Afflicted: The Pendle Shadows

Set against the bleak moorlands of 1612 Lancashire, Afflicted: Book 2 – The Pendle Shadows reimagines the infamous Pendle witch trials through a lens of human frailty rather than supernatural horror. Dr. Thomas Ashford, a rational London physician, arrives in Pendle expecting to treat illness but instead finds himself entangled in a web of fear, superstition, and long-standing family feuds.
When a young girl, Alison Device, is accused of cursing a traveling peddler, suspicion ignites tensions between rival families—the Devices and the Chattox clan. As accusations escalate, Ashford observes that poverty, hunger, and rivalry fuel the hysteria far more than any evidence of witchcraft. Through medical examinations and careful questioning, he uncovers natural explanations for supposed curses, while witnessing how coerced child testimonies and community paranoia distort reality.
Magistrate Roger Nowell, influenced by King James I’s obsession with witchcraft, struggles between reason and duty as the machinery of justice begins to turn. Meanwhile, the arrival of Daemonologie intensifies fear, transforming folklore into “evidence” and pushing the community toward irreversible consequences.
As Ashford fights to uphold reason, he realizes that the true danger lies not in dark magic, but in the human capacity for fear, ambition, and vengeance.