Scarecrow

he was just a normal scarecrow, or so everyone thought. one day the wind blew him off his stakes, and he broke, and the farmers noticed something very odd. the torn sackcloth way full of hay, and feathers, and... bones. too small to be draconic- vertebrae, ribs, and the tiny skulls of rodents and birds. they left him on the ground where he fell, but when they returned the next day to haul him off, they found him back up on his post, his tears stitched back up. they thought maybe it was a dream, a shared hallucination, but below his dangling feet lay one single rat skull.

his field is long abandoned, the corn withered and brown. yet it is still full of life- crows and sparrows, rats and mice. the earth churns with the activity of moles and worms. and at the very center, he sits up on his post, a stitched smile on his face. everyone says it's haunted, of course. sometimes folks visit, to see if it's true. they return shaken, but no proof, of course- just stories of button eyes watching them and something moving through the dead crops.