Funny how the fear of being treated as an incomer, as her mor had been, never deserted her. It was only as she grew older and was embraced by the fishwives that she understood her mor had brought her isolation upon herself. Recognising it wasn’t simply the Weem folk rejecting her mother, but Astrid herself spurning their attempts to make her one of them, she also understood why Dagny behaved the way she did, why she refused to show an interest in fishing or the tasks the women were expected to master. She was merely imitating their mother. Their poor unhappy mor, who loved their father but never ceased to regret leaving Norway and coming to Scotland, especially once she understood her fisher-husband would leave her for months at a time. Not even her children compensated for his absences, or for what she’d left behind. It didn’t matter what they said or did, or how some of the community went out of their way to include her, she refused all overtures and as a consequence earned little but the mutual suspicion and resentment of the Weem women, and many of the men, too. Astrid tried to share this attitude with her daughters, hoping to make them cleave to her, but only Dagny did so. Thank God I did not, thought Sorcha, feeling a rush of first guilt, before it was overcome by a swell of sentiment for the woman beside her.

Sorcha remained where she was, enjoying the warmth and the comfort of having a body next to hers, and reflected on the whispered conversation she and Nettie had shared until well after midnight when they’d finally come to bed. With her face only inches from hers on the pillow, Nettie had asked, ‘So, are you all right, hen?’

‘Me?’ said Sorcha, propping herself up on an elbow and facing her friend, glad the night wasn’t to end just yet. ‘Of course. Isobel just gave me a fright, that’s all. As for what I told you about Dagny and Kennocht, well.’ She shrugged. ‘What can I do?’

‘That’s not what I mean.’

Sorcha tried to keep her expression neutral. She’d known what Nettie meant and hoped to deflect her. It hadn’t worked.

‘You look well,’ said Nettie. ‘Better than you have for a long time.’ She picked up one of Sorcha’s long, tawny tresses and twined it around her finger, tugging gently. ‘You’ve roses in your cheeks and your dress doesn’t hang off you any more. Seems the countryside agreed with you, even if you didn’t agree with it.’ She grinned, releasing the strand. ‘But I’m not referring to Isobel or your sister and her swither of a man, and you know it. I want to ken how you really feel. In here.’ She pressed her hand against Sorcha’s heart.

Sorcha curled her hand over Nettie’s.