Nora, a cellist, returns home to the Sussex coast with memories she must banish in order to survive: a charismatic teacher; a mistake she cannot unmake. Her mother Ada is waiting: a fragile, bitter woman who distils for herself a glamorous past as she smokes French cigarettes in her unkempt garden. A documentary maker has arrived in the village to shoot a film about King Cnut and his illegitimate daughter, whose body lies beneath the flagstones of Bosham church. As he digs up tales of ancient battles, Ada and Nora find themselves face to face with their own carefully buried secrets.