Old Soul

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The girl blew out the candles on her birthday cake, certain that she counted more; she saw ghost candles. She was convinced that she had lived more than her years even though she was still young. The smoke that drifted into the air slipped through her fingers, just like her wish; just like many wishes from the past and, unknown yet to her, many wishes from her future, for wishes are hard to hold.

Part of her soul died the day she blew out the candles. She doesn’t remember slicing the cake or even who sang the song she dreaded each year she aged. The years slipped by like waves on the shore; time is reliable in the way it marches ahead, even when we stumble and fall.

It took years, but the girl made peace with the ticking of the clock and the waves on the shore of time. Each birthday her ghost candles aged her more than her birthday year and each year the wishes slipped through her fingers; all except a few. Enough wishes weren’t granted to give her sorrow, yet enough were granted to give her hope.

In exchange for time, the girl was granted wisdom; the wisdom that she hadn’t had when she was young. She was granted the wisdom to see into people’s hearts. The girl saw the blackness of some hearts as clearly as she saw the shining light in others. She was surprised that the blackest of hearts were covered in fancy dressings, while the light of heart didn’t need fancy dress; because they didn’t need to hide. The girl gladly traded the years for the wisdom that she hadn’t had and surrounded herself and her family with hearts of light.

Over the years, when she blew out the candles, the old soul breathed in strength that she didn’t know she had, she breathed in the courage to keep wishing. The girl made peace with the wishes that slipped away and the wishes she breathed into her soul, knowing that there was only one path that mattered; and that wasn’t hers to make. The path was hers to trust with a trust as strong as a wish; a trust as strong as faith.

Providence of Souls “Found and Lost”

Chapter 37 continued…

“Well, Allessandro, it looks as if we found your hiding spot,” he glared at me as he held his head high. He was staring at me with the most menacing eyes I had ever seen. I waited for the voices to tell me what to do, how to escape, or at least try, but I didn’t hear anything. I couldn’t hear the voices. The boys were in a semicircle around me with Caleb’s gravestone behind me. All I could do was walk in a circe as my heart beat into my ears.

“Why do you hand out here with dead people?” James snickered. “Is it because you don’t have any friends who are alive? Are your only friends the ones in your head and the dead children in the cemetery?”

I stayed silent while I stared at the boys who had so suddenly appeared. James sneered as he waited for an answer. The crew of boys he brought with him smiled.

“Well, what is it, freak?” James yelled while the other boys laughed, encouraging him.

I didn’t know if they had a plan to hurt me or if they just wanted to scare me, so I answered him, “I just pray for the children here.”

“Why would you do that?” James answered. “They don’t care about you any more than anyone else around here does.”

I just shook my head, unable to think of what to say. It was true that no one cared. I was a nuisance to my mother and the nuns, probably event to Ernest. He was probably too kind to let me know it. I had failed everyone and now I was praying for children that I never even knew. I put my head in my hands. I felt shame settle over me, I was a failure to everyone.

Suddenly I felt a whooshing of wind around me, like a storm had rolled in with high winds. I looked up to see an angel beside each boy in the graveyard. I turned around and there was an angel behind me. My mouth dropped open.

The angels were dressed in immaculate white gowns. White curly hair fell beautifully around their heads and their wings were outstretched, as if on guard for something. The outstretched wings had immaculate white feathers. The angels behind the boys had been able to use their beautiful wings. That was probably the rush of air I felt, when they descended from the sky. However, the angels were roped together by their hands. The rope was tied like the stevedore knots that we tied the ship cargo with. The angels looked frustrated and powerless with their hands tied and their eyes remained dark while their wings remained outstretched.

When I turned around, the angel behind me was not roped to the other angels. Yet, its glistening wings were also outstretched.

To be continued…

 

Providence of Souls “Found and Lost” Chapter 37

Chapter 37 shows the final struggle beyond the veil. It deals with Allessandro’s final encounter with the angels and darkness that have followed he and his mother, Cessarina, both the angels and demons are trying to gain influence over their lives.

Chapter 37 “Lost and Found”

I soon learned that trying to be invisible and being invisible are two entirely different things. It didn’t take much time for the gang of bullies led by James to search me out. There were so many of them and they were bent on destruction.

I was sitting on Caleb O’Downey’s grave. Caleb had died at ten years of age. I made up a story about him and imagined his face as one of the boys from the orphanage. I imagined that the children and nuns loved him. Caleb was strong and athletic and led all the boy’s games, as well as being the smartest boy in his lessons. Caleb had become everything that I wanted to be, but could never become. However, I imagined that his life was cut short from flu. The nuns weren’t able to save him as his fever rose until he was lifeless. I imagined that the boys and the nuns had grieved his loss. But in truth, his death was so long ago that the boys he had lived with were grown. They had all probably forgotten about Caleb O’Downey.

By the state of the graveyard, the nuns who had grieved his death were either elderly or had moved on to other callings of the church. It was doubtful that this forgotten graveyard was remembered by anyone in the rush of life and living. This graveyard had become a passing memory for those who remembered the souls within it.

As I sat and prayed for Caleb, facing his gravestone, I heard a hurried, yet hushed trodding of feet. as if a small family of deer were passing through the forest. But, when I turned around from the gravestone, I was met with the menacing gang, led by James. They had already crossed the frozen stream and were treading stealthily up the embankment. They surrounded me by the time I noticed their presence. The peace of the graveyard and the peace of the forest were shattered instantaneoulsy by James’ smooth voice.

To be continued…

 

 

 

My Latest Review!!!

What would you say to Dracula if you met him face to fang? The airbnb challenge!

Happy Halloween!!!

Tonya Jermann Fraser

Read about the challenge HERE

I am still awaiting news of the winner of the Airbnb challenge!!! In the meantime, Happy Halloween to Bram Stoker’s Dracula fans…

My entry to the airbnb Dracula’s Castle challenge…

“What would I say to Dracula if I met him face to fang?

On a night so dark and dreary,
I stumble, cold and weary,
As my candle waft along the corridor.
The Sisters they do chase,
I run as though in haste,
The candle dies and darkness draws him near.

A guest of the Count De Ville,
Was, I admit, a thrill,
Until he was a Count no more.
A common Walprus Night
I hear witches scream in delight,
Up on the wooded hill.

Bonfires burn brightly,
Ever clever nightly,
The graveyard, laid in marble, is Countess Dolingen.
In a marble tomb she rests,
Iron stake upon her breast,
Atop a wooden bier.

There…

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What would you say to Dracula if you met him face to fang? The airbnb challenge!

Read about the challenge HERE

I am still awaiting news of the winner of the Airbnb challenge!!! In the meantime, Happy Halloween to Bram Stoker’s Dracula fans…

My entry to the airbnb Dracula’s Castle challenge…

“What would I say to Dracula if I met him face to fang?

On a night so dark and dreary,
I stumble, cold and weary,
As my candle waft along the corridor.
The Sisters they do chase,
I run as though in haste,
The candle dies and darkness draws me nearer

A guest of the Count Dracula,
Was, I admit, a thrill,
Until he was a Count no more.
A common Walprus Night
I hear witches scream in delight,
Up on the wooded hill.

Bonfires burn brightly,
Ever clever nightly,
The graveyard, laid in marble, is Lucy Wenestra.
In a marble tomb she rests,
Iron stake upon her breast,
Atop a wooden bier.

There does seem no escape,
From him dressed in black cape,
I stumble upon a wooden box unknown.
The earth between my fingers,
A silence that dare linger,
Until the words I utter to the Count himself.

“Will you do your bidding,
With fangs luminous and searing,
Will you have me as your own?”
Only you know the tale,
I sink to the floor, weak and frail,
You sit near me and cradle my face in your cold hand.

Eyes steely as they stare,
Your hand with black nails pet my hair,
Your decision is clear for me to see.
I will stay by your side,
Like a young and happy bride,
And forget all I used to be.

I’ll take your hand in mine,
You’ll be in this heart of thine,
Will you feel abiding love,
Can your monstrous ways think of,
The mysteries that await us forevermore?
I caress your cold, dead cheek,
And give my countenance to thee,
And count the blessings of a near eternal sleep.

Providence of Souls

 

Cessarina Iacovino accompanies her mother, Melania, to the Fontenelle Cemetery, a cave full of bones in which the “Cult of the skulls” was born. Melania leads the prayers for her family skull, Ambrogio, whose soul, they believe, is in Purgatory.

With their prayers for Ambrogio, he will be able to reach Heaven and appeal to God to help their family break the curse of the “evil eye.” In the end, Cessarina must decide who is in providence of her soul?

In a story that shows the healing power of redemption and forgiveness, your very soul will be tested as you enter into Cessarina Iacovino’s world.

PROVIDENCE OF SOULS is available on Amazon.com. Follow Tonya’s blog at tonyajermannfraser.wordpress.com.

 

My Latest Review!!! And a possible sequel!

Thank you Joanie for the review! I am considering a sequel flushing out more of the story as Cessarina Iacovino searches for redemption. I have had other readers also ask for a sequel. I’m glad you enjoyed the story and thank you for reading!

 

The church of Santa Maria delle Anime del Purgatorio ad Arco

 

My family and I visited Naples, Italy, the site of the beginning of my novel, PROVIDENCE OF SOULS, in 2014. The plan was to visit the ossuary, or cave, of the original Cult of the Skulls. The cave in which the skulls and bones were piled and housed by the cult. However, our driver told us that the destination could not be driven to and we would have to walk the narrow, winding roads unaccompanied by him. It was a dangerous part of town, he warned. It didn’t take long to decide to lean on the side of safety. The next best place to visit, he advised, was the church of Santa Maria delle Anime del Purgatorio ad Arco.

The guide sent us down the crowded Naples street of Via de Tribunali of central Naples and told us we would know it when we saw it. We had heard rumors of the crowded conditions of Naples and the opportunity for pick pocketing, so my husband, myself and our three children, feeling slightly uneasy, stuck together as much as we could in a single file line on a street in which the pedestrians, along with the small, honking cars, roamed loudly and haphasardly. We had just about given up hope of finding the only church of Purgatory that we might have a chance to see when, looking up, we spied two bronze skulls and crossbones on a gate in front of a church. Skulls! Just what we were looking for!

Entering the church, I was immediately drawn to the alterpiece painting, “Madonna of the Souls of Purgatory” by Massimo Stanzione. The art depicts the Virgin Mary helping souls in Purgatory. According to the Catholic Church, Purgatory is a place for souls who have not been completely freed from sin. Though the living can get immediate forgiveness for their sins, complete redemption happens over time. If someone dies before that process is complete then the soul needs to be purified in purgatory so that they are holy enough to enter Heaven. But the living can expedite the time needed for purification with masses and prayers for the souls caught in limbo.

We continued our exploration of the church with a tour to the hypogeum, or underground crypt. I felt the coolness of damp underground as I descended the stone stairway. We were introduced to a second, underground, sanctuary with its own rough alter. The large room with its high ceiling had darker rooms attached that were filled with the skulls of souls. Additionally, as we followed the tour guide who spoke only in Italian, we entered a room full of graves and wooden boxes full of human remains. This is where the Congrega di Purgatoria ad Arco buried the poor and said prayers for the souls in Purgatory. And, although time had passed, it felt as if the graves were freshly dug.

You will enter into the world of the Cult of the Skulls of Naples, Italy when you read PROVIDENCE OF SOULS. Find out how a young girl, Cessarina Iacovino, uses her cult beliefs to attemp to break the curse over her family, the curse of the “evil eye.” PROVIDENCE OF SOULS is available on amazon.com and currently holds 5 star reviews. PROVIDENCE OF SOULS is also available on kindle.

My Bully Tale

When you smell your prey; they must smell delicious. They must smell like a smorgesboard of flavors that you haven’t experienced; flavors new and exciting. Perhaps you were bored with the usual tastes; the vineyard of grape had dried up on your serpent tongue. How do you choose your prey? Do you know straight away or do you circle around like the lion circles the antelope? Circling to determine which angle to strike at to take it down.

But you do choose and you choose well. You choose the weakling in the group. You choose the one who stands out from the rest. You choose the one who has already been shunned. You choose the one whom life has already been cruel to. You choose the one who is too tired to see you coming. You choose the one who is broken. You choose the one who has no protection. You choose the one who is alone. You choose the one who is clinging to life with bloody fingernails; but you choose.

What was behind the eyes of your prey? Was it need? Was it want? Was it loneliness? Was it despair? You could smell it on them. For you are a hunter, forever searching for prey.

Your plan started small. Like a child who dips his toes into the lake, to test the water. The water was just right. It felt good to bathe in the coolness of cruelty.

First, you stole. Taking a tidbit here and there from your prey until they doubted their own sanity. There was no explanation  for the loss. But once you began, you were relentless. The prey was more delicious than you had imagined. And you were hungry.

You were hungry because life had not fed you well. Perhaps you were born cruel, with a stain on your soul that made you do bad things. So you did bad things without skill and you were caught. Caged like an animal, no one saw the fear in your eyes of what you were capable of. You were afraid of yourself. But you were silent. How, after all, would you describe your fear? No one would understand. So you were punished often, for you did bad things often. You must, then, be a bad person.

The stain on your soul grew as the punishment grew until most of your soul was a very dark place. The darkness became comfortable for you. It was a darkness you could hide behind; like a cloak of disappearance. You finally learned how to sneak around in the daylight. You learned to be someone that others wanted to be around. The cloak helped you hide and the darkness became your friend.

Coming out of the shadows, you attacked. One attack after another; a well formed-battle, a well-formed war. Your soldiers were young, but well-trained. They bit at their prey; stealing bits and pieces. The prey was already weak; too weak to fight back. The prey lost time, joy, light. The prey lost pieces of herself to the hunter and his army.

Finally, the hunter went in for the kill. The hunter wanted the prey’s pride, home, children, and her life. The hunter needed the prey to lurk in the shadows as he did. He needed his prey to live in the darkness where life is hopeless. The hunter didn’t want to live there alone and had many other heads stacked onto his trophy shelf. With every trophy, the hunter could wrap the black cloak around his soul even tighter, feeling the comfort of hiding. You don’t want to be seen. Your soul with it’s black stains must be covered. You must live in the very shadows that you step out from.

You have followers; they can’t be called friends, after all, they don’t know you. You show them what you want them to see. They are shallow and easily fooled. You are bored with them, but need their respect; you can’t respect yourself. There is chaos around you, but your followers think it’s exciting. You are the life of the party.

When you point your finger at your prey, it will be in your plan; but plans are fickle. Plans don’t always work out. Plans can change. You had missed something in the dimmed eyes of your dying prey. You had missed the fact that your prey had the heart and soul of a lion. It was your turn to be caught off guard. Your prey finally saw what was not hidden by your cloak of shame. Your prey saw your eyes and your childrens eyes. They were blank with a longing of needs unmet. They were blank with failure. They were blank with a lack of worth. A worth that you tried to steal for yourself and your children. You realized that you had chosen wrong. You lost control. Your prey rose up one last time.

You smelled defeat, and like a coward, you ran, into the night. You would keep running; again and again. For you had learned at a young age that you were only wrong if you got caught. You were only wrong if your wrongs were brought into the light of day.

Your prey, however, knew when you were wrong. It was when you put your plan into place. It was when you and yours first stole. It was when you and yours told your first lie. It was when you and yours struck your first blow. But the hunter doesn’t have the lines of right or wrong in his dark heart. The hunter believes it’s ok to rape “just a little,” to steal “just a little,” to lie “just a little,” to poison “just a little,” to humiliate “just a little,” to set fire to your enemies home, “just a little.”

The prey knows that you’ll never be free from the chains around your life. You will never be free to find out who you are without your black soul. You will wander the Earth, rattling your chains lounder and louder throughout your life. The chains will fill some with fear and it will fill your followers with excitiment and envy. Yet they envy someone who will never feel the warmth of the sunlight of a new day on their face. You will forever live only to throw others off of your scent as the hounds grow closer to you.

That is your hell. And you and yours are in it; for life.

Your prey will recover. Your prey will be happy to be alive, that her children are safe, that her home is not burnt to the ground and that they are free from the darkness that is you and yours. Your prey will lick their wounds and have friends to share their heart with and will feel the sunlight on their faces. Your prey will feel joy and sadness. Your prey will be wiser and look at the world differently; warily.

Yet, the hunter and his will die wearing masks in the dark. The hunter will leave a legacy of violence, intimidation and fear. His legacy will live on through his offspring. A legacy of darkness and loneliness and hiding. The legacy of a bully.

Those of you who are being bullied right now, I want you to find the strength inside of you to rise up. You will always win. Your light shines brighter than the darkness of even the darkest soul. Your legacy is light and joy and hope. Your legacy is a life well-lived out in the open, away from the shadows and away from the darkness. Your legacy is free from the chains of evil and hate and harm. Your legacy is goodness and kindness and human spirit. Your heart and soul are strong and bright and you will overcome. You will prosper. And at the end of your days, you will have a life well lived; a life to be proud of.