richellemead-vampireacademy01-vampireacademy-110824015328-phpapp02

Seeing her expression, he nodded. "Yes. I won't lie to you. It will be hard. It will exhaust you—
mentally and physically. But I must do it. I am sorry. You'll be provided with feeders and other
entertainments for your services.”
She leapt from the chair. Ben immediately stepped forward and pushed her back into it. "And
then what? Are you going to just make me a prisoner here? Your own private nurse?”
He made that annoying open-palmed gesture again. "I'm sorry. I have no choice.”
White-hot anger blasted away the fear inside of her. She spoke in a low voice. "Yes. You don't
have the choice, because this is me we're talking about.”
"It's better for you this way. You know how the others turned out. How Vladimir spent the last
of his days stark, raving mad. How Sonya Karp had to be taken away. The trauma you've
experienced since the accident comes from more than just your family's loss. It's from using
spirit. The accident woke the spirit in you; your fear over seeing Rose dead made it burst out,
allowing you to heal her. It forged your bond. And once it's out, you can't put it back. It's a
powerful element—but it's also dangerous. Earth users get their power from the earth, air users
from the air. But spirit? Where do you think that comes from?”
She glared.
"It comes from you, from your own essence. To heal another, you must give part of yourself.
The more you do that, the more it will destroy you over time. You must be noticing that
already. I've seen how much certain things upset you, how fragile you are.”
"I'm not fragile," snapped Lissa. "And I'm not going to go crazy. I'm going to stop using spirit
before things get worse.”
He smiled. "Stop using it? You might as well stop breathing. Spirit has its own agenda…You'll
always have the urge to help and heal. It's part of you. You resisted the animals, but you didn't
think twice about helping Rose. You can't even help compulsion—which spirit also gives you
special strength in. And that's how it will always be. You can't avoid spirit. Better to stay here,
in isolation, away from further sources of stress. You'd either have become increasingly
unstable at the Academy, or they would have put you on some pill that would have made you
feel better but stunted your power.”