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“The figs,” I said, gesturing to the remnants on the plate. “Where’d they come from?”
“Seriously? From the fig trees on your property.”
I blinked. “Wait. I have fig trees?”
Pellini tossed his hands up. “Jesus. You have about half a dozen along the east fence line.”
“Huh. That’s cool. I love figs.”
He shook his head, laughing softly. “I’m gonna go see about getting the wizard staff.”
“Thanks for lunch,” I said. “You take pretty good care of me.”
He snorted and drew breath to make what I was certain would be a snarky reply, but instead he let it out and gave me a crooked smile. “Anytime, Kara,” he said then strode off toward the war room.
Feeling restored in body and mind, I skimmed the rest of my list, pleased to see that the major tasks had all been taken care of—with the exception of the Be Lordy crap. Maybe being lordy was about being super confident? Lifting my chin, I filled my brain with positive thoughts. Tonight, I will successfully summon a Jontari Imperator, survive the experience, and send him to Fed Central to snatch Elinor from Xharbek’s clutches!
Crap. Unless Xharbek had moved her. That was a very non-positive thought, but a darn timely one. It would suck major ass to make it through the summoning only to send Dekkak to the wrong place.
After a moment of consideration, I pulled out my phone and called Agent Clint Gallagher. It was a total long shot, but if he was keeping tabs on the plague victims, he might know something about a non-plague patient.
“It’s Kara Gillian,” I said when he answered. “Do you know anything about patients brought to Fed Central since my last visit?”
“No, because there haven’t been any,” he replied gruffly.
“Wait,” I said. “No new patients? There’ve been no more plague victims?”
“That’s right. Guess there wasn’t much of whatever infected them.” He paused. “David Hawkins has been in a giant black sphere since a few hours after you saw him.”
A pod. “Has Dr. Patel said anything about his potential outcome?”
He made a noise of frustration. “Not a word. Have you figured anything out on your end?”
“Nothing useful,” I said honestly enough.
“All right,” he said, voice thick with disappointment. “Why did you want to know about new patients?”
“Just checking on the status of the plague,” I lied. “I’ll be sure to keep you in the loop if I find out anything,” I lied some more.
“Do that.”
I disconnected and scowled at my phone. So much for my long shot. I was running out of time and options for nailing down Elinor’s location.
“Kara, you dumbass,” I muttered with a smile. I had an Elinor-sensor right inside me.
Relaxing, I closed my eyes and let myself sink into her awareness.
Bright light and pale walls. A man in blue scrubs.
That could be anywhere, damn it.
Tick. Tick. T-t-t-tock.
But that was Fed Central.
I opened my eyes, wrote Find Elinor on my to-do list, then drew a nice thick line through it. That was satisfying, but now I had no choice but to deal with the final item.
Scowling, I wadded up the list and chucked it in the trash, then I went down to the basement and made a pile of every bit of Jontari info we’d scraped up. To that I added Szerain’s notes, Elinor’s journal, and my own notebook, then I lugged it all out to the nexus, plopped down to sit on the slab beneath the grove tree, and tried to figure out what the hell to do next. Because I honestly had no idea.
