Swathes of silver light streaked the north-eastern skies, and in the cool dewy twilight Stonewylde slept soundly. On the dirty flagstone floor of a tumbledown cottage an old crone hunched stiffly, rocking as she crooned her incantation. Five points were marked on her circle with stubs of candle and symbols of the elements. A large leather-bound book lay open, the spidery writing faded on the parchment. The glossy crow sat in her lap with eyes shut. Mother Heggy muttered and poked at the small fire. With a shrivelled hand she flung a quantity of dried essence onto the smouldering sticks. A foul-smelling smoke billowed into the air and hung in wreathes about her. Her other clawed hand was clamped around something soft and malleable. Something vaguely human in shape, fashioned from wax, pig fat and a few ginger hairs. This mommet had a strange heart. In its centre lay a crescent of human toenail, yellow and horny.

Smoke choked the cottage and the crow fidgeted in the crone’s lap. Her mumbling invocation gathered in power. The mommet became softer, the heat from her leathery skin transferring its energy along with that of the spell she cast. She scraped the remaining dry powder from a dish; all that was left, after her cake-baking, of the concoction she’d prepared one Dark Moon as the boy had sat here, his body bruised and battered and his heart seething with dark hatred. The crop of Sickener from the beech grove was unrecognisable as this desiccated essence which she now used to empower her spell.

She uttered the final words, no longer legible to her in the Book of Shadows, but known in her heart. She traced the five-pointed shape of magic in the smoke about her, and with a cry pitched the mommet into the fire. Instantly the pig fat turned to grease and the wax melted to nothing. The gingery hairs shrivelled and the crescent of nail lay in a viscous pool of thick tallow. Mother Heggy raised the crow gently from her lap, kissed its head and flung it into the air. With a frantic flapping it landed on the floor outside the cast circle.
“Fly, my lovely one! Fly to him now!” she croaked.

The crow hopped out and launched itself into the glimmer of dawn.