His hands were so sure, the pressure of his fingers so gradual and steady, that she couldn’t help thinking of his family, years ago. Their fields of crocuses. Their quick, delicate work of picking the saffron threads from the center of those purple flowers. She wondered if this was a thing that lived in his blood and in his fingers. A craft that started as finding wisps of red among violet petals, and that, through years and generations, became the skill of finding, easily and without hesitation, what he was looking for.
