As she fought to get back the wind that had been knocked out of her, she allowed herself a moment to stare up at the thick cloud above and feel the cold pinpricks of rain on her skin. But no more. She had to move. The knife had fallen not far from her right hand. She reached for it, then got to her hands and knees before pushing herself upright.

One last time, Esther looked back towards the house. Now Ivan stood on the step, his hands in his pockets, as if this were any dull day. She turned back to the lane ahead of her. Clumps of coarse grass between two tracks gouged out of the earth by tractor tyres. Hoof divots pocked the ground, churned it to mud, leading to and from a large door in the side of the cowshed. Hedgerows either side, a barrier between her and the fields all around.

Somewhere, not far away, she heard the diesel grumble of a tractor, the sound rising and falling as the engine worked. The others were around these fields, doing whatever work they did. She needed to find her way back to the road in front of the house, staying out of their sight. Panic churned beneath the surface of her mind, a monster beneath the waves, a shadow ready to break into the now. She had to keep it below or it would surely devour her.

Esther moved along the lane, the mud sucking at her shoes, pulling her balance from under her. She tried to keep to the grassy channel in the middle, where the tractor’s tyres had not stripped the turf away. The ground was firmer here, and she was able to move faster, eyeing the fields as she went.

Too late, she saw the tractor crest the rise up ahead and to her right. She ducked down to a crouch, the hedgerow between her and the driver, but she heard the engine rev and grow louder as it steered down towards her. Keeping low, she broke into a run, and had gone only a few steps before the mud pulled her left shoe loose, and soon the right was gone too. Her bare feet slipped in the mire, and she staggered, then fell onto her stomach, the knife held out in front of her. Somewhere behind her, the tractor’s engine rattled to its death, and a brittle silence fell over the lane.

Even though she had sworn to herself that she no longer believed, Esther closed her eyes and said, “Please, God, please help me.”