34. Cori
Cori
I t was dark outside when Cori awoke from sleep with a jolt. She didn’t remember the dream, but she knew it was a nightmare. Cold sweat clung to her skin. Adrian didn’t stir as she slipped out of bed.
The floor was shockingly cold under her feet, and despite being inside the house, she could see her breath. She walked to the kitchen to quench the parched fear in her throat with a cup of water.
Her eyes focused through the dim light in the aftershocks of her nightmare, when she noted a soft glow from outside the window. Her Eye snapped to attention. Go to it .
She pulled on boots and a coat, her gaze fixed on the light. Soft amber gleamed from the garden, emitting a peacefulness and familiarity that she couldn’t place. The charm bracelet on her wrist felt heavy and hot with magical energy.
That’s odd .
She had worn the bracelet every day since Nonna died, but she had noticed nothing magical about it before.
Wrapping her coat around her, she ventured outside. In the silence of the night, the door hinge let out a creaky sigh. The air was too cold, even for a September night in Maine. The door clicked heavily behind her when she saw it in the garden .
A spirit .
She could tell it was a spirit’s aura, and the true source of the light she had seen. A living soul had an aura that was inky and breezy, like watercolor on canvas. Spirits shimmered like an ethereal mist, and as she slowly approached the man, his body was a wisp of light, cast upon a shadow.
Despite the ghostlike appearance of the man, she was struck by how his form was nearly solid. Most spirits could not fully manifest, but this man seemed nearly there .
He didn’t seem to notice her as she slowly approached him. She was nervous that she would scare him away. Not all spirits were interested in talking to her, but why else would this man be here? She took slow, careful steps toward him, casting his features into her view.
His dark hair was tidy, streaked with gold. As he turned toward her, she was struck by the strong angle of his jaw and the large, familiar eyes. He smiled kindly up at her from his perch on the garden bench, and she gasped.
“Enzo?” she said in disbelief. She reached out as if to touch him, the cold sheen of his aura chilling her skin.
“No, Stellina. I admit I’m not nearly as handsome as your brother turned out to be,” the man replied with a warm laugh. His accent was thick and rich like Nonna’s.
Cori’s heart leaped and her lungs constricted, stealing her breath. “Papa?” she asked in disbelief. The man stood and strode toward her with a warm, deep smile. His arms reached out to hug her, and he wrapped them around her shoulders.
Despite the thick fabric of her coat, she could feel him . She didn’t know that a spirit could manifest enough to have a solid sense of touch, but her father had seemed to manage it. Warm energy of his magic washed over her. It felt crisp and bright and familiar, like a déjà vu of something that had since been woven into her subconscious.
This man— this spirit —who she had never met on this Earth, felt familiar and right, as if she had known him for eternity. She pulled back and stared at his face, her mouth agape, words escaping her. “I just can’t believe you’re here,” she finally said.
His aura flickered as he looked at the ground with sad eyes. “I should have come to you a long time ago, Cordelia.” He gripped her hand. “I’m sorry. I was such a coward.”
Cori’s brow knotted together in confusion. “Coward? Papa, it’s OK. I know this must be hard. Manifesting like this. It must take an enormous amount of energy.”
He waved his hand dismissively, and she forced back a smile. His gestures were so similar to Nonna’s, it was laughable. “ Mia cara , it would have been easy. Celestial witches are very gifted at manifesting in the spirit form.”
Confusion melted away into disappointment. Despite the apparent ease with which it could be done, he and Nonna had never visited her. She had always assumed that the soul could be fatigued from a visit to the living realm.
“Not that I didn’t want to,” he continued, reading her aura. “I was selfish. I didn’t feel like I could answer the inevitable questions I knew you would have, and that weighed on me.”
“I do have questions,” Cori admitted. “So many.” She raked her brain as they all flooded to the surface.
Did he know about her before she was born? Did he have any visions about what she would be like? What was it like when he met Mama? Did he know right away that they were fated? Had he dreamed about Mama when he was a child, the way she had dreamed of Adrian? She shook her head, mulling over which one of these questions would be hard for him to answer.
For her whole life, she had some comfort in knowing that perhaps her father had seen her in visions before he died. The hope that he had known her in some way dulled the sting of never knowing him .
“But, Cordelia, I have no choice. I come to you now because of your brother.” Her lungs sucked in a breath at the words, and the air became lodged in her chest as a ball of guilt. She knew that Enzo would have been furious with her carelessness these past few days. All this time, he was risking his life to protect her, and she had been so reckless—exposing her secret.
She managed to speak. “How?”
His hand squeezed her shoulder. “Your brother has gotten involved in dark magic, Cordelia,” he said. The glow around him morphed into an iridescent, sad blue. “Heavily involved. I knew it would happen one day. It was the last prophecy I ever delivered.”
Her mouth parted in shock. The surrounding air sucked into a void, pulling with it all the sound. There had to be some kind of mistake. She shook her head numbly.
“I know this is hard to believe,” her father continued. “I’ve been watching Enzo get more and more involved. Just like I predicted he would.”
“You made a prophecy about Enzo? You knew he would turn to dark magic?” Her father looked up at her with sad eyes and nodded. “Did Mama know?”
He nodded again, sighing heavily. The sting of betrayal echoed through her chest.
“She knew. I delivered the prophecy to your mother and Nonna a few weeks before you were born.”
Cori’s head spun. All these years, they had known Enzo would go down this path. Was this the true reason her mother sent her away?
“For hours, your mother refused to tell me what I said. I was in agony. You know what it’s like to make a prophecy. We’re pulled out of our body. We don’t hear what we say, but I could tell when I returned that whatever I had said was devastating.” He paced, staring out to the sky as he moved, tipping his head back the same way Cori did when she searched for guidance from the stars.
“When did she tell you?” Cori asked. “It was hours before she told me what I said, but I had a much bigger audience.”
“She never told me, but your nonna did. After your mother went to bed that night. It was the most horrible moment of my life.”
The air had become supernaturally cold, and a few flakes of snow danced around her. Cori held in tears, fearing they would turn to ice on her face. “Papa, what was your prophecy?” she whispered.
The lines on his face were etched with sorrow as he closed his eyes. He sat back down on the bench, thinking hard for a few moments before he spoke. “ Son of darkness and light, daughter of sea and sky. The darkness of one will extinguish the light of the other. He will end her life to seal his own fate, banishing the light into eternal darkness. ”
Her chest was heaving now as the tears stung her cheeks. “He will end her life to seal his own fate?” She couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“I predicted your brother would kill you.” He clenched his fists. “Not only that he would try, but that he would succeed.”
Cori buried her head in her hands as she sat heavily on the bench beside her father. His arms embraced her again as she sobbed silently. Her heart cracked open as she cried for the burden that he carried.
She thought her own prophecy was bad. Cori couldn’t imagine being the messenger of one child’s eventual demise at the hand of the other.
She sobbed for her mother, knowing the truth now about why she was sent away. It wasn’t to protect her from dark witches. She was sent away to protect her from— Enzo —someone she loved and trusted.
She grieved for her brother, someone she remembered as kind and good. Was there any part of him left, or was he consumed by darkness in her absence?
“Oh, Papa. I’m so sorry,” she said through broken breaths.
“I’m the one who is sorry, Cordelia,” he said, choking on his own tears. “Sorry that I had to end my own life to give you a chance at yours.”
Shock gripped her, freezing the air in her lungs as she looked up at him.
His face contorted with tortured grief. “That I never got to take you on the trolley. I never got to see you in your school plays and treat you to ramen and ice cream. When I nose-dived my plane into the Pacific Ocean that day, I did it with every intention of saving you from your brother. And that’s how I know you are safe from him. You needed to know this. He cannot harm you, and the darkness inside him will not win. Because I wouldn’t let it.”
He grabbed her hands. Through her tears, she held his stare, his eyes flashing with specks of gold. “That’s why I have come here tonight, Cordelia. Your brother has joined a reform coven, and as we speak, they’re working out a plan to kill you. Enzo does not know about my prophecy, Cordelia.”
“What are they planning to do?” she asked frantically.
“They plan to lure you to Salem, Massachusetts on the solstice by kidnapping your mother. The birthplace of the Covenant. You need to know the truth because…” he paused, gazing up at the sky. “You need to know that they cannot touch you.” He paused again, wiping a tear from her cheek, his touch like ice on her skin. “You are the only person who can free your brother from the grip of the darkness.”
“What are you saying? Can’t I just warn Mama not to go near them?”
He shook his head. “Your mother will go with them willingly. She won’t leave your brother’s side. Astrid knows the reason I ended my life, and she would rather die herself than stand by and know that I died in vain.”
The icy air chilled her skin, sending a shiver through her. “I can leave the country. I’ll go to Europe—make sure he won’t find me.”
Paolo shook his head. “If you are not present on the solstice, Calvin will kill Enzo—and your mother.”
The light surrounding him flickered and dimmed as he looked to the sky, beams of moonlight shimmering over the most distant parts of the sea.
She stood and wrapped her arms around the man who had died for her. He felt less solid now, and she knew he was fading back into the spirit realm. “Papa, I’ll try. I hope I can be half as strong as you are.”
“Stellina, I have watched you for your whole life. I don’t think you realize how powerful you truly are. Let the power inside you be free. Stop hiding, and you will find yourself.” He planted a soft kiss on your forehead. “Your brother is not the only soul you are capable of saving.”
His hands were clasped around hers as he faded away. Just before he left her, panic rose in her heart as she said one last thing to him. “Papa, please come back and visit me again.”
He smiled down at her. “Promise,” he said. “Cordelia, I’m so proud of you, my star. I love you more than life.”
“I love you, too,” she whispered, as the snow swirled around them. As if riding the wind, he returned to the sky.