The Sun Has Forgotten How to Set

How it begins

Luma sold her first lantern at midnight, in bright sunshine, to a woman who wanted something dark enough to sleep beside.

“That's a different product,” Luma said.

The woman held out three coins and began to cry.

By the time Luma reached the inn, she had sold every lantern in her cart. People carried them unlit beneath their coats. A man cradled one against his face as if smelling a flower.

The valley had not seen sunset in forty-three days.

At the inn, all the curtains were nailed shut. The landlord served breakfast because he had lost track of the other meals. His dog slept beneath a table with a sack over its eyes.

“What happened?” Luma asked.

“The sun stopped moving.”

“I had gathered that.”

“We asked the priest. He said to be grateful.”

Outside, a rooster attempted another crow and gave up halfway through.

Luma took her tools into the yard. She had one damaged lantern left, its blue glass cracked by the mountain road. As she lifted it toward the sun, its shadow moved in the opposite direction.

A voice came from beneath the cart.

“Please put that down.”

A thin man lay beside the wheel, wrapped in a cloak that seemed made from the last minute before evening. His boots were covered in burrs. One of his hands was transparent.

“Are you ill?” Luma asked.

“Becoming unnecessary.”

She crouched beside him. On his wrist, a small watch showed a motionless line of stars.

“I'm Naro,” he said. “I used to keep dusk.”

“What frightened the sun?”

He looked toward the hills, where every old hedgerow had been cleared to make room for orchards.

“It asked where the night creatures had gone.”

“And what did the valley say?”

“That we no longer needed them.”

Above the empty branches, the sun shone with the terrible vigilance of someone refusing to close an eye.