‘At least now we know we can open the window. He wouldn’t have expected that. Keep together. Let’s go.’ Tom spoke decisively, though he was trembling.

They reached the window, and Tom, letting go of the others’ hands, peered out gingerly. A freezing blast of wind blew the hair into his eyes. He pushed it away.

‘What dost see?’ It was Kit, awe in his voice. Something was changing within him; some realisation was coming to the fore, that he was disobeying Jack for the first time in several hundred years. It seemed to both exhaust and exhilarate him at once.

Tom looked down. ‘Something that looks like the ground.’

‘How far away is it?’ This was Zita, crowding to the sill.

‘I don’t know. It’s hard to tell.’

‘We maun die there.’ Kit was suddenly deflated, his voice hollow.

‘It’s better than being in here. We’ll probably die in here too.’

The cold meant that Tom could hardly feel his fingers. He blew on them. ‘There’s nothing to hold onto. The wall looks smooth. You couldn’t get a grip on it.’

‘How about jumping?’

‘I can’t tell what’s down there.’

Zita felt around her neck. The locket with John Temple’s obituary in it.

‘Don’t!’

‘It’s the only thing we have.’

‘Wait!’ Tom took out a vial which held a healing draught. He unstoppered it and offered it to Kit and Zita. They shared it, welcoming the tang of herbs. Zita let the locket fall gently back onto her throat, and then Kit leant over the windowsill and dropped the vial.

They all listened and shortly heard a soft thud as it landed.

‘There must be something there. Something we can walk on. Something that will lead us away.’

Tom was filled with new purpose. He kept glancing to the door, the real door, in Jack’s chambers. But still the room was undisturbed. Where was Jack? What was he doing? Was he waiting somewhere, toying with them? They had to move quickly.

‘It’s so dark out there.’ Zita bit her lip.

‘Lights!’ It was Kit who spoke, and Tom saw an intensity burning in his eyes he’d never seen before.

They searched around the room, knowing that at any second Jack might return and discover what they were doing.

The two dim lamps on the mantelpiece were the only sources of light. They glowed without real flame and, when Tom passed a finger through the top of one of them, did not even give off heat.

Then they faced the window. Outside, the blackness seemed thick, unbearable. It was like being in the belly of some terrible beast or in the deepest coalmine. The shadows lay thickly on top of each other. It was as if no ray of light had ever penetrated it.

Just as Tom was steeling himself to take the first jump, Zita said, ‘I can send myself.’