Written in the Stars (17 page)

Chapter Eighteen

Dunham Castle, 1605

Last night in my dream flight I hovered above the vortex of wind in which Carlyle’s
ship floundered. The monstrous waves crashed into the wooden hull as the screaming
wind ripped the sails to shreds.

Carlyle gave no thought for the woman and child but only sought to keep safe his treasure.
The wooden chests filled with silver, gold, and jewels. The five hundred heavy bars
of gold. Ingots of silver, rubies, emerald, diamonds, and pearls by the hundreds.
The heavy pieces of jewelry set with precious stones. All sinking to the bottom of
the sea.

He saw that I was there as I promised and he gave a silent scream as he drowned, entangled
within my celestial girdle beneath the warm waters, which wash the shores of the New
World.

I saw the woman and the boy she calls his son reach land safely. They will bother
Serena and Stephen no more from that far off place.

Yet their role in the play is not finished.

At last the curtain of time has parted to show me a glimpse of the final act.

The part of me which never dies will find Will at last. Know that if I combed the
earth and searched through the galaxies for eternity there is no being I would want
but this one. And so it shall be when once again passion beats between us like a living
force.

I long for this with every breath I draw. Yet I have foreseen that once again Carlyle’s
evil shall rip us asunder.

Do not be so bewitched by enchantment that you believe all danger is past.

For you and I are one.

Feeling as if she’d just seen the Celestine sink through Elizabeth’s eyes—a supernatural
feat on her ancestress’s part that took away her breath—Cordelia set down the journal
in the middle of her bunk. Her own abilities of having precognitive dreams and a brush
with telekinesis were dwarfed by comparison.

Elizabeth had written: That future is for you to write for it is set firm in your
stars. And: For you and I are one.

Had Elizabeth meant her specifically? Was she the “you” in the journal? Was she meant
to fulfill Elizabeth’s destiny and find her Will?

Or was it the Will, as in Will reincarnated?

Was she Elizabeth reborn?

All along, the journal had drawn her closer and closer to the past. The dreams had
taken her to another level, had shown her what she now believed to be true.

At first she’d been afraid to believe.

Never having known that kind of love, she hadn’t been open to it.

But that last dream had convinced her, had seduced her in new ways. She wanted its
promise. Needed it. And only one man could give it to her.

Which man? she wondered, hoping it would be the one who had her heart.

Open your mind and you will know what is true…

Had she really heard a woman’s voice? “Elizabeth?”

No answer.

So, closing her eyes, Cordelia went through every moment of the past days.

Innis saving her from the shark. Morgan giving her his spare air hose.

Innis romancing her. Morgan trying to seduce her.

Innis doing all in his power to make her dreams real. Morgan trying to take them from
her.

She concentrated on finding the truth. She needed to know for certain who to trust.
Her hand went to the chain still around her neck. She fingered its length, and the
moment the ring and crescent met, a charge of power shot through her entire body.

Her wrist burned.

The ring tightened.

Her mind opened.

Though she was awake this time, a dream-vision threw her back to the underwater realm.

The diver hurtles through the water, racing toward the wreck.

Which man? she thinks frantically, needing to uncover his identity now, before it
is too late.

He plunges inside the maw, and without hesitation, continues straight into the bowls,
his headlamp the only light…

Horrified, she realizes he is making a deep penetration.

Her wrist and her ring set off like a fire alarm…

A deep penetration without his first setting a line puts him in serious danger.

What is he thinking? What if he can’t find his way back out?

Another danger follows. She senses more than sees a school of tiger sharks.

Her breath catches in her throat and the flesh along her spine raises. No way to warn
him as the danger multiplies.

Another diver follows the sharks. The man who would kill him.

Which man?

She thinks she knows but she has to be certain.

The events of the past days race through her mind. Every word, every action, every
look…

Jerked out of the vision, Cordelia shook with dread.

One man would be a victim, the other a killer, unless she stopped it from happening.

“No, Morgan, don’t do it!” she cried, rushing from her cabin straight through the
galley and across the deck past her mother reading in a lounge chair.

“Cordelia?”

“Later, Mom.”

She jumped to the salvage ship.

Two of the divers leaned against the rail of Foley’s Treasure. Chatting, they stopped
when she stepped down from the rail.

“Innis—where is he?” she asked, rubbing at her birthmark. It wouldn’t quiet.

One of the men said, “He’s already below.”

That’s what she’d been afraid of. She looked to the Sea Rover on the other side of
the Evening Star. The man with the oxygen tank had his feet propped on the ledge.
To her horror, he was smoking.

“Where’s Morgan?” she yelled.

The man’s wrinkled face pulled into a grin. He pointed to the water. “Waiting for
you to join him.”

Certain Morgan had said no such thing, Cordelia ignored the wet suit, and the protection
it offered. Getting below quickly was critical, so she pulled a harness over her swimsuit
and secured it in record time. Her wrist was on fire and growing hotter and more insistent,
and her ring threatened to cut off her finger.

Birthmark and ring had acted up every time Morgan was around Innis, not because he
was dangerous, but because he was the one in danger. Considering both were activated
without his presence, she knew her dream vision was about to be realized if she didn’t
stop it.

“Help me!” she ordered the divers.

They jumped up. One grabbed a fresh tank, while the other gathered the peripherals.

“The gauge is new,” the first said, attaching the tank to her back. “I checked it
out myself.”

The other one said, “Hey, you want to leave that here?” He was pointing to the chain
around her neck.

“No.”

Sticking the crescent back into the top of her swimsuit, Cordelia hoped it could somehow
help her save Morgan. She jumped down to the dive platform, pulled on her fins and
mask, then checked her regulator and clamped down on the mouthpiece even as she rolled
herself into the sea. Praying she wasn’t too late to save the man she should have
recognized as her soul mate, the one meant to share her life as Will should have shared
his with Elizabeth.

She wouldn’t let it happen.

Not again.

Elizabeth hadn’t been able to save Will.

Cordelia wouldn’t let Morgan die.

Chapter Nineteen

Below her, a diver skimmed the hulk of the wreck, his light catching the opening to
penetrate it. Cordelia did a three-sixty twirl to scan the area, but she didn’t see
a second diver.

Was one of them already exploring inside?

Turning back to the wreck, she realized she was alone. The diver she’d seen had disappeared.
She forgot to breathe for a second, and her heart began to pound. Her wrist was burning
off the charts and the Posey ring had tightened until her forefinger had gone numb.

Elizabeth, help me be as fearless as you…

She shot toward the dark maw of the wreck, her bare flesh raising when a cold current
caught her. The discomfort wouldn’t stop her. Nothing could.

She noted no line as she entered. She’d been so panicked to stop a murder that she
hadn’t brought one herself. Hesitating a second, trying to figure out what to do,
she started when a woman’s voice whispered through her mind…

Save him, and I will guide you both back to safety.

Elizabeth?

Had she really heard that, or was her imagination working overtime?

Whichever, Cordelia had to believe that she could save Morgan and get them back out
of the wreck. What would happen after that wasn’t clear.

First things first.

Lights ahead guided her. There was some distance between the two headlamp beams and
both stayed focused straight ahead. Was Innis following Morgan and Morgan didn’t know
it? Although she’d had feelings for Innis, in her heart, she believed in Morgan. She
trusted the connection between them that had become so evident to her. Something fast
and sleek cut within the fading beam of Innis’s light, and Cordelia knew it to be
a shark. Swallowing hard, she had to put it out of mind to go on.

Instead she thought about Innis, who’d won her young heart for a season, who had played
the good friend for years.

How could she have been so mistaken about him?

My greatest enemy, Carlyle, wielded the deadly dagger, yet I must marry him.

Elizabeth’s journal haunted her.

I will act well my role in this play.

Then when the moment is right, I shall step to the edge of the stage between the light
and the darkness beyond. From this place, hidden yet exposed, I will claim what is
right and just for those I love.

As she would do, Cordelia vowed.

If her role was Elizabeth and Morgan was her Will, then Innis had to be Carlyle.

Cordelia knew Innis hated Morgan, but enough to kill him? There had to be more to
this horror. Surely not her. Surely this couldn’t be jealousy that drove him.

Even as she thought it, she knew it was part of the truth. Innis wanted her. Plus
he wanted the glory that went with finding the mother lode, not to mention his portion
of the treasure’s worth.

They were all guilty of wanting the glory. All three of them.

She’d wanted the glory of the find enough to close her heart against Morgan when he’d
tried to win her over. All the things she’d thought about him were true of herself.
Though she might have wanted to pump the will to live back into her mother, she’d
also wanted the fame of the find to assure her own reputation as a marine archaeologist.
So she’d viewed Morgan with distrust and had let that stop her from really knowing
him, really seeing through the veil of suspicion Innis had created.

She’d fought her feelings for Morgan until that moment he’d given her his spare airline
and had brought her up to safety. She’d softened to him then, only to allow Innis
to twist her mind against Morgan yet again when he hadn’t deserved it. And then for
those few seconds before he’d escaped back to the sea, she’d seen the truth in Morgan’s
eyes.

Pulling out of her thoughts, Cordelia realized the first headlamp had stopped moving
and the second had gone out. Her pulse roared, and for a moment she couldn’t catch
her breath.

Innis…where was he?

Undoubtedly, he’d turned off his lamp to make a stealth approach.

Hoping Innis hadn’t already seen her, Cordelia clicked off her own headlamp and arrowed
straight for Morgan’s light. A hard, sleek body slithered against her arm, jerking
her to the side, and her heart nearly jumped from her chest.

Tiger shark!

She froze.

They are not your enemy. Trust yourself.

Taking a shallow, ragged breath, Cordelia listened to the voice in her head and swam
straight toward the man she’d mistakenly mistrusted.

Morgan’s beam picked up a brilliant gleam in the sand below him—emeralds set in a
crescent of gold. Her pulse picked up a beat. He waved the sand from the artifact
and revealed a patch of gold mesh. When he pulled at it, Cordelia could see that he’d
found Elizabeth’s celestial girdle, and as he fought to pull it free, other, smaller
treasures popped out of the sand.

He’d found the mother lode.

She shot toward Morgan faster.

Then another headlamp clicked on, taking Morgan’s attention from the treasure.

Innis reached past him and from the girdle still half-buried in a sandy grave, removed
the dagger.

A frantic Cordelia closed the distance between them, and as Innis raised the blade
to strike, she grabbed his hand to stop him. His gaze met hers through their masks.
She saw surprise and then the shock of betrayal. They struggled for control of the
dagger. The blade nicked his thigh. He jerked hard and pulled free of her grip.

Before he could strike out again, Morgan lunged upward and shoved Innis away from
her. A thin trail of blood from Innis’s thigh wound followed.

Innis came back at Morgan and the men struggled in bizarre silence. Just when Cordelia
feared the dagger would find its way to Morgan’s heart, he knocked Innis’s arm hard.
The dagger dropped back to the sea’s floor.

Morgan moved toward Cordelia, and a current sizzled between them even before he reached
her. She felt as if she was just seeing the real man now for the first time. Her heart
pulsed with anticipation. He held out his hand to her, and she took it. The touch
was electric, a pulse that beat throughout her, and she realized he was wearing the
Posey ring that was mate to hers.

Before he could draw her away from further danger, she saw Innis recover the dagger.
He came at them, blade raised to pierce Morgan’s back. Cordelia shoved her love out
of the way.

The dagger struck…

…her…

…plunging hilt-deep into her stomach.

Shocked by the pain, Cordelia froze, saw her life’s blood ooze from the wound in dark,
foggy fingers swirling around her, saw Innis before her, his eyes behind the mask
opening wide in horror.

Movement from the corner of her eye raised the flesh along her spine. Drawn by the
scent of blood, the sharks were circling, motions increasingly frantic.

Clasping her hands around the dagger hilt, fearing to free it and do more damage,
she tried to stem the blood with her fingers.

Morgan reached for the chain and crescent. No sooner had he lifted the artifact over
her head than Innis grabbed him around the neck from behind and ripped his air hose
from his mouth. Apparently Innis had vanquished any regret. He closed both hands around
Morgan’s neck and squeezed. Morgan struggled, but without air didn’t have what he
needed to free himself.

Growing weaker from each second of blood loss, Cordelia despaired. She could do nothing
to save Morgan. She could do nothing to save herself. She could barely move. They
were both going to die.

Don’t give up. Born on Witches’ Night, we are magic. Use our power…

Cordelia tried to focus on the words whispered in her mind.

Power.

Elizabeth’s power.

Their power.

The sharks were closing in on them, drawn by the blood billowing from her wound and
from the cut on Innis’s thigh. Soon they would grow bold enough to attack.

Cordelia focused her mind on finding some way out of this. The girdle! She switched
on her headlamp to look for it, but the seafloor had claimed it once more. Picturing
the priceless artifact, she called to it with her mind. She visualized it—every gem-studded
detail—and directed her thoughts to lifting the girdle from its watery grave. Within
seconds, bejeweled strands of chain snaked out from their briny hiding place.

Concentrating with everything she had, Cordelia called on her latent telekinesis.
Emotions high, she urged the source of Elizabeth’s power from its grave inch by inch,
at the same time visualizing what she wanted of it.

Suddenly, the girdle seemed to take on a life of its own and flew at the would-be
murderer. It wrapped around his back and Innis jerked and let go of Morgan, who quickly
recovered his air hose. The girdle’s chains snaked around Innis and held him captive,
suspended and unable to flee, no matter that he fought it with fury.

Morgan kicked him away and swam to her side, pulling her from the path of the sharks
closing in. When one came too close, he snapped the chain still in his hand and smacked
the predator in the nose with the crescent. Sparks shot where it hit, and the shark
swam off into the deep.

Mere yards from them, Innis fought to free himself from the threat of several sharks
working up to attack, but Elizabeth’s magic held him fast.

Cordelia’s vision dimmed. Morgan was alive. She’d fought the dream-vision and won
this time. She might be lost, but at least he was saved. She would have the comfort
of his arms around her as she joined Elizabeth in her celestial home.

Her eyes grew heavy, her head light. She felt disembodied.

Dying.

Suddenly her life flashed before her, from the kiss with Morgan at the club backward…back
to the hurricane the summer a dozen years before when she’d met Innis…and further
yet…

She threw herself onto Will’s hard chest, and his powerful arms closed around her.
“To have had such a love”—she sobbed, swallowing tears—“and to have lost it is a tragedy
of the soul.” She flung back her head, resting it on his shoulder, and gazed up at
him. “In God’s eyes, you are the duke’s firstborn son. I should be yours.”

Excruciating pain slid through Cordelia as the dagger slid out of her side. Her eyes
fluttered open for a last look at Morgan before she died. She could feel more than
see his panic.

We have become one in all ways.

We have pledged our love with Posey rings which will last for eternity. And so we
will confess to the duke who I know will bless our love.

In joy I have made my choice.

Yet in this moment my joy is turning to fear.

Something cold and hard pressed against her flesh. Forcing herself to focus, Cordelia
saw that Morgan had placed the crescent from the girdle over the wound.

Again I feel the terror of finding Will fallen upon the grass, blood gushing from
his wounds, staining red the earth beneath him.

Again feel my joy when I press a crescent from my celestial girdle against his flesh
and it heals into a scar of the waxing moon upon his wrist as it did on Laurel’s forehead.

Again the blackness consumes me as the powers of my celestial girdle are not great
enough to heal the deep stab wound in Will’s back…

Morgan was trying to save her the same way Elizabeth had tried to save Will, Cordelia
realized.

Too late for Will…too late for her…

Behind her mask, she wept, for finally she understood what Elizabeth had meant when
she’d written

…we are one and shall meet and fight for what is written in our stars.

Through the veil of time I have seen the face of you who comes after me, and I have
seen Carlyle beside you. He shall menace you with his evil. You must defy him and
overcome his magic curse.

Believe this, for it will be true for you.

Cordelia touched Morgan’s face and looked into emerald-green eyes that spoke the truth,
just as they had when she’d accused him of tampering with her air gauge. She’d recognized
hurt then, and now the hurt, more desperate, dug deeper. Despite the fact that she’d
given him absolutely no reason, Morgan cared for her.

Beyond him, the sea thrashed red with fury.

Horrified, she realized the boy she had once loved was finished. He’d been finished
the moment he’d put his plan to get rid of Morgan into action. She didn’t even know
the man he’d become. Even so, digging her fingers into Morgan’s arms to brace herself,
she couldn’t help the tears gathering inside her mask.

As the sharks tore Innis to pieces, Morgan forced her upward so she didn’t have to
watch.