For a bit I can’t think straight. Don’t know whether to scream or curse or cry or go rushing off in all directions. Have to make myself breathe, slow down, try to work out the puzzle the way she would. No time to think about why she’d up and go like this, when we’re just getting settled and there’s a job on hand. What I need to think about is where. I stuff the kerchief in my pouch and head outside. Black Crow save me, what if she had a horse? She could be miles away by now. Left Winterfalls forever. Broken her promise to Conmael. There’s only one place she’ll be headed for, winter or no winter. Laois. She’s gone to face up to Mathuin. And if she doesn’t want to be found, there’ll be no finding her.

I throw my head back and bellow like a wounded bull. ‘Conmael, you bastard! Why in the name of the gods didn’t you stop her?’

Last thing I’m expecting is an answer. But here he is, come from nowhere, standing right next to me all wrapped up in his big swirly cloak. On his own. Not sure if that’s good or bad.

‘Why did I not stop her?’ he asks, in a way that says I’m far too stupid to talk to the likes of him. ‘Surely you know by now that Blackthorn is her own woman. If she wants to go, she’ll go. If she wants to throw her life away, that’s precisely what she’ll do.’

I want to grab the fellow and shake him up and down a few times, even though all he’s done is say what I was thinking myself. But there’s nobody else to help me, so I hold back. Count up to five in my head. ‘If you thought that,’ I say, ‘why did you get her out of Mathuin’s lockup?’

He laughs. I want to kill him. ‘You’re wasting time, Grim,’ he says. ‘You’ll never win a battle of wits with me. If you want her back, go after her.’

‘You planning to help or just stand about watching? I don’t know where she went.’

‘That way.’ Conmael points southward. His fingers are long and pale, with silver rings on them.

I want to ask him how he knows, and whether he saw her, and when, but he’ll only say I’m wasting time. ‘She went early,’ I say. ‘And she’s good at covering her tracks. Doubt I’d find her.’

‘What, giving up before you’ve even begun?’ His brows lift in scorn. ‘And you the devoted hound who guards her every step? She’d be disappointed in you.’

‘If you won’t help,’ I growl, ‘then I’ll be on my way.’