RagPies - endlessm/threadbare GitHub Wiki

"Shoo! Go on, shoo, you ragged rascal! ...Oh, very well. I'll come and find it." -- A Frays End washerwoman, to a RagPie

RagPies are mischievous birds made entirely of rags. They are found all over Threadbare, and most of all in its busiest towns, where they steal buttons, ribbons, odd socks and anything left out on a washing line. Threadlings call them pests, shoo them off every windowsill, and love them anyway, because a stolen tea towel is very often the beginning of an adventure.

At a Glance
Core Thread Imagination, Memory and Spirit
Found All over Threadbare, most of all in Frays End, LinenVille and WeaveWater
A group is called A mischief
Known for Stealing buttons and washing, and heralding the arrival of Maud MendWell's cottage

Appearance

A RagPie looks very much like a magpie, if a magpie had been put together from the bottom of a rag bag. Its feathers are strips of cloth, mostly black and white, cut from old aprons, shirt tails and dusters, with a flash of blue-green at the wing where a scrap of petticoat silk catches the light. Its long tail is a trail of ribbon ends that flutters behind it like bunting. Its eyes are two black boot buttons, and every RagPie insists it found them fair and square.

A RagPie's chatter sounds exactly like a tin of buttons being shaken, which is usually the last thing a Threadling hears before something goes missing.

Light Fingers

RagPies love anything that shines, and buttons most of all. They also steal washing, rags, ribbons and apron strings, and there is a good reason for it: a RagPie's feathers wear threadbare over time, and the only way to replace them is with fresh cloth. Every odd sock in Threadbare is, in one sense, a feather waiting to happen.

What makes RagPies such a nuisance is that they do not choose. A silver thimble and a darned sock are equal treasure to a RagPie. They steal whatever is nearest, brightest or least carefully pegged, and fly off with it before anyone can say "my good tea towel!"

A Mischief of RagPies

A gathering of RagPies is called a mischief, and a mischief on the rooftops is something every Threadling notices. In Frays End they say that when a mischief gathers, someone is about to lose something, and someone else is about to find something, and it is not always clear which of the two is the luckier.

RagPie Nests

RagPies build their nests high up, in chimney pots, bell towers, the tops of the mill wheels in WeaveWater and the rigging of the ships in Hem Harbour. Each nest is woven from stolen washing (stockings, tea towels, ribbons and the occasional pair of long johns) and studded all over with buttons, so that on a sunny day it glitters like a crown.

Most Threadlings who lose something to a RagPie end up sending a Patchling up after it, and most Patchlings come back down with more than they went up for. A RagPie nest never holds only your things. Tucked between your sock and your button there might be a key that opens nothing in town, a letter addressed to someone no one has heard of, or a scrap of map with a cross on it. More than one grand adventure in Threadbare began with a Patchling climbing a chimney to fetch back a tea towel.

Children of All Three Threads

Unlike most creatures, RagPies belong to all three Core Threads at once, because what they take, they take from all three.

  • Imagination. A stolen sock leaves a question behind: what if I wore odd socks today? A missing blue button asks: what if I sewed on a pink one instead? Would anyone notice? Every RagPie theft is a small invitation to what if.
  • Memory. When something goes missing, a Threadling feels it. Not the thing itself, but the shape of where it used to be, the little tug of something that belongs and isn't there. That feeling is what sends them looking.
  • Spirit. And then there is the chase. Following a RagPie across the rooftops, finding the nest, and never quite knowing what else will be waiting in it. That is why the Threadlings of Frays End shoo RagPies away with a laugh rather than a scowl. If a RagPie gets away with your tea towel, you have to go looking for it, and who knows where that will lead.

RagPies and Maud MendWell

RagPies gather wherever Maud MendWell's cottage is about to appear. Those who call on Maud leave a single shiny button of indigo or azure on her step, and there is nothing a RagPie likes better than a doorstep full of buttons with no one watching them. A mending house is never short of cloth and loose thread either. Maud's wren, Weft, chases them off the washing line, but has never managed to keep them off the roof.

No one knows how RagPies know where the cottage will turn up next, but they always seem to get there first. Threadlings have learned that when a mischief settles on the rooftops of a quiet lane, it is worth putting the kettle on, because a mender is on the way. On most mornings after the cottage arrives, a single RagPie can be found sitting on its chimney pot, keeping watch over the buttons.

RagPies and Bree ButtonBoon

Bree ButtonBoon is fond of RagPies, which most of Frays End finds very suspicious in a button trader. To Bree, a button taken by a RagPie always has a story, because somebody missed it, and somebody went looking. She keeps such buttons in a pocket of their own, deep in the lining of her coat, which she calls the Mischief.

RagPies and the Void

Near the Void, RagPies lose interest in shiny things. Their feathers fade to grey, their button eyes go dull, and the chatter stops. They sit on the rooftops of the border towns without stealing a single thing.

That is why a town with no RagPies stealing its washing is a bad sign, not a good one. The Threadlings of the Fraying count their socks every morning, and are glad to find one missing. A single bright button left out on a windowsill is said to be enough to bring a grey RagPie back to its colours, and back to its mischief.

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