Elodie was really starting to hate her phone. All of her bad news seemed to come via text.

She'd been studying for her chemistry class when her ringtone filled her room.

The room felt several degrees colder as Elodie recognized which song she was hearing.

The one she assigned to her mother.

Elodie bit her lip, hesitating. Maybe it would be better not the answer, she thought to herself.

But her curiosity got the better of her.

That was the first time since Jinn left that she had tried to contact anyone other than Arman.

She swallowed thickly and answered the phone.

"Mama?" She hated how vulnerable her voice sounded, like she was still a small child, desperate for her mother's approval.

"I need you to get down to the smoothie shop," Jinn said, no greeting, no pleasantries. "Your friend, her grandmother, and her boyfriend started a fight outside my storefront."

Aideen, Elodie realized.

"Where are they now?"

"In my office, and I've had to break up a fight between the boyfriend and the grandmother twice upon putting them in my office."

There was a special distaste in Jinn's voice on referring to Felecia Wentworth.

"I'll be down as soon as I can," Elodie promised, against her better judgement.

Jinn hung up, saying nothing else.

Elodie sighed, closed her books, and walked out of her room.

Up the stairs she went, and knocked on the first room to the left of the bathroom.

"Brad! I need you go give me a ride!"

"Where the hell are you going at seven-fifteen?"

Elodie internally cursed the universe, wondering why on Earth her parents had never let her get her driver's permit, like Brad had.

"Mama's shop."

"No!" Brad sounded legitimately angry from behind the closed door. "I am going nowhere near Mama until she apologizes for everything! Find someone else!"

Loud music thundered from his speakers, killing any chance at further persuasion.

Arman wasn't home yet, and Nani wasn't allowed to drive anymore.

But there was a way to get to places quickly. After all, it was the first spell that she'd ever seen.

Surely she could replicate it?

Elodie closed the door to her room, playing music from her room. It was all the sort of endless low-fi beats and instrumental songs that would were recommended all the time on her YouTube homepage.

She exhaled a little bit of fire, and it hovered beneath her hands. She pictured the brilliant gold of the portals that she'd seen on her birthday.

Making a circle, the fire grew, shedding gold sparks that refused to light all over her room, and suddenly she could see the smoothie shop's back office in the center of the portal.

Elodie squinted, focusing on expanding and stabilizing her circle of fire.

She then stepped through, entering her mother's office.

Made of neutral pastels, it was stripped of much personality, making Elodie think of the stereotypical office building and the mentality that came with it.

Sitting on the couch with the scratchy fabric reminiscent of burlap were Aideen and Felecia, who were refusing to look at each other.

"What happened—"

Then Elodie saw Ansel. "You were found out."

"You know what this is about?" Jinn's voice wasn't condemning or particularly interested. More a dispassionate investigator.

"You knew that my granddaughter and this—" Felecia spluttered, unable to find an insult grievous enough.

"Yes." Elodie somehow found the strength to look at Felecia. "I knew."

Ansel slumped back in his chair. "You know that the Paladins are starting to ask where I am, right?"

"You could have left me and my granddaughter in peace on the street," Felecia reminded him.

"And let you hurt her?" For the first time since Elodie had ever met Ansel, he was angry.

It wasn't the yelling that men often did, either. It was quietly simmering, cold— not hot— but not any less dangerous.

"I'm not leaving until she's safe," he said, looking over to Aideen, who was still turned away.

"You are bringing unnecessary conflict here," Felecia declared. "And you're putting her in danger by your people."

"They wouldn't hurt her." Even Elodie knew he was uncertain of that, but she still admired the attempt.

"They killed her parents just weeks after she was born!"

Elodie walked over to Aideen, who placed her head in her hands. Her face was bright red— whether from embarrassment, fear, anger, or a mixture, Elodie could not be entirely certain.

"Really, Felecia?"

Jinn's tone was dangerously low. And yet alluded to familiarity, to some past stretching behind all of those in the room binding them together with invisible red threads.

"What are you on about?" Felecia asked.

She tried to look imperious— but there was fear in her words.

"Is that all you've told Aideen?" Jinn crossed her arms over her chest. "That the Paladins killed them?"

Aideen looked up so quickly, Elodie feared she would suffer whiplash.

"She didn't even tell me that much, not until the Paladins came to town," Aideen said.

Even Ansel looked horrified.

"That's not the truth," Ansel assured her. "Oh— Lord, forgive me— I thought— You thought my family killed yours—"

"The Paladins did kill my mom and dad, didn't they?" Aideen looked confused, and Elodie had to admit her own confusion and curiosity as the two girls looked to Jinn.

Before Jinn could answer any questions, however, there was a knock on the office door.