And this is how, with cold metal that was not cold metal, with blood-red thread, and with salt, Yehuda Leib and the Nameless Girl came to enter the House of Death.

—

The Rebbe of Zubinsk lay motionless in his bed, neither awake nor asleep, prayers flying all around him like a thick flock of starlings.

For nearly two hours the first night, the Hasidim prayed, cycling through psalm after psalm. They were all of them terribly moved: worried, impassioned, heartsick.

But it is very hard work to pray with all one’s might, and mortal men tire easily. Presently, the group flagged, and one by one they departed for home and bed.

But not all of them.

One of their number, a stranger in black clothing, blacker than the night, blacker than the darkness hidden inside your eyes, remained behind. He had not prayed in many thousands of years, but as soon as his mouth began to shape the words, his eyes drifted shut, and he did not stop.

In the gray light of morning, when the Hasidim returned, they found the dark stranger precisely where they had left him, praying for the Rebbe’s recovery with unwavering fervor.

All day he prayed, enveloped by an ever-changing crowd of Hasidim. He did not stop once—not to sit, not to eat, not to rest. By the time the afternoon came around, rumors had begun to circulate: Was he another holy Rebbe from a faraway town? Was he Elijah the Prophet come to advocate for the Rebbe’s recovery?

Darkness began to fall once more. A large assembly of Hasidim had grown up around the stranger like twining ivy on the tidy trellis of his psalms, and so fervently did they pray now that it was a short time before someone noticed that the Rebbe was stirring in his bed.

An excited murmur rippled through the crowd, breaking the Hasidim off from their psalms.

Only the voice of the dark stranger chanted on, until, looking up, he saw the open eyes of the Rebbe staring directly at him.

Slowly, the Rebbe raised a gnarled finger to point at the stranger.

“You,” said the Rebbe. “You should not be here.”

All eyes turned to the stranger, who began to sputter with tearful regret.

“No,” said the Rebbe. “You neglect your duty. They have breached your walls. You must go.”

Again, the dark stranger fought to object, but before he could manage a word, the Rebbe sat up in bed and bellowed “Go!” with all his might.

The word having passed his lips, the Rebbe collapsed into his pillows.

With a gasp, the crowd of Hasidim rushed forward.

In the mad press, no one noticed that the dark stranger was somehow gone without having taken a single step.

The Rebbe was dead.

Chapter Eighteen: The Gilgul

Each of us crosses the threshold of the House of Death eventually, and each of us goes alone.