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Back The Darkest Shore Save as PDF
Chapters (76)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. Also by Karen Brooks
  4. Title Page
  5. Dedication
  6. EXPLANATORY NOTE
  7. PART ONE
  8. One
  9. Two
  10. Three
  11. Four
  12. Five
  13. Six
  14. Seven
  15. Eight
  16. Nine
  17. Ten
  18. Eleven
  19. Twelve
  20. Thirteen
  21. Fourteen
  22. Fifteen
  23. Sixteen
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Twenty
  28. Twenty-One
  29. Twenty-Two
  30. Twenty-Three
  31. Twenty-Four
  32. Twenty-Five
  33. Twenty-Six
  34. Twenty-Seven
  35. Twenty-Eight
  36. PART TWO
  37. Twenty-Nine
  38. Thirty
  39. Thirty-One
  40. Thirty-Two
  41. Thirty-Three
  42. Thirty-Four
  43. Thirty-Five
  44. PART THREE
  45. Thirty-Six
  46. Thirty-Seven
  47. Thirty-Eight
  48. Thirty-Nine
  49. Forty
  50. Forty-One
  51. Forty-Two
  52. Forty-Three
  53. Forty-Four
  54. Forty-Five
  55. Forty-Six
  56. Forty-Seven
  57. Forty-Eight
  58. Forty-Nine
  59. Fifty
  60. Fifty-One
  61. Fifty-Two
  62. PART FOUR
  63. Fifty-Three
  64. Fifty-Four
  65. Fifty-Five
  66. Fifty-Six
  67. Fifty-Seven
  68. Fifty-Eight
  69. Fifty-Nine
  70. Sixty
  71. Sixty-One
  72. Epilogue: Autumn 1706
  73. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  74. GLOSSARY
  75. LIST OF CHARACTERS
  76. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Taking her seat as if she was a lady entertaining in a grand salon, folding her soiled skirts under her skinny rump, she raised her head. ‘And to what do I owe the pleasure?’

The hefty soldier shut the door, but not before she’d seen Camron’s pale, wide-eyed face. That unnerved her far more than having the reverend there. The soldier — what was his name? — tramped towards her, swinging his stick. Janet gulped, and gathered her hands in her lap to hide their quivering.

‘Thing is, Janet,’ said the reverend, squatting down beside her, as if she was a naughty bairn about to be delivered a lesson. ‘You’ve gone out of your way to make a right slabber of me. Here I was with your confession written out, signed, sent off to Edinburgh, ready to baptise you again and admit you back into God’s graces and our Christian family here in the Weem, and what do you do? You tell the city gents it’s all a confeck. That it’s all lies.’

Janet sighed. So, it wasn’t over yet. Never mind that this whole business started because a lad supposedly fell victim to a sea-charm. Didn’t matter that the woman accused of it — and all her accomplices — had been acquitted. He had to punish someone.

He had to make someone pay for being made to look a fool and that someone was going to be her.

Janet opened her hands and regarded them again. They were auld hands. Well used. They’d worked hard her entire life; held bairns, and not just her own. They’d touched the flesh of men, stroked cocks, dried tears, made bannocks and bread, scaled and gutted more fish and baited more lines than she cared to remember. If she screwed up her eyes, she could still make out the tiny cuts and deep grooves from her first clumsy attempts to learn the fishwives’ craft. God, what was she then? Five? Six? And now? Seventy-two? Maybe. Maybe younger. Maybe older. It didn’t matter. She’d lived a good full life, known the love of a few good men and, even better, the loving friendship of many a good woman. Good women who were also being asked to pay for this man’s wounded pride and whatever else drove him. Pay for his devotion to a cruel and stupid God. Not her God. Not the one she knew and to whom she prayed.

Enough.

Enough.

She’d done all the reverend said and still he punished her. Repeated the words he drilled into her head until she could recite them in her sleep, and still he didn’t let her go, didn’t stop tormenting her or the others.