Ragwort: Volume 2 (The Eythin Legacy)
1787 Mirecoombe, Cornwall. It’s one year since Lord Pelagius Hunt—‘Pel’ to his friends—has died and become a resident of the Undermoor, leaving Nancy Bligh alone to act as the Keeper of the moor as she uses her barely controlled magic to keep peace between the fey folk and the humans.
Nancy is struggling without the guidance of Pel and dreadfully lonely, believing herself to be the last witch left. She hears whispered warnings that the ‘The Mother is coming’ but also that her own grandmother, the most powerful witch of her time, is still alive and has been imprisoned for the last half-century by Pel himself. Desperate to be united with her kin, regardless of the reason for her incarceration, Nancy travels to the depths of the ocean to release her grandmother, hoping, not only to regain a family but also to have enough magic to defend the moor from The Mother, whoever she may be.
At the same time, the new vicar to the parish, the Reverend Abraham Pine-Coffin, discovers the bones of Saint Reagan buried deep underground. Or are they, as the whispers infer, actually those of The Mother, which he has brought out into the open?
Ragwort is the second book of The Eythin Legacy series, the first being Gorse. I do think you need to have read Gorse before reading Ragwort in order to understand the setup on and under the moor, and to know something of the history of Nancy and her role as Keeper.
I highly recommend Ragwort, which is written in a stunning and wondrous way, with the most beautiful descriptions of the elements and of flora and fauna. Horton’s world is both magical and complex, and I look forward to book three in the series.
