I hesitated before I put it in my rucksack. I had never seen her wear it. Once I had asked her about that only unused garment in her chest. She had shaken her head. ‘I don’t know why I kept it. It has nothing to do with my life any more. In Bingtown, Trader families wear them when they go to the Traders’ Council to vote on Trader matters. Saffron was my family’s colour, the Lantis family. But I gave all that up years ago.’

I fingered the soft wool. It was cut in an archaic style, but the wool would be warm, I told myself. Besides, I had no intention of leaving it for my cousins. Now that my grandmother was dead, her little house on the seacliffs and the sheep pastures behind it would go to my uncle. And I, the sole daughter of her daughter, would have to make my own way in the world. My uncle had scowled at me when I had told him last night that I had nowhere to go, and asked his leave to stay on for a week.

He replied heavily, ‘The old woman was dying for two years, Cerise. If, in two years, you couldn’t make a plan for your future, you won’t do it in a week. We need this house, and it’s lawfully mine. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to go.’

So I went, but not far. Hetta, the shepherd’s wife took me in for the night. They were as angry with my uncle as I was, for he had already announced to there that he was raising their rent. In all the years that they had been my grandmother’s tenants, she had never raised their rent. Hetta was older than I, but that had never kept us from being good friends. She had two small children and was big with her third. She was glad to offer me a bed by the fire and a hot supper in exchange for help with her chores, ‘for as long as you want.’ I tidied the house as we talked, while she was relieved to sit down, put her feet up and put the last stitches into a quilt. I showed her both my ring and my pendant and chain. She exclaimed at the sight of the pendant and pushed it away from her.