Stone and Blood

Prologue

It just wasn't .......normal. Oh it felt normal. It looked normal. The old farmer turned it over in gnarled and grubby hands. Hands that had seen years toiling in the earth. Hands that every year worked to bring out the wagons of vegetables that he sold to the Chateau to support his wife, son and 3 daughters. His father and his father's father had supplied such staples to the Chateau du Clos Luce and he always felt that it was his privilege to continue that simple tradition.
This .....thing..... should not have held his attention like it was. He had seen more than his share of rock and stone as he tilled the soil either in harvest or planting season. So
Why should this be so different? His intense light brown eyes took in the stones details.
It was a simple stone about the size of his two fists.  It was rough to the touch and a simple grey in colour, but if the old man's eyes did not deceive him, and his eye sight was as keen today as it had been in his youth, also had thin black lines that wrapped themselves around the surface. They looked to penetrate into the stone as well.  And it was heavy. Unusually heavy. but that in itself wasn't enough for the old farmer to be so mesmerised. Picking up a metal spike, roughly 2 handspans in length and as thick as his first finger that he kept close for any task, from relieving a stone or thorn that occasionally caught in his beloved mules hoof, to cleaning the dirt from under his own nails, he scratched at the grey surface.  The earth came away easily but the sharp metal point never left a mark in the stone .  He looked to the ground where he'd first seen it. It had been half submerged in the lane way, only becoming visible, due to the heavy rains of the past days which must have washed away some of the dirt to reveal it from its resting place. He looked about him, taking in the trees and bushes that lined this lane way. They were thick with green and birds chirped in the higher branches. This was not a path he ever used. In fact he didn't think anyone had used this path in years. He had only come this way because the rains had washed out his usual route to the Château and he could not well afford to delay his departure. Not if he wanted to get the produce to the destination before it spoiled.  Perhaps it was those same rains that had uncovered this stone.
He then looked at the broken wagon wheel.

It looked like Jehan the blacksmith had taken his hammer or an axe to it. Those strong arms and shoulders of Jehan's  could've cleaved the wheel like that, had he had a mind to do so, but this????

How did this stone break that wheel?  It must've been the stone because there was nothing else that looked out of place.  They weren't travelling fast.  Neither the mule nor his old bones were up to that these days and yet there was the stone and there was the wagon wheel.
But he recalled as he passed over the spot where he found the stone there was an.... Eruption??? Is that what it was called? He was almost in a daydream, swaying to the rhythm of the wagon and the mule, feeling the fresh cool air on his face, when the earth beneath that wheel seemed to rise up with a fury, like the splash of water when a huge rock is thrown in a puddle.  The wagon had rocked back and forth and it had taken a moment to calm the mule so that he was sure it wouldn't bolt off down the lane.
On getting down he saw the rock and the wheel.
It shouldn't have been able to do that.
It was not..... normal.
A younger man with the same light brown eyes came from around the back of the wagon. The mule, the old man noticed, was now tethered to a sprig of a tree not much more than a sapling some small distance away. 

Not yet 20 years of age, the boy, the youngest of his children, had broad shoulders and light sandy coloured hair, like his mothers, that fell to just above his collar. His eyes sat below a heavy brow and he squinted slightly in an effort to keep the sun out of them.

The farmer nodded in approval and held the stone out for his son to see.
Hands every bit as gnarled and grubby as his fathers reached out. As soon as his finger touched its surface he pulled back hissing through his teeth. A small drop of blood showed where something had stabbed into his flesh. Grimacing he looked at his father who in turn rotated the stone to see what could've caused such an injury. There was nothing. The surface was the same. Dull grey, dirty and solid. The black lines still cutting through the plainness of the rest of its mass
A flash of heat suddenly coursed through the younger man's arm, travelling swiftly from one extremity to the other. In an instant it was gone. He blinked and shook his head slightly as if to clear it. His father was still studying the stone. They made eye contact and the old farmer shrugged his shoulders.  His son said nothing.