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Evie sank into a chair again. “You what?”
“He was sick. Pneumonia. The doctors thought… he wasn’t expected to live and Jake had developed the tonic.…” Will raked a hand through his hair. “So I gave it to him. His recovery was miraculous. James was the proof Jake needed to move forward with Project Buffalo.”
“Subject zero. Zenith, Ohio,” Evie said numbly. The first thumbtack in the map they’d seen was her own brother. Evie’s eyes stung. She narrowed them at Will. “What about me?”
“That was a mistake.”
Evie flinched at the word mistake.
“The tonic. I’d left it behind. Your mother was already expecting you. She’d had several miscarriages after James. She figured if the tonic had made James strong and healthy, then… so she…” Will looked down at his shoes. “I didn’t know until she was well along with you. You said you wanted the truth, Evangeline. But truth is complicated.”
Evie slapped a hand down on the table. “No. It isn’t complicated. It’s very simple. You experimented on human beings and we are the results. What’s left of them, anyway. That board we saw had thumbtacks all over the country. One hundred and forty-four of them, to be exact. So, where are the rest?”
“Some of our subjects simply never developed any powers,” Will said. “It turned out that it was actually very hard to make Diviners.”
Theta narrowed her eyes. “You said some didn’t develop powers.”
“You don’t seem to understand: Once they shut down the department, that was the end of it. We never saw the files or the subjects ever again. We were finished,” Will said. “We don’t know what happened to the others. For all we know, their powers didn’t take and they’re out there now, living perfectly ordinary lives wit
hout a lick of connection to the supernatural.”
“Well, somebody didn’t think it was finished,” Sam said. “And I’m pretty sure that those somebodies have my mother. And now they’re going around killing people who had anything to do with Project Buffalo. You remember a fella named Ben Arnold?”
“I have read my history books, Sam,” Will snapped.
“Wrong Ben Arnold. This one was my informant. Except now he’s dead, right after he told me a buncha stuff about Project Buffalo. And his death notice was slipped under our door at the Bennington.”
Will paled. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Sam snorted. “Why didn’t I tell you? Oh. That’s rich. You’re the ones who’ve been keeping secrets about us from us and telling us to trust you!”
“All right! Now you know.” Sister Walker marched forward and planted herself in front of the Diviners. “We can’t undo the past. But we are here now. If you truly want to help your country, you’ll move past this. We have work to do to save—”
Memphis leaped up, voice thick with scorn. “Move past this?”
“You’ve got some nerve saying that—” Sam said, joining him.
“Don’t yell at her,” Ling snapped.
“How ’bout you don’t tell me what to do!”
Will came forward now, hands up. “Now, wait just a minute—”
“Hang your ghosts!” Henry growled. He was out of his seat now. They all were. “You’re liars!”
The Diviners had gathered, without realizing it, in a tight huddle, nearly nose-to-nose, arguing, their voices rising over one another:
“—What choice do we have?—”
“—I don’t like being lied to—”
“—Easy for you to say—”
“—Who asked you?—”
The Metaphysickometer hummed loudly, its needle popping up and down. The radio came on with a sudden squawk and raced through stations in a jumbled jazz of speech, music, and static. A corner of the room seemed to wobble and bend.
“What just happened?” Theta asked when it quieted. The smell of electricity hung in the air.
