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Back The Starving Saints
Chapters (57)
  1. Cover
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. 6
  8. 7
  9. 8
  10. 9
  11. 10
  12. 11
  13. 12
  14. 13
  15. 14
  16. 15
  17. 16
  18. 17
  19. 18
  20. 19
  21. 20
  22. 21
  23. 22
  24. 23
  25. 24
  26. 25
  27. 26
  28. 27
  29. 28
  30. 29
  31. 30
  32. 31
  33. 32
  34. 33
  35. 34
  36. 35
  37. 36
  38. 37
  39. 38
  40. 39
  41. 40
  42. 41
  43. 42
  44. 43
  45. 44
  46. 45
  47. 46
  48. 47
  49. 48
  50. 49
  51. 50
  52. 51
  53. Acknowledgments
  54. About the Author
  55. Also by Caitlin Starling
  56. Copyright
  57. About the Publisher

Acknowledge me, she thinks. See what I can do. Be intrigued. Desire what I can teach you.

Jacynde never will.

The water is clean, and Jacynde cannot explain it. Their bellies are empty, and Jacynde cannot fill them. Phosyne understands, then: Jacynde is insulted. Deeply insulted, that Phosyne can do what she cannot. The water, she had hope of solving one day. But the food—

If Phosyne can do it, it will not be by the Priory’s alchemy, and it will be, incontrovertibly, magic.

It will be the domain of the Constant Lady, if they are lucky. If they are not, it will be something beyond.

How can Phosyne ever claim to be capable of such a thing?

I’m not, she wants to say. The king has decreed, but that can’t make it so. And yet even as she cringes away from the theological consequences of what she hopes to achieve, she also longs for it. Hears a siren call, a whispering that there are rules to this world the Priory has no ability to understand, rules that nonetheless exist.

How can the Priory reject understanding the world, just because it follows an unfamiliar order?

Jacynde, unimpressed, says only, “You should make the most of what I’ve given you. There will be no more.”

And then she is gone.

In the silence after Jacynde’s departure, Phosyne gazes at the dancing candle flame. It consumes the wax beneath it, transforms it into heat, the way the body transforms food into warmth and movement. But stomachs cannot break down the wax. She will burn her meager stores away soon.

A nun of the Priory can summon fire from iron. There, then gone, explosive and powerful, eating away at a new kind of food. What did it consume? Perhaps that is the new angle she has needed, the next conjunction of ideas.

Jacynde’s visit has been illuminating. She has been looking at the problem all wrong. The king has asked for food from nothing; she will find a way to let them have nothing as food.

It will begin with the candle.

Her mind is full of hymns. The fire cants as she hums them nearly below hearing. Green vitriol, sulfuric acid, the gasses that caught fire and melted Etrebia’s engines of war. She will wait no more for fire from the heavens.

She needs more supplies.

8

8

Five days after the bombardment, Ser Leodegardis sends a runner to fetch Ser Voyne for Priory service. It’s a welcome relief. Phosyne has now added stinking sulfur to the mix of her experiments. Voyne’s only balm is that Phosyne is running low on candles, and when they are gone—well, then the Priory will give her no more, her work will stop by force, and Voyne can argue to be freed.