He crouched down to Pooja’s level.

A crack appeared in the center of the riverbed. A single drop of water, perfectly round, rose up like a pearl. Then another. Then a trickle. Then a stream.

That night, the river sang for the first time in a thousand years.

Muthu stood up slowly, his shadow stretching long in the twilight.

“She did more than wake it,” Muthu said. “She offered it a trade. ‘Give me your breath,’ she said, ‘and I will give you my voice. You will sleep another thousand years in silence. I will carry your water to the people, but my throat will turn to stone.’”

The children fell silent. The river, their silver mother, had been shrinking for three summers. Now it was little more than a muddy thread.