THE THREE LIVES OF CHRISTINA THE ASTONISHING (#15)

As Told by the Holy Woman in Her Own Words
A Hundred or So Years after the End of the World

A woman in a headdress stood guard inside the entrance. Her clean white tunic was smooth as stone, but it wasn’t the synthetic material we all wore—could it really be made of the precious pre-Miasma “cotton”? When I tried to pass, she blocked my way with a long wooden staff.

“Sign?”
I squinted at her.
“You haven’t given me the sign.”
“I beg your pardon,” I said. “I’m from the duchy of Sequoia. In our Giver House we don’t have signs.”
She gave a little sigh and lifted the staff. “Go on in,” she told me. “But behave yourself.”

(to be continued tomorrow)