She was what would become known, centuries later, as a strong woman. Determined, open-minded and very intelligent. She had spent years learning how to make medicines from the herbs that grew in the woods around the cottage. She had studied the animals, even as she prepared them for the cookpot. She knew when the birds migrated. She watched the phases of the moon. She spoke her mind.

She’d never particularly cared for the opinions of those around her, teaching those who would learn and doing her best for those who needed help or advice. She had delivered all of the village’s children under the age of twenty, and had been working on the second generation for a few years.

That had made it all the more galling when the sheriff, a young man by the name of Bryn – she’d welcomed his second child only the previous month – arrived with soldiers and dragged her to the town.

As the flames moved towards her, the only sound she could hear was the mob chanting “Witch! Witch!”