The Village Well

Long one today; this just wouldn't have been the same if I couldn't have had those middle paragraphs, so it's two hundred. Double-wide! Hoo-ah!

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The pool fills all year, percolating up from the mysterious underground reaches beneath the town. At the Festival, the twenty-four families gather in the square and mount the ivory steps to dip their buckets in and take their share.

The first family skims from the top, where the pool is clear and bright. They mix it with wine and sell it briskly. It is gone in a month’s time.

The second family fills from the deeps, where the pool is dark, blue, and secretive. They blend it with the tears of virgin maidens and charge dearly. They serve an exclusive clientele.

It continues throughout the day. Some treat their takings with fruits, some with bitter herbs. Some boil it down to syrup and crystals; others feed it to animals meant for slaughter.

The last family has no buckets. They climb into the empty basin and roll in the dregs, soaking up the last leavings with their clothes and hair. They squeeze these into murky brown bottles and store them in their cellars, long tunnels beneath their unprepossessing home. They do not sell any of it. Someday, perhaps soon, the cellar will be full.

No one knows what will happen after that.