Solomon speaks. “We have some help – a few in Featherstone care about us still. As for Featherstone – the crows bring them food, just like always. But there’s less – the crows are having to be more circumspect. There are those in Saintstone who would have them destroyed.”

“How do you know all this?” I ask. “Is Fenn still in Featherstone?”

Solomon nods proudly. “In many ways staying in Featherstone was riskier than leaving, but he did it. Once Oscar told us what Sana had been doing to the people – and had done to Longsight – we challenged her in front of the rest of the community. Our questioning was useless; she has them so convinced.”

“She has them terrified,” Tanya adds and Solomon nods.

“There was no choice for the three of us – Sana has banished us. She has made the people believe their hunger is our fault for being unfaithful. Fenn convinced Sana that he supported her in spite of all he’d seen that night you left with Gull. He let her believe that her actions made him want to follow her even more devotedly. Justus vouched for him.”

Tanya gives Solomon’s hand a squeeze. “Fenn’s trying to help those we left – the innocent, ordinary people of Featherstone,” she tells me. “Sana’s still doing it, Leora – she’s still keeping them in the dark, keeping them hungry and desperate.” Clever, cruel Sana. “And it’s working.”

“Working how?” I ask, dread in my voice.

“Do you remember what it was like, Leora? To be so hungry? The hopeless hunger that you know won’t recede, because you know that even if you eat something that day it won’t be enough – it won’t fill or satisfy.”

“I remember it,” I say quietly. And yet, I almost don’t – it’s strange how quickly I have forgotten. But I remember the fear. The idea that I might feel hunger like that again if I stay here leaves a terror in my bones that almost makes me run.

“How did you feel about Saintstone when you were hungry, Leora?” Tanya said softly. “What did you think when you knew their bellies were full while you ate mouldy bread?”

“I hated them,” I whisper. And there is no lie there – I never felt more at home than when we were hungry together. More united in hatred. “I wanted to hurt them like they were hurting us.” There is sad recognition in Oscar’s face.

“They blame us,” Tanya says, a little quietly. “According to the teaching, Gull was meant to stay beneath the water on her birth day ritual.” I close my eyes and remember the cold of the dawn and the ice of water and the horror of Gull’s limp body. “The verdict had been cast – she was meant to pay for her sins, for the sins of the people, by staying under. A sacrifice.”

I swallow. It was me who dragged Gull out of the water that day. I did this. As if reading my mind, Tana lays a sudden hand on my arm. “And I will always be grateful to you for saving her – we will always be in your debt. But faith and tradition are powerful masters, Leora, as you know. Sana tells the people that their poverty, the land’s exhaustion, their hunger and sickness, is not just the fault of the marked; it is also judgement upon them for their faithlessness. Because Gull did not pay the price, the land must pay instead. They are told every day that they live under a curse. The community have never been so devout – so watchful and wary of sin in their midst.”