One autumn, a boy named Tomas disappeared from the village. He was small and fearless and had been dared by friends to hide inside the hollow at dusk and call the oldest name he knew. When the children found him, he lay underneath the tree, eyes open but empty like a basin. He could not recall the names of his mother’s stories, the rhyme that used to make him laugh; he could only hum a tune that was not from any songbook.

Day by day she left pieces of her past at the hollow. A ticket stub, a pressed flower, a lock of hair, a word she’d whispered into a pillow until the word tasted of rust. The Adnofagia took them with no clatter—only the hollow’s edges seemed to close a little tighter, as if satisfied. In exchange the village watched Marta as one watches someone who lives too near the sea: with wonder and a small, wary awe.

The first time she approached the tree she felt it—an odd hunger that was not hers but knew her by name. At the hollow’s mouth someone had tucked a photograph of a boy with a grin like summer sunlight. Marta crouched and traced her finger over the boy’s face. The bark was warm.

That night she returned to the tree and placed her trunk of remaining things at its base—not the small, safe items but the heaviest: a locket that had not been opened in years, the last letter tied with a ribbon, a child’s shoe whose pair had been lost in a river. “Take what must be taken,” she said aloud. “Make room.”

The village council met under the chestnuts and discussed whether Adnofagia was mercy or theft. Some wanted to uproot it and burn the roots. Others wanted to worship it as a saint. Marta listened and did not speak, because she had felt the hollow’s kindness and its taking. She understood both.