The Last Bearer

Morrow can hold an ending off. Put his hand on a wound that should bleed out, or a sluice gate about to fail, and it waits. In a flooding river town that runs on a failing engine, that makes him the most useful man alive.

His grandfather had the same gift, and kept a dying man breathing for forty-three days. The town learned to count. Now the counting has started again. Repairs go unmade because Morrow is already there. His name is on the shift board before he walks in. Young people keep leaving, and none of them write home.

Le Guin's Omelas kept one child in a cellar. This town has Morrow, and he walked down the stairs himself.

For readers of

• N.K. Jemisin's Broken Earth trilogya power the world depends on and never forgives.
• Joe Abercrombie's First Lawconsequences that land, and humor that survives bad rooms.
• Robin Hobb's Farseer trilogya close, slow look at what a gift costs the one who has it.

see you in the dark