The Tale of the Haunted Scarecrow

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley.

Nor this lasting drought.

It felt like fire. It felt like a curse.

The last town lay in ashes. I drifted on.

In a field of clogs and withered stalks a score of scarecrows stood with skyward eyes. The hope of a storm stirred above. Dust swept in droves.

I gathered towards them. I had forgotten most of their names. I would have to keep going, sooner or later. This was the saddest lot I had seen.

Carl the Careless, as he was known, sundered himself away from the group. He reached for a pipe within his ragged overalls. With his hands he made a lee from the wind.

“Why do they call him careless?” I asked.

“I’ve always wondered the same––”

A spark fell. Carl rubbed it into the dirt. “Folks are always on the lookout for a token. It feels good to feel better. A scarecrow smoking a pipe in a field before a rain – Now, that’s a token.”

Lightning splintered. A thousand claps followed.

“Your farmer is stuck to the glass of his dusty windows as we speak,” said Carl. “He’s watching; he’s sweating; he’s begging.”

“This isn’t even his field.”

Carl flicked another fallen spark from his sleeve. The gray smoke from his pipe blended against swinging dust and gray sky. His thin shape tottered in the wind. “That’s why he’s upset the other fellow is going to get it. Only too bad it won’t rain. And if it does, it will hail.”

The storm was a tease. Up it huffed a big show and enough dust. No rain fell but for a few walloping drops here and there. One by one the crowd split away for their barns.

Carl staggered by me, a sway in his step. “They call me careless, from all the careless weeds in my hay… I reckon you can’t take the field out of a scarecrow.”

The walk away was slow and gray, and I scraped my legs into the abandoned barn where I’d be sleeping the night. Lauw lolled within the dim glimmers of the loft. I didn’t care for him, but he had found me some work. His scarecrow-mate had taken off, I had heard.

“How was the rain?” he asked.

I threw my hat down. “Hell, did you hear it?”

He chuckled.

“I got us a shift tomorrow morning,” he said. “The fields on the west side of the gulch at Stuckelfold.”

“What happened to Slimp and Glome?" I asked. "I thought they had those acres. Did they get sent packing?”

Lauw smirked. “Yelsen said a duststorm got them.”

“Aye then… leaving for less-brown fields.”

The next day the sun was scorching and my eyes lazy and listless with little to ward. After my shift I took a long drink of water and a long nap. I awoke and began towards Eldsrug Hill. The evening was late. So was the breeze as it snuggled down the fir-laden slopes. The alehall atop was doing its best within its golden glow to not look gloomy. Its barn was doing worse. Lauw swung a flagon in his hand. It reeked of rottenness and sweetness. Other scarecrows strode in from the fields of the Valley.

It was the Bramble-Eve. The eve when we came together to make merry that we were scarecrows and not brooms. A tale lurked behind the lore, something about witches and the whatnot and riding off into the night. I didn’t look too much into it, though there was an oughtness to showing up, even when one was in a new town.

Lauw lingered to me, like a stick in my side. I meant to make a few new friends. With luck I could find another scarecrow to do shifts with, as if there was any luck that there was any work. With better luck I could find a wagon train heading off to the next town. I snuck outside and kicked up some dust. The fir trees were dark beyond the alehall’s glow. The night sky was dazzling.

A small flickering red light, like a firefly, whistled along a forest path. Carl stepped out from the darkness with a lit pipe in his mouth. He wore a guitar over his shoulder. His suit sparkled with the night, as if he was one of those big ranchers from up north of here in the Yellermeed. He nodded to the ground. His hat was a shade against the glow. His shape was a shadow underneath. He lingered at the door, and he stepped inside.

I welcomed the aloneness and more of the breeze and more of the stillness. I strode along the trees about the top of the hill. I thought about walking down, leaving the uproar, leaving the chatter, leaving the put-off-for-a-day meaninglessness. I talked myself out of talking myself out, and I talked to myself some more.

I made my way inside the ale-storm. A clattering din sung through the room. Through it all I found myself back next to Lauw. We talked about work, and he talked about some easy money to be made in Thorvendal. He had a dirty sly grin. I needed another drink.

There was some apple-ale I thought I’d try, though I had never taken much to apple-ale.

I squeezed through the throng at the bar.

“Old Haggarden,” I said.

“It’ll get you sick, newbie,” said the barkeep.

“Give me a Loud Cloudy too,” I said.

I handed Lauw the Old Haggarden. He was bickering with some fellow. Someone owed someone something. I didn’t bother getting in between. A guitar, underneath a rusty croon, played in the background. I couldn’t make out the words. I wondered if it was Carl.

I sipped at my Loud Cloudy apple-ale. I’d leave after this.

A lady-scarecrow brushed up next to me. “Hello, Shuck.”

Strola was her name, if I recalled.

“What are you doing running with Lauw?” she asked.

I thought quick, but with laid-back ease. “I’ve been doing a lot of running lately – I’ll run with you, if you’d like.”

“Are you that desperate?”

“A few more,” I said. “And I’ll get there.”

“How long do you reckon to last on that dirt road?” she asked.

“I’ve breathed dust before.”

“You do know that your pal Lauw pulled a firebrand on Chaff? Outside the Sough and the Plough a few weeks ago.”

“He’s not my pal," I said. "And I don’t know a Chaff.”

“You got here too late. Chaff was Carl’s best friend for as long as I can remember.”

“Was?” I asked.

The bewailing croon of the rue of that guitar-lingering song tugged at my ears again.

“Some say he stood up to the dragon,” she said.

I snickered. “The dragon? A bit reckless.”

“Do you laugh at dragons?”

“What do you believe then?” I asked.

“Carl said Chaff got eaten by a bull. He said that’s how bad the drought’s gotten. But Carl’s a drunkard. It hit him hard.”

“I believe we’re cursed,” I said.

“You’ve taken to the Bramble-Eve. Or is that the apple-ale talking?”

My eyes glinted to her. “I have a mind to get out of this town.”

“And where do you reckon to run to?”

“Anywhere.”

“Without a goal, you’re only a drifter.” Her eyes softened and lifted and glowed. “See that painting over there? the frame hanging over the hearth? the one with the shimmering green meadows and knolls and hills? That’s Treestow. That’s where I wish to go.”

I curled a boyish grin. “Let’s be off by first light. I’ll steal a mule.”

“Treestow isn’t next door. Anything faster?”

“A dragon, if I’m bold.”

“Laugh again,” she said.

“A horse then,” I answered.

“That’s better. Carl wrote a song about stealing a horse one time, a stallion that is.”

“Careful," I said. "You might fall in love with the Careless.”

“My friend’s nodding to me over there. I’m going to see what she wants.”

“Already running away?” I asked

“With you at first light,” she answered.

I stepped outside, and I wandered towards the trees. If I didn’t stumble onto my earlier path, I would stumble down to somewhere else below.

From the shadows ahead I heard the underhanded crinkle of Lauw’s speech as he dealt with some other grifting fellow. I hitched myself back towards the light of the alehall and the laughter of the Bramble-Eve. I had a jump to my step.

I squeezed through scarecrows again and tapped some golden ale from one of the barrels.

“You ever play the Devil and the Dragon?” asked Carl. He leaned upon a barrel, staring away into the uproar, a foam-rimmed flagon in his hand.

“I don’t gamble – I’ve never had the money for it.”

“Me neither. But I need a partner for the game.” He nodded towards a bench where the game was being drawn. “It’s how you end. You don’t need much to start.”

“Where’s your guitar?” I asked. “Did you lose that already?”

“I don’t gamble my guitar.”

“I don’t gamble.”

Carl talked another someone into the game. I watched him from the bench. He stole for a further fill of his flagon. What he had won he had soon lost. I didn’t care for whatever game this was, and I was losing any aught for Carl. But I had learned that Lauw was forbidden from coming near this gambling side of the hall, so I stuck nearby.

Carl wagered away till he was down to only his hat and his suit. It wasn’t enough. He withdrew his pipe from his pocket and lit it once more. The other scarecrows flinched. Soon he was dazing out. I was too. I left with a mind to trek back to my barn. I stopped before a downhill path. I lit my own smoke. Strola clung to me upon my first strides away.

“You’re back,” I said.

“You said at first light,” she answered.

We walked along, though not upon the path I would have followed.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked.

“We’re headed to a lookout.”

“To look at what?”

“It’s on Timbel Hill," she said. "Over the Valley. Since you’re new, that isn’t the name of this hill, but the next one over. I ran up there all the time when I was little. There’s a ledge they call the Fjorm Tooth.”

She knew her way in the darkness. I let her lead me on, through the leaves, through the stickle-brush, through the falling cliffs of eaves. A dampness hung upon us, a trapped fog from a forgotten yestermorn. At the lookout ledge at Timbel Hill she took out two flasks of ale.

“With that big sky… I still feel little every time,” she said.

The night was dazzling.

I sunk into myself. The ale was a warm stream through me.

Strola stared away, wide awake.

A screech warped over the Valley. The dark shape of a witch glided in and alighted upon our ledge.

I was too befuddled to stand. Strola smiled to me. “The Bramble-Eve.”

She hopped onto the broom behind the witch.

“The fire of the dragon is not far behind,” she said with a wink. “I’ll see you in Treestow.”

I lifted my hand, maybe as a reach, maybe as a farewell wave. The witch cast a wrenching, writhing laugh. The two bolted away into the night.

I sunk back. My head spun. I drifted but not into dreams. A winged shadow raced over the Valley. It wailed and ringed back around. My nostrils itched with fire. I breathed it in. Fear swarmed upon me.

The dragon.

Again.

I did my best to stand up. I did my best to run. Smoke wrangled a blanket between me and the stars.

I was blurry of my whereabouts. If there was any path down from the ledge, it was too steep. I could only guess at the way back towards the alehall. The fire’s reek only grew stronger.

I scrambled and stumbled up the side of a saddled slope. It was my earlier hill. At the top a soaring blaze crackled ahigh, smothering astride the alehall and the barn. Screams stabbed into the night. The burning sting of the fire-breeze stirred my senses awake. I was but a scarecrow. I still dared forth.

Before the alehall my heart twisted, if I had a heart. Whoever was inside spilled their last goodbyes.

There was nothing I could do but leave and spare my own straw.

I heard a whimper, barely worthy for the ear.

A scarecrow crawled to me.

It was Carl.