He stood and faced me, his expression relaxed and innocent. “Is the sunlight a danger to the night?” he asked.

It was a strange question. “They don’t exist at the same time, so no.”

“But imagine all you knew was night and had never seen the sun. If a sun came up and chased the darkness away, would you feel threatened?”

“If all I knew was darkness? I suppose so, yes.”

“Well, think of me as the sun,” he said.

I shook my head. “But Haven Valley doesn’t live in darkness.”

“Then fear, which is the same thing. Does Haven Valley live in fear?”

“Fear isn’t darkness,” I said. “It keeps us from putting our hand in the fire.”

“You don’t have to rely on fear to keep you from putting your hand in the fire. You can make that choice without fear, only because you still want your hand. But I’m talking about deeper fears. The fear of failure or loss. Being afraid that you aren’t good enough. Fearing evil. Understand?”

I didn’t know how to answer.

“Are you afraid, Grace?” he asked sweetly.

“A little fear is good for you.”

“Because it keeps you safe.”

“Yes.”

“Because you can be threatened?”

“Yes.”

“Because you’re just a girl?”

“Yes.”

I could feel my bottom lip quivering, though I couldn’t explain why. There was something unnerving about the energy in Eli’s tone, the look in his eyes.

“Like I’m just a boy.” He flashed a grin, spun around, and grabbed something off the ground. “The truth is, you’re the light of the world.” He bounced back around to face me, now clutching something in his palm. “You’ve heard this?”

“That I’m the light of the world?”

“Yes.”

It sounded familiar, but it wasn’t a phrase I could pin down. What was I supposed to say? Light of the world. I wasn’t even sure I understood what that meant. Besides, Jesus was the light, not me.

“But you’re made in the likeness of God,” he said as if hearing my thoughts, just like Bobbie could. “Like God. Do you think that means eyelashes and fingernails?”

I’d never considered the question.

“No,” Eli said. “He’s the light without darkness.”

Warning bells issuing charges of heresy clanged through my mind, and in that moment I thought Eli really was the darkness masquerading as light. He was suggesting that I was like God?

“I was made like God, but we fell into darkness,” I said, voicing what I’d been taught.

“Exactly. Into blindness of the light. Blindness to who you’ve always been. Darkness. But that doesn’t mean you can’t see again.” His eyes brimmed with excitement. “Want to see something?”

I hesitated, leery of his naïve beliefs, but his enthusiasm was infectious. “All right.”