Tamza’s consciousness returned in pieces. First was the pain, throbbing, obstinate. Then, under the left side of her body she could feel twigs, cool earth, something damp and squishy like moss. The smell of the forest, trees, dirt. Her mouth tasted of blood, and she was thirsty, very thirsty. Gradually she became aware of where she lay, in a small clearing in the forest.

Her headscarf was loose and Fir-bear licked at the scar on her cheek, his rough tongue scratching her skin. The cub’s breath hot and acrid on her face. It was comforting yet also, uncomfortable. It sharpened her senses.

She forced herself to see.

Rae-bear had dropped the doorway a few paces away. She channelled all her attention on that circle, drew all her energy up from the depths of her toes, from every space in her body and, in her mind, threw it at that doorway. It shimmered, and slowly grew large, a perfect circle that glowed bright blue in the dark forest. It lit up the eyes of her bears.

Please, Bear-God, grant me the strength to have opened the first doorway just as wide, back in the hall with Maryam and the other prisoners.

A few moments passed and then Vaasarians started stepping through into the forest from the black hole. Tamza tried to count the people, one, two, three... But her strength was faltering, her energy pouring from her body in the blood that flowed from her wounds.

Her eyes flickered. No, do not lose the connection, do not close the portal, not yet… not yet…

Fir-bear licked her face again and she prized open her eyelids, the doorway was shrinking. The people clambering through scratching themselves on the thorny edges around the centre of the blackness.

She felt a hand on her face. Maryam. “Close it Tamza, close the doorway, we’re all through! The soldiers…”

Tamza glanced at her doorway as a sword came through the black hole, followed by a head and torso.

“What the fuck?” the soldier yelled. “They’re all here…”

But he didn’t get a chance to finish as Tamza tugged one hand to the other, that was burnt and raw from holding the doorway too tight. With everything she had left, she clapped.

The circle shrunk and the sharp teeth around the black hole cut the man in two before disappearing. The soldier’s torso rolled on the forest floor, just as his legs would be rolling in the Usefuls’ hall back at the palace.

Tamza had nothing left.