Page 136 of A Sanctuary from Shadow
Pete stomped to the fire, its coals crackling in the silence, and hulked down onto one of the logs he’d set around it. He glared into the leaping flames as he flexed and unflexed his fingers. Then, on an afterthought, he snatched the bunched-up swath of burlap he’d stuffed in his belt—the one that once held a thick slab of bacon—and tossed it on the fire.
Biting my nails, I paused like a bundle of frayed wires a safe length from his side.What can I say to make this better? How can I mitigate his anger?So many good, humbling options sprung to mind, but what I settled on was a big fat, “It wasn’t my fault.”
He shot to his feet and rounded on me, teeth gnashing. “Then whose bloody fault was it?”
I stumbled back as Pete advanced, wrath fuming in his charcoal eyes. “If that asshole hadn’t laughed at me, none of this would’ve happened!”
Pete shook his fists. “I told you all your faffin’ about was pointless! I told you to bloody turn back!”
“But I had to do some—”
“No, you didn’t, you eejit! You didn’t have to do a fecking thing. Youwantedto do it, and now look at the complete fecking bags you’ve made for us!”
“You think I wanted that to happen? You know I don’t have control over it! It just comes out of me.”
Pete’s anger writhed through his limbs. He bared his teeth, towering like Everest over me, a mouse.
Though my chin trembled, I held my ground.
“You’re truly going to look me in the eye and claim you had no notion whatsoever that there was a damn cyclone churning away in your veins?”
I gulped. “Well, I—I didn’t know it was going to manifest like that.”
“But you felt something coming, didn’t you? Yet you went to lambast that innocent shopkeep anyhow.”
“He’s anything but innocent! Remember how this started?”
“He didn’t deserve to have his entire livelihood scattered to the four winds!” Pete roared, his breath misting my face. “Nor did the twenty other marketeers whose stalls you destroyed in your fit!”
I winced, feeling like the crud on the bottoms of my boots. I’d terrified half the population of the market with my storm. After damage assessment, objects were the only casualties, but that included the entirety of Pete’s seed purse.
The only reason I wasn’t thrown into the thieves hole—a muddy pit in the ground—or taken as some Goblin’s slave for my outrageous behavior, was because Pete had made it rain seeds. When his purse had dried up, he’d tossed me over his shoulder and fled. Livid Goblins had chased us, screeching, until they could no longer keep up. Clever little devils they might’ve been, but their wits had nothing on a harbinger’s sheer speed.
After another silence, Pete swore something vehement under his breath and turned his back on me. He raked his already mussed hair.
I stood by in a mix of petulance and utter self-loathing, tears prickling the corners of my eyes. What would Daddy have said of me that night? If he’d seen me lose my shit over a bottle of ketchup? He’d have scolded me like the child I was and grounded me for eternity. If currently tuned in from the afterlife—wherever that was after being cursed—he’d deem Pete’s hostility as warranted. He’d order me to make amends.
Huffing, I stomped over to Pete. “Look, dude.” I threw up my arms. “I’m sorry. All right?”
Pete’s lip curled. “Was that meant as an apology?”
I couldn’t quit pouting. “Yes.”
He sniffed. “Sincere apologies aren’t customarily accompanied by an eye roll.”
I huffed again. “I’m sorry I forced you to give away all your seeds, but—”
Pete stomped to the other side of the fire by his pallet, began jerking himself free of his clothes.
“But it was just money, Pete! I didn’t hurt anyone!”
“You’ve no idea what you’ve done.” He yanked off his belt.
I froze.
Pete was from the 18thcentury. Yes, he was a rather progressive man from that time, but still—what if he thought the best punishment for wayward females was the strap?
I tried to contain my relief when he dropped his belt to the ground beside his pallet.
