‘I have something to tell you. I wasn’t going to. Not yet, anyway. But I’m growing sick of lies and secrets and pretence. Especially after what’s happened today, with Ségán’s men and the wretched document. I misjudged you before. I treated you like a child. But you’re a grown woman now, and you need to hear this.’

What could she be talking about? ‘All right,’ Cara said.

‘Before I start,’ said Blackthorn, ‘I want you to remember what I said about possibly getting other folk into trouble. Your father has made it very clear, for a long time now, that he doesn’t want his personal business spread abroad. He’s kept some other folk’s business secret too. As you’ve worked out for yourself, there’s something about the story of your first year that doesn’t add up. I don’t have the whole answer to that, but I do have some of it. If you decide to pursue it further you’ll need to tread carefully. A number of folk could be in serious trouble over it, including me and Grim.’

‘And Fedach?’ Cara’s voice was fading away. She cleared her throat and tried again. ‘And his mother?’

‘His mother, certainly, since I made a guess at the truth after speaking with her. Probably not Fedach, since this was long ago.’ Blackthorn took a deep breath, as if she needed to pluck up courage before she could say whatever it was. ‘Cara, it’s to do with building the heartwood house.’

‘So what is it? What do you need to tell me?’ Her heart was thumping.

‘There was another baby. You know already that Bardán was hired by your father to build the heartwood house, the first time. He was a widower with an infant daughter. Fedach’s mother came up from Longwater to feed that child as well as her own.’

‘Oh. So it wasn’t me after all.’

‘It was Bardán’s daughter. But there’s another story. A story in which, after only three turnings of the moon, that little girl died. Suanach was by then with child herself, though not visibly so, and she chose to travel away to her kinsfolk for the pregnancy and confinement, returning home with her baby girl after, by my reckoning, about six turnings of the moon. Your mother died within a season of coming back to Wolf Glen.’

Your father’s a liar, a liar, a liar. ‘Wait,’ Cara said, frantically trying to add it all up and failing. ‘But – no, but –’