Life at the Molokov Bay Chapel ran like clockwork tides, each day keeping time with the moon.

Once routine set, the nuns held it with both hands, believing it soothed their hearts like warm tea on a cold dawn.

They loved seeing others keep the same steady rhythm, like quiet gears meshing in a sunlit mill.

Morning prayers, meals by the bell, leisurely walks, or work at their posts, all moving like swallows in a looped flight.

Day after day, the cycle droned like field chants, yet it kept the Sacred Cathedral’s order steady as a stone riverbed.

Selina’s refusal to eat snagged that rhythm like a burr in a loom, a small tear spreading through the weave.

Like dominoes tipping, the trouble rippled through the Sacred Cathedral, swift as wind skimming reeds.

The nuns grew unsettled, worry pricking like a trail of ants under the skin.

“Still not eating?” The Holy Maiden looked at the plate gone cold as moonlight and asked the anxious nun.

The nun nodded, bitter as over-steeped tea; they’d added seasonings like sparks, and none had caught.

The Holy Maiden stepped into the dark guest room, where the bed held a large curled bundle like a quilted moon.

“Why aren’t you eating?” Her question fell soft as snowfall.

On the bed, the round lump kept silent, like a sleeping cloud over a winter hill.

“The sisters even added spices to suit you,” she said, her voice dusk-soft like a lantern in fog.

The lump stayed mute, a slumbering cloud with no wind to stir it.

“Trying to starve yourself?” Her words dropped like pebbles into a still pond.

As the words fell, the bundle trembled like a hatchling straining against its shell.

Selina poked out a small head from the cocoon of blankets, eyes peeking like wet seeds; when her gaze met the Holy Maiden’s, she ducked back like a shy fish.

Her shame pressed first, heavy as fog; when she spoke, her voice came out sand-dry and sank into the quilts like a muffled sigh.

“Would Melvina say that when you’re sulking?” The question drifted like a leaf on water.

“No!” she shot back, quick as a thrown pebble.

The Holy Maiden set the plate on the nightstand, chin propped like a poised crane, watching the round bundle with a smile sweet as spring. “You don’t mind stewing yourself in there?”

“I’m just punishing myself,” Selina muttered, guilt coiling like vines around a post.

“Had a fight?” The question floated like smoke.

The lump stayed mute; from every angle, it was only a ball, a sealed cocoon under low light.

“You left the Sacred Cathedral with Melvina, then came back sobbing soon after...” The Holy Maiden sank into memory, her voice heavy as rain over old stone.

“You kept repeating ‘the Professor doesn’t want me,’ and no coaxing worked,” she said, the words trailing like wet strings.

“You wept till past midnight, your wails like a cold wind that nearly scared the night patrol sister to death—she thought she’d met a resentful ghost-maiden.”

“I said things that went too far,” Selina confessed, remorse stinging like salt on a fresh cut.

“Mm?” The small sound rose like a moth’s flutter.

“The Professor hates having her mind taken apart, but I got impulsive and said so much,” she said, words drooping like wilted leaves after sun.

“Small-hearted,” the Holy Maiden said, the remark soft as feather yet sharp as a reed blade.

Selina eased her head out; her eyes, puffy from tears, glared like a little snarling beast with damp fur.

“Don’t you say that!” she snapped, then dove back into the blankets like a startled hare.

“Bold, snapping at the Holy Maiden inside the Sacred Cathedral,” she said, amusement glinting like a blade of sun on water.

“I’m scary when I’m mad!” Her pride arched like a cat’s back.

“Heh. Eat,” the Holy Maiden replied, her tone calm as stone on a riverbank.

“I’m still punishing myself,” Selina said, stubborn as a mule planted in mud.

“Won’t Melvina hurt to see this?” The question tapped like a knuckle on a door.

“Is it that...” Selina showed only her eyes, the rest hidden in warm quilts, gaze bright as stars seeking an answer.

The Holy Maiden shook her head, silence settling like ash after a burned note.

“I’m not eating! If she abandons me, she’ll have to watch my starved, shriveled corpse!” Her words clanged like a bell in a winter field.

“She’ll come back. Eat first,” the Holy Maiden said, patience steady as a pond under cloud.

Her face locked like plaster, fear quivering before any move; her voice trembled, and tears poured from fluttering lashes like a spring under stone.

“Mm... she... she just left after saying ‘I won’t abandon you’!”

“If Melvina truly meant to leave you to the Sacred Cathedral, she’d warn me beforehand,” the Holy Maiden said, words firm as a gate on iron hinges.

“The Professor... was gone six years and never thought of coming back...” The memory fell like old snow off an eave.

The sudden silence made Selina cry louder, her sobs beating like heavy rain on tin.

The Holy Maiden kept steady, her comfort low and warm as banked embers. “That and this aren’t the same.”

“What’s different?” Her curiosity pricked like a thorn.

“More complicated,” she said, the word thick as fog rolling off the sea.

“It’s just not wanting me... a troublesome girl like me...” Her self-loathing crawled like ivy up a damp wall.

The Holy Maiden watched the quivering bundle and rubbed her brow; the sharp crying pricked her ears like needles, sinking her mood like a stone into a well.

In all the world, only one scene makes crying pleasant—when you’re the one who made them cry, a bitter blossom on a cold branch.

“Why is she crying again?” A nun hurried up as the Holy Maiden stepped out, her concern fluttering like moths at dusk.

“Still not hungry enough,” the Holy Maiden said, weariness hanging like a damp cloak across her shoulders.

She tipped her face to the sky, resignation pooling like rain in a basin.

The weather grew gloomier by the day, like a clothesline sagging under endless dirty laundry.

Everywhere, thick low clouds in gray-yellow swells, like smoke-stained wool over the bay.

“She’s been hungry since yesterday; at this rate she won’t eat all day,” the nun said, listening to the sobs like a slow drip in a cave. “Does she really want to starve?”

“The one who can fix this isn’t in Naghtown,” the Holy Maiden said, worry stretched like a taut string between posts.

“Should we recite the sacred text? I can gather a few sisters,” the nun offered, faith rising like incense in the nave.

The Holy Maiden saw her earnest face and crooked her mouth, the gesture quick as a sparrow’s shift. “She’s not a follower of the Goddess Aiir.”

“This kind of fasting only harms the body! The Sacred Cathedral, dedicated to the Goddess of Life, can’t let this stand!” Her indignation flared like a torch in dry wind.

“I’ll think,” the Holy Maiden said, a thought flickering like a struck match—silencing spell—then she shook her head and let it die like smoke. “That only stops sound.”

“Did you think of something?” the nun asked, hope peeking like dawn over hills.

“An impractical one,” she said, the words falling like dry leaves on stone.

The nun’s face clouded; she smoothed her habit like a windless pond, then said quietly, “I’ll go comfort her again.”

“Only one person can truly comfort her,” the Holy Maiden sighed, the breath heavy as smoke in a cold room. “Sadly, she’s not here.”

“First she flung magic around, then she abandoned her partner—you shouldn’t have lifted the confinement!” The nun’s anger crackled like dry twigs underfoot.

“Let her cry a bit; you can’t eat with emotions surging,” the Holy Maiden said, calm steady as a river stone in current.

“Hope it won’t take long,” the nun murmured, her prayer thin as thread in the hand.

The Holy Maiden sighed and walked into the nave, her pace slow as drifting leaves in late autumn.

She glanced up at the stained glass overhead, light pooling like colored ponds, then lowered her gaze to the praying faithful like a field of bowed grain.

The believers noticed her and sent looks of reverence like lanterns swinging in a night wind.

She moved among them, her elegant face still showing a hidden gloom in the fine lines of her brow like shaded reeds by water.

“You look pale—did something trouble you?” a believer asked, concern soft as rain on clay.

She met the concern with a quiet shake, her tone smooth as water over pebbles. “I’m just thinking through some questions.”

“Glad it’s no trouble,” they said, relief light as a breeze through willow.

The Holy Maiden smiled, her back to the statue of the Goddess Aiir, trying to keep her worries from rippling the sanctum like stones in a pond.

As she idly admired the hall’s greenery, a striking gray-white head flashed into view like a gull’s wing turning.

Hedi looked about, searching like a fox in brush; seeing the Holy Maiden stride over, she hurried, “Where’s Selina?”

“So you do know to come back?” The words cut like a breeze with frost.

“I come back when things are sorted,” Hedi said, casual as a tossed pebble skimming water.

“Heh. Come with me,” the Holy Maiden snapped, her command crisp as a bell in chill air.

“Where... where to?” Hedi faltered, the question fluttering like a loose page in wind.

Ignoring the believers’ puzzled looks, the Holy Maiden seized Hedi’s wrist and hauled her toward the guest quarters, her grip firm as iron warmed by sun.

Before the doorway even came into view, a pitiful sob knifed into their ears like a sharp instrument tuning too high.

“She kept crying after you left, won’t eat, and nothing we said worked,” the Holy Maiden said, frustration stacking like stones on a cart.

“For real?” Hedi blinked, doubt rustling like dry grass behind a fence.

“Go in and see,” the Holy Maiden said, her patience thin as paper at the edge of flame.

Feeling a push at her back, Hedi stumbled into the guest room, eyes landing on the round, sobbing bundle on the bed like a rain-swollen beehive.

She shot a look at the food on the nightstand and demanded, “Why aren’t you eating?” Her voice cracked like ice.

“I’m going to starve myself!” Selina shot back, her defiance flaring like a torch in a tunnel.

“That bold? Who gave you that nerve?” Hedi’s snort snapped like a whip in dry air.

“I want the Professor to regret abandoning me; even if she comes back, she’ll only see a shriveled—” Her tirade snapped off as the warm shield around her was ripped open like a tent in wind.

She yelped, panic flashing like a flock of birds; then she saw the face and froze, eyes widening with disbelief. “Pro—”

Hedi gave her no chance to speak; she scooped a spoon of food and shoved it into Selina’s mouth, then pinched her jaw, forcing the chew like a drill sergeant at dawn.

“Mm... mm...” Selina whimpered, the sound small as a mouse under straw.

“Eat,” Hedi ordered, handing Selina the plate as she crossed one leg on the other bed, her presence hard as a drawn blade.

“You ignore the good and learn hunger strikes? If you dare leave a bite, I’ll beat you senseless!” Her threat rolled like thunder over the bay.