The Hidden Worlds Read online

  First published by Moon Books, 2018

  Moon Books is an imprint of John Hunt Publishing Ltd., No. 3 East Street, Alresford

  Hampshire SO24 9EE, UK

  [email protected]

  www.johnhuntpublishing.com

  www.moon-books.net

  For distributor details and how to order please visit the ‘Ordering’ section on our website.

  Text copyright: Sandra Ingerman and Katherine Wood 2017

  ISBN: 978 1 78535 820 3

  978 1 78535 821 0 (ebook)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017952288

  All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publishers.

  The rights of Sandra Ingerman and Katherine Wood as authors have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Design: Stuart Davies

  Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY, UK

  We operate a distinctive and ethical publishing philosophy in all areas of our business, from our global network of authors to production and worldwide distribution.

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter One—Chain Reactions

  Chapter Two—The Dream

  Chapter Three—The Discovery

  Chapter Four—Recognition

  Chapter Five—Eavesdropping

  Chapter Six—Meeting Jeremiah

  Chapter Seven—Following Instructions

  Chapter Eight—The North Wind

  Chapter Nine—Caught!

  Chapter Ten—Fire

  Chapter Eleven—What Is Next?

  Chapter Twelve—Advice

  Chapter Thirteen—Journeying

  Chapter Fourteen—Lower World Travels

  Chapter Fifteen—Ideas

  Chapter Sixteen—Organizing

  Chapter Seventeen—The Agency

  Chapter Eighteen—The Law

  Chapter Nineteen—The Plan

  Chapter Twenty—Success—Barely!

  Chapter Twenty-One—The Announcement

  Chapter Twenty-Two—Watch

  Chapter Twenty-Three—Scare

  Chapter Twenty-Four—Legacy

  Chapter Twenty-Five—Halloween

  Chapter Twenty-Six—Volcano

  Chapter Twenty-Seven—The Leak

  Chapter Twenty-Eight—Invitation

  Chapter Twenty-Nine—Flow

  Chapter Thirty—Thanksgiving

  Chapter Thirty-One—Upper World

  About the Authors

  This book is dedicated to Jordan, Carter, Grant and Gavin, and their Power Animals, Chee, Yani, Bear and Dali, and all of the young people of the world. May your spiritual practices and your power animals help you create a joyful and meaningful experience that helps all of life and the Earth.

  Books/Audio Programs/Transmutation App all by Sandra Ingerman

  Soul Retrieval: Mending the Fragmented Self

  (HarperOne 1991)

  Welcome Home: Following Your Soul’s Journey Home

  (HarperOne 1993)

  A Fall to Grace (fiction)

  (Moon Tree Rising Productions 1997)

  Medicine for the Earth: How to Transform Personal and Environmental Toxins

  (Three Rivers Press 2001)

  Shamanic Journeying: A Beginner’s Guide, book and drumming CD

  (Sounds True 2004)

  How to Heal Toxic Thoughts: Simple Tools for Personal Transformation

  (Sterling 2007)

  Awakening to the Spirit World: The Shamanic Path of Direct Revelation, book and drumming CD

  (co-written with Hank Wesselman)

  The Shaman’s Toolkit: Ancient Tools for Shaping the Life and World You Want to Live In

  (Weiser 2010)

  Walking in Light: The Everyday Empowerment of a Shamanic Life

  (Sounds True 2014)

  Speaking with Nature: Awakening to the Deep Wisdom of the Earth

  (co-written with Llyn Roberts)

  (Inner Traditions 2015)

  Audio Programs

  The Soul Retrieval Journey

  (Sounds True 1997)

  The Beginner’s Guide to Shamanic Journeying

  (Sounds True 2003)

  Miracles for the Earth

  (Sounds True 2004)

  Shamanic Meditations: Guided Journeys for Insight, Vision, and Healing

  (Sounds True 2010)

  Soul Journeys: Music for Shamanic Practice

  (Sounds True 2010)

  Shamanic Visioning: Connecting with Spirit to Transform Your Inner and Outer Worlds, 6-CD audio program

  (Sounds True 2013)

  Shamanic Visioning Music: Taiko Drum Journeys

  (Sounds True 2014)

  The Spirit of Healing: Shamanic Journey Music

  (with Byron Metcalf) (Sounds True 2015)

  App

  Transmutation App for Apple and Android Devices

  Acknowledgements

  It has been a true delight to work with Katherine Wood on The Hidden Worlds. I wrote a story based on my own spiritual guidance to share a shamanic foundation with children and young adults. Our children are our future and need and deserve a way to work with the personal and planetary challenges they are facing in life. Katherine took the skeleton foundation of the story I wrote and helped me to create an engaging teaching adventure for all who read this inspirited book.

  I also want to give deep gratitude to Barb Haas who helped as we were bringing more life to the characters and to the plot of the original story I had written.

  I want to thank everyone at Moon Books and John Hunt Publishing for their support of our work and their brilliant help with birthing this book into the world.

  I am always so grateful for my agent Barbara Moulton who tirelessly supports all my books and projects and helps and supports me on so many levels.

  And I hold such deep love and give thanks to my husband, Woods Shoemaker, for his patience and support when I get so involved in my writing projects.

  I also give thanks to the characters that showed up in my dreams and visions, who wanted their voices and stories to be shared.

  Sandra Ingerman

  Sandra Ingerman has been my teacher for almost a decade, and I have so much for which to be grateful to her. I thank her for trusting me with her idea and allowing me to work with Isaiah and Company to bring forth their story which I know will touch the lives of our readers.

  I thank my grandson, Carter Lusk, who, with red pen in hand, made suggestions. He did not want to leave in the part about the big ass truck, but Rose won out.

  I, too, thank Barbara Haas for her early input and Denise Vega for her wonderful questions that led to the final draft. I also thank Imelda Almquist for guiding us to John Hunt Publishing and Moon Books, and I thank all of the people who helped us there for their patience and wonderful suggestions.

  Finally, I thank Julie Lusk and Cheryl Linden for their undying faith in my writing, and I thank all of my former students—31 years’ worth—for their reading and writing suggestions. Here’s your reading homework!

  Katherine Wood

  Chapter 1

  Chain Reactions

  Math problems finished, Isaiah dropped his forehead onto his desk. His face flushed against the cool desktop as he recalled the breakfast exchange with his mom. The instant replay ran in full Technicolor across Isaiah’s closed eyelids:

  “Klick. Klack.” His mother’s teeth snapped together—the warning sound to be on alert for something embarrassing.

  “I just read an article about
the concerns boys have with puberty.”

  Puberty? At breakfast? Missing his dad volted through him. Why wasn’t he here right now? Without looking up, Isaiah poked out the center of the sunny-side-up egg with his toast. Yoke spread yellow across the plate.

  “Your testicles will double in size and may be uneven meaning one may hang down farther than the other.”

  Isaiah noticed how powder rose, hovering just above her oatmeal as she plopped a spoonful of protein into it. He wished he could rise up and leave the kitchen. His face was hot. She stirred, apparently waiting for a response.

  “Okay,” he croaked, feeling certain that if one of his testicles was lower than the other, he’d never ever tell her.

  “Your voice cracking is normal too,” she said. “Your voice box is enlarging, and your vocal cords are stretching. It’s embarrassing and annoying but will eventually go away.”

  Isaiah thought his voice changing was more than annoying. He was used to not being able to trust his asthmatic body, but now he couldn’t rely on his voice either. He never knew when it would be high or low or both in the same word. And puberty and everything enlarging?

  His mom was still speaking. “…involuntary erections…”

  “I have to brush my teeth,” he said, standing so quickly he knocked his chair over.

  “Wait!” his mother said using her no-nonsense voice. “It is time for you to start wearing deodorant.” She placed a container on the table. Isaiah noticed it was the same brand she used. Was that right? From commercials on TV, he didn’t think men and women wore the same deodorant. “It has no animal ingredients and there’s been no animal testing with this product,” she added.

  If he had to wear deodorant, at least it was one that hadn’t harmed any animals. The container said ‘Natural Fragrance’ but right below that was the word ‘calendula’. Didn’t that have something to do with marigolds? Great.

  With his head still against the desk, Isaiah fanned his shirt under his armpits and sniffed at the air. He didn’t smell flowers.

  The classroom door squeaked open, and Isaiah watched the boy named George enter. As George’s special services teacher waved goodbye to him, Isaiah heard several boys in the back of the room laugh. George dropped his head, pushed his sliding glasses back against his nose, and returned to his seat. Isaiah felt sorry for George.

  “Shut your faces!” Rose, a girl two rows over, said twisting around, her magenta and black hair flying. Isaiah admired her courage in speaking up, but she often got sent to the hall for it, or the principal’s office.

  “That will be enough all of you,” his math teacher said.

  Isaiah was glad he was invisible to his meaner classmates so he didn’t have to put up with what George did. He just wished the others saw him as more than the weak kid with breathing issues.

  “I’d like to correct our problems, please,” Magda said to their teacher. Magda was planning on getting a soccer scholarship so she often redirected the class. Isaiah admired how easily Magda could boss people around, especially adults. She probably got to pick out her own deodorant.

  The teacher smiled at her. “Okay everyone; it’s time to check your work.”

  The next period, their science teacher explained that they were going to be learning the difference between physical and chemical reactions. With their lab partners they were going to do an experiment to make their own cold packs to demonstrate a physical reaction.

  Isaiah wrote in his notebook, “A physical reaction is one where the matter stays the same, but the size, shape or appearance of the matter changes.”

  His lab partner said, “I’ll get the ammonium nitrate, plastic storage bag, and graduated cylinder.” He was already halfway across the room and called back, “You get the aprons, gloves, and goggles.”

  Isaiah wanted to say, “I wear deodorant now so I should get the ammonium nitrate.” But he wasn’t brave enough. It did help a little to notice the goggles were marked ‘chemical resistant’. That made his job seem a little more daring.

  “I’ll measure out the 25 grams of ammonium nitrate into the bag,” he heard himself saying a few minutes later.

  His lab partner stared at him and then grabbed the graduated cylinder to measure out 50 milliliters of water which he quickly poured into the bag. He took the bag from Isaiah, released the excess air, pressed the bag tabs closed, and began squeezing it to mix the water with the ammonium nitrate.

  Isaiah thought his lab partner was working quickly just in case Isaiah tried to do anything else. He was proud of himself for speaking up for once. And his voice hadn’t cracked.

  “Whoa! It’s getting cold,” his lab partner said. He handed the bag to Isaiah. It really did feel like an ice pack. Soon kids were parading around the room with their bags on their foreheads, backs, shoulders, and arms.

  “Take your seats,” the science teacher yelled. “As you can see from this experiment, everything is inter-related or connected, and by combining different types of matter, a physical reaction can occur. The ammonium nitrate stayed the same. The water stayed the same but putting them together changed the temperature. Our choices to put different matter together can create changes that impact everything around us.”

  Isaiah thought about how in math class George walking in the door had created a chain reaction. Just like his parents’ divorce meant his dad moved to Denver which led to his mother being the one to have the talk with him this morning. A chain of events that could possibly lead to flowering armpits.

  “It’s very helpful for a soccer player to know how to make an ice pack in case there aren’t any around,” Magda was saying.

  “You might have difficulty finding a good supply of ammonium nitrate,” blurted George. Isaiah noticed the silence that followed George’s comment. Isaiah couldn’t remember ever hearing his voice before. Then Isaiah heard someone mutter something unintelligible. Probably the same kid from math.

  And Rose was on her feet. Magda also stood and stepped in front of her. “Let’s do the next experiment,” she said, never taking her eyes off of Rose.

  “This isn’t over,” went through Isaiah’s mind as he watched Rose sit down, glaring back at Magda the whole time. “Deodorant and drama,” he thought. “Glad it’s Friday.”

  Saturday mornings were Isaiah’s favorite time of the week. He would jump out of bed, grab his favorite cereal and milk, and head for the family room for hours of video games. It was the only time he was allowed to do three things: stay in his pajamas until noon, eat his favorite sugary, magically delicious cereal (a whole box if he wanted it), and play video games. The only thing that could make Saturday mornings more perfect was to share them with a dog, but because of his asthma, he wasn’t allowed to have one. That didn’t stop him from reading book after book about training dogs and picking out names. Currently his dog would be Lucky.

  This Saturday, right before he left his bedroom, he thought again about breakfast yesterday and somehow it didn’t feel right to go to the family room in his PJs. He pulled on a pair of sweatpants over his pyjama bottoms.

  At noon each Saturday when she wasn’t working, his mother vacuumed. Everywhere. At noon he was expected to put away his games, eat the sandwich she always had waiting for him on the kitchen counter, do his chores (put his laundry by the washer, clean his bathroom, and take out the recycling), and start on his homework. Saturday night they always ordered pizza and watched a movie, and Sundays were family time (church and playing board games) so his mother wanted all homework and chores done by the six o’clock pizza delivery on Saturday.

  Isaiah opened his notebook at the counter while he ate his sandwich. He hoped this would discourage his mother from discussing puberty further. He looked really busy each time she came through the kitchen.

  For science, he had to write up the lab report for the second experiment they had done on a chemical reaction—again in a plastic bag—using calcium chloride. He wanted to note that he was the one who had collected the calcium chloride. Tha
t meant his lab partner only got to pick up the sodium bicarbonate (a fancy name for baking soda) and the cabbage juice. It had been cool to watch the color turn from blue-green to purple to pink when they were all mixed and how the bag inflated with gas and got hot and then cold. A chemical reaction because the color changed, and it became a gas.

  He also needed to collect a water sample from home or around town to be tested during lab time next week. He found a little jar and loaded it with tap water from his kitchen sink. Boring old tap water, he thought. He wished he knew somewhere to get water that might be exciting to test.

  For math, he had to create a graph on world population growth since records had been kept. On graph paper, he put the years across the bottom and the population numbers along the sides. He was surprised how quickly the population had grown from 1900 to 7.4 billion today. He then had to explain one possible effect that the growing population has had on the world. He wrote that more laws were needed to control bigger groups of people. He guessed even with more laws it was easier to get away with crimes in cities; different from his small town. One of the reasons Isaiah’s mom said she liked their small town was that crime couldn’t exist because everyone knew everyone else’s business.

  His language arts teacher had said she would be assigning groups of four on Monday for a cause-effect project. He wondered what that might be.

  As he did his chores, his dread grew about working with a group of four in language arts. He didn’t have any friends. At least his teacher was assigning groups so he wouldn’t have to be embarrassed when he didn’t get picked. He had struggled with team work all through elementary school. It had really made him feel invisible. Maybe in middle school it would be different.

  Chapter 2

  The Dream

  In his dream, thick yellow air surrounded Isaiah, hanging like blankets as if to block his way. Burning his eyes. Filling his mouth with a foul taste. He ran trying to escape it, his asthma causing him to suck in big gulps. His throat felt furry. His lungs were heavy, as if filled with hot cotton. He coughed trying to expel the dirty air.