With a pained groan, the woman manoeuvred a large piece of timber and dislodged a slab of masonry in the process. Pain shot along one of Amelia’s legs, making her cry out. Everything went black, until the shining light found her again. Minutes may have elapsed, or only seconds. Amelia couldn’t tell.

‘I need you to be brave now,’ the woman said. ‘Do you think you could hold this for me?’

Light came towards Amelia and a torch was pressed into her hand. It fitted inside her palm and, as she pointed it at her rescuer, she recoiled with fresh horror. The woman’s face was the colour of stone. It was as if one of the figures moulded into the ceiling had come down to save her.

Her rescuer smiled. ‘It won’t be long before you can see Evie again.’

‘I want my mum,’ Amelia replied, fighting the urge to cry.

She hurt so much, from the top of her broken head to the tip of her crushed toes. Her nose was blocked, but she could taste the smoke. The woman was framed in an orange glow, and the specks of red and yellow light floating around her looked like fireflies.

‘So, are you a dancer too?’ the woman asked, forcing Amelia’s attention away from the fire.

‘No, I want to be a director.’

The woman leant over Amelia to clear more debris, and the torch picked out a silver pendant hanging from her neck. ‘Sorry, but this might hurt a wee bit.’

As Amelia braced herself for the excruciating pain that would eclipse everything else, she focused only on the pendant as it moved back and forth. The woman heaved a piece of masonry that had been pinning down her arm and then Amelia was falling back into her imagined rabbit hole.

Rex could see the same eerie glow that had entranced Amelia. It was taking over the auditorium as he cowered against the wall. The dust had settled enough to reveal the dam of writhing bodies blocking the main exit. The crowd had shrunk, but not nearly enough, and the smell of smoke was growing stronger.

‘I want to go home,’ sobbed his granddaughter.

Rex’s wife turned to him. ‘We have to find another way out.’

She went to stand up, but Rex stopped her. ‘I’ll go,’ he insisted. He cupped her dusty face in his hand and kissed her. ‘I know I haven’t said this enough, but I love you.’

‘Don’t be getting all mushy,’ his wife said with a flicker of a smile that was snuffed out by panic when her husband moved to leave. ‘I love you too, Rex. Please, make sure you come back to us.’