Fair warning: Even I’m not sure what this is. I don’t know where it came from or where it’s going, it just made a lot of ripples.

A fisherman awoke in the water at the shore. Crawling from the surf, he struggled to find a familiar landmark, something to tell him where he was. Finding none, he sat on the pebbled beach for a moment before realizing that this was probably not a good idea. The sun was setting, and he needed to find shelter or build a fire if he wanted to live. The sky was clear, there was no sign of the storm.

He rose and walked toward the brushline, angling vaguely toward a head where he could see some trees. He thought the emptiness of his surroundings should worry him more than it did, as he heard not even a bird, but his survival after the sudden squall was enough of a blessing. It must have blown him past the bays and inlets he knew, perhaps even to one of the small rocky islands, but that did not bother him. He felt surprisingly good, considering the battering he had taken in his small boat. His eyes were clear and his step was longer than it had been for some time. Even the pain in his stomach was gone, and that did trouble him slightly.

When he reached the trees, he started looking for deadwood to build a fire with, but there was none on the ground. Not even leaves to burrow into to keep warm. Nothing disturbed the stillness. He walked on, and as night fell the path he followed narrowed until he came at least to a clearing with a small round hut. It seemed at once both a hut and a cluster of trees, reminding him of the tales of the fairy folk. There was smoke rising from the centre hole of the roof, however, and a the warm glow of a fire from behind the door-hanging. He had no choice, and reminding himself neither to eat nor to drink, knocked on the threshold and called, “Ho, the house! I am lost and in need.”

The voice of an old woman replied quickly, as if expecting him. “Then enter, friend, and share the fire.” He pulled the hanging aside and entered. A hooded figure sat at the fire, stirring a pot on the coals. But for the voice, there was no outward sign of the slight figure’s identity, but somehow the fisherman knew, had known since the hollow echoes in his heart as he had celebrated his survival. The Goddess-crone looked up at him. “Sit, Gairdh, and eat.”

He remembered his promise about eating, but dismissed it. It was too late to worry about sleeping for a mere hundred years. He accepted a bowl of the fish stew the Goddess offered him. He sat and gathered up what thoughts he could catch as they raced round his mind. He was in the land of the dead, and the crone had come to claim him. He should be terrified, and yet though he was afraid, he knew the Goddess.

Some people saw her in the trees, in the weather, and some in the harvest; but Gairdh saw her in the waters, and best in the sea. He saw her as the maiden as the deep mystery that had enticed him as a boy into the deeper waters he fished, out further than the other fishermen in the village. He had worshipped the Goddess as his ancestors before him in an unbroken line, despite the horse people and their unnatural habits and despite the damned Romans and their jealous god that wanted all the sacred places. He couldn’t see any damned horse god galloping around, and the priests of the Christ couldn’t even ask for a decent harvest. When the harvest and the hunting had failed a few years back in his village, the Goddess’ mother aspect had sent them more than enough fish to keep them through the winter. But that was then; and now, when he dared raise his eyes, he recognised the crone that claimed everyone in the end.

One more thought became clear. He might not be terrified, but he wasn’t ready either. He hadn’t done any of the things he’d wanted to do. He bowed his head toward the crone and said, “Lady I — I cannot go with you. My — My family needs me.”

“They will mourn you and continue on. As you must soon do.” the crone said. “When you are ready, we will travel on.”

“But Lady, you do not understand!” he pleaded. Wincing at his own affrontery, he continued, “My family needs me. Without me, they will starve or worse.” He flushed slightly, but considered that it was only a slight exaggeration after all.

The crone opened her mouth to speak and then regarded him a moment. “How so, little man?” she asked. Her voice was still kindly, but Gairdh fancied he heard a sharpness in it.

He drew in a breath and blurted his reasons. “They need a strong hand, you see. My wife, she has no sense, and my children are unruly. I need to guide them. I must go back to them!” He flushed more redly with the heat of his own lies.

“If you think they need that, then go you will, and I will judge how much your family needs your strong hand,” the crone proclaimed. “And I think we shall also see whether Graf the innkeeper can survive without your custom.”

“Thank you, Lady! Thank you! I will be the strong hand. You’ll see!” Gairdh’s heart soared, and then it fell with dread at the look in the crone’s eyes.

“You will, for I place a geas upon you. And I myself will witness.” The Goddess waved one clawed hand and the world swam.

Gairdh came to himself with hands lifting him from his swamped boat. “Damn fool!” “What do expect from a drunk?” “If he has any sense he’ll thank the Goddess he’s alive.” Yes, I do, thought Gairdh, and promptly passed out.

His family, at least, rejoiced that he had been found. His wife, Wena, made a fuss over him, put him to bed on the rushes they shared. She sent their boy, Bachen, running for half-beer, and she dried Gairdh, dressed him warmly and built up the fire.

Gairdh found to his amazement that he could not drink the half-beer at all, and he did give it two tries. But each time he drank, he spat it back out. “That’s not beer, there’s something wrong with it!” he cried, grimacing. There seemed to be something wrong with everything after that.

The next day, he went to the smokeshed to rotate the frames of fish, but found that the fire had gone out. He found Bachen in one of the usual places, regalling some of the other boys with his own imaginary version of how his father had bravely survived the sudden storm. But where he would have usually found humour and comfort in his boy’s affection and pride, this time all he could think of was the fire unattended and maybe some ruined fish as well.

He dragged Bachen to the smokehouse, showed him the dead fire and for the first time in his life, hit the lad, cuffing him a couple times about the head before the boy could duck away. He stopped, stunned, and the boy ran away, a look of fear and betrayal in his eyes. Gairdh couldn’t even cry for what he had done. In his heart he found nothing, in his head only the work that needed to be done. A raven eyed him accusingly from the smokehouse roof. He shooed it away and rebuilt the fire.

There was a tension that had never been in the house before when Gairdh came in that evening. Wena glanced up nervously from Bachen to Gairdh. It was obvious that he had been telling her what happened. But Gairdh could not explain it even to himself. He could not speak of it to her, and they ate in silence.

Later, Wena tried to smooth things over by starting one of the family’s favourite games. called “Some day”. “Some day,” she supposed, “your father will find treasure from a sunken dragonboat in his nets.”

“Yes, and then Father will…” the boy mused, beginning to feel more secure and trying to think of something new that hadn’t been said in previous games, “Then he will buy…”

“Enough.” Gairdh grunted more gruffly than he intended. “Foolish notion. Head full of fancies. Nothing like that will happen.”

Wena interrupted, “Be easy with the boy, Gairdh. You made up that game.”

“I was a fool, then,” he said hotly.

“You were drunk, as I recall,” she replied, smiling.

“Well, I don’t drink anymore,” he said.

“Since when? Well, if that’s what’s made you so joyless, maybe you should start again!” she said mockingly. With that, she turned away, but he grabbed her by the arm.

“Maybe you should stop talking so much!” he growled and glared at her. “A wife should be silent and respectful.” Wena gasped, shocked, and he froze. What’s happening to me? he wondered. We always have a laugh and a game. But… but it’s not right. None of this is right.

He released her and opened his mouth to apologise, but found himself turning and stomping out of the house. He headed in the direction of the inn, but knew he wouldn’t go there. He glanced back at the house in time to see the eyes of a fox melting into the shadows across the dirt path. Damn it!

There was work to do the next day repairing the boat. He set Bachen to fashioning some pegs, and he starting sealing some of the planks that had sprung. Wena, still not speaking to him or even meeting his eyes, brought the hot pitch from the fire.

After several attempts with one plank, he called Bachen over.

“Hold this,” he ordered. But every time he jammed the wadding into the leak, the plank slipped out.

“The boy’s not strong enough, Gairdh, you need one of the other men to help you,” Wena said. A glare from Gairdh silenced her.

“Hold it!” he barked. The boy tensed, and managed to hold the plank while Gairdh tamped the wadding in. He took the pitch, and muttering “hold it, hold it” began to brush it in. Suddenly, the plank sprung again, striking the bowl of hot pitch. The damn boy’s arm was in the way, of course. Bachen screamed with the pain. Furious, Gairdh threw the bowl of pitch to the side and yelled “NOW maybe you’ll learn to HOLD it!”

Wena shrieked and gathered Bachen up, rushing to the water to cool the pitch and remove it.

“Let me see him, I…” Gairdh began.

“NO!” she screamed. A passing seabird echoed her coarse shriek.

Gairdh stepped towards her, and saw his wife and son flinch away. The boy moaned weakly in pain and fear.

“Oh, Goddess” Gairdh breathed silently, “What have I done?” The geas broke with his heart. He backed away from his family, shaking his head and mouthing words he could not speak. Turning, he ran.

He ran weeping until he found himself on a beach much like the Lady’s, and at the water’s edge he stopped and fell to his knees.

“Lady, help me, please!” he beseeched. “I am… I have done… Something is wrong with me!”

The waves continued to wash in gently, but they fell silent. Instead, Gairdh heard the whispering voice of the crone. “The boy will not be harmed, Gairdh, and they will not remember. Such is the healing I can bring, if you are ready.”

“But I was a fool and a drunk! Why couldn’t I do better this time?” Gairdh moaned.

“No, Gairdh. You were a drunken sot who loved his wife and child and shared all he had and always rejoiced in life,” the crone whispered gently into his mind. “Now you know what it is to truly be a fool. Remember what you were, and that is what they will remember. Do not stay beyond your time, man. Are you ready?”

“Yes, Lady,” he said haltingly, “You were right.”

“Then come to me.”
The fisherman went. His body was found tangled in a net in his little swamped boat, an accident of the storm.

His family wept and were bereft for a time. There was nothing to sell, and they were poor, so Wena went with the boy to stay at her brother’s. Things were strained with little money and life was sombre, until one day Bachen chanced accidentally to say the words “some day”, and mother and son looked at each other and laughed.