“I don’t know. It has been days.”
“Days.”
“My parents said I was going to die anyway.”
“They were wrong.” She kept her voice steady, not betraying her anger at a mother and father who would stop feeding their own child. Yet, she knew the poverty of some in the countryside was desperate. Perhaps there were other children to feed. Perhaps they felt they had no choice.
She smiled at Niccolo as she reached out and smoothed a long, sweat-thick lock of hair from his brow. Her soul was bonding to this child, her heart mothering him even as her hands followed her natural impulses. She hoped he would come into the Oneness very soon.
Franz reappeared, not carrying the called-for porridge himself, but ushering it in via the helpful hands of one of the older sisters. He looked much like a master ordering a servant, which bothered Teresa a little, but she was too grateful for the food—and the sister’s company—to dwell on that overmuch. The sister sat on a low stool across from the bed and watched while Teresa helped the boy sit up and hold his bowl and spoon. He seemed capable of feeding himself. The sister fidgeted, and Teresa felt her impatience to be going. There were needs. Great needs. Every hand ought to be engaged in meeting them, not in chaperoning. But Franz did not seem inclined to leave the room.
The boy took his first few bites tentatively but gained speed as his strength began to return, until Teresa had to put out her hand to slow him down lest he make himself sick. She supervised his eating until the last drop of porridge was gone and then helped him lie down again—he seemed exhausted by the surge of effort. His face had gone white and his hands shook.
“Sleep,” Teresa said, making up her mind to leave him alone—though her heart wanted to stay. “I’ll come back to check on you. Just sleep for now.”
He nodded, but his eyes were already closing of their own accord, and when she looked back just before stepping out of her quarters, she was sure he was asleep.
Other Books by Rachel Starr Thomson
Novels
Worlds Unseen: Book 1 in the Seventh World Trilogy
Burning Light: Book 2 in the Seventh World Trilogy
Coming Day: Book 3 in the Seventh World Trilogy
Exile: Book 1 in The Oneness Cycle
Hive: Book 2 in The Oneness Cycle
Attack: Book 3 in The Oneness Cycle
Renegade: Book 4 in The Oneness Cycle
Rise: Book 5 in The Oneness Cycle
Taerith (Fantasy)
Theodore Pharris Saves the Universe (Juvenile/Humour)
Lady Moon
Angel in the Woods
Reap the Whirlwind
The Babel Chip
Short Stories
Magdalene
Butterflies Dancing
Ogres Is
Fallen Star
Journey
Wayfarer’s Dream
The City Came Creeping
Of Men and Bones
Non Fiction
Tales of the Heartily Homeschooled (Humour/Memoir)
Heart to Heart: Meeting With God in the Lord’s Prayer
Letters to a Samuel Generation: The Collection
Fifty Shades of Loved
Mind Soul Ink Paper
Now For the Not-Yet
Undivided Devotion
Still Praying in the Wilderness
Renegade Page 18