“That wasn’t me,” she said, her tiny body feeling like a cold stone against him. “We’re not the only ones skulking around, but we are the stealthiest.”
“Only because you’re so smart,” he said, eyeing the street for any movement. “I’m going to try that pharmacy,” he added as he inched out of cover. “If we’re lucky, they’ll have a working phone. If we’re really lucky, there’ll be something to eat.”
“I’m fine,” she said faintly, but he knew the short flight and the low temperature were taking their toll. If she got too cold, she’d fall into a torpor that might last until spring. Ideally he would wait until dark to move, but Orchid needed to eat, and he had to contact Ulbrine. The plague could not be allowed to be blamed on the elves.
He crossed the empty street, taking care to keep his feet from scuffing. Pulse fast, he stepped up onto the opposite curb, feeling as if he’d passed enemy lines somehow. Frowning, he eyed the broken window, deciding that no one could have gotten in that way, but then he tried the door and found out why. It was unlocked. With a last look at the street, he pulled the door open, reaching for the door chimes in a panic when they began to clink.
“Way to go, Kal,” Orchid muttered, and he slipped inside, breathing a sigh of relief when he looked out the glass door and saw no one.
“It’s warm,” he said, and Orchid pulled herself up, standing in his pocket to poke her head out the top. “I think the heat is on.”
“Thank God.” With a clatter of wings, Orchid levered herself out, hovering beside him as they looked over the conspicuous gaps on the shelves. The long counter with its swivel stools was strewn with straws, and a sticky syrup dripped from one of the nozzles behind it. Kal’s nose wrinkled at a sour smell, and he could guess why the place wasn’t entirely looted. “Oh, gross!” Orchid exclaimed as she darted behind the counter to sample the syrup, only to rise up with her fingers pinching her nose shut. “Kal, don’t come back here.”
“No problem.”
If there was a phone, it would be in the back, and Kal headed that way while Orchid enthusiastically stabbed a sugar packet left forgotten by a desiccated cup of coffee on the counter. Seeing her dust brightening made Kal feel marginally better, and he peered at a stale slice of chocolate cake decorated with Halloween ghosts under a glass dome. It looked okay, so he lifted the lid, crumbs spilling to the tile floor as he ate it. Feeling better, he continued to the back to find the offices.
“Kal, if I package up some of this frosting, will you carry it for me?” Orchid asked, her tiny voice somehow reaching him.
“You bet,” he called out, smiling as he found a phone in the first paper-strewn office. He knew Ulbrine’s number by memory, and the ratchet of the dial was familiar as he cycled through it. Listening to it ring, he felt himself relax; the decaying smell wasn’t as strong back here, either.
No one answered, and looking at his watch, he hung up and immediately dialed again, hoping that the practice of making two calls in quick succession—an age-old code for an emergency—would trigger a lingering secretary to pick it up. Sure enough, the line clicked open, and a terse voice said, “Sa’han Ulbrine’s office is currently closed. If this is an emergency—”
“It is,” Kal interrupted. “This is Dr. Kalamack. I’m calling long-distance, and I need the number where I can reach the Sa’han in Detroit.”
“I’m sorry,” the woman said, not sounding it at all. “He’s not in at the moment. I can take a message if you like.”
Kal pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance. Did I not just say he was in Detroit? “I know he’s not in,” he said patiently. “All I need is the number where I can reach him. I have information about the plague, and I need to talk to him.”
“Sir,” the woman said somewhat snidely, “I can’t give you the number where he is in Detroit, because Detroit is gone. Sa’han Ulbrine is unavailable, en route to Washington to give his deposition concerning his part in Detroit’s extirpation.”
Kal’s jaw dropped. Extirpation? he thought in shock, looking at Orchid as she darted in. Her pale gray dust gave evidence that she’d heard as well, her pixy hearing much better than even his. “Extirpation?” he said, the word feeling alien on his lips. “Why? What happened?”
“The fool witches broke the silence when those moronic vampires started taking witches as unwilling but healthy blood donors,” the woman said, the sound of shuffling papers in the background. “He was there, and the witches’ coven of moral and ethical standards asked him to help since they couldn’t get one of their members out there in time.”
“They destroyed an entire city?” Orchid whispered as she landed on a bookshelf full of smiling troll dolls, and Kal nodded, not believing it himself. The only other time that had happened was more than two thousand years ago. That was when they’d begun to self-police themselves.