“Baby, you can talk to us about anything,” Mom said. “You know that.”

I should have trusted them with this sooner. I hoped they’d understand why I’d waited. “Since we’ve been here, I know things have been weird. Strangers showing up, this shop, the garden. But I think it’s all connected.” I tried to think in a straight line. “Circe left me some letters.”

Mo straightened up.

“They led me to the garden. She knew what I could do with the plants. But she also knew something about me that even I didn’t know until a few days before we came here, when I cut my thumb.” I took a deep breath. “Mo, when you scared me that day, I was working with a water hemlock. It’s one of the most poisonous plants in the world.”

“Where’d you even get something like that?” Mom asked.

“I grew it in the park and brought home a piece to study. I was just gonna take a few notes and then get rid of it. I cut it open and there was poison on the blade of the scalpel when I sliced my thumb. It should have killed me.”

Tears welled up in Mom’s eyes. “Baby, you should have told us. We’d have taken you right to the hospital.”

“There wouldn’t have been time. There shouldn’t have been time. I should’ve died within the first five minutes, but I didn’t.”

“What are you saying?” Mo asked.

“I’m completely immune. I’ve come in contact with every poisonous plant you can think of since we’ve been here and nothing has happened. Circe knew I was immune and that I could cultivate the garden I found. And there are plants in there that are too toxic for anyone besides me to handle. That’s why people have been showing up here. I can grow things they can’t get anywhere else. So could Circe and Selene, and the Colchis family has been running this shop for generations.”

Mo and Mom continued to stare at me, speechless.

I took a deep breath and continued to the part that I knew would be the hardest for them to understand. “Also, I found a document that says the goddess Hecate—the exact same goddess that altar is dressed for—gave the power of immunity to Medea, and her children inherited that power from her. It’s been passed down to everyone in her line. Now I have it, but—” I stopped short.

“ ‘But’ what?” Mom asked.

I gripped my hands together in front of me. “Circe and Selene were keeping a plant called the Absyrtus Heart. Absyrtus was Medea’s brother and he was murdered. Dismembered. Medea kept the six pieces of his body buried in her garden. The pieces seeded a plant that isn’t like any other plant in existence—the Absyrtus Heart, and there’s one right out there in my garden. The Colchis family has been running this apothecary and protecting the Heart, but I think Selene was trying to keep me from having anything to do with this place.” If it hadn’t been for Circe I never would have known any of it. That was a detail that still made no sense if she and Selene were as close as everyone else made it seem.

“Someone was after the Heart,” I continued. “It has some very special properties. It’s why . . .” I hesitated. The tendrils of everything I had learned twisted together like the vines in the Poison Garden—inescapable and deadly. The people who’d come after me wanted the Heart. Maybe someone had always been after it, killing off members of the Colchis family to try and get to it. A piece of the Heart had made Marie immortal, and clearly, somebody wanted that power for themselves, wanted it enough to kill for it. Everything I’d learned pointed to one conclusion. “I think that’s why Selene was murdered.”

Mom blinked, then put her hand on her chest. “Briseis, are you serious? Who told you that?”

“The medical examiner,” I said.

“I thought she was sick,” Mo said. “That’s what the agency told us.”

“There’s been some issues with record keeping,” I said. I felt like I was lying and telling the truth at the same time. The issue was that Lou had a job to do in Rhinebeck and it was inextricably linked with trying to keep the Colchis family secrets intact.

An alarm went off on Mo’s phone. She sighed. “I’m supposed to go into the shop and touch base with Jake. I need to do the bank deposit, too, but it can wait.”

“You can go ahead and go, Mo,” I said. “It’s okay.”

“Seems very not okay, Briseis,” she said.

“We need that deposit to get put in the bank,” Mom said. “I don’t want you to go, babe, but I kind of need you to.”

Mo sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I know. I know.”

“Until Leti gets back to me, let’s take things one step at a time,” Mom said. She put her hand on my shoulder. “We can talk about Selene if it’s bothering you, and we can damn sure see that her death gets a thorough investigation if it hasn’t already. You’ve been learning all these new details and not telling us? Baby, that bothers me.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t want to ruin this for us.”

“We are not that fragile, baby,” Mom said. “And you’re not ruining anything.” She took my hands in hers and held them tight. “I’ve watched you and your power grow over all these years. Sometimes I wonder what it means, where it comes from. Now it looks like we have some answers.”

“You don’t think it sounds impossible?” I asked.

Mom shook her head. “What it sounds like doesn’t make a difference to me. This isn’t just something in your blood. It’s you. It’s who you are. How could I doubt what you’re telling us when I’ve seen what you can do?”

Tears streamed down my face. There were still questions that I needed answers to but they could wait. Mom put her arms around me and pulled me close. Mo came over and wrapped us up like she always did when me and Mom got to ugly crying.

CHAPTER 27

Mom dropped Mo off at the train station so she could commute to Brooklyn and check in with Jake. The rest of the day passed in a haze. In the early afternoon, I snuggled up next to Mom on the couch as we waited for Auntie Leti to call back. I sent Karter a bunch of texts asking him if he was okay, but he didn’t text back.

The doorbell rang.

“I got it,” Mom said. She went out into the hall and a few seconds later, I heard Karter’s voice.