A branch snapped under Ben’s foot. He guided his torch skyward where skinny tree arms stretched overhead. Their fingers fanned apart just enough to let a glimmer of moonlight wink through. It was years since he had been in the countryside at night-time. He’d forgotten the quietness and that heightened sensitivity – the sound of the softest breeze and the crunch of leaves underfoot, curled up like balls of tinfoil.

He gathered whatever sticks he could find into a mound. Ben could hear Chloe talking to herself across the stillness of the field. She was either reading the instructions aloud or conjuring a spell. The latter made more sense judging from the way she was waving her arms around. Within the light of her torch, the tent’s frame was quickly taking shape.

‘That should do it,’ Ben whispered, dashing any dirt from his fingers.

He was standing stock-still – shining the light onto his pile, judging if he had enough – when he heard a branch crack behind him.

He froze.

Something was there, behind the trees. Ben listened, limbs set as they were.

Seconds passed. He looked over to Chloe, to the tent nearly erected.

Branches don’t just snap from the cold.

Was it the blind woman from earlier? But the animals were supposed to be on the other side of the village; not the mark of a great shepherd to wander off from her flock.

It could have been anything. A fox, a badger, even a fat mouse that had missed a step. Still, Ben listened, and still the night yielded not another sound.

‘Benny Boy, what are you doing over there?’ Chloe called out. ‘I’ll have this thing ready by the time you pick up a few sticks.’

It was nothing. He wouldn’t tell her. She’d only worry.

‘Sorry,’ he replied, scooping the wood up in his arms, ‘I’m all done here.’

*

The kindling cracked and split. Its flames bravely fended off the cold from their nest of stones. Ben and Chloe sat close enough to wave their fingers over it, as though it were a sleepless child craving constant attention. Oily shadows rippled around them, never settling on the crisp grass; rigid from the promise of a frost that was felt but not yet seen.

Chloe had laid down a scarf between them, patterned in mustards and navy blues with tassels on all four sides. On it they set their bread, tins of tuna, and a packet of sliced cheese. As their sojourn was to be but a single night, they now had more than they needed. The quantity as opposed to the quality was what mattered to the cold and famished.

Aoife would probably be asleep by now, divided from Ben by more than mere distance. He often wondered if she knew how much he thought about her and how he regretted all that he had already missed – those first moments that happened only once.