As he walked back to the village through the barren, stony scrub, something gnawed at Little Mouse like a parasite. A vacancy; something missing, something left undone.

As he walked, weary in body and soul, he prayed – and his prayer was answered.

He saw his beloved abbot up ahead, an indistinct, deep-glowing figure in the washy white sunlight.

‘It is not enough,’ Little Mouse shouted, and heard his words echo among the trees.

‘The order,’ the abbot told him, ‘needs more than blood. Think of our treasures – the lost treasures of St Quintus. You must restore them,’ the abbot said. ‘When they are restored, then shall we all be reborn.’

Little Mouse threw up his hands.

‘I cannot paint pictures, Father Abbot,’ he cried. ‘I cannot work with gold and silver. I am no prophet, to write new sacred texts.’

The abbot said nothing. And in the silence Little Mouse saw the truth.

The relics.

He turned and ran back to where he’d left the body of the priest, his father, dangling from the ash tree.

As he ran, he heard the abbot’s voice. It chimed like a bell amid the boulders and gullies. It told him what he must take, what he must preserve, what he must keep safe so that the order might return to its former glory.

When Little Mouse reached the priest’s body he drew from his pocket a small, keen-edged knife. Folded out the blade. Steadied the hanging body with a firm one-handed grip on the bare, damp ribs. Reached up with the knife and carefully pared away the priest’s right ear.

The work done, Little Mouse held the ear in his hand. It was grubby, rough with dead skin. It was holy. A relic. Little Mouse’s soul sang.

This would be the first. ‘There will be more,’ Little Mouse promised the abbot. ‘Wherever I must go, whatever I must do, there will be more.’