It is like sinking to the very depths of a dark ocean. The pressure becomes unbearable. Night-time forces us deeper into the dark ground, rasping in distress at my side. We are pressed together so tightly that our bodies and our bones begin to break and our eyes explode. Our blood is frozen to sludge and bursts out of our veins. We are crushed, bodies mangled to jagged ends of bone. The weight of everything obliterates us. We are crushed until we are no more than particles, dust. There is no more Olivia, and no more Night-time. Please, I think, it must be over now. The agony cannot go on. We must be dead. I can’t feel him anymore. But somehow I am still here.

A gleam of light ahead, like the first evening star. We struggle toward it, weeping and gasping. Somewhere, Night-time raises his head and roars. To my amazement, I feel it rumbling in my chest.

I am powerful and sleek, my great flanks heave. Where are you? I say. Where am I?

Nowhere, he says, and here.

Are you still Night-time?

No.

I’m not Olivia anymore, I say, certain.

I roar and run toward the light. I tear at the dark with my great paws, clawing at the point of light until it rips and grows. I fight with all my strength until I burst out of the black, into the barred sunlight. I cannot move, I lie trapped in the cold and bloodied corpse on the forest floor, with the red-haired man’s hand pressed down hard on the wound. The blood has slowed almost to a stop.

I take a deep breath and spread myself throughout the body, running through all its cold bone and veins and flesh. Come back. Wake up.

Our heart twitches faintly.

The first beat is like thunder, echoing through the silent body. Another, then another, and the roaring begins, blood hurtling through the arteries. We gasp, we take his breath in a great heaving sigh. The body lights up cell by cell, reawakening. It begins to sing with life.

DEE

Dee runs into the dawn. The bite on her arm is a ragged hole, edges brown with dirt. She knows she needs a hospital. The pump seems to have got the venom out, but the bite might be infected. She tries not to think about that. All that matters is finding Lulu.

She stumbles on through the forest, seeing faces in the patterns of light and shade. She shouts her sister’s name. Sometimes her voice is loud, sometimes it is a dry whisper. Ahead, she catches a little sound. It could be a blackbird, or a child’s whimper. Dee hurries on, faster. Lulu must be scared.