When Tilda acts she does so out of instinct, as she has not time to consider what she is doing or whether it will work. She lifts her arm so that the glowing torc is held high. She closes her eyes and pictures as clearly and as vividly as she can what it is she wants to happen. What it is she prays will happen. There is silence. She opens her eyes. The glass has stopped. Every single, deadly sharp slice has halted in its lethal trajectory, so that hundreds of cruel spikes quiver in the air, only inches from her, pointing at her face, her eyes, her throat, her heart. She trembles at the thought that it is her own will alone that is keeping them there.

Enraged, Nesta swoops to the floor where she spins, spitting more spells and curses as she turns. The glass begins to move again, to twitch and vibrate, as if gathering power to surge forward once more.

‘Tilda, get out of here. For God’s sake, run!’ Dylan shouts.

She cannot answer him. Dares not so much as shake her head. It is taking such an effort of will and concentration to hold off Nesta’s magic that she fears any second she will lose the battle. Already she can feel her strength ebbing. Can see the shards starting to move.

She’s too strong for me!

Just as she thinks she will fail and that both she and Dylan will die at the ghostly, mangled hand of this demented witch, Tilda thinks of the Afanc. On the floor, still wrapped in damp muslin, is the piece she has been working on ever since the time she wore the torc and the water-horse appeared to her. She risks closing her eyes again. Images loom and fade in her dark vision, but she ignores then, in the same way she ignores the cacophony of ringing and screaming that comes from inside her own head as well as from the fiend who would see her dead. She calls the Afanc. She wills it to come, to help her again.

I am a child of Seren Arianaidd, please help me once more!

She opens her eyes. The glass spikes quiver and twitch. Nesta is still ranting, still raving, still exerting her formidable power, full of hatred and rage. To her left, Tilda’s creation starts to move beneath its dusty wrapping. Astonished, she risks shifting part of her focus, part of her will, onto it. The cloth undulates and shifts, as what was until seconds ago merely a quantity of clay shaped into a form, a piece of art, nothing more, writhes and stretches as it is filled with magic and brought to life. A second later it bursts from its covering, taking to the air.

‘My God!’ Dylan gasps.

‘Yes!’ cries Tilda. ‘Yes!’