Just for that split second, she finds herself wondering if Ma’s also listening. Whether she’s come far enough that she wants to see the house of cards finally come down for herself. And she affords another moment to the man she now accepts was her father. Could he honestly have known who they were to him? Was his own flesh and blood worth so little in the case for national security at all costs? As the defence rises, the stiff curls of the barrister’s wig leer sickly yellow in the daylight flooding in from the skylight overhead. But she’s strangely heartened, remembering this is the only court with a glass ceiling, with a view of the sky. She no longer needs to fathom the answers to these questions. All she need do next is watch the birds as they fly away.

And so it begins again. The war that had to be won. The intelligence that could only be overseen by one general. The crowd fidgets and jeers, the idea that the untouchable British army might only have one general able enough as preposterous now as it was then. The sanctity of the defence forces. The lack of funds, of oversight, of understanding of the pressures of the battlefield. The overwhelming pressures of duty, of living to serve.

She drifts with the birds, eyes travelling over the screen reserved for the most violated of witnesses, where countless children will have had to sit. A sharp intake of breath as she wonders – could she be here today too? And would she recognise her if she were? Even she couldn’t put a name to the face she once knew so well. But the tension leaves her as a bird loops a lazy curl in the sky. She remembers this is bringing Kayleigh her own closure, too.

She stands as the defence rests, edging her way through the crowd jammed into the gallery. She doesn’t need to stay for the final word. She knows what it will be. It’s the only possible word that’s left: guilty. Years of lies absorbed in a single breath, a single pronouncement. But that’s what everyone else is waiting for. That’s 275not what this is about for her. She feels it in every corner she turns, in every step she takes through the winding corridors of centuries-old justice. This is about finally turning the page. Finally being in charge of her own script, and beginning her own story, knowing nothing and no one has been abandoned as she takes yet another first step.