‘Pretty, isn’t she, Ned?’ Red nudged him in the ribs, a knowing expression in his eyes.

Ned coloured to the roots of his hair, but he drew himself up. Ignoring Red’s snatching the top trencher was one thing, but he could not let this pass. ‘Sergeant Fletcher to you, Red,’ he said, more sharply than he had intended.

Red raised a russet brow. The wine had made him careless of the fact that he was Ned’s subordinate. ‘Hark at you.’ He grinned familiarly. ‘You’ll be trying for a knighthood next.’

Ned ground his teeth. Red was impertinent, but it was all the more galling because there was a grain of truth in his remark. Ned did dream that perhaps, if he won favour, he might better himself. It flashed in on Ned that his cousin Alan le Bret would not stand for such insolence. Alan would have had a man flogged for less. Aware that he had supped a drop more wine that was wise, and that his command of his temper was slipping, Ned sucked in a breath, and counted to ten. Today was meant to be a celebration, and he was not about to sour it. He moderated his tone. ‘In any case, you’re wrong.’ A white lie might put Red off the scent. ‘I was looking at Lady St Clair. She looks about sixteen.’ This last was no less than the truth. She did look sixteen, her eyes were sparkling every bit as brightly as her daughter’s.

Red crowed. ‘I’m not the clod you take me for, Ned...Sergeant,’ he amended, with the understanding but insensitive smile of a drunk unable to recognise when he was going too far. ‘Come on, we’re none of us blind moles. No one need follow the direction of your eyes when you wear that dreamy expression. Every man in the guard knows who holds your heart in her keeping.’

Feeling his temper heat up, Ned flung Red a look that was all daggers.

A temperate man would have heeded the warning. But Red was not temperate, the wine was flowing freely in his veins and it had driven caution from his head. ‘It is May Day...’ He made a lewd gesture.

Ned could not stomach this. He’d not sit around listening to bawdy suggestions about Mistress Gwenn. Standing precipitately, his bench rocked, and one of his neighbours pitched into the rushes. A chorus of slurred complaints reached his ears, but Ned ignored them. ‘Your tongue wags too freely, soldier,’ he said, using a voice that was a cold copy of one he’d heard his cousin employ. ‘Take care lest it wags once too often.’ Turning on his heels, he stalked out.

Denis the Red’s jaw sagged as he watched the sergeant slam out of the hall. ‘Well, well. I must really have touched him on the raw for him to storm off like that.’ His gaze still on the door, he blinked in astonishment for Ned was not the only one to be leaving the hall. Mistress Gwenn was sailing serenely towards the door. He leered. ‘The dice have finally rolled in Sergeant Fletcher’s favour.’

Ned was not in the yard when Gwenn reached it. All that morning, she had meditated on the conversation she had had with her uncle, and she saw that it would be wicked to let matters drift as they had been doing. She must tell Ned that though she liked him, her liking did not match his.

The churchyard gate was open. Concluding that Ned must have gone that way, she went through the glebeland towards the wood. A few minutes later she found him, sitting on a tree stump in a pool of sunlight a little way from the main path. His head was bowed, he was staring at the ground, a sprig of apple blossom in his hands. ‘Ned?’

Ned started, and the blossom fell to the ground. ‘Mistress Gwenn! I thought you were at the feast.’ He stood up clumsily, and while the too-ready colour flooded his cheeks, the wine Ned had drunk made it easier for him to speak to her. ‘Will you sit and talk with me?’ he asked, halfway between a request and a command.

Gwenn seated herself on the bole of the tree and shook out her sapphire skirts. The sun’s rays streamed through a gap in the leafy canopy. Ned’s corn-flower blue eyes blazed with love. He moved closer. Gwenn held her back stiff as a post. Ned was never devious, but he was not usually so bold. This was going to be more awkward than she had anticipated. She hauled in a breath and launched in. ‘I’m glad I found you, Ned. I wanted to speak with you.’

‘You did?’

Ned’s voice was breathless and so full of hope that her heart contracted. Waldin had made her see that sometimes one had to be cruel to be kind. So, because she realised she must, Gwenn hardened her heart to the pain her words would bring. And in order that Ned might be spared some dignity, she turned her head away from him, so the sun played on her cheeks. She did not want him to think she was willing to witness the hope dying on his face.

‘Ned...I must tell you–’ He took her hand. She tried to pull free. ‘No, Ned. No.’ He held her hand gently, but firmly, and without an unseemly struggle, which Gwenn was not prepared for, she was unable to free herself. A cloud threw a chilly shadow over her shoulders. Strange, one part of her mind found time to think, she never would have guessed that so fine a day would turn dull.

‘Gwenn... May I call you that? Gwenn...’

To add to her confusion, he dropped to his knees, and for the second time that day she had a man kneeling at her feet. Only this time it was no jest. This time she did not laugh.

‘No, Ned. Please. Listen to me.’ But Ned shook his head and gripped her fingers fiercer than ever. He touched her cheek. His hand was trembling. Gwenn felt tears prick behind her eyes. ‘Oh, Ned,’ she said, despairingly. ‘I’m so sorry.’

The shadow was growing longer. Everywhere as far as she could see, the dappled sunspots winked out one by one. She shivered. The birds fell silent. The leaves stopped rustling. It was eerie. It was as though all life in the wood was suspended, and everything – birds, animals, trees, shrubs – had stopped breathing. The hairs rose on the back of her neck. ‘Ned,’ she whispered, urgently. ‘Ned, something’s wrong.’

Reluctantly, Ned tore his eyes from her face. The bright colour ebbed from his face. ‘You’re right.’ He jumped up, pulling her to her feet. ‘Something is wrong.’

The light had taken on a dusk-like quality, and it was growing darker and more like night by the second.

‘A storm?’ Gwenn asked optimistically, though in her heart she knew it was no such thing.

‘No. Not a storm.’ Ned’s hand crept to the reassuring solidity of his swordhilt.

The darkness was still thickening, it hung like a pitchy awning over the glade.

Vainly Gwenn tried to see beyond the gloom gathering in the gaps between the trees. It was like twilight. ‘Ned, I’m scared. I’ve never heard such a silence in the forest.’

Ned was scared too, but he wasn’t going to admit it. He should protect Gwenn, but he was damned if he knew what he was meant to be protecting her from. Valiantly trying for lightness, he threw a swift grin over his shoulder. ‘You can’t hear silence, Gwenn.’ His witticism was ignored. He heard her move closer; he felt her fingers curl round his belt. Her breath fanned the back of his neck. He shut his eyes and steeled himself from turning and taking her in his arms.

‘Ned?’ She was clinging to him as though he were a lifeline. ‘Holy Mother, it’s the end of the world!’

He whirled about. Gwenn’s head was tipped upwards, her eyes so dilated with terror, they were solid black. She was staring through a gap in the leaves.

‘Look,’ she pointed, ‘look at the sun!’

Ned looked and wished he hadn’t. One moment he could see its brightness, and the next he could not. The sun was snuffed out. Gwenn’s panic fuelled his, and the boundaries of his world tilted. God and His Angels must be at war with the forces of the Devil. Order was fighting chaos, and chaos had triumphed. They were enclosed in a dark, quiet world and the only sound was the sound of their heartbeats and their flurried, frightened breathing. Then, because Gwenn’s slight body pressed trembling to his, and because he had pledged himself to her and wanted to comfort her, Ned pulled her into his arms