Sebastian

brother?"
    "Gone to visit our mother. Or, more to the point, trying to decide how he feels about our mother's lover moving into the family home."
    "Ah. The lover is a fortunate man to have earned your mother's regard."
    "I don't think Lee has your wisdom."
    "He is her son. I am not. It is easier for me to have wisdom," Yoshani said, grinning.
    Glorianna laughed. "There is truth in what you say." She looked at the dark eyes she thought of as wells that went all the way down to the great pool of wisdom that lay at the heart of the world. "But you didn't come to this part of Sanctuary to share that wisdom."
    "I came to give you this." He handed her a smooth white stone that lay warm in the palm of her hand.
    "And to show you this." He picked up the jar.
    "What is it?"
    "It is a jar of sorrows," Yoshani replied softly. "Every season, in my part of the world, those who serve the Light go out into the villages with these jars and a large bag of white stones—enough stones for every man, woman, and child. In the morning each person in the village takes a stone and carries it with them.
    Throughout the day each finds quiet moments to hold the stone and whisper the things that weigh on the heart. Small hurts, large regrets. The stones hear the sorrows and absorb them. Before the sun sets, everyone drops the stones into the jar, and the jar's keeper pours clean water over the stones and closes the lid. The next morning, as the sun is rising, the villagers bring jugs and buckets of water with them and follow the keeper to the spot they have chosen as 'sorrow's ground.' The keeper opens the jar and pours out the water, which has turned black. The jar is refilled with water again and again until it finally pours out clean. That's when the people know the sorrows have been cleansed, and they return to their lives with lighter hearts."
    "Is there something in the jar that turns the water black?" Glorianna asked, rubbing the white stone in her hand.

    "Only sorrows," Yoshani said, smiling. "That is the magic those who serve the Light in my homeland can give to our people. The people in your part of the world have a saying: Travel lightly. It does not mean the burden a man can carry on his back, but the burdens he carries in here." He tapped his chest. "Is that not so?"
    "That is so."
    "Your heart does not travel lightly these days. So I offer you the magic of my people: a stone… and the jar of sorrows."
    Glorianna looked at the white stone, warm and smooth in her hand. What would it be like to let go of the weight of memories, to still the echoes of hurt that remained inside her from the day she'd realized the Instructors and wizards had tried to wall her inside her garden? How would it feel to whisper her secret fear—that loneliness might one day darken her heart so much she could no longer touch the Light?
    Wouldn't life be easier if she let stone be the vessel for those feelings, if she let those feelings be washed away?
    She closed her eyes and listened to the resonance of Light and Dark that lived inside her and made her another kind of vessel.
    With a sigh of regret, she handed the stone back to Yoshani.
    "Why will you not accept this gift, Glorianna Dark and Wise?" Yoshani asked. "Why do you hold on to your sorrows?"
    His hand was open. It would be so easy to take the stone back.
    Glorianna gently closed his fingers over the stone, hiding it from sight. "Because, Honorable Yoshani, I think I'll need them."
    After finishing what he considered a meager breakfast, Koltak pushed back his chair, picked up his saddlebags, and headed toward the door. The barman, the only other person in the tavern's main room, was pretending to clean the bar with a rag instead of clearing away the dirty dishes left by the other travelers.
    Probably trying to avoid talking to me . The thought was surprisingly bitter, since, back home, he would have felt insulted if a mere innkeeper or tavern owner attempted conversation with him.
    "You'll be going then?" the barman asked, keeping his eyes on the rag he rubbed over the bar's wood.
    "I am," Koltak replied coldly, reaching the door.
    "Your horse is saddled. Stable is around back." The man hesitated. "Which way are you headed?"
    Why do you want to know ? But he turned back to face the man. After all, this was a strange place, and a day's ride had taken him a long way from home. "Back over the bridge."
    The hand holding the rag stuttered to a halt. After a moment, the barman picked up the rhythm of