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THE HUNGER OF SAINT MARGUERITE'S HOSPICE

73 Jars of Preserved Hands. 129 Years of Missing Surgeons. The Hospice is Still Recruiting... and the Saint is Always Hungry

By Tales That Breathe at NightPublished 8 months ago 4 min read
The saint was never canonized. She was hungry. And her choir of surgeon-servants is still growing

Season 1

PROLOGUE: THE FIRST INCISION

Sister Evangeline's Private Journals - Locked Ward, 1893

The hospice's east wing had been silent for seventeen years when the screaming began again. Not the usual cries of the dying - this was the wet sound of meat being parted from bone with deliberate precision.

I found Dr. Lemarchand in the surgical theater, though he'd been buried a fortnight prior. His corpse stood upright, performing an autopsy on little Claire Duvalier. His hands moved with impossible skill, tendons snapping as dead fingers wielded the scalpel.

Most horrifying was the audience - our marble statue of Saint Marguerite had somehow moved to the observation gallery. Her stone hands were now flesh up to the wrists, dripping onto the theater floor below.

When the morning bell rang, three truths became clear:

Claire's body had been perfectly dissected, her organs arranged in neat rows

Her hands were missing

The statue's new fingers wore Claire's skin like gloves

The Bishop declared it a miracle. That night, he disappeared. We found his tongue nailed to the chapel doors, threaded with surgical wire. Pinned beneath it, a note in his own hand:

"The first Felix is ready."

CHAPTER 1: THE THIRTEENTH FELIX

The Arrival:

The vellum envelope smelled of embalming fluid. Inside, a contract written in what Daniel Shaw hoped was iron gall ink:

£90,000 for six months' service as resident physician

Requirements:

Fellowship in surgical medicine

No living immediate family

Willingness to answer to "Felix" without question

Daniel's mentor at Edinburgh had warned him about Saint Marguerite's Hospice. "They don't just treat patients there, Shaw. They harvest them." But £90,000 would erase his gambling debts and buy the silence of that nurse from Bethlem.

13 signatures. 13 disappearances. The 14th space remains empty... for now

The Orientation :

Mrs. Duchamp, the hospice administrator, wore gloves at all times. During the tour:

The surgical theater's walls bled between the tiles

Patient records showed his signature from 1927 and 1983

The statue in the chapel turned its head to track their movement

At precisely 3:33 PM, every clock in the hospice stopped. Mrs. Duchamp whispered: "She's waking."

First Night Rituals:

1:17 AM. The counting game began.

Thirteen beds in the children's ward. Fourteen sleeping forms.

Bed 7's occupant:

No face, just a void that drank the lamplight

Breath that smelled of ether and rotting roses

Small hands grafted to the mattress with surgical screws

When Daniel lifted the blanket, the thing whispered through stitches:

"She's been waiting 129 years for hands like yours, Felix."

His pager buzzed. The screen showed one word:

CONSULTATION

Count the patients. If you see 14, don't let it see you back

CHAPTER 2: THE BASEMENT ARCHIVES

The Specimen Collection

The lock yielded at 2:15 AM. Inside:

73 glass jars containing hands in various metamorphic stages

Ledger entries tracking each Felix's "progress":

Felix IV (1902): Vocal cords preserved. Hands rejected (tremors).

Felix IX (1951): Near-perfect conversion. Sacrificed during lunar eclipse.

Film reels showing Felix XII's transformation:

Day 1: Fingers elongating

Day 43: Nails hardening into surgical steel

Day 178: Screaming as his tongue unraveled into suture thread

The projector clicked. A new title card appeared in Daniel's handwriting:

FELIX XIII: PRIME CANDIDATE

Not medical specimens. Applications

The Choir Practice

3:03 AM. The chapel was never empty.

Twelve figures in surgical gowns stood facing the statue, singing a Gloria in perfect Latin. When Daniel stepped closer:

Their mouths were stitched shut

The harmonies came from incision wounds in their throats

Their hands were the surgical instruments

The statue's marble lips were now flesh up to the chin. It whispered:

"You'll make beautiful music, Felix."

They don't sing with their mouths. They sing with their wounds

The First Procedure

Daniel woke to find:

His fingernails replaced with scalpel blades

Suture thread spooling from his mouth

Shadow performing an amputation on nothing

The pager buzzed again:

OR THEATER 1. STAT.

SEASON FINALE: THE APOTHECARY'S GOSPEL

The Truth in the Ledger

The final ledger entry:

"Saint Marguerite was never canonized. Born 1799 as Marguerite Lemarchand, she pioneered living surgery , grafting patient consciousness into organs. The hospice is her harvest chapel. Each Felix becomes another instrument in her eternal symphony."

The Transformation

Midnight in the surgical theater:

The 12 former Felixes emerged from walls, their bodies fused with tools

Daniel's hands moved independently, performing flawless incisions

The statue stepped down, revealing mummified flesh beneath marble

Her first words in 129 years:

"Let us begin the final dissection."

The 13th Felix never realized: the tools weren't for his patients

The New Arrival

As Daniel's severed hands continue operating on empty air, a fresh applicant rings the hospice bell. The reception book opens itself to a new page:

FELIX XIV: INTERVIEW PENDING

========================================

The choir is missing its final instrument. Follow for Season 2 - The Harvest Mass - arriving this thursday.

=====================================

The hospice doors are open. The surgical lights are bright. And Saint Marguerite is always watching.......

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About the Creator

Tales That Breathe at Night

I write what lingers in the dark—true horrors veiled in fiction, fiction rooted in truth. Some tales are whispered in graveyards, others buried in silence. If it gave someone nightmares, I’ll write it. Some stories remember you, too.

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  • Rohitha Lanka8 months ago

    Nice story!!!

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