Soul Beliefs (Soul Stone #1)

1. Prologue

Prologue

Katherine

Five years ago

“ H ey, Dad, look what I found!” I rush into my father’s hospital room and sit down in the chair beside his bed. Excitedly, I fish for his stone that I stored in my pocket to show him.

I hate this room. I hate that it’s cold and too white, and that him being here means he’s not getting better. Mom and I did our best to make it feel more like home with photos on the table next to his bed, and his favourite blanket on the bed, but nothing really worked.

The stone is clear, unlike the misted one hanging around my neck. It’s cold to the touch, too. I don’t think mine’s ever been that cold; I reach for the one around my neck to make sure.

He takes it in his frail hands, they shake a little. I try not to notice—for his sake, but also my own.

He looks so thin now—everywhere. His face isn’t the one I remember, and I try to not let this face be the one embedded in my mind forever. Because this isn’t him, not really. It’s a version of him but not the dad that used to put me on his shoulders when we’d watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, or the dad that cheered so loud at my middle school graduation that I tripped across the stage. Those are the memories I try to hold on to .

“Sweetie.” His voice is dry.

I scoot my chair closer to the side of his bed, I hold the hand laying next to him, and only slightly, do I pull back when I feel the frigid temperature of his body. But I make myself hold on tighter, letting my warmth sink into him.

He’s not looking at me. I think it’s because he doesn’t want me to see him cry but he’s looking at the stone in his other hand as he moves it around. But I see it, a tear races down his face and it takes everything in me not to react.

“Yeah, Dad?” I don’t know how many more of these trips I’ll get. And it might sound weird, but I voice record them all. I haven’t told Mom. I don’t want her to think I’ve completely lost my mind, or make me delete them.

I’m hoping one day she might thank me for it, but right now, I don’t think her knowing would help. Right now, I think it would make her think I’ve given up on him.

He starts out, “I want you to have an amazing full life.” He breaks out in a coughing fit, so I hand him some water.

I imagine this is the worst part about being a doctor. Being the patient yourself. Not being able to believe the doctors when they say it’ll be okay or we’ll try this trial . Knowing exactly what’s happening to you, I can’t ever know how that feels.

I might not be a doctor, despite my parents best efforts, but I’ve been around them enough to not believe them either. I’ve heard my dad and mom talk about patients in the same condition as him, those stories never end well. I’m running low on believing in miracles.

Dad has been a doctor at this very hospital for twenty-two years, and with that much experience, he knows exactly what’s happening. He knew something was wrong when he first got ill, he knew the first time he passed out on shift. And we knew when Dad’s doctor, his friend, handed him his test results. My world stopped that day, everything came to a halt.

I hear my mom shuffle and stand in the doorway, but I don’t look at her—I keep my sights on Dad.

“Katherine, I want you to live all the life you can, live every minute of it, okay? Don’t let any of this stop you, or this.” He holds the stone up so I can see it again, and he looks down at the one hanging around my neck.

I’ve worn it since I got it over a year ago; I don’t ever take it off, which I know is strange to some. I’ve been told enough by the kids at my school that it’s all stupid and no one cares anymore, but god, I care so much. It’s one of the last bits of hope I have.

One of the last bits of magic I still think exists.

“I love your mom and you more than anything, I’m so lucky to of had this time with you both.”

“Dad, don’t talk like that,” I say, squeezing his hand a little.

“Sweetie.” He rests both his hands on mine, and then reaches to wipe my face. I hadn’t even noticed I was crying, the tears are hot on my face now but I can’t stop them.

I don’t sob, I don’t make a noise.

“Go to college, get that degree you want. Live your life, find your soulmate if you want… But make sure you have your own life, too. Okay?”

He’s looking at me like he wants me to promise, he used to give me that look when I was younger and he’d take me for ice cream just before dinner and make me promise to not tell my mom.

I’m not sure I know what he means. My application for NYU is already in the admissions hands but I don’t say anything, I just nod my head .

My mom comes in wiping her own eyes, she’s got her own white doctors coat on. She's been a doctor here longer than my dad and I know she can’t be lied to either.

“Come on, Kat, I think Dad needs some rest now. Bella is waiting outside for you.” She puts an arm around me and we switch places.

“I love you, Dad.” I kiss his forehead before walking out the door. When I reach it, I turn to look at him again, him and Mom are holding hands, looking at each other. Their love makes my heart feel warm and full. Even with everything else going on.

My heart hasn’t felt full since I walked across the threshold of his hospital room.

Four years ago

I make the three and half hour trip from my home in New York to Washington, D.C.

After months of researching online, I read in a chat room that there’s a woman here that can use your stone and her ‘spirit powers’ to help find your soulmate.

I jumped at the chance to try and get some real answers, to try and narrow down my search to a location I could work with.

After what feels like hours of looking for her home, I finally find it hidden away between two tall modern buildings. Old, red brick; really, it sticks out like a sore thumb.

Taking a deep breath I knock on the front door, ready as I’ll ever be.

“Katherine Miller.” I blurt out my name right as she opens it.

A smile pulls on her dark purple painted lips, and her eyes sparkle. “Come in, dear,” she says, shuffling back into the house. Her long grey cardigan drags on the floor as she lets me pass her .

The inside is just what I imagine a fortune teller's house to look like. And all of a sudden, I’m not sure if maybe I’m being ripped off.

Thick velvet curtains are hung up everywhere which make the room dark, the only light are the hundreds of candles on every open space I can see. My mind quickly turns to the fire hazard those curtains and candles impose.

“You seem awfully young to be worrying about your soul stone, dear. The men and women I get visiting me are ones who have searched for years with no luck, so why are you worrying about this now?” The elegant older lady questions me as she sets down a pot of tea and a large world map onto the round table in front of us.

Time.

It’s the answer I give her, and it’s the answer I’ve given everyone—not that they understand.

The earlier I can find my soulmate, the longer I have with them. It seems simple to me, and it’s simple to the woman sitting across from me, too. She simply nods her head and puts her hand out for my stone.

Carefully, I unclasp the chain around my neck. After I give it to her, she holds it in her left hand and holds my hand in the right. She sits there with her eyes closed for what feels like forever, but is actually two minutes. Once she’s given the stone some ‘natural energy’ from herself—which I don’t actually understand, and she didn’t really explain—she holds it over the map, letting it hang from the chain.

As we sit there in silence, I can almost hear the candles flickering from behind me and I begin to worry it’ll never work. That this might have been a complete waste of my time and that maybe my soulmate isn’t even out there.

My anxieties begin to swirl themselves up into a frenzy.

As if my stone can read my worried mind and wants to prove me wrong, it moves .

I’d never seen or heard of anything like it before. No one really knows where the stones come from, and no one knows when it all started, it’s just how it’s always been. So, no one I know questions it. I certainly never have, but in this moment, I definitely do. In this moment, my mind explodes thinking about how much magic could be in the world that I never knew about.

It swings gently at first, over continents and countries. But then it seems to linger over New York for far too long, the woman keeps her arm still until the stone is pulling hard against her. She only moves it when I think the stone is pulling so hard that it might take her arm clean off.

But then it stops.

The lady leans over the table, keeping the stone still to make sure she doesn’t lose where it’s landed, and she reads it aloud as if I can’t see it myself.

“Sydney, Australia.”