Woven with Starlight.

By

Naintara Sitaram

“All across the world, glimmering and gleaming at night, the moon twinkles and illuminates the sky. But how did it get its shape?”

All across the world, glimmering and gleaming at night, the moon twinkles and illuminates the sky. But how did it get its shape? Long before there was any light, the world lay in permanent night, ruled by the Shadow Weaver. Lily, an orphan who has learned to make one small loaf of bread last for days, gives away her last piece to a boy and his mother in a freezing alley, and the darkness notices. A silver thread leads her to a magical sketchbook hidden in the roots of an ancient tree, and to a Council of creatures who must choose between a little girl and their own hunger. Woven with Starlight is a myth about kindness written by Naintara Sitaram, who was thirteen when she wrote it. It is honest about fear: when the Council is asked to stand beside Lily, not one of them does, and they are not made into villains for it. The moon at the end is not made whole. It is pieced together, still shifting from night to night, and that unevenness is the point.