‘She got captured after a battle and someone sold her to the English for a lot of gold. They took her to an English court that was run by Catholic priests who put her on a bed and tied her down. They told her she had to say she didn’t really hear the voices, but she wouldn’t do it. After a time she gave up because torture is very terrible, but they still burned her to death anyway. Her last words were “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus”.’

Both Ruthy and I were hoping this homework would be the end of Caleb’s obsession, but instead he let out a rip-roaring scream and we cuddled him hard to try to make him quiet before Mum got out of bed.

‘Caleb! Shhhhhh! Mum’s still in bed. And we have to be good or she’ll have a worse than usual head day,’ said Ruthy.

‘What’s that noise about?’ we heard Dad call out from the bedroom. ‘What’s going on? You all right, Caleb? Need your nebuliser?’

‘He’s fine, Dad. He just saw a spider,’ I called out. Ruthy had her hand over Caleb’s mouth trying to calm him down.

‘What’s wrong, Caleb?’ she said. ‘This is what you wanted, isn’t it? I finished it this morning for you. What’s wrong?’

‘This proves that Dad is going to be sacrificed,’ he said, white with panic.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I said, tired of the game now. ‘Dad. Is. Not. Going. To. Be. Sacrificed.’ I thumped the bed next to him with each word.

‘Yes, he is, Dorcas. Yes, he is. Because yesterday you drew a picture of a crown and sword, like the army coat from the king, and Ruthy drew some flowers.’ His little bottom lip was trembling and his eyes were as wide as a full moon.

‘But Caleb, I am always drawing swords and armour and crowns, and Ruthy is always drawing flowers,’ I said, exasperated. Really, boys could drive me nuts. I made a mental note to be sure no boy knights came to live at Caramel.

‘But when I saw Dad tied up to the tree in my dream, he kept saying not to worry, and then he said, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus”,’ insisted Caleb.

‘Caleb, that was just a dream,’ said Ruthy, patting his back now because he had started to hiccup between words.

‘But Joan Dark had dreams too, and they came true and they sacrificed her.’ His face was crumpling up in the way it did when he was about to lose it, so we were both patting him and stroking him, and I was holding his Ventolin ready to help him use it if he started to panic and wheeze.

‘Want me to come and get the spider?’ called out Dad.

‘No!’ Ruthy and I both called out at once.

‘Dorcas got it and squashed it with her shoe and it’s quite dead,’ called out Ruthy.

‘You’d better not have squashed a spider on my clean sheets,’ called out Mum.