Conten raised the construct to the light, examining it from multiple angles, and grinned as the light refracted through the carefully wrought angles and points. Holding it in his right hand, he threw it onto the floor, shattering it into an unrecognizable mess of glittering shards. “Still no progress,” he sighed, sweeping at the scattered pieces.
His workshop consisted of a small room filled with jars and containers, holding every type of compound and material he could afford to buy. He’d collected dirt vials from all corners of the known world, rock compounds from every mine, sands, plant samples, nectars, saps, animal extracts, all layered one upon another across the walls of his room. The only gaps held the doorway, a cluttered windowsill, and a small table well-wrought enough to be approaching a pedestal, which held a single opaque glass cube.
The cube was his treasure, a work created early in his efforts, and nearly indestructible when compared to the unaltered glass. He’d found that salt, ground finely enough, would dissolve into the fluid, and that when provoked it would form glass with unparalleled strength. He’d been working for over a decade now to reduce or remove the opacity, however, as the constructs were nearly useless when unable to refract.
He poured the crystal shards through a sieve, collecting the larger pieces, and let the dust fall into a small bin below. Marking off the bumblebee venom as unsuccessful, he stepped out the doorway and began the short trip to the dining hall. Both of the researchers he passed smiled at him, but saw his expression and decided against passing conversation.
“Am I that frightful of a sight?” Conten wondered, glancing back at the pair. He made a deliberate effort to smooth his features before stepping into the bustle of a room filled with more hungry people than it should ever reasonably hold.
He spotted Torean across the room, and waved as he searched for an unoccupied seat. Torean drifted over as Conten waited for a small group to finish their lunches, and felt himself relax at the old man’s delicate grip on his shoulder.
“I see from your face you’ve made a great breakthrough today!” Torean said wisely, his face empty of guile or malice.
“How do you figure?” Conten asked, as the last of the seated group downed their drinks and stood to leave.
A grin fought for control of the old man’s face, but couldn’t quite keep its foothold. “Rumour has it,” he said quietly, “that you’ve discovered the lost art of patience!” The grin burst forth, all the wider for its brief repression.
Conten stared blankly at the delighted man, unsure how much of his words were humour, and how much was his aging brain giving up ties to reality.
“For someone so young, you didn’t really fit your name,” Torean continued, unaware or uncaring of his companion’s deadpan. “You’ve never before really seemed Content…” He paused, sweeping his feet dramatically off the floor, and slowly falling into his chair. “But today,” he exclaimed loudly, “rather than search for a table where none would be found, you learned patience, the ancient and nigh-lost art!”
Conten felt a smile rising at his friend’s theatrics, despite himself.
“No, today you stood by a group obviously finishing up, and you waited for them to depart. In all my years, there are few here who I have e’er seen act so wisely –nay, sagely– in the pursuit of their humble goals.” Torean concluded, gesturing widely at the packed room. “So what else has my wisest of friends learned?”
Conten laid his head in his hands. “My dearest companion,” he began, trying to mimic Torean’s speech, “I have learned that if ever I desire peace and quiet, I would sooner revise those who I call my friends than expect anything less than exuberance from you.” He smiled across the table; “though often, unexpected flair seems to be exactly what I need.”
Torean smiled, and made a mock bow. “I’ve eaten already, if that’s what you came to this fine establishment for, but I can keep you a table while you collect the delightful stew they’ve served for the fourth time this week. I understand pride, but their cooking choices might now be verging on folly.”
Conten stood, groaning theatrically, and walked to the bar. As he waited for the stew to be served out, he stepped into a window’s sunlight, and looked out at the mountainside.
The view was dappled green, though considerably less than it had been before the settling had started, and woven through with roads and trails. Further down the mountain, the settlement was properly taking form. The constructs returned by the first researchers had proven monumentally valuable, and people of every profession had started trekking to the site. Talks and bartering with the closest of cities and rulers had given them permission to form a university, and only now was the school beginning to settle into a sustainable rhythm.
Conten was glancing further up the mountain at the entrance to the fluid tunnels when the room seemed to stutter. Every table wobbled in unison, every glass rattled, the bowls of stew rippled in matched time. A plume of dust and smoke had erupted from the mouth of the cave, and the travellers in sight had paused, staring in that direction. In the hush that fell, Conten’s commentary carried much farther than he had intended.
“That must have destroyed the tunnels,” he said, brow furrowed, as he stared out the window.
Every eye turned to towards him, fear and confusion writ large. He flinched back, and desperately pointed out the window. “Th-The cave. There was a… it just… exploded. The glass tunnels.”
Comprehension swept through the crowd, and a stampede began as researchers fled the room, desperate to determine the fate of their beloved glass reservoir.
Conten stared out the window as a single form stumbled from the wounded mountain and collapsed at the cave mouth.
“What are you waiting for?” Torean asked from beside him. “Let’s go!”
-
Conten gasped for breath, watching Torean bound effortlessly up the mountainside, and cursed the old man not for the first time. Dragging himself up the glorified goat path, he arrived at the landing and found himself on the edge of a crowd of frantic researchers attempting to revive a dust-covered man.
The man wheezed for air, and the crowd hushed, two glaziers fussing over him and trying to ease pains. Someone passed forward a waterskin with a bright brass buckle, and the man drank, spitting out murky water.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Torean alighted at the man’s side, others making room for the oldest of researchers. “What happened, Gillam?” he asked desperately.
Gillam coughed and drank, his lips forming words unspoken. Finally, he wheezed, “The sounding-”
Another coughing fit took his voice, and he spat tarry phlegm at his feet before continuing. “We tried a sounding. Bennard insisted on taking the lead. He was finishing his first draw when the tunnel collapsed.”
Torean’s face was drawn, all joviality gone. “What were you using to measure? We’ve tried all manner of soundings before.”
Gillam frowned, “Everything else bowed with distance, or floated too much. Glass… it’s neutral in the water. So he just pressed out and formed a rod of glass in the reservoir.” The crowd exchanged uncertain glances as Gillam coughed, waiting for something to explain the disaster.
“I was watching the entrance, to keep anyone from going in and disturbing them, but… I could hear the voices if I stepped inside a few paces. I heard Bennard saying he was feeling resistance. He tied off the end of the sounding rod and pulled it from the water. Last thing I heard was shattering glass, then… bang.”
Conten craned his neck, trying to see as the dust-covered man lay down again, his energy spent. “Do you think the tunnels are down? Can we find a way through?” he called out, hoping to get some kind of answer, though from where he wasn’t sure.
“Someone needs to go in there and check!” someone in the crowd called out, and the noises of agreement were cut short by Gillam hacking up another lump of black spit. No one stepped forward as a volunteer.
Conten eased through the crowd to look down the tunnel. Dust still flowed outwards, seeping out from the cave like a thick fog, and rubble strewn along the bottom gave credence that it might have collapsed completely. He stepped forward, edging slowly towards the entrance, and took a breath of the dusty air.
A burning filled his lungs, and he started coughing heavily, backing away from the cavern. He shook his head, trying to speak through the feeling of grit. “We might have to wait a while,” he managed, trying to muffle his coughs. He stepped forward again, holding his breath this time, and pocketed a handful of the fallen debris for his tests.
“No.”
Conten glanced up at the crowd, and saw Torean marching towards him. “This place is all I have left,” Torean called out, his voice growing louder with every word. “My friends are gone, my wits are leaving me, but I will not see my only legacy crumble in my lifetime!”
Conten held the old man back as he pulled towards the opening. “Torean, it’s darker than pitch in there, unbreathable, and you can’t even be sure of the tunnels themselves. It’s not possible!”
Torean jumped, and Conten’s arm was nearly torn from its socket by the force of the pull. He let go, as Torean bobbed in the breeze beside him.
“I swam through the darkness of these caves to find the reservoir once, and I have no doubt I can do it again now. I know the tunnels better than any man living.” Torean glanced around feverishly, and settled his eyes on one of the men caring for Gillam. “Give me the waterskin!”
Torean caught the tossed vessel, emptied it of water, and peered at the cave opening. Slowly settling back to the ground, he touched down uncertainly with one foot. His ragged breathing slowed. Conten stepped forward and put a hand on his friend’s shoulder, helping him stay planted.
“Are you sure about this?” Conten asked quietly, all too aware of the whiteness of Torean’s hair, the wrinkles of his skin.
“Just give me a push, so I can get some speed.”
Conten braced himself, his hands overlapped in front of his chest. Torean pushed off lightly, placed his feet on Conten’s hands, and sprung out, leaping towards the cave like an arrow, vanishing into the gloom.
The minutes that followed tore at Conten’s mind, the guilt at enabling his friend’s reckless action growing in him. None in the crowd spoke above a murmur. Twice, the sound of stone scraping against stone echoed from the cave, and all froze, waiting for something more. Even the men bolstering Gillam paused in their labour, as they helped him limp down the path to the hall.
Slowly, the dust and shadows began to clear in the cave entrance. Shafts of light pierced into the wounded stone, and glanced softly off a parcel on the floor. Conten took a breath, wading into the dispersing mists, and reached out to grab the parcel. As his hand brushed over it, he felt a leathery surface, and retreated with his catch.
Staying his breath in fear of residual dust, Conten found himself holding a full waterskin.
He panicked, and lunged into the dust, frantically scrabbling for shapes not rubble or rock. A twist in the air showed a drifting shadow, and Conten grabbed it by the boots and threw it towards the entrance.
He followed, footsteps growing heavier at the lack of breath. Outside, the crowd had again joined together to render aid, and he needed several emphatic gestures before he was deemed healthy and released. With shuddering breaths, he stood to watch Torean’s limp form being towed down the mountainside.
Murmurings from the cave drew his attention again, and he saw the forgotten waterskin being spilled, shards of crystal chiming on the stone ledge. He walked over and put his hand into the stream, withdrawing it cradling a small vial and stopper. Pulling the gathered cave-dust from his pocket into it, he stoppered the bottle and began the slow trudge back to his tiny office workshop.
-
Conten sat in front of a bowl of glass-water, and released Apothet’s blessing to light the tinder beneath it. As the distortions of heat passed through the liquid, he pressed it into the liquid itself, and formed the thinnest tendrils he could manage, spiralling around and around until the construct seemed more a ball of yarn than a glass sculpture. Unlike his past efforts, he focused on passing his magic through all the spirals, and only once it reached through did he allow it to continue to extend the glass thread.
He began to feel a resistance. As he lengthened it, it was as if the magic he poured into it was falling through a sieve, and less was reaching the end of the glass with each moment. He pushed harder, and saw bubbles of steam forming along the edges of his construct, where the heat was slipping from the glass despite his concentration. Finally, the glass would go no further, and he allowed the magic to recede before the roiling water shattered the fragile craft within.
Plucking the glass from the bowl, he raised it to the light, and marvelled at the complete lack of elegance. No fine curves, or sharp edges, just a hodgepodge of strands twisting and turning like a pile of drunken snakes. He held it firmly in his right hand, turned to leave his meager office and walk to the dining hall, when the bottles in his room began to rattle and shake. Row upon row of carefully collected samples fell, most surviving the light impact with the wooden floor, and came to rest in a disorganized heap of glass.
Conten’s gaze bounced from the bottles leaking samples to the tangle of glass wires in his hand, then back again. Feeling oddly hollow, yet emboldened by the sign, he stepped through the mess, left the room, and closed the door on the chaos behind him.
Walking down the hallways, he passed two chatting researchers, and gestured for them to follow him. Curiosity piqued by the mess of glass, they followed him to the meeting hall, full of friends and colleagues, and rife with speculation about the unexpected tremor.
“If I could have your attention!” He called out, and this time was prepared for the eyes of the room to turn his way. He raised the glass tangle in the air. “I have a new construct for the interest of all!”
Skepticism showed plain on the faces of many, looking at the fist-sized rat’s nest of glass wires.
“I believe I might have an answer for last week’s unexplained tragedy,” Conten continued, stepping towards a window. “I haven’t tested it yet, but if my instincts are right-” He paused, brow furrowed. “Well, if they were right, I might not have a knee-high layer of jars and dirt samples in my office. But if I’m right in this case, we’ll all have something new to worry about.”
With his audience’s interest piqued, Conten opened the window and gestured grandly. As he gestured, he let the construct fly free, and it dropped out the window and out of sight.
The cries of confusion were quickly overshadowed by the large explosion two floors down throwing a flash of light up through the windows, and the shattering of all the window panes on one side of the dining hall.
Conten picked himself up and brushed the dust and glass pieces from his clothes.
“As you can see,” he said, surprised at how quiet his shouting voice sounded to his own ears, “we have a problem. Our university is able to produce weapons of war.”