A small square of the platform – about the size of my spread-out hand – is pulled up by an inset ring and flipped on its hinge. Into it is thrust a wooden T-shaped frame, just a little less tall than I am. I wish I hadn’t been thinking about trees because now this reminds me of one – the roughness of the wood, the knots and grain showing through. It leans back at about seventy-five degrees and instead of leaves or bark, there are leather straps. My lungs have shrunk, I think – I can’t take in proper breaths; someone has them squeezed in their hands.

Mayor Longsight steps forward once again and I am a creature stunned by fear. Jack Minnow comes up behind me and pins my wrists in his hands. I pull with all my strength, trying to break from his grip. But he’s always been stronger. The mayor addresses his people.

“I take great joy in your loyalty as you celebrate with me the marking of a forgotten. But doesn’t this feel just a little like a sentence that has no full stop? Aren’t we missing something of the satisfaction of seeing full justice be done?” He looks around the room at faces that hold frozen half-smiles, cheers still fresh on their lips – but there is a new tension that hisses in the gaps.

“We are here this morning for justice. And justice is what you will get.”

Minnow pulls me aside then, and my heels push against the base of the wooden T. Leather straps are pulled tightly and buckled by assistants while Jack Minnow keeps hold of my wrists and smirks his delight at me. At last, he has me where he wants me. They have won. He lifts one of my arms and binds it to the crosspiece. My chest is stretched by the reach it forces, and pain sings through my shoulders as my other wrist is bound too. The angle of the frame means I have to lean back as though I am at the beginning of a fall. They made us do trust exercises when we were at school; I only ever trusted Verity enough to fall back and believe she would catch me. The wood creaks but holds me; my chest rises and falls – each breath an effort of will and strength. I can feel the soles of my soft boots beginning to slip forward and the movement makes me hang lower, leather biting into my wrists.

“Of course, we abide by our own rules – she must have a skin book, she must have her mark of the forgotten read, and her skin book must be burned in the fire of judgement.” It’s hard to see anyone with my head thrown back and it hurts to lift it, but I hear the rumbles of conversation that travel through the rows of people.

“For a skin book to be produced,” Longsight continues, “the body must be flayed.”