“Sometimes you have to when reality kind of smacks you in the face.”
Acacia tapped the fruit with her finger, making it swing back and forth. “So what should we do with it?”
Sapphira laid a hand over her heart. “Let’s promise each other that we won’t eat it unless we’re truly starving, like if for some reason we can’t get any food from the upper world.”
“That doesn’t make sense. Even if we were starving, we still wouldn’t want to live forever, would we?”
“I don’t know what I’d do if I were starving.” Sapphira caressed the fruit with her fingertip. “But it can’t be a coincidence that it showed up after exactly a thousand years, can it? It has to mean something.”
“True, but we don’t have anything but guesses.”
Sapphira leaned to the side and peeked at the portal screen. “Maybe we’ll see something today that will make it all clear. We always seem to get messages from the Ovulum whenever we really need them.”
Acacia leaned with her. “I don’t think we’re going to learn much from it. It’s still just a column.”
“I noticed.” Sapphira crossed her arms and began tapping her foot.
Acacia wrapped her fingers around Sapphira’s wrist. “I can read your mind, Sister. You’re not going to traipse over to Glasgow to see what’s going on.”
Sapphira stopped tapping. “Why not? With our disguises, we could get there without anyone noticing us. We’ll be wearing our sunglasses.”
“Oh, sure,” Acacia said, rolling her eyes. “I can see the people on the train, pointing at us. ‘Look at the poor little blind girls all dressed up in their frilly bonnets. Aren’t they cute?’”
“But today is Easter, so no one will think anything’s unusual. And maybe we won’t need bonnets at all. I read about a new hair dye that might work.”
“Another one? Those chemicals did nothing but give you a rash, and, besides, we can’t color our eyes. Wearing sunglasses might raise a lot of pity, but it’s not going to get us to Glasgow.” Acacia took Sapphira’s hand. “Look. Even if you could get there, how would you ever find Elam?”
Sapphira heaved a big sigh. “I guess you’re right, but when I can’t keep an eye on him, I just ” She pulled her hand slowly away from Acacia. “My palm! The rash is gone!”
“No, it itched terribly this morning.” Sapphira swung her head toward the tree. “The last time I remember scratching it was right before I touched the fruit.”
“How could fruit heal your rash?”
Sapphira caressed her palm with her finger. “Maybe it has medicinal properties.”
“And maybe it was a miracle.” Acacia touched the cross resting behind the waistband of Sapphira’s long gray skirt, part of the dreary outfit she had scavenged from a charity box. “After all the miracles you’ve seen,” Acacia said, “I don’t understand why you get so jumpy about Elam.”
Sapphira pulled out the cross and gazed at its seemingly invulnerable surface. “I guess you’re right.”
“I know what we can do!” Acacia whirled around and marched toward the exit corridor, her own mousy skirt spinning around her legs. “Let’s go visit Yereq. Maybe the screen will be on by the time we get back.”
“Wait for me!” Sapphira hustled to catch up, whispering to her cross, “Give me light!” Instantly, a bright flame danced across the slender wood, smokeless and reaching tiny yellow limbs toward the cave’s ceiling. As the two walked silently through the tunnel, Sapphira reflected on the cross’s eerie glow and repeated the words to herself, “Give me light.” Though she hadn’t spoken them out loud this time, the command seemed to echo in her ears. “Give me light. Give me light.” She blinked at the undulating flames and shook her head. If there was a deeper message hiding behind those simple words, it wasn’t ready to show itself yet.
Now accustomed to the once forbidden path to the mobility room, Sapphira took little notice of the empty growth chambers lining the final corridor that led to the massive vault-like room. Even the bones of dead giants were easy to skip around. The stench of their rotting flesh had long since diminished, so they were just a morbid collection of stones the girls could easily dodge.
Now, marching right into the room seemed easy, almost too easy. The once prohibited journey had become like a stroll to the library, a way to pass the time. Sapphira raised her cross near Yereq’s growth chamber, illuminating