The moment she steps back into the studio Tilda finds her mood shifts, as she knew it would. To engage in her creative endeavor is to lose herself in that act of creation, even when attending to the seemingly mundane process of preparing for a firing. As she carefully takes the wrapping off her pots and reveals them in their raw, unfinished state, she feels once again that powerful connection. A connection to the result of her own artistic effort, but also, this time, a connection to the ancient patterns and symbols she has worked into her pieces. She takes a minute to gaze at the bounding hares and the chasing hound. To let her eyes travel along the lithe, supple limbs, feeling their easy movement, imagining the strength of the muscles propelling the animals forward across frozen ground, immersing herself in the idea of their running free and wild, so that soon she is convinced she can hear the dual rhythms of their heartbeats, the hares’ fluttering and fast, the hound’s slower, but every bit as urgent and vital.

It is past midnight by the time Tilda and Dylan are able to step back and look at the smoldering kiln, watching as reassuring amounts of smoke pour steadily forth from its short chimney. The construction looks home built, but nonetheless robust, and the mortar appears to be set firm in the gaps between the bricks. The snow around it has melted, so that it sits, stout and russet, standing out against the stark whiteness its glow illuminates close up, fading into the darkness a few strides on. It took them two hours to carefully load the shelves with Tilda’s pieces, and another to get the fire properly going so that they could then seal up the door.

‘You know, I think it might actually work,’ says Dylan.

Tilda nods emphatically. ‘It will work,’ she says. ‘It has to.’

At last, with the fire beneath the kiln packed with as much wood as will fit into it, Dylan is able to convince Tilda it does not need to be watched. They decide to go inside, get something to eat and come out and check and restoke the fire at regular intervals through the night.

The cottage has warmed up in the hours they have been busy. The Rayburn fills the kitchen with a slightly smoky but welcome heat, so that the freezing temperature outside is kept at bay. In the sitting room, Tilda takes the bracelet from her pocket and puts it carefully on the small table by the window before laying a fire in the hearth and putting a match to it. Dylan fetches what food he can find from the kitchen.