“How do you expect me to relax right now?!”
“It’s Dr. Czerny,” David announced. “And an extremely well-dressed midget.”
Amanda squinted her eyes shut. Oh God. Please. Please . . .
“Hannah, maybe you should run distraction,” Zack said.
“What should I say?”
“Anything. I don’t know. You’re the actress. Improvise.”
Amanda forced her mind into calming memories—the nature hikes she took with her father, her honeymoon cabin on the French Riviera, all the young patients who cried happy tears when they learned they were in remission.
Soon the milky crags and dots began to melt away. Mia squeezed her shoulder. “It’s working. You’re doing it.”
Amanda opened her eyes and peered down, just as the last of the whiteness retracted into her skin.
“They’re almost here . . .” David cautioned.
“It’s all right,” said Mia. “It’s gone.”
Zack wasn’t relieved. He scooped up the remnants of Amanda’s bracelet, then threw a quick glance around the room.
“Look, I don’t know who these people are, but I don’t trust them. Until we learn more, we need to keep this to ourselves. We’ll talk about the big weirdness. We won’t talk about the other stuff. Agreed?”
Hannah, David, and Mia accepted his premise with shaky nods. Amanda had the least trouble with Zack’s proposal. On this matter, she couldn’t have agreed with him more.
Two hazy shapes appeared in the smoky glass. David opened the door to Czerny and a diminutive companion. They studied their five skittish guests with leery caution.
“Is everything all right in here?” Czerny asked. “We heard noises.”
Zack hurried across the room to greet him. “The strangest thing just happened, actually. Amanda bumped her arm against the pool table and her bracelet broke apart.”
Czerny furrowed his brow at the warped silver fragments in Zack’s hand. “Huh. That is strange.” He looked to Amanda. “Are you all right?”
“She’ll be fine. I’m Zack, by the way. You Sterling Quint?”
“That would be me,” said the other man, in a stately baritone.
The guests all took a moment to study him. He was indeed a little person, as David implied, but he carried himself with the regal airs of a maharaja. He wore a lavish three-piece suit with a red silk ascot, and his feathered gray coif was flawless to a hair. Zack figured his jeweled rings alone could fund a man’s food, clothing, and shelter habit for nearly a year.
“So you’re the answer man.”
Quint nodded. “As it stands.”
“Good,” Zack replied, with an anxious breath. “Because as it stands, we have questions.”
—
The conference room was a perfect oval of hardwood and gray marble. In lieu of overhead lightbulbs, the entire ceiling glowed with milky iridescence. Mia noticed a pair of multitiered switches on the wall—one to control the ceiling’s brightness, the other to change its color.
Quint sat at the head of a long oak table, shining a sunny smile at each guest as Czerny introduced them. For five people who’d made such a remarkable journey, none of them seemed particularly remarkable themselves. Why them, Azral? Of all the souls to sweep across existence, why these?
“Thank you for being patient with us,” Czerny began. “I know we haven’t revealed a lot—”
Hannah waved a shaky palm. “Wait. Hold it. Sorry.”
Mia’s eyes narrowed to frigid slits. She didn’t want to dislike anyone, especially on a day like today, but from the moment Hannah stumbled into the lobby with her tight clothes and ditzy airs, she struck a sour chord. She was every living Barbie doll who’d broken her brothers’ hearts, every gum-chewing mallrat who’d mocked Mia mercilessly.
“Before we get to the big stuff, I just want to know how Theo’s doing.”
Czerny had to wait for Quint’s nod of approval before answering Hannah’s question.
“Fortunately, he’s okay. Still unconscious, but stable. We expect he’ll pull through just fine.”
Amanda sat rigidly in her seat, her hands hidden deep inside her sleeves. “What happened?”
“I regret to say it’s our fault,” Czerny admitted. “Our security men gave him apacistene, a dermal sedative more commonly known as a baby spot.”
Hannah averted her gaze from the giant neon TOLD YOU SO that sat in place of her sister.
“It’s not a harmful drug by itself,” Czerny explained, “but it can be particularly strong on first-time users. The problem in this case is that Mr. Maranan had a high amount of alcohol in his bloodstream. The combination caused a toxic reaction and . . . well, you saw the results.”
“When can we see him?” Hannah asked.
“Not for a while,” Quint replied. “Once he’s sufficiently detoxified, he’ll be sure to join you.”
Zack glanced around uneasily. “I’m late to the party. I take it Theo’s another one of us.”
Hannah nodded. “Yeah. I met him right after you.”