I am intrigued, yes. I had never given the future much consideration. My life has been spent running human affairs and dealing with the Laymil project.

Well, we’ll have to wait until the immediate crisis is over before we consider our options. But it would be something, wouldn’t it? Creating the first post-possession culture, one that overthrows this ridiculous Adamist prejudice against bitek. We could incorporate the best of both cultures.

Now you talk like a true Saldana.

Luca Comar reined in his horse at the end of the drive, and dismounted to wait. It was near to midday, and people were drifting in from the fields to take a break. He didn’t begrudge them that, the sticky heat was quite something. Bloody unnatural for Norfolk.

But it was the community’s choice. Every day’s weather was a constant summer optimum, with bright light and warm breezes; while the nightly rains doused the land. Such a combination produced a vicious humidity. He was worried it might start to affect the aboriginal plants; late summer was normally a period of gradually increasing rain and reducing heat. There was also the question of how they’d react to missing Duchess’s crimson light. So far there was no visible malaise, but he felt uneasy about it.

But these conditions seemed to be doing wonders for the new cereal crops. He’d never seen them so advanced. It was going to be a great harvest. Things are getting back to normal.

You could tell the world was at rights just from the general mood. There was a heartiness that’d been missing before. Individual homes were being taken care of, kept properly clean and tidy, not just wished presentable. People paid attention to their clothes and general appearance.

And there’d been no sign of Bruce Spanton and his motley crew for awhile now. Though Luca had heard from other community leaders he was down at the southern end of Kesteven, giving decent folk a hard time. Apart from the odd problem like that, this was becoming a good life, gentle and unhurried. Satisfying.

Oh really, you’ll live it for a quintillion years, will you?

Luca shook his head, clearing it to open his perception wide. He’d sensed her approaching early this morning. A solitary figure making her way across the wolds, a knot in the uniformity of thought enveloping the county. Unhurried, untroubled. Not a threat like Spanton. But certainly a curiosity. Something about her was slightly out of kilter. He didn’t have a clue what.

So just before Cricklade’s lunch bell was rung, Luca had told Johan he would go and investigate the stranger. They still had newcomers drift in. Anyone prepared to work was given a place in the community.

The stranger was half a mile away now, dawdling along the main road in some kind of vehicle. Luca frowned. That’s a Romany caravan. The sight was a pleasing one, bringing up the old memories. Young girls pleased with his attentions, the coquettish and blatant. Their bodies yielding willingly, in fields of tall corn, secluded glades, darkened caravans. Year after year I proved my sexuality with them.

I?

He wrapped his horse’s reins around one of the spikes on the huge wrought iron gate, feet shuffling impatiently. The caravan’s driver must have been aware of his mood, yet her horse’s plodding gait never altered. It was a big sturdy horse, Luca saw while it was on the last couple of hundred yards, its piebald coat muddied and a wild mane in long tangles. He got the impression that it could have hauled the caravan right round the world without pausing.

It kept on coming, and Luca twitched slightly, knowing his nerve was being tested. He refused to give ground as the huge beast lumbered inexorably towards him. At the last minute, the woman sitting on the driver’s bench clucked softly, and pulled back on her slender reins. The caravan halted, rocking slightly on its lightweight spoke-sprung wheels. Carmitha applied the brake, and hopped down. She studied the man edging cautiously round Olivier. The horse whinnied at him.

“Greetings,” he said. Then gave a sudden start as he found himself staring into the twin barrels of her shotgun. Not for the first time, she regretted giving Louise Kavanagh her pump-action weapon.

“My name is Carmitha. I am not one of you. I am not a possessor. Is that a problem?”

“None!”

“Good. Believe me, I will know if it becomes one. I do have some of your powers.” She concentrated, and the seat of Luca’s trousers became very hot indeed.

He twisted about, frantically slapping at the fabric with his hands before it started smouldering. “Bloody hell.”

Carmitha smiled artfully. His thoughts were equally agitated, pastel whorls of colour that hung just outside her physical sight. I can read them, she told herself happily. Along with the rest of the magic.

The heat gone, Luca squared himself, recovering some dignity. “How did you . . .” His jaw moved silently. “Carmitha? Carmitha!”

She shouldered the shotgun, and brushed some loose strands of hair from her face. “I see part of you remembers. Then, no man would ever forget an afternoon in my bed.”

“Eh.” Luca blushed. The memories were certainly strong and colourful, with her vital flesh hot beneath his hands, the smell of her sweat, rapturous grunting. He felt the stirrings of an erection.

“Down boy,” she murmured laconically. “What do you call yourself these days?”

“Luca Comar.”

“I see. At the town they said you were the one in charge up here. Nice irony, that. But then you’re all reverting.”

“I am not reverting!” he said indignantly.

“Of course not.”

“How have you got our powers?”

“I’ve no idea. It must be something to do with this place you’ve taken us to. After all, you don’t have any contact with the beyond any more, do you?”

“No. Thank God.”

“So it must be the way everybody’s thoughts impinge on reality here. Congratulations, you made us all equal in the end. Grant must be real pissed about that.”

“If you say so,” he said disdainfully.

Carmitha had a throaty chuckle at the umbrage on show. “Never mind. Just as long as you lot realize you can’t turn me into a host for one of your own anymore, we’ll get along okay.”

“What do you mean, get along?”

“It’s very simple. I hate what you’ve done to these people, don’t be under any illusion about that. But there’s nothing I can do about it; nor you, now. So I might as well try and live with it, especially as you’re reverting and re-establishing everything that’s gone before.”

“We are not reverting,” he insisted. Yet there was the nagging worry about just how much of Grant Kavanagh’s personality he was employing these days. I must stop being so dependent on him, treat him as encyclopaedia, nothing more.

“Okay, you’re not reverting, you’re mellowing out. Call it whatever you want to salvage your dignity. I don’t care. Now, I’ve spent the last few weeks hiding out in the woods, and I’m getting very sick of cold rabbit for breakfast. I also haven’t had a hot bath for a while either. As you’re probably aware. So I’m looking for a place to stay over for a while. I’ll pull my weight, cooking, cleaning, pruning; whatever you like. It’s what I always do.”

Luca pulled thoughtfully at his lower lip. “You shouldn’t have been able to hide from us before. We’re aware of the whole world.”

“My people still have the earthlore your kind—both of you—have forgotten. When you brought magic back into the world, you made the old enchantments strong again, no longer just words mumbled by crazed old women.”

“Interesting. Are there any more of you?”

“You know how many caravans are here for the midsummer collection. You tell me.”

“I don’t suppose it matters. Even if all the Romanies survived, you don’t have the power to take us back to the universe we escaped from.”