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infinitesimally, its grin stretching. It flexed its hands in black gloves, and Kami heard tiny wooden pieces click inside the leather. Rob Lynburn and his sorcerers had made all these creatures come to some semblance of life. Kami had known as much already. But this scarecrow was specifically designed to last longer, to be more capable of hurting her.
    It was horrible that there were lights on in the Kenns’ house. She wondered how many people were awake in the other houses along this lane, knowing nothing or hiding in fear, or standing at the windows watching the chaos they had created.
    A hand touched the back of Kami’s neck, so terribly light, like a glove filled with nothing but air. Kami spun, trying to keep both scarecrows in her line of sight and jabbing her branch at the new one.
    It was the scarecrow in the pink sun hat. Kami felt a little betrayed.
    She hit it and the branch caught on the ruffled material of the scarecrow’s dress. Kami stabbed the branch in deeper and then yanked it out, ripping the scarecrow in two.
    The Kenns’ scarecrow grabbed at her arm, its grasp firmer than the other scarecrow’s, feeling slick and strangling-strong on the bare skin of her wrist. Kami wrenched away and saw that there were other scarecrows very close now. One with a little whittled wooden face, its nose a knot in bark, was suddenly at the Kenns’ scarecrow’s side like a henchman.
    A couple of houses down, there was a dark shape lying splayed in the grass. Kami felt her stomach turn, cold and sick, as she realized it was a scarecrow so badly made it could not stand.
    It was crawling to get her, on its belly like a snake.
    Kami dived for the scarecrow with the wooden face. The Kenns’ scarecrow crashed into her, heavier than a scarecrow should have been, as if it had a wooden skeleton buried underneath its straw, and caught her off-balance.
    Kami fell heavily onto her side, elbow catching the edge of the pavement. The Kenn scarecrow’s leather shoe slammed down toward her face. Kami rolled to avoid it, and ended up flat on her back in the wet grass of the Kenns’ garden. The scarecrow’s waxy face and living marble eyes glistened above her, impassive and terrible, and Kami lifted her branch in both hands to ward it off.
    In the black shadow of the church spire, light was born. First an orange glint ran along the dark wood of her branch; then Kami caught the sharp smell of smoke and heard a crackle nothing like the sound of straw.
    Kami kept tight hold of her branch as light raced along it, sparking between the forked ends, and watched it burst into burning life. By the sudden light of fire, she saw there was someone with her in Shadowchurch Lane.
    Jared Lynburn, one of the sorcerers. Rob Lynburn’s nephew, the real boy she had once believed was her imaginary friend.
    He was standing back, arms crossed over his chest, watching her. His face was mostly shadowed but the stark line of the scar on his face was white as moonlight, firelight catching the sleeping gold in his dark-blond hair and setting twin lights burning in his pale eyes.
    The boy who used to live in her head.
    But not anymore.
    Kami lifted herself onto her unhurt elbow and plunged the burning branch into the Kenn scarecrow’s body. Its coat caught alight, and Kami scrambled to her feet as it scrabbled at the branch with its leather gloves. She shoved the branch into its straw breast and watched it burn from the inside out.
    She was not surprised when she looked for the scarecrow with the wooden face and saw its face already a charred ruin. She was surprised when she looked across the street and Jared was gone, twining shadows and moonlight where he had stood.
    Firelight burst in the corner of her eye. Kami turned and looked down the street. There he was, a shadow passing through forms bright with burning. Some of the scarecrows writhed as they burned in a ghastly parody of a dance. Jared stopped at the garden where the ill-made scarecrow lay, a