Page 143 of House of Roots and Ruin
Kosamaras was gone.
But there, at the top of the hill, watching from the boardwalk, was Alex, his mouth hung open in horror.
“Alex,” I called up fearfully.
What had he seen?
What had he heard?
He backed his chair away, retreating from me, confusion written across his face.
I sprang into action, racing up the grassy embankment. “Wait. Alex! Please wait!”
He wheeled past one of the Menagerie animals, an almost-butterfly with tentacles instead of legs, and I lost sight of him. When I rushed around the great stony mass, I saw he’d stopped, frozen in the middle of the boardwalk, his back to me.
“Alex?”
I heard my voice rise with uncertain hope. Maybe this wasn’t really Alex. Maybe this was still part of the poisons I’d consumed. Maybe he wasn’t here at all.
But when he whirled his chair around—whole and him, without a trace of otherworldly tint—I knew such luck was not mine.
“Whatwasthat, Verity?”
I licked my lips, buying time. “What…what exactly did you see?”
His eyebrows furrowed together. “I don’t know. You were in the middle of some sort of…fit. You were screaming and…” He shook his head and a strange light flickered over his features as he studied me. “What’s wrong with you?”
I bristled against his insinuation. I’d known there was a strong chance he’d react like this. It’s why I had held my secrets so closely all this time. But it still stung to hear him say it aloud. “There’s nothingwrongwith me. I was…I was speaking to someone.”
Alex scanned the garden in disbelief. “There’s no one here. Just you.”
“There was,” I insisted.
“I saw no one.”
“But I did…” In a hasty sweep, I knelt beside his chair, putting us both on the same level. “I…I see things.”
“Things,” he repeated.
“Ghosts,” I admitted softly.
“That’s not possible.”
“It sounds fantastical, I know, but it’s true all the same.” I took his hands in mine, as if I might somehow tangibly impart my confession. “I’ve seen them my whole life. Ever since I was a girl. I don’t…I don’t always know they’re ghosts. My nursemaid, Hanna…she’s been with me my entire life. She was always there—kissing skinned knees, telling me stories before bed. She held me when I cried, she made me laugh. She was everything to me…The night I left Highmoor, I found out that she had died when I was very small. But she’d stayed behind, tolook after me.” My eyelashes were wet with tears. “All that time, she’d been a ghost.”
Alex’s face softened by degrees. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“I didn’t know what you’d think. Or rather…I did and I didn’t want to see that. Most people who hear you see ghosts think there’s somethingwrongwith you,” I said, throwing back the little dagger he’d flung. It was oddly satisfying to see him wince.
“So…just now. Down there. You were talking to a ghost?”
“Not exactly.” I looked away. This was the moment I’d been waiting for—I was going to tell Alex everything, confess all that I knew, and there would be nothing left between us. But now that the time was here, with all of my secrets right on the tip of my tongue, it felt impossible. I scrunched my eyes shut and let everything fall loose in a heated rush. “It was a Harbinger. Kosamaras. I summoned her because something terrible is going on at Chauntilalie. Your father…your father’s experiments…”
“Father’s experiments,” he repeated, and I dared to open my eyes. “The flowers? What about them?”
I let out a deep, shaking breath. “Flowers aren’t the only things he’s been experimenting on.”
Slowly, painfully, I told him everything.
