Tobias opens his fingers. The gold thread slips free, curling upward into the cold air like smoke before it dissolves into the quilt of stories. Without it the pull north vanishes — and the tower below rushes toward him, or he toward it, distance collapsing the way it does in dreams. The bark fairy clings to his collar as they fall, her violet eyes bright with something between alarm and delight. The dark tower grows from a thumbnail smudge to a thing of black stone, older than it looks, wound round with ivy gone grey in winter. The lit window is close now — close enough to see the flame lean sideways behind the glass as if it noticed him coming. Tobias reaches out and catches the sill. His boots find a narrow ledge. The candle waits, and something behind it stirs.