Page 39 of Rogue Elves of Ardani

“Hmm. You would know, wouldn’t you?” Crow said.

Garros grinned. He did that a lot. “I would. Come on.”

“We must be going, actually. We have—”

He clapped a hand on her shoulder. “I won’t take no for an answer.”

Vaara thought he saw a flash of annoyance cross her face, but then it was gone.

“I suppose I must say yes, then,” she said lightly.

“Good. Your, uh, friend can come, too. As long as he agrees to be nice. Though if he isn’t, we can take care of that, too.” He gave Vaara a rather arrogant smile. Vaara didn’t reply.

“Garros,” Crow said, clicking her tongue. “I thinkyoucould stand to be a little nicer.”

As they turned to walk toward the trees, Garros casually dropped a large arm across Crow’s narrow shoulders. Vaara scowled at his back.

He glanced around at the other men surrounding them. Two walked on either side of the group, and two more walked behind Vaara, watching him. Almost as if they were still being guarded.

His hand itched for a sword. Every time he reached toward his hip, he felt the ghost of it there. It was massively uncomfortable.

It started snowing again as they walked the short distance through the woods to Garros’s camp. According to Crow, this wasn’t unusual. It snowed often in Ardani during the winter. Vaara had seen snow in Kuda Varai, but only once every other year or so, and never gathering deep on the ground the way it had been recently. Just another annoyance on top of all the other annoyances.

Behind a small ridge, a fire pit glowed, and two more men sat around it. That made seven of them in total. Some tents were set up nearby. Nine of them. Somewhere, two more bandits were unaccounted for.

Most of the others stared at him as Crow and Garros sat down near the fire and started talking. Vaara hesitated to join them, not wanting to be sitting down when one of the humans inevitably decided to try to stab him in the back.

“Take a seat,” one of the others said, with a tone that suggested no argument would be tolerated. He gave Vaara a curious once-over like Garros had, looking nervous and ready to jump at a chance to fight.

Vaara slowly went to sit a few steps away from Crow. Garros was in the middle of an animated story about a werewolf he’d encountered recently. Crow laughed melodiously at something he’d said, which sent a spike of annoyance through Vaara.

He kept an eye on the others around the fire. They talked quietly amongst themselves. Vaara caught them glancing in his or Crow’s direction often. None of them smiled. They would glance at Vaara, then whisper to each other in a way that put him on edge.

Crow was either oblivious to their behavior or was pretending to be. He couldn’t tell which. He knew she was a good enough actor to have been faking it.

Garros punctuated the end of his story by slapping a hand on Crow’s knee, then launched into another story.

Crow’s smile was stiff. Her gaze flickered in Vaara’s direction for the first time since they’d sat down. This time, he was sure he’d seen annoyance in her expression.

“Show us your magic, Crow,” Garros said after a while. “We could use some entertainment.”

Vaara’s frown deepened. Garros knew she was Ashara. Vaara had been under the impression that she tried to keep that fact hidden.

And by the look on Crow’s face, he was right. She kept smiling, but looked to be suppressing discomfort. Someone who didn’t know her might not have noticed. Her face had become surprisingly familiar to him over the past few days. Maybe he’d been looking at her too much.

“I’d really rather not.”

Garros squeezed her knee. “Come on. Go use it on Thilo. Show us how you can control him.”

The youngest man in the group looked up, his eyes widening at Crow. But he said nothing, perhaps too afraid to cross Garros.

“It isn’t a toy, Garros,” she said more firmly. “I don’t care to use it as one.”

“It’s just the once. Don’t be a spoilsport.” This time, he pushed Crow bodily toward Thilo. Vaara’s fingers clenched over his knees.

Crow’s lips had become a thin line. She stood still for a long moment, then crossed the circle toward Thilo. The man waited, tense, and winced when Crow removed a glove and touched his hand.

At first, nothing happened. The two of them were perfectly still. Thilo’s expression grew vacant, like the guard’s had at the prison.

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