He’d feel better if he still had it, and he found himself wondering why only he and Kristen, out of all of the residents in all the Houses, had been granted such extrasensory abilities. It seemed strange to him, and he wondered if it wasn’t a fluke, a mistake.

Maybe he’d been chosen.

That made no sense. Chosen that long ago? Selected as a child? Why? So that he could one day go up against the girl? It seemed both absurd and stupid to him that the House would know all of this was going to happen, would prepare for it by grooming him, yet would do nothing to prevent any of it from occurring.

Still, the idea was not inconceivable, and he could not quite believe that his possession of The Power had been accidental.

But why had it been taken from him?

Maybe she had taken it.

He should have asked Kristen.

Mark forced himself to stop thinking, to concentrate only on the House around him and the task ahead of him. He could not allow himself to be distracted. One false move could cost him whatever small advantage he might have. He had to remain focused.

Slowly, he climbed the stairs to the second floor.

He stopped for a moment at the top of the stairs, hesitated. The mood up here was familiar, the ambience one of palpable malevolence. It was exactly the same thing he’d felt that day when he’d been alone in the house with the retarded girl, and it was everything he could do to keep from running back down the stairs. He felt like a kid again, a scared kid, and he forced that feeling into submission, knowing it was what she wanted, knowing it would give her the edge she needed.

He moved carefully down the hall, alert for any sign that anything was out of the ordinary, and froze as he heard the sound of a child laughing. It was a chilling sound, the timbre that of a pre-adolescent but the cadence informed with the experience of an adult.

It was coming from halfway down the hall.

From Kristen’s room.

Mark could smell the sour stench of his own sweat as he approached the closed door. His hands were clenched, the palms sweaty. He still had no plan, no idea of what he was going to do or even what he should do. There was no choice but to plow ahead, however, and he stood before the door, took a deep breath, reached out.

And opened it.

The retarded girl was seated cross-legged on Kristen’s bed. She looked over at him, and he saw for the first time that she looked exactly like Kristen had as a child. He’d never noticed that before.

Had it been true before?

He wasn’t sure, couldn’t remember.

“Mark,” the girl said.