Page 1 of The Sea Witch (Salt & Sorcery #1)

Massachusetts

The cold thick shadows of midnight were her only safety.

Alys Tanner galloped her stolen horse into the shelter of a stand of trees. Pulling sharply on the reins, she urged her mount

to stop within the white oaks’ sanctuary. The trees shifted and rustled with the wind, whispering sullenly to themselves,

resenting her presence. These woods had protected Alys her whole life, given her a haven when she needed to hide. Yet now

she wasn’t welcome, a fugitive, even as she hoped the oaks’ shadows hid her.

She closed her eyes and concentrated, reaching out to the night, drawing on its darkness. Though she was half a mile from

the ocean, the water was near enough, strengthening the power within her so the night thickened into a briny scented cloak

that hid her and her horse.

Beneath her, the anxious animal stepped sideways. It tossed its head, making the hardware of its bridle jingle. She leaned

forward as best she could with her skirts wound around her legs to ride astride, and stroked the horse’s damp neck in an attempt

to soothe it.

The beast wasn’t familiar with magic. In Norham, and small villages up and down the Colonies’ coast, power such as Alys’s was always ruthlessly stamped out the moment it appeared.

Any boy who showed magical aptitude went to be educated at the academies and make his fortune in the larger towns.

Any girl who failed to hide her supernatural ability was killed.

She tried to quiet the horse, yet there was no one to soothe her own rattling nerves.

Hoofbeats thundered on the road and the glow of torches streaked past.

She held her breath as the mounted group of pursuers drew to a halt. They gathered in a circle in the middle of the road,

not thirty feet from her. Her mantle of magic-summoned shadows clung to her and her horse. For now.

A dozen men massed, all of them as known to her as her own blood kin. Some of them were her blood kin. They wore cloaks over their rough fishermen’s clothing, the hoods pulled up and low, but she recognized them

just the same.

“Her house is empty.” The glow of torchlight shone on Lawrence Charles’s face, his expression twisted by anger and the dancing

flame.

“You should have waited,” Constable John Vale protested.

“The dresser drawers were on the floor, clothes were scattered.”

“How did she know we were coming for her?” Vale growled. “Her magic?”

“How would I know?”

“You could’ve warned her. Or maybe she is there, and you’re lying.”

“Alys may be my cousin,” Lawrence threw back, “but there’s as much love between us as two stones. ’Struth, I can well believe

she’s a witch in league with the devil. Since she was in leading strings, she had an uncanny way about her. The way she spoke

to the sea, the fire in her eyes whenever the moon was full. And then when her husband died—”

“When she murdered him,” Quinton Brown said grimly. “Used her magic to strike him down upon the deck of his own boat so she could take the vessel for herself.”

The men muttered prayers.

It wasn’t true. Samuel Tanner had possessed a weak heart, which proved to be his doom. Yet if these men believed Alys had

been the agent of his death, her fate was cast.

“It’s in her blood,” Vale grumbled. “That sister of hers, Ellen—”

“Keep that woman’s name from your lips,” Davy Smythe said quickly. “The sister may be dead, but witches can have power from

beyond the grave. In Virginia, they burned one at the stake. With her last breath, she cursed her executioners, and three

days later, those that brought her to the stake and lit the flames all died of putrid fevers. Speak no more of Alys Tanner’s

sister.”

Hot tears burned Alys’s eyes, and she blinked them back.

“The sooner Alys is at the end of a noose,” Lawrence vowed, “the happier I’ll be.”

“The happier any of us will be,” Quinton snapped. “The road to the east past the village is cut off to her.”

“Dougan and the others have the roads out of Norham watched,” Vale said, confident. “None of Alys Tanner’s witches will get

far.”

“Unless they use their infernal magic to take to the skies,” Quinton pointed out, and the men cast their fearful gazes up

to the dark night above.

Despite her fear, Alys nearly laughed. How powerful did they think her to be? She was still learning the limits of her magic,

so long suppressed. Flight was one art she’d yet to attempt.

“Head to the crossroads. We’ll block her escape routes to the north and south.” Lawrence kicked his horse, as did the others,

and with the pounding of dozens of hooves, they were off on the hunt.

Alys’s hands tightened on the reins.

Damn them all.

The glare of torchlight was swallowed by the trees along the road. Her eyes adjusted to the night, making sense once more

out of shadows, before she urged her horse into a gallop. The world was huge and dark around her, sinister where once she’d

been most alive and herself in the hours between midnight and dawn.

She headed back to the village from where the men had ridden. Alys slowed the horse as she neared a stone house at the edge

of the settlement.

A man armed with a musket stood sentry outside the front door. He peered sharply into the shadows, eager to make his name

as a hero.

Late autumn mists muffled sound, and she called upon their dampening ability to deaden the noise of her horse’s hooves upon

the ground. In muslin tatters, the fog silently crept forward. The guard outside the house shifted from foot to foot, looking

nervously around as the fog slid over the terrain and surrounded the cottage, turning the world hazy and indistinct.

He remained at his post, but held his musket closer, as if more for comfort than protection.

The longer Alys waited, the more the noose tightened around her neck. Once again, she held her breath as she guided the animal

around the back of the house. There was no one standing guard back here, and the windows were all dark.

She dismounted and loosely tied the horse’s reins to a birch standing white and ghostly beside the house. The animal shifted

restlessly and she rubbed its muzzle to calm it, but the beast was unused to being abroad at this hour, and with an unfamiliar

rider.

Not merely any rider. A witch.

With arms grown strong from climbing masts and fastening rigging, Alys pulled herself up the tree, until she reached a second

story window and peered through it.

Light from the moon slid into the chamber, revealing the rough-hewn wooden floor, a washstand, and two narrow beds.

Alys tapped on the glass. Faintly at first, and then a little louder. Two figures clad in pale nightgowns came to the window,

which swung open with a squeak. Alys winced at the sound.

Cecily’s and Polly Gower’s astonished faces appeared. Both had plaited their hair for sleep, though Cecily’s braid was flaxen

and Polly’s braid was black. In the moonlight, Cecily’s fair cheeks glowed ghostly white, while Polly’s bronze skin shone

deeply.

Polly had been forcibly taken from her Pawtucket family as a small girl and “adopted” by Reverend and Mrs. Gower. The Reverend

liked to claim he treated Polly as his own daughter, insisting she and Cecily were sisters in every capacity, but Cecily didn’t

have to scrub the chicken coop, or draw bucket after bucket of water for the household’s baths, or a hundred other tasks Polly

was made to do.

Before the women could speak, Alys whispered, “Whatever’s most precious to you, grab that, and dress warmly. Quickly, now.”

Cecily said, “What—”

“Talk softly,” Alys hissed. “Henry Dales stands guard outside your front door, waiting for his comrades to join him and seize

us.” At the Gower girls’ questioning looks, Alys explained, “You, me, Susannah, the others. I overheard men talking by the

courthouse. We’re to be arrested and charged with witchcraft.”

The girls’ eyes widened.

Alys drew in a shuddering breath. “They’ve made charges against you and me and the rest, and they’re coming for us tonight.”

“Will they—” Cecily’s hand went to her neck.

“A trial is too much bother for them. We won’t live past sunrise.”

“We can take the southern road to Gloucester,” Polly said.

Alys pressed her lips into a line. “The roads out of the village are watched.”

“Then there’s no way to freedom.” Cecily’s words were despairing.

“There’s always a way to freedom.” Voice firm with conviction, Alys instructed, “Dress quickly, take only what you must. The men are at the

crossroads, there’s no way out to the north and south. Sentinels are stationed at our houses. Use the forest and the fields

and gather the others. I’ll summon as many shadows as I can for you. Meet me at the docks in quarter of an hour. Come now,

Ellen.”

A pained silence fell.

Alys closed her eyes, but it never stopped the images from flooding through her mind, and she would never, never forget the sound of the tree limb creaking from the weight of her sister Ellen’s lifeless form...

“Hurry, girls,” she said.

The other women nodded.

“Good lasses,” Alys said. “Spines stronger than any mainmast—that’s what you’ve got.”

Polly gave her a brief smile. “With you as our example.”

“The sun will be up too soon. Grab Susannah and Jane and Josephine and Faith. I’ll gather the others. Find me at the docks.”

“Yes, Alys.”

Cecily and Polly moved toward the clothes press, but Cecily stopped and moved back to the window. She grabbed Alys’s wrist.

Pride swelled in Alys’s chest to feel the tightness of Cecily’s grip, power that was acquired from hauling ropes and manning

the tiller. Only six months earlier, Cecily had possessed the soft hands that belonged to a reverend’s daughter, but they

were rougher now, callused and strong. Bright currents of magical energy coursed through her fingertips, traveling into Alys’s

skin, strengthening her own power. Surging through them both with life.

“I’m not sorry,” Cecily said, fierce.

“Not for a moment,” Polly added as she stuffed clothing into a satchel.

“Me, either,” Alys answered.