Without thinking Hanni slapped her daughter, the love of her life, the child she would have done anything for. Lea put a palm to her cheek, confused by her own feelings.

Hanni sank to her knees, reaching to take the girl’s face in her hands. “I need you to do as I say.”

Perhaps her mother blamed her for what had happened with the soldier and this was her punishment, to be sent away.

“When you travel you will no longer be yourself,” Hanni told her.

She would be Lillie Perrin, a Catholic accompanied by her cousin Ava. Jews were no longer issued visas or allowed to travel outside the country, and if asked she must remember an unfamiliar prayer to prove her identity.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

That evening they shared the last pot of Hardship Soup. It was made only of cabbage and water, for there were no longer any spices. Ava lifted Bobeshi from bed and carried her so she could sit at the table, something she hadn’t been able to do for more than two years.

Bobeshi kissed Ava in gratitude. The kiss was sweet and pure. “She is the one,” Bobeshi declared.

“Why is she so strong?” Lea asked her mother.

“Because she needs to be,” Hanni told her daughter.

In the midst of the heartbreak of what was to be their last dinner, Hanni took out a small paper box. Inside was a gift she’d planned to give her daughter on her thirteenth birthday. Now she understood that they would not be together on that day.

Hanni had considered this gift carefully, ordering it before the Jewish jewelry stores had been closed down, forced to turn over their gold and silver to the government. The charm she’d had fashioned was a silver triangle marked with Lea’s birth date and three Jewish stars. On the back there was the mystical letter hey, the most mysterious symbol in the Hebrew alphabet, which in the ancient world could mean thread or window or fence or behold. It was made up of three lines to represent the three aspects of humanity: the physical world, the spoken word, and the soul. It was one of the names of God. It was protection, it was love, it was a secret, it was the beginning, it was the end.

Hanni clasped the necklace at her daughter’s throat. She must keep it hidden to ensure that no one noticed the Hebrew letter, but one day, when she was at last safe, when there were no more soldiers on the streets or murderers knocking at the doors, she must unlatch the necklace, open the charm, and do exactly as she was instructed.