Stone of Tears

Adie tapped the spoon clean on the edge of the iron kettle and hung it back on its hook, then lifted a dented tin from the side of the mantel, unscrewing the lid. Her voice was quiet, her rasp softer. “I do not wish to revisit that pain. Had I known what it would be like, I would have chosen to live the rest of my life without the foot.” Reaching her hand into the tin, she took a three-finger-and-thumb pinch of five-spice and flung it into the stew.

Zedd tugged at his ear. Perhaps she was right. Growing the foot back for her had nearly killed her. He hadn’t expected what had happened, her reaction to his using that much magic on her. Still, he had been successful, and managed to draw away the pain of the memories, though he still didn’t know what they had been about. But he should have taken into account that she could have had memories that held that much pain.

He should have taken the Wizard’s Second Rule into account, but he had been intent on doing something good for her. That was the way it worked with the second rule; it was usually hard to tell if you were violating it.

“You know the price of magic, Adie, almost as well as a wizard. And besides, I made it up to you. For the pain, I mean.” He knew it wouldn’t take as much magic to make the ankle longer as it had to grow the foot back, but after what she had suffered, he could understand her reluctance. “Perhaps you are right. Maybe I have done enough.”

Her white eyes settled on him again. “Why be you here, wizard?”

He gave her an impish grin. “I wanted to see you. You are a hard woman to forget. And I wanted to tell you about Darken Rahl being defeated, by Richard. That we won.” He frowned at her stare. “Why do you think the grippers are coming here?”

She shook her head with a sigh. “You talk like a drunk man walks: in every direction but where he be headed.” She flicked a finger toward the table, indicating that she wanted him to get the bowls. “I already knew we won. The first day of winter has come and past. Had Rahl won, things wouldn’t be so peaceful as they are. Though I be pleased to see your bones again.”

Her voice lowered, became even more raspy. “Why be you here, wizard?”

He strode over to the table, glad to elude the scrutiny of those eyes for a moment. “You didn’t answer my question. Why do you think the grippers are coming here?”

Her voice lowered into a deeper, harsher rasp, bordering on anger. “I think the grippers be here for the same reason you be here: to cause an old woman trouble.”

Zedd grinned as he returned with bowls. “My eyes don’t see an old woman. They see only a handsome woman.”

She regarded his grin with a helpless shake of her head. “I fear your tongue be more dangerous than a gripper.”

He handed her a bowl. “Have the grippers ever come here before?”

“No.” She turned and began spooning stew into the bowl. “When the boundary be in place, the grippers stayed in the pass, with other beasts. After the boundary went down, I not see them for a time, but when winter came, so did the grippers. That not be right. I think something be wrong.”

He exchanged the empty bowl for the full, holding it to his nose and inhaling the aroma. “Maybe when the boundary finally failed, there was no longer any hold over them, and they simply came out of the pass.”

“Maybe. When the boundary failed, most of the beasts went with it, back into the underworld. Some were freed of their bonds and escaped into the surrounding country. I never saw any grippers until the winter came, nearly a month ago. I fear something else happened, for them to be here.”

Zedd knew very well what had happened, but didn’t say so. Instead, he asked, Adie, why don’t you leave? Come away with me. To Aydindril. It would be…”

“No!” Her mouth snapped closed. She seemed almost surprised by her own voice. She smoothed her robe with her hand, letting the anger leave her face and then took the spoon out of the hand with the bowl and returned to dishing out stew. “No. This be my home.”

Zedd watched silently as she worked over the kettle. When finished, she carried her bowl to the table, set it down, and retrieved a loaf of bread from over the counter, from a shelf behind a blue-and-white-striped curtain. She pointed with the bread to the other empty chair. Zedd set his bowl on the table and sat, hiking his robes up as he folded his legs underneath himself. Adie lowered herself into the chair opposite him and sliced off a chunk of bread, using the knifepoint to push it across the table before she looked up to meet his eyes.

“Please, Zedd, do not ask me to leave my home.”

“I am only worried for you, Adie.”

Adie dunked a chunk of bread in her stew. “That be a lie.”

He looked up from under his eyebrows as he picked up his bread. “It’s not a lie.”

She ate without lifting her head.” “Only” be a lie.”