Page 26 of The Starving Saints

Halfway between the keep and the grotto, Treila curls up against the stone and laughs.

It’s not sane laughter. She knows very well it isn’t. It’s the laughter of the absurd, of the tragicomic, and she is shaking

apart with it. Not only can Ser Voyne not see her, not hear her, not conceive of the concept of her, but the very earth spits her back out when Treila tries to draw her into this grotto she now thinks of as her own.

There are more than a few glistening jokes in that, and she wishes she could tell the Loving Saint, because she knows he would

laugh against her skin.

She should go back for Phosyne; a little more cajoling, perhaps, and the woman would likely follow her in and leave Ser Voyne

behind entirely. Treila saw the bruises on her, after all. Has put together a little of their dynamic. But that might take

time, and the Loving Saint’s echo is still ringing in her head.

And she knows exactly the cost she has to pay to leave on her own. It’s small enough.

When she can will herself to move again, she slinks through the passageway. It’s easier this time, and not only because soon

she can see the glow of Phosyne’s candle at the other end. It’s not roomier, exactly; if there were more space around her,

she would fear getting lost. But it is simpler . She doesn’t scrape herself as often. The tight pinches aren’t quite as tight as she remembers them being.

At last she emerges into the grotto and sets about dressing once more. It’s quiet, save for the faint trickling of the water, the susurrus of fabric over her skin. No Phosyne, no Ser Voyne, no refugees, no saints. The air of simple safety is almost strong enough to make her forget to fear the creature in the darkness.

He doesn’t say anything to greet her. The candle, after all, is still burning.

Treila looks at the crack for a long time, flexing her hand at her side. The Loving Saint’s words echo in her head. If you have a way out, I would suggest you take it. Whatever the cost. You won’t have the choice soon. It could be a trap, of course; perhaps he said it knowing it would drive her down here. Perhaps whatever lurks in that crevice

is a friend of his.

She knows that just because it felt genuine, the way he purred against her skin, it doesn’t mean anything. He’s a good liar,

down to the bone. He must be.

But she doesn’t think he was lying when he warned her to be careful of bargains. One half of an exchange. She will not get something for nothing. Any way out was always going to cost her.

Here is what Treila knows: there is no chance of survival here, and no chance of retribution, either. The Constant Lady has

taken that from her, and no matter what the Loving Saint says, Treila has enough of a sense of self-preservation not to go

toe-to-toe with a woman who can simply erase her from Ser Voyne’s awareness. Treila’s not happy with it, will never be happy with it, but there are other people still

outside the castle who had a hand in her family’s destruction. And, perhaps, it is poetic to let the king and his attack dog

rot here, even if it’s not Treila’s doing. Even if they’re barely aware of it.

There is no chance of survival or triumph here, and though Treila is stubborn and hungry for satisfaction, she’d rather live short one finger than die sulking

and lurking in a castle gone mad.

Pity about Phosyne, but really, Treila doesn’t need her anymore.

She douses the candle.

Near-darkness folds around her, cool and enticing, and she wets her lips. Tucks the wax into her pocket and approaches the

crack.

“Hello, clever,” it breathes. “I missed you.”

Treila shivers and plants her hands against the rock, one on either side of the fissure. “And I, you,” she returns, though

it’s not true in the slightest. The lie is sweet on her tongue.

Her creature laughs, delighted, either without guile or adoring her own. “And will you feed me this time? It’s not so nice, to tease.”

“Oh, yes,” she says. “But first, a few questions. I want to know the shape of your teeth before they pierce my skin.”

“Clever, clever,” he sings. “Ask away.”

“And what will I owe you for answers?”

“Somebody has been teaching you,” he replies. His tone has shifted. Treila can’t discern if he’s irritated or afraid.

And that is certainly an answer, all on its own. She doesn’t think her creature knows about the castle’s guests.

She doesn’t think it’s the Loving Saint on the other side of that gap, waiting for her to flinch.

Treila rolls her gaze castle-ward. “We have visitors,” she says. “Strange visitors. They say it is eat or be eaten.”

The crack hisses. Seethes. It’s for just a moment, but the sharp stench of iron accompanies it, lingers even when the noise

is gone and Treila wonders if she really heard it.

“Your questions?” he asks, sounding normal once more.

“Your price for answers?”

A pause. “The questions will pay for the answers.”

She thinks that the price may have changed, just a little, now that he knows there’s competition aboveground. Another successful

feint; her lungs burn with satisfied arrogance.

“Will it hurt very much?” she asks, and leans in once more. Slides her hands closer to the gap.

He makes a pleased sound now. This is far more to his liking. “Yes,” he says. “Oh, yes.”

She shivers again, but keeps up the slow stroke of her palms on rock. “And will I survive it?”

“It’s just a finger,” he says, as if that answers the question.

She waits him out. She stops where she is, hands only a few inches from the divide. She waits for him to protest, to realize

this is more negotiation than interrogation. It doesn’t matter that she knows his answer; it matters that he gives it.

“Yes,” he says at last. “You will survive it.”

Treila shifts her fingers closer. Strokes the stone. A faint breeze, like an exhale, ghosts across her face, and she leans into it. “And I will be out of this castle, able to make my way to wherever I wish?” she murmurs, voice low and sighing, as if she’s giving in to a fantasy. “If I let you take a finger of my choosing, will I emerge from Aymar Castle onto the plain beyond, safe and sound?”

She lets one fingertip slip from the stone, hover in the space just before the darkness.

“ Yes ,” her creature sighs. “But.”

“But?”

“But should you wish to return,” he says, and she can hear his smile, “the fee will be a little higher.”

He doesn’t specify. She doubts she could make him if she wanted to, but—she doesn’t want to. Doesn’t need to.

Resolved, Treila extends the smallest finger of her left hand into the darkness.

At first, there is nothing. Then the brush of gentle lips against her knuckle. A tongue, laving from the web between little

and ring finger up to the very tip, prodding beneath her fingernail. She thinks of the Loving Saint, planting his tainted

seeds, and grips her free hand tight against the stone so that she doesn’t flinch, doesn’t pull away. It’s eat or be eaten , she tells herself, and she cannot eat darkness.

But it can eat her.

Teeth close around her first knuckle, test the heft of the joint. Treila clenches her jaw and refuses to close her eyes or

look away. There’s nothing in the darkness that she can see, and so there is no warning when the bite comes, and there is

nothing but pain. Treila cries out, falling forward, catching herself against her left shoulder on the stone.

Tears burn her eyes. She’s yanked her hand back from the crevice, helpless to resist, and nothing stops her. Nothing stops

her, but nothing opens for her, and she stares at the abbreviated length of her finger.

There is no blood.

“It’s not so nice, to tease,” her darkness whispers. “That’s not enough to set you free. A little more, clever. Just a little

more.”

Treila’s crying. She doesn’t want to be, but the pain is too much, even though there’s no blood, even though there are no longer teeth against her skin. For a moment, she doesn’t think she can do it. Doesn’t think she can complete the bargain, offer her hand once more to the creature in the crevice.

But she has suffered worse. That long winter, starving, cold, too shocked and confused to be angry yet, not angry enough to

keep herself alive. And yet she is. She found her spite, at last, and rode it out of the forest.

Treila harnesses that spite again and thrusts her hand into the black.

The second bite is faster than the first, one more knuckle gone, and Treila howls. She screams. She thrashes, but she keeps

her arm in the gap, and she can feel it grip the length of her arm. There aren’t hands, no, though the lips and tongue still

work against the skin of her palm. If anything, it’s like she’s enveloped in a spiral of interlocking legs, jointed and pulsing

and tangling around her. She presses her forehead to the rock and pants, desperate not to move, desperate to see this through.

And then the third bite. The last one, severing her finger cleanly from her hand, and this time the pain is like scalding

oil, shooting up her veins, and she is on her knees before she can stop her fall. She tumbles forward, and the stone is not

there anymore, it was never there, and she is in a tunnel of flesh. She is crawling. She hears laughter all around her as

the limbs of this monster convulse and slide and grasp. Treila pushes forward all the same, grips skin, grips stone, and then—

And then—

And then she emerges into sunlight and the sigh of a breeze through grass.