All of a sudden he was running, struggling to get his feet under him, caroming off the kitchen doorway and out towards the main stairs. Alice was caught for a moment in stunned surprise, then started running herself, back up the servants’ stairs, heedless of the creaking. He made it to her door only a few seconds before she arrived.

Finding the door slightly open, he flung it ajar, and stared wide-eyed at the empty room. His expression, bathed in the glow of her electric desk lamp, was the most terrifying thing Alice had ever seen.

She hurried to his side and grabbed his arm. ‘Father! Is something wrong?’

‘You—’ He gestured weakly at her empty room, then down at her. ‘I thought—’

‘I was studying,’ Alice said, ‘and I got up for a moment. I’m sorry if I startled you.’

All at once his fierceness melted, and he wrapped his arms around her in a hug so tight, he lifted her off the ground.

‘Alice,’ he said, his scratchy cheek pressed against her forehead. ‘Alice.’

‘I’m here, Father.’ She squirmed until she worked her own arms free, then put them around him as far as they would go.

‘It’ll be all right,’ he said. She wasn’t sure if he was talking to himself or not. ‘Everything is going to be all right.’

‘Of course it is,’ she said.

When he let go, there was something new in his face, a strange, wild determination so far out of the ordinary that it made Alice feel scared and proud of him, both at once. Her set her down gently, put his hands on her shoulders, and looked her in the eye.

‘I love you,’ he said. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

Alice felt herself blushing. ‘Of course.’

His eyes were already miles away. He patted her shoulder, absently, and then got up and hurried towards his study. Alice looked after him, wondering about the decision she’d seen in his eyes.

Then, because she was a girl who followed the rules, she went back into her room and went to bed.

The next morning, everything seemed so normal that Alice almost thought she’d dreamed the whole thing. Almost, but not quite.

She woke up in her familiar bed, under her warm, familiar quilt with its frayed edge. Her room was just her familiar room, with the heavy oak wardrobe in one corner and the framed picture of her grandmother looking down benevolently.

There was no elf sitting on her desk, and her books were just where she’d left them the night before. No troll in the heavy wooden chest at the foot of the bed, only the winter quilts and an ancient pair of stuffed rabbits she couldn’t quite bear to throw away. She even, feeling intensely self-conscious, lifted the bed valence and looked underneath, but there was no dragon there, only a thick layer of dust.