The Knot Keeper of Cajamarca

His father taught him to count what was there. The conquest will force him to decide what must remain.

Cajamarca, 1532. Seventeen-year-old Mayu is learning to keep the records of the Inca Empire through quipus: knotted cords that account for harvests, storehouses, and the labor of entire communities. Beside the numbers live his father's stories-and the comforting belief that careful records can protect the people behind them.

Then foreign soldiers enter the square.

Separated from his father amid the violence, Mayu escapes with a bundle of quipus. When the conquerors discover what he can read, his knowledge becomes a means of finding supplies, wealth, and people to serve them. Cooperation offers the possibility of bringing his father home. Every answer may expose another family to harm.

But the records also hold truths Mayu once overlooked: failed harvests concealed by completed deliveries, demands that outlasted endurance, and suffering under the rulers he was taught to trust.

As the soldiers demand the remaining accounts, Mayu must choose what to surrender, what to destroy, and what deserves to survive.

The Knot Keeper of Cajamarca is an intimate historical novel about family loyalty, cultural survival, and the responsibility of preserving a past that refuses to offer easy comfort.