The Magic Box (Arcane History Book 1) by Scott Thrower

Author:Scott Thrower [Thrower, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Periodically Productions
Published: 2019-11-10T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

The bathroom was a narrow slice off the kitchen, forced into the boarding house the previous year by a government plumbing initiative with less care and planning than our landlady would have liked. It was the cheapest option, so she eventually made her peace, tacking prayers and house rules to the head-level water tank so her gentlemen residents had something to read while they emptied their bladders. This month was Colossians 3:5-6.

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.

The scrape of a kitchen chair pulled my attention back toward the kitchen. Pestle’s voice was light. “How do you spell the last name, Martin?”

“You don’t,” Henry snipped. It wasn’t a tone I was well acquainted with. “Best stay out of this, Marty.”

“‘Recovering Private Fights Off Beast’—it does have a ring to it.” Pestle’s voice softened like honey on warm bread.

Henry slammed the oven door a little too loudly. “‘Crazy Veteran Hallucinates the Devil’ doesn’t though.”

Martin cleared his throat apologetically. “I did see it,” he asserted.

“I’m not saying you didn’t,” Henry replied, “but Mr. Pestle and the Globe aren’t known for publishing monster stories in—”

The rest of it was lost in the jingle of the pull chain and flushing water. Martin had to move out of the way for me to open the door back into the tiny kitchen. The small table was pushed against the wall, with Pestle on one side, Martin on the end, and Henry still over by the stove. I quickly shimmied past Pestle into the corner chair to get out of the way, trying not to feel trapped.

Henry passed me a clean cloth for my bloody knee before setting out mugs on the table, giving Pestle the cracked one before sitting down across from me. His curls fell down across his eyes. Behind him, the stove was heating up. The room was already uncomfortably warm, making Pestle’s cologne come across even more strongly.

“I didn’t know you two knew each other,” Henry said, looking from me to Pestle, somehow skipping over the most important thing—a monster had been in our home.

It had found out where we lived.

“Met the other day,” Pestle replied, leaning his shoulder into mine as he slid his mug over a stain in the checkered tablecloth. “Nothing scandalous.”

I had nowhere to go, so I pressed the cloth against my knee and focused on the sting. I couldn’t take my eyes off Martin’s gun in the middle of the table, next to Pestle’s hat.

“Are you supposed to have that?” I asked Martin.

His eyes were sunk back in dark circles, and his brown hair was shaggier than it should have been. The shoulder of his robe was unravelling at the seam. Henry had said he’d once been quite handsome, but since coming back from the front, he always seemed just out of focus.

“They’ll be sending me back soon,” he murmured. “This war will swallow all of us, eventually, except—” Martin glanced at me.

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