Page 17 of Rogue Elves of Ardani

It might have been the most pleasant sensation he’d experienced in a year.

“It wasn’t nonsense,” he said.

“You want me to take it off?” she asked, nodding to the cloak.

He hesitated, wanting to argue and also very much not wanting her to take the cloak back. He looked up at the ceiling and said nothing.

From the corner of the room there was a drip. He was almost always blindfolded when they moved him around the prison, and he had only ever heard the leak, not seen it. The wet patch on the ceiling was barely visible. It was so much smaller than he’d imagined. When his vision was obscured, it sounded so loud.

“They only keep me here for a few hours at a time,” he explained to Crow. “It’s not long enough to cause damage.”

“Just long enough to make you miserable.” She was smirking.

“Yes.”

“Well, you’ll not have to put up with it much longer,” she said. “And neither will I. Just do as I say, and we’ll both be free soon.”

Chapter 6

Late that night, Crow crept down the hall toward the cell block that held Vaara, who she hoped to the Five was there waiting for her and wasn’t planning on trying to kill her. That would complicate things significantly.

Some time during the past few days—she wasn’t completely sure when—she’d made the decision to escape the prison with the night elf instead of with Toreg. She still wasn’t certain she hadn’t completely lost her mind. It had been a long time since she’d done anything so drastic to try to escape Patros.

But the gods had aligned the stars for her, and she couldn’t help but feel a sense of urgency to act. It was too good an opportunity to pass up. Vaara was the perfect person to help rid her of Patros. Night elves made the best assassins in Heilune. She couldn’t have happened upon someone with a more ideal skill set.

And more importantly, he represented an advantage over Patros she’d never had before—he was completely outside of Patros’s sphere of influence. There was no chance he was secretly on Patros’s side, or even knew anyone who was. There was no possibility that a night elf would have any vested interests in Valtos at all. In a strange way, she could trust him more than she could anyone else in the city.

He certainly deserved to get out of this place more than Toreg did. She could only hope he would feel similarly sympathetic toward her own plight.

She refused to think too hard about the fact that she was disobeying direct orders from Patros, because if she thought about it too much, she’d lose her nerve. That was the way it usually went. It took careful effort and resolve to find ways to betray him.

This time, things were going to be different. She was going to be free of him for good. And she wasn’t going to think about the alternative.

The stone hallways of the prison were narrow and cold and dark, sparsely lit by mage lights on each corner. They were mostly empty at this time of night.

She’d already slipped into the guards’ quarters and stolen the keys to his cell from one of the guards, who had been drooling in his bunk in a post-ale sleep. She’d been planning on making a subtle use of empathy to distract them while she grabbed the keys, and hadn’t even needed to in the end. Maybe she’d been overthinking it.

It was looking more and more like this was going to be quite simple. The getting-out part, at least. Vaara was the wild card. She still didn’t know what he’d do when she let him out of his cage. He could ruin everything.

She was almost to the stairs when she rounded a corner and nearly bumped into a large body.

She stiffened. Alexei was looking down at her.

“Crow,” he said evenly.

She reflexively smoothed her hair over her ears. She recovered from her surprise and gave a warm smile. “Lord,” she said politely.

“Alexei, please.”

She nodded. “Alexei.”

“You’re up late,” he said, arching a perfect eyebrow at her thick cloak, boots, and coat. “I hope you’re not planning on leaving us.”

She knew she wasn’t imagining the suspicious edge in his voice. “Of course not. I couldn’t get the fire going in my room. I think the chimney might be blocked.”

The suspicion on his face lessened. “They do that sometimes. I’ll help you fix it.”

“Oh, please, you don’t have to…”

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