Grindstone

The grindstone had stood under the eaves all summer, and now Nyra rolled it out into the yard where the light was good. There were blades to put an edge on before the cold came for good, the hatchet and the long knife and the two sickles that had gone dull with the harvest. Nyra set a pail of water beside the frame and dusted the stone flat with the flat of her hand.

“Turn it slow and even,” Nyra said, “and keep it wet, or the edge will burn.” The girl took the crank in both hands and leaned into it, and the great wheel began to go round, dark and heavy and smooth. “Like this?” she asked. “Just like that,” said Nyra, and she lowered the hatchet to the stone.

The sparks came off in a fine bright thread and died before they reached the grass. Nyra held each blade to the wheel at just its angle, turning it against the wet stone, feeling the burr come up along the back. The girl kept the wheel going until her arms ached, and the hatchet, then the knife, then the first sickle and the second lay keen in the cut grass.

“How many have we done?” the girl asked, slowing. “Four,” said Nyra. “Write four in the book, and the day, so we know they were ready.” The girl wiped her hands and wrote the figure and the date in a careful row. A book gathers what can be set down in a line and counted, and leaves the rest to the one who was there.

What it did not hold was the ache that had crept into the girl’s shoulders, or the low sound of the stone, or the way the blades had gone from dull to bright under her own two hands turning. Nyra nodded at the page as if she knew all of this already. The book keeps the count, and you keep the turning of it.