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wouldn’t believe how easily they get distracted!” He was a good looking boy, not much older than Hayley, and he seemed as happy and excited as his dogs. He cracked his whip in the air. “Down, Chaser! Come on , Snuffer! Bell and Doom, get away, get on !” He cracked his whip again. Hayley saw that he was careful not to hit any of the dogs. “Come on , all of you!” he shouted.
    It took a while, and a lot more shouting and whipcracking, but at length the dogs turned away from these interesting new humans they had found. One or two put noses to the ground. One gave an excited yelp. And finally they all rushed away into the forest with the boy running and bounding behind them.
    â€œOh, I liked him!” Hayley said. “Who is he?”
    â€œAnother huntsman,” Flute said. “One of many. We’re on the hunters’ strand here. But I think we ought to be getting back now. I’ve got a busy afternoon and I suspect that your grandmother will be wanting you by now.” He strode off through the sunlit forest in the same direction that the boy and his dogs had gone.
    Hayley said, “Bother!” as she trudged after him. The midge people had come back again to circle in the sun and she had wanted to watch them.
    Just as she caught up with Flute, the boy came racing back towards them. He was older now, with a little curl of beard on his chin, and he ran as if he was running for his life. If he noticed Flute or Hayley as he tore past them, he gave no sign of it. His eyes were set with terror and he just ran. Behind him came all the dogs, older too now, and a bit gaunt and grizzled. Theywere all snarling. One or two had foam coming from their mouths and all their eyes glared. As the boy crashed past Flute and Hayley the foremost dog almost caught him and then lost ground because it had a bloodstained piece of the boy’s trousers in its mouth. The rest chased on furiously.
    Hayley clutched Flute’s hand. “Do they catch him?”
    Flute nodded. “I’m afraid so.”
    Hayley was horrified. “ Why ?”
    â€œHe managed to be really offensive to a goddess,” Flute told her. “Things like this happen on every strand, you know. The mythosphere is not an entirely happy place.”
    â€œBut it looks so beautiful!” Hayley protested.
    Flute laughed a little. “Beauty isn’t made of sugar,” he said. “Through this way now.”
    They pushed their way through some thick laurels and came out into the common again. Hayley stared from the bushes behind to her to the still impossible sight of her grandparents’ house beyond the road, over there .
    Flute said, “Do you think you can find your own way back, or do you want me to take you?”
    â€œI’d rather stay with you,” Hayley said. She felt raw with sorrow over the fate of the nice boy.
    â€œNot possible, I’m afraid,” Flute said. “But I’ll show you some more magic quite soon if you like. See you.” He plunged back among the laurels and was gone.
    Definitely gone, Hayley knew. She stood and wondered what Grandma might say if Hayley simply went across the road and rang the doorbell, and Grandma opened the door. It hardly bore thinking of. No, she had to get back to the garden somehow.
    She pushed her way dubiously in among the laurels. And pushed and rustled and plunged and rattled, and for a while wondered if she was going to have to just stand there and yell for help, or even stay in the bushes for ever. Then she was quite suddenly through them and into the garden, almost treading on her rock garden. She was about to kick it moodily to bits – it was only a heap of stones with wilting ferns stuck in it, and that nice boy was being ripped apart by his own dogs – when she heard Grandma calling her. At which Hayley forgot that she was not supposed to run and rushed frantically up the path to the garden door.
    â€œI think Flute