Every harvest, the scarecrow in the high field turns on its pole. It points one straw arm at a house, and before the snow that family packs up and leaves. They never write back. This year Wren counted the empty homes: eleven gone. Last week the scarecrow turned. Its arm now points straight at Wren's own front door. That makes them the twelfth. This morning the crows stopped singing all at once, and the field went dead quiet. Wren stands at the fence, heart pounding, and decides not to wait for the snow.

Wren doesn't go to the field. Instead they run to old Mr. Pell, the last neighbor still living nearby, and bang on his door. "You've watched this happen eleven times," Wren says. "Tell me where they all went." Mr. Pell goes pale. He pulls Wren inside and locks the door behind them.

Mr. Pell hands Wren a yellowed notebook. "I wrote down every family it took, and the date. There's a pattern. It always points the morning the crows go quiet, and it can be stopped, but only before sundown that same day." Wren grips the book. The crows went quiet an hour ago.

Wren reads fast. The notebook says: bring the scarecrow something it lost, before sundown. On the last page is a pressed, dried sunflower and the words, "This was the first thing it ever guarded. Give it back." Wren grabs the flower and runs for the field, sun already sinking low.