It starts with a simple idea: Silhouine is lonely; the master bedroom is empty; some extra money wouldn’t hurt. She hangs out a sign for a boarder. An applicant duly arrives.

“I’ve got money,” says the woman, whose name will turn out to be Yael. “Will you turn me out if I say I’m foreign born?”

“Will you do foreign magic in the spare room?”

“No,” says Yael.

“Then come in,” says Silhouine, feeling magnanimous and clever.

Yael, it seems, can cook; Silhouine can mend. In a week they’re fast friends.

This is the part where they burn down the shop.