David had said he would be the first to kill, Isaac had argued till Rebecca had found the compromise. None should claim the privilege by right, in the cell they were as one, she had said, and seemed to mock at David. The leader had rejected her, demanded it for himself, the prerogative of the front runner, but Isaac would not yield. Rebecca had spoken again, chided David. Were they not all capable? It was a simple thing, was it not? She had opened the door, disappeared for a minute, not more, and when she returned there were four twigs in her fist, their tips arranged in line, their length hidden in her closed palm. David had drawn first, expressionless, watching and waiting, then Isaac with a smile lightening his features because his was shorter, Moses third, and the winced sigh of disappointment from the other two men when they saw the stubbed length of the one which he had chosen. A protest from Isaac, a taunt from Rebecca that already they would divide themselves – officers and men, commissars and proletariat – a shrug from David. No remark from the boy himself. Again and again in his mind Moses had worked over the plan, digesting the part that he would play, remembering the details.

The first blow they would strike, and Moses Albyov had been chosen; not David who was their leader, not Isaac who fancied and believed in his fitness, but Moses, the last of the recruits to arrive before the cell had been sealed. To curse

Rebecca or to love her for the chance she had wished on him – he had not known the answer as he stumbled from shadows of the wood to the roadside.

But his hand had shaken, and the wool had drifted across his eyes. The mistakes of Moses Albyov. Errors that the others would not have made. And if he now collapsed, if he buckled, then all would pay the penalties for the faults that were his alone.

If there could only be someone to speak to, or just the sound of a human voice, however distant…