#Chapter 215 – Between Us

Alvin folds his hands in his lap, shrugging one shoulder. “Ever since we were very little –“

“Since we can remember, I guess,” Ian picks up, miming his brother’s action.

“We’ve always been able to see the magic. To notice it, when others don’t,” Alvin finishes. Both boys look apologetically Victor and I, then, as if they’ve been keeping a big secret and are sorry for it.

“But what is it?” Victor presses.

“It’s just…extra stuff, I guess,” Ian says, frowning, trying not to be vague but failing. I sit back and try to be patient, to let them work through it. “Like, it is the thing that is between Alvin and me. The thing that makes us able to talk to each other. The thing that makes us able to do…extra stuff.”

I frown at this, confused. What kind of extra stuff?

“When we were little,” Alvin says, “it was just around, the magic. And it was just between us – like always floating there, in the air.”

“Do you mean,” Victor says quietly, “that you can see it?”

Ian nods lightly. “Sometimes, we can. Not all the time. Or maybe we just don’t notice. But when we look for it, and it’s there, we can see it.”

Alvin nods, agreeing. “And then,” he continues, “as we got older, we learned how to start to use it.”

“That’s actually pretty new,” Ian says, excited. “Alvin figured it out most – like, he was able to use it just a little bit ago – on the battlefield –“

“The Alpha command,” Alvin clarifies, nodding. “I was able to…grab the magic. In the air. There wasn’t a lot. But I was able to use it to make the command work, even though I’m not technically their Alpha.”

Alvin smiles at Victor then, the Beta’s actual Alpha from whom he had briefly stolen command. Victor just shakes his head at him, not in denial, but in wonder and confusion.

“We thought,” I say, hesitating, “we thought you could just do that stuff because you’re smart. But you’re saying it’s because you’re…magic?”

mom,” he says, wrinkling his nose at the idea of it. “We can just see the magic, and now, I guess, move it around sometimes. But,”

this as well. I shake my

brushing up against the fabric of the tent. I shudder at the

curious. He saw

see that he’s starting to get tired, but no way in

and excited at the thought of it. “Like, so much, that it can make

“maybe you could see it tonight because you have

word sputtering from my mouth. “I – I have

nods, smiling at me. “Yes,” he said. “You always had a little bit of the magic, when we were little. But then you got more when we started spending more

you at Quiz Nation. You had a little magic around you.

looks at me as he scrounges through it. “And then, after the claiming ceremony, when daddy tried to bring

a chocolate bar out of his pack. He takes

got lots more right before the wedding. And then more and more later, when you decided

shake my head, disbelieving, and then snatch the candy bar out of my son’s hand. He gives a little squeak of protest, which I ignore as I take a bite and hand it back to him.

Alvin says, looking at us in disgust. “You guys are like,

Victor says, baffled and frankly

to tell you, because we didn’t want to hurt your feelings – and because, like, you wouldn’t get it – but ever since the first night after daddy came home from the hospital…you guys are like, covered

the air around me for any sign of

flicking his hair through the air around me, like he’s scattering flies. “You

kind of makes sense. I still don’t know what the hell this magic stuff is, but if it is…between us. Then it’s certainly something we’ve been dabbling in more and more since

explains how so many unexplainable

to Alvin, who accepts it gratefully and takes a bite. “That’s what the ghosts were drawn to, tonight. All the magic around you two.

I say, looking down into my hands.

but I can’t think of

it. If there are any changes to it, or anything

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