There was an exchange of looks all the way around. Stephen said, "I don't know if we can explain it to you."
I nodded. "I know, magic is like that. You either get it, or you don't."
"Is this magic?" Teddy asked. "Or is it just psychic ability?"
"I'm not sure there is a difference," I said. "Sometimes I think the only difference is that psychic ability is something you do without thinking about it, and magic requires a ritual to get your juices going."
"You do more of this kind of shit than we do," Kevin said. "We're just werewolves, not witches."
"I'm not a witch. I'm a necromancer."
He shrugged. "Same diff to me." He sat down in the chair he'd started out in, crushing the cigarette into the palm of his hand as if it were lit and his flesh were an ashtray. He scowled up at me. I didn't know him well enough to be sure, but he seemed nervous.
Me, too. I only knew two ways to raise energy: ritual or sex. The sex took the place of ritual when I was with Jean-Claude or Richard. But I had no bond with Nathaniel. No marks, no emotion, nothing. I wasn't his leoparde lionne,not really. It was all lies. I couldn't do this without some feeling towards him. Pity wasn't enough.
Teddy loomed up behind me. "What's wrong, Anita?"
I would have walked across the room and whispered, but I knew Nathaniel would hear anywhere in the small room. "I need some emotion to work from, something."
"Emotion?" he asked.
"I don't know Nathaniel. I don't feel anything for him except pity, obligation. Neither of those is enough to even get started."
"What do you need?" His eyes were very serious. The intelligence in them was almost touchable.
I tried to put it into words and ended up saying, "I need something to take the place of a ritual."
"Raina didn't use a ritual," Kevin said from the chair.
"She used sex. Sex can take the place of the ritual."
"You raised power at the lupanar that one night with Richard," Stephen said. "You didn't have sex, but you still raised power."
"But I... I wanted Richard sexually. It's a sort of energy all of its own."
"Nathaniel is handsome," Stephen said.
I shook my head. "It's never been that easy for me. I need more than a pretty face."
Stephen slid out of the bed in one of those wraparound gowns, but it didn't gape as he moved. It was wrapped around him like a sheet, more cloth than he needed, just like it would have been on me. One size never really fits all.
He tried to take my hand, and I wouldn't let him. "Let me help you."
"Define help." Suspicious, who me?
He smiled, and it was almost condescending. The smile men get around girls when they're doing something sort of cute and girlish. The smile alone pissed me off. "What is your problem?" I asked.
"You," he said softly. "You know I would never hurt you, don't you?"
I looked into his cornflower-blue eyes and nodded. "Never on purpose." I said.
"Then trust me now. Let me help you call the power."
"How?" I asked.
He took my hand in both of his, and this time I let him. He drew my hand to Nathaniel. He rested my fingertips on Nathaniel's forehead. His skin was cool. Just the touch of his skin, and you knew he wasn't well.
"Pet him," Stephen said.