Page 66 of A Time of Witches

“I think he may be able to help,” Sybil said. “With his sermons, not with vengeance, but with love from someone who guides them with wisdom, so they might see the wrong happening through their own beliefs.”

“I can speak for ye.” But even as she agreed, Kat’s gaze slid toward the old vicar who’d broken after the swimming test, the ancient man who had condemned himself decades earlier when he’d helped a woman accused of witchcraft. She had died in the end, and now, all these years later, when charges resurfaced, so too would he.

“If nothing else, mayhap the church can help see to Jacinda’s care,” Sybil hedged, suddenly unsure of the plan that felt certain in her mind only moments before.

Kat nodded soberly, understanding the danger. “And if his parish cannot offer aid, I will take Jacinda in as mine own.”

They held hands, palm to palm, a fleeting moment of sisterhood, a reminder that life could still hold something beautiful.

Once the earth had pulsed between their fingers, an energy that resonated in their souls. The flat silence landed hard in Sybil’s heart and the longing for her gifts returned tenfold.

And then Kat was freed, much to the dismay of the guard she’d bitten.

Edith had not returned. Each hour that passed sent a warning creeping up Sybil’s spine.

In the absence of her friends, at the loss of Kat’s good humor and light, the darkness of the prison pressed in on Sybil, aggressive and entirely without mercy.

She did not know how much time passed, only that day faded to night and then to day once more, and still, Edith had not been returned.

Finally, that third night, Sybil was startled awake by the familiar shrieking groan of the rusted prison door scraping open.

A shadow of a woman was dragged between two guards and thrown into the cell. Though their victim issued only a grunt, Sybil knew the woman to be Edith.

Sybil leaped to her feet and crouched beside her friend.

“They wouldn’t let me stop walking,” Edith gasped. “On and on. My feet. My feet.” She whimpered, her breath coming in great huffs like a woman in childbed. “Oh, my feet.”

The little girl roused and cautiously approached, her face creased with worry while poor Edith continued to murmur, her words blurring together in an exhausted rant.

“They walked her.” The pretty young woman appeared at Sybil’s side, almost unseen in the darkness. “To make her confess. They will do anything to obtain a confession.” There was something flat to her voice when she said this, a note devoid of life. “None of us are safe.”

“We must tend to her.” Sybil looked around their cell, heartily missing her assortments of salves and tinctures and teas. “Perhaps we might find some water?” She voiced the impossibility aloud.

The girl slipped away and eased her slight frame between the bars. Sybil’s eyes widened. The child could have been freed from their cage long before.

As silently as she’d left, the girl returned, a cup of dank water in hand. By the light of the moon, they cleaned Edith’s wounds as well as could be managed. They would have to wait until dawn to make out the true damage. Edith trembled in her sleep, body twitching with pain and trauma.

Sybil lay at her back and wrapped her arms around her friend to soothe her suffering. The girl observed this and tucked herself against Edith as well, sharing her body heat.

Edith slept deeply with an unnatural slumber, brought on by extreme fatigue and agony. Even when the sun peeked through the narrow windows, she did not rouse. Such sleep was a mercy.

Sybil examined her friend’s feet and sucked in a breath. The heel and ball of each foot revealed open wounds where she had worn through leather and flesh alike.

Lacking any other means of a bandage, Sybil tore at her petticoat where the linen had remained clean enough to still appear white. These strips were bound carefully around Edith’s feet.

A fiery rage simmered in Sybil as she tended to her dear friend.

Their numbers in the prison had risen to seven score. All women save less than a dozen men. The few men who had been arrested were those who spoke out to save their wives, or were the old or addled. Pariahs of society, ones who did not adhere to the strict rules of a Puritan life.

“Sybil Brantham.” The guard’s voice rang out and fear doused Sybil in ice-cold dread.

She hesitated, wishing she had the time to tear up several more strips of her petticoat to layer the soles of her shoes with. For she knew exactly why her name had been called.

And she suspected the pretty young woman was right—they would all have their breaking point.

Sybil could not help but wonder what hers would be.

And exactly what breaking might cost her.