‘For your pleasure this evening, your grace, we have songbird tiffin.’ The waiter indicated slices of canary-yellow finger cakes. ‘As well as butterfly biscotti.’

These were beautiful lavender biscuits decorated with piped white icing, and Rosa took one of them first. It crumbled into sweet, buttery pieces on her tongue, and she was sure she could feel the flutter of tiny wings inside when she swallowed them. But the real star was the songbird tiffin. Before she could even touch the cake, it broke apart to reveal a pair of tiny white birds with bright-yellow chests. They fluttered together to the handle of the teapot and sang duets there for the remainder of the evening.

When the carriage clock on the table struck midnight, a footman called out, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, the plum rain is about to begin. Anyone who wishes to participate should read the instructions.’

Rosa was about to turn to her guidebook, thinking the instructions would be found within its pages, but then she noticed that her teacup had transformed once again into a china rabbit, and the animal was pushing a little scroll of paper towards her with its nose.

She unrolled the scroll and read the words painted there, as the carriage clock sounded out the hours with a clear chiming of icy bells:

At the hour of midnight, for one minute only, the plum rain falls.

You are welcome to relax in your chairs beneath the parasols and enjoy the show. Or, if you would like to experience their magic for yourselves, simply reach a hand out into the rain.

The first drop that lands on your skin will show you another life. A life that might have been yours, if you had taken a different path.

Beware! This can be a fascinating glimpse, but it can also be the most shocking thing you will ever experience.

The choice is yours.

The moment Rosa finished reading the note, the plum rain began in soft, whispered sheets. The violet drops sparkled all the way to the snow and, to Rosa, they looked as dangerous as glittering daggers. She knew she had not made good choices in her life. She didn’t need any magical plum rain to tell her that. And yet … the chance to see how life might have been different was just too tempting to pass up. With a sort of wondrous horror, she watched herself reach a hand out into the rain and felt the curiously warm splash of a purple drop upon her fingertip.

At once, church music flowed through the air, wrapping itself around her like lengths of scarlet ribbon. The purple plum trees and the rain melted away, revealing the new picture that had been hidden beneath: bright sunlight streaming through a kaleidoscope of jewelled windows.