‘You dance me wild,’ he says as his music reaches a crescendo. Only then does the song come from deep inside her. Raw in her throat it rises until she feels the power of it against her teeth, a power older than her soul. The song is returned to her in the growl of a bear, in the howl of a wolf. Breathless she falls into his arms. And still it snows.

‘You are the most beautiful of women,’ he says.

‘Have you seen many?’ Edith asks.

To her surprise, he says simply, ‘Yes, but none compare to you. Now,’ he says, changing the subject. ‘Tell me your story. You listened to mine, it’s your turn.’

‘There’s not much to tell.’

‘I don’t believe that. Try.’

She thinks she could gaze on him for all time. Then she looks down at her hands. ‘I was born and brought up, and I met you.’

‘His shoes were new,’ he said.

‘Whose shoes?’

‘Whoever shot me.’

‘How do you know?’

‘It’s the last thing I remember thinking as I lay on the ground, and he walked towards me. It’s the smallness of things that matter, the brevity of a little rock can’t be dismissed. It’s still part of the mountain.’

This night is the last. The last time she hears his music, the last time they make love. She can’t tell in all their passion where he begins and she ends. They are floating over her village, they are a part of the moon and the stars.

He whispers, ‘Do not fear the coming of the light.’

It isn’t as if they’re waking into a new day, more that they’ve travelled there and arrived in a different place and found the cabin to be filled with sunshine. On the table is a bunch of snowdrops.

Edith turns to him. ‘It broke me once to lose you.’

‘You aren’t losing me. Neither will you lose your voice. I’m here. I’ll always be here; my soul is with you, and you will come back to me. Dress for me. I want you to look a queen when you return to the village.’

He hands her the fur hat with its reindeer horns.

She smiles. ‘I can’t wear it.’

‘You should,’ he says. ‘The more strange and wondrous you look, the more they’ll respect you and leave you alone. Don’t go back with your head bowed. Stand tall, be brave. The one thing men fear most is the freedom of a woman to be herself. Wild women frighten men.’

‘They’ll see me as a ghost or one of the bloodless.’

‘They will see you and hear you, and no one will lay a hand on you.’

Demetrius hands her the violin.

‘I’ll look very strange dressed like this,’ she says. ‘Perhaps I’ll be with you sooner than I think for they’ll…’ She stops.