Where the Hills Let Go

In the hills of Merionethshire, Wales, Thomas ap Rhys has spent nineteen years as a county magistrate - signing warrants, levying fines, enforcing the laws that punish his Quaker neighbors for the crime of worshipping in silence. He knows Rees ap John and his family. He has watched Catrin shell peas through hands twisted by illness. He has seen the children in the kitchen. And he has signed every paper the Crown has required, because signing is what magistrates do.

When soldiers come for Ree...