Never Sew Shrouds for Changeling Children
Every knot binds a soul. Every stitch seals a grave.In the blighted parish of Oakhaven, death wears the scent of shroud-tallow, lye, and bitter frost. While village infants wither under a relentless, unnatural chill, the Duke's hillside orchards flourish with blood-red apples that defy the snow. At the edge of the wood lives Marisol Mercer, a pariah seamstress who wraps the dead. Her only companion is her dying younger sister, Eleanor, whose failing breath rattles beneath an iridescent chrysalis suspended from the rafters-a costly ducal "cure" that secretly feeds on her spirit.Marisol's only tool of trade is an heirloom needle carved from petrified bone. Whenever it pricks her skin, her wounds seal instantly like sewn parchment. Desperate to purchase more medicine for Eleanor before winter claims her, Marisol accepts a dark ducal summons to Highbarrow Keep. Duke Victor Hale offers an ungodly fortune for a singular task: tailor a bespoke court doublet for his young heir, Austin, who was mysteriously retrieved from the Under-Bramble after three lost years.Yet the moment Marisol measures the boy's collar, her shears catch on an impossible secret.Austin does not breathe. Along his spine runs a jagged line of silver thread pulsing with quicksilver light, and when he speaks, a dissonant chorus of missing village children cries through his lips. Horrifyingly, the needlework holding the boy together belongs to Marisol's own mother, who vanished into the briars ten years ago. Austin is not a resurrected son; he is a changeling construct of stolen flesh and trapped souls, built to anchor an ancient harvest tithe.As the winter solstice looms, Marisol unearths the horrifying truth: the bone needle in her pocket is a severed rib torn from the Briar King, an ancient fairy land-god. For years, every shroud she lovingly sewed to grant village children dignity was the very mechanism tethering the forest's parasitic roots to Oakhaven's soil.With zealot bailiffs hunting her as a witch and the Briar King rising to claim his missing bone, Marisol faces an unbearable choice. Brute force cannot fell an immortal woodland pact; salvation requires the seamstress's ultimate act of destruction-unpicking the foundational weave of the land itself. But fairy bargains demand an absolute price: snapping the living tapestry will sever the memories of everyone bound to it. To tear Austin free and save Eleanor from becoming an empty vessel for the Winter Queen, Marisol must accept an eternal twilight exile-knowing the sister she rescued will look into her eyes and see only a stranger.Never Sew Shrouds for Changeling Children is a haunting, atmospheric dark fairy tale steeped in folk horror, gothic tension, and heartbreaking sisterly love. Perfect for readers of Katherine Arden, Naomi Novik, and Christina Henry, this tactile, mesmerizing story will pull you beneath the brambles and refuse to let go until the very last thread snaps.
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