Alan Garner Classic Collection

“I don’t know,” she said. “It may be the heat, or because we’ve walked so far, but all the time you were talking to her I thought I was going to faint. But what’s so strange is that my Tear has gone all misty.”

Susan was fond of her Tear. It was a small piece of crystal, shaped like a raindrop, and had been given to her by her mother, who had had it mounted in a socket fastened to a silver chain bracelet which Susan always wore. It was a flawless stone, but, when she was very young, Susan had discovered that if she held it in a certain way, so that it caught the light just … so, she could see, deep in the heart of the crystal, miles away, or so it seemed, a twisting column of blue fire, always moving, never ending, alive, and very beautiful.

Bess Mossock clapped her hands in delight when she saw the Tear on Susan’s wrist. “Oh, if it inner the Bridestone! And after all these years!”

Susan was mystified, but Bess went on to explain that “yon pretty dewdrop” had been given to her by her mother, who had had it from her mother, and so on, till its origin and the meaning of the name had become lost among the distant generations. She had given it to the children’s mother because “it always used to catch the childer’s eyes, and thy mother were no exception!”

At this, Susan’s face fell. “Well then,” she said, “it must go back to you now, because it’s obviously a family heirloom and …”

“Nay, nay, lass! Thee keep it. I’ve no childer of my own, and thy mother was the same as a daughter to me. I con see as how it’s in good hands.”

So Susan’s Tear had continued to sparkle at her wrist until that moment at the car, when it had suddenly clouded over, the colour of whey.

“Oh, hurry up, Sue!” said Colin over his shoulder. “You’ll feel better after a meal. Let’s go and find Gowther.”

“But Colin!” cried Susan, holding up her wrist. She was about to say, “Do look!” but the words died in her throat, for the crystal now winked at her as pure as it had ever been.

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