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I snatch it up, then groan when I see the caller ID—Mom.

I’m pretty uneager to talk to her so soon after I got railed within an inch of my life.

I answer anyway. “Hi Mo?—”

“Selene Imogen Bowers,” my mom says, her voice shrill, “howdareyou not tell me what’s been going on! I heard you were arrested—” Her voice breaks. In the background, I hear my father soothing her.

The two of them are still overseas on their months’ long tour of Europe. I’d hoped the distance was enough to avoid this conversation altogether, but apparently not.

“Mom, it was a mistake,” I say, trying to placate her. “I was released literally hours later. I didn’t want to call and worry you.”

“Worry me? Worry me!” she says, and I can’t tell whether she’s outraged or panicked. “I amyour mother, I carried you inside me for nine months, then lovingly raised you for eighteen years. I haveearnedthe right to worry about you.” In a gentler,more hurt voice, she says, “I thought you knew you could tell me anything.”

“Mom, I was…confused. And someone framed me for murder.”

There’s a sickening silence on the other side of the line. Then, “Ben, book us the next available flight home.”

“Mom, I’m fine.” I really do feel fine. I just don’t know how to make her believe that.

“Fine?” She laughs disbelievingly. “Stoplyingto me,” she says, sounding unnervingly like Memnon. “First the fucking plane crash, now arrested for murder? None of that’sfine. What the fuck is going on over there? This sounds like someone laid a big fucking curse on you.”

About that…

“Mom, stop sayingfuck,” I say.

“Don’t tell me what to fucking do.I’mthe mother here.” She breathes heavily for several seconds, then clears her throat. “I had to hear the news of your arrest from Donna, that insufferable witch. She called to check on me and see how I was doing now that my daughter was a convict.”

I make a face at the term. “Convict?” I echo. “That’s being a bit dramatic.”

“I get to be dramatic too! And cuss—and worry!”

In the background, “Liv, please, it’s all right.”

“Don’t fucking try to calm me down, Ben!”

It’s quiet for several seconds as my mom catches her breath. I can imagine her magenta-colored magic filling the space around her as it sometimes does when she’s upset.

“Mom…” Suddenly, my throat thickens, and I want to tell her everything that’s happened to me just as I used to in the past. There’s so much I don’t feel I can tell her over the phone—my strange relationship with Memnon, my recovered memories, myancient past, and the fact that I’m trying to sleuth out what’s happening with the witches on campus.

But I can talk about the ongoing murders and my mistaken involvement, so a little reluctantly, I do. I let what I can of the truth pour out of me.

By the time I’m done, my mom is no longer panicked. Instead, a troubled silence stretches on.

“Selene,” she finally says, “it’s not safe there on campus. Come home. Your dad and I will book the next available flight and arrive there as soon as we can.”

Moving back in with my parents is honestly an even worse option than living with Memnon. I love them, I do, but to go from the coven I worked so hard to join to being back in my parents’ house without any sort of future plans sounds hellish.

“Mom, I’m not going home. You can cut your trip short and see that I’m fine, or you can stay and enjoy the rest of the trip that you and Dad planned for literal years and trust that I’ll be okay. But no matter what, I’m not leaving. I worked too hard to be here.”

The silence is long and drawn out. I think my mom is realizing she cannot actually strong-arm me into leaving Henbane.

“Text me—daily,” she says finally, her words hard. “Even if it’s just ‘I’m alive.’ If you can do that…I will trust your word.”

“I can do that,” I say solemnly.

I hear her swallow. “Okay. Okay.” I can picture her nodding to herself, her hand pressed to her forehead. “Then I will trust—” Her voice breaks. “I will trust you to be safe, but you must be safe, if not for yourself then for me. Please.”

“I’ll be safe,” I promise, my throat raspy as it wells with emotion.