Caris knew the answer. “It’s a dead nun.” The corpse on the ground was naked, but had the cropped hair of a nun. The body had somehow survived the fire. The woman was about a week dead. The birds had already eaten her eyes, and parts of her face had been nibbled by some scavenging animal.

Also, her breasts had been cut off with a knife.

Mair said in amazement: “Did the English do this?”

“Well, it wasn’t the French.”

“Our soldiers have foreigners fighting alongside them, don’t they? Welshmen and Germans and so on. Perhaps it was them.”

“They’re all under the orders of our king,” Caris said with grim disapprobation. “He brought them here. What they do is his responsibility.”

They stared at the hideous sight. As they looked, a mouse came out of the corpse’s mouth. Mair screamed and turned away.

Caris hugged her. “Calm down,” she said firmly, but she stroked Mair’s back to comfort her. “Come on,” she said after a moment. “Let’s get away from here.”

They returned to their horses. Caris resisted an impulse to bury the dead nun: if they delayed, they would still be here at nightfall. But where were they to go? They had planned to spend the night here. “We’ll go back to the old woman with the apple tree,” she said. “Her house is the only intact building we’ve seen since we left Caen.” She glanced anxiously at the setting sun. “If we push the horses, we can be there before it’s full dark.”

They urged their tired ponies forward and headed back along the road. Directly ahead of them the sun sank all too quickly below the horizon. The last of the light was fading when they arrived back at the house by the apple tree.

The old woman was happy to see them, expecting them to share their food, which they did, eating in the dark. Her name was Jeanne. There was no fire, but the weather was mild, and the three women rolled up side by side in their blankets. Not fully trusting their hostess, Caris and Mair lay down clutching the saddlebags that contained their food.

Caris lay awake for a while. She was pleased to be on the move after such a long delay in Portsmouth, and they had made good progress in the last two days. If she could find Bishop Richard, she felt sure he would force Godwyn to repay the nuns’ money. He was no paragon of integrity, but he was open-minded, and in his lackadaisical way he dispensed justice even-handedly. Godwyn had not had things all his own way even in the witchcraft trial. She felt sure she could persuade Richard to give her a letter ordering Godwyn to sell priory assets in order to give back the stolen cash.

But she was worried about her safety and Mair’s. Her assumption that soldiers would leave nuns alone had been quite wrong: what they had seen at Hopital-des-Soeurs had made that clear. She and Mair needed a disguise.

When she woke up at first light, she said to Jeanne: “Your grandsons – do you still have their clothes?”

The old woman opened a wooden chest. “Take what you want,” she said. “I have no one to give them to.” She picked up a bucket and went off to fetch water.

Caris began to sort through the garments in the chest. Jeanne had not asked for payment. Clothes had little monetary value after so many people had died, she guessed.

Mair said: “What are you up to?”

“Nuns aren’t safe,” Caris said. “We’re going to become pages in the service of a minor lord – Pierre, Sieur of Longchamp in Brittany. Pierre is a common name and there must be lots of places called Longchamp. Our master has been captured by the English, and our mistress has sent us to find him and negotiate his ransom.”

“All right,” Mair said eagerly.

“Giles and Jean were fourteen and sixteen, so with luck their clothes will fit us.”

Caris picked out a tunic, leggings and a cape with a hood, all in the dull brown of undyed wool. Mair found a similar outfit in green, with short sleeves and an undershirt. Women did not usually wear underdrawers, but men did, and fortunately Jeanne had lovingly washed the linen garments of her dead family. Caris and Mair could keep their own shoes: the practical footwear of nuns was no different from what men wore.

“Shall we put them on?” said Mair.

They pulled off their nuns’ robes. Caris had never seen Mair undressed, and she could not resist a peek. Her companion’s naked body took her breath away. Mair’s skin seemed to glow like a pink pearl. Her breasts were generous, with pale girlish nipples, and she had a luxuriant bush of fair pubic hair. Caris was suddenly conscious that her own body was not as beautiful. She looked away, and quickly began to put on the clothes she had chosen.

She pulled the tunic over her head. It was just like a woman’s dress except that it stopped at the knee instead of the ankles. She pulled up the linen underdrawers and the leggings, then put her shoes and belt back on.

Mair said: “How do I look?”

Caris studied her. Mair had put a boy’s cap over her short blonde hair, and tilted it at an angle. She was grinning. “You look so happy!” Caris said in surprise.

“I’ve always liked boys’ clothes.” Mair swaggered up and down the small room. “This is how they walk,” she said. “Always taking more space than they need.” It was such an accurate imitation that Caris burst out laughing.

Caris was struck by a thought. “Are we going to have to pee standing up?”

“I can do it, but not in undershorts – too inaccurate.”

Caris giggled. “We can’t leave off the drawers – a sudden flurry of wind could expose our… pretences.”

Mair laughed. Then she began to stare at Caris in a way that was strange but not entirely unfamiliar, looking her up and down, meeting her eyes and holding her gaze.

“What are you doing?” said Caris.

“This is how men look at women, as if they own us. But be careful – if you do it to a man, he becomes aggressive.”

“This could be more difficult than I thought.”

“You’re too beautiful,” Mair said. “You need a dirty face.” She went to the fireplace and blackened her hand with soot. Then she smeared it on Caris’s face. Her touch was like a caress. My face isn’t beautiful, Caris thought; no one ever judged it so – except Merthin, of course…

“Too much,” Mair said after a minute, and wiped some off with her other hand. “That’s better.” She smeared Caris’s hand and said: “Now do me.”

Caris spread a faint smudge on Mair’s jawline and throat, making it look as if she might have a light beard. It felt very intimate, to be looking so hard at her face, and touching her skin so softly. She dirtied Mair’s forehead and cheeks. Mair looked like a pretty boy – but she did not look like a woman.

They studied one another. A smile played on the red bow of Mair’s lips. Caris felt a sense of anticipation, as if something momentous was about to happen. Then a voice said: “Where are the nuns?”

They both turned round guiltily. Jeanne stood in the doorway, holding a heavy bucket of fresh water, looking frightened. “What have you done to the nuns?” she said.

Caris and Mair burst out laughing, and then Jeanne recognized them. “How you have changed yourselves!” she exclaimed.

They drank some of the water, and Caris shared out the rest of the smoked fish for breakfast. It was a good sign, she thought as they ate, that Jeanne had not recognized them. If they were careful, perhaps they could get away with this.

They took their leave of Jeanne and rode off. As they breasted the rise before Hopital-des-Soeurs, the sun came up directly ahead of them, casting a red light on the nunnery, making the ruins look as if they were still burning. Caris and Mair trotted quickly through the village, trying not to think about the mutilated corpse of the nun lying there in the debris, and rode on into the sunrise.