There she is. It's inevitable now that he's spotted her. He will not be chased away by so mild a shooing as that. Saying she doesn't want to talk about it is as good as saying she does, in bratty little sibling speak.

Michael walks over and slides one of the nearby pots out of the way with care—one far too bright and visually noisy to be to Wanda's tastes, he thinks now, getting a closer look at it—and takes a seat on the flat stone it previously occupied.

"I'm afraid the passing of time is inevitable. You can face it with a friend or without."

He intends it to be with. He reaches over and taps his knuckles against the side of the pot she's in. Knock knock, open up.

"Why are you holed up in there?"

Michael could make a dozen guesses, certainly. Maybe because her worshippers have finally gotten too loud to take; maybe because it's the noise of the other gods' thoughts and activities that have finally got to her; maybe because the sky is cracking and this dream is finally starting to fade. He's not always an expert in predicting human behaviour, he's come to realize, so he expects it's even more likely it's some combination of that and another emotion he can't even guess at.