"A Guide on How to Repay your Vow to the Deity of Many Faces" + "Dreamweavers"

“A Guide on How to Repay Your Vow to the Deity of Many Faces” and “Dreamweavers” are two speculative fiction stories that share a throughline: the cost of making and keeping promises in worlds where supernatural or technological forces demand payment. The first is a direct, instructional narrative about a father’s quest to renew a vow to a deity to save his daughter’s life. The second is a dystopian meditation on friendship, complicity, and the seduction of digital escape as the physical world collapses. Both stories explore what people are willing to trade—memories, stories, dreams, even their own humanity—to fulfill obligations or survive.

The Mechanics of a Supernatural Vow

The first story, “A Guide on How to Repay Your Vow to the Deity of Many Faces,” is structured as a numbered list of instructions addressed directly to a grieving father. His daughter is mysteriously ill, and after his wife’s death, he discovers a letter and a red stone talisman in her wardrobe. The letter explains that their child was a “granted wish” from the deity of many faces, a “borrowed blessing” that must be renewed every five years. They are three months late, and the daughter’s illness is a reminder of the broken vow.