She reached down and picked up the hem of her checked woollen dress, ringing out the muddy water that clung to it before tucking it into the thick leather belt she wore tightly around her waist. This way, she had free movement of her legs and her feet and didn’t have to add flowing skirts onto her list of potential trip hazards as she traversed the cliff-edge. She rolled the sleeves of her dress up to her elbows and pushed her cloak behind her. If she fell, at least the heavy folds of material would soften the fall a little.

She stepped down the first part of the slope, one hand poised against the edge of the cliff wall to guide her and the other left free so that she could catch herself if necessary. With precarious steps, Lily made her way down, her eyes flicking between the glimmering lamp of the lighthouse that was her target, and the ground, which was the complication that lay between her and her destination.

Halfway down the cliff, Lily started to feel confident. She was a child of the land; she had always been short and sturdy, and her legs were strong with thick muscle, which meant they kept her upright and balanced. She felt so appreciative of all that time she had spent climbing trees and hiking the moorland, leaping from stone to stone to cross the river.

With quiet joy, she recalled chasing Alice through the forest, the two of them unconsciously building stamina with all of their playing and running. For the first time in her life she felt solid, capable, powerful, when before she had only valued her logic and her cleverness, and thought of herself as stocky and unadventurous. She found it hard to believe that just a few days ago she had been that person. Alice will barely recognise me, she thought, pride bubbling through her chest.

It didn’t occur to Lily that she might not recognise Alice.

Halfway down the crumbling track, Lily’s breath became laboured and her thigh muscles cried out from the continuous tension she had to maintain in order to stay upright. A gust of wind took advantage of her momentary lapse of concentration and she stumbled, the rocks and mud beneath her feet sliding and taking Lily along with them.

She was helpless to their movement; she couldn’t resist, couldn’t hold on to anything. The rock face was suddenly devoid of handholds, and all she could do was attempt to stay upright as the sliding debris gained momentum. She was careering towards the very edge of the cliff, seconds away from being pitched over the edge. There was still a huge drop to the level of the village, and alongside the inevitable fear, Lily also felt a strange frustration that this was how she was going to die.

Here, now, on a stupid cliff, after days of relentless travel, just a few miles away from where her best friend was being kept, this was where she was going to die.