The Chronicles of Tryterra: Uprisings Excerpt
“…Bres was the first of his kind, if only by a few hours. He would not know of the others until after he reached manhood. Perhaps that was the greatest tragedy, for the rumors of others like him were the genesis of the ostracization which plagued him in his youth.
He was raised among men, and men fear nothing more than that which is different. He stood out for his size and his tremendous strength, so no one saw his sensitivity, beauty, or intelligence. He was treated as little more than a stubborn beast of burden, fit only for the field.
His ideas and insights were dismissed, as was his trauma from his near constant victimization. He was bullied and assaulted by children and adults alike and punished when he defended himself. His resentment of humanity and its civilization was inevitable.
With no friends nor family nor caretakers who loved him, Bres found no comfort save for his love of music and song. He learned to write songs himself, and taught himself to play the makeshift instruments he constructed from the tools within the barn he was forced to dwell in.
His songs were rough and loud, full of anger and condemnation of a society hellbent on his oppression. They would echo through the night, causing fear and anxiety in the dreams of those who heard them as they slept. In the mornings after he played, the children were nicer to him…not nice, but nicer…and disdainful of the adults that taught them to fear and never question.
Once rumors of others like him reached the village, taunts like “giant” and “mammoth” were replaced with “cuckoo” and “demon”. His songs grew harsher, the words more cutting and insightful, and as his muscles grew to fit his frame, his instruments became larger and louder.
The village woke in the nights when he sang and played. But while the adults would cower and curse in their beds, Bres’ss contemporaries – now teenagers – would rise from theirs and venture to the barn where he played. Bres’ss songs moved them. They opened the teenagers hearts and minds and instilled into their souls something new: rebellion.
The leaders of the village decided that Bres was too dangerous, too disruptive to live. Their offspring disagreed. The generations began to fight among themselves until the village could no longer sustain itself. It disincorporated, the community unable to work together as it turned against itself. Families drifted apart, and fields went fallow with no hands to tend them.
Soon all that remained was Bres and his new horde of groupies.
Bres was not inclined to forgive his tormentors, however. He left them to their own devices and wandered off to practice his music elsewhere.
In time, in his wanderings, he did meet others like him, and he was surprised to learn that they had all heard of him, his music, and the power of his songs. They had taken his name for themselves: Bresians.
The newly christened nation of Bres went north, in search of unsettled lands where they could found their own communities, and provide each other the support and defense that humanity never gave them.
But that is a story for another day…”
George L. Stewart © 2026