"Every thread bears the mark of its maker. And every maker demands a reckoning."
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Ilsbeth woke in darkness. The pile of gold coins at her feet had cooled overnight, but they still gleamed like watching eyes. The candle had guttered to black wax. The walls of the king's chamber seemed to pulse, as though the stones themselves soaked up her terror and let it drip back at a measured pace.
She rose unsteadily, her skirts rustling like dry leaves. Her fingers brushed the coins. They were cold to the touch, but the faint hum of their power thrummed through her veins, an unnatural warmth that whispered of promises broken and bargains paid in blood.
A knock sounded at the door, slow and patient. Three light taps. Like fingernails tracing a rune. She swallowed, heart pounding so loudly she feared it might shatter the quiet.
"Enter," she whispered.
The door swung inward without a sound. Rumpelstiltskin stood there, exactly as she had seen him once before in the cramped mill. Small, twisted, impossibly old. But tonight he wore a coat of woven shadows, seams glinting with tiny golden teeth, and his eyes flickered amber like dying embers.
"Back so soon?" His voice was dry as bones, a rasp that sliced the air.
Ilsbeth backed away. The room seemed smaller. The gold at her feet now looked like sickly fungus, sponging her strength. She pressed trembling hands to her mouth, trying to call out, but no sound came.
Rumpelstiltskin smiled. "You spun well," he said. "But spinning gold twice never hastens the bride." He cocked his head. "The king grows restless."
She forced her voice out: "You said three nights."
He stepped closer. Each footfall was a sigh of ancient sorrow. Each shadow he cast seemed alive, flickering at the edges like living runes. "Three nights, yes. And on the third, you give what was promised."
Her skin prickled. She remembered the bargain's price: her firstborn. A promise sealed by trickery, made in desperation, spoken in blood. But she had thought to cheat it by bearing only sons, unless a daughter slipped through. She had not considered that this faceless creature might not care which child.
"I have no child," she managed. "I am not yet wed."
His grin widened, a crescent of razor-lips. "Let us arrange that, shall we?"
He reached into his coat and produced a single golden thread. The thread glowed faintly, as though lit from within by a dying star. He dangled it before her eyes. "This will bind the king's heart to yours. Spin it three times, and he will wed you upon sunrise."
Ilsbeth recoiled. The thread writhed like a living snake. "What is this?"
"A gift," he whispered. "For your trouble. You earned it."
She would have refused, but the hunger in her belly, now unfamiliar and gnawing, wanted it. Her fingertips brushed the thread. It prickled. She remembered the parting gift from the last bargain: the miller's daughter's name, held captive in some dark vault. She would not give more of herself. Not again.
Rumpelstiltskin's eyes softened, but his smile never left. "Then forget our pact. Refuse me thrice, and the king will kill you for failure."
Ilsbeth trembled. The door behind her rattled. Footsteps echoed in the hallway—soldiers pacing, awaiting her fate.
She closed her eyes. The glowing thread dangled between them like a noose. She whispered, "I refuse."
He shrugged. "Very well." The thread disappeared. The room grew colder.
Before she could speak, the candle burst into flame, green and oily. The drapes caught instantly, black smoke erupting. In the reflection of the polished gold, she saw him slip away through the wall, his cackling echoing in the blaze.
She fled. The fire roared. Servants broke in, screaming. She stumbled down corridors that twisted impossibly. Staircases led into darkness. Tapestries writhed behind her like living things.
She emerged into the night courtyard just as the moon broke through the clouds. Soldiers seized her. They bound her wrists and dragged her before the king, who stood beneath a canopy of fluttering ravens, taxidermied cousins perched on gilded perches, their eyes burned out and replaced with gold dust.
The king's face was drawn. His breath smelled of copper and rot. "Why did you fail?" he demanded, voice thick with rage.
Ilsbeth swallowed. "I—I refused the creature's gift."
The king's lips peeled back. "The creature? You dare deceive me?" He turned to his guard. "Count the gold. If it has been squandered, she dies."
Ilsbeth sank to her knees. The soldiers shock-rattled the bag of coins. One by one, they spilled onto the cobbles: three piles, each the exact weight demanded, six sacks per pile. The gold glinted grotesquely. She looked at Rumpelstiltskin's gift, gone now, like a dream melted.
The king's anger drained into disappointment. "You trick me, girl, and I lose everything."
He gestured. "Take her."
As the knights seized her, a faint whisper drifted across the courtyard:
"Remember the Needleman's mark."
It was gone instantly, like a tremor of half-remembered horror.
Inside the castle's darkest dungeon, Ilsbeth sat on a bench carved from jagged bone. The air was thick with brine, like drowned dreams. Her mind reeled with fear and regret. She traced the outline of the three rings in her mind, the glyph she had glimpsed in the mill. The mark of the Needleman.
She did not know what it meant, but she felt it in her blood, like a lock tightening.
A rustle of straw. The door opened. A single torch flickered, lit by… something.
Rumpelstiltskin stepped in. He carried a battered spinning wheel, its parts scavenged from charred pews, worm-eaten oak, and human-rib spokes. It pulsed with malice.
"I see your defiance has delayed but not deterred." His voice echoed off damp walls. "Will you spin for me now?"
Ilsbeth looked away, stomach twisting. "I want my name back."
He cocked his head. "Ah, yes. Your name, the first promise. It lies in a wallet of skin, in the vault where I keep what I collect." He stepped closer. "But you want the key. I can offer you that, at a price."
Her pulse hammered. "What price?"
He set the wheel on the floor. It spun of its own accord, gathering straw into the central shaft. "Three secrets," he said. "Tell me three truths, and I will return your name."
Ilsbeth swallowed her dread. She searched his face, if that twisted mask could be called a face, for any hint of mercy. Saw only ancient patience.
"First secret," she whispered, "I am the false bride."
Rumpelstiltskin nodded. Straw wove into gold threads around the wheel.
"Second?"
She hesitated, then said, "I stole my sister's hope."
The threads snapped. The wheel hissed. Steam rose.
"Final secret," he murmured.
She clenched her fists, knuckles cracking. "I have already bled my child into your darkness."
The wheel's spinning slowed. Gold dust settled on the dungeon floor. A single goldseed rolled free, fell at her feet. It cracked open to reveal a scrap of parchment: her name, scrawled in crimson.
Rumpelstiltskin reached down, pinched the parchment. "Your debt is paid."
He froze. His grin faltered. He looked past her. The shadows on the wall quivered.
Something moved behind the door.
He hissed, "No."
Ilsbeth saw for the first time: behind him, the Dungeon's walls bore hidden doors. All three opened simultaneously, revealing narrow corridors lit by phosphorescent moss. Beyond each lay a shape, hunched and bound, eyes shining.
They were the miller's daughters, past victims, past bargains, collection of the Needleman's toll. Each held a strung tapestry: fragments of their lives before the wheel, a childhood memory, a stolen kiss, a whispered lullaby—stitched in silver thread.
Ilsbeth stepped back. Fear pulled her to her knees. The child in her womb cried, as though sensing the gathering. She clutched her belly. She remembered the bargain: her firstborn, promised in ignorance. She realized then that her bargains were not with Rumpelstiltskin alone, but with something older, something woven into the kingdom itself. The marks in the stones, the creaks in the floor, the loops of the king's tapestries, all spoke of an ancient loom pulling the world into its design.
Rumpelstiltskin's shoulders sagged. He whirled on her. "You've taken my gifts and spat in my face." His voice cracked. "You cannot escape me."
The daughters stirred as one and began to sing. Their voices wove a dirge in a language older than memory. The air congealed, thickening like custard, trapping heat. Straw from the spinning wheel burst into flame, golden sparks blazing trails across the cold stones.
Ilsbeth felt something break open in her chest, like an egg cracking. She rose, voice echoing with steel. "I give you another secret."
He paused. The daughters' song faltered.
"I know your true name."
Rumpelstiltskin's grin froze. The strands of shadow coat unraveled, revealing sinew and thread. The spinning wheel stuttered, its gold glow dimming.
Ilsbeth took a trembling breath. "He is called The Needleman."
The word cut through the dungeon like a blade. A collective gasp: the daughters, Rumpelstiltskin, the very stones. The candles shuddered.
He screamed. Not a man's scream. Something wet and rasping, echoing in every corridor and every locked room in the castle.
The wheel collapsed inward, burying itself in splinters. The straw blackened, snapped. The corridors closed. Walls sealed with bone and mortar.
When Ilse, no, Ilsbeth, blinked, she was alone. The rusted bars of the cell door had melted away. The torch had burned itself out.
She sank to the floor, chest heaving. In her hand, she still clutched the golden scrap with her name.
A whisper: "Find the thread. Free the tapestry. Begin again."
She didn't know who spoke, only that it was neither Rumpelstiltskin nor the king. It was a voice older, gentler, echoing from some forgotten loom.
Ilsbeth rose. She tucked the name into her bodice and walked out of the dungeon. Each step she took left golden footprints that faded at dawn.
Above her, the castle loomed, tapestry-strewn and broken, singing of bargains and blood.
And somewhere, at the very foundation of stone and mortar, a needle quivered, waiting for its master's return.