No further shots followed. A tense silence fell. Maybe Zayala was trying to judge exactly where in the loft she was. Glancing around in the thin light seeping in beneath the soffits, she saw it ran the length of the house, planked for maybe half that, with several brace-beams breaking up the space.

Wada eased herself up on to the nearest brace-beam and waited, wondering what Zayala’s next move would be. Her heart was hammering inside her chest. She was drawing fast, shallow breaths. There was sweat on her forehead, despite the chill hanging around her in the dusty air.

She could hear voices below, but she couldn’t make out what was being said. She couldn’t even distinguish between Zayala and Caldwell, although one raised and piercing note was surely Caldwell crying out – in pain, maybe, or panic.

Then the voices stopped. A minute or so passed. She heard a thump from the direction of the kitchen, followed by another. Another minute of silence. Then one brief scream – and a gunshot.

Wada didn’t doubt what had happened. Caldwell was dead, executed by Zayala, who would surely now do the same to her. She lowered herself off the brace-beam and began to move along the loft, away from the hatch. She had no clear plan of escape. Was there another hatch at the other end of the house? Was there any kind of way out? She could only hope against hope.

She heard the hatch being pushed up behind her and immediately shrank down in the shelter of the large water tank she’d just passed. The light in the loft changed as the hatch opened. She saw Zayala’s bird-like shadow cast across the underside of the roof.

‘Show yourself, Wada,’ he called, speaking in Japanese. ‘I will not kill you.’

She didn’t answer. He was obviously lying. He had no intention of letting her leave the loft, let alone the house, alive. Her shoulder bag was hanging on a chair in the kitchen. She assumed he’d already inspected it and satisfied himself that it contained the kage-boshi file and the stolen Emergence documents. With that established, there was no reason to refrain from killing her.

‘Come out now from wherever you are hiding.’ His voice was too harsh for his words to be at all persuasive. She wondered if he realized that. Perhaps he didn’t care. ‘This is your only chance.’

In Wada’s mind there was no only chance. There was in truth no chance at all. She could think of no way out of the situation she was in. She was trapped. She was helpless. Death was coming for her.

‘Stay where you are, then. And take the consequences.’