A few years had passed and am about to lock 18 ready to make my vows, years since I stopped writing. My journals lay silent, sealed beneath linens folded with the scent of rosewater and prayer. I had become what she hoped: Mother Superior Mostel II although I haven't yet took my vows, they already call me that. My days were quiet. My heart, trained. My faith, unwavering—or so I thought.
But that changed one rainy afternoon.
It was raining.
The cathedral bell had rung early that day, its echo weaving through the stone halls of St Andrews like an old hymn.
I slipped out of class, my uniform damp at the edges, and climbed the narrow stairs to Mother Superior's office — my sanctuary.
I sat by the tall window, legs tucked beneath me, watching the rain trace lines down the glass like forgotten prayers.
That's when I saw them.
Three men, draped in long, flowing Arab robes, walking through the nunnery gates with grace that came not from religion, but from memory—ancestral, ancient, rooted. They moved with purpose, their sand-colored garments soaked through, their sandals slapping against the wet stone. No hesitation. Straight toward the Archbishop's office.
Whispers followed, of course. The dining hall became a sea of voices.
"Who are they?"
"Why now?"
"Did you see the one in the golden scarf?"
"I heard they're from the East. Arabs, they said."
No one paused to look at me when they said it.
No one remembered that I was an Arab.
Or maybe… they chose not to.
I chewed my bread in silence, the taste suddenly strange in my mouth. I wanted to vanish into the folds of my robe. My fingers trembled as they clutched the crucifix at my neck.
Then came the call.
The Archpriest had summoned me. Not as a student, not as a servant, not even as a Sister—but as Mother Superior Mostel II.
I walked the corridors with steps made of stone. My thoughts were louder than the storm outside. When I entered the Archpriest's office, the room was already full. Elder nuns, Fathers, and the Archbishop himself, all seated in reverence. Their eyes met mine with something I could not name—regret, perhaps… or responsibility.
"Please sit, child," the Archpriest said.
I sat.
Then came the truth.
They told me who the men were. That one among them had crossed deserts to find me. That I was not abandoned. That I was remembered. That a family—my family—still waited for me across the sea of years. That I was never meant to be left behind.
And I listened. Calm, collected. My heart was a quiet riot, but I did not show it.
Then I said, my voice firm though my soul wavered,
"If I go with them… I will no longer be a nun. I will leave Christianity."
No one corrected me. No one denied it. Silence swallowed the room whole.
And then, he entered.
An old man, cloaked in white and memory, stepped forward. He looked at me for only a second before his voice broke through the hush.
"Salma," he said.
"I am your grandfather."
I froze.
He spoke my name with such softness it nearly undid me.
And then I saw it.
The slope of his nose—my nose.
The bridge of his brow—mine.
It was not proof I needed. It was familiarity.
I was not an orphan. I was a granddaughter.
Tears didn't come, not yet. My body moved before my spirit could catch up. I followed them outside, into the rain. I entered the car. I watched the nunnery grow smaller in the rearview mirror, the cross on the roofline fading into gray.
We drove into a world I did not know. But one I had come from.
They said I was going home.
To my blood. To my past. To my people.
But the question clung to me like the rain clung to my veil:
Did I really belong there?