Stone 36

**Chapter 36**

Something just occurred to me. Back in *Wizard's First Rule,* when Giller used Wizard's Life Fire, he incinerated Rahl's two bodyguards and left their blast shadows on the wall. It was one of these blast shadows that Zedd tasted, which told him that Giller had died heroically (which is why I made such a fuss about Zedd tasting carbonized human remains).

When Richard tasted the grit inside the towers, it covered the inner walls. There were no blast shadows.

The only possible explanation is that the towers were absolutely crammed with people when the ancient wizards suicided.

Anyway...we return now to Richard, who is busy hunting wolverines with a Fish. Wait; what?

Apparently the young Fish whose life Richard spared has *“somehow”* followed him through the impassable valley that only spellcasters of a certain specific power band can ever find their way through. \~/ Richard feels responsible for the poor li'l thing, and has taken to hunting wolverines to feed it. Why wolverines? Why are there wolverines in the far south? Why is Richard, a trained woods guide, hunting an animal notorious for its ferocity, toughness, wariness and bad smell, as food?

Who knows? \~/

Richard kills the wolverine with a single arrow (of course), and the Fish eats it, then puts the arrow back in Richard's quiver. We learn that Verna is still angry at Richard because he insists on standing watch. How does one person stand watch? Does Richard just not sleep, ever?

The Fish is smart. *“[Richard] had only to show it something once or twice to make it understand. It was learning to understand his words, and tried to imitate them, although it didn't seem to have the capacity for speech.”* It keeps following them, and Richard doesn't really want it to leave, since he sees it as a friend.

No mention is made of the numerous Fish that Richard maimed horribly and left to die back in Book 1, all of whom were doubtless highly intelligent and sensitive creatures.

Richard decides the Fish needs a name, and does the old point-at-himself-and-say-his-name routine. The Fish calls Richard *“Raaaach aaarg,”* which actually seems rather appropriate to me. Especially the “Aaarg” part. Maybe I ought to just start calling him Aaarg.

The Fish indicates that its name is *“Grrratch,”* which Richard shortens to “Gratch.” Dawn comes, and Richard leaves Gratch to go argue with Verna.

Richards angsts a bit about the vision he had of Kahlan, and how he's “the bringer of death” and suchlike. He and Verna quibble for a bit, and Verna says that he was using his Force when he saved them from the tongue-eyed wraiths.

Richard and the Screelings...Chase and the Elders...the Tongue-Eyed Wraiths...there are a lot of good band names in this series.

Verna heals Richard of his magical poisonous bug-bites (seriously) as they argue, with Verna taking the position that everything Richard did increased the danger, while Richard argues that he had to do *something,* and nothing Verna was doing seemed to be helping. I can't help but notice that Verna is again holding the Idiot Ball so Richard can appear Wise and All-Knowing. Verna says that Richard is *“a blind man swinging an axe in a crowd of children”* because he doesn't know how to use his magic, and insists that he was using his personal Force, not the magic of the Sword of the Homicidal Hobo.

We learn that no one has ever been able to break through the Magical Sparkly Air Barrier that was trapping Verna, but Richard did it because he was Just That Special. \~/

Richard tells how he killed “Verna” in a tower, and Verna bitches at him for going into the towers after she explicitly told him not to. He asks if she can do what pseudo-Verna did in the tower, specifically, throw him around by the collar. Verna admits that, yes she can: *“We don't have the power of a wizard, the male Han. The collar amplifies our power, so we may be stronger than the one who is wearing it. So we can teach them.”* Yes, once again, male spellcaster > female spellcaster for no reason. \~/

Verna insists that, had the fight happened for realsies, Richard wouldn't have been able to beat Verna. She then says that, by destroying the evil, evil spade bits back in Chapter 19, Richard was using prophecy and his Force was attempting to fulfill that prophecy. I...guess Richard's Force is subconsciously precognitive. \~/ Richard is rightfully dubious of this assertion.

Richard asks Verna who the Prelate is, and learns that she is in charge of the Nuns. Verna is upset that Richard read her magic diary, but insist that since it was a vision, it didn't count; however, the two letters Richard read in it turn out to be exactly accurate.

We then learn that Richard was spoken of in a prophecy, and that Verna and Nuns #2 and 3 have been searching for him for over twenty years; normally, it takes less that a year for a Nun to find and bring back her quarry. This, Richard concludes, is why Verna is so angry at him: she's wasted half her life and most of her youth chasing after him. This impresses Verna, who says *“The Seeker, indeed.”* Richard says that Verna shouldn't be mad at him; she should be mad at the Prelate.

Verna responds that Richard shouldn't be mad at her, he should be mad at Kahlan, since it was Kahlan who insisted that Richard put on the collar. We also learn that our happy pair will soon be passing through the land of *“a very dangerous people,”* and as part of the deal the Nuns have with them, Richard will have to kill someone.

This whole bloody chapter was an infodump. \~/ Worse, it was an *utterly pointless* infodump. Let's sum up the salient bits of information we gained in the previous 10 pages, shall we?

1. Richard is friends with a young Fish named Gratch.
2. Verna thinks Richard is subconsciously using magic and prophecy.
3. Richard is awesome and special and better than you.

That's literally it. All the nonsense about the tower, all the crap about Verna being angry, and all Verna and Richard's endless quibbling is so much wasted paper.

I'm taking another drink for that. \~/

Drinks: 7

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