Read Online Soulstice (The Souled Series) by Diana Murdock - Free Book Online

seemed like such a happy, content, connected man. What could he possibly have in his life that would be consuming him the way it was? He seemed perfectly comfortable with who he was. I didn’t see him running around town in bright colors with a trained smile on his face. He practiced what he believed in. It didn’t matter who was watching. Like me. Staring. Peeking into his personal space. And it didn’t bother him in the slightest.
    A few more seconds passed before he opened his eyes and smiled at me. Not an embarrassed smile, like I would have probably given had he been watching me, but a genuine smile. Pure and simple. There’s so much I could learn from him. Like my mother, he walked the walk and seemed at peace with who he was and what he believed in.
    “So no w we prepare the fire,” he said, placing his arrow next to him.
    “ By placing two sticks in a Southern Cross formation in the center of the fire pit, it represents a point of navigation from the fire to spirit.” He handed me some newspaper. “Help me wad up this newspaper and put them around the cross, like this.” Then, using small, thin strips of wood, he arranged them to lean inward to form a teepee to direct the energy skyward.
    Shawn lit the match and put flame to paper which turned and fed upon itself without hesitation, creating a mini-inferno within the teepee.
    “ I’m going to start a chant that will call upon the spirit of the waters beneath the Earth to help us.” He paused, looking past my shoulder, his smile a mix of surprise and welcoming. “You’ve got ancestors here waiting to help you.”
    “Really?” I spun around, expecting to see the ghostly images of American Indians or Pilgrims, or even my grandmother. “Who?”
    “I’m not sure. ” He cocked his head to one side, listening, his eyes fixed over my shoulder. “Family.” He looked at me. “Can you feel them?”
    Closing my eyes, I stilled my breath and mind. A soft breeze kicked up and the pressure behind my eye s intensified.
    “I’m not sure what I feel.”
    “That’s okay. Just know you have a lot of support.” Out of a cloth bag, he pulled out an orange-sized bulb-kind of thing with engravings that created a band around the center.
    “My rattle,” he said, “and spirit water. ” He smiled and held up a small vial of liquid. “Spirit water honors the Spirits of the four directions when we call upon them to open the Sacred Space.”
    He shook the rattle and recited a beautiful chant in a language I didn’t know, and sipped at the bottle of spirit water, he quickly blew it out in the four directions of South, West, North, and East.
    The wooden sides of the teepee could no longer withstand the damage from the flame, and silently collapsed into a mound on top of the burned paper. I leaned closer and watched the exchange of give and take within the circle of fire.
    “How often do you practice this ceremony?” I asked.
    He used the handle of the rattle to push the burning pile around a bit. “At least once a month. It helps to rid myself of issues that don’t serve my higher self.”
    The wood sizzled and the flame jumped to join the olive oil he drizzled across the pile. Shawn didn’t take his gaze away from the fire as it settled itself into the bottom of the fire pit.
    “Now we’re waiting for the fire to become friendly.”
    “A fire can be friendly?” Definitely news to me.
    He nodded. “When we have true intent and we resonate with the energy of the fire, then we can approach it without being burned.”
    Exactly what Mom had said, but I had a hard time believing I’d ever see fire the way they did. The images in my mind were still so vivid even after all this time – the flame snaking along the edge of the curtain, melting back the fabric to reveal a gaping flaw in my plan, punctuating its statement by dropping big-ass fiery exclamation marks onto the carpet. My frantic waving only fueled the fire to go faster and to get hotter, until it