Chapter 2-

Chapter 1-  conclusion

Having patiently listened to the child's
tale, Menell's eyes welled up with tears.
   
   "Ramella, allow me to be the first of
my people to express my apologies for
all the injustices that my ancestors com-
mitted towards your people, and for all
they suffered later on.  What they did to
you was barbaric and inexcusable, just
thinking about it sickens my heart.  One
day, they will answer for their crimes
against you.  I couldn't begin to ask for
your forgiveness, but maybe we could
start the process by becoming friends."

  "There's no need, Menell," Ramella
replied.  "I already consider you and your
son to be my friends.  I think I'm a\good
judge of people's character, and I sense
that you are a good and honest man.

  At these words, taking into account
the fear that Ramella's people felt for
strangers, Menell was skeptical.  "Your
understanding of forgiveness is
quite developed for someone your age.
There are a lot of good people in the
world, but trusting someone takes a
lot of courage.  What makes you
trust us so easily, since you hardly
know us?"
 
  "My uncle Pelmuss is a wise man,"
she answered frankly.  "He has always
told me that everyone deserves the
chance to be forgiven. Our beliefs tell
us that all have sinned and fallen short
of God's glory.  You could have easily
hurt me, but you didn't.  When I saw
your face, I saw only peace there.  That's
when I made up my mind to trust
you."

  "You are an amazing girl, Ramella of
Copper Point, "observed Menell.  Then,
he repeated to himself the girl's words: 
'All have sinned and fallen short of the
glory of God.'  You will have to explain
to me later in more detail what that
means."

  "Sure," she answered, "but I'll have to
go back soon, so my mother doesn't
get angry. By the way, since you and
Ranthas are here, where exactly do you
plan to spend the night?"

  "Our boat lies a half a kilometer to the
south of here, we dragged it to the base
of the dunes.  We will set up a tent and
make our camp there for the time being.
Do you think there is anyone in your
village who might be willing to listen to
us, perhaps even help us?"

  Ramella thought a moment.  "It seems
a good idea to me for you to stay on the
beach for right now, seeing as our village
elders don't take kindly to strangers,
no matter who they are.  We wouldn't
want to scare anybody.  I'm going to
talk to some of my friends to try to find
a good solution to your problem.  If
you need anything at all, let me know.
I'll try to come back tomorrow and let
you know what I find out.  Sleep well."

  A large smile appeared on the man's
face.
  "Thank you, Ramella, we are both
indebted to you.  May you sleep well
as well."

  Taking leave of her new friends,
Ramella slowly started back up the
path to the house,gripped by terrible
anxiety.  "What would she say to her
mother?"  As soon as the girl disap-
peared, Menell and his son set about
setting up a makeshift tent next to a
large boulder, away from the wind,
set up camp for the night.  Before
going to bed, Ranthas turned to his
father with a questioning look, to
let him know what was weighing
on his heart. "Papa," he asked, "do
you think that Ramella and her
friends will be able to help us?"
"Nothing is certain, my son," Menell
answered.  "But I am sure that the
gods have been quite benevolent
by guiding us safely here.  It's likely
that they will use them in some
way for our good." Reassured,
Ranthas closed his eyes and went
to sleep.


 

END OF CHAPTER 1-  Chapter 2
coming soon!

Chapter 1- continued

   Many new questions flooded Ramella's mind, mixed with great
joy.  "I was right!  I was right!"  She exulted to herself.  "There
really isanother continent beyond the great sea!  This is too in-
credible!  No one's going to believe me!"
  
   Then, influenced by her own burning curiosity, Ramella asked
another question.  "You spoke
earlier of the Velta Parthas.  What is that?"

   Always quick with an answer, Menell continued:  "The Velta
Parthas is what my people call the great sea which separates our
two continents.  velta means sea in our language, and parthas is
our word for world.  The civilisation which Ranthas and I come
from is one of fine sailors, who since time immemorial have sailed
the world's seas.

    "If your people know so much about the sea,  how is it that you
don't know where you are?"

    "A reasonable question," replied Menell.  "You must know a bit
of our history, particularly our recent history.  Until just a few
centuries ago, the Kithan were one people.  Since our race is by
nature warlike, some of the families grew tired of the raids, the
pillaging and the endless violence.  From that moment on, two
factions appeared:  the northern tribe, which is currently led by
the ruthless Lord Ransha, and the southern tribe, of which my
son and I are a part.  More recently, Ransha's tribe has shown
itself to be increasingly intolerant towards mine, seeking to
strike fear into us by organising frequent raids into our territory,
attacking our families and ravaging our lands.

     "Why?"  asked Ramella.

     "To remind us of his superiority, and to force us into
submission, or he will destroy us by continuing to slay us and
burn our lands.  He is no more than a bloodthirsty, vicious tyrant.  
In desperation, our council chose me to secretly seek help else-
where.  Not knowing where to go, we looked to a four hundred
year-old account.  This tale speaks of a little known land, far to
the west, where Ransha's ancestor led a particularly bloody and
destructive raid, which with the years passed into legend for our
two peoples.  Unfortunately, his people having little interest in
history, that ancestor said nothing specific as to the location of
that mysterious and distant land.   Along with my son, I decided
to undertake a great risk by sailing west, in hopes of finding it. 
The council made known to us the dangers of this decision,
and that the success of finding the mythical land was the tribe's
only hope of avoiding destruction.

     Menell's words moved Ramella to tears, mixed with joy. 
"This is the land you seek!   We have rather strong memories
of the killings that our ancestors experienced four hundred
years ago, right here on this beach.  That's why our children
aren't allowed to go down onto the beach alone.   Our adults
are still cautious, always searching the horizon in case the
attackers decide to come back one day.  We don't at all like
to talk about the incident, it's still too painful, and even today,
none of us feels completely safe."   
(Stay tuned for the conclusion of Chapter 1).

    



Chapter 1- continued

"Little girl, stop!"  The strangers' shouts were heard in the distance.  "We don't want to hurt you! We need help!"  With the last word, "help", Ramella stopped short.  Her fear gave way to curiosity, and she let them
approach her.  The man was slender and in his early thirties:  he was starting to grey around the temples.  The boy at his side, probably his son or nephew, was about her age.

Completely speechless, Ramella stared intently at the pair for a long time.   Then, in a shaky voice, she stammered:

"J..just who are you?"

"My name is Menell, and this is my son, Ranthas," the man
answered calmly.

"I'm Ramella.  I'm sorry for running away."

"Quite a natural response to someone you don't know, Ramella.
We are both delighted to meet you, as well as grateful.  You un-
doutedly have many questions for us, first of all, "What are we
doing here?" Right?" The man's easy manner allayed the rest of
Ramella's fears.

"Well, yes," was all that Ramella could manage to say in
 response.

"Well, in that case, let us sit a bit," Menell answered.  "Ranthas
and I have come quite a way to end up here, and we are quite far
from home.   We're both rather tired.  By the way, where exactly
are we, at the moment? What is this place?"

"This is Copper Point", answered Ramella, with a hint of pride
in her voice.  "Our village is right up there, just beyond the cliff",
she added, casting a glance over her left shoulder.   "I'm not even
supposed to be here, on the beach," she resumed.  "It's strictly
forbidden!  Still, I love seashells!   Wanting to find some got the
better of me."

"You found a good deal more than you expected, today,"  Menell
said.  His humour made her giggle.  "So, where shall we begin? 
It's a long story.  What do you know of Kithan?"

Ramella returned a blank stare.  "What's Kithan?"

"It's the continent we are from, beyond the Velta Parthas," Menell
explained.  "We have sailed for two months before landing here, at
Copper Point.  I can't tell you how happy Ranthas
and I are to have found dry land!"

(Stay tuned for the continuation of Chapter 1, coming soon!)

Chapter 1- continued

This restriction, however, by no means diminished

Ramella's unquenchable curiosity.  Like any eleven

year-old girl, she was enthralled by everything in the

world around her.   Moreover, like most of the folks

in the area, she knew by heart all the legends and

stories, so-called myths by some, of the mysterious

lands beyond the Eastern Sea.  The fishermen and

sailors never ventured more than a short distance

offshore to cast their nets, never out of sight of land. 

To be sure, some of the boldest among them sailed

along the coast from north to south, while yet others

went around the southern cape to travel to ports in the

far west of the continent.  No one knew exactly what

was beyond the Eastern Sea, if in fact, there was anything

there at all besides endless sea.   The continent was their

world, and for the inhabitants, nothing else mattered. 

Ramella, on the other hand, with her youthful zeal, 

thought quite differently.


   Having no intention of obeying her mother, she

carried out her chores by watering the plants, then

asked herself introspectively:  "what if were to go

down to the beach just this once?  I'll be quick, no one

will even know I'm gone.  I don't see any harm in that." 

Determined to carry out her bold expedition, she made

sure she was out of sight of the kitchen window, where

she knew her mother enjoyed keeping watch.  Taking the

sand path half overrun with grass and nettles, she managed

to make it onto the beach.  Halfway across, she lost her

footing and slipped on a dune, tumbling to the ground. 

She carefully wiped the bottom of her dress which was

now covered with sand, and continued on her way.  

"Mom's going to have a fit", she thought.  "Still, it's too

late to turn back now."

  Finally on the beach proper, Ramella immediately

felt her anxiety slip away, and headed for the waterline.  

Oh, how long she had dreamed of soaking her feet

in the surf!  "Yet", she thought for a moment, "If I

do that, Mom will know for sure that I went down to

the beach despite her warning!"

  So she abandoned that idea, choosing instead to take a

short walk on the sand, hoping to find some pretty shells. 

After more than a half hour of feverishly looking, she was

disappointed to not have found one single unusual shell. 

Upon heading back to the path which would take her back

to the house,  to quite her surprise, mixed with great fear,

she saw two figures moving toward her.   Terror so took

hold of her that she failed to notice that the duo was walking

at an even rather than a hurried pace. 

  Already thinking about hurrying on, there were still a

few hundred metres between Ramella and the path.   She

would never manage to outrun the two strangers.  Never-

theless determined to not be so easily caught, she broke

into a sprint towards the edge of the beach.   While

running, it seemed to her that she could hear her

heartbeat pounding in her ears, and she was breathing

so hard that she thought her lungs would burst.  To

make matters worse, her frenzied pace and her

pounding the sand with her feet sent it flying into her

eyes, making them sting horribly.   With tears streaming

down her cheeks, her heart pounded wildly, and her feet

caught several times in her skirt.    (stay tuned, reader,

for the next installment of this story,

which is coming soon!)

The Beginning of my new book, 'Parthas, The Oceanic Saga'- English version

Synopsis:  An isolated continent on a largely aquatic world
 undergoes attacks by a mysterious invader;  The inhabitants
of this continent try to share the gospel of Christ with their
invader.  A fictional lesson on love and forgiveness.


                                              Dedication

I dedicate this book to my daughter, Lizzie, whose boundless
curiosity and imagination is forever opening doors for her to
new worlds.


                                             FOREWORD

     Very far from our solar system, in the constellation of
Lyra, orbits around its star a blue-green planet, glittering
with beauty:  Parthas is its name. Imagine that thousands
 of years ago, the Lord Jesus Christ decided to pay
a visit to a people on a continent of this planet covered
with vast oceans, just as He did for the Israelites on Earth.  
To a certain people of Parthas, who live on what they simply c
all the Continent, Jesus passed on all his knowledge and
wisdom, and chose from among them twelve disciples to share
His Word with the rest of the continent.  Some people in this
 society doubted His Word and His divinity, and put Him to
death.  Resurrected three days later, Jesus created a great faith
within His disciples' hearts.  Before going up to Heaven, 
Jesus urged His disciples to remain on the path of faith. 
Hundreds of years later, descendants of the first disciples
 place the testimonies of their ancestors and the words of
Jesus into a collection of books called the Holy Script.
     
      Hundreds more years pass.  The inhabitants of a village
on the eastern side of the Continent find themselves brutally
attacked by unknown raiders who have come from the sea. 
Following a particularly violent and bloody raid,  the village
inhabitants are overcome with fear and mistrust, and begin to
 lose the commission which Jesus has entrusted to them.

      Four hundred years further on, the startling discovery of
 two strangers by a village girl, Ramella, drives her to put these
ancient fears to the test. Through her courage and determination
to help a mysterious, faraway people, will her people once again
learn what it is to love?

Phones

I have come to the conclusion that the Aspie's dislike of loud noises manifests in me in the sound of the telephone ringing, particularly the sound of a landline phone. Some people can sleep through that sound, but if the land phone rings and I am asleep, I will wake up every time. This goes hand in hand with my dislike of alarm clock rings. I usually put my alarm clock on the radio to wake up, because if it is on the alarm, when it goes off I will almost leap above my bed with my arms flung out as if a bomb just went off. It is highly underpleasant. Strangely though, I have no problem with the noise of trains (we regularly have trains go by just miles from our house) or with vacuums or airplanes. Car horns though, screaming babies, and shrieking teenagers really hurt my ears.