In Hajtovka, behind the grove of trees along the Poprad river, there’s a large limestone rock. Babies grow underneath it like earthworms and wriggle out. Babas, out gathering mushrooms, find them and take them to the village’s mothers.

A young wife lost her baby, went mourning-mad. She sat at the rock until moss tunnelled into her ears and quail nested in her skirts, waiting for her baby to wriggle back out.