In our village, kids grow up fast. By six, you’re checking fences. By eight, you’re shearing wool. And by ten, you’re expected to move the flock without losing half of them in a ditch.

So when my younger brother Nico begged to take the sheep out by himself, Mama finally gave in—mostly just to stop his fussing. “One hour,” she warned, pointing a stern finger. “And don’t go past the ridge.”

He didn’t return for almost two.

When I finally saw him coming back, he looked like he’d just won a prize. Every sheep followed him obediently, like he was some tiny shepherd king with a stick and muddy boots.

But then I counted.

Fifty-four.

We only have fifty-three.

At first, I thought I’d made a mistake. But I know our flock like family. I’ve been working with them since I was twelve. I know each face, every mark. And one sheep—the one with the torn ear and a strange yellow tag—wasn’t ours.

Nico said he found her by the stream. She just started following him. Thought maybe she “belonged to the mountain.”

But we don’t have any neighbors with sheep past the ridge.

When Papa read the tag, something changed in his face. He went quiet. Pale.

He gently told me to take Nico inside. But as I turned to go, I heard him whisper to Mama, “That’s impossible. That farm burned down five years ago.”

That night, I couldn’t sleep.

I crept down the hall and found them in the kitchen. Papa was digging through an old wooden box we weren’t allowed to touch—full of old papers, charred maps, and faded photographs.

Mama sat silently, clutching a chipped mug like it was the only thing keeping her grounded.

“She shouldn’t be here,” Papa whispered. “That entire flock was lost in the fire. So was their boy.”

The boy?

The next morning, Papa said we had to return the sheep.

“But where?” I asked. “That place is gone.”

“The land’s still there,” he said softly. “And sometimes, the land remembers.”

We loaded the extra ewe into the trailer. She didn’t resist. She just looked at Nico like she understood.

The ridge seemed steeper than I remembered.