He stood where the front door had been. Now, there was just an entrance into a jungle. Wet vines and rubbery leaves curled around the doorframe, the foliage inside growing as he watched. A damp heat emanated from everything. He touched the trunk of a plant that twisted and turned – he could follow it only so far in the mess that was once a hallway. His fingers met solid, slick bark. For a heartbeat he stood still and silent; that was how long it took for him to accept what he was seeing was real, and not another of his visions. He pushed his way inside the Eder house, which now held a vast jungle. Though he’d never been to the far south, he felt sure these were plants and trees of that land. Of Olesca’s home.

Christophor looked up. Between plate-like leaves and fronds he saw swirling clouds. A crack of thunder urged him on, but the going was slow. The ground beneath him was uneven and marshy. Every step had to be made with care and calculation. The jungle fought him. Many plants were inexplicably sharp, with edges honed like cutthroat razors. He quickly learned to spot how they caught the scant light; though not quickly enough to save his coat sleeves, which were slashed all over. Ducking under a vine, he almost impaled himself on a plant that resembled a nest of sabres.

But it was the flashes of the house that unsettled Christophor most.

Wrapped in creepers that tightened as he watched, as if constricting prey, were fragments of the reality he recognised. A carved, polished banister floated in the greenery – bereft of its staircase – until it buckled under the pressure. A gilt picture frame hung high above him. Nothing remained of the canvas, instead the frame was filled, edge to edge, with violently questing branches. As he continued further into the jungle, he found the broken remains of the Eder’s piano. The keys rolled and tumbled, free from their previous constraint. He could not fight the urge to press one. Somewhere, far in the distance, he heard the chime. He shivered despite the heat.

It was then he realised the jungle itself was silent. No bird calls, no rustle of animals, not even the creak of wood or the noise of restless leaves. No sounds but his own.

Until he heard the breathing.

It was irregular and quiet, just on the edge of his hearing. But he was getting closer. With each step he took the breathing grew louder, deeper. So loud, each exhale was like the wind buffeting his face.

Then it stopped.

He was in a brief clearing in the jungle. The slick trees stretched higher and higher towards the spiral of storm clouds, and created a kind of atrium.

In the centre was Louisa Eder, night-sister to Harriet, hanging upside down.

Christophor staggered. There was no way to understand it, even after all his years. I would have fled the sight, forever, but Christophor held his ground.