“The visionary of the Wage of Crow Hill is a hereditary role,” Lizzy told them. “It passes from grandmother to granddaughter. Tabby must have known my granny, who was also called Lizzy Goode. In time, when I find a man who pleases me sufficiently, I shall bear a daughter, and her daughter will be named Lizzy Goode. Then she will take over this place when I am returned to the earth. For that is how it has always been and how it will always be.”

“And have you yet found a gentleman to please you?” Branwell asked her.

Lizzy looked him up and down. “No,” she said.

It seemed unlikely that a life as perfect as this one could continue for very long, not when the mills and machines of industry were cutting ever further into the wild land, but Emily hoped that Lizzy’s certainty was well-founded.

“I have never met a visionary before,” Emily said happily as she took a seat on a low wooden stool, with both her Keeper and the great black dog leaning against her as if they had always been the best of friends. “What does such a life entail?”

Lizzy shrugged, throwing some herbs and berries into a pot of simmering water that hung over the fire.

“I keep my own counsel, live my life simply and in harmony with Mother Nature and all her animals. And from time to time, when I am blessed with a vision, I see into the future and make a prophecy,” Miss Goode told her. “But I don’t bother telling people my prophecies much these days—they are never grateful for the warnings, and in truth sometimes it is kinder just to let fate take its path unseen.”

“Well,” Anne said, “we have not come for a prophecy, but for your expert advice, if you will give it to us. We have some coin to pay you for your time.”

“As you have not come for love potions, I shall help you,” Lizzy said affably. “I cannot tell you how very bored I am with silly girls coming up here, thinking I can conjure up a husband for them out of thin air.”

“We promise not to tell our sister Charlotte where you live,” Emily said.

Emily took the stoneware mug of heather tea that Lizzy handed each of them, grateful to wrap her frozen fingers around its gentle warmth, as the great beast of a dog laid his head on her lap.

“You are so very young to be living such a life of solitude,” Anne said. “Did you never think that you might want something different for your life than that which had been decided even before you were born?”

“No,” Lizzy Goode told her, and that was the end of that conversation. “So, if you have not come for a love potion or a prophecy, then tell me what have you come for.”