The dawn light seeped through the paper windows of Meridian Pavilion, gilding the edges of Lin Wan's mother's notebook. She sat cross-legged on the floor, the half-moon jade pendant warm against her palm, as she traced the first counter-pattern in the notebook: Peony Facing the Sun—stitched with moonlight silk and cinnabar threads, its root winding into a shape that matched the carving on the pendant.
"Pure joy," she muttered, repeating her mother's note. "The thread-eater can't touch pure joy."
A soft knock pulled her from the pages.
She tucked the notebook and pendant into a silk pouch, then opened the door. An old woman stood on the steps, her hands wrapped in bandages, her hair streaked with silver. She held a crumpled cloth bag, and her eyes—clouded with age—lit up when she saw Lin Wan.
"Are you the embroidery inheritor who mends memories?" the woman asked, her voice trembling. "They said you're at the Meridian Pavilion."
Lin Wan stepped aside to let her in. "I am. What memory do you want to mend?"
The old woman sat on the wooden bench, pulling a frayed embroidery hoop from her bag. Inside was a half-finished peony—stitched with childlike, wobbly threads. "My name is Auntie Qin. I was a (embroidery girl) with your mother, back when the Su Workshop was still busy. When I was seven, I stitched this peony with her—we stole silk threads from her mother's cabinet, and laughed so hard we spilled tea on the frame." She traced the tea stain on the hoop. "But I can't remember the sound of that laugh anymore. The thread-eater's pattern… it gnawed at it, bit by bit."
Lin Wan's breath caught. Auntie Qin knew her mother.
"Your mother once said," Auntie Qin continued, "that the best embroidery holds a piece of the stitcher's soul. This peony—my first one—holds the only pure joy I ever had. Can you get it back for me?"
Lin Wan flipped to the Peony Facing the Sun pattern in the notebook. This was the counter-pattern her mother designed for joy-filled memories. It was a sign.
"I can try," she said. "But it will cost you something. Not money—another memory. A small one."
Auntie Qin smiled. "I have plenty of old, useless memories. Take the one where I burned my first quilt. It's been a bother for years."
Lin Wan spread the hoop on her worktable, then threaded her needle with moonlight silk (she'd kept a spool from her mother's studio). She began stitching the Peony Facing the Sun pattern over Auntie Qin's wobbly threads—each stitch hummed softly, as if the silk itself recognized the joy in the memory.
Halfway through, the jade pendant in her pouch warmed.
A low hiss echoed outside the pavilion.
Lin Wan froze. She'd heard that sound before—at the Su Workshop, when the thread-eater's red threads surged.
She grabbed her bamboo needle, then pushed Auntie Qin behind the screen. "Stay here. Don't make a sound."
She stepped to the door, pushing it open a crack. A figure stood in the alley, their coat stitched with faded thread-eater patterns—weaker than the main villain, but still dangerous. They held a roll of black silk, and their eyes locked on the pavilion.
"Where is the notebook?" the figure snarled.
Lin Wan didn't answer. She slipped out of the door, her needle at the ready, and positioned herself between the figure and the pavilion. The Peony Facing the Sun pattern was still half-stitched, but she could feel its energy thrumming in her threads.
The figure lunged, black threads snaking toward her.
Lin Wan raised her needle, stitching a fragment of the Peony Facing the Sun in mid-air. Moonlight silk glowed golden, wrapping around the black threads—erasing them like ink on wet paper.
The figure yelped, stumbling back. "You have the counter-patterns. The Master will—"
Before they could finish, a frost-threaded coat flashed through the alley. Shen Yan's dagger sliced through the figure's sleeve, and the black threads unraveled in a cloud of dust. The figure fled, vanishing around the corner.
Shen Yan turned to Lin Wan, his face pale but uninjured. "You shouldn't have faced them alone."
Lin Wan's heart raced. "You're alive."
"I told you I'd find you," he said, his eyes flicking to the pavilion. "Who's inside?"
"Auntie Qin—she worked with my mother." Lin Wan stepped aside, letting him in. "She came to mend a joy-filled memory. My mother's counter-pattern worked. It stopped the thread-eater's minion."
Auntie Qin emerged from behind the screen, her eyes widening when she saw Shen Yan. "You're the boy from the frost-thread clan. Your grandmother worked with Lin Wan's mother, too—they designed counter-patterns together."
Shen Yan's jaw tightened. "You know my grandmother?"
"Your grandmother gave your mother the moonlight silk," Auntie Qin said, pointing to Lin Wan's needle. "She said it was the only thread that could hold pure joy."
Lin Wan looked at the jade pendant, then at Shen Yan. The half-moon carving—could Shen Yan have the other half?
Before she could ask, Auntie Qin pressed a small wooden box into her hands. "Your mother left this with me, years ago. She said, 'If my daughter comes looking for the peony's secret, give her this.'"
Lin Wan opened the box. Inside was a fragment of the peony screen from the Su Workshop—its carving matching the root pattern on the pendant. On the back, there was a note in her mother's handwriting: "The two halves of the moon will unlock the peony's core. Trust no one but the one who carries frost in their threads—even if their secrets burn."
Shen Yan's hand touched the inside of his coat, as if he was hiding something.
Lin Wan closed the box. The thread-eater was hunting her, her mother's legacy was tangled with the frost-thread clan, and the peony's secret was closer than ever.
But for the first time, she wasn't alone.