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‘You scarcely speak to me,’ Keffria pointed out.

‘When I muddled the ledger books for what I had inherited, you simply took them back from me and did them yourself. You run the household as if I were not here. When Cerwin appeared on the doorstep today, you charged directly into battle, only sending Rache to tell me about it as an afterthought. Mother, were I to vanish as Althea has, I think the household would only run more smoothly. You are so capable of managing it all.’ She paused and her voice was almost choked as she added, ‘You leave no room for me to matter.’ She hastily lifted her mug and took a long sip of the steaming coffee. She stared deep into the fireplace.

Ronica found herself wordless. She drank from her own mug. She knew she was making excuses when she said, ‘But I was always just waiting for you to take things over from me.’

‘And always so busy holding the reins that you had no time to teach me how. “Here, give me that, it’s easier if I just do it myself.” How many times have you said that to me? Do you know how stupid and helpless it always made me feel?’ The anger in her voice was very old.

‘No,’ Ronica said quietly. ‘I didn’t know that. But I should have. I really should have. And I am sorry, Keffria. Truly sorry.’

Keffria snorted out a sigh. ‘It doesn’t really matter, now.

Forget it.’ She shook her head, as if sorting through things she could say to find the words she must. ‘I’m taking charge of Malta,’ she said quietly.

She glanced up at her mother as if expecting opposition.

Ronica only looked at her. She took a deeper breath.

‘Maybe you doubt that I can do it. I know I doubt it. But I know I’m going to try.

And I wanted to ask you… No. I’m sorry, but I have to tell you this.

Don’t interfere. No matter how rocky or messy it gets.

Don’t try to take it away from me because it’s easier to do it yourself. ’

Ronica was aghast. ‘Keffria, I wouldn’t.’

Keffria stared into the fire. ‘Mother, you would. Without even knowing you were, just as you did today. I took what you had set up, and handled it from there. But left to myself, I would not have called Malta down at all. I would have told Cerwin and Delo that she was out or busy or sick, and sent them politely on their way, without giving Malta the chance to simper and flirt.’

‘That might have been better,’ Ronica conceded in a low voice.

Her daughter’s words hurt. She had only been trying to think swiftly and handle things quickly to prevent a disaster.

But although her daughter’s words stung, she could also hear the truth of them.

So she closed her lips tightly and took a sip of her coffee.

‘May I know what you plan?’ she asked after a few moments.

‘I scarcely know myself,’ Keffria admitted.

‘She is so far gone, and she has so little respect for me… I may not be able to do anything with her. But I have a few ideas of ways to begin. I’m going to take Rache away from her.

No more dance or etiquette lessons unless she earns them.

If and when they resume, she will have to extend to Rache the same courtesy and respect that Selden gives his tutor.

The lessons will be at a set time every day, not whenever Malta is bored and wishes a diversion.

If she misses one, she will have to earn the time back with chores.

’ Keffria took a breath. ‘I intend that she will only earn the privileges of a woman by doing the work of a woman. So.’ She took a breath and then met her mother’s eyes.

‘I am taking back my ledger books from you. I will not let Malta grow up as ignorant as I am. Malta is going to have to spend some time reconciling the ledgers every week. I know she will blot them and spoil pages and make mistakes and copy pages over. We will both have to endure that, as will she. She will have to enter the numbers and tot them up. And she… we, that is… will have to accompany you when you meet with the brokers and the tradesmen and the overseers. She needs to learn how the estates and trading accounts are handled.’

Again Keffria paused, as if waiting to deal with an objection. Ronica said nothing.

‘She will, of course, have to behave well at those times. And dress as befits a girl who is becoming a woman. Not cheaply and suggestively, but not childishly, either. She will need some new clothing. I intend that she shall share in the making of it. And that she will learn to prepare food, and supervise the servants.’

Ronica nodded gravely each time Keffria added another task to those Malta must learn.

When she finally paused, her mother spoke.

‘I think you have made wise plans, and Malta can benefit greatly from what you propose to teach her. But I do not think she will come willingly to this. It is not fashionable at all for a woman to know how to do such things, let alone actually to do them. In fact, Bingtown now sees such behaviour as plebeian. It will hurt her pride to do it. I doubt she will be a willing student.’

‘No. She will not,’ Keffria concurred. ‘And that is why I have yet another task. Mother, I know you will not agree with this, but I think it is the only way to rein her to my will. Not a coin must she be given to spend on her own, save that it comes from me. I will have to instruct the shopkeepers and tradesmen that they are no longer to extend her the family’s credit.

It will be humiliating to do, but…’ she paused as if considering.

‘Yes. I will widen that to include Selden as well. I suppose it is not too early to begin with him. Perhaps I should never have allowed Malta to have so easily whatever she desired.’

To this Ronica nodded, suppressing a heartfelt sigh of relief.

There were already on the desk a handful of chits with Malta’s imprint on them, for sweets and baubles and outrageously-priced perfumes.

Malta’s casual spending had not been easy to allow for, but it was yet another thing that Ronica had been unwilling to bring up to Keffria.

Now she honestly wondered why. ‘She is your daughter,’ Ronica added.

‘But I fear this will not be easy, on any of us. And,’ she added unwillingly, ‘there is yet another thing she must be taught about. Our contract with the Festrew family.’

Keffria raised one eyebrow. ‘But I am married,’ she pointed out.

Ronica felt a sudden pang of sympathy for her daughter.

She recalled how she had felt, the first time she realized that her growing daughters were now vulnerable to a bargain struck generations ago.

‘That you are,’ she agreed quietly. ‘And Althea is missing. And our debts grow faster far than our credits. Keffria, you must recall the terms of the Vestrit bargain. Blood or gold. Once Malta is presented to Bingtown society as a woman, then she is forfeit to the Festrews, if we do not have the gold to make the payment. And,’ she added unwillingly, ‘at the midsummer, I was short. I have promised to pay it in full by midwinter, plus a penalty.’ She could not find the courage to admit to her daughter what a large penalty she had accepted.

‘If not,’ she went on with difficulty, ‘Caolwn Festrew may invoke her right to claim blood from us. Althea, if she is found by then. Malta if she is not.’

Ronica could find no more words. She watched understanding and horror grow in Keffria’s eyes. Followed, inevitably, by anger. ‘It is not fair. I never agreed to such a bargain! How can Malta be forfeit to a contract signed generations before she was born? It makes no sense, it isn’t fair!’

Ronica gave her a moment or two. Then she said the words familiar to any Trader’s daughter or son.

‘It’s Trader. Not fair, always; not right, always.

Sometimes not even understandable. But it’s Trader.

What did we have when we came to the Cursed Shores?

Only ourselves, and the value of a man’s word.

Or a woman’s. We pledged our loyalty to each other, not just for the day or the year, but to all generations.

And that is why we have survived here where no others had before.

We pledged ourselves to the land, also, and to what it demands.

That, I imagine, is another topic you have not yet discussed with Malta.

You should, and soon, for you know that she must have heard rumours. ’

‘But… she is only a child,’ Keffria pleaded. As if by agreeing with her, her mother could somehow change the facts that time had imposed on them.

‘She is,’ Ronica agreed carefully. ‘But only for a short time longer. And she must be prepared.’