Cara found a dish and filled it with water. Ripple lapped a little, then collapsed beside the bowl. For all her exhaustion, she could not relax, but kept lifting her head, listening for something.

‘She’s run all the way,’ Cara said. ‘There’s something really wrong.’ She looked up at me from where she was crouched by the dog. ‘Mistress Blackthorn, I’m scared my father might . . . might kill someone.’

I stood completely still. Took a breath. Felt the world go quiet around me. Ripple had run herself to the very end of her strength. She would die for Grim, if it came to that. And Grim would give his life to protect me. I knew it as I knew the patterns of sun and moon. I knew it as I knew spring brought new life to the stark, bare trees of winter. I knew it as I knew even the bitterest, angriest, most wounded woman in all Erin could learn to love again.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said to Cionnaola. ‘I can’t come. I must go to Wolf Glen with Cara, and I must go now.’

Perhaps he’d seen it coming; he didn’t try to argue the point, only raised his brows. If it had been Ségán, it might have been a different story.

‘Only,’ I said, ‘Cara needs a fresh horse, and we need an armed escort. And we must go right now. The other way, through Longwater, because it’s quicker. I’ll understand if you have to ride off immediately for . . . the place you were taking me to. Only, if you would come with us, it would save a lot of time.’ This felt quite unreal. I couldn’t believe I was doing it. I couldn’t believe I had made this choice. But I knew it was right. Ségán had my written testimony. And I could still go later, if one of the men would take me. I would be too late to stand up and speak, but I could find out what was happening with Mathuin. I could at least be witness to the aftermath.

‘A moment,’ Cionnaola said, and went out to confer with Cúan. I could have hugged him for not getting angry with me; for not pressing the point. For not bullying me.

‘We should take Ripple,’ Cara said. ‘We might need her.’

Exhausted as she was, Ripple was up on her feet again now, wobbling, making little whining sounds, pawing at my leg and at Cara’s. Trying to make us understand.

‘She was the one who found me when I fell down into that place,’ Cara said. ‘If – if he’s – I think we should take her.’

That made two men, two women and a biggish, exhausted dog. And only three fresh horses. ‘The Island men are supposed to be good at this kind of thing,’ I said. ‘We might leave it to them.’