White Is for Witching

Content Warning: This section of the guide mentions suicide, self-harm, and disordered eating. It also includes racist and xenophobic content, including offensive terms for Black people and undocumented citizens, which is replicated in this guide only in direct quotation of the source material.

Chapter 3 explains why Miranda went to an adolescent psychiatric unit and traces the pervasive xenophobia in Dover. As Luc and Eliot pick Miranda up from the facility, she recalls the night that convinced her family that she needed medical intervention. On a night with a full moon, Eliot found Miranda not speaking verbally in front of the white fireplace at the Silver House. She was bleeding from her scalp, hands tied with her own hair (which she pulled out). The narrator doesn’t share the details of Miranda’s intensive treatment at the psychiatric unit.

During the car ride home, Eliot shares he’s applying to Cambridge, and Miranda also decides to apply, creating an uncomfortable situation as neither Luc nor Eliot wants to imagine Miranda on her own, away from Dover. Eliot’s memories of his and Miranda’s imaginary games at King Arthur’s court surface, clarifying his conflict between his own desires and care for his sister. He reads about a streak of murders in the Kosovan refugee community, and his judgment is swift: He believes the murderer is a Kosovan refugee, and that the community has chosen to protect itself from the authorities by hiding them.