We hope you enjoy this reprint of a story by Ellen Kushner set in the world of her classic Swordspoint and originally published by Temporary Culture as a limited edition chapbook earlier this year.  This appearance of the story features two Tom Canty illustrations not found in the chapbook; you can click on each of the illustrations for a closer look.

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Her father had told her a story about a sailor who fell out of love with the sea, so he put his oar up on his shoulder and walked inland far and far, until he finally met someone who looked at the oar and said, “What’s that thing you’re carrying, friend?” and there he stayed. Her father told her he had done much the same thing himself: crossed from the mainland to the island, and then walked inland through the hills and forests until he found a place where no one could read a book, and settled there with his little daughter. He gave the villagers what he could in the way of physick, and taught Sofia to read and to do the same. Her father was gone, now, and here she was, alone with them all, with her goats and her garden at the edge of a village full of people who had never read a book.

[And so she remained, not getting any younger, until the man with the knives appeared.]