Wren Kolm felt the frost before he saw it. It crept up his straw legs, and the stuffing inside him went stiff and brittle. He was a scarecrow stitched into a man's shape, with burlap skin and button eyes, and he wanted a real body more than anything. A body of warm blood that would not crack in the cold. But tonight he only had straw, and the straw was freezing. He stood staked in an open field. His post held him upright, arms spread wide. He wrenched one arm, and dry straw crackled at the joint. If he waited longer, he would snap apart at every seam. He gripped the post with stiffening fingers and pulled. Splinters bit his burlap palm. On the third heave, the wet ground let him go, and he fell face-first into the mud. Across the field, a windmill leaned against the gray sky. Its blades hung crooked and still. Its walls looked warm. Wren dragged himself toward it, one slow arm over the other. The frost chased him. He could feel it hardening his ankles into wood. Something small landed on his shoulder. He turned his head and saw a sprite no bigger than his thumb. Pale crystals grew along her arms, and her wings shed tiny flakes of ice. She smiled at him, and where her bare feet touched his burlap, the frost spread faster. "You'll be a lovely statue by morning," she said. Her voice was thin as cracking ice. Wren understood then. She was the frost itself, and she was riding him down into stillness. He could not fight her with straw hands. So he did the only thing straw does well. He let the wind take him. A gust rolled across the fen. Wren went slack and light, the way he always had, bowing to every passing wind. The gust caught his flat burlap body and skidded him across the frozen grass. The sprite shrieked and clutched his collar. He rolled once, twice, and slammed against the base of the windmill. The door hung loose on one hinge. Wren shoved inside and kicked it shut. Warmth from the old wood pressed against his frozen seams. The sprite hissed and beat at the door, but the cold could not follow him in. He lay on the plank floor and thawed. His straw softened. His fingers bent again without cracking. He was safe, and he was whole, and he was still only straw. Then he saw the coat. It hung on a peg by the stairs, stitched from uneven burlap patches, worn and layered and man-sized. Beside it, a vine climbed the wall, its petals shaped like small blue moons. They glowed faint in the dark. Wren stared at the coat and the glowing vine. Straw had saved him tonight. But straw would freeze again tomorrow. He needed more than shelter. He pulled himself upright and reached for the coat.