Prologue
Rules for Relinquishing
Snuff out the lights.
Bolt the doors.
If you must weep, find a source of rushing water to drown out the sound.
Scorch your bread. Let your wine sour. Switch your sugar and salt.
Don’t travel after sunset.
Mask your face so you won’t be recognized.
Though you may be frightened, let go.
The Skyweaver’s Knife
Once there lived a man named Sunder who loved everything about his life. He rose every day with the dawn and walked out into his fields. He marveled at the rain that nourished his crops and the sun that made them grow. He cherished the strength of his own two hands—hands that planted and threshed and built his house. Hands that rocked his child to sleep.
He loved his life so much that when Death came for him, Sunder hid.
Death searched Sunder’s house and did not find him.
Death called out over his fields, but Sunder did not come.
So, giving up, Death took someone else instead.
When Sunder came out of his hiding place, he smiled at his own cleverness. He strode down the dirt roads toward home, whistling happily. But as he approached the door of his house, a sound made him pause.
Someone was wailing.
Sunder opened the door and found his wife kneeling on the kitchen floor, clutching their child to her breast. When Sunder fell to his knees beside her, he found his small daughter’s eyes lifeless. Her body cold.
Sunder cursed his cleverness. He wept and gnashed his teeth.
After that day, Sunder no longer rose with the dawn. No longer marveled at the rain or the sun. And when he looked around the house he built, he saw only what he’d lost.
He begged Death to give his daughter back. But Death could do no such thing. Her soul was with the Skyweaver.
So Sunder set out to make it right.
He found the goddess of souls at her loom. Skyweaver’s warp was fashioned from the dreams of the living, her weft from the memories of the dead. At the sound of Sunder’s intrusion, her shuttle stopped. She put down her threads.
Sunder fell at her feet and he begged.
“There is a price for what you’re asking,” she said.
“Whatever it is, I’ll pay it.”
Skyweaver rose from her loom. “It’s your soul that is owed. Your death that was cheated.”
Sunder closed his eyes, thinking of the rain that nourished his crops and the sun that made them grow and the strength of his own two hands.
“I can give back your daughter’s soul. I can restore her life.” Skyweaver picked up her weaving knife. “But only you can pay the price.”
On his knees, Sunder looked up at the faceless god and said, “Take it, then.”
