I nodded. “I managed to sleep it off, though you should see the bathroom. It looks like a colony of bats had a fiesta in there.” I couldn’t bring myself to tell her about the Purge or the missing people, so I bent the story slightly. If you squinted really hard, a pixie could pass for a brightly-colored, really skinny, humanoid bat.
“Lovely.” My mom pulled a funny, disgusted face. “I hope you’re drinking plenty of fluids and sugary things to get your electrolytes back up?”
I chuckled. “Lots of tea. The Irish love their tea.”
“Tell me about it. Your dad used to go crazy whenever he came back from a trip to the motherland—he’d have crates of Barry’s Tea and bottles of red lemonade in his luggage. Weird stuff, but apparently it’s a huge deal over there. Maybe you could get a bottle to help your tummy?” She leaned closer to the camera, as though she could reach me through it.
“I’m already much better,” I promised, which wasn’t a complete lie. The effects of the Purge had worn off after I’d gotten my three hours of sleep this morning, and I only had a few aches here and there to suggest I’d Purged at all. Aside from what came out of me, the recovery time on Purging appeared to be the second biggest surprise of this ability. With the banshee, it took days; with the griffin, the hydra, and the gargoyle, it had been hours; and with the others, I was more or less fine immediately afterward. I guessed it depended on the power of the monster. Sure, I’d Purged lots of pixies, but maybe their cumulative power wasn’t as big as other things I’d created.
I wanted to tell my mom everything, but she’d only have worried. And not the usual motherly worry, either. She’d have been battering down the mirrors and trying to take over Victoria’s investigation before I could even end the call. I did not want to see a stand-off between the head huntswoman and my mom, but I did need to pry some information out of her regarding the missing magical cases. A delicate venture, which would call for stealth and dexterity.
“You still haven’t Purged?” A note of expectation hung in my mom’s voice, like she suspected I had and was giving me the chance to come clean.
I picked up a pencil and doodled nervously on the cover of my sketchbook. “No, still nothing.”
“You can tell me, you know. I won’t go all tiger-mom.” She looked through the camera so earnestly that I hated not telling her everything. But with the pixies at the forefront of this investigation, I couldn’t tell her one thing without revealing the other. And I didn’t want to betray Victoria’s trust, after she’d just let me off the hook… not any more than I already had by hunting the pixies when she’d told me not to. More than that, I didn’t want to dump a new layer of stress onto my mom’s already packed plate.
I made sure to look into her hologram eyes. “Honestly, aside from the bats in the bathroom, I’m fine. But what about you? How are things at the SDC?”
“Busy,” my mom admitted. “I’ve got paperwork coming out of my eyeballs.”
“Did anything come of what Marius and Azar found?” I pressed a little more.
She smiled sadly. “You know I can’t talk about that, sweetheart. It’s all still under investigation, so it’s secret information.”
“No emerging patterns or anything? You can tell me that much, can’t you? I promise I won’t say anything.” I refused to stand down. This was part of my “failing better” mantra, and I’d keep at it until failure turned into success.
She tilted her head, thinking for a moment. “I suppose so.” She lowered her voice to a whisper, as if the forces that be were listening in. “As of yet, we haven’t been able to find any patterns. Magicals are vanishing from all over the US, so there’s no geographic pattern there. The returnees show up hundreds of miles, even states away from where they were taken, which muddies the waters a lot.”
I gave a humph of exasperation on her behalf. “And what about global disappearances? Do you think this might be a wider problem?” This was the question I’d been leading up to.
“We’re trying to dig into that, but there are always issues with international collaborations. A lot of jumping through hoops on both ends, so it’s a slow process.” Mom sighed. “Until the UCA agrees to hash out a deal, we can only track US disappearances.”
Crap! I probably shouldn’t have hoped for a simple solution. Even so, I had one more angle up my sleeve. “What if you reached out to a local coven? Would they be able to tell you about any disappearances?”
“I could, but they wouldn’t be under any obligation to share information.” My mom frowned. “Why do you ask? Is something going on? Are people going missing in Ireland?”
I kept up a calm façade. “I just thought it was strange that these disappearances cross so much distance, but are only happening in the US. What if it’s happening all over, and you just don’t know about it? Is there no way to kick the UCA in the butt?”
“I could take a hot poker with me next time I go to the head office.” My mom laughed, not understanding how infuriating this was for me. It wasn’t her fault; I hadn’t told her about the dire straits the Institute was in. Still, I could only muster half a snort at her joke. There needed to be another culprit so the pixies weren’t the ones in the firing line. And I just knew someone else was responsible for this.
“Or maybe a clown shoe?” I offered, trying to keep things light.
My mom smiled. “I forgot to ask, how did your first
