Odd Prompts: Moonlight

This is a snippet from the middle of a short story I'm working on. 

***

“I have a story to tell you.” Mona sat on the steps to their trailer. Beth looked up at her. She’d plopped down on the ground, crosslegged, as soon as Mona had gestured for her. The stamp collector, looking down at the scientist and considering how very young she looked down there, saw a folding camp chair tucked under the porch and pulled it out. He sat, mindful of his old bones, but Mona was focused on the girl. 

“There are mountains, rivers, the glacier, and the sea.” Mona gestured loosely in four directions as she spoke. “Long ago, they were the impassable barriers for our people.

“The people, they didn’t know how to make boats. They tried to cross the mountains, but they all died up there. The ones who didn’t try, they became timid. They crouched between the mountains and the sea, drinking from the river they could not cross, and they muttered.” 

Mona stopped talking for a moment, looking up. She wasn't’ seeing the long row of trailers, but the forest-clad peaks that reared up behind them. She turned her face in the direction of the sea. 

“One woman, she knew there had to be another way. Her people were sick, they had been too long in one place and it grew filthy. They needed to move, to let the land recover, and find a new place to be. But there was no way out, they told her. The glacier would eat them with crevasses if not freeze them.” 

The stamp collector listened to the cadence of the story, hearing the old ways in it, while the overlay of modern vocabulary was almost jarring. But that was Mona. Her education was impeccable and she never, ever mentioned it. 

“So what did she do?” Beth prompted softly when the silence grew long.

Mona flashed a little smile at her. “You ask questions. Good. She waited until the moon was full, and then she walked across the ocean on the glowing road of moonlight. She came back in a kayak, and the people learned how to make them, so they could go to another place.” 

The stamp collector blinked and cocked his head as he tried to understand the story. 

Beth, at his feet, spoke first. “She didn’t assume the mountains were the only way.” 

“Good, good. You understand.” Mona nodded emphatically. 

“The traps should be set for both sea and land access.” Beth twisted around and looked up at her companion. “We assumed the only way in was overland. But the air is too thin...” 

“Of course.” 

Mona grunted, getting up. “I’m stuck here. Wasn’t supposed to stay this long after the conference. I may as well do something useful. Come on, I’ve got a pot of moose stew on the stove.” 

***

I was prompted this week by Becky Jones with "She walked across the ocean on the glowing road created by the moonlight." 

I prompted Becky in return with "Reality is a flexible concept." 

You can read all of the prompt responses, or take part in the challenge yourself, over at More Odds Than Ends.