Wintertide

Wintertide by Sinclair, Linnea. mass_market edition. ISBN: 0884254000081.

SORCERY. TREACHERY. LOVE. For centuries the Infernal War has been waged by witches and sorcerers to control the Orb of Knowledge. The war must end. Then, at Wintertide, the Hill Raiders attack the village of Cirrus Cove. The sea captain’s daughter is raped, and a child conceived. "If the child is to be who the stones say she will, it’s best I raise her. She will live with me."Bronya the Healer accepts the responsibility of caring for the unborn child. Having read the truth in the Stones, Bronya tends the birth and, in the midst of a maelstrom, takes the babe to her cave. Warded now by the signs and symbols of magick, Bronya keeps the child, Khamsin, safe from the Sorcerer. On the eve of Khamsin’s eighteenth birthday, the Hill Raiders, those who wreaked havoc upon her mother, come again. They murder the inhabitants of her village, her husband and her family. Blaming Khamsin for witchery, for bringing the scourge down upon them, the survivors of Cirrus Cove nearly take her life. The enigmatic Tinker, selling pots and pans, heals Khamsin. And he accompanies her on a journey that magick omens have directed her to take. One of them knows the truth. One of them is seeking, just as she is sought. The war for the Orb is about to end. But only love can win it.