41 The First Meditation

"What in the world are you doing?" Jacob asked, waking to the sight of Rod sitting on top of his cot in a lotus position. The younger soldier opened his eyes, searching for the source of the question.

"I'm meditating. My pa always said that it helps when you're stressed or anxious," Rod replied, an odd feeling of calm emanating from him. Jacob wondered at how the antsy boy managed to calm himself down so much. Perhaps Rod's dad really did have a point with the whole meditation thing.

Rod hopped up, following Jacob to breakfast and then to the armory. Picking up their armor and their weapons, Jacob still wearing the wyrm-scale armor with express permission from the Commander, the pair rotated to their position by the large iron gates that the fortress was built around. Rod wore the much more common leather armor, dyed green to make identifying him as a Delreyan soldier easy. It was of poor quality, but it had seen its uses during the goblin attack on the way to Writha.

Since then, not much had happened by the way of fighting. Following the discussion they had a couple of weeks ago, the pair of gate guards were even friendlier with each other, sneaking quick conversations between travelers. If one of the corporals caught wind of their infractions and reported it to their sergeant – Rod had been reassigned to Jacob's squad following the goblin attack – they'd be in hot waters.

A rumbling, indicating a larger caravan, approached the Delreyan fortress. Jacob turned his full attention on the merchants and travelers closing distance with them. A familiar man was riding in the lead wagon, the captain of his mercenary force grinning predatorily at the sight of Jacob and Rod. Rod's body tensed, watching the small mercenary near for the second time in as many weeks.

"Do you have all your papers in order, sirs?" Jacob asked, taking the lead from Rod. As much of a blessing it was to have a friendly face around, the boy was terrible at standing up to authority, especially authority with more pointy weapons than he had.

"Aye, they're all in order," the captain said, bringing the merchant's papers forward. The tall man's longsword remained sheathed, but Jacob was sure that the veteran warrior could have it out in a moment if he needed to. Jacob accepted the papers from the mercenary's outstretched hand, unrolling them to inspect their contents.

He stifled a laugh. These were obviously forged; whichever moron they had tasked with their creation wrote "Yoru" in Delreyan characters. It was a correct spelling, but the people from the Kingdom of Yoru used a different alphabet. Their official papers, while utilizing the Delreyan language for ease of understanding between the two fortresses, always had their kingdom's name written in their native tongue. It was a simple mistake, but it was noticeable.

"I'm afraid these have been forged, good sir," Jacob said with the utmost politeness. His sword skills have improved even further with the daily training he did with the soldiers of Ericksson's Fourth, but they were not peerless. Not yet, at least. There was no telling if this warrior would prove too much for him to beat, not to mention the dozen or so similarly confident mercenaries accompanying the wagons. Fighting was to be a last-ditch effort.

"No, no, I'm quite sure they aren't," the captain let two pieces of gold glint in the palm of his hand. Looking at Rod, Jacob pocketed the couple of coins, waving the caravan through. Rod looked as if he was scandalized by Jacob's actions.

"Oh come on, Rod. You know what the lieutenant told us. 'Take the bribes, but give eighty percent of them to me.' Those are direct orders," Jacob reminded the goody-two-shoes.

"You don't think maybe we should go to the captain?"

"And get what? An even bigger headache? Two silver is two silver, Rod. You need it for your family, remember?" Jacob reasoned, regretting the words as they left his mouth. In his attempt to convince his partner, he alienated him.

"That was a low blow, Jacob. I know perfectly well what my family needs. They wouldn't want this kind of money, though. Not the kind that I got from deceit. Keep my share, Jacob. Do whatever you want with it," the sixteen year old said, looking out into the mountain pass. No further conversation passed between them until the end of their shift.

"Ro-"

"Can it, Jacob," Rod called as he walked past. Shaking his head in frustration, Jacob followed. A lonely dinner lay in store for him. Stopping by the lieutenant's quarters to deposit the man's share of the bribe, Jacob chose to forego dinner. One missed meal wouldn't be the difference between life and death. Instead, he figured that he might as well make a stop by the training yard. After the sun set, there was never a soul on the packed dirt grounds.

Jacob tried deepening his connection with earth magic, and while the ground bent to his whim far more easily and with more control than he once had, he was unable to raise it past a small spike with any measure of reliability. Pushing further than that resulted in a headache, the first sign of mana exhaustion.

At this rate, freeing himself of his constraints was nothing but a pipe dream. He supposed it was a small miracle that no one had thought of prohibiting him from removing the bindings, on the miniscule chance that he could work something out. That being said, that miracle was wasted if Jacob couldn't even begin to move the metal in the collar.

Pure metal, such as in the collar, was far heavier than the dirt in the ground. No amount of trying enabled Jacob to pry any molecules away without immediately landing him with a splitting headache. Frustration over the day's events, over his inability, boiled over.

Taking Rod's example, Jacob plopped himself down onto the hard ground, taking a final glance at the stars before closing his eyes and meditating. He imagined the molecules of the air flowing around him constantly, maintaining a small breeze over every part of his body. The visual aid should aid him in focusing on something else; he was an absolute novice when it came to meditation. It would look weird to an onlooker, Jacob being the only object in the vicinity upon which a breeze acted, but it was late in the evening. Everyone was busy gambling.

Sweat poured down his forehead. This meditation was far harder than he imagined, though it definitely did distance himself from his personal problems. The constant use of his mana drained him at a steady rate, making him feel as if he were doing some weird combination of a math competition and a running race. Before long, his eyelids grew heavy, oblivion claiming him.