Silk and Starvation

The second chamber was a garden, but nothing grew. The trees were blown glass, the leaves were emeralds, and the water in the fountains was molten silver.

Elara walked through the splendor, her pockets heavy with gems she had gathered. But a sharp cramp doubled her over. The Rat was biting. She hadn't eaten in two days.

She sat on a bench made of opal, clutching her stomach. The porcelain hands looked alien against her dirty coat.

"Hunger is such a vulgar thing, is it not?"

The Curator was there, standing under a tree of sapphires. He hadn't walked; he had simply occurred.

"I need food," Elara rasped. "Is there food here?"

"Food is fuel for a dying engine," the Curator said, disdain coloring his tone. "You eat, you defecate, you rot. It is a cycle of decay. Why do you cling to a biological imperative that chains you to the animal kingdom?"

He plucked a fruit from a glass branch. It was made of ruby. He held it out.

"In the world above, you spend half your life working just to feed the furnace in your belly. Imagine if you were free of that. Imagine never feeling the Rat again."

Elara looked at her stomach. It was concave, her ribs pressing against her skin. "I... I can stop being hungry?"

"I can replace your digestive system," the Curator said casually, as if offering to trim a hangnail. "I can replace the wet, churning organs with a core of solid starlight. You will never need to eat. You will never need to sleep. You will be sustained by the ambient light of the Oubliette."

"But," Elara hesitated. "I like the taste of bread. Sometimes."

"Bread is dust and water," the Curator countered. He stepped closer. He touched the collar of her ragged coat. "And this... this smell. The sweat. The grease. It comes from the pores. If you accept the Core, you will be clean inside and out. You will be worthy of the silks."

He gestured to a chest at the foot of the fountain. It was overflowing with gowns of gossamer, velvet, and spider-silk, colored in hues that didn't exist in the Slag-Heap.

Elara looked at the gown—a shimmering violet thing that looked like twilight woven into cloth. Then she thought of the latrines in the shantytown. She thought of the gnawing pain in her gut that ruled her life.

"Take it," she said. "Take the hunger."

The Curator placed his hand over her heart. A flash of light blinded her.

The pain vanished instantly. The hollowness was filled with a humming, cool vibration. She took a deep breath, and for the first time, she didn't smell her own unwashed body. She smelled like nothing. Like ice.

She stripped off her rags, leaving them in a pile on the floor. She dressed in the violet silk. It slid over her skin like water. She looked at herself in the fountain. A princess stared back. Her hands were art; her clothes were dreams.

She reached for the ruby fruit and bit into it out of habit.

Her teeth—still bone and enamel—cracked against the stone. She felt the shock, but no flavor. She touched her tongue to the roof of her mouth. It felt dry. Useless.

"You have no need for taste," the Curator said, watching her. "Taste is a bribe to make animals eat. You are no longer an animal, Elara."

She dropped the ruby fruit. She felt a pang of loss, but it was quickly drowned out by the feeling of the silk and the absence of pain. She was becoming something else. Something better.