The woods thickened in the dusk, colour and definition fading out of the landscape so even the distinction between the white snow and the narrow black naked trees blurred. For all that, Jess negotiated the narrow paths without a torch; neither Ellie nor the others, following her, reached for their own lights. This was a territory Jess understood better than any of them – except Madeleine, perhaps, if her fever-visions approached anything like true knowledge. Best to follow her lead; besides, given the creatures’ sensitivity to light it seemed best to conserve theirs until the last moment.

The path was overgrown and treacherous; Ellie winced at every snap of brittle wood or undergrowth. Charlotte gasped and cursed; Ellie hissed “Ssh,” pausing as she did to search the trees for movement. But they remained still.

“We’ll be okay,” Jess whispered over her shoulder. “They won’t come out till it’s full dark.”

The bare trees rustled overhead. Ellie glanced up several times, but could see nothing.

“Here we are,” said Jess at last.

They stepped out of the trees into the day’s last light. In front of them was the earth bank, with its single gap. Jess led them through.

Half a dozen holes of various sizes dotted the ground between them and the second earth bank. Two gleamed with ice. Ellie shone her torch down another; it was only a few feet deep, choked with soil and grass. When she looked around she saw the two parallel earth banks were linked by another, shorter pair lying perpendicular to them, creating an enclosed space broken only by the gap they’d entered through.

“This is it,” said Madeleine. “Bayliss was right. Another long barrow, or what’s left of one.”

“Here,” whispered Jess.

She pointed to the hole that lay beneath the slab of rock set into the far embankment. Madeleine shone her torch on it, revealing its pinkish colour. “Rhyolite,” she said.

“You’re a geologist now?” whispered Charlotte.

“What can I tell you, wack? Far too much free time. ‘Sides, you never know where you’ll get a good idea for a sermon. Gotta keep the punters interested somehow.”

Charlotte’s laugh was short and faint.

“Rhyolite,” said Madeleine again. “You don’t normally find that in the Peaks.” She shone the torch over the charcoal marks. The angular, reversed D; the smudged smeared marks below it.

“Those –” Jess reached out to the smudged marks, letting her hand drop before her fingers could touch them, “– Mum told me about them. There were three to start with. They rubbed one out for each night.”

“Two nights and then the Dance,” said Charlotte. “That was how it went, right? So the first night...” She fell silent; Ellie could almost see Joda and Barbara, standing at her side.

Ellie indicated the triangular mark. “What about this?”

“Dunno,” said Jess.

“Mad?”

“I think it’s dālet,” the vicar said.

“Phoenician again?”