Villagers

The small cast of Sculler's Cove. They leave over the course of the game — one by one, undramatically, the way real places empty: not evacuated, just subtracted. Nobody dies in a storm. They get old, or tired, or the ferry stops, and they go to a daughter on the mainland.

The design rule that ties them to the whole machine: Wren never records the person. She records the trace. A boat's absence, not the fisherman. The shutters up, not the shopkeeper. This is The Almanac Mechanic doing emotional work — a knot is a thing noticed, and what Wren can notice of a departure is only what it leaves. It's also the quietest version of Attention as love I know: you loved them; all you can keep is the shape of the gap.

The cast

Silas Kerne — the last working fisherman. Says "one more season" every season. His leaving isn't a scene of him leaving; it's the morning his boat isn't on its mooring, and then the morning after. Wren records: silas_boat_gone. The mooring buoy, riding empty. Not a word about the man.
Tam Maddock — the keeper before Wren, retired, ancient, will not leave the Head. He's the one who taught Wren the old tide-names. He goes last, or doesn't go at all — I haven't decided, and maybe Wren shouldn't get to know either. Wren records: the tide-names themselves, written into the almanac in his phrasing. She saves the calendar by saving how he said it.
Dorcas Vane — runs the shop and the post, which are the same counter. The village's actual heart. Leaves when the supply run stops coming — no supply run, no shop, no reason. Wren records: the day the shutters go up on the shop window, and the hand-lettered card that says nothing, just closed.
Nessa Ferrier — the last child on the shore. Draws in chalk on the slipway; the tide takes it every night; she draws it again every morning. Her family leaves so she can go to a school with other children in it. Wren records: one of the chalk drawings, copied into the almanac before a spring tide washes the slip. The only knot in the book that's a picture, not a sentence.
Mr. Quist — lay preacher, keeps the chapel. When he goes he takes the bell — can't leave it to the damp. Wren records: the silence at the hour the bell used to ring. An entry about an absence of sound, which nearly broke the parser and is completely worth it.
Enid Roscarrow — ran the guesthouse nobody stays at anymore. Last to accept it's over. Leaves the key under the mat "in case." Wren records: the key, still under the mat, three sets later. Nobody came.

Six people and the shore they can't stay on. The trick is to make the player miss them without ever giving them a big goodbye — because that's the truth of a place like this. The goodbye isn't a scene. It's a boat that isn't there.