‘I mind my business,’ I reply, giving him a stern look over my shoulder. ‘Most people of good sense would do the same.’

He laughs off the rebuke.

‘Very well, seeing as how you wish to know … I saw a lone figure taking the path alongside the lake, and to my surprise I knew it to be my Seer. What is this? I asked myself. What manner of emergency can compel Seren Arianaidd to go about beneath the brightest sun we have seen in many a long week? Seren who favors moonlight for her excursions almost exclusively.’ When I do not respond to this he goes on. ‘I had to find out for myself what it was that brought you from your solitary home. What is it that calls you to the trees when the sun is at its highest and the light is so sharp and so hot?’ He steps in front of me and stares at my hair as a shaft of that same sunshine falls through the boughs above and illuminates me. ‘You are a very vision yourself,’ he murmurs.

Does he know that last night his wife came to me for help? I doubt it. She will not have discussed the matter with him. Her humiliation runs deep enough as it is. I could tell him, tell him that the reason I am gathering ingredients for a vision quest and a spellcasting is to make his seed quicken in the belly of his princess. I could. But I will not.

‘I was about my work,’ I say. ‘If you will stand aside, I would continue.’

But he does not stand aside. Instead he moves closer and stretches one arm out against the trunk of the silver birch to my left. ‘I would detain you but a moment more,’ he says gently. I keep my gaze fixed on the ground at our feet as he slowly, cautiously, reaches forward and touches my pale hair, letting his fingers follow its sweep down onto my shoulders. Onto my breast. His fingertips stray across to the narrow gap of bare skin my tunic reveals at my throat. His touch is warm. ‘You are like … no other,’ he says. ‘You are moonlight made flesh.’

I raise my face and force myself to look into his eyes. And he to look into mine. He does not flinch, only returns my stare with such intensity I fear for an instant that my own resolve might weaken. That I will let down my guard and reveal the depth of my own feverish wishes. But I must not. Still I do not trust myself to speak, for a woman’s heart can be a faithless mistress of her mind, and her tongue is more than able to betray them both!