We took off our shoes and took a few steps. “I love the feel on my feet. It makes a noise when I step in it, like a faint vibration — a crunch in my head, not my ears. Do you hear that — listen, the sand?”

“Aye, tis verra loud.”

“That’s right, I forgot how sensitive your ears are.” We stood for a moment, digging our toes in the sand, staring out at the water, Magnus’s horse standing calmly beside him. I said, “Here’s the last thing I’m going to show you today, unless I think of something else of course — when you come to the beach you have to dip your toes in the water. It’s tradition.”

We walked to the edge of the ocean and squished our toes into the wet sand. The warm water lapped around our ankles. “If you walk on the beach, you have to have sand from mid-calf-down; it’s like a rule.” I splashed water and sand on my feet. “And now you have to look for seashells and shark teeth.”