‘Perhaps Riven and that giant of his did the damage,’ she says, ‘but it was the Prioress and Sister Joan who together choked the life out of her, to that I will swear an oath on all that is holy.’

The pardoner is watching her closely.

‘What happened then?’ he asks.

Katherine shakes her head and says nothing. She pulls the blanket up around her face and a long silence follows. After a moment, she settles herself more comfortably, and, then, despite the cold, she begins to snore softly.

‘The ale is strong,’ the pardoner observes.

He leans forward and tugs the blanket over Katherine’s ravaged foot, and then he pours the last of the ale to share. He sits back, turns to Thomas, and speaks confidentially.

‘How long do you think it will be before it is known that you are apostate?’ he asks.

‘But we are not apostate!’ Thomas says.

The pardoner waves his hand.

‘I know that now,’ he says. ‘But when first I saw you, I naturally assumed you had fled your priory for the love of one another. It is what everyone will think.’

Thomas cannot help glancing at Katherine. Despite her snores he is certain she is listening.

‘But—’ he begins.

‘But nothing. A monk and a nun. The moment your flight is known, you are excommunicated. Your sin will be broadcast abroad, even in Boston by tomorrow if you are unlucky, and then no one will help you. All are forbidden to do so, and who would willingly offend the Church? No man. The friars will start looking for you first, and then the Justices will come after you with their writs of apostata capiendo.’

‘But the worst they can do is take us back to the priory, surely?’

‘But you left the priory accused of common assault, and now, no doubt, the charges will be magnified a hundredfold. And your prior will only hand you over to Riven again, and this time he will take no chances. He will kill you. And her.’

This is a bitter truth. Thomas feels his spirit, so cheered by drink, curdle.

‘We are making our way to Canterbury,’ he tells the pardoner. ‘The Dean of the Priory says our only chance is to find a sympathetic audience with the Prior of All, the head of our order. He will hear us and give us justice.’

‘And you hope this Prior of All will go against a man like Riven?’

Thomas has not thought of it like that.

‘I suppose not,’ he says, thinking on what the pardoner has said about the Duke of Somerset. ‘Yet what else can we do?’

‘Remember Deuteronomy,’ the pardoner tells him. ‘An eye for an eye.’

Thomas feels something stir in his chest: a flutter of excitement. The offer of some alien freedom.

‘You cannot mean me to find Riven myself?’

The pardoner shrugs.

‘Why not? You have shown how capable you are.’