Perhaps neither. He was drowning and the overwhelming awareness of that alone left little room for other terrors. Yet through this horror of imminent death he felt an arm encircle his throat from behind. Bubbles spewed furiously from his open mouth as he was dragged backwards. Ash struggled but his efforts were feeble, for already a mist was dulling his thoughts, a sluggishness leadening his limbs. For one brief and peculiarly lucid moment he was in another time – an instant of déjà vu – fighting weakly against tumbled water, a rough hand pulling at him, lifting him . . . And he was clear, cold night air rushing at him as overwhelmingly as had the stagnant water he was now emerging from. Other hands clutched at his clothes, cruelly pinching the flesh beneath. He was rising, being hauled over the wall that encircled the moonlit pond that was no longer placid but heaving with the swell created by his own struggles.
