Path of the Stonebreaker

“My lord, perhaps you should come inside?” Ferath asked, stepping out into the frigid night air. Ferath surely felt the bite of the night air on his face, it stings right into the bones when you first step out onto the balcony. Ecko was a thin blue crescent but luna was full, her reddish light working with the city’s gaslamps to cast the city of Rubastre in a dim orange hue. Unlike at home, there was no warmth from luna in this wretched place. It was a testament to Ferath’s resolve that he didn’t shiver. Daegan was far past any measure of sobriety for the cold to affect him as much.

“The whitewhiskey does light a fire in you,” Daegan said. He felt the slur in his own words but didn’t care, “far more than a topaz, I’d wager.”

“I haven’t tried the stuff yet,” Ferath said, purposefully not taking the vacant seat opposite Daegan.

“And I’ve no way to try the topaz, have I?” Daegan replied bitterly, “so you’ll be the judge.” Daegan had been swigging the clear liquid directly from the crystal decanter.

“Sit. Drink.” Daegan said, pointing the decanter at Ferath, sloshing the drink.

“I’d rather not, sir.”

“Kerala’s on duty tonight, so you can have a drink with me, can you not?” Kerala stood guard by the balcony door as always like a cast bronze sentinel. A topaz on her too.

“Bet you’ve got a hidden topaz somewhere on you, as well, eh, Kerala?” he said, and she nodded impassively. “I’d get more words out of a bronze statue,” Daegan said and was disappointed the others didn’t seem to pick up on his joke.

“You look like the miserable fucked the hopeless,” Ferath said, finally sitting down and taking the decanter.

“There he is,” Daegan smiled, “I knew you were still the same.”

“You know, Daegan,” Ferath said, all formality now thankfully shaken off, “of all your vices; drinking, whoring, cheating, I didn’t think that self-pity would be the one that would control you. You didn’t hate yourself this much when we were boys.”

“Hate is not the same as pity,” Daegen replied, “I’d much rather have a man’s hate than his pity. You used to hate me. Don’t pretend you didn’t. You hated Landryn and I. You were the better swordsman—and the better runewielder. Yet we got all the promotions, all the advantages. And they left you to rot as a low-ranking soldier. I preferred you back then, when you hated me.”

“You’re right. I did hate you,” Ferath replied, he didn’t seem to have taken any offence to Daegan’s rant, “and Landryn too. I beat him in every bout in the sparring yard. And yet when the time came, he became my captain. Then my major, and then general.”

“—And now he’s your Lord-Commander, and you’ve only just made it to the rank of captain. Surely it must seethe in you each time he arrives home victorious from another battle.”

As it does in me.

“It did,” Ferath admitted, “..for a time.”

The other man’s face took on a distant expression and just before Daegan could press him further, he began, “He saved my life once, you know. It was a skirmish along the river Remen and I was leading a charge against a line of pikemen. This big ox of a foebreaker bursts from their line, swinging an axe in each hand,” Ferath spoke animatedly using his fists as if to somehow express the size of the man, “I’d never seen a charge break so quickly. Most of my men were barely more than boys—heck, I was barely more than a boy myself—and we hadn’t expected a foebreaker to be hiding within such a small group of pikemen. He smashed their morale to dust. Even mine, with all my resilience training” Ferath said still with that far off look on his face, “I’d never felt such crippling fear. Waves of sheer unrelenting certainty that this man would kill me if I charged at him. They train you for it, to resist. But in training, the real fear isn’t there. You have the safety of knowing you’re not in any real danger…” Daegan wasn’t sure if he’d ever truly felt the effects of a Foebreaker’s control, his own training hadn’t progressed that far. He had undoubtedly been manipulated by someone using a mindstone before but he’d never—and thankfully was unlikely to ever—experience what Ferath had.

“Then your brother,” Ferath continued, “clad in his black armour appeared like some hero from the fucking stories. He fought like a demon, far more skill than he ever showed against me. The foebreaker was surely crushing Landryn with every ounce of fear he could muster and your brother fought through it. He never once faltered, never let the foebreaker crush his resolve. Landryn tore through the line, not a single swing of his sword was wasted, each one taking down another pikeman until he faced the foebreaker himself. I’ve watched runewielders fight my entire life and I can say this with absolute certainty that the two men I watched were the most skilled I will likely ever see.

I had been wrong to resent your brother. It may have been your father that got him those initial promotions, but any soldier who can stand against that foebreaker’s dread and raise their sword is a person I will gladly follow. Any man who would throw himself between a powerful runewielder and group of novice boys, is not deserving of hatred.”

Daegan—even if he were sober—couldn’t truly grasp how Landryn’s actions could have instilled in Ferath such fervent loyalty and admiration. An accomplished mindstone wielder pushing a terror into him so strong that he couldn’t move, couldn’t run, wasn’t something he could really comprehend without experiencing it. His training had ended long before the boys were taught the techniques that could be used to defend against such attacks against one’s psyche. He liked to believe he could tell when a secretive mindstone user was attempting to manipulate his emotions, that he would be able to recognize such an affrontive shift in his own emotions, an abrupt denial of what he truly felt. But the truth was he had no idea, he barely knew how a mindstone worked and nor could he ever hope to learn.

“I didn’t know that,” was all Daegan could say. And it was true, Daegan had long stopped paying attention to the accomplishments of his brother. His victories in battle, his promotions and honours.

“I envied him, for a long time,” Daegan said, “I wished so hard that it had been him and not me that was cursed with this… affliction.” A deep part of him still did.

Ferath nodded in understanding, “If the secret sorrows of everyone could be read on their forehead, how many who now cause envy would suddenly become the objects of pity?” he said.

“Such similar emotions; hatred, envy that becomes pity,” Daegan said, the handgun that Grimsworth had given him discarded on the table next to the decanter. A soft glow emanating from the eradite and aquamarine gemstones. He picked it up, and pointed it out toward the cold, encroaching darkness beyond the balcony. He pulled the trigger and there was a loud crack as the bullet was fired from the barrel. In quick succession, he fired all five rounds in the barrel until the trigger clinked uselessly. The light in the eradite stones had faded to nothing. Five bullets is all I get before I have to come crawling to a stonebreaker so that they may grace me with their superior ability. Ferath leaned forward, one hand resting on the chamber of the handgun, the other on the steel balcony palisade. Within seconds the light returned.

“I thought metal was slow to dissolve,” Daegan said, noting the now crumbling patch on the balcony where Ferath’s hand had been. Ferath did not respond, instead he rose from his seat.

“It’s a good weapon, my lord,” Ferath said as he made his way to the door, “don’t let the prick that gave it to you be the reason not to use it. Don’t give him that power over you.”

Dark clouds dimmed the night further, blocking out the moonlight, Daegan remained a while longer as the snow had begun to fall lightly on the city of Rebastre. Holding the handgun and staring into the swirling light of the eradite stones with a resentment that he wished he was strong enough to overcome. Indignantly, he tossed the handgun off the balcony—or rather, he attempted to. The weapon clattered against the palisade and bounced back, landing on the floor.

Not for the first time that day, Daegan felt the familiar tightening in his throat. There is no ailment whitewhiskey won't cure, something along those lines Duke Edmund had said. And so Daegan reached for the crystal and tried to burn away the pressure on his larynx.