Страница 87 из 106
"I would say that control is one of the most important things to you."
I nodded, my hair catching on the peeling paint of the house. I pushed away from the boards to stand in front of her in the dusty yard. "How can I get back control, Maria
She laughed again, that wholesome-bedroom sound. "Not all the answers, but the answers you seek, perhaps. I know that the munin will come for you again. It may be when you least expect it or when you need your precious control the most. It may overwhelm you and cost the lives of people you hold dear as it could have last night. All that saved Richard from having to kill to get to you was Verne's intercession."
"Raina would love that, to drag one of us down to the grave."
"I felt the munin's pleasure in destruction. You are attracted to violence, but only as it serves a greater purpose. It is a tool that you use well. Your old lupa was attracted to violence for its own sake, as a destructive thing. Destroying was what she was about. It is nicely ironic that someone so dedicated to negativity was also a healer."
"Life is just full of little ironies," I said. I didn't try to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.
"You have a chance to make her munin, her essence, into something positive. In a way, you might help her spirit work through some of its karma."
I frowned at her.
She waved her hands. "My apologies. I'll keep the philosophy to a minimum. I believe I can help you call and tame the munin. I believe that together we can begin to harness all the different kinds of power you are being offered now. I can teach you to ride not just the munin but this master vampire of yours, and even your Ulfric. You are their key to each other, Anita. Their bridge. Their feelings for you are part of the binding that has been wrought between the three. I can make you the rider and not the horse."
There was a fierceness in her face, a force that made my skin react. She meant what she said; she believed it. And strangely, so did I.
"I want to control it, Maria
She smiled, and it made her eyes sparkle. "Good; then let's begin with our first lesson."
I frowned at her. "What lesson?"
"Come into the house, Anita. The first lesson is waiting for you if your heart and mind are open to it." She went back inside without waiting for me.
I stood there for a moment in the summer heat. If my heart and mind were open to it. What the hell did that mean? Well, as the clichй goes, only one way to find out. I opened the screen door and walked inside. Lesson number one was waiting for me.