April pounded her forehead against the door a few times before joining them in the kitchen. “Okay, let’s start at the top. You found out that someone is going to kidnap Alexander. Who?”
Since Louise was the only one who had actually seen and heard the elves, she told the story without explaining where they were when they overheard the conversation. April got out a cold Diet Coke, poured it into a glass, and added rum to it.
“They were just standing out in public, planning this out loud?”
Put that way it did seem unlikely. Sparrow’s movements, though, were highly publicized, as hordes of fans and protesters followed her. If someone came to the Waldorf Astoria, the
“They were talking in French,” Louise said.
“So how did you understand them?” April asked.
Jillian slurped down the chow mien noodle she’d been fighting with and explained. “We’re fluent in French.”
“And Spanish — but in New York, how could we not be?” Louise felt that confessing to trivial things made up for leaving out the whole museum robbery thing.
“And Low Elvish.” Jillian apparently felt the same way.
“And Hindi and Mandarin.” Louise started to tick off on her fingers the languages they knew.
Jillian waved her chopsticks to negate that claim. “That’s more ‘limited working proficiency’ than fluent.”
“Hindi and Mandarin?” April added more rum to her drink.
“We learned Hindi by watching Bollywood musicals,” Louise said.
“And Mandarin from Chinese historical dramas,” Jillian said. “And a smattering of Korean, for the same reason.”
“But that doesn’t matter,” Louise said. “I was hiding, so they thought they were alone while they planned to kidnap Alexander and kill Windwolf.”
“Whoa! Wait! Kill Windwolf? Holy shit! You said this was Sparrow and Windwolf’s bodyguards!”
“Well, that’s why Sparrow was talking in French. None of the
“Who cares what language they were speaking in?” Jillian cried. “We have to warn Alexander!”
“We can’t.” April took a big swallow of her drink. “At least, not until Shutdown. Are you sure about this?”
“Yes!” both girls cried.
“We can’t call her because we don’t have a phone number for her,” Jillian said. “And we haven’t been able to find a Pittsburgh directory.”
“Oh, I have one,” April said.
“You do?” the twins cried.
April went to her bookcase and pulled out a paper book. “Pittsburgh is completely last century. They do old-fashioned paper directories.”
The twins leapt at her with a cry and snatched the book from her hands. “Bell, Bell, Bell.” They chanted, flipping pages. “Bartley. Bowles. Bruton. Burger. There’s no Bell!”
“Their number might be unlisted.” April got out another Diet Coke.
“Why would anyone do that?” the twins cried. “What’s the point of having a directory if everyone isn’t in it?”
April shrugged and added rum to the new soda. “I don’t know. My folks are in it. They mailed me that copy as a hint to call more often. Maybe the reason Tim Bell’s phone stopped working was because they moved to Earth.”
“No, on the application to CMU, Alexander said she lived on Elfhome.” Louise flipped to the
“Well?” April asked as the twin frowned at the only Wright listed.
“There’s an Oilcan Wright. Who names their kid Oilcan?” Louise stared at the simple listing of name, street address, and phone number. “How are you supposed to cross-reference this?”
Jillian gave a small scream of frustration. “We can’t call him and say ‘If you have a cousin named Alexander, Sparrow is going to try to kidnap her and kill the viceroy.’ What if it isn’t him and we just told a stranger this secret that could get him killed?”
April motioned for her to stay calm. “Are you really, really sure that you understood what they were saying — in French?”
“I’ll take that as a yes,” April said. “Look, there’s nothing we can do today. It’s probably too late for me to get train tickets to Elfhome; normally the seats are booked months in advance. I can try, but we shouldn’t count on it. Usually if I want to go home for Christmas, I have to get the tickets before March. I’ll probably have to drive down a few days before Shutdown and hope I can get through.”
“Couldn’t you fly in?” Louise knew that the airport still operated, but she’d never heard of flights into Pittsburgh. Airports equaled planes, though, didn’t they?
“No. Passenger flights aren’t allowed in the airspace during Shutdown. Everything in and out is either cargo or military planes, and that’s only after dawn. There’s always some residual magic in the zone, and it wreaks havoc on mechanical systems. The risk is too high for passenger flights.”
