At that time, the elder’s father had been deeply ill, his body and spirit greatly weakened. Even still, the night when he heard that a boy had been born to Muraj and Suzu-a boy with horns growing from his head-he had leapt from his sickbed, his face filled with a furious grief. He had rushed to the birthing place in the village and cradled the newborn child in his own arms, brushing his fingers across its soft head until he felt the horns.

Upon returning home, he summoned his son. He shut the doors and windows and shortened the wick on the lamp until the room was dim, and when he spoke, his voice was a whisper, no louder than the night breeze.

“I did not pass the mantle of elder to you readily,” he had said. “Even while I saw how the other men and women of the village regarded you with pride and trust, I held you back. I’m sure you wondered why this was at times. You were unhappy, I know, and I do not blame you for it.”

The new elder sat, unspeaking, his head hanging low. He lacked the courage to meet his father’s eyes. That night had transformed the tired, sick old man who was his father into something altogether strange and frightening.

“But know this-I did not cling to my role as elder out of a reluctance to let go. I merely wanted to spare you the burden of the Sacrifice. I was too cowardly, and put off that which I knew must come to pass sooner or later. What a fool I was. The one who rules in the Castle in the Mist sees through all our flimsy schemes. How else can we explain that just now, on the very day that my illness compels me to pass you the title of elder, a boy with horns is born to our village?”

His father’s voice trembled as though he were on the verge of tears.

In Toksa Village, it was a fact of life that every few decades, a child with horns was born. The horns were small at birth-soft, round bumps, barely noticeable beneath the infant’s fine hair.