Shadows and Light

county declared that anyone with woodland eyes was to be brought in and questioned to determine whether or not the person was a witch, one of the Evil One’s servants,” Rory said. “From what we heard, it’s not the baron or the magistrate who’s doing the questioning— and so far no one who was brought in has been seen again.”
    “The Inquisitors?” Breanna asked.
    “We ran,” Fiona said, stepping back far enough to look at Breanna. “The elders decided that we had to run. After the new decrees were posted in the village last autumn, most of us stayed away. Rory and the other men went when we needed supplies. But when the baron ordered that a ... procedure ... be done on all females, the elders decided we had to get away. Now.”
    “Procedure?”
    Fiona shook her head. “They won’t say what it is. Won’t explain.”
    “They did the women in the village first,” Rory said. “When I went into the village for the last time, those women looked at me with dead eyes.”
    Fiona’s eyes filled with tears. “My mother... my grandmother. They stayed. All the elders in the family stayed. They said it had to look like the younger members of the family had just gone for a summer visit.
    They said it couldn’t look like we were fleeing or we might be stopped before we could get away.”
    “For months now, Craig has been buying cargo for our ships that would keep in the warehouse and not spoil. Bolts of cloth from some of the far-off lands whose ships make the journey to Durham to trade.

    Tea. Sugar. And he’s been drawing more from the family’s accounts than he needed to pay for the goods and sending the gold and silver upriver. We’ve brought your share of it. There’s no way of telling if we’ll be able to get more.”
    “They burned Tremaine’s ship,” Fiona whispered. “That was the last message we got—along with Craig’
    s plea that we get out of the eastern counties.” She choked on a sob. “They burned his ship, and the men who jumped into the river to keep from burning with it never got to shore.”
    Breanna’s knees started to buckle. “Jennyfer?” While she would never admit it to the others, Jenny had always been her favorite cousin. They had little in common except being witches, since air was her strongest branch of the Mother and Jenny’s passion was the sea, but they’d always worked well together and enjoyed each other’s company.
    “She went with Mihail when he set sail to talk to some baron he knew in the west about finding a safe harbor for the ships and the family. Tremaine’s boys went with him, too. He was supposed to sail back to Seahaven and wait for the other ships—and for those who are traveling overland to meet him there. If the other ships can’t get past the barons and Inquisitors who are watching the Una River and reach the sea, his may be the only ship we have left.”
    “Craig?”
    Rory hesitated. “He was going to stay in Durham as long as he could to keep the warehouse and the business open. He’s supposed to be one of those meeting Mihail at Seahaven. We don’t know if he got out of Durham in time.”
    “I know you weren’t expecting so many,” Fiona said. “We’d only intended to have the Daughters among us slip away, but we couldn’t leave people behind.”
    Breanna looked at the carriages, wagons, and riders. Not just family watching her out of frightened eyes.
    It looked like some of the younger servants and farming families had come, too. But almost every one of them had woodland eyes.
    “There’s still some time before the Summer Solstice,” Fiona said. “Those of us whose branch is earth could plant—”
    Breanna shook her head. “It’s already planted. Keely knew.” No need to wonder now what they were going to do with the harvest. They would need everything the Mother could give.
    “We can’t go back, Breanna,” Rory said quietly. “Not until we’re told it’s safe to go back.”
    That message would never come—and the ones who had stayed behind knew it.
    “Nuala is the elder now,” Fiona whispered.
    Dull pain surrounded Breanna’s heart. She hadn’t visited her eastern kin often, but that didn’t change the feeling of loss.
    “Come on,” Breanna said. “We may have to share beds for a while, but we’ll get it sorted out.”
    As she led them through the archway, she realized Liam now held the lives of her eastern kin in his hands.
    And it suddenly occurred to her that he should have been back from the