Zeke suddenly stands to attention and does the three-fingered sign of the monster on his chest. ‘Domsley!’ he hisses, and the big monster looks up.

‘Oh, leaping lumbears!’ he mumbles, quickly snatching up the water barrel and hoisting it back onto his shoulder. ‘You two stay here!’ he says gruffly, and bumbles out of the cage, locking it behind him. Then he stands beside Zeke, his paw held the same way.

‘What is it?’ Buster asks.

Polly feels her heart begin to flip about like a fish. ‘It must be Carmen,’ she whispers, standing up anxiously, then changing her mind and sitting back down.

Through the bars of the cage she sees a small group of monsters lumbering towards them, maybe five or six. They are all different shapes and sizes, and all dressed in the same red vests, except the one in the middle also wears a pair of studded silver cuffs on her wrists.

That must be Carmen! Polly thinks, and she feels a ripple of nervousness pass through her.

Carmen is tall and stately, with dark blue fur flecked with streaks of silver. She has a long, narrow face, and wide, almond-shaped eyes that glitter like emeralds. While the other monsters lumber and jostle about, she seems to glide through them, walking with long, determined strides, as though she always knows exactly where she is going and what she is meant to be doing.

Polly can’t help but feel impressed.

Carmen turns to talk to the monsters on either side of her as she walks. One of them steps away, and someone else steps up beside her. It takes a moment for Polly to believe what she is seeing.

It can’t be! she thinks. But that’s impossible!

‘Miss Spinnaker?’ she gasps.

The huddle reaches the cage and Zeke and Domsley step to one side, still doing the three-fingered salute.

‘We have captives!’ Domsley proclaims proudly to Carmen, whose eyes have widened in horror.

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ she growls in a deep, husky voice. ‘Domsley, Zeke, whatever were you thinking? These are children! And what in blooming moons are you doing in the cage?’ she asks Buster, who scuffs his feet awkwardly beside Polly. ‘You’re a monster!’ Buster says nothing. There is something about Carmen that makes it hard to find the right words to say. ‘Let these two out. Immediately!’ she commands.

Zeke scowls, but pulls the long key out of his pouch and does what he is told.

Polly and Miss Spinnaker stand staring at each other, their mouths open.

‘What are you doing here?’

Miss Spinnaker asks Polly.

‘What are you doing here?’ Polly shoots back.

Miss Spinnaker’s face reddens a little and she frowns. ‘Polly, Carmen is a very old friend of mine. Just like Buster is a friend of yours. She asked me to go with her to speak with Mayor Redwolf about what has been happening recently with Deidre Halloway, and to see if she can help us calm things down. But you shouldn’t be here! It’s not safe. I thought I told you to wait for me at my mother’s!’

‘But you didn’t come back!’ Polly protests. She can’t help feeling a little miffed. Why didn’t Miss Spinnaker tell her this was what she was planning to do when she left them behind that morning? Polly thought they were in this together!

‘Mrs Halloway came looking for us at your mother’s house,’ Polly explains. ‘We couldn’t stay there. She might have come back again. She might have seen Mortimer!’

Miss Spinnaker claps her long fingers across her mouth, her bracelets jangling.

Carmen’s green eyes glitter angrily as she listens to the conversation. ‘I know who you are!’ she says to Polly, suddenly furious. ‘You’re that witch who made up those stories in the newspaper about monsters being dangerous. You started this! And you’re her friend!’ she says to Buster, who shrinks a little in fear. ‘You’re the one Deidre Halloway is after!’ Carmen draws up to her full size and towers over Polly and Buster. ‘And you dare come into my camp and risk bringing Deidre Halloway and her followers here?’ she roars.

The monsters around her growl menacingly, and rock from side to side, cracking their knuckles and glaring at Polly and Buster.

Polly feels her bottom lip begin to tremble as she looks up into the monster’s furious face. Her tummy curls and her heart begins to race.

‘Carmen, stop!’ Miss Spinnaker says, and even though her teacher is much smaller than the monsters’ fearsome leader, Polly can see she is the only one there who is not the least bit afraid. ‘Polly made a mistake by doing that spell in the gallery and she is still paying for it. Deidre Halloway is the one who twisted the story around. Polly and Buster are both innocent. Their friendship is a good and beautiful thing. Deidre Halloway knows that if other monsters and witches see that friendships like theirs can exist she will have no way of dividing our town. And so she will do anything to destroy them. They need our protection, Carmen. Can’t you see? They are our only hope for a peaceful future.’

‘It’s true,’ comes a mumbling voice from behind them. Polly turns and is surprised to see Domsley step forward, despite Zeke kicking him in the shin. Domsley’s face reddens and he pulls anxiously at his big bottom lip as he talks. ‘They’re good ones, these two. Done no harm to no one, and they are real kind to each other. He could’ve left that witch behind and walked free,’ he says, pointing to Buster, ‘but he stayed beside her, good and true. I never seen nothing like that before. Warms the heart, it does. Makes me feel hopeful that all monsters and witches can get along just like them some day.’

‘Rubbish!’ Zeke snaps. He pushes Domsley out of the way and sneers into Polly’s face. ‘Once she’s grown up she’ll be the same as all them other witches and warlocks in Blackmoon Coven. There isn’t one I trust. Not even you!’ he hisses, pointing at Miss Spinnaker. ‘Bad to the bone, they all are. Your Mayor is never going to listen to us! Never has and never will! I say we stay true to our original plan.’ He turns to the other monsters. ‘What do you think, my friends?’ he snarls. ‘I say the only way we will ever get what we want is to fight!’

‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’ growl the other monsters, getting louder and louder, until Carmen lifts up a great furred paw to silence them.

‘We are a team and we will decide our way forward together,’ she says firmly. Then she pauses. Her ears prick up and she tips her head back to squint up into the bright glare of the sky. Her eyes grow wide and her voice grows harder and steelier. ‘But for now, it seems we have other, more urgent, problems to solve.’

Polly looks up at the sky. In the clearing above the monsters’ camp, she sees what Carmen has seen.

A black figure on a broomstick circles above them like a crow.