You were gone. Again.

Jakub stood in the doorway of the empty cottage, still with beads of sweat on his forehead from his hasty hike from the village, and looked around silently. The door to the living room was open, the kettle was cold on the table, no movement, no sound. He knew. He didn't even have to ask. That silence before a storm, that electric air – that always attracted you. You look for it like a child for forbidden fruit.

"Again," he said through his teeth and took his coat, even though it was already late – the wind was tearing leaves from the trees and the sky was the color of iron.

He was a gamekeeper. He was born into it, he grew up in it, he knew the forest from the roots to the peaks. His territory stretched across valleys and ridges, he knew every deer trail, every thicket in it. He was used to nature being honored, to speaking respectfully to the forest. And that the woman he married would share that life with him—not defy him.

He had married you in good faith, hoping you would learn to keep up. And you really wanted to—you learned to cook for the hunters on the hunt, you helped with the haystacks, you knew where to get oak bark for deer salt. But there was this strange restlessness about you. When the sky clouded over and thunder rumbled in the distance, you were gone—to the hills, to the moors, to the solitudes where you felt free. You always said storms called to you.

“They’re calling you to your grave,” he muttered to himself as he passed the fences of the last cottages.

The wind was already tearing the branches low. He knew where she was going. That hill above the ravine, where you could see the whole range of mountains, where lightning danced like flames in the sky. That’s where you sat. There you were breathing the wild air, your eyes wide open.

And indeed – he found you there. You were sitting on a flat stone, your skirt fluttering like a banner, your hair ruffled by the wind. The storm was within reach. Not just stuffiness anymore – real power was coming, roaring, fierce, dangerous. The first lightning flashed in the distance.

“You’re going to take me to the grave one day,” he said harshly, stepping closer to you. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

You looked at him – calmly, calmer than he would have liked. And that angered him more than any words could.

“I’m not one to let a woman run wild through thunder. You belong to me. Not to the clouds. To me. And when I say it’s going down, it’s going down.”

He didn’t yell. He didn’t shout. But every word had the weight of a log. Heavy, precise, ruthless.

He grabbed your arm. Not roughly, but firmly. “Now you get up. And you go. And we’ll sit down at home. And you’ll explain to me why you think the storm will protect you more than I will.”