by Joseph Evans
After a delicious helping of ellonberry pie that evening, Pawl and Coralle Sevenstars put their two children to bed and went to sleep feeling happy.
But at three thirty in the middle of the night, Pawl sat up in a cold sweat, breathing heavily.
What had woken him? The window was open slightly, just as they had left it, and the netting was shimmering gently in the night breeze. He turned to his wife and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She stirred and reached up sleepily to touch her face.
Pawl lay back down and told himself that it must have been the rich food upsetting his stomach. But there was one thing he had to check before going back to sleep.
He lifted his left hand and unclipped the face of his watch.
As he did so, his whole body began prickling with fear.
“Oh, dear Gedin, no,” he said to himself.
He rubbed his eyes furiously to make sure he wasn’t seeing things.
But there was no mistaking the colour of the xinary.
It was glowing deep, blood red.
Chapter One
Estergate High