I’ve got a half-bag of flour, thanks to my day’s work for Scannal, and there’s a rabbit hanging, snared last night. I make a pie, throwing in the vegetables Blackthorn’s cut up. While I do it I’m going over the day, my day, not hers. A good day’s work, hard enough to keep out bad thoughts for a while. Scannal’s not much of a talker, which is the way I like things. Trusts me with his horses and the cart. Big strong horses, gentle as lambs the two of them. Sturdy and Storm, their names are. Handle the load of flour bags like a dream. That’s the best part, driving the load from the mill to this other settlement, place called Silverlake, over to the east. Back along the road Blackthorn and I came in on, then take a fork to the left, and a few miles on, there it is, lovely spot, scatter of houses by the water, few fishing boats out on the lake, sun shining, trees all red and gold. Birds everywhere, swans, ducks, others I don’t know the names of. Scannal’s said the baker’s place is a bit further on, and I stop in the settlement to ask the way. A woman tells me how to get there. She’s got two little boys, and they stare at Sturdy and Storm with big round eyes. I give them turns on Storm’s back, not moving along, just sitting.

The woman tells me a bit of a story. Scannal hasn’t supplied this baker before. Silverlake has its own mill, but no miller, because the fellow’s died in a nasty accident. Found one morning crushed under his own grindstone. She says even if there was someone in Silverlake or surrounds who knew how to do the job of milling flour, which there isn’t, they wouldn’t be wanting to take over. Everyone thinks the mill’s got a curse over it, or a ghost in it, or both. The woman points out where it is, up on a rise behind the settlement. Then she remembers what I’ve asked, and shows me the path to Branoc’s place, which can’t be seen from where we are. I have to drive the cart further along the lake shore.

‘Better be getting on,’ I say, making sure the children are out of the way of wheels and hooves.

‘We’ll be seeing you again, then,’ says the woman, giving me a look up and down that’s a surprise to me.

‘Maybe,’ I say. I climb up and take the reins.