Page 69 of This Vicious Hunger
The agony is endless. It isn’t long before I am begging aloud for Hell to take me instead. Anything is better than this.Please, I beg silently.Please, please, make it end. If there is a god, may he shepherd me away from this torture and grease the palms of those above—or below.But if there is a god, he does not hear me, since Hell clearly doesn’t want me either.
The pain is simultaneously hot and freezing cold, each movement I make fracturing my bones and mending them again so that they can break anew. My tongue is dry as dust, my teeth aching, too big for my mouth, blood seeping down my chin from my tattered gums.
In the throes of this pain, I dream of nightmarish landscapes, twisted roots blackened by fire atop writhing craters filled with maggots or the crush of soil overhead, crawling in my mouth and nose, spitting flies. In the next in-between place I find table after table heaped with food, roast chickens and succulent joints oflamb studded with rosemary. Thick wheels of yellow cheese and jugs of wine the colour of blood. I surge towards the feast, knowing there is a place set for me at the table although I am unable to see it.
At the head of the table there is a chair made of carved ivory, polished like a fresh duck egg. The seat of the chair is adorned with ropy red and black velvet, tassels creeping against its legs. Olea sits atop the throne, her head pushed back in ecstasy as she finishes chewing and licks the pink meat juices from her delicate fingers.
My heart thunders at the sight of her, but it is the feast that guides my feet. My body sways, a corpse-like stagger. I reach for the table. My nails are black and ripped down the middle and I claw at the meat, dragging a drumstick to my mouth.
I bite down, savouring the soft flesh between the sharpness of my teeth, the meat melting on my tongue. The taste of blood rushes down my throat, vibrant, still beating, beating like my heart should. The chicken in my hand goes limp, feathers drifting down my dress. I hardly notice that where before was a platter of cooked meat, now lies the body of a rabbit, another of a whole pig, barely cold.
Olea. Her face is bloodied, ruby droplets on her bare chest, rivulets running down past her navel and her hands slick with the dark display. She opens her eyes and they are the black of night, lips parted, teeth bared. She tears at something small and white and blood spurts down her chin.
The chair of ivory is a chair of bones, the velvet tassels the remnants of flesh. Olea leans forward in her throne and beckons me.Come, she whispers, and a familiar, aching wetness surges between my legs.Come.
I awaken, breathless, to the aroma of roses. Buttery early sunlight falls in beams around the edges of an ill-fitting shutter. I blink and slowly the room swims into relief.
It is not sunlight, but the flickering flames of candlelight; I am not in a bed, but somebody has laid my body across some kind of burlap sacking, which bunches between me and the hard flagstone floor.
It hits me then. I am alive.
I grope down my body, feeling the hardness of muscle and bones at my hips and the soft plumpness of my breasts. The dress I’m wearing is white and silken and I luxuriate in the feel of it across my skin, the fabric so light and sweet it is like spider silk. Every synapse fires within me. The candlelight is golden and glorious, my dress the most exquisite thing I have ever touched, my skin as soft and cold as fresh water. I pause.
My tongue snakes between my teeth, which are sharper than I recall. I cannot feel my heartbeat.
“Perfect.”
The word comes out a purr, the voice without a face. Long seconds pass before I recall its owner. My hands drop to my sides, frozen. I would take the pain over this.
“What do you feel?”
Dr. Petaccia’s face swims into view, only her eyes visible over the band of fabric she wears to cover her mouth, and my vision distorted by the angle of my neck. I try to turn my face away and she clucks disappointedly.
“Ah now,” she scolds. “Must you really continue to be so mulish? Anybody would think you’d be a little more grateful.”
I struggle to prop myself up on my elbows. My limbs are sofluid they feel almost like water. No, more like running a moistened hand over glass. I judder, knocking my chin against my shoulder and biting down on my tongue.
The taste is… not quite right. It is blood and yet it is not. Somehow it is thicker, slower, honeyed. I try to hide my panic behind the action of sitting upright, but it doesn’t work.
“Holy fuck.”
I can’t believe my eyes. I am sure I must be dreaming, another nightmare in the in-between taking over, for right ahead, upright on the table, legs dangling over its side as she peers down at me, is Olea.
“Well, quite,” says the doctor, and I know I’m not hallucinating. She steps away from both of us and lowers her mask to expose the rest of her face, clearly satisfied. Her grin is wolfish.
“How?” I exclaim.
Olea doesn’t speak right away. It’s clear she’s just as confused as I am. She reaches up to her face, examining her nose, her lips, her cheeks, through the gentle touch of her fingertips. Her skin is barely a whisper darker than her nightgown, smooth and unblemished. Her lips are a healthy peach. When she opens her mouth, her voice is throaty with disuse.
“The cure,” she breathes.
“Well done,” Petaccia says to me by way of agreeing. “Iknewall we needed was a little freshness. Fresh eyes, fresh passion.” Her gaze travels between the two of us and her wolfish smile deepens.
“It worked?” Olea asks.
I touch the satin material of my nightgown again, rubbing it between my fingers as if I could start a fire and blaze this whole place to the ground. A wave of rage crests in me.Didit work? And what is the cost?
“I told you to trust me, my dear. Didn’t I say—”
