The yard is dusk-darkened. She has slept the whole day. Lisbet scatters chickens as she hurries towards the commotion, her body not yet awake enough to entrust itself with a run. Her belly always feels heavier after sleep, and she is gasping by the time she reaches the skep yard. What she sees is enough to stop her breath entirely.

It makes no sense to begin with. The dogs are running in crazed loops around the fence that borders the skeps. Sophey is standing at the boundary of the forest, waving her rake and yelling. From the trees Lisbet can hear but not see Nethe, bellowing as though on a hunt. And between them, between Lisbet and Sophey, and Sophey and Nethe, the air is smudged, made thick with bees.

Lisbet’s ribs grow sharp, slicing with each breath. It is because the pain is so intense that she knows she is not dreaming. She gathers herself, holding her upper arms and squeezing, pushing away the panic buzzing around her body.

‘Stop shouting,’ she calls, making her voice melodic, as though singing a nursery rhyme. ‘Stop shouting, Sophey, Nethe. Stop shouting.’

Sophey cannot hear her. Lisbet checks the sky. The bees are floating over everything, making the heat visible, waving on the stifling air. But they are not one body. She can see the deepening sky through them, see wisps of cloud, see that there is no moon, no stars yet. They are not a swarm. But whatever has unsettled her sister- and mother-in-law has unsettled the bees, and the threat is only growing with their shrieking.

First she must deal with the dogs. They are the most like to be targeted. She whistles them over. Ulf obeys, and Fluh follows when she sees Ulf sitting at Lisbet’s feet. She lifts the smaller dog, who snaps and yaps, and leads Ulf to the kitchen, throwing Fluh inside after Ulf and closing the door.

Lisbet eyes the pressing shed. She could fetch her robes, her wicker mask, the net. But more immediately, she must stop the noise, soothe the air so the bees start to calm.

‘Frau Wiler?’ Lisbet turns her head. Frederich is there, his mouth agape, the drum at his hip. He is raw-eyed, just returned from the city.

‘Don’t speak,’ hums Lisbet. The drum has given her an idea. ‘Where is Eren?’

‘I believe in bed—’

Lisbet shushes him. ‘Fetch him,’ she says again, in that same mellifluous voice, thrilled at the thought they lay with only a wall between them and no soul else in the house. ‘And his lute.’

Frederich nods his understanding, and runs toward the house, his drum banging at his hip. Lisbet winces, but the bees are still a floating tide, not a cloud. In the forest, Nethe has stopped shouting, or has moved out of earshot. Lisbet walks closer to Sophey.

‘Stop shouting,’ she says as she walks, over and over until at last Sophey turns to her, her swollen cheek a livid red, her face bright with fury.