In 1687, 16-year-old Kit Tyler is sailing into Saybrook Harbor in the American Connecticut Colony from her home in Barbados. The formerly wealthy girl has just lost her grandfather and has come to live with her aunt’s Puritan family. She isn’t impressed with her first glimpse of her new home: “The bleak line of shore surrounding the gray harbor was a disheartening contrast to the shimmering green and white that fringed the turquoise bay of Barbados […]” (1-2).

During the crossing, Kit made friends with the captain’s son, Nathaniel Eaton, who acts as first mate on her ship. He praises her sea legs since she is the only passenger who didn’t get sick during the journey. When the boat docks at Saybrook, it takes on additional passengers to make the journey upriver to Kit’s final destination of Wethersfield. A Puritan family named Cruff joins the group along with a young clergyman called John Holbrook. Kit immediately raises the ire of Goodwife Cruff by diving into the water to retrieve her daughter’s lost doll. Everyone is shocked that Kit, a female, can swim because they believe that only witches can do so.