Hung the Moon

I Want To Lay Up Riches On Earth (Since I Don't Believe In Heaven)

"You can't be a god," Wensleydale blurted. He peered suspiciously at the other being through the lenses of his practical glasses. "Gods aren't real."

The setting swam before his eyes, the clear sky an endless vault where spirits played. The water at his back, replete with all manner of life, whispered wisdom to him in a language he only half understood. A kind of fire had kindled in his head, the kind that burned forests to infuse them with new life.

He shuddered. Even though he'd stood at the end of the world, he'd chosen to focus on Adam's words from that gray day: "thing is, they're not real. Not really. They're just like nightmares..."

He'd applied that to everything that had happened, and what he couldn't explain away he ignored. Kept him from going completely insane, at least. He hoped. He didn't want to end up like Granny at the end, calling for family members long dead and mixing up the ones that still lived.

The man threw his head back and laughed. Wensleydale felt his negative emotions melt like thin-sliced onions in the man's stew pot, leaving him blessedly at ease for the moment. However, he was no less confused.

"Are you so sure? How are you here talking with me, if that's true?"

Wensley considered, giving his surroundings a furtive accounting. It could be a dream. But he had to admit it felt like no dream he'd ever experienced. He stood in a liminal space in the way of dreams, but this in-between place was not triggered by normal sleep.

"Sit," the man said, stirring his bubbling concoction. The ladle looked so big Wensley bet he could have fit into it twice over if he'd been so forward as to test his theory. He did as asked instead, the river burbling and rushing at his back. It brought the silvery aroma of spawning fish to Wensley's nostrils. Tangled up with it, Wensley could detect otter fur slick with water.

A vision flashed across his consciousness; ogham writing, proclaiming the people that lived around the carved stone the people of the otter.

"Why am I here?" Wensley asked, trying to put on his best adult-aggravated-at-the-DVLA voice.

"I brought you here," the man said, with mischievous simplicity. Wensley chewed the inside of his cheek in annoyance.

"Now you're doing it on purpose," Wensley said, cross. "You didn't bring me here just to tease me and tell me obvious things, did you?"

He could have sworn the hog at the man's side stopped eating for a moment to give him a withering glare.

The man passed over the biggest bowl of stew Wensley had ever seen instead of answering. Wensley had to balance it on his knees with the precise control of a trapeze artist to avoid spilling it. It smelled delicious. No, it smelled like the ultimate stew, the first stew, after which all stews had been modeled. He could recognize the heady perfume of braised pork fat, and the base of vegetal variety that he nonetheless couldn't name with any degree of certainty.

It is a liminal space, after all. Who knows what they grow here? Or do they magic up whatever they like?

He took the spoon sticking out of the bowl. He pushed through the trepidation he felt about eating a meal made by a supernatural being and allowed himself a mouthful. Instantly, it was as if he'd never known the barest hunger. He felt warm and stuffed in a pleasant fashion as he continued to enjoy the meal. As opposed to eating too much holiday food and having to lie on the floor for four hours until the discomfort passed.

Not that Wensley had ever ended up in such a position. That was for little babies who didn't know better. Surely.

"Pepper told us that some gods and stuff showed up to give her a spot that used to be War's," Wensley tried again, keeping his head bent so he wouldn't have to look at the...god before him. He set the dish aside as his stomach knotted with anxiety again, and plucked an anemone. He picked off its layered, vivid-purple petals with shaking fingers.