Lui finished walking up the stairs to Grandma Alassi's room, but paused at the doorway. Although she... she had not bothered her papa about it, she *knew* that something was very different about Grandma. Although she had been too busy to come back and check on her, now that she stood by the doorway again, she could already sense a difference.

Papa didn't like Grandma Alassi, and she didn't like Papa. If it were simpler, Lui might have sided with one or the other. But Papa said some things that were definitely right, and others that were definitely wrong, and so did Grandma Alassi. When they argued, they never admitted to being wrong, and only talked about how they were right. Lui hated when they argued.

But she knocked, and entered, and to her surprise, Grandma Alassi's chair was not where it had sat all day, as it usually was. The air around her was fresher, and the window was *open*--although it should not have been. Lui had tried several times to open that window, but it had been stuck fast for... *years*. Papa had said it was probably painted shut, or something. She stared at the window for a long moment, aware that Grandma was looking at her, and then, with a monumental effort of will, met Grandma Alassi's eyes.

They were not the same eyes. Grandma Alassi's eyes were like the Birdrot Swamp, down across the mountain. The waters there were not for drinking--that was something everyone agreed on, even Papa and Grandma. She knew enough words to have figured it out from the name, of course. She hadn't known when she was very little, but she hadn't known much at all then. She was learning. She was ...*okay* at learning. She learned things.

This Grandma Alassi was a single tree, not a swamp. Solid, where the old Grandma had been a mixture of bad odors and ugly colors. No... there were marks here and there in her face and eyes, like moss growing on an old tree. But it was an *alive* tree.

"You're staring, child," Grandma Alassi spoke, her voice less hard and raspy than before.

"Yes, grandma. I'm sorry." Lui cleared her throat. "Um. It's dinner time, so I'll help bring you down."

When she pushed the chair, she noted Grandma looking around, sometimes subtly, sometimes more actively. It was night and day, the difference to how the old woman had been; Lui had seen too many weeks go by in which Grandma hardly moved at all, and barely acknowledged her, even when spoken to. Whatever had happened, had shocked her out of the decay.

She wheeled Grandma over to the lift--the single most expensive item in the inn, but one that Grandma had paid for, not Papa. It only took her a spark of qi to activate it; Lui was now almost two full bronze stars, though Papa scolded her every time she did anything obvious. He *knew* that she used her qi to operate the lift, but he still acted like she didn't. He acted like she shouldn't use *any* of her qi. With the lift active, it very slowly lowered to the ground floor, where Papa had taken her place at the front counter.

She paused a long moment to see if Grandma Alassi would speak to him, or if he would speak to her, but when there was only silence, she wheeled Grandma past him and into the main room of the inn, to her place by the fire. She... was sure she felt Grandma's eyes on her as she moved back into the kitchen, laying hands almost immediately on the soup bowl that Uncle Mian had laid out. She noted as he glanced at her, but it was a busy look, simply acknowledging the extra room on the countertop now that she'd taken the bowl. Uncle Mian didn't hate Grandma, but as far as she knew, they'd never even talked.

Then, Grandma Alassi hadn't talked much in years, except to argue with Papa.

Grandma Alassi took the soup, and even began eating it right away. Lui watched her, for a moment, although she knew it was rude. She had watched her grandma sit and stare, barely even conscious of the bowl in her lap. She'd tried, once, to force the woman to eat, but the woman had revealed strength and willpower that made no sense, throwing her *and* the soup across the room with a burst of some kind of foul qi. Witchcraft, Papa called it, but Papa called it, but Papa was a man without any qi, and he didn't like the people who used it much, especially since Mama had died.

"Lui!" A customer raised his mug, and Lui turned away from Grandma and took the mug, giving the man as much of a smile as she could muster, which... was maybe a little more than usual? She paused at another table to take their orders, and relayed them to Uncle Mian, refilling the mug and taking an order with her when she came back. Mealtime was busy for Lui, and although she didn't forget about Grandma--she *couldn't*, not today--she found plenty of excuses not to stand there staring at her.

Strangely, none of the men were... strange with her today. She thought she'd have trouble, from the look of one or two of them, but nothing happened. Sometimes, she would catch those men looking a little pained, but she wasn't sure why.

When she took Papa his plate of food, after most of the rest had eaten, she took a moment to stand close by him. He leaned closer, as it wasn't unusual for her to report things quietly. At least he no longer had to bend down to hear her, as when she was younger.

"Papa... Grandma Alassi is different today."

He made a face. "Don't..." he stopped, thought it over, and sighed. "Different how?"

"She's... *alive*. I don't know." She looked up at him, measuring how he felt from his expression, even though he tried to hide it. Papa would always have a look on his face for customers, and he could hide how he was feeling very well, but Lui knew him, and Grandma Alassi had always seen through him. "She said... she said she'd remembered something."

"Well, isn't that great." The scorn in Papa's voice was a little too thick, and Lui knew that he wasn't interested. She was hoping he would want to see this refreshed version of her, but... perhaps the hurt between them was too deep. "Does she need anything? Does she seem upset?"

"Not upset. She seems... calm." Lui watched Papa's face for only a moment more before turning away. She saw what she needed to see.

"Calm? No, that... that woman only seems calm on the surface. She'll explode again, like she always does." She heard the anger in his voice, but then he sighed again. "I'll talk to her tonight. Might do her good. Or it might..."

Lui looked back at Papa, but he didn't finish the thought, and ate his dinner in peace.

Lui finished her shift, as the evening crowd went from dinner to those who only stuck around to drink. It wasn't much of a crowd, really; two trading groups had been here to make an exchange, as they often did. Papa told her not to ask questions about them. One group was very scary looking, the other looked polite but were rude. Sometimes they brought guests, who were usually not very happy. Papa told her that if anything happened, she would run to Uncle Mian. That had only happened once. Uncle Mian was a scary man when he got upset.

Since nobody was bothering her, and they had gotten into a sullen bout of drinking, Lui left them be. They had been here often enough to know to call on her for another beer or ale if they wanted, and instead, she pulled her chair to the fire to sit with Grandma Alassi again. Lui had sensed something shifting around her, perhaps the witchcraft that Papa had talked about, but there was nothing obvious. When she sat down, Grandma met her eyes again, and although they were deeper, like Grandma was thinking about something, they were still clear. A tree, and not a swamp.

"Are you feeling better, Grandma Alassi?" she asked quietly, though she still heard a pause in the conversation at the table.

Grandma just nodded, for a long moment, remaining silent for long enough that Lui started to worry she didn't want to talk. But then, Grandma spoke strangely, so that she was quiet but easy to hear. "Lui. I want you to remember one thing, no matter what happens."

Lui looked at her, and nodded, wondering just what Grandma wanted to say.

The look on her face shifted, maybe three times, as if she was choosing her words again, and then she said, in that same quiet voice, "Both your Grandma and your Papa love you very much."

The words... Lui wasn't sure exactly sure what it was about them that made her start to cry, but she did, and Grandma made a gesture with one hand, and Lui found herself giving her Grandma a hug, tears rolling down her face and snot coming out of her nose. Lui hated a lot of things about herself, but... she definitely hated being such a crybaby almost more than anything. Papa would get upset when she cried... and Grandma had used to be upset when she cried, too. But today, Grandma held her while she cried, and even kissed her on the head.

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

"I hear that some old beasts know when their time is coming," said a voice, and although the voice broke Lui out of her crying fit, she still found herself huffing and snuffling and unpleasant. She pulled herself away from Grandma and backed up to the wall, trying to wipe all the tears and ugly snot off of her face, but all it did was leave her hands covered as well. One of the trading men, an unplesasant and sharp man--one of the ones that was supposed to look nice but was mean--was standing there and glaring at her openly, his breath stinking of ale and his voice sounding as dangerous as if he carried a knife in his hands. "I've hardly seen you do more than feebly suck at soup. Taking a last moment to say your goodbyes, perhaps?"

Grandma Alassi looked at him, her face unreadable--and not wearing her normal frown. For a moment, Lui became scared that she really was dying, or facing death--that she was going to be so scared of the man that she would die. Lui often felt so scared of men that she wanted to die, and they... they didn't usually come at her with this much sense of danger. But... but this man also wasn't like Grandma. He wasn't even like Lui. He was a dangerous man, but he didn't have qi. He wasn't in danger, of course. Others in his group did have qi, and they protected him. Nobody ever got close to him, not that Lui had seen.

But Grandma Alassi opened her mouth, and Lui felt her heart jump into her throat at the words.

"Why my useless son-in-law would allow slave-trading scum in this place is beyond me."

Lui didn't stop to see what happened next. She turned and ran to the kitchen, where Uncle Mian was sitting against the wall. He often did that with a blank look on his face, but Lui had been in a rush, and he heard her coming. He was already getting up, laying his hands on the one knife in the kitchen that was *not* a knife, the long one hanging on the wall. Lui rushed in, trying to explain with a voice that refused to work, but she already knew that Uncle Mian would rush out, and he did.

And there was a lot of very violent and scary noise, and Lui huddled in the kitchen and cried, and hated herself for being weak, and a crybaby. She... she had qi, so she was stronger than some of those men. She *knew* that. But she had never tried to hurt anyone. It wasn't who she was; she *couldn't*.

It took a lot less time than Lui expected for it to quiet down, and Papa came in, the look on his face... Lui couldn't understand, not in the few moments she saw it, before he pulled her into a big hug, and nestled her face to his collarbone, and whispered over and over that it was alright, and she would be okay. And with the warmth and the familiar smell, Lui began to calm down, and Papa held her.

"Is... is Grandma Alassi okay?" she finally asked, sure that she knew what the answer was going to be. Sure that everything had gone badly, and that Grandma was... that Grandma was...

"She's okay." Papa's voice lost its warmth. Whatever he was feeling, he was not glad that Grandma was okay. After... after she had insulted the guests, if she was okay...

"Did she... did the guests...?" Lui wasn't sure exactly how to say what she feared. The inn was too often empty, and she knew that if the guests were upset, it would only get harder.

But Papa stood up, and helped her to her feet. "You might as well come look," he said, his voice a mixture of bitterness and tiredness that she couldn't understand. "We'll need your help cleaning it all up."

Lui, later in her life, would look back on the moment she stepped through the doorway as the end of her childhood. She had seen dead bodies before, when Uncle Mian protected her. But she had never seen an entire room full of men ruthlessly cut down. She had never seen the walls covered with blood.

And she had *never* seen Grandma Alassi *standing up*.

The qi pressure that rolled off the woman soaked into Lui's bones with a strange familiarity, a strange... *acceptance*. Affection, maybe. Most qi was scary, even Uncle Mian's, but Grandma's wasn't scary at all, even in this room covered with blood. Grandma's grey hair suddenly had tinges of red to it, and not the red of blood--red that she remembered from her youngest years, from before Mama had died. And lines of power hovered in the air behind and around her, power that she knew was not *real* real, because Papa couldn't see them. But she knew that Uncle Mian saw them, and she saw them, so they were *real,* just the same. And it was clear that they meant something, because Grandma Alassi was *standing*. Grandma didn't stand; she *couldn't*.

Could she?

"I..." Grandma's voice was strange. It had been strange since this afternoon. She looked at Uncle Mian, who was looking without fear or anger at one of the dead men. The one in charge, she thought. Then Grandma looked at Papa, and Lui was afraid that their eyes might meet, that the dirty anger of Grandma would rise up again, that she would go back to the yelling, screaming woman that she often was when she yelled at Papa.

But Grandma looked Papa in the face, and with a stern set to her jaw, said, "I won't say I'm sorry. Not to you. You should never have allowed this."

"Never should have--I'm not *like* you, Alassi! I can't *kill* people!"

Grandma ignored him, and turned to Lui, and Lui met her eyes. The swamp still wasn't there, but there was more than just a single tree in Grandma's eyes. With the power of the qi she was expressing, Lui thought she saw an entire *world* in Grandma's eyes. "I am sorry, Lui. I put you in danger. I shouldn't have."

"You're damned right you did!" Papa almost exploded at her. "I don't care if you are an Iron Cultivator, Alassi! Any one of these men could have killed her with a thought! Or me! Or you, if they had the drop on you! And they wouldn't think twice about doing it, either!"

"All the more reason you should have turned them in." Grandma's voice was cold, suddenly, and as her eyes swept from Lui back to Papa, Lui saw the change that came over them. Grandma's eyes had been a whole world for her, but for him, they were a wall, shutting him out. Lui felt her heart clench, and she wanted to break in, but there was no room in this conversation for a teenage girl.

"Nobody can protect us out here, Alassi." Papa had made these arguments before, Lui knew. "I would think that *you* of all people would remember that."

"Protect. Is that what you were doing? While slave traders were grabbing your daughter's ass? What was your plan when she got old enough to really tempt them? Or did you think they would be nice to you? To *her*?"

The meaning of Grandma's words flowed over and past Lui for a long time. Those words buried themselves in her mind; she knew that they meant something. She didn't know what. She had... she had *kind of* understood. She even now only *kind of* understood. That these people were very bad men, and that none of them were safe. But she didn't understand what Grandma meant, and she was sure, to the deepest parts of her bones, that she didn't want to. Something deep below hoped that she *never* knew what Grandma meant. But Lui was not just that deep part of herself. She wanted to understand, to be an adult. So, she ended up confused, conflicted.

The argument had continued, until Uncle Mian spoke up. He spoke the way Grandma had, before, so that he was quiet, but they heard him. "We need to clean this up," he said. And he looked to Papa, meaningfully. "And the rest."

Papa was tense, and scared, and he didn't understand. But Grandma just nodded, and... and *walked*. She *walked* over to the man that Uncle Mian was squatting down and looking at. It was... kind of a limping walk. Lui thought that Grandma must be very upset about her hip, given how she seemed to be forcing herself to walk in spite of it. And Lui thought she saw some part of the magic around Grandma Alassi working at her hip, although she wasn't sure what it was doing, or how. But so much about Grandma was strange, now. She didn't understand.

Grandma just looked down, then looked at Uncle Mian. "Dig, or carry?"

Uncle Mian looked at her. Lui thought he met her eyes, and thought he saw some of what she had seen in Grandma Alassi's eyes. She thought his eyes cleared a bit, too. "You carry them out back. Make sure this one is separate. We better turn him in for a bounty. I'm sure there is one." He looked back at Papa. "I'll find a spot deeper in the woods. Afterwards... you three see to the others." And then, Uncle Mian picked up one of the corpses as though it weighed nothing at all, and marched straight out the door. Grandma picked up one in each hand, and followed, her limping gait resolute and unyielding.

Lui looked up at her Papa, who had a strange look on his face. "The others?" she asked, unsure of what the answer would be.

Papa looked away. "The cargo," he said, and turned away, headed to the kitchen, most likely for water. Lui knew that the blood would start to stain if they didn't clean up soon. Maybe Grandma or Uncle Mian could do something about it. Uncle Mian had done a little bit, before... but the old stains were still a little visible. If you knew what to look for.

It was... odd, to think about that now, but Lui thought it anyway. She wasn't sure what *else* to think about. It was all too much for her to understand. And when Papa came back with a bucket of water from the well, she began to wash the walls as best she could. It wasn't good wood, although Uncle Mian had tried to improve it. It didn't take to cleaning very well, but she did her best.

And a little later that she, and Papa, and Grandma Alassi went out to the covered wagon that the men had brought. And as they drew near, she began to understand the part of her mind that didn't want to know. And when Grandma waved her hand and the cover on the wagon tore apart, and the lock shattered, and the people inside screamed in fear, Lui began to wish that she had never found out.

But she wasn't a child anymore, although she didn't know it yet. And Lui didn't run, or walk away. She listened to Grandma and Papa, and did her best to learn, and did whatever she had to do. Lui tried to be a good girl, like Mama and Papa and Grandma had all told her to be. And she remembered that Grandma had said that she and Papa loved her very much, and it helped.

And in the distance, she saw Uncle Mian carrying something into the woods, and felt a very strange... lack of fear about it. It almost... made her happy. Not... not really maybe. Maybe not happy. But something. Something... not-childish. Something she didn't yet understand. But she would.