‘Aye. You’d know it, I reckon, as “Sleeping Beauty”.’ He smiled, and this time it was without humour. ‘Probably the Disney version, all singing and kind woodland animals.’

‘It’s the one with the three colourful fairies,’ said Heather. ‘Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather.’ To her surprise, she felt her cheeks turn pink. There was something surreal and vaguely embarrassing about naming cartoon characters in a prison yard. ‘They bless the princess at her christening.’

Reave looked amused now. ‘That’s right. But in the original story, they were wise women, or witches, and there were thirteen of them in the kingdom. The king only had twelve gold plates for them to eat off – witches being fussy, I suppose – so he decided not to invite one of them. When the thirteenth wise woman arrived at the christening, furious at being snubbed, she cursed the princess so that she would prick her finger on a spindle in her fifteenth year, and die.’

‘I remember,’ said Heather.

‘But the twelfth witch, she hadn’t had a chance to give her gift yet. Although she couldn’t undo the sentence of death …’ Reave paused, his eyes abruptly far away. ‘She couldn’t stop the killing, the twelfth witch, but she could soften it.’

‘To a hundred years of sleep instead.’

Reave nodded. ‘Your mother was like that good witch, lass. She softened things. She took some of the pain out of this world. Like a tiny piece of light in a forest of shadows.’

‘And how long was she at Fiddler’s Mill?’

‘I’m not sure I could say.’ Reave turned away slightly, no longer meeting her eyes. ‘I didn’t keep an eye on her every movement.’

‘But you were close?’

‘We were friends.’ Something in his tone made goose bumps break out across Heather’s arms. ‘She is – was – my oldest friend, I suppose. The only one who still thought of me, twenty years after Fiddler’s Mill. Her soul was too kind to just let me rot in prison without another thought. Every letter she wrote to me was out of the kindness of her heart – I never asked her to do that.’

‘Did you know a woman called Anna Hobson while you were at Fiddler’s Mill, Michael?’

‘Anna Hobson? Should I have?’

‘She was a young woman who got involved in drugs when she was at the commune. She claims that she got pregnant there, and that the baby was taken from her shortly after it was born. Taken against her will.’

Michael Reave chuckled warmly. ‘Never heard of her. Doesn’t surprise me that people are making up strange stories about the place though. What do you think, lass? Do you think that sounds at all likely?’

‘I don’t know,’ Heather said, unable to keep the sarcasm from her tone. ‘A lot of stuff I thought was pretty bloody unlikely now seems to be true.’