The Power Read Online Free PDF Page B

tried to talk it out of what it wanted me to do. The beat of Widow Winters’ heart grew louder, and I covered my ears. It was deafening. I grew crazed. I turned sharply and tipped over my wineglass. Widow Winters gasped from across the room.
    “ “What is wrong with you, dear girl?” She practically shouted from across the long table. I stared at the ground, not wanting her to see me. I was sure that I was not presentable. I could feel it: the change that was trying to come over me. I looked to my hand and I saw that my nails had sharpened against the table, digging long furrows into the wood. What was this? Something new, I wondered curiously as I felt newfound strength oozing through my every limb.
    “ “I don’t feel so well.” I said, and she stood, overturning her chair. I gripped the table tighter, fighting off the hunger with what willpower I could muster up.
    “ “Dear God!” Widow Winters shrieked. “It’s about time.” She said, and I shook my blonde head in confusion. What was she talking about?
    “ “Time?” I croaked out.
    “ “Yes! Time! Die already!” she screamed at me, and I was so shocked by her words that my head shot up.
    “ “Die?” I cried out, still fighting against the hunger that wanted me to do what I had been reborn to do.
    “ A cruel smile slid into place on Widow Winter’s pink-fleshed face as she morbidly watched me, and then suddenly, I could hear her thoughts in my head as if they were my own. My face furrowed in confusion as her thoughts caught my brain.
    “ “Die!” She shouted inside my mind. “Die, won‘t you? I’ve been poisoning you for months. I thought you would die nearly a week ago. I called the doctor here to watch you do so, so that he would think that I had done all that I could to save you, my dear niece.”
    “ “No!” I covered my ears as her sickly twisted thoughts rushed to me. “I’m your niece?” I asked out loud, unbelieving the voice that I had heard in my head. All of these years, I had thought that Widow Winters had taken pity on me, the orphan that I had become after my father’s death. She had taken me in when I had had no one, but she had made me her servant! “Your niece?” I asked again in shocked disbelief.
    “ “How did you know that?” she shrieked furiously, and she started toward me. “Why aren’t you dead yet?” she demanded in extreme agitation.
    “ “Because I died five nights ago, dear aunt.” I rose to my tall height, towering over my small aunt with strength that came upon me as swiftly as the fierce winds of a storm.
    “ “What did you say?” she shrank back in alarm, holding up defensive hands.
    “ ”You tried to kill me. Why?” I demanded, walking toward her with intent. Her eyes widened in surprise, and she picked up a brass candle stick from the table to bash my head in, I was sure. I looked upon her with hatred, hatred for the years of lies, for the years I had spent in cold and filth beneath the stairs while she and her daughters had lavished in wealth! “Why?” I shouted at her.
    ““Because you have more money than the Duke of Winchester and the Earl of Havenmore put together!” she shouted at me wildly. I knew the names. I had even met the Earl of Havenmore. He was a delightful man. I had looked up to him when I had been a child of five and he would visit my father. My father, I thought suddenly. It was difficult to recall those times. I had been so young, but if the Earl of Havenmore had visited with my father, then surely my family could not have been that bad off, I reasoned.
    “ “My father had wealth?” I asked carefully, and it was her thoughts that came to me first. I could read her like an open book, but I despised the words that adorned the pages. They sickened me!
    “ “Your father had nothing.” Her thoughts told me in disgust. “Not when my stupid sister married the man, he didn’t. He won the first of his fortune on a silly bet, gaining himself a prize thoroughbred