I looked straight at Bingham, at Dale, at the men who thought winter was a story that always ended the same way because it always had.
“You can call it what you like,” I said, and to my surprise my voice didn’t wobble. It sharpened. It became something you could cut rope with. “But there will come a winter… a hard winter… when you’ll wish you had even one good apple down in that pit.”
For a heartbeat, the store went still, like my words had landed heavier than they meant to.
Then Dale snorted, and the spell broke.
I didn’t wait for their response. I stepped out into the sun and let the door slam behind me.
The name followed anyway.
The Fool’s Pit.
Not a curse, I told myself as I walked the dusty track toward the hill.
A promise.
My inheritance wasn’t money. It wasn’t land that made people nod with respect.
