City of Fate by Nicola Pierce

Author:Nicola Pierce [Nicola Pierce]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781847176493
Publisher: The O'Brien Press
Published: 2014-10-15T04:00:00+00:00

BREAD FOR YURI AND PETER

Peter looked very glum, his head bowed as he kicked away any pebbles that dared to stand in his way. ‘I’m hungry!’ he whispered for about the tenth time since they left the basement.

Yuri was hungry too but what was the use in complaining. ‘I’m not your mother,’ he snapped bitterly. As soon as the words were out of his mouth he was sorry for them.

Peter seemed not to have heard. He kicked another stone and didn’t even bother to see how far it would roll, ‘Where are the soldiers?’

‘How should I know?’ Yuri was tetchy and irritable, and Peter was really getting on his nerves. Everything was. That’s the bad thing about kids his age; they don’t worry about anything. Yuri, on the other hand, had to do all the worrying for the both of them. For instance, should he be looking for the sergeant and his soldiers again? What they made Peter do was so dangerous. Thank goodness it worked out fine and they both got fed, but today Peter was in a bad mood, and clumsy with it. Already Yuri had had to steady him twice when he lost his balance, either out of hunger or tiredness.

But if they didn’t bother with the soldiers and their bribes of sausage meat, they were going to go hungry again. There would be nothing to eat until Tanya came back, and that might be nothing more than a few crusts. What else could they do for food? Apart from not wanting to listen to the moans of a hungry Peter, Yuri was determined to find something to bring back. Surely Tanya would regret her decision to have them move in if there wasn’t enough to eat for her mother and herself. He couldn’t bear the thought of her asking him and Peter to go back to sleeping in the tunnels or, worse still, the sewers. He had an idea. ‘Will we go and see if there are any apples left on that big tree?’

‘No!’ Peter’s answer was definite and Yuri wasn’t going to try and change his mind. Neither of them wanted to run into that mad woman with her dead baby. Peter must have felt obliged to provide a proper explanation because he added, ‘She’ll only try to eat me.’

Yuri didn’t bother to argue. They continued on in silence until something built up inside Peter causing him to blurt out, ‘I want cake!’ He started to cry, although there were no tears in sight.

The small boy’s sorrow was so dramatic that Yuri couldn’t help himself; he started to laugh.

Peter was shocked. ‘Why are you laughing?’ The pain in his voice was real, dampening Yuri’s fun.

‘I’m sorry, Peter. I didn’t mean to. I just wasn’t expecting you to say that. I mean, when was the last time you had cake?’

Peter’s faced creased up like newspaper, and tears threatened this time as he yelped, ‘I don’t know!’

To soothe him, Yuri agreed that it was all so stupid, ‘We should be able to have cake if we want.

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