But this trip, and the Heavenly Kingdom, was already so very different from everything she’d expected. That was reinforced when she stepped out of the truck and directly onto a pile of spent bullet casings. There were burnt cars in the street; burnt buildings all around her, and a vague but persistent smell of sour milk in the air. The feeling of dread that had built inside her since she’d left the crate hit a new crescendo.

And then Darryl took her inside the House of Miriam and everything changed again. Sasha saw a middle-aged woman sitting behind a desk in a big white room while younger women sat and lined the walls around her. The older lady had loose, friendly jowls and a mop of gray hair tossed into a lazy bun. She looked exhausted until the moment she fixed her eyes on Sasha. At that moment, her eyes lifted along with her lips into a smile that was the truest thing Sasha had ever seen.

“Praise be to God!” she cried. “You’ve made it!”

And then a sea of girls rose up around her. Most of them appeared to have been sewing up military uniforms. But at the woman’s call, every one of them set their work down and rose up to meet her. Sasha was swarmed by a sea of smiling faces as girls pressed their hands to hers, or embraced her, or prayed over her and chanted in tongues. A dozen people told her their names at once. Sasha went stiff at first, shocked and a little mortified by the mass display of physical affection by so many strangers.

But then the older woman made her way through the crowd and put her hands on Sasha’s shoulders. She brushed a stray hair out of Sasha’s face and fixed her with a smile that was more motherly than Sasha’s actual mother had ever been.

“It’s alright now,” she said in a voice that was pure comfort. “I’m sure you’re probably feeling frightened, and overwhelmed. But you’ve reached the Heavenly Kingdom. Loose yourself from the chains around your neck, O captive daughter of Zion. You’re home now.”

Something about the woman’s voice and the way her hands felt broke through the anxious wall around Sasha’s heart. She found herself in the older woman’s arms. She sobbed. And then she felt the press of bodies close against her. The mingled scents of lavender, citrus, and human beings filled her nose. It comforted Sasha in a way she’d never quite known. The anxiety and fear were gone now, but so was any sense of motive inspiration. She let her sisters guide her to a pillow on the ground.