“Ah,” she nodded. “Nostradamus’s prophecy?” Burnside had filled her in on this, amongst many other things.
“Only love closes what ambition tore.”Cosimo quoted the last verse of the prophet’s proclamation. “I know what needs to be done and I intend to do it. Once and for all. It’s the only way to restore order.”
“And you can’t think of any other way to interpret it?” Goldie was aghast.
“I cannot.” He nodded, refusing to meet her eye.
“I see.” Goldie took a seat on Octavia’s bench and let the swing sway her gently. “And you didn’t see any point in discussing it with me first?”
Her anger was beginning to dissipate, leaving a wake of sadness. Sadness and hurt.
“I’m here now, aren’t I?” He spoke in low, controlled tones, but she didn’t think that reflected how he actually felt. Beneath that facade, she heard the rumble of distant thunder, felt the hot electric crackle of fiery lightning.
“Why didn’t you tell me the truth all along, Cosimo? Don’t you think I deserved to know?”
“Of course you did. There’s no excuse. Only that I was afraid of losing you. And your uncle was right, Ondalune. I was so besotted with you that I took unnecessary risks. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Exposing you would only have put us both in harm’s way. With the wars still raging in the ocean and my inability to end the curse, it would not have been safe for you to go home or remain on land.”
“And now it is?”
“It will be. When I am gone, the bloodstone will also disappear. The curse will be lifted. There won’t be anything left to fight for. You could go home.” He finally looked up, eyes somehow sad and hopeful at the same time. His expression was heartbreaking and also infuriating.
“I thank you for your intentions in making that decision for me, Cosimo, but what if I don’t want to go home? What about the home I’ve crafted for more than a century here on land? What if I don’t want to give it all up?”
Cosimo did not answer immediately. “I guess I hadn’t really considered that,” he admitted.
“I’ve lived my entire life to date here on the land. Would I like to explore my origins? Of course! But I’m not about to give everything up.” Goldie gestured at the house, the garden, the town. She thought of the other volunteers from the film institute. Of the other islanders who greeted her with warmth and a wave and remembered her order at the coffee shop. She thought of her creations—Octavia and Gary the Garibaldi and Kitty the whale. She adored Kitty, both in sculptural and real life form.
“I have a life I love here. I have responsibilities, friends, a purpose,” Goldie said.
“But look at you, Ondalune. You look fifty years younger than when you arrived here. What will people say about that?”
“I don’t care what they say. I’ll tell them I’m Goldie’s granddaughter. I’ll make something up. I’m sure you’re familiar with that sort of ruse. The point is, I love ithere. I love my life here,” she argued, trying to ignore the small voice in the back of her head telling her, rather pointedly, that she wasn’t being entirely truthful with him.
She had liked her life here just fine. But she had only come to love it since Cosimo had come back to the island. Now she couldn’t imagine staying and living her life there without him.
“You know, I used to think I knew what I wanted.” Cosimo paced the perimeter of the garden. “To be a powerful sorcerer, for the world to know my name. I was so wickedly ambitious, Ondalune. I only wanted Catherine’s favor so I could achieve those goals. I went along with her diabolical plans. She wanted to use the stone to manipulate and control the future. I wanted that, too. I wanted to control fate.”
When he spun to face her, his eyes were dazzling and predatory. The unmet need in them made her soul ache. A month ago, such a look from a man in her garden would have scared her senseless. But she was not frightened. She felt her own powers rising. Something similar had awakened in her.
“How’s that battle for control working out for you?” She met his eye unflinchingly.
“I think you know how it’s working,” he growled.
Cosimo moved with such speed, she didn’t even see the blur of his body. One second he was across the garden and the next, he was kissing her, not tenderly, but with a ferocious hunger that betrayed the centuries of loneliness, longing, and regret that he’d endured alone.
For a moment, she kissed him back, lips recalling their long-ago trysts. But then she remembered what he intended to do to himself during the upcoming eclipse and shoved him away.
“Don’t kiss me and try to convince me you are doing me a favor with what you are planning.”
In an instant, he was standing beside the fountain again. He walked in a slow circle as he spoke, almost as if he was telling a story. Not just to her. To both of them.
“I have followed your life. Since you were a child,” Cosimo said. “I’m almost ashamed to admit it. I loved you then, too.” He shot a quick glance at her, gauging her reaction. “Though not at all as I do now, of course. I didn’t have those sorts of feelings for you until we met here, on the island.” Cosimo raked a hand through his hair. “It was a wonderful and difficult time. Do you know what it did to me, watching everyone take such care to keep you from the water? Knowing you were robbed of the experience of being your true self, reaching your full potential?”
He paused, searching her eyes for an answer, but she had none to give.
“I was happy just to be with you, Cosimo. Even after I knew what I was. I had no other great ambitions,” she admitted.
“I have always felt responsible for your plight, Ondalune. And as much as Burnside and your parents meant well, this is not the life you were born for,” he argued.
