“A what?”

“Agito. It’s Latin roughly translating to ‘put into motion.’ Half-demons come in many types, as you’ll discover. An Agito’s power, as the name might suggest, is telekinesis.”

“Moving things with the mind.”

“Very good. And it is an Agito who moved that chair, though one who is still very much alive.”

“You?”

He smiled and, for a second, the mask of the doddering old fool cracked, and I caught a glimpse of the real man beneath. What I saw was pride and arrogance, like a classmate flashing his A+ paper as if to say top that.

“Yes, I’m a supernatural, as is almost everyone who works here. I know what you must have been thinking—that we’re humans who’ve discovered your powers and wish to destroy what we don’t understand, like in those comic books.”

“The X-Men.”

I don’t know what was more shocking, that Dr. Davidoff and his colleagues were supernaturals or the image of this stooped, awkward man reading X-Men. Had he pored over them as a boy, imagining himself in Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters?

Did that mean Aunt Lauren was a necromancer? That she saw ghosts, too?

He continued before I could ask anything. “The Edison Group was founded by supernaturals eighty years ago. And as much as it has grown since those early days, it’s still an institution run by supernaturals and for supernaturals, dedicated to bettering the lives of our kind.”

“Edison Group?”

“Named after Thomas Edison.”

“The guy who invented the lightbulb?”

“That’s what he’s best known for. He also invented the movie projector, which I’m sure you’re grateful for. Yet you, Chloe, have accomplished something he dreamed of but never succeeded in doing.” A dramatic pause. “Contacting the dead.”

“Thomas Edison wanted to talk to the dead?”

“He believed in an afterlife and wanted to communicate with it not through séances and spiritualism but through science. When he died, it’s thought he was working on just such a device—a telephone to the afterlife. No plans for it were ever found.” Dr. Davidoff smiled conspiratorially. “Or, at least, not officially. We adopted the name because, like Edison, we take a scientific approach to matters of the paranormal.”

Improving supernatural lives through science. Where had I heard something like that? It took me a moment to remember, and when I did, I shivered.

The ghosts I’d raised in the Lyle House basement had been subjects of experiments by a sorcerer named Samuel Lyle. Willing subjects, at first, they’d said, because they’d been promised a better life. Instead, they’d ended up lab rats sacrificed to the vision of a madman, as one ghost had put it. And that thing in my room had called Brady—and me, I think—Samuel Lyle’s “creations.”

“Chloe?”

“S-sorry. I’m just—”

“Tired, I imagine, after being up all night. Would you like a rest?”

“No, I-I’m fine. It’s just—So how do we fit in? And Lyle House? It’s part of an experiment, isn’t it?”

His chin lifted, not much, just enough of a reaction to tell me I’d caught him off guard and that he didn’t like it. A pleasant smile erased the look and he eased back in his chair.

“It is an experiment, Chloe. I know how that must sound, but I assure you, it’s a noninvasive study, using only benign psychological therapy.”

Benign? There was nothing benign about what had happened to Liz and Brady.

“Okay, so we’re part of this experiment….” I said.

“Being a supernatural is both a blessing and curse. Adolescence is the most difficult time for us, as our powers begin to manifest. One of the Edison Group’s theories is that it might be easier if our children don’t know of their future.”

“Don’t know they’re supernatural?”

“Yes, instead allowing them to grow up as human, assimilating into human society without anxiety over the upcoming transition. You and the others are part of that study. For most, it has worked. But for others, such as you, your powers came too quickly. We needed to ease you into the truth and ensure you didn’t harm yourselves or anyone else in the meantime.”

So they put us into a group home and told us we were crazy? Drugged us? That made no sense. What about Simon and Derek, who’d already known what they were? How could they be part of this study? But Derek clearly was, if what Brady said was right.

What about that thing calling us Dr. Lyle’s creations? What about Brady and Liz, permanently removed from this study? Murdered. You don’t kill a subject when he doesn’t respond well to your “benign psychological therapy.”

They’d lied all along—did I really think they’d fess up now? If I wanted the truth, I needed to do what I’d been doing. Search for my own answers.

So I let Dr. Davidoff blather on, telling me about their study, about the other kids, about how we’d be “fixed” and out of here in no time. And I smiled and nodded and started making my own plans.

Five

WHEN DR. DAVIDOFF WAS done with the propaganda, he took me to see Rae, who was still in that makeshift game room playing Zelda. He opened the door and waved me in, then closed it, leaving us alone.

“Game time over?” Rae said, turning slowly. “Just let me finish—”

Seeing me, she leaped up, controller clattering to the floor. She hugged me, then pulled back.

“Your arm,” she said. “Did I hurt—?”

“No, it’s all bandaged up. It needed some stitches.”

“Ouch.” Rae took a long look at me. “You need some sleep, girl. You look like death.”

“That’s just the necromancer genes kicking in.”

She laughed and gave me another hug before plunking back down in her beanbag chair. Despite our long night on the run, Rae looked fine. But then Rae was one of those girls who always looked fine—perfect clear copper skin; copper eyes; and long curls that, if they caught the light right, glinted with copper, too.

“Pull up a box. I’d offer you a chair, but decorators these days?” She rolled her eyes. “So slow. When the renovations are done, though, you won’t recognize the place. Stereo system, DVD player, computer…chairs. And, as of tomorrow, we’re getting a Wii.”

“Really?”

“Yep. I said, ‘People, if I’m helping you with this study of yours, I need a little love in return. And a GameCube ain’t gonna cut it.’”

“Did you ask for a bigger TV, too?”

“I should have. After the whole Lyle House screwup, they’re tripping over themselves to make us happy. We are going to be so spoiled here. Of course, we deserve it.”

“We do.”

She grinned, her face glowing. “Did you hear? I’m a half-demon. An Exhaust—Exustio. That’s the highest kind of fire demon you can be. Cool, huh?”

Being a half-demon was cool. But being a half-demon lab rat, teetering on the brink of extermination? Definitely not cool. As much as I longed to tell her the truth, though, I couldn’t. Not yet.

Just last night, Rae had been lying on her bed at Lyle House, trying to light a match with her bare fingers, desperate for proof she had a supernatural ability. Now she’d discovered she was a special kind of half-demon. That was important to Rae in a way I couldn’t understand—in a way that I just had to accept until I had more proof that this wasn’t the best thing that ever happened to her.

“And you know what else?” she said. “They showed me pictures of my mom. My real mom. None of my dad, of course, being a demon. Kind of freaky when you think about it. Demons aren’t exactly…” For the first time, worry clouded her eyes. She blinked it back. “But Dr. D. says that it doesn’t make you evil or whatever. Anyway, my mom? Her name was Jacinda. Isn’t that pretty?”

I opened my mouth to agree, but she kept rambling excitedly.

“She used to work here, like Simon’s dad. They have pictures of her. She was gorgeous. Like a model. And Dr. D. said they might even know where to find her, and they’re going to try. Just for me.”