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you always look at something from the front you only know a part of it. It doesn’t matter if it’s a tree or a person, a building or chair. You only see one side. Wizards are supposed to look at all the different sides. We’re supposed to see what other people don’t notice.”
    Winny offered Tamrin an apple. She took it and bit hard.
    “Thank you,” said Winny. “No, I’m not a tinker. But you knew that. I collect metal and take it back to my father and he melts it down and works it into new things. I don’t mend, although I could, because I want to take the metal away.”
    “Does your father live far from here?”
    “A little way.”
    “That’s a sort of wizardy answer,” said Tamrin. “It doesn’t tell me anything.”
    Winny stood up and stretched.
    “I know,” she said. “The sun’s getting lower. We can get on our way.”
    She took hold of the handles of the cart and pushed. Tamrin walked alongside. She looked at the pile of old metal and broken stuff.
    “Do people ever give you anything valuable by mistake?” she asked.
    Things had changed at Boolat since Smedge had last been there. Ash was stronger. Bakkmann was more sullen. She had always looked at Ash with a mixture of fear and love. Now, Smedge sensed less fear, less love, and a new element of anger. He wondered what Bakkmann would do if she ever managed to break through the sealing spell completely and leave Ash inside. Would she come back? Or would that be the last that Boolat would see of her?
    Smedge let these thoughts drift like dandelion clocks through his head, not trying to catch them and examine them. Leaving them to blow away or take root and grow. The pain of his punishment had almost gone now. The shock of it still remained. The assault still hurt. His flesh had returned to what he had made it. It always did.
    He stepped over a filthy, piss-stained corner of the courtyard and slipped into a tight slot that became a passageway deep in the outer wall. He couldn’t see where he was going and felt his way along with his hands on the smooth stone. It wasn’t long before he reached an obstruction. He couldn’t go any further. He put his face to the wall and listened.
    Silence.
    Sometimes he could hear scratching, like rats. Once or twice, perhaps more, he fancied he heard voices, or just one voice, or the wind through the tunnels like a voice.
    More than that, he could smell something in the gap in the walls. Whenever he returned to Boolat his first thought was always to come here and listen. Today there was nothing. Tomorrow was another day.
    He emerged from the darkness and looked at the squat creatures entering through the gate.
    They were new, too. Bigger than before. Stronger than before. Upright. They almost looked like armoured men. And they could talk now. That was a change. And red. That was new.
    But they were still beetles and Smedge hated them.
    He had eaten beetles. Back then. Not these beetles. Not Ash’s beetles. He remembered eating them and feeling the sick, empty sensation of beetle-life.
    Ash’s beetles changed all the time. They developed. Smedge didn’t know if she was doing it, forming them into an army, or whether it was just the nature of the creatures to change and become ever more skilful, ever more dangerous. Or was it something greater even than Ash that was doing it?
    Smedge left them to it and made his way to the dungeon. He needed some fun after his journey.
    “Tell me about your father,” said Tamrin.
    Winny was sweating and her wet hands slipped on the handles of the cart. It was a long hill.
    “You’ll find out for yourself,” she said.
    “What?”
    “When you meet him.”
    Tamrin stopped dead.
    “Why am I going to meet him?”
    Winny carried on pushing the cart so Tamrin had to trot to catch up. She took one of the handles and helped. It was heavy, hard work. She made just a small spell to make the wheels go round on their own.
    “Stop that,” said Winny. “I’ll push on my own if I