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Winter, 1344 Years since the Sacrifice.

The light of the setting sun paints the recent snow and sets the countryside awash in brilliant, otherworldly orange. To Mr. Bruce Archambeau, recent novice initiate of the Leonsjardine Abbey, it feels as if not of the world he always has known, but rather somewhere different.

He sits in his little work chamber, a practically furnished room on the ancient stone abbey’s second floor. There he has his little desk covered with his little artist’s materials, his very ordinary bed, his wardrobe, and very little else. His mind leaves his surroundings as he peers out through his window, lost in heathen imaginings about fairies and pagan things. About other worlds one could, if not mindful, simply fall into, whisked away by immortals and magical men, with special wines and forbidden dances.

This, as you might imagine, is the sort of thing one ordinarily keeps private. These are, after all, beliefs of the old world, superstitions that wayward souls believed in before they heard the Word of the True Faith. Stories, that’s all, which the Abbot and his brother monks rightfully believe are best left untold and unremembered.

Alas, Mr. Bruce is a man of memory and imagination, and these fantasies of his so often seem to possess him. They seep into his artwork, into the margins of the illuminated manuscript tomes he toils away at for the Abbey and the Church. He so often paints snails with the heads of rabbits and eyes alive with secrets, noble badgers with the bodies of owls, or - perhaps his favourite - little mice much like himself, with the teeth of lions. If his brothers recognize these as the characters of yesterday’s faith, they say nothing, save for how fond they are of these wee men and the strange journeys they seem to take surrounding the passages of Scripture and history Mr. Bruce so carefully records.

God’s son, the Old Scripture says, was a lion. He was born of mortal flesh but divine invention, unlike any other mortal, predator or prey alike. He taught the wayward people of the world the sanctity of life, to love rather than to kill selfishly. Before Him, prey lived in constant fear, be it under the lash of those who would one day feed on them, or in furtive communities of meek toil where any true prosperity carried a threat of discovery by those who hunt them. Predators knew no moderation, no appreciation for the lives that fed them, and would simply take as they pleased, often to excess, thus bringing doom upon themselves. These times are referred to as the Days Of Hunger, and to regress to pagan thought is to invite their return.

Now, instead, in these more peaceful times brought about by God’s son and his sacrifice, prey and predator live comfortable adjacent lives, with roles defined by appreciation and respect. Mr. Bruce lives comfortably among predators who have embraced the True Faith, not as their servant or their food, but as an artist and brother.

This is the way of the world.

---

#1: The Transubstantiation of the Mid-Winter Feast

Truthfully, Mr. Bruce remains rather cloistered even within the abbey. He has only had conversations with a small handful of his fellow brothers. His is a timid disposition, something he often attributes to his mouse nature. In the old days, he rationalizes, people like him would have been the first swept up by an owl or a fox, and so it made sense to remain in a state of near-constant fear. In divinity, mice were designed to be food, as were all prey, but divinity has a sense of fairness all its own, and so mice were made vigilant. So sayeth the Scripture, anyway. Mr. Bruce, with his safe, comfortable home, considers his natural fear more of a burden than a blessing.

There is one fellow resident of the abbey who has, of late, taken an interest in him, or perhaps accepted the responsibility of coaxing him out of his little hidey-hole, and that is Brother Mathéo.

For past few nights, Brother Mathéo has come by just before dinnertime, and knocked on Mr. Bruce’s door. He does the same tonight. As every other night, Mr. Bruce finds the voice to call, “a moment, please.” He rises out of his chair only to stand in the middle of his room rationalizing that no, he has no need to be so afraid, that nothing he says will be all that awkward (he’ll just discuss the weather and the goings-on of his work, really) and that besides, his brothers shan’t judge him for any little stammer or errant thought. This brief meditation of his lasts almost a minute. Then, having found his confidence, he crosses the room and opens the door.

And there, precisely as expected, is Brother Mathéo. An older man, perhaps about fifty or so, with a stoat’s slender build. Although he appears tall to Mr. Bruce (as does everybody), Brother Mathéo is among the shorter of the abbey’s predator residents, at approximately double the mouse’s height. His fur is a dull brown along his back and atop his head, but a stark, brilliant white under his chin and down, presumably, over his belly.

Though Mr. Bruce expects never to admit it aloud, he has, in quiet and lonely moments, wondered where the white might end underneath Brother Mathéo’s robes.

The old stoat smiles kindly down to Mr. Bruce and, as has become usual, offers his hand and says, “I thought you might accompany me to dinner, if you’re not too busy.”

Just as he had last night, Mr. Bruce places his small hand in Brother Mathéo’s and answers, “I’d be happy to.”

There is, of course, nothing improper nor necessarily romantic about holding a man’s hand, especially not a friend’s. It is as natural as looking one another in the eyes, or smiling, and yet as the two walk alongside one another, Brother Mathéo measuring his strides so that Mr. Bruce may match him comfortably, the little mouse’s thoughts stray again. Brother Mathéo’s hand is warm and soft. It’s nice, he thinks, to have even a small part of himself held. Ah, but to ask for more? No, no. What if in so doing, he somehow sours their budding friendship? Better to pine in silence instead –

“I must warn you, tonight is a rare occasion, little friend,” Brother Mathéo says, pulling Mr. Bruce from his anxious pondering.

The mouse cants his head back, peering far up to find the stoat smiling down at him again, with his kind, ever-patient eyes. “Oh. Should I wear something different? To tell the truth, I always feel strange, all of you in your habits and me in my…” Mr. Bruce motions down to his linen cotte, practically eccentric fashion for such a uniform place.

Brother Mathéo shakes his head. “I doubt anybody will be looking at you tonight, to tell you the truth. Rather…”

The stoat pauses mid-stride. He tuts, turns, squats before Mr. Bruce so that they’re near to eye-level and though his smile never falters, a certain trepidation creeps into his voice. “It is, as you know, mid-winter, and so we celebrate the Wakening From Hibernation with a feast. This is the first winter you’ve been with us, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Mr. Bruce nods once. He cants his head sidelong and asks, “am I supposed to bring something to share, then? Oh, how embarrassing…”

“Ah, no. If you were to provide something to the mid-winter feast, you’d be bringing yourself. Each winter, the Abbot selects one of the prey brothers and, should he be willing, devours him in during the feast, as we all observe.”

“Oh!” Mr. Bruce feels a cold jolt run down his spine, beginning between his shoulders and striking straight down to the tip of his tail. This sort of thing is not unheard of. In fact, before he ever came to Leonsjardine, Mr. Bruce knew of brothers being devoured in ritual, but it had never occurred to him that it might be such a communal affair, or that he would ever see it.

Brother Mathéo sets a hand on Mr. Bruce’s shoulder and the mouse is reminded of the sheer difference in their size, in their strength. His prey fear seizes him, if only for an instant. Brother Mathéo must feel the tension in his body, because the stoat reassures, “it only ever happens when the chosen brother is willing. We have winters where no one is eaten, though I doubt this will be one such year. Brother Côme has been eager for some time now.”

“It’s not that,” Mr. Bruce answers. Suddenly, he finds it difficult to meet Brother Mathéo’s eyes. “Truthfully, brother, I’m not certain what I’m feeling.” Fear, excitement, curiosity, a strange sense of arousal –

“Forgive me, my little friend. I should have been more direct. I had no intention of upsetting you,” Brother Mathéo apologizes again, but this time, Mr. Bruce interrupts him.

“I want to come along. I want to see it. It is a Sacrament, after all. Only…”

“Only it is rare and confronting for prey to be spectators to such things. I understand. If you find it makes you uncomfortable, you have only to tell me, and I will leave with you.”

“Thank you, Mathéo.”

The stoat rises to a stand, and reaches his hand out to Mr. Bruce once again. The mouse sets his hand in the predator’s, this time with a strange, instinctual trepidation that he finds impossible to ignore. The warmth and softness remains, but now, for perhaps the first time, it is tinged with a sense of danger and excitement. Mr. Bruce is, for the first time in the week or so that they have eaten together, conscious of Brother Mathéo’s teeth.

The abbey dinner hall is among the most decoratively furnished of all Leonsjardine’s many rooms, for it is a place of worship, meant to invoke the Transubstantiation. The ceiling is domed, and painted in the likenesses of sacred hunts and events from the Scripture, most of which are of powerful predators uplifting, revering, and sometimes devouring exalted prey, and being revered in turn. Tapestries adorn the walls of the curved chamber portraying much the same. The brothers all sit beside one another as equals (albeit often with seats adjusted to their various weights and sizes) along two long, curving tables, each positioned opposite one another. Between the tables, at a smaller, far more decorative table of his own, the Abbot is seated on an ornate wooden throne, often with at least one chosen brother beside him. The Abbot never eats at regular dinners, and instead leads prayer or conversation.

Eating, for the monks of Leonsjardine, has always been a social affair, and so before Brother Mathéo took an interest in him, Mr. Bruce had always found dinners a dreadful event. He would sit quietly, passing the time practically unnoticed, while he studied the artwork on the walls and the ceiling.

Tonight the dinner hall is especially energetic, already alive with the conversation of monks. There are roughly forty brothers living together in the abbey (and will be one fewer after tonight, Mr. Bruce considers). It seems, for the first time, every one of them is in attendance at once, except for the Abbot and brother Côme.

“Mathéo!” One of the brothers calls from his seat. A bear, enormous by contrast to Brother Mathéo, a ridiculous giant when compared to Mr. Bruce. As is the case with most of the predators of the abbey, the bear is old, his muzzle faded a clear sable silver. He wears a pair of spectacles that, although they seem small upon his face, are at least as wide as Mr. Bruce’s forearm. Brother Mathéo waves back to the bear and starts to lead Mr. Bruce along by the hand, prompting the little mouse through the instinctual prey panic he hadn’t realized had seized him. Strange. That had never happened here before. He had happily shared meals with these men for months, and although he had feared making a fool of himself in conversation, he had never considered that he might be thought of as a meal himself. His mouse nature coming through once again.

Brother Mathéo coaxes him to sit in the empty seat beside the bear. Suddenly, the bear leans forward, inadvertently looming over Mr. Bruce with a big, boisterous grin, rows of dagger-sharp teeth on display. Mr. Bruce’s thoughts race. He watches the giant brother’s mouth move as, to his absolute horror, he is addressed by name.

“Little Bruce! Wonderful to see you about. I was worried you’d stay shut in that room of yours tonight.” The bear’s monstrous paw settles across the mouse’s back, practically enveloping the whole of him in a friendly shake. Mr. Bruce, accustomed to being handled with care with every handshake and embrace, knows well enough how to recognize when somebody is treating him as if he’s fragile, and in this instance he appreciates the care the bear shows deeply. If only he wasn’t so mortified by the fact that, although this brother clearly knows him – he does not know the bear’s name.

He sits frozen, idiot smile on his face, stammering, “um, yes, well… Brother Mathéo warned me, but I… I’m curious, and it is a sacred event, and…”

“Brother Edmé is just glad to see you, little Bruce,” Brother Mathéo reassures him. Inwardly, Mr. Bruce wonders, did Mathéo realize the nature of his panic? Was his use of Edmé the bear’s name deliberate? If so, what a kind and merciful friend he has made in the stoat, he reflects.

“I doubt you’ll be able to see much down there!” Brother Edmé laughs. He brings his other heavy hand down, grasping Mr. Bruce between the both of them. The embrace is sudden but careful. Mr. Bruce finds being so absolutely enfolded within Edmé’s grasp overwhelming, a sudden animal excitement seizing him as he feels rough, work-worn palms against arms and chest. Brother Edmé lifts him just enough to slide one hand under his rear, then lifts him effortlessly, to stand him atop the table. Even on his paws, he’s too short to look the bear in the eye without canting his neck. The only brother of the abbey bigger than Edmé is the elephant, brother Étienne, presently seated on the opposite side of the room – Mr. Bruce has avoided brother Étienne thus far for fear of being accidentally crushed. He wonders, as he stands there in a daze, if he shouldn’t regard brother Edmé with the same policy.

The bear unhands him with a brief fingertip pat on the shoulder. “Of course, now you look like part of the dinner yourself!” He laughs again, a deep belly-laugh.

Another jolt runs through Mr. Bruce, another emotion he cannot describe nor understand. He realizes, in one overwhelming moment, that the notion excites him as much as it scares him. He feels heat under his collar, a flush in his ears, a tightness in his trousers –

“No one is going to mistake you for a meal, little Bruce,” Brother Mathéo interrupts Edmé’s teasing, obviously concerned.

Either because he’s merciless or clueless, Edmé persists, “unless you want ‘em to! It’s an exciting night, I might just find myself confused…”

Mr. Bruce is stunned. No one has ever spoken like this before him, especially not any predator of the True Faith, especially not an ordained brother of a sacred order. The Old Scripture –

“Temperance, Brother Edmé. Remember your vows,” Brother Mathéo chides. He’s stern with the bear now, in part driven to protect his small friend, of course, and in part offended that one would eschew the conventional manners of the order, especially on this, a sacred occasion.

“Ah, it excites him! Look at his face,” Brother Edmé waves Mathéo off, and it occurs to Mr. Bruce, if Edmé chose to snatch him up, there wouldn’t be a thing that Mathéo could do about it. With the bear’s size, if he wanted to, he could even swallow Mathéo – not that any predator would devour another predator, of course. Such is not the way of things.

Any potential debate between the monks is interrupted by the sudden announcement that the Abbot has at last arrived, and that the ceremony may begin. Two brothers enter through ornate doors used only to deliver food from the kitchens to the dining hall, and through which the Abbot and other exalted brothers enter.

The ceremony at last begins. Two brothers, a fox and rat, enter with a cart of plated meals, which they distribute between their seated peers with a brief exchange of the Hunter’s Prayer, giving thanks for the lives taken in the preparation of the food. These meals, of course, are not made with the meat of prey persons, but rather the non-sentient farm creatures. Prey brothers in attendance, for whom it is forbidden to eat meat of any variety, are served vegetables and the like. Truthfully, Mr. Bruce is disinterested in this meal, his nerves such that he won’t be able to eat for several hours at least.

Once each plate has been set and the two have found seats of their own, the Abbot, a fat old lion, strides into the room with his head high. He greets the brothers conversationally, answering praise with compliments of his own, as if this were any other feast. Except for the fact that, for this dinner, he wears a ceremonial shawl embroidered with symbols derived from the Old Scriptures, much like the paintings and tapestries, though all of them portray the Transubstantiation and subsequent Consumption. To Mr. Bruce’s surprise, it appears the Abbot is bare underneath the shawl, as the golden fur of his heavy, round thighs is in plain view.

He reaches his throne at the center of the room and, in full view of each of the brothers, he lifts away his shawl, standing nude before everybody. It is the first time that Mr. Bruce has seen another man naked, and it captivates him. His eyes are drawn again and again between the Abbot’s bare crotch, his belly, his chest – his attraction is immediate and overwhelming. Somehow, it lacks the tender, careful intimacy of his idle fantasies about Brother Mathéo. When Mr. Bruce ponders the possibilities of Mathéo’s body, he imagines himself pressing his face into the fur of Mathéo’s chest, being held in the stoat’s arms, he ponders the possible texture of his fur and (most boldly) the taste of his lips. To simply see the Abbot’s cock in plain view confronts Mr. Bruce with another kind of arousal, something base and vulgar, something he feels immediately and powerfully that he should not feel for a man of such sacred authority, and yet…

“Brothers! My friends!” The Abbot calls over the din of conversation, and each of the brothers falls silent to allow him to speak. “We have come together again to praise the God of the Lions, the God of All Who Hunt, the God of the Feast and the God of the Exalted Prey, for He has lifted us from our need to rest through winter, and allowed us instead to wake and walk. That Brothers Edmé and Félix are spared their hibernation and torpor respectively is a blessing of His will, and so we celebrate him in the manner of the Old Scriptures: with feast! Rejoice!”

Mr. Bruce is startled by a sudden surge of cheers from the brothers. Their excitement is daunting, and impossible not to be swept up in. Mr. Bruce even squeaks a brief attempt at a cheer of his own, and mercifully does not notice the look brothers Edmé and Mathéo share when they hear it.

The Abbot continues, “and so we call upon brother Côme, who has nobly and fearlessly offered himself as Sacrament for this, a Transubstantiation! Brother Côme, join us, please!”

Brother Côme enters to another chorus of cheers, bellowed compliments and well-wishes. Although Mr. Bruce knew that Côme is a fellow mouse, it is startling to see him walk nude before so many predators. He’s a fat little man, taller than Mr. Bruce by several inches, and much wider. His fur is a uniform shade of brown and lacks the a distinctive pattern, while Mr. Bruce has a distinctive black mask surrounding his eyes and curling under his ears. Where Mr. Bruce’s tail is covered in lush fur, Brother Côme’s is bare and sleek. These differences, which seemed absolutely immaterial to Mr. Bruce before, suddenly seem to matter. Which of the two mice, he wonders, is more appealing to a predator’s eyes? He hardly has time to question his own thoughts, to ask himself why he’d be interested in knowing.

His fellow mouse reaches the edge of the Abbot’s table and bows, reciting, “I thank you for this opportunity to appease both you and God, Great Hunter! I beg of you, make me a part of you, that we may exist as one!” He raises his arms to the Abbot. The fox who laid out the meals of the spectators earlier hurries over and lifts him up onto the Abbot’s table, where he turns about, displaying himself to each brother in the audience.

Another new feeling storms through Mr. Bruce. When he he imagines brother Mathéo, or as he looks upon the Abbot, he considers himself small, he ponders being held or lifted or made weak. Now, as he looks upon his fellow mouse, displayed and made a meal for others to behold, Mr. Bruce is overcome with strange notion of holding him down, taking him, entering him and even, though it seems profoundly contradictory to his mouse nature, biting him.

Thoughts for later.

The Abbot lays his hands on brother Côme, encircling the mouse’s waist. Then he licks, his broad, flat tongue glossing across the mouse’s mid-back, all the way up to his shoulder and then down, the lion’s muzzle obscuring the mouse’s head and chest. For an instant Mr. Bruce thought he was seeing the lion simply swallow Côme, but no, a trick of the angle, the Abbot’s chin instead rested on Côme’s shoulder, much of his fellow mouse obstructed by the Abbot’s dense mane.

Most of the brothers eat their own meals now, make conversation with one another, and treat the ceremony like a communal dinner, but Mr. Bruce watches on. He’s fixated by every slight motion, every twitch, every hitch of breath. How did Côme become so fearless? How did he come to want this, to become food in such a way? Is this a kind of sex? The Abbot’s broad hand enfolds Côme’s crotch, carefully kneading his balls between forefinger and thumb, and Mr. Bruce notices of course that Côme is hard and dribbling precum. Was he hard when he entered the room? Mr. Bruce can’t recall, but it seems impossible now that he wasn’t, as excited as he appears.

The Abbot opens his mouth again, and this time, he bites Côme, closing his teeth around the little mouse’s neck and shoulder just hard enough for Côme to feel it. The mouse squeaks loudly, and several brothers chuckle and laugh, not at Côme’s expense, but as if this were all a kind of play.

The bite has a particular effect on brother Edmé. The bear’s enormous hand comes forward and wraps itself around Mr. Bruce’s waist, thumb up against his chest, pinky approaching his thighs. Mr. Bruce becomes aware that he’s as hard as Côme, feeling his cock against the other man’s palm. Shock, fear and raw arousal intermingle into a desperate stammer. A protest? A plea? The bear drawi him back a few short strides and then, suddenly, Mr. Bruce feels the bear’s wet tongue against he back of his neck. He shudders involuntarily, but his eyes are still on Côme. He watches as his fellow mouse is treated similarly, and the fear in him subsides, replaced with a vicarious longing. In that moment, Mr. Bruce wants nothing more than to be the mouse on the altar, devoured by the Abbot, to become an exalted Sacrament, adored by a community of loving predators, and –

Reality strikes him. He is being eaten. Cold fear snatches his chest and he starts to struggle uselessly against the brother Edmé’s hold, as if he could possibly overpower the giant monk.

“You’re safe,” he hears, before realizing the words come from brother Mathéo. He looks to the stoat, who’s expression reflects the same warmth and kindness as always, now tinged with a kind of desperation, a hunger. “You’re safe,” he reiterates. “No one will swallow you unless that is what you want of them.”

“He’s right,” Edmé murmurs, the giant voice shaking him down to his bones, the bear’s lip against his back. “All in fun. I won’t swallow… unless you ask.” The bear licks him again, tongue streaking through his fur. It presses his dome ears down against his head before passing over his face. Mr.

Bruce swallows breath desperately. “Okay,” he squeaks out. “Don’t swallow me. Don’t.”

“Do you want us to keep playing?” Brother Mathéo asks. The stoat lifts one of Mr. Bruce’s little legs, pulls away his slipper, and suddenly kisses, then licks, the top of Mr. Bruce’s little pink paw. Brother Mathéo handles him so delicately, so tenderly, just as brother Edmé had earlier – as brother Edmé continues to.

Gingerly, Mr. Bruce says, “yes. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. Must I do something?”

“No,” Edmé answers.

Suddenly, Mr. Bruce is lifted forward by the bear, and the stoat’s hands are underneath his cotte shirt, lifting it away to leave him nude from the waist-up. Edmé takes a hold of Mr. Bruce’s waist again, holding the mouse upright, and licks him once more, this time from the root of his tail all the way up along his back. Edmé adjusts his angle, leaning forward to loom again, this time opening his mouth wide enough for Mr. Bruce to not only see inside, but to realize he fits, effortlessly, through the bear’s teeth and no doubt down his throat. He’d slip away as if he were nothing, barely a morsel, a single swallow and –

He feels a sting at his heel and turns his head down. Brother Mathéo bites him, and bites him again, not so hard as to hurt, but enough that Mr. Bruce can count each of the stoat’s teeth. The two come from both angles, and differently. Where Edmé favours fitting his whole mouth around Mr. Bruce, Mathéo bites and licks with precision, building pressure and tension before he, at last, eases one of Mr. Bruce’s paws into his mouth, making it clear to the mouse that he could be swallowed from below just as easily as from above.

Mr. Bruce lays his little hands on the bear’s Edmé’s teeth, noting the bear’s fangs were almost the length of his arms, a thought that sends a shiver through him. He cants his head sidelong and looks out over the dinner hall, searching for Côme. He sees similar scenes occurring throughout the dinner hall wherever a prey man happens to be, with the nearest predators having their way.

Côme kneels on his hands and knees before the Abbot’s throne, atop the dinner hall altar. The Abbot holds him by the waist, tongue inside of his rear while his tail curls in knots above his back. Côme rocks and moans and, at last, bursts in desperate orgasm before everybody in the dinner hall. A chorus of applause rings out among those still spectating.

Brother Mathéo’s deft hands slip under the waistband of Mr. Bruce’s trousers, stealing his attention back. The stoat slides them away, leaving Mr. Bruce bare at last, the mouse’s cock springing straight up. Mr. Bruce is overcome by a sudden doubt and fear – what if he’s too small, what his nakedness is repulsive somehow, what if – but the stoat licks him once, twice, then swallows his length, and the blissful heat banishes the last of Mr. Bruce’s fears. The bear’s tongue glides down low, practically a mattress against Mr. Bruce’s back. It slides down over his ass and thighs, wetting everything, coating Mr. Bruce in heat and pressure.

The mouse’s eyes roam again, through the bars of the bear’s teeth. He sees one brother, a fox, spread on the table while another fox pins him. They kiss with such heat and desperation, beside the elephant Étienne, who’s eats his plated meal almost indifferently to the sex surrounding him. Mr. Bruce’s eyes wander further, and he finds the owl, the only avian in the abbey, with another brother hanging half-way out of his beak, about to be swallowed away forever –

The thought overwhelms him. A familiar heat roils through his body, and pressure wells behind his crotch. Then, for the first time, he comes inside of somebody else. Brother Mathéo swallows it all away effortlessly, lovingly. He cradles the underside of Mr. Bruce’s cock with his tongue and massages it as if to coax out more. As he does, Edmé closes his mouth around his little body, sealing him up away down to the waist behind lips. Edmé’s sharp, sharp teeth dig against Mr. Bruce’s waist, a careful, measured not-quite-bite. The thought of the nameless brother in the owl’s mouth, about to be swallowed away, recurs through Mr. Bruce’s mind, and he is for an instant convinced beyond reason that his is to his fate inside of Edmé. He remains hard, desperately so, in Mathéo’s mouth, too excited to soften.

Edmé doesn’t swallow him, of course, as he said he wouldn’t. Mathéo keeps a firm hold on his thighs each moment that he’s in the bear’s mouth all the same, either to anchor him if temptation overcomes his fellow monk, or to reassure Mr. Bruce that something has a hold of him. He comes again in mere moments, and that, it seems, is enough for Mathéo and Edmé to free him.

The bear lifts himself away from Mr. Bruce, leaving him wet but most assuredly safe. He and Mathéo assist the little mouse down into his seat again, where he can scarcely see over the table. Moments later, as conscious thoughts return to him, Mr. Bruce realizes that the reason the two brought their impromptu game to its abrupt end was that the ceremony was over. Blinking his eyes into focus and straightening his back see over the table, Mr. Bruce realized he was now the only mouse in the room. Côme was gone, and the Abbot was a little rounder than he had been when he entered the room. No – Côme was not gone yet. The Abbot’s stomach moved as he watched, the second mouse squirming about inside of him.

The thought seems, to Mr. Bruce, as surreal and otherworldly as his thoughts of men from other places, of lands between the mushroom circles.

“Brothers!” the Abbot calls, and the throng of men turn from their distractions, be it their meals, their conversations, or their wayward affections. Once the chamber is near to quiet again, the lion, with his arms around his moving belly, declares that “the Sacrament has been received! We knew brother Côme as a friend and companion, and we know him still as he is of me. As I live, so too does he, our souls entwined. Those who wish him well in this, the hour of Transubstantiation, are welcome to do so.”

Several of the brothers rise, including Edmé. The massive bear inches by behind Mr. Bruce, his own dome stomach brushing the back of the mouse’s head, perhaps intentionally. It sends a shiver through him, but dazed as he is, Mr. Bruce does not turn to look. Rather, he watches as a procession of monks each form an orderly line before the Abbot, approaching one at a time to either lay their hands upon his swollen middle, or press their heads into it, kiss it, rub it. None say farewell to brother Côme. Rather, they praise him, congratulate him, compliment his performance upon the altar or reassure him that they’ll remember him as a part of the Abbot.

Mr. Bruce feels brother Mathéo’s hand upon his arm, drawing his attention. Quietly, the stoat asks, “do you wish to say something to brother Côme, my little friend?”

“I didn’t know him,” Mr. Bruce answers, perhaps a touch mournful.

“Don’t know him,” Mathéo corrects. “He hasn’t departed, only become a part of the Abbot. You’ll be introducing yourself.”

The stoat offers his hand and Mr. Bruce reluctantly takes it in his own. Then, together, they join the procession. Mr. Bruce awaits amid a haze of brown robes, unable to see much surrounded by so many of his larger peers, but brother Mathéo waits beside him all the same. Mr. Bruce finds himself at a loss for what he might say. Congratulations, as the others had? An apology for never meeting while the mouse was still of his own flesh? It feels strange, foolish perhaps. The brother in front of them in the queue concludes his praises and moves aside, and now, as he peers up at the enormity of the lion Abbot’s well-fed, wriggling belly, Mr. Bruce realizes that, through the incredible strangeness of the ceremony, that the odd feeling welling in his chest is doubt. Is brother Côme’s soul joining with the Abbot’s, or is he simply dying inside the lion, to fade away and –

Brother Mathéo’s arms enfold him, one curling around his chest and under his arms, while the other rests beneath his rear. Suddenly, Mr. Bruce is lifted off of his paws so that the Abbot may properly see him, and so that the little mouse may reach the Abbot’s belly. It is the first time that brother Mathéo has held him, and yet the doubt nags at him, draws him away from the intimacy he would rather feel.

“I don’t believe we’ve had the opportunity for a proper meeting just yet, little Archambeau,” the Abbot says. He offers his hand to Mr. Bruce and the mouse, of course, lays his own upon the Abbot’s palm. The lions’ thumb enfolds all of the mouse’s hand. The Abbot handles him as delicately as brothers Mathéo and Edmé had, but Mr. Bruce’s eyes are drawn away from the Abbot’s curious eyes, his whiskers, his silvered mane, his powerful clawed hand, down to his still-moving stomach. The thought that a mouse much like himself was there, inside, ‘undergoing Transubstantiation,’ was impossible for him to ignore, even for a moment. To be so close to such a thing, to know the men surrounding him were all possessed by divine urge to desire precisely that for him…

“I understand the fear of prey,” the Abbot tells him, his voice low and quiet, as if sharing a secret meant only for Mr. Bruce. “God-given, meant to keep you alive that you might father children in the Days of Hunger, so that the balance of things might be preserved. The Sacrifice of the Son taught us better wisdom, but our natures remain. Something we must all strive to overcome.” With that, the Abbot leads Mr. Bruce’s hand to his belly. The lion’s fur is short but lush, and he radiates warmth. His flesh is pillow-soft, but Mr. Bruce feels it kick with motion as the mouse within continues. It’s as if brother Côme can feel him through the lion – Mr. Bruce feels brother Côme inside, or he believes so anyway, and imagines the two of them pressing their hands against one another’s with the body of the lion between. The motion starts to slow and settle.

“Is it painful?” Mr. Bruce asks, surprised to hear his own voice.

“The Old Scripture tells us that with the Sacrifice and the gift of Transubstantiation, no, the devoured do not feel discomfort. It’s quite pleasurable, in fact, hence why so many of you feel a natural urge to experience it, underlaying your fear.”

The Abbot’s insight startles Mr. Bruce. Is that what he’s feeling? Desire, competing with an animal instinct to flee? If that much is true, then perhaps, indeed, to be devoured is painless. Whole, at least. He feels the phantom sensation of brother Edmé’s teeth across his waist and shivers.

“Will he be… How much longer?” the mouse asks, feeling foolish, or disrespectful, or somehow inappropriate. The doubt crawls through the back of his mind. He should show more decorum, he tells himself, but –

“Sometimes an hour, sometimes a whole evening. In fact, in a short while, I’ll be laying down to allow it time to happen. Would you like to stay with us?” the Abbot offers.

“Yes,” Mr. Bruce answers reflexively. Then his mind catches up to him. “No. That is – would it be appropriate? Would it be…” He trails off. His concerns are of his own safety. Would he be eaten, too? Would the Abbot contain his appetite? Does he even still hunger? But to ask such things of the Abbot would be inapprorpiate, and with all of the brothers in attendance…

Once again, the lion intuits his fears and his meaning. He chuckles, a low, musical sound, much like purring. It puts Mr. Bruce at ease, though it seems, rationally, as if it shouldn’t. “It’ll be quite alright. Not to worry. In fact, I think it might be the best thing for you. Put your nerves at ease.”

“You’ll be safe with the Abbot. You’re safe with all of us. Don’t let brother Edmé playfulness unsettle you,” brother Mathéo reassures him.

Mr. Bruce ponders for a moment more. “Yes, I’ll come along with you, Father Abbot. Thank you. I apologize if I’m…”

The lion lifts his hand from Mr. Bruce’s. The mouse hadn’t even realized that the Abbot was holding him. He’d been lost in the feeling of the lion’s belly, and brother Côme, under his palm. Mr. Bruce lifts his hand away, tucking his arm against his chest as if to protect it.

“Should I dress first?” Mr. Bruce asks, aware at last of his own nakedness. When had that happened to him? Brothers Edmé and Mathéo had done it, of course, and without realizing it, Mr. Bruce had stood at the center of the mass of monks nude, struck dumb.