‘Reparations,’ I said, my mind on the hundred silver pieces that had been mentioned. ‘A fine, large enough to allow Ness to build her life again. I do not know if Branoc owned the bakery, but if he did, it could be sold. The mill, too. And . . .’

‘And her father’s money should be given back to her,’ said Prince Oran. ‘I agree on all those points, save for execution. Cannot even a man capable of such base acts learn to mend his ways?’

He meant he’d throw the offender into the lockup and leave him there to muse over his crimes as he mouldered away and went half-crazy. Like Strangler and Frog Spawn and the others. Like us.

I must have turned white, for suddenly all eyes were on me, and everyone looked concerned. Donagan put a hand on my arm.

‘Mistress Blackthorn, are you unwell?’

Gods! This was a choice to make anyone sick. It was a dilemma to test the wisest of sages. Branoc had performed acts of great evil – all the more heinous because he did not seem to understand they were wrong. He had shown himself to be without a conscience. But how could I condemn him – how could I condemn anyone – to incarceration in a place like Mathuin’s lockup? Yet if I did not agree to imprisonment, and Prince Oran would not countenance execution, did that mean Branoc’s only punishment would be the payment of a fine? That would leave him free to molest more young women, to wreck more innocent lives. He’d head away to another region, establish his bakery anew, and go straight back to his hideous ways. We could not let that happen.

‘Mistress Blackthorn?’

‘Give her some time!’ snarled Grim, who was doubtless having the same problem I was. It was a pity Prince Oran did not fancy the idea of unofficial execution. In Branoc’s case, that solution seemed to me both tidy and just.

I must pull myself together; I must not become that woman who had collapsed and wept out there in front of the whole community. I straightened my shoulders and took a few deep breaths. ‘Master Cael, Master Tassach,’ I said, ‘under the law, are those the only options? Incarceration or a fine, or perhaps both?’

‘And if it’s incarceration,’ said Grim, ‘where would you be locking him up?’

‘Not here at Winterfalls,’ Prince Oran said. ‘I don’t have the facilities to hold a prisoner securely for longer than a few days, and I don’t plan to change that. He’d have to go to Cahercorcan.’

He didn’t say whether the prison there was dank and filthy and cruel, and we didn’t ask.