After Ytine’s husband, Irris, has been gone for more than a year, her neighbour becomes intent on marrying her to take hold of their fishing rights. Armed with a couple of frogs, Voud, Irris’ kid sister, does her best to convince the village’s gods to intervene after she overheard their neighbour talking about his succesful murder plot against her brother. But then Irris returns. Who is he really?
Ann Leckie manages to pack a lot of plot in a short story without losing track of her characters or setting. Voud’s matter-of-fact acceptance of what happened to her brother feels at once fresh and reminiscent of old folk tales. I had to reread the ending a few times to figure out what had exactly happened but otherwise it’s a well-told tale in an interesting setting and I’ll definitely seek out the other stories Leckie has written about this world.
