Shadow Kiss (31 page)

"Only to some people. And apparently not you since you're pretty good at it."

She stiffened. "Why would you think that?"

"Because someone—a couple people, actually—hinted at it." People? I tried to remember what Christian and I had said in the feeder room. We'd never mentioned her by name, though both of us had bragged about having seen someone use compulsion. And apparently, Jesse had noticed other things about her. "Besides, it's actually kind of obvious. People love you. You've gotten out of so much trouble, and I finally figured out why. You've been working people over this whole time. I was watching you in class the other day when you convinced Mr. Hill to let Christian work with you on that project. He never would have let anyone else do that."

I'd been with them in class that day. Lissa actually had used compulsion on her teacher to get help for Christian. She'd been so caught up in her pleas that she'd compelled Mr. Hill without even realizing it. Compared to other things I'd seen her do, it had actually been a pretty weak show of compulsion. No one had noticed. Well, almost no one.

"Look," Lissa said uneasily, "I seriously have no idea what you're talking about. I need to go to bed."

Jesse's face grew excited. "No, it's okay. We think it's cool. We want to help you—or actually, we want you to help us. I can't believe I never noticed it before. You're really good at it, and we need you to show us. Plus, none of the other Mână chapters has a Dragomir. We'd be the first to have every royal family represented."

She sighed. "If I could use compulsion, I'd make you guys go away. I told you, I'm not interested."

"But we need you!" exclaimed Ralf. Jesse shot him a sharp look and then turned his smile back on Lissa. I had this weird feeling he might actually be trying to compel her, but it had absolutely no effect on her—or me, since I was watching through her eyes.

"It's not just about you helping us. There are groups of Mână at every school," said Jesse. He was leaning close, and suddenly, he didn't look very friendly anymore. "Its members are all over the world. Be a part of it, and you'll have the connections to do whatever you want with your life. And if we can all learn to work compulsion, we can stop the Moroi government from doing stupid things—we can make sure the queen and everyone else make the right decision.

Everything about this is good for you!"

"I'm doing fine on my own, thanks," she said, stepping back. "And I'm not really sure you know what's best for the Moroi."

"Fine? With your Strigoi boyfriend and slutty wannabe guardian?" exclaimed Ralf. He spoke loudly enough to get Eddie's attention, and Eddie did not look happy.

"Be quiet," Jesse told him angrily. He turned to Lissa. "He shouldn't have said that…but he's kind of right. Your family's reputation is all on you, and the way you're going, no one's taking you seriously. The queen's already trying to keep you in line and get you away from Ozera.

You're going to crash and burn."

Lissa was growing angrier and angrier. "You have no idea what you're talking about. And—"

She frowned. "What do you mean she's trying to get me away from Christian?"

"She wants to marr—" Ralf started to speak, but Jesse immediately cut him off.

"That's exactly what I'm talking about," said Jesse. "We know all sorts of things that could affect you and help you— you
and
Christian."

I had a feeling that Ralf had been about to mention the queen's plans to marry Lissa off to Adrian. I was puzzling out how he would know about that until I recalled again that Ralf was related to the Vodas. Priscilla Voda was the queen's adviser and best friend. She knew all of the queen's plans and had probably told Ralf. His relationship to her must have been closer than I'd realized.

"Tell me," Lissa demanded. The thought of using compulsion on him actually crossed her mind, but she dismissed it. She wouldn't lower herself to that. "What do you know about Christian?"

"No free information," said Jesse. "Come to a meeting and we'll tell you everything."

"Whatever. I'm not interested in your elitist connections, and I don't know anything about compulsion." Despite her words, she was insanely curious about what he knew.

She started to turn away, but Jesse grabbed her arm. "Damn it! You have to—"

"Lissa's going to bed now," said Eddie. He'd shot over as soon as Jesse touched her. "Remove your hand, or I'll do it for you."

Jesse glared at Eddie. Like most Moroi-dhampir matchups, Jesse had height, and Eddie had muscle. Of course, Jesse had Ralf's bulk too, but it wouldn't matter. Everyone there knew who would win if Eddie went up against them. The beauty of it was that Eddie probably wouldn't even get in trouble if he claimed he'd done it to save Lissa from harassment.

Jesse and Ralf slowly backed off. "We need you," said Jesse. "You're the only one. Think about it."

When they were gone, Eddie asked, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah…thanks. God, that was so weird." They moved toward the stairs.

"What was it about?"

"They're obsessed with this royal society or something and want me to join so they can have every royal family in it. They were kind of fanatic about it." Eddie knew about spirit, but she wasn't comfortable reminding him what a badass she was with compulsion.

He opened the door for her. "Well, they can annoy you all they want, but they can't make you join something you don't want to."

"Yeah, I suppose." Part of her still wondered what they knew about Christian or if it had been a bluff. "I just hope they don't get too annoying."

"Don't worry," he told her, his voice hard. "I'll make sure they don't."

I slipped back to my body and opened the door to my own dorm. Halfway up the stairs, I discovered I was smiling. I certainly didn't want Jesse and Ralf bothering Lissa, but if it came down to Eddie having to rough them up? Yeah. I wouldn't mind seeing them get a little payback for what they'd done to others.

DEIRDRE THE COUNSELOR must not have had much of a life, because she scheduled our next appointment on a Sunday. I wasn't thrilled about it, seeing as it wasn't just my day off—it was also the day my friends had off. Orders were orders, however, so I grudgingly showed up.

"You're wrong," I told her as soon as I sat down. We hadn't really addressed the questions from my first session yet. We'd spent our last couple of times talking about my mother and what I thought of the field experience.

"What about?" she asked. She wore a sleeveless floral dress that seemed too cold for a day like today. It also bore an eerie resemblance to the nature photographs that hung around the office.

"About the guy. I don't just like him because I can't have him. I like him because … well, because he's
him.
I've proven it to myself."

"Proven it how?"

"It's a long story," I said evasively. I didn't really want to get into the details of my Adrian compulsion experiment. "You just have to trust me."

"What about the other thing we talked about?" she asked. "What about your feelings about Lissa?"

"That idea was wrong too."

"Did you prove it to yourself?"

"No, but it wasn't the kind of thing I could really test the same way."

"Then how can you be sure?" she asked.

"Because I am." That was the best answer she was going to get.

"How have things been with her recently?"

"Recently how?"

"Have you spent a lot of time together? Kept up with what she's been doing?"

"Sure, kind of. I don't see her as much. She's doing the same things as usual though. Hanging out with Christian. Acing every test. Oh, and she's practically got Lehigh's website memorized."

"Lehigh?"

I explained the queen's offer to Deirdre. "She won't even be there until fall, but Lissa's already looking at all her classes and trying to figure out what she wants to major in."

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"What will you do while she attends classes?"

"I'll go with her. That's what usually happens if a Moroi has a guardian close to her age. They'll probably enroll me too."

"You'll take the same classes she does?"

"Yup."

"Are there classes you'd rather take instead?"

"How do I know? She hasn't even picked the ones she's going to take, so I don't know if I want to take them or not. But it doesn't matter. I have to go with her."

"And you don't have a problem with that?"

My temper was starting to prickle. This was exactly what I hadn't wanted to talk about. "No," I said tightly.

I knew Deirdre wanted me to elaborate, but I refused to. We held each other's eyes for a few moments, almost like we were challenging the other to look away. Or maybe I was reading too much into it. She glanced down at the mysterious notepad she always held and flipped through a couple of pages. I noticed that her nails were perfectly shaped and painted red. The polish on mine had started to chip.

"Would you rather not talk about Lissa today?" she asked at last.

"We can talk about whatever you think is useful."

"What do
you
think is useful?"

Damn it. She was doing the question thing again. I wondered if one of the certificates on her wall gave her some sort of special qualification to do that.

"I think it'd be useful if you stopped talking to me like I'm a Moroi. You act like I have choices—like I have the right to be upset about any of this or pick what classes I want to take. I mean, let's say I could choose them. What good would it do? What am I going to do with those classes? Go be a lawyer or a marine biologist? There's no point in me having my own schedule.

Everything's already decided for me."

"And you're okay with that." It could have been a question, but she said it like a statement of fact.

I shrugged. "I'm okay with keeping her safe, and that's what you keep missing here. Every job has bad parts. Do I want to sit through her calculus classes? No. But I have to because the other part is more important. Do you want to listen to angry teenagers try to block your efforts? No.

But you have to because the rest of your job is more important."

"Actually," she said unexpectedly, "that's my favorite part of the job."

I couldn't tell if she was joking or not, but I decided not to pursue it, particularly since she hadn't responded with a question. I sighed.

"I just hate everyone acting like I'm being forced to be a guardian."

"Who's 'everyone'?"

"Well, you and this guy I met at Court…this dhampir named Ambrose. He's…well, he's a blood whore. A guy blood whore." Like that wasn't obvious. I waited to see if she'd react to the term, but she didn't. "He made it sound like I was trapped in this life and all that too. But I'm not.

This is what I want. I'm good at this. I know how to fight, and I know how to defend others.

Have you ever seen a Strigoi?"

She shook her head.

"Well, I have. And when I say I want to spend my life protecting Moroi and killing Strigoi, I mean it. Strigoi are evil and need to be wiped out. I'm happy to do that and if I get to be with my best friend in the process, that's even better."

"I understand that, but what happens if you want other things—things that you can't have by choosing this lifestyle?"

I crossed my arms. "Same answer as before. There are good and bad sides to everything. We just have to balance them as best we can. I mean, are you going to try to tell me that life isn't that way? That if I can't have everything perfect, then there's something wrong with me?"

"No, of course not," she said, tilting back in her chair. "I want you to have a wonderful life, but I can't expect a perfect one. No one can. But what I think is interesting here is how you respond and cope when you have to reconcile these contradictory pieces of your life—when having one thing means you can't have another."

"Everyone goes through that." I felt like I was repeating myself.

"Yes, but not everyone sees ghosts as a result of it."

It took several heavy seconds for me to finally realize what she was getting at. "So wait. You're saying that the reason I'm seeing Mason is because I secretly resent Lissa for the things I can't have in my life? What happened to all the trauma I've been through? I thought that was the reason I'm seeing Mason?"

"I think there are a lot of reasons you're seeing Mason," she said. "And that's what we're exploring."

"And yet," I said, "we never actually talk about Mason."

Deirdre smiled serenely. "Don't we?"

Our session ended.

"Does she always answer your questions with questions?" I asked Lissa later. I was walking with her through the quad, heading toward the commons for dinner. Afterward, we were going to meet up with the others for a movie. It had been a while since she and I had hung out just by ourselves, and I realized now how much I'd missed it.

"We don't see the same counselor," she laughed. "It'd be a conflict of interest."

"Well, does yours do that then?"

"Not that I've really noticed. I take it yours does?"

"Yeah … it's actually pretty amazing to watch."

"Who knew the day would come when we'd be comparing notes on therapy?"

We both laughed at that. Several moments passed, and then she started to say something. She wanted to tell me about what had happened with Jesse and Ralf, not realizing I already knew.

Before she could say anything, though, someone joined us. Dean Barnes.

"Hey, Rose. A bunch of us are trying to figure out why you're on half-time."

Great. I'd known somebody would ask about that sooner or later. And honestly, I was kind of surprised it hadn't happened already. Everyone had been too busy with their own field experiences to give it much thought until now. I had an excuse ready.

"I've been sick. Dr. Olendzki didn't want me going full-time."

"Really?" he asked, staggering a little. "I thought they were always talking about how in the real world, you don't get sick days. Or something like that."

"Well, this isn't the real world, and Dr. Olendzki's word is final."