‘I’m not at liberty to share the tale.’ Her face tightens up; I see her wishing she hadn’t said so much. ‘Please don’t mention that we spoke of this. Best that you just do the work, take your payment and keep quiet. It’s the way things are done here. Now, I’ve been keeping you from your meal. What bad manners!’

The conversation’s over. No more answers to be had. We walk back to where Bardán and Ripple are waiting. ‘Thank you, Mistress,’ I say, and wait for her to move on. I’m not going to start eating with her watching me.

She crouches down to pat the dog. Ripple rubs up against her hand as if the lady’s her best friend. ‘What a fine dog you are,’ says Mistress Della. ‘You remind me of my old Dancer, that I had when I was a girl. She was a beautiful thing, long limbs, fine soft coat . . . It broke my heart when I lost her. You get attached to them.’ She straightens, looking away from me, gazing over the part-built house to the many greens of the forest. ‘If he is sometimes a little demanding,’ she says, ‘if he seems harsh, remember his loss. It was grievous; he never recovered fully. Now I should go. Enjoy your meal.’

When she’s gone I sit down, put the tray between Bardán and me, give Ripple her share. Don’t say a word. There’s a jug of ale as well as the food. I pour a cup for me, a cup for Bardán. I think about what Mistress Della’s told me.

Doesn’t make a lot of sense. Tóla believed the heartwood house would bring all sorts of luck, good fortune and so on. Bardán ran off before he got it finished. Not long afterwards, Tóla’s wife died. And he blames Bardán. If Cara was a baby when Mistress Della came to Wolf Glen, it’s fifteen years or thereabouts that Bardán’s been away. Away in the Otherworld, or some place he thought was the Otherworld. Only, he’s got fey knowledge. And if he learned from his father, that could mean his father was there too. Where else would you learn how to build a heartwood house? It’s not only using the different woods. Bardán’s telling me all sorts of little things that matter, exactly how the pegs are made and where they go, how many wedges I’ll need, how deep to set the poles, what the pitch of the roof is going to be. There’ll be more, no doubt of that.

‘Seems a pleasant woman,’ I say. Pleasanter than her brother. Not that it would be hard.