Another step is taken but closer now, and with a soft blast of air that silences the entirety of the vicinity. Everything freezes. The climbing spider holds perfectly static. The one on the web holding the now dead dragonfly in front does the same. Silence everywhere. Even the trapped dragonflies go silent and unmoving. Fear grows. Something bad this way comes. Something these creatures know and fear. Time pauses. The continental drift ceases. The earth stops spinning. Nothing moves. Another snort of air. Deep and hungry, then it bursts into action, running towards them with pounding feet that no longer remain stealthy.

They run. They run without warning or words needed, but simply breaking from static to all-out sprinting as they charge frantic through the undergrowth.

Harry turns to look over his shoulder and stops dead to stare back with a grin stretching across his face. ‘Slow down,’ he calls out softly to the other two still blundering on. Safa looks back, seeing Harry staring, and reaches out to touch Ben’s arm. Bringing him to a gradual stop. They look back at Harry, Safa breathing easily while Ben gulps for air with his hands on his knees and the binoculars hanging from his neck.

‘What is it?’ Safa calls back softly.

‘Come and look,’ Harry whispers, motioning for them to go back. They go carefully, picking a quiet route back to Harry, who is grinning widely.

Every image they have ever seen of bipedal dinosaurs is right there, with two strong back legs holding it upright, a long tail for balance and a head like a lizard with two cunning eyes. Lizard-like but less reptile and more animal with two forearms stunted but fingered with digits that twitch.

‘Oh my God,’ Safa mouths in delight. ‘He’s gorgeous.’

The dinosaur is tiny. Standing no higher than Safa’s waist as it stops beneath the dragonflies caught in the web.