I remain by the door as Molly stands and straightens her petticoats. Walks past me without a word, without a glance, just the brushing of fine cloth against my arm and the faint scent of hot metal.

Annie and John don’t return home. Mam assures me they’re both in the woods, and when I tell her I saw John in the village she claims I’m mistaken, that I saw another lad and imagined my brother. She swears it so, I’m almost convinced. She busies herself over the fire.

I tell her all. How with just the prattling of one tongue her work will have her condemned and swaying from the Hanging Tree. To continue with balms and poultices if she must, but on no account to stray into enchantments and curses.

‘You tell me nowt that Seth did not say last night, and nowt that has not always been the case,’ she says.

‘It’s not the same, now. Magistrate Thompson is gone and they’re feared, I’ve seen the change. They’re angry. You’ve no hold over this Wright. You mustn’t give him any chance to hurt you. Any of you.’

She pats my hand. ‘Don’t fret, lass. I know how to keep them safe.’

At last I must leave, without knowing the comfort of holding Annie, without seeing her sweet, unmarked skin. Hearing nothing to assure me that Mam understands.

Heavily I walk, from a home no longer a home, to a home not yet one.

Daniel waits at the path by the sheep field. A risk, but I’m glad to see him. He takes me in his arms and, just for a moment, I let myself breathe in his scent of sunlight and hay, and be comforted.

‘It feels everything we’ve built is about to be swept away,’ I say. ‘Should they discover who I am we’ll be forced to part. And worse, they will hurt you.’

‘We will not part,’ he says. ‘We are bound now.’ He releases me, taking my hands in his. ‘There is another way.’

I know his mind, for the same thought is in mine. ‘To leave?’

‘Yes. Leave and find work.’

I long for it so, but the thought of Mam, John and Annie left here is too much to bear. To go without them is not possible. ‘But – I can’t. My family …’

He hesitates just a beat. ‘They shall come. Yes. We’ll find work and then call for them. And one day, in the end, we shall have our own little house. You will bake the bread.’

‘And we’ll eat flawn,’ I say.

Even now, in the face of desperation, we laugh. He pulls me to him, kisses the top of my head. ‘You would run away with the flawn itself, I am surplus.’

I shrug.

‘Oh,’ he says. ‘Do not deny it.’

‘I – nay, of course.’