John’s hands push into the dirt. It isn’t wet, but all he can smell is dampness and mud. It smells like the village. As if he hasn’t run away, as if he’s still there. He clenches his teeth, summoning everything that remains of his strength and willpower to scramble to his feet.

His eye dart around, searching for a miracle. The world is washed-out greys and browns. Everything from the sky above to the ground below is faded and dull.

The pounding of the horse hooves is so loud that it feels as if they are already here, on top of him, trampling his fragile body into a bloody broken mess. 

Then he sees it: a twinkling within the thick hedgerow. Immediately he stumbles towards it, and the foliage opens to reveal a hollow space where the hobgoblin is waiting, dancing a spinning jig. John crawls in, and the branches close around him. He breathes deeply, his lungs filling with the woody aroma of leaves and earth.

The hobgoblin leaps up and floats in front of him, touching him on the lips as softly as a spider’s web.

His body is motionless, caught in the space between two heartbeats.

A horse, two horses, stop by the hedge: beasts of fire, with spiked hooves and curled horns on their heads. Their riders are skeletons with black hearts visible through yellowing ribs. They bellow out all the pain of the world.

John blinks. The skeletons are gone. Now all that is visible from his hiding place are normal horse legs of a dunny brown colour. And the voices that are speaking belong to ordinary men.

‘Zounds! Where has that little nymph gone?’ There is delight rather than disappointment in the man’s tone, as if John’s whereabouts are a fun mystery, soon to be solved.

‘Aye, she’s disappeared, but where? There’s nowhere to go.’

John puts both hands over his mouth to muffle his gasp of surprise. Neither man is Da. Or anyone from the village. The people chasing him don’t know him; haven’t come to drag him back home. So what do they want with him?

The first man speaks again. ‘Come now, my pretty maiden, show yourself. Don’t be shy. We will use you well.’ He drops from his horse and paces backwards and forwards. John can hear his breathing.

‘Harry!’ the second man protests. ‘We’ve wasted enough time. If a wench vanishes into thin air, it’s best to leave well alone.’

‘You’re not scared are you, old friend?’ The man called Harry laughs. ‘Did you see how long and golden her hair was? How could it ever be a waste of time to pursue beauty like that? And you call yourself a man!’ Harry pauses. If he but reaches through the branches, his fingertips will brush John. ‘Do you think she could be hiding in the hedgerow?’