Page 114 of House of Roots and Ruin
He sighed. “That’s not saying much.”
“Would one of you please explain what’s going on?” I demanded. Too many things were happening too fast. I felt bogged down in their collective mire.
Julien turned to me. “I’m special.” His tone was flat and expressionless, making the word sound anything but. “Viktor’s special. We’re both so terribly special.”
“You read people’s minds?” I repeated, needing to hear him say it.
I knew there were things, many things, about the world that I did not know, did not understand. Things too fantastical to be believed. Mind reading sounded far-fetched but they’d overheard me talking to a ghost. Who was I to say their story was outlandish?
“Yes,” Julien said simply, offering no other explanation.
“Both of you?” I asked, carefully avoiding Viktor’s gaze. My cheeks flamed as I remembered all the things he might have overheard while I enjoyed his kisses.
Julien let out a short laugh, more a burst of sound than actual amusement. “No. Viktor has other…talents.”
I dared to look over at him. “What?”
“I…” His eyes fell to the floor, looking somber.
Julien sighed with impatience. “Just show her.”
“But—”
“We’re all laying our cards upon the proverbial table. There’s little use in keeping secrets now.”
Viktor pursed his lips before gesturing to the writing desk on the far side of the room.
At first, I wasn’t sure what I was meant to notice.
Then, a flicker of movement.
The slight dance of a slip of flame.
I turned back to Viktor. “You lit the candle?”
He nodded and a candelabra on the side table ignited as well.
Then the tapers lined in the windows.
Then the gas lamps.
“Stop!” I ordered. The illumination was too great, too bright to trick myself into believing what happened before me was an illusion, some sleight-of-hand mischief designed to impress and enthrall.
Viktor shrugged and, one by one, the flames extinguished, wicked away by hands unseen.
“How?”
Another shrug. “I just…concentrate on the feelings inside me and—”
I struggled to find the right words. “No, nothow—” I paused, all the swirling chaos of my mind stilling down to the only question that really mattered to me. “If you are Alex’s brothers, and both of you can do thosethings…what about him?”
Viktor shrugged. “Father sent us away before we ever noticed Alexander’s…gift.”
“Sent you away?”
They nodded together.
“To…to boarding school?” I guessed, trying to pry the story free.
