Don’t move, Kal told himself, feeling as if he was walking a thin line. “I’m not the one running away,” he said, and Niles lifted a hand and inclined his head in a gesture of acceptance.
“That’s what you told Saladan. Perhaps she still lives and can tell us if she is running away from or running to something.” Steps soundless, Niles moved to the door. “It’s become obvious that you don’t know what is going on, but Dr. Cambri? She knew less. Her confusion was more.” He hesitated. “Is more?” he questioned, grinning as he put Trisk into present tense.
“You think she’s alive?” Kal asked, cursing himself when the vampire’s eyes went black again at his faster pulse. But the sun was threatening, and for Niles to remain aboveground would mean light poisoning and his death.
But still the vampire lingered, his feet spread wide upon Kal’s welcome mat. “I think my attempt to end her life was less than successful,” he said. “And that has become an unexpected pleasure. What’s more, I expect you and the enclave to clean up after yourselves instead of baiting me into doing it for you. If Dr. Cambri is indeed dead, you’ve put yourself in my debt, Dr. Kalamack. Think on that, and perhaps hope that she is alive.”
Kal’s shoulders stiffened. Seeing his understanding, Niles stepped back through the threshold and into the hallway. “If I see the need to call that debt in, I will kill you, Dr. Kalamack. Not fast, and certainly not without pleasure, but I will kill you.”
Saying no more, Niles left, leaving the door open behind him.
Lip curled, Kal strode forward, not daring to look into the hall before he slammed the door shut. His hands were shaking, and with a sigh of frustration, he frowned at Saladan, still unconscious on his floor. “Kal?” Orchid prompted, and with a soft thought that moved his headache to the front of his skull, he broke Saladan’s connection to the ley line and the bubble holding Orchid fell. Saladan shuddered and went still. Kal knew he should check on the man, but frankly, he didn’t care.
“You okay?” Orchid said as she hovered beside him, her dust an ugly yellow-green.
His couch scattered about his feet, Kal stood in the middle of his apartment, his plans ruined, stinking worse than Trisk’s decaying field. “We have to go,” he said flatly, too angry to think straight about the details yet. “Right now.”
“No kidding.” Orchid darted to the window. “So much for riding it out here. Nothing like a master vampire wanting to come to you personally when his main food supply goes bad.”
“That’s not it,” Kal said as he strode into his bedroom to pack a small bag. Most undead had a bevy of living vampires they fed upon, but if they all fell sick, there’d be a span of time when the undead might go ranging for the uninfected, and unwilling, blood of witches, Weres, and elves. Even so, he wasn’t running from Niles or Saladan.
No, he had to find Trisk and prevent her from exposing the truth, for as Sa’han Ulbrine had said, if humanity was indeed on its way out, he couldn’t allow the elves to be the reason for it lest the rest of Inderland rise up and wipe them all out in turn.
20
Trisk lay on her cot, aching from having hit her truck’s dash and rolling over the hood and onto the road. One arm across her forehead, she stared at the ceiling, knowing exactly how many wads of gum were stuck to it and the exact rhythm of the faucet drip in the cell across the aisle. The smell of the cotton cot mixed with the oil and grime from the gas station on her clothes, making her ill. There were no windows, but she could tell by the utter silence that dusk had fallen. The sun hadn’t set yet, but it was close.
And I’m alive. Stretching where she lay, she winced, a hand going to her middle. Alive, yes, but she didn’t feel well, hungry and ill at the same time. Lunch had been spaghetti, which Daniel had missed entirely since he had been at the hospital getting his possible concussion checked out. The thought that she’d caught Daniel’s virus flitted through her, easily dismissed. Even if Kal had made the virus more virulent, he wouldn’t allow it to infect elves, and not through spaghetti sauce canned a year ago.
All afternoon, they’d listened to the sporadic talk coming from the front offices of possibly transferring them to Reno, but that apparently had fallen through. So had dinner, as lunch had been their last meal, Daniel getting someone’s meatloaf sandwich instead. The phone had rung a few times, going unanswered. That they hadn’t seen anyone since Daniel had been brought back didn’t bode well. It was utterly quiet, not even a radio anymore. Daniel was asleep on one of the benches in the cell across from her, but Quen, in the cell with him, stood at the bars, his head down as he listened.
“Do you think anyone is out there?” she whispered, and his eyes flicked from the open door to the offices to her.