She shrugged, "Zane and I can share."
It must have shown on my face, because she added, "We aren't lovers, Anita. Though we have been. It will be ... a comfort to touch each other. It's not sexual. It's ... " She looked at Marianne, as if for help.
Marianne smiled. "One of the things that binds a pack or a pard into a unit is touch. They touch each other constantly. They groom each other. They care for each other."
I shook my head. "I'm not sharing a bathtub."
"No one is asking you to," Marianne said. "There are many ways to forge a pack bond, Anita."
"I'm not part of the pack," I said.
"There are many ways to be part of the pack, Anita. I have found my place among them, and I am not lukoi." She left Zane, Cherry, and me to unload the coffins while she took Nathaniel off to lie down. Cherry and Zane helped stow the coffins in the basement, then went off to take their communal bath.
The entrance to the basement was outside, like an old-fashioned storm cellar. The back door was all screen and wood. It clanged loudly as the wereleopards went inside. Marianne met me at that door, stepped through that door, and blocked my way.
She was smiling and calm and seemed at peace in the center of her universe. Just seeing that content look on her face made me itchy and uncomfortable. Made me want to scream and lash out until her universe was as messy as my own. How dare she be content when I was so confused?
"What is so very wrong, child? I can hear your confusion like bees buzzing in the walls."
There was a stand of pine trees near the back of the house like a line of soldiers. The air smelled like a perpetual Christmas. I usually like the smell of pine, but not today. I just wasn't in a Christmas mood. I leaned against the weathered boards of the house, while she stayed on the small back porch looking down at me.
The Firestar dug into my back. I pulled it out and shoved it down the front of my jeans. Fuck it if somebody saw.
"You saw Verne," I said.
She looked at me, grey eyes calm, unreadable. "I saw what you did to his neck, if that is what you mean."
"Yeah, that's what I mean."
"Your mark on his neck proves two things to all of us. That you consider yourself his equal -- no small boast -- and that you are not happy with his hospitality to date. Are either of these untrue?"
I thought about that for a moment, then said, "I don't acknowledge anyone as dominant to me. Maybe they can beat the shit out of me or kill me, but they're not better than I am. Stronger doesn't mean better or more dominant."
"There are those who would argue with you, Anita, but I am not one of them."
"And no, I'm not happy with the hospitality to date. I destroyed most of Colin's vampires for you guys. Verne was pleased as punch, but he still didn't let me have my guns last night. If I'd had my guns last night, then the bad guys wouldn't have nearly killed Jamil and Jason and Zane -- hell -- and me."
"Verne regretted last night or he would not have offered himself to you."
"Great, fine, but I didn't mean to mark him. I didn't mean to do it. Do you understand, Marianne? I didn't do it on purpose. Just like last night with the munin, this morning I wasn't in control. I was seduced by the scent of blood and warm flesh. It was ... creepy."
She laughed. "Creepy? Is that the best word you can come up with, Anita? Creepy. You are the Executioner and a force to be feared, but you are still so ... young."
I looked up at her. "You mean naive."
"You are not naive in the sense that it is usually meant. I am sure you have seen more blood and death than I have. It stains your power, this violence. You both attract it and pursue it. But there is something about you that stays fresh and somehow perpetually childlike. No matter how jaded you grow, there will always be a part of you that would be more comfortable saying 'golly' than 'goddamn.' "
I wanted to wiggle under the intensity of her gaze, or run. "I am losing control of my life, Marianne, and control is very important to me."
"I would say that control is one of themost 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, Marianne? You seem to have all the answers."
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."