I take another, and pour myself a helping of tea too. I bite into a sugar sweet when I’m done, the syrup dripping down my chin. I catch it with my thumb and lick each of my fingers in delight. A few minutes, maybe more, pass, until I’m interrupted by a very determined miaow.

I jump, and my cup of tea clatters to the floor. But when I look back it’s on the table again, where I first found it.

Sitting in front of me, its tail wagging impatiently, is a cat with yellow eyes.

I stand up and walk towards it. As soon as I take my first step it launches itself at the back door, which stands open, and walks a few paces into the courtyard beyond.

Then it sits, looking at me determinedly again. And it glows a little brighter than everything else, the way the bracelet did. I think I’m supposed to follow it.

The cat is a grey tabby; bits of its fur are missing in places, and there’s a scar on its left ear. It looks like a stray. But the most remarkable thing about the cat is the white heart-shaped line of fur that starts in the middle of its back and winds down towards its tail.

As we make our way along the courtyard I notice the house is crumbling in places it wasn’t before. One of the windows has no glass in it any more, and I can see the staircase peeking through a great big gouge in the wall. I have to dodge pieces of rubble the way I do in Fairy Hunters whenever I approach the ruined palace.

I’m back at the swings now, the ones Aminah sat on the day she was crying. That’s when I realize this must be one of the cats that had landed on her head. I didn’t see them properly last time, but I know there were two of them.

‘Where’s your friend?’ I ask.

The cat doesn’t answer.

‘Just like Lady,’ I mutter.

The cat jumps up on to the courtyard wall, looks at me, and miaows again.

This time I know it wants me to follow because the slide is standing there in the same spot as before. I rest my hand on one of the silver branches as I climb and notice a flower has bloomed where Aminah stood. It’s bright yellow, with a little cupped section in the middle and five long petals closing round it protectively.

As soon as my feet hit the sandy ground on the other side of the wall I hear a voice.

‘What are you, some sort of assassin? I didn’t hear you at all.’

The girl from beyond the wall is staring at me now.

I soon realize it’s not me she’s looking at but Aminah, who is standing right next to me.