You are ambidextrous. You can lift weights heavier than your own body. You can grasp a new avocation in an instant. You do not require food or drink to survive. You are loved by your true family. You love your Daddy. I struggled to keep my composure at those last words, unable to erase the mental image of Zosimon with Pippa. ‘No.’ I started at the sound of a voice that wasn’t Zosimon’s. I opened my eyes and turned around, noticing that the others sitting cross-legged around me were doing the same. It was Maggie. She had a wild look about her, more alive than I’d seen her for days. She held a knife, and was making her way shakily but deliberately to the raised platform where Zosimon was seated. He rose to his feet, seemingly unperturbed. ‘Magnus,’ he said mildly. ‘What’s this all about?’ ‘Stop,’ said Maggie, taking relentless steps forward, her knuckles white around the knife’s hilt. I recognised it as being one of the kitchen knives we used to cut up vegetables.
