After being haunted by creeping shadows and disturbing visions, she accepts that she was marked at birth—cursed. But when she encounters a cryptic stranger, his riddles penetrate through the heavy veil of darkness and confusion.
In a world of magic and self-help, the brightest light reveals the blackest shadow once a possessed stalker starts hunting Beth and her family. Hell’s fury appears in both the flesh and the unseen realm, where trust is blurred, and deception is a matter of life or death. In an epic showdown to escape the entities seeking to destroy her, Beth must embrace a mysterious and ancient truth. One that will shatter everything she’s ever known.
Watch Beth’s slow burn from fringe to faith—terrorized to triumph—haunted to healed. For fans of novels by Frank Peretti and Colleen Coble. Expect a bumpy but redemptive ride—eventually.
As Beth held the peculiar book, a visible tremor ran through her hands. The page, delicate and thin, rustled ominously, as if it might rip like tissue paper.
“So, some random guy sent you this?” River asked, his jaw clenching as he shot a quick glance at her.
Their separation lasted a few months before he’d moved back in, after finding a farmhouse outside of town. They escaped from crowds, media press, “fans”, and onlookers.
In the country, pine-tree farms kept neighbors hidden behind rows and rows of evergreen, away from the intense attention that had followed them in the city.
“He said he saw me on TV a while back,” she said, her eyes staying on the book. “During the Amelia case.”
Beth regretted it. Regretted him moving in.
Isolated.
Cut off from others.
She regretted all of it. Her decision to allow him back into her life had been from a moment of weakness, circling old patterns and habits.
But their marriage felt as empty and resonant as a hollow shell.
His list of expectations always shifted or grew or morphed. She could never measure up. She failed him at every turn.
“It’s weird, Beth.”
His eyes glared, burning through her.
A package had arrived earlier that day with an aged book and a brief letter from an unknown man named “Paul.” The handwritten note felt personal, in some way.
She continued holding the open book, staring at the bright-yellow, highlighted words. The print jumped off the page as she silently reread the passage.
“A lot of things are…..weird,” she said, trying to understand what it meant.
“Are you sleeping with him?” River asked, more as a statement than a question.
“What?!” Beth asked, jerking her head to look at him, hot tears stinging her eyes. “That’s a stupid thing to say.”
River’s body tensed, his eyes narrowing.
“You know what’s stupid?” He asked, saying each word with slow, laser precision. “You are.”
Staring at her, his hands balled into fists.
With that, River stormed out of the room and headed to the back, towards their bedroom.
Beth didn’t care what he thought.
Not anymore, anyway.
There was a day she would’ve begged him to believe her. When his accusations would’ve sent her into a tailspin, sobbing from sheer frustration.
But she’d grown tired of his insults, control, and jealousy. When she had gone to work early, he spied on her to see if she was meeting someone or having an (imaginary) affair. What should have been straightforward grocery runs became heated arguments when she arrived home past an unstated curfew.
His affection or kindness was conditional. She had stayed in the marriage to prove something to herself. Perhaps as a badge of honor?
But what had that proven exactly?
Beth barely recognized herself.
River stormed back into the room, carrying a suitcase.
“And you know what else?”
Beth refused to look at him, holding the book as if it were a lifeline.
“You are not…” He paused for emphasis, “….worth it. Nobody will want you. You’re too weird with your shadows and visions,” he said, waving his arms wildly in the air. “You’re cursed!”
His spite hit her like a dagger.
Beth stepped back. Struck by his words.
But she mustered no more than a blank stare, a silent testament to her inability to react, as if he hadn’t wounded her.
Over the years, River had seen her go from the pleading Beth, to the silent Beth. From the fun Beth, to the bitter Beth.
However, he preferred the fearful, needy Beth. Or the compliant, insecure Beth.
He had called her a lot of things over the years. But she’d heard the same from many other people, too.
She absorbed the labels until they had become her identity.
Without any emotions, she now felt a surge of power from the absence of his sway over her.
She just wanted to be left alone. To be able to read and understand the words on tbe page of this strange book.
Slamming divorce papers on the kitchen counter, River walked out.
Beth stood with unwavering composure, her gaze averted and her emotions perfectly contained.
Beth did not beg. No tears. No desperation. No, “I’ll do better.” No, “let’s try one more time.”
Nothing.
Hollowness echoed inside her. She was like an oak tree with insides that were rotted to sawdust.
Any good thing in her piled like dust as if she’d become the cremated remains of the person she once was or could’ve been.
Beth exhaled after he shut the front door. She felt no remorse that River was gone.
Instead, she returned her attention to the frayed edges and worn book spine in her hand, hinting that it was older than her. She read, “from the appearance of His waist and upward I saw, as it were, the color of amber…” Beth remembered a stone had been placed in Amelia’s hand during her vision.
She’d almost forgotten. An amber gem—just the kind of stone she’d seen.
Beth’s brow furrowed, each line etched deeper in her forehead with every sentence, as she tried to comprehend. Make sense of it.
She continued, “....with the appearance of fire all around within it; and from the appearance of His waist and downward I saw, as it were, the appearance of fire with brightness all around….” In the field with Amelia, a man had appeared and glowed just like this, as if the sun itself lit up the night.
Beth’s heart raced as it thumped against her chest.
“....Like the appearance of a rainbow in a cloud on a rainy day, so was the appearance of the brightness all around it……” Even a rainbow. Beth had seen it in the field, as well.
How did this ancient book know these things?
She didn’t recognize the name on the delicate page.
Ezekiel?
Never heard of him. She placed the marker back in its spot and put the book on the table behind her couch.
Outside, as the sun dipped low in the sky, a ray caught the edge of the silver picture frame with Beth, Lily, and her mom from the week after her father was killed. The ray’s glint bounced off the frame, sparkled, then lit up the ancient book that she’d laid beside it.
As she watched the light dance across the book’s cover, Beth’s body released the tension she’d been holding. Exhaustion flooded her mind and body from the pent-up energy she’d kept inside.
She felt like she could finally rest. Truly and deeply.
Her eyelids felt heavy, each blink taking longer to open. She shuffled toward her bedroom and collapsed on her bed, still in her jeans and sweatshirt.
She melted into the soft comforter.
Her last thoughts were of her cryptic pen-pal. How his book stirred something inside her. Something she couldn’t quite decipher, yet.
Beth felt lost.
Nothing made sense.
Copyright (C) 2026 T.H. Meyer, Author. All rights reserved.
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Well done. I found it interesting and read it till the end. Flashes of my ex appeared as I did.
Well done, I like adventure with relationship struggles, it feels real. Godspeed my friend