Chapter 5: The Spool Market

Lina first heard the market before she saw it.

It wasn’t the clamor of shouting vendors or the jangling of tills, but something softer, stranger—like laughter tucked into wicker baskets, the shuffle of velvet paws brushing against cobbles, and the faint pop! of a misfired spell thread snapping against the air.

She crested the hill above the glade where the market sprawled, and her breath caught.

Color.

Everywhere.

The market bloomed like a garden in riotous patchwork. Stalls unfolded beneath awnings of candy stripes and dandelion spots; others shimmered as though the canvas itself were stitched from changing seasons. Lanterns drifted lazily above the winding paths, glowing like sleepy fireflies and casting golden light on the bustle below.

And the villagers—oh, the villagers.

A badger in a floral bonnet haggled with a hedgehog over a basket of button mushrooms. A trio of frogs in suspenders rattled spoons in jaunty rhythm beside a stall selling embroidery floss that glowed faintly as though it still remembered the magic stitched into it. Nearby, a family of beetles busied themselves with a postal cart, each scroll tied neatly to their backs with thread as they scuttled to and fro.

It was noisy, busy, alive—but no one even looked twice at Lina.

For the first time in a long while, she felt like just another stitch in the pattern.

🧶

Thimblewick led her through the stalls with the ease of someone who had walked these paths a hundred times before. His whiskers twitched proudly, like a conductor guiding an orchestra of chaos.

“That’s Sprig’s Threadery,” he said, pointing with a paw toward a stall draped in glittering skeins. “Best shimmer-yarns this side of the Laced Woods. Don’t touch the mint-spun unless you fancy your voice echoing in rhymes for a week.”

Lina blinked at a jar labeled Jubilant Jute. It rattled on its shelf as she passed, and—impossibly—giggled.

“Over there’s Cobbler Cobb,” Thimblewick continued, steering her past a stall stacked with boots, belts, and curious contraptions. “Practical side of things. Storm-proof sock garters, if you can believe it.”

A puffin in a velvet cloak haggled nearby, trading hand-beaded feathers with a mole who wore not one but two monocles, stacked absurdly over his beady eyes. The puffin bobbed his head solemnly, as though this were the most serious of transactions.

Lina’s lips curved into a smile before she even realized it. “I love it,” she whispered, wonder sparking through her chest like a lantern being lit.

“Of course you do,” Thimblewick replied, his tone matter-of-fact, almost smug. “It’s not built to impress. It’s built to belong.”

🧵

They paused at a booth no larger than a wardrobe, its shelves cluttered with spools, jars, and scraps of fabric that looked like they’d been salvaged from dreams. Behind the counter sat a red squirrel with fur tufted and frayed, like a ball of well-loved yarn.

“Lina,” Thimblewick announced, “meet Mimble.”

The squirrel’s entire face lit up. “You’re the new tailor!” she squeaked, practically vibrating. “We’ve all been watching the cloak! It tugged left twice this morning, which definitely means it’s hungry—either for more patches, or for some kind of emotional resolution.”

Lina blinked, half-amused, half-overwhelmed. “I… think I’m just trying not to sew my thumb to the table.”

“Perfect. That’s the spirit.” Mimble produced a tiny glass jar from beneath the counter and pressed it into Lina’s hands. “Pocket lint. Yours to keep. For emergencies.”

Lina stared at the offering, confused but oddly touched. “Thank you…?”

“Never underestimate lint,” Mimble said with such gravity it left no room for doubt.

From behind a barrel of velvet beetle buttons, another head popped up—a small hedgehog with spectacles far too large for his face.

“This is my brother Moss,” Mimble added. “He’s the quiet twin. Knits things that make you cry—in a good way.”

Moss shuffled forward and held out a neatly folded square of lavender yarn. Lina accepted it, bringing it hesitantly to her nose. The scent unfurled instantly, rain-soaked and familiar, and before she could stop herself, her eyes blurred with sudden tears. Her grandmother’s flat. The damp wood after summer storms. Home.

She laughed through the lump in her throat. “Why did you do that?”

Moss only shrugged, bashful, but his smile was warm enough to stitch the ache closed again.

“You’ll get used to him,” Mimble said proudly. “He’s basically a sentient hug.”

For a moment, surrounded by lantern-light and laughter, with a jar of lint in one hand and lavender in the other, Lina felt it—the subtle pull of threads weaving her into the pattern of Tetherwood. Not as an outsider, but as someone meant to be here.

🧵

The rest of the morning passed in a blur: thread samples that shimmered like bottled rainbows, tea tastings that left her tongue buzzing with honey and peppermint, and a very confusing stop at a booth labeled Tinctures & Textiles, where Lina accidentally sat on a cushion of compressive compression and didn’t re-inflate for ten whole minutes.

By midday, she was beginning to feel at home in the chaos—until the cloak tugged again.

Once.

Twice.

This time, toward the south side of the market.

She followed.

There, tucked between a mirror-polishing mole and a fortune-sewing fox, stood a stall with no name. No trinkets or jars cluttered its shelves. Only a single bolt of indigo fabric stretched across the table. Behind it hovered a figure—a woman woven entirely of shimmering thread, her outline wavering as though caught between stitches.

She smiled.

“Lina,” she said.

Lina froze. “How do you—?”

But the woman was already unraveling, her voice scattering into the breeze like frayed silk.

The indigo cloth remained.

Lina reached out, fingertips brushing the fabric. At once, a flash struck her vision:

A hand—hers?—threading a needle beneath a sky scattered with stars. The certainty of work long practiced. The quiet of midnight belonging.

And then—nothing.

When her sight cleared, Thimblewick was at her side, his whiskers still but his eyes watchful. For once, his voice carried no hint of mischief.

“Market’s full of echoes,” he said softly. “Sometimes things come through from other seams.”

Her throat tightened. “Was that—Eliwyn?”

Thimblewick shook his head, slow, deliberate. “A remnant, maybe. A hint. Not all memories come from your own thread.”

Lina held the indigo cloth tighter, its weight heavy as mystery in her hands.

🧵

Back at the cottage that evening, Lina unfastened her cloak and spread it across the table. The day’s treasures waited beside her: the indigo scrap, smooth and cool as twilight, and the tiny jar of lint, absurd and precious in equal measure.

Carefully, she threaded her needle and stitched a new pocket into the lining—just big enough to hold both. Her fingers fumbled once or twice, pricking her thumb, but the work steadied her. Each stitch felt like planting a root.

It wasn’t magical.

Not yet.

But somehow, it felt like a future waiting to happen, a promise she couldn’t quite name.

When at last she hung the cloak for the night, the fabric swayed gently, as though breathing. A low hum slipped through the room, soft as a lullaby—thread whispering to thread.

And in that hushed vibration, she heard it: echoes of laughter, the murmur of paws on cobbles, the market’s chorus woven into her walls.

All saying the same thing, over and over.

You belong here.


🧵End of Chapter 5