The woods are winter-gripped. There is no wind, no sound. The air is frozen. The branches of the dark trees are weighed down with snow. The small creatures of the forest lie deep in their winter sleep, snug in their shelter of dead leaves, moss, bracken, and hollow trees. Between the crowded trunks, under the twisted branches, there are shadows—deep, formless shapes that, though motionless and without life, still seem to be alive and lie waiting, waiting. The wildwood sleeps. But at one point, in the deepest shadow, there is movement. A shadow blacker than the others creeps between the trees towards a bare patch of moonlight, where the forest has retreated. A shape like no form of life ever created moves into the cold glow of the winter moon. It is a shape so monstrous, so unbelievably foul that it defies all imagination—a huge, swollen, maggot-like body three metres in length with eight bulbous, toad-like legs but no head. Instead, on the top of the body, there is a protruding lump from which a swaying tentacle probes the night, and at its very tip, one green glowing eye. The monstrosity crawls across the bare patch of moonlight and disappears into the black shadows beyond. It leaves no track, not a single mark on the smooth, white surface of the snow.