Danse Macabre (Vampire Hunter 14)

Requiem nodded. "Meng Die meant my death."

"A little power and she changes her mind."

"It is not a little power, Anita," Jason said.

I looked back at Requiem. "Do you know what Raina will do?"

Nathaniel knelt by us. "I told him what she liked to do during sex."

I fought to focus on Requiem's still face. "Is it"--I searched for the word I wanted--"all right?"

"I have been at the court of Belle Morte, Anita, this will be as nothing." He found a smile for me. "Heal me so that we may both serve our master well this night."

I nodded. "Okay." I looked behind them all, at Noel. He was pressed in the far back of the limo, as far from the action as he could get. "Out, now."

"Wait outside with Fredo," Jason said.

"I was told to stay close," Noel said. His eyes were big, his mouth a little parted. I realized I was na**d in front of him. I'd known that, but the drugs or the emergency, or my collapsing morals, had made me not think about it. The look on his face wasn't lust. It was fear.

"Outside the car is close enough," Jason said.

Still, he hesitated.

"Get out of the car, Noel," Nathaniel said. He sounded angry.

Noel got out of the car. When the door closed behind him, Nathaniel said, "How could Joseph have sent him for this job?"

"Joseph didn't understand," Jason said.

"Didn't want to understand," Nathaniel said. His eyes had gone almost purple with anger.

"Protect the innocent," I said.

He gave me those angry eyes, then made a smile for me, and nodded. "You can control Raina. I know you can."

"The drugs..."

"Will make it harder, but you can do this. I was there when you learned how to do this, Anita. Drugs or no drugs, your will is stronger than hers."

I stared into his face, studied that anger, that surety. I got that glimpse that I had sometimes, of what he might be in ten years. He was going to be something special at thirty, and I planned on being there to see it. I planned on us all being there to see it. Which meant we had to get through tonight. Whatever it took.

Jason laid me back on the seat. Nathaniel gave me a quick kiss, then he moved away, too. Requiem sat on the end of the seat, like he was on an uncomfortable first date.

I held out my hand to him. "Help me."

He took my hand, and knelt beside the seat, still covering as much of his nakedness as he could. "How can I help you?"

"Use your power on me."

His eyes filled with rich blue fire, and my body jolted with it. It hurt my sore hand, but the mixture of pain and pleasure and confusion would appeal to her. I'd learned to control Raina, which meant she had to be coaxed inside me now. It was sort of like leaving a perfectly good house when you know a tiger is just outside, and oh, by the way, let's strap a raw steak around your neck. This was all such a bad idea. Problem was, I didn't have a better one.

49

THE FIRST THING you need to know in order to control something is how it feels to do it. I was a natural psychic, which meant that my gifts weren't something I had to strive for, they just came to me. The problem with being a natural is that sometimes things come so easily that you don't know how, or even when, you're doing psychic stuff. It sort of sneaks up on you. You must understand a thing to truly control it. I'd relied for most of my life on the fact that I was just such a brute psychically that I could bull my way through things. But some things can't be controlled by brute force alone, or even by sheer power alone. You need control. It's the difference between being able to throw a baseball ninety miles an hour, and being able to throw it ninety miles an hour over home plate. The speed and skill is great, but if you keep throwing wild, it'll never get you into the majors. In fact, you may kill some poor fan in the stands. Getting hit in the head with a ball going that fast, well, not good. Raina wasn't my only ninety-mile-an-hour ball, but she was the second one I learned to control, after the necromancy.

Requiem was flat on his back on the seat. I didn't remember changing places with him. The last thing I remembered, clearly, was me na**d on my back, on the seat. Now, it was him lying naked. Him, looking up at me, a surprised look on his face. What had I done to put that look on Requiem's face? What had I done, while Raina was in control and I was fighting off the morphine?

I was sitting on his waist, which was an improvement over lower, I guess. I looked behind me to Nathaniel and Jason. The look on my face must have been enough, because Jason said, "You body-slammed him down on the seat."

"Your hand is bleeding," Nathaniel said.

I stared at my left hand as if it had just appeared at the end of my arm. There was fresh blood soaking through the gauze. The moment I saw the blood, the hand began to hurt. It wasn't as bad as before Lillian gave me the shot, but it was a persistent, grinding pain, with twinges of sharper things. The sharper pains promised worse to come.

"I believe you injured yourself throwing me down on the seat," Requiem said. His voice was mild, almost politely empty. His face matched it, handsome, and blank. The surprise was gone as if I'd dreamed it. He was in control of himself, once more.

I felt Raina inside me. She didn't want him in control of himself, or anything else. She wanted to break him. I'd seen far enough inside his head with the ardeur to know he'd been broken centuries before, and more than once. I knew that breaking someone already broken wouldn't appeal to her as much as being the first one to do it. Jason had been right; Raina liked virgins, of every sort. She loved to be in on someone's first experience, especially if she could turn pleasure to pain, joy to terror. That just flat did it for her. Not my kink, which made it easier not to do it.

Her voice whispered through my mind, not as clear as it once had been, more a wind-in-the-trees kind of sound. Marianne had informed me that Raina had come close to truly possessing me, as in almost demonic possession. That had been a scary thought. Now I knew how to keep Raina from getting that intimate a grip on me. The wind of her voice blew through my body, smelling of forest, and fur, and perfume. "You know what I want, Anita."

"You know what I'm willing to give you." I said that part out loud, because talking mind-to-mind with her spirit could give it a stronger hold on you. I thought about how close Requiem and I had come to intercourse earlier today. I thought about him rolling off, unsatisfied, and unsatisfying.

"The first f**king between you," she laughed, and my concentration wasn't pure enough to keep that laugh off my lips. Her laugh was a low, throaty, alto sound, a joyous promise of sex. I didn't own a laugh like that.

Nathaniel said, "Concentrate, Anita. You can do this."

Raina wanted me to look behind me at him, and I fought not to do it. Not because it was a bad thing, but because I had to start fighting somewhere, and it was a place to start. It was also something that if I lost the fight, it wouldn't hurt anyone.

"Petty, Anita," she whispered.

I ignored her, as best I could. Always hard to ignore people who are sharing your consciousness. I tried to concentrate on my breathing, but the pain in my hand kept distracting me. I tried concentrating on each heartbeat, on the pulse in my body, and that was a mistake. It was as if each beat of my heart hit my injured hand like a spike. As if the very pulse of blood made it hurt worse.

I shook my head, and that was a mistake. I was suddenly dizzy. Requiem's hands caught my arms, kept me from falling. I let myself collapse on top of him, my head resting against his shoulder. He made no sound, but his body flinched. I was lying across his wounds. Raina liked that a lot.

I kissed his shoulder. The skin was warm. Warm with the blood he'd taken from me earlier, but not as warm as it should have been. I gazed up into those brilliant blue eyes, with their hint of green around the iris. "Your body is using more energy trying to heal your wounds."

"Yes," he whispered.

"Do you need to feed more often when you're this badly hurt?"

"Yes, m'lady."

I smiled at him. "Somehow m'lady doesn't work with me na**d on top of you."

He smiled, and it even reached his eyes. "You will always be m'lady to me, Anita."

I was suddenly drowning in the scent of wolf. The beast inside me stirred, as if Raina's power were a spoon and I were some kind of soup. Stirring, looking for just the right tidbit.