Grub not working anymore (but boot does)

Entirely by accident, I updated my ancient version of grub. Once I found 
out I said to myself that it would be better to update the boot stages 
but this is what happens:

  ~ # grub
grub: asmstub.c:215: grub_stage2: Assertion `simstack_alloc_base != 
((void *) -1)' failed.
Aborted

I hadn't run grub in AGES, so I can't say what/when it broke. The good 
news is the machine still boots but I'm not in a reliable condition.

equery l grub
  * Searching for grub ...
[IP-] [  ] sys-boot/grub-0.97-r16:0

Relevant kern.log:
Nov 30 09:55:45 phantom kernel: [61181.759120] REISERFS warning (device 
sda3): jdm-20002 reiserfs_xattr_get: Invalid hash for xattr 
(user.pax.flags) associated with [1919251317 2019651630 0x616c662e UNKNOWN]
Nov 30 09:55:45 phantom kernel: [61181.958737] grsec: From 127.0.0.6: 
denied RWX mmap of <anonymous mapping> by /sbin/grub[grub:9291] 
uid/euid:0/0 gid/egid:0/0, parent /bin/bash[bash:2357] uid/euid:0/0 
gid/egid:0/0
Nov 30 09:55:45 phantom kernel: [61181.959072] grsec: From 127.0.0.6: 
denied resource overstep by requesting 4096 for RLIMIT_CORE against 
limit 0 for /sbin/grub[grub:9291] uid/euid:0/0 gid/egid:0/0, parent 
/bin/bash[bash:2357] uid/euid:0/0 gid/egid:0/0

# paxctl-ng -v /sbin/grub
/sbin/grub:
         XATTR_PAX : -em--

# grep PAX /usr/src/linux/.config
CONFIG_PAX_PER_CPU_PGD=y
CONFIG_PAX_ENABLE_PAE=y
CONFIG_PAX_USERCOPY_SLABS=y
CONFIG_PAX=y
# CONFIG_PAX_SOFTMODE is not set
# CONFIG_PAX_PT_PAX_FLAGS is not set
CONFIG_PAX_XATTR_PAX_FLAGS=y
# CONFIG_PAX_NO_ACL_FLAGS is not set
CONFIG_PAX_HAVE_ACL_FLAGS=y
# CONFIG_PAX_HOOK_ACL_FLAGS is not set
CONFIG_PAX_NOEXEC=y
CONFIG_PAX_PAGEEXEC=y
CONFIG_PAX_SEGMEXEC=y
CONFIG_PAX_EMUTRAMP=y
CONFIG_PAX_MPROTECT=y
# CONFIG_PAX_MPROTECT_COMPAT is not set
# CONFIG_PAX_ELFRELOCS is not set
CONFIG_PAX_KERNEXEC=y
CONFIG_PAX_KERNEXEC_MODULE_TEXT=4
CONFIG_PAX_ASLR=y
CONFIG_PAX_RANDKSTACK=y
CONFIG_PAX_RANDUSTACK=y
CONFIG_PAX_RANDMMAP=y
CONFIG_PAX_MEMORY_SANITIZE=y
# CONFIG_PAX_MEMORY_STACKLEAK is not set
# CONFIG_PAX_MEMORY_STRUCTLEAK is not set
CONFIG_PAX_MEMORY_UDEREF=y
CONFIG_PAX_REFCOUNT=y
CONFIG_PAX_CONSTIFY_PLUGIN=y
CONFIG_PAX_USERCOPY=y
# CONFIG_PAX_USERCOPY_DEBUG is not set
# CONFIG_PAX_SIZE_OVERFLOW is not set
CONFIG_HAVE_PAX_INITIFY_INIT_EXIT=y
# CONFIG_PAX_LATENT_ENTROPY is not set

Thanks in advance for any help.