A young, beast-like creature named Vru serves as an apprentice to another of his kind who is a master carver of gods. Vru lives in a world in which his kind are the dominant species and marked by their special Ghennungs—leech-like creatures they earn and carry to contain their memory for them. Vru is poor and only has three, but his master is wealthy and has sixteen. Vru and the other god-worshippers are at war against the Godless, those of their kind who worship no gods and have no Ghennungs. One day his master tasks him with carving a new god out of green stone. Vru carves the god Embracing-The-New, free from Ghennungs and poised to reach for one upon the ground. Before the big reveal, and without Vru's knowledge, his master recarves the statue to show a god with seventeen Ghennungs, must to Vru's dismay. For Vru knows that when his master dies, he will inherit his master's Ghennungs, and with them his overbearing personality and values. Vru will essentially become a slave to the memory of his master. But Vru knows the god he carved was true. As punishment for not conforming to the wants of his society, they strip him of his Ghennungs and release him to the wild. The story ends as Vru, now more beast than person, and with little self-awareness or memory, heads into the forest to search for something he can hunt.