Thomas can hardly believe it. All he knows of France is that it is where his father was killed, and that it is a land so badly ravaged that when the alarum bells ring, even the stock animals know where they must gather to shelter from the English. Men and women threw themselves in the river rather than be caught. It does not seem the sort of place one might find a cure for anything, other than life itself.

‘It is where I am bound,’ the pardoner explains. ‘First across the Narrow Sea to Calais and then south to Chinon, to the court of King Charles, to seek the cure of his touch.’

He speaks quickly, as if unwilling to dwell on the details of his journey, or the cure. Thomas is thirsty now, and pleased when from the shadows the pardoner opens the flask and pours more ale.

‘But what is your story?’ he asks, changing the subject. ‘What brings you from your cloister? That is the tale I wish to hear.’

‘We were set upon,’ Thomas began with his eye on the cup, ‘set upon by men belonging to a man named Giles Riven.’

‘Sir Giles Riven?’ The pardoner stops pouring the ale and sits forward, his face lit by the fire.

‘You know of him?’ Thomas asks.

‘There is no one north of Stamford who has not heard of Giles Riven. I heard he took the castle at Cornford after old Lord Cornford was killed at Ludford Bridge this last year, claiming it on some slight connection. It is also said that he killed Cornford himself, putting a dagger through his eye, and that now he means to marry his son to the dead man’s daughter.’

Thomas closes his eyes and sees Riven, smiling, holding out the dead sister’s beads.

‘We know nothing of this,’ Katherine says. ‘We have been in cloister for these past years.’

The pardoner nods, and finishes pouring the ale.

‘How long have you been in orders?’ he asks, passing the cup to Thomas.

‘Eight years,’ Thomas replies, before draining the cup and handing it back. ‘Since I was twelve.’

The pardoner nods.

‘And you, Sister?’ he asks, pouring more ale.

There is a momentary pause before she replies.

‘Since being a child,’ she says. Thomas and the pardoner look up.

‘You were taken in as an oblate?’ the pardoner asks.

Katherine is hesitant.

‘I was,’ she agrees.

‘I thought they had abandoned that practice?’

Katherine opens her mouth to say something and then shuts it again. She does not seem to know.

‘And how many Eastertides have you seen in the priory?’ the pardoner presses.

She shrugs.

‘Ten?’ she supposes, and then looks desperate. ‘Fifteen?’

That would make her about twenty, Thomas thinks. About his age. There is a silence, disturbed only by the hissing of a damp log on the fire, the susurrus of the river through the trees.