles are gone!" It was a strange complaint coming from a skinny 5 year-old.
Landros shrugged. "The form eventually shapes the spirit. You have been a little boy for many years, and your true self is adjusting. If you do not break the curse, your true self will continue to get younger until you really are that 5 year-old."
"So, what?" Mike struggled to understand. "You guys both got turned into kids by some kind of curse? Doesn't sound so bad to me."
Aaron spun to glare at him. "You think it is easy being a small child? I have no family. I live off charity of others, no possessions, not even clothing. If I don't work at it, I think and act like a little kid as well."
"Understand, Mike, that while this is a game to you, everything is quite real to us." The boy wizard raised an eyebrow. "And your Wizard Tye has made you part of our world, so everything that happens to you is just as real."
"You know about Tye!?" Mike was amazed. "Yeah, he said something about being careful. So, are you the wizard who is supposed to help us on our quest?"