Belinda felt that she had to do something; she sensed the need for a kind of magic, a benevolent act of purification that would forge a connection between herself and Azzurra. Thus, the kitchen had been transformed into an alchemical laboratory. On the wooden table, amidst the remnants of breakfast and the lingering scent of Marseille soap that Tiziana had left like an indelible footprint, lay Azzurra's pale pink pointe shoes and the tiny purple remains of Shimmy. Outside, the scirocco continued to press against the shutters, creating a suspended, almost claustrophobic atmosphere.
Belinda held a small seam ripper with fingers that, despite her chronic fatigue, had rediscovered a micrometric precision. With extreme delicacy, she began to separate the purple silk from the tiny lead inserts hidden within the tips of the doll's slippers. They were small gray grains, opaque, appearing to absorb the light rather than reflect it.
"Do you feel how heavy they are, Mama?" Azzurra whispered, watching her mother at work. "It's not a bad weight. It's as if they have a story to tell—a story of people who have walked a long way and no longer want to fall."
Belinda nodded, feeling a sharp pain in her kidneys that forced her to pause for a moment. "Mattia said this lead was used by exiles to keep their robes from flying away during rituals. Perhaps, Azzurra, it serves us too—to keep us from losing our way when the pain becomes too strong."
They began the work of the "graft." With tiny, invisible stitches, Belinda sewed the fragments of Shimmy's purple silk into the casing of Azzurra's pointe shoes. Then, using a special adhesive and canvas reinforcements, she inserted the lead grains just beneath the plaster of the toe box. It was a risky operation; altering the balance of a dance shoe could cause injury, but Azzurra guided her mother's hands with a confidence that brooks no argument.
When they finished, the pointe shoes were no longer merely instruments of dance. They were relics. Appearing pink and delicate on the outside, they hid within their heart the purple of mystery and the lead of the past. Azzurra slipped them on, tying the satin ribbons with tight knots around her slender ankles.
She stood up. The sound of the tips on the floor was not the usual sharp thud of plaster, but a dull, deep thrum that seemed to vibrate through the very foundations of the house. Tiziana, who was coming in from the garden, stopped at the threshold, crossing her arms. "Those shoes have the voice of the earth," Tiziana said, her tone caught between fear and admiration. "Careful, picciridda. If you dance with those, you'll stir the dead and the living alike."
Azzurra did not answer. She attempted an échiné and then a turn. The centrifugal force, accentuated by the weight of the lead, made her spin with a speed never seen before; yet, when she stopped, she was as motionless as a Greek statue. There was no swaying, no uncertainty. In that moment, Belinda felt a strange sensation of warmth in her side. For the first time in months, the sense of oppression that accompanied her every breath seemed to ease. It was as if Azzurra, by carrying that lead upon her feet, was draining it from her mother's body.