Sweet Savage Charity by Margaret Lake

Sweet Savage Charity is one of the only shorts that I downloaded during Read an eBook Week.  At 99 cents normally, though, it's still a pretty good price.  The page numbering isn't quite accurate epubs yet, but Bluefire said it was 28 pages long.  It might be a little more than that (usually the page numbering falls short of what it actually is).

The story takes place in Plymouth Colony in 1621.  Charity is widowed shortly after the colony is founded.  She had converted to Puritanism and come to the New World for her husband's sake, but now he's gone and the council is ordering her to remarry a man of their choice — a man she despises.

The council gives her a few days' reprieve before she has to remarry, though, and in the meantime she meets a native in the woods.  Meeting him changes her life, and helps her find the courage to stand up for what she really wants.

I wish the story would have been longer, because I would have liked to get to know the characters better, and to find out what happens to Charity later on.  But the story is well-written, with just the right amount of backstory, leaked at just the right times.  Definitely worth a dollar if you are looking for something to occupy you for an hour or so.