She wriggles the bracelet over her hand, her fingertips showing blue-tinged cold out of her fingerless gloves. With awkwardness, she pushes the gold band up under the sleeve of her duffle coat, beneath her fleece and thermal T-shirt, until she feels the metal’s now-familiar warmth against her flesh. The transformation is immediate. Straightaway, the bracelet’s charge, its energy, courses through her body, banishing the chill of the December day, filling her with a warm strength. Where the gold sits against her bare skin she feels as if she is being burned, feels certain that this time there will be a mark, a scarring from such heat. And yet she has no wish to stop it, to remove the bracelet. The pain is a price she is more than willing to pay.
She starts to hear whispering voices and to see the flitting figures and shapes once more, always moving, always on the very periphery of her vision. Beside her, Thistle begins to whimper. Tilda is aware of her dog’s anxiety. She wants to say something to comfort her, to reassure her, but no words will come. Her whole being is overwhelmed by the tumultuous experience wearing the bracelet triggers. Once more, she becomes aware of a change in the quality of the light around her. Even here, outside, in the brightness of the day. There is a phosphorescence to the air that surrounds her. More movement disturbs her vision, and again the lurching giddiness threatens to take control of her stomach.
Tilda closes her eyes tightly and the shapes become instantly clearer, sharper, bolder. She sees the hares again, running, ears flat, twisting this way and that. And the hound, silent and swift. And birds again, cawing crows this time, and a buzzard casting a broad dream of a shadow with its majestic wings. Tilda searches for faces. And for the Afanc. She longs to find the magnificent creature. Wants to experience again its ancient, magical presence. But today it is absent, and the dancing animals move ever faster, increasing her dizziness. The ringing in her ears is building, too, quickly reaching a painful level.
It’s too much. I can’t control it!
Instinctively, she opens her eyes. The supernatural brightness is shocking, making her blink and gasp, her sensitive eyes smarting, her vision blurring. For a moment she fears she will fail; that all she can do is snatch off the bracelet to make it all stop. She has her hand on the gold loop, ready to wrench it from her arm, and yet she pauses.
It’s not the bracelet … it’s me. This is in me, somehow. And if that’s true, then I must be able to handle it. I must!
Slowly she takes her hand away, holding her arms out to balance herself. No shapes appear in the blinding whiteness that reflects, dazzling, off the snow. No diamond-eyed woman. No mythical water-horse. Just glare and noise, both painful and overwhelming. Tilda can feel her heart thudding, the beat of it pounding against her eardrums, blood surging, the sensation of plummeting threatening to make her pass out.
No! Dammit, no!
She flings her arms wide and her head back.
‘Stop!’ she shouts, the word echoing around the valley, rebounding off the hills again and again, repeating and insisting. Stop! Stop! Stop!
And it does. Or at least, the unmanageable parts of it do. The deafening ringing noise ceases at once. The strobing whiteness fades to a softer glow. The swirling sensations and the bewildering giddiness abate, so that she stands steady now, stable, strong. She is aware of a powerful tingling in her hands and feet, and when she looks closer she sees that her fingertips are fizzing. Tiny blue flashes crackle from them, like the arcing of circuits shorting out. Tilda steps over to the snow-covered stone birdbath on the wall and reaches out to touch it. As her fingers get close the snow recedes, melting as quickly as if she had touched it with fire. Cautiously she brings her fingertips to her cheek. There is a zinging vibration, but no pain, no burning. She looks around the garden. Thistle stands close by, her eyes never leaving her mistress. If she is frightened she does not show it.
‘What is it?’ she asks herself as much as the dog. ‘What am I supposed to do with … this?’ She flicks her right hand outward as she speaks and a burst of something invisible yet tangible flies from it, a pulsating wobble through the bright air. It connects with the holly bush, causing every flake of snow on it to explode into a million white crystals before they melt into nothing. The little plant stands out oddly, its prickly leaves glossy and green amid the whiteness. Tilda tries again. This time she carefully waves her hand at the garden bench. Although she stands three long strides from it, it is as if she is sweeping it clear of snow with a heated broom. In seconds the worn wood is exposed, and the snow at its base recedes to reveal the yellow-green grass of the lawn.