My name is Mary. I am a witch, though that word carries a lot of weight these days, doesn’t it? It comes with connotations and accusations – labels that can turn a woman into a cautionary tale. However, I have never hidden what I am, nor have I ever apologised for the power that flows through my hands or the knowledge that rests in my bones like old light. What I did hide – what I failed to protect – was my daughter. Elara was sixteen when they took her. She was intelligent and careful, entirely unaware. that the gift she carried, dormant and unacknowledged, was the very thing that made her valuable as leverage
