🥇1st place award winner in the 2022 Riot Awards, the 2022 The Hearts Awards and the 2022 Gemini Awards for best Horror!
Allesandra Melano's soul was one of three chosen at birth and marked by the Heavens to save mankind from the fiery pits of Hell...
*Author's note: I'm proud to announce that The Devil's Handmaiden has won 3 first place writing awards for best horror!
"Midnight" the original music for this book series is now available on all streaming platforms. The music video is above if you'd like to check it out. I would love for you to get to know my characters so you can envision them as the story unfolds....So grab some headphones and listen to Midnight by Maiden (my alter ego)! Turn it up & Enjoy!
Allesandra looks up as the door slowly swings open, and the doctor enters the room. Her heart sinks and her pulse races as she sees the concerned look on his face. She tries her best to remain strong, but she can't shake the overwhelming feeling that it's not going to be good news. She sits up straight with her hands clenched tightly to the arms of her chair and teeters on the edge of her seat, waiting for him to deliver the news she has been dreading.
"Ms. Melano, I have Katrina's test results and I'm sorry, there's just no easy way to say this."
He pauses for what seems like an eternity and continues, "unfortunately, the cancer has spread and there's nothing more we can do for her."
Allesandra doesn't answer and seems to be paralyzed in a state of shock over the bombshell that has just been dropped on her.
"Ms. Melano, do you have any questions? Is there someone we can call?"
She blinks several times, holding back the tears that have welled up in her eyes, takes a long, deep breath and asks, "How long?"
The doctor looks down at the clipboard in his hands, shuffles through the papers as if he's looking for the answer to her very difficult question, looks up and calmly responds, "A few months, perhaps a little longer. Again, I'm very sorry."
After the doctor leaves the room, Allesandra looks over at her two year old daughter quietly, sleeping in her crib. She attempts to get up from her chair, but immediately drops to her knees beside the crib and begins to cry harder than she's ever cried before. She buries her face in her hands and bites down hard to try to muffle the agonizing wail of emotion she's releasing so she doesn't wake her daughter. But that doesn't help much and her pain-filled cry echos loudly in the small, scarcely furnished hospital room. In between trying to catch her breath and the uncontrolled sobbing, she finally pulls herself together long enough to pray.
Lord, I know I don't pray often and I don't go to church much anymore, but please, please, I beg of you, please don't take my little girl! Please hear me and answer my prayer! I'll never ask you for another thing as long as I live, I promise! Please Lord, I beg you. She's just a baby! I will do anything! I will do absolutely anything you ask of me. Just please, please, heal my baby. Please let her live and I will...
Before she can finish praying, a loud clap of thunder startles her, and she hears a maniacal laugh coming from across the room that absolutely terrifies her. She quickly looks up and sees the silhouette of a man standing by the window in the darkest part of the room.
"Does he ever answer you?" The man calls out, with a distinct hint of sarcasm in his gravely voice.
"Excuse me?" Allesandra responds, with a valiant attempt to sound protective, even though it's pretty obvious she is scared to death. "Who are you and what are you doing in here? My daughter is very sick. Please leave before I call for security."
The man chuckles and begins walking across the room, into her full view, and then pauses for a moment, as if to allow Allesandra a moment to retreat. He can see the pure terror in her eyes and he decides to toy with her a bit.
"You poor thing. You pray to a God that never hears you and never answers any of your prayers and yet, you still believe he loves you. I won't lie to you and tell you I love you. I don't even know you. But I do know that you need something. You need your daughter to be healed from the cancer that is eating its way through her little body as we speak. What kind of God does this to children?"
He kneels down beside Allesandra and gently glides his hand across her forehead. "I can heal her. I can take away all of her pain and I can give her back to you like she once was, healthy and full of life. All I need from you is a promise." He reaches out his hand and motions for Allesandra to stand to her feet.
She slowly rises and then takes a few steps back towards the phone and asks him, "How do you know all of this? Who are you?"
"Allesandra, I am, let's just say, the man who can give you everything I just promised to you and more. But I will need something from you in return for my generosity."
Allesandra slowly inches her way backwards again towards the phone to call for help and suddenly she is frozen where she stands and can't move. "Who the hell are you? What are you doing to me? Can't you see I'm scared to death and my daughter is dying? I don't have time for sick jokes."
The man chuckles again and condescendingly offers, "I think you know precisely who the hell I am, my dear. You're just too damn afraid to say my name out loud. I'm always painted in such a bad light. It's a shame if you ask me. I'm really an old softie when it comes to children, and that is precisely why I'm here. You want to save your daughter, and I'm the only one who cared enough to show up tonight. Deep down, you know I'm telling you the truth and I'm your only hope. Where is your God?"
He poses the rhetorical question to her, as he paces around the room, hands clenched behind his back, like he's deep in thought, trying to solve the age old question. The expression on his face then changes as if he's grown tired of waiting on an answer and he stops, makes a motion with his hands that pulls Allesandra across the room and right into his arms. He stares into her eyes as he levitates her off of her feet and leaves her dangling, helplessly in front of him.
"Say the word and I will save Katrina. She doesn't have to die so you can prove to your God that you're a good little Christian and you still have faith in him. I can save her and all I ask in return is for you to denounce him and put your faith in me."
Allesandra, trembling, scared out of her wits and feeling desperate for this all to end, finally looks back into his cold, dark eyes and nods her head. He knows he has her answer, but he needs to hear her say it out loud.
"Allesandra, do we have a deal?"
Again, she nods.
"No nods," he insists. "I need to hear it from your lips that you agree to my terms."
"Ok, ok!" she yells back in agreement. "Yes! Just please, please, save my baby! If you can really do that for me, I'll do anything you want!"
As he pictures Allesandra by his side as his indentured servant, a fiery gleam comes to his eyes. He has patiently waited for hundreds of years for a marked soul like hers to come along, and now that he has what he has come for, he releases Allesandra and lets her body fall to the floor with a loud thump.
He then casually walks over to the crib where her gravely ill daughter is sleeping, waves his hands over the child's body and speaks in a language Allesandra has never heard before. Katrina wiggles around, opens her eyes and starts to cry. She pulls herself up to the side of the crib and puts her hands out to the strange man. The moment he picks her up, she stops crying, and this stuns Allesandra. She helplessly watches as he holds Katrina in his arms and looks her over from head to toe as if he's admiring his work. He then places the child in her mother's arms and declares, "my work here is done. See you in three years!"
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