Cover

Epigraph

What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god!

—Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2, William Shakespeare

Pinion

noun

The outer part of a bird’s wing including the flight feathers.

verb

1 Restrain or immobilise (someone) by tying up or holding their arms or legs.

2 Cut off the pinion (of a wing or bird) to prevent flight.

origin

Late Middle English: from Old French pignon, based on Latin pinna, penna ‘feather’.

October, 1840

October, 1840

Shropshire

The bark is rough under her hands, scratching at her palms and fingers as she stumbles between the trees. She retches violently, her body jerking and shaking as the convulsions push her forward, deep into the clutches of the forest.

Copper and bronze leaves dance around as the wind shoves at her, roars like a rushing river. She is aware of everything. Breath and heartbeat. Colour and sound. The smell of the dank autumnal air. All of it heightened somehow. More vivid, more real.

She coughs, chokes in agony, tears streaming down her face as she gasps for breath. Make it stop, she begs, silently. Whatever hell this is, make it stop!

She had left the cottage mere hours ago. A bright autumn day, a long walk in the low golden sun. She had desperately needed to clear her mind. Scout was gone, her beloved companion buried just this morning. She had seen to it herself. Sobbing tears of anger as well as sorrow into the thick clay soil as she had dug his grave. His faithfulness for so many years cut short by some poisoned meat from who knows where. Her pleas to Walter to help her find the dog’s murderer had fallen on deaf ears. Her half-brother disliked the black-and-white pointer only marginally more than he disliked her. ‘My father’s exotic bastard,’ she had once heard him call her as she left the drawing room. The words had cut into her, carving at her heart, as his friends had laughed, the sound of them echoing down the long hallway as she had fled.

And now she was fleeing again. Distraught at having buried her most loyal, most faithful of friends and reeling from her loss, she had done what she always did when she was unsure of herself – she walked. Walked until her feet were sore and the fog in her head began to slowly lift.