“I hope she’s okay,” I say.

“Roman has been in touch with her and said that she’s doing fine.”

I’m so confused. I need Izzy. Quite frankly, I don’t have a lot of close friends. I mean, when you’re from a family that’s part of a weird secret society, it can be hard to connect to people outside of it.

“Don’t worry,” Kor says. “She made a ton of money selling her app, and she just wants to focus on other things now. She’s been pulling away ever since she went off to college. This isn’t that big of a surprise.”

But that doesn’t explain why she would ghost me. Or why she would keep working with a company that she thinks is harming people.

“Hey.” Kor gently kicks my foot with his. “We should be celebrating.” Once I pocket my phone, he takes both of my hands in his and stands, pulling me to my feet. “You’re going to learn how to use your abilities.”

My abilities.

It’s so weird to think of them as something positive that can be trained and used for good. Aside from the easy healing and my talent with plants, I’ve rarely ever felt different from other people. Because of my parents’ fear, I’d gotten used to suppressing anything peculiar about myself over the years. And it mostly worked. It’s easy enough to turn yourself into someone else when your true self scares the people you love.

But in recent months, it had all become harder to ignore. The stress of college applications was making my hands hot and tingly all the time, and keeping it in check was taking way too much emotional energy. I knew from experience that talking to Mom about it was not an option. I finally confided in Kor and Izzy, thinking maybe they could find the book that I had seen so many years before in the archives to help me learn more.

I haven’t gotten over the whiplash of what followed.

Kor had been elated, and he immediately convinced me that I had to tell the Families and be initiated.

When I’d asked Mom why she hadn’t told me sooner that the Families needed someone like me, she brushed it off, saying that she hadn’t realized it was the same condition they’d been researching. But as soon as the idea of trying to get me into the institute had been suggested, she’d agreed, as if she couldn’t wait to have the problem of “What is Ada going to do with her life?” off her plate.

Kor is giddy now like he was that same day I first told him about my abilities. “Do you have any idea what you’re capable of?” he asks me, squeezing my hands tightly.

No. I have no idea.