Page 203 of A Sanctuary from Shadow
Sure will, Buster Brown.
I folded my arms. “I think Gentian had been planning that night for a long time, that he was going to invade the palace that night regardless of your decision to become a harbinger. The fact that you gave in right beforehand was just a coincidence. Maybe he even decided to useyouon Daddy’s blood curse, just so Daddy would feel the irony of being attacked by the suffering man in the cage, who he hadn’t helped.”
Pete sniffed. “Your father forgot about me the moment he sat for supper.”
“No, he didn’t.” Regardless of Daddy’s actions, I knew his heart like I knew my own. “Whether Daddy did anything to help you or not, Pete, please know he wouldn’t have forgotten you. Either he was still wracking his brain to figure out a way to get you away from Gentian, or he was tormented in knowing he couldn’t. Either way—you weren’t forgotten.”
You were never a Forgotten,I wished to say but didn’t think I should invoke Gentian’s term for his slaves. Pete looked miserable enough.
“I’m pretty sure there’s a rat in the Spring Palace,” I barreled into my conjecture. “Someone high enough in the ranks to ensure there were no guards around when Gentian came to cast the blood curse. Someone who’s still collaborating with him to do things my father wouldneveragree to. Like mass enslavements—or rerouting a major river to the Shadow Court. Hearing about that even shocked Briar, and he was always in the loop about things like that on Earth.”
“You mean Dragoner Rill?” Pete asked.
“If that’s the one near Avenshire.”
“It’s now the primary water source for Covenlen. Heard tell it was done to promote crop growth thereabouts.”
“In a wasteland? Have you seen any crop fields?”
“Not a one, Shorty.”
“Didn’t figure.” I bit my lip on a snarl, thinking again of little Gail and her brothers. “But my point is—the rat and Gentian had that awful night with you and my parents planned out. He wanted Daddy at his least prepared—after a long journey in the dead of night.”
Pete’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “There’s no preparing for an attack of that sort, Shorty. The curse seed—well, you ken what they do to Dananns. Your mother even tried to wrestle him away from it when her siren song failed.”
I recoiled, wanting no more details about what led to her death. I knew more than I wanted already. “Regardless, I believe they were going to attack Daddy that night no matter what. They’d have taken another harbinger, who might’ve succeeded. And even if he or she failed like you did, the odds that your replacement would’ve had the compassion and courage to save a scared faelet from under Gentian’s nose are slim to nil, Pete.”
His eyes swam, peering away from me.
“So, I thank Danu that it was you that night, or I’d probably be dead.”
Several quiet beats passed before Pete said, “It wasn’t only me, ken. Myrrdin—”
“How come he didn’t know Gentian was coming?” The guy was a prophet, after all. Why hadn’t he warned my parents of Gentian’s plans? Why not just tell my mother, the beyn he claimed to know so well?
“Gentian voids all visions coming out of the Shadow Court. Myrrdin tries every day for a clear reading from that hellhole. He always fails.”
Sounded like a network firewall.
“Myrrdin’s soul is pure, Shorty. Of that, be assured. Irksome he may be.” Hmphing, Pete took another sip. “But he means no one ill. And he came running to your mother the moment he heard the rumpus. What he found was me, huddled in the corner on the side of your parents’ bed with you tucked into my shadows—shadows I barely knew how to use, ken. Which was how he saw us. I was doing a piss-poor job of concealing us from the wickedness just beyond that blasted bed. And you justwouldn’tstop crying.” He gulped, hard. “For your mam and your da.”
I blinked back another prickle of tears. “But they couldn’t help me. Only you could.”
He set his now empty mug aside, regarding it like it was my mother’s apparition, there to answer all his unasked questions. “I—I often wonder if that’s why she didn’t incant protection for you instead.”
The same thought had crossed my mind.
“Maybe she knew there was no way I could help your father out of that mayhem. No matter what I’d have done. But you—you were tiny enough to keep hidden. And I sometimes like to pretend that—that she saw enough good in me when your family visited the Shadow Palace to ken that I’d do all I could, risk everything, to protect you.”
One tear escaped my lashes. “Seems like she was right.”
He cleared a thickness from his throat. “Was she?”
I flung my arms around him.
“Shorty,” Pete huffed, stiffening.
“Thank you, Pete,” I gushed, my tears cascading as I squeezed his every jagged scar. I pressed my cheek to his thrumming chest. “Without you—” The rest of that truth dispelled into silence, the words preferring to remain unspoken.
