Chapter 223: Uncaring Nature
"Now, let’s start with something just a little simple," Amahle said. Reaching into a pouch at her waist, she produced a small, rough stone, no larger than a robin’s egg, and placed it on the table. "What would you do to make the stone happy darlin’?"
"Make the stone happy?" Ashlynn said, puzzled. "Keep it close, I guess? Like the way you kept it in a pouch on your body? Maybe keep it warm?"
"And what about you, sugar?" Amahle said, turning to face Heila. "How would you make the stone happy?"
"Um, clean it? Maybe polish it?" Heila said though she lacked any confidence in her answer. "Can you really make a stone happy?"
"Let’s try a different one," Amahle said, putting the rock away. "You two were both in the High Pass recently. When you were there, all out in the open, what did the wind want?"
"Nothing," Ashlynn said with much more confidence than she felt about the idea of making a stone happy. "The wind didn’t want anything, it was just cold."
"Exactly," the older woman said with a smile as she sipped her lemonade. "This is your first lesson in witchcraft. Earth has no joy, fire has no hate, water has no sorrow, air has no worry and wood has no desire. The five elements themselves do not care about anything, they simply are."
"But we care, we can care," Talauia chimed in from the side as she scraped the bottom of her wooden bowl with a spoon for the last bits of the saucy gumbo. "We have hearts to care."
"Yes darlin’," Amahle said, reaching out gently to ruffle the younger witch’s hair. "But don’t get us ahead yet," she added, turning back to Ashlynn and Heila and giving them a serious look.