“How she got here, and what happens next.”

  Yes. What does happen next? Mélange wanted to know.

  She sat up, wincing at the pain that rippled over her. Glancing over her shoulder, she noticed the ryweed and frog gel coating her wing. Looking down at her side, she saw thick bandages—not human bandages, fairy bandages, which meant…

  Mélange looked around, but couldn’t quite see out of the box. Slowly, she stood up, and then she stepped up onto the bed so she could see over the side. The brown-headed man talking to the dark-haired woman, must be ‘sergeant,’ although Mélange remembered his voice as Clements.

  The woman must have seen her move, because she looked right at Mélange and smiled, touching the sergeant on the shoulder.

  “There you go, sergeant. Time you got talking,” she said, and walked away, but not before Mélange realized she was wearing a disguise, one that rippled, the harder she stared—a glamor, then. An elf!

  But that still didn’t explain the bandages, the fairy gel, maybe, and the fact her wing no longer felt broken, but not the bandages. There had to be another fairy somewhere about.

  “Calomey! I need you!” Clements called, as he sat down at his desk, and offered Mélange his hand. “I’m Leo.”

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  “Mélange,” the fairy said, touching the end of his finger with her own.

  “Well, at least she didn’t think you were trying to squish her!” A dark-haired male fairy flew down onto the desk, and looked up at Mélange. “You want some help getting out of that box?”

  “Please.”

  Leo reached in and cupped his hand so Mélange could stand on it. When she was ready, he lifted her out of the box and down to the desk, so she could stand near Calomey.

  “Did you do the bandages?” Mélange asked.

  “Yeah,” Calomey said, and blushed. “You, uh, you got yourself pretty banged up. Clements has a lot to learn about holding fairies!”

  “He didn’t do it! I think it happened when I was in the jacket.”

  “The jacket?”

  “Inge tossed it out of the cab, when he was looking for me. I hid inside it.”

  Calomey gave her a look that said it all.

  “You’re an idiot!” he added, as though the look wasn’t enough.

  “So,” Clements said, before Mélange could respond. “I’m supposed to thank you for helping us find the smugglers, and let you know you can stay here until your wing is healed, okay?”

  “What happened to them?”

  “The smugglers?”

  “Well, we caught them, and rescued the people they’d kidnapped…except for one.”

  “And you killed the troll,” Mélange made it a statement of fact, but couldn’t’ hide the relief she felt.

  “Yeah.” Leo’s face went a couple of shades paler. “We killed the troll.”

  And Mélange felt like she could breathe again.

  “Where am I?” she asked.

  “You’re in the Paranormal Operation Squad’s H.Q. I’ll take you on a tour, later, okay?”

  Mélange nodded, and Leo took a deep breath, settling into the chair beside the desk.

  “But first,” he said. “I need to take your statement.”