An Excerpt from The Stone - Entering Quat City

An Excerpt from The Chronicles of Quat: The Stone

by Bryen O'Riley

Entering Quat City

Etan rode through Quat City, as always amazed at how different it was from the land of his birth. To enter Quat City, one had to be a Quatist, a scientist, an apprentice, or a support person committed to the way of science. If an apprentice failed the test or a support person sought to leave, he would have his memory of Quat completely dissolved. When they returned to the rest of the world, they would not be able to give away the secret accomplishments of science.

Clearly, if the commoners knew of the luxuries that Quat enjoyed, they would demand the same for themselves. Without the discipline and understanding of science, however, those luxuries would inevitably corrupt and wreak havoc on the established order. It was deemed best that the commoners should go without, but of course the same did not go for scientists and Quatists. So Quat was a closed city that lived eons ahead of the rest of the world, and all luxuries and advances were strictly kept from the populace at large.

Etan rode his horse down a main thoroughfare in early evening. The hum of etherlamps rose as one when they came alight simultaneously to banish every shadow from the street. He caught his breath. It was a glorious thing to see the shadows of evening banished by a scientific act. He wished for just one moment that he had been allowed to demonstrate the ether for Idynn. Etan smiled; they would have fallen to the ground in shock. They had hardly been able to fathom his simple compass and how he had changed the direction with a mere magnet.

It hadn’t been so long ago that he had been as simpleminded as they. He could hardly remember that now, but it was important to recall nonetheless. He didn’t want to forget his humble origins. These were the people he was to advise and rule, after all.

The streets were wide, with etherlamps lining the street at regular, measured intervals. A few people strode purposefully along, clearly on business they felt was important. Several wore the deep blue mantles of scientists and Quatists but a few were clearly apprentices. This part of Quat was reserved for official use and most people had retired to the residential areas of the city by now, but the faithful few were still working hard to ensure the Isle of Quat and the world beyond were ruled effectively and efficiently.

The buildings were set back from the street and built of magnificent stone. Each building was without seams or cracks but rather looked as if an enormous solid stone had been set down, hollowed out, and given windows and doors. There was very little decoration on any building in the city, or the entire island for that matter, as scientists are hardly interested in decorating structures. The massiveness of the buildings alone, and their stone-like appearance, was enough to drop the jaw. Each building was nearly identical with a wide door, sometimes a double door, and nearly floor-to-ceiling windows rising directly from street level. These windows reflected like mirrors night and day; they were stacked on top of each other for each level up. Most buildings were not more than four stories high, with most roofs used for gardening and tree-growing. These stately buildings were reserved for official Quat governance or for academic pursuits.

The walkways between the buildings and the street were laid with large, flat stones cut to the exact same size and lined with evenly spaced trees. There was little dirt to be seen in all of Quat City. Most of the trees had stone paving ringed nearly up to their trunks. The rest of the world offered dirt streets and walkways.

From behind him Etan heard the whoosh of an approaching railcart and quickly nudged his horse to give it wider berth. It didn’t slow down for him but sped along on its rails without a horse or any living thing to pull it. 

The railcarts worked as if by magic to him; that was a choice of study that was not available to apprentices. But now that he was an official scientist, having passed the final test of his hometown accepting his change in station, he would be able to study and experiment on anything science had to offer.

Etan turned down a side road and finally saw another person riding a horse. If one had far to travel in Quat City, railcarts were the best way, but for the local neighborhood travel, horses and walking were still used. Etan had come in on the north road, and this was the fastest way to arrive at his neighborhood. If Etan had chosen to stable his horse at the entrance to Quat, he could have ridden the railcart in.

The side streets were busier, were narrower, and held more people. A horse and cart turned onto the road just ahead of him, and Etan slowed his horse to accommodate the cart’s jostling pace. This side street was cobblestone, which jostled the cart in front of him to no end. The smooth stone of the main road would have felt like a sleigh ride in comparison. 

Most buildings were smaller in the residential neighborhoods, only two stories and made from either brick or wood. These structures had a more comfortable feeling than the academic buildings gave. Etan wondered if the buildings were built in the continental style in part because that is where most people came from and what they associated with home, or if it were merely because the construction was simpler and cheaper. Each neighborhood was centered around one or two slightly larger, but simply built, stone buildings that housed the apprentices.

He would certainly rather live in the side neighborhoods than in the majestic stone buildings. These smaller houses still had all the amenities that science provided: etherlamps, indoor water pumps, indoor privies, coolboxes like he had made for his mother, and heat that radiated from pipes dispersed through all of the walls and floors. At the same time his neighborhood, made up mostly of apprentices, had felt like a small village to him these past five years. He had gotten to know his neighbors, the grocer, butcher, tailor, and other craftsmen serving the apprentices. He smiled as he came to his street. It felt like home.

There were many more people out on the streets now. Groups of young men, set free from the confines of their mentors’ expectations and disapproval, cavorted on the sidewalks and walkways. Many had exchanged the plainer mantles worn during work with brighter, more festive versions for their evening activities. Shopkeepers were at their doors announcing specials and offering samples to the young men, and the young ladies of the city had on their brightest mantles and were swaying along the sidewalks in groups as they easily succeeded in catching the eyes of all the apprentices.

“What’s a scientist doing visiting us lowly apprentices?” a voice spoke from the right side of his horse just as Etan dismounted on the left.

Etan ducked his head to see past his horse’s neck and grinned when he saw the familiar, smiling face of his friend Hal. “Just here to make sure some of you simpletons hadn’t been kicked out of Quat while I was away.”

Etan walked his horse down the alley beside their building, and Hal followed. 

“Nearly have been, a couple of times.” Hallum Wenton grinned, grasping Etan’s forearm in greeting. “What fun would it be to stay on the straight and narrow all the time like…well, like you, actually?”

Etan raised an eyebrow. “Fun enough to be finished with my apprenticeship while you are still slogging away. How long had you been here when I arrived, again?”

Hal rolled his eyes. “Only five months, not five years like I know you were thinking.”

“And how much longer do you think until you are done?”
  

“If I had an easy master like you I would have been finished years ago, but Scientist Jensen is…exacting. He should just be glad that I haven’t chosen a memory dissolve yet.”

“You’d never do that. Then you wouldn’t remember me.”

“That’d be tragic,” Hal said solemnly, then laughed. 

“Besides, that would mean he had won.”

Hal nodded. “I am close now, though. Old Jensen mentioned the final test within a fortnight. I think he hopes I’ll fail, but I won’t.”

Etan opened the stable door and led his horse in, with Hal following behind to shut it. Etan removed his bags and the saddle to give the poor beast some much-deserved rest. He had ridden hard to allow himself several days before having to report to his first assigned position as a scientist.

“No, you won’t fail.” 

Hal gave Etan’s horse a pat. “I didn’t think you were coming back. I thought you were going straight to Gaellyn once your visit was over?”

“That was my plan but it changed. I found I had some business to sort out here before I started my assignment. I took leave of my mother and rode hard.”

Hal shook his head. “My ma would skin me alive if I didn’t spend the full two weeks at home with her. She’s threatened to write Jensen herself to hurry my final testing date. Wouldn’t that be a catastrophe?”

Etan grunted in agreement, his mind racing. It had seemed so simple in Idynn and on the trip back. Come to Quat, find his father, smooth the family tension, and gain a father in return. Now that he was here, he wondered if he had been presumptuous. 

Quat wasn’t as simple of a place as Idynn. The world of scientists and Quatists was much more complex than anything he had experienced up to now as an apprentice. What if his father really did want to kill him? There would be nothing Etan could do to stop a Quatist. His own younger, stronger build would be worthless against the power at his father’s fingertips.

The difference between a scientist and a Quatist was so vast they shouldn’t be considered the same occupation. It was only the lack of understanding of the common folks that linked the two so closely. True, one must be a scientist to become a Quatist, but that is where the connection stopped.

Scientists figured out how the world worked and used the rules they learned to interact with the world differently than how they had in the past. Quatists figured out the meaning of the world and used it to break all those rules. 


Quatists were scientists without boundaries, without ceilings. They didn’t interact with the world; they fundamentally changed it. In fact, some Quatists believed that if a Quatist were strong enough he could change the most basic of scientific rules for all of time. Something a die-hard scientist wouldn’t even consider or want to do.

Quatists could change rules for certain places for certain times. He had heard of a Quatist who had thrown a cow off the top of the highest tower he could find, but instead of dropping to the ground, the cow floated on the wind until it came to rest gently upon a river bank some 100 meters away. Whether the Quatist changed the mass of the cow for the short period of time, the thickness of the wind, or the Graviton itself, no one knew. Many people, however, had seen the Quatum act and verified it; it couldn’t be doubted.

Was he really going to walk into his father’s lab and offer his neck?

Etan was pulled from his thoughts by a rough shaking of his arm. “What?” he looked around in alarm.

“I was saying,” Hal repeated, irritated, “that we’re all going to The Bearded Goose if you’d like to join us.”

Etan smiled fondly at the name of his favorite tavern. Every tavern on Quat had a silly, whimsical name, which seemed to be the proprietors’ way of reminding scientists that they should enjoy life as well as study it.

Etan shrugged. “I may come by in a while. I’m not sure though.”

Hal nodded and slapped his shoulder. “Glad to see you once more before you report. When your assignment ends, I will certainly be out on mine.”

“I’m glad to see you too. I’ll probably be over in a while.”

Hal dropped to one knee and clutched his hands to his chest in jest. “Let us spend some time hanging on every word of an important scientist. That would be such an honor.”

Etan rolled his eyes and pushed him. “You are going to be unbearable once you’ve attained the Order!”

“After nearly six years of torture?! You bet I’ll be!” Hal left the stable with a loud laugh and headed back up the alleyway. He always had a bounce in his gait, perfectly suited to his carefree nature.

Etan gave his horse a fond pat, making sure he was eating well before leaving. He shut the stable door and strode quickly back to the street. He had some errands to run before he could even think of The Bearded Goose.

After a quick stop to his old rooms to drop off his bags, Etan headed back into the softly lit streets. He wouldn’t have his own apartment in the city until he returned from the two years spent at his first post. Then he would be given apartments that would be his until he chose to apply for a nicer living space as his seniority improved. He was glad that his rooms hadn’t been taken by a newly arrived apprentice yet; he hadn’t wanted to stay in a boarding house, not when his task was so secretive.

Etan wrapped his mantle about him as he walked back to the main thoroughfare to catch the railcart. There was a cool breeze tonight that managed to slip right down his shirt collar to chill him. He waited at the railcart stopping place closest to his street, pulling his collar up against the wind. Several other apprentices waited beside him, most laden with books or boxes. Etan couldn’t help the small smile that escaped for his liberation from the thumb of a master. It was good to be a free man again. Even during his required two-year post, he wouldn’t have the worry of a master to please. He would only have to do the best job he could as he saw fit.

He filed onto the railcart after the apprentices. Poor blokes. Some of those boys would have the full five years to go. An apprenticeship could last longer than five years, as in Hal’s case, if the apprentice were particularly slow or if his master was particularly hard to please, but it couldn’t last much less than five years. It didn’t matter how intelligent an apprentice was, there were five years’ worth of information to be learned before an apprentice was ready to be a scientist. Etan was glad to be done.

Almost 20 minutes later, the railcart stopped in front of the largest, most regal building in the city: the library. Even the governor’s building was not as grand as the library. In keeping with the rest of Quat’s buildings, there was nothing to decorate it. What made the building majestic was its architectural structure. The library looked like an intricate waterfall made out of massive stone. The detail of drops of water hitting rocks was impossible. It was as if a Quatist had turned a waterfall to stone, moved it to the city, and hollowed out the inside of the rock to house the library.

The entrance of the library was behind the “water” of the falls. One entered either by walking in at the sides of the waterfall or, if one were particularly bold, there were a few open slits in the water made by rocks parting the flow further up the falls. Etan always walked directly under the waterfall because he couldn’t understand how, even after doing it hundreds of times, one still felt that moment of panic when passing directly under the massive weight of stone droplets that, except for inexplicably defying the Graviton, should crush a person passing beneath in an instant. Perhaps it was to demonstrate the crushing weight of responsibility that scientists should feel regarding all the knowledge they had stored up behind the waterfall. Or perhaps it was some early Quatist’s idea of what décor ought to be. Either way, Etan felt his stomach clutch familiarly as he ducked beneath the stone frozenly plummeting to the earth.