Sophey pulls a face in cruel imitation of Lisbet’s probing stare. ‘Are you going?’

No, Lisbet decides. She could not.

Nethe is spread across the bed, her mouth wide open, just like Henne’s when he sleeps.

‘Nethe,’ says Lisbet, and when she does not stir, she places her hand on Nethe’s shoulder and squeezes. ‘Agnethe.’

Nethe smiles lightly, and tilts her cheek down so it rests on Lisbet’s hand. Lisbet withdraws sharply, and Nethe opens her eyes.

‘Nethe, your mother needs you.’

Nethe groans: a waft of sour beer reaches Lisbet. ‘I am tired.’

‘Not as tired as I,’ says Lisbet. ‘She wants you up.’

‘Can she not make do with you? Tell her I’ve a headache.’

‘I’ll wager you do,’ says Lisbet. ‘I am ordered back to bed.’

‘You meant it, didn’t you?’ says Nethe, unmoving.

‘Meant what?’

‘The dance tree,’ says Nethe. ‘We really can go?’

Lisbet does not want to have said it, doesn’t want any of last night to have happened.

‘Tonight?’ asks Nethe.

‘If I cannot sleep, nothing will be possible.’

‘I can find it without you,’ says Nethe.

‘And I can wake Sophey.’

Nethe glares at her, but it is without her usual intensity. The last of the beer still blurs her eyes. ‘You will not.’

‘No,’ admits Lisbet. ‘But if you don’t let me sleep now, Sophey will find her daughter murdered and her daughter-in-law on the gibbet.’

Nethe laughs. ‘Black, Lisbet.’

‘As pitch.’

•

Lisbet wakes with confusion. Her sleep was dreamless but for the fact she was at sea, on a boat that lifted and fell on rolling waves. Her thighs are sticky and in the dark, shuttered room she cannot see why. She fumbles with her shift, hauling up her skirts and rubbing her hands across her legs. She brings her hand up to her nose, already knowing her fingers are bloody, anticipating the stink of iron coating her palm – but no. She licks her forefinger. Salt. It is sweat, only.

She lies back on the pallet, her heart slowing by increments, and places her hand on her belly. Still there, still here. My boy.

She levers herself upright. The room is unbearably hot. Her hair is stuck in stringy ropes down her back, on her forehead. No doubt she stinks as badly as Nethe did. Did Sophey smell the drink on her daughter? Lisbet used to think her mother-in-law all seeing, all knowing, but now she realises she is only a woman, suffering often, and as scared as any of them of the damnation her cherished Geiler bestowed on them all, and especially upon Agnethe.

She listens, but can hear nothing. Not the musicians’ snores, nor Sophey’s clattering. Her eyelids start to close. She could sleep more, sleep again. She should, if their visit tonight is insisted upon by Nethe.

Lisbet is beginning to drift when a cry rises from an indeterminate distance. She pushes herself up again, listening. Another cry, of anger or alarm, and then, belatedly, the dogs begin to bark. Lisbet forces herself to her feet.