Page 19 of Dark Elves of Ardani

When she went to the inn the next morning, she half expected to be met by a group of furious Paladins ready to punish her for releasing their captive. But none of the people crowding the inn that morning gave her more than a glance as she entered. The regulars, a few of whom lived in the rooms upstairs and the rest of whom were villagers who lived in the houses outside, took up most of the long dining table, and a group of the Paladins sat at the end of it while Tahir delivered food and took payments.

“I don’t understand how this could have happened,” one of the Paladins was saying.

“He was still bound when we left. It’s possible someone else untied him,” Theron said.

“No one untied him,” Basira said, leaning her hip against the end of the table. Her tone made it sound like this was not the first time she was saying it.

Theron paced. He limped on his injured leg, but he was no longer using the crutch. “And the locks were unbroken. Is there anyone else who has a key?”

Zara froze, glancing up at Basira. Basira looked directly back at her.

After a long beat, Basira turned back to Theron. “Only Tahir and I have keys. Only, Tahir’s is missing. The elf must have stolen it off him when Tahir went to feed him last night.”

Zara stared at Basira. Her racing heart slowly settled. She was not being outed. She was not going to be killed by angry Paladins.

When she’d calmed enough to remember how to walk, she went to the table and sat down beside Basira and Farhana.

“Hungry?” Basira asked.

Zara looked up at her. She offered Zara a small smile. Silent understanding passed between them. Perhaps Basira was not as similar to the other Ardanians as Zara had believed.

“Yes. Thank you,” Zara said tensely.

Naika was sitting across from Farhana, her feet up on the chair next to her. There was a book with blank pages in front of her, and she was drawing in it with a stick of charcoal. Zara peered over to see her work—an astonishingly realistic portrait of a smiling Farhana.

“That is incredible,” Zara said, looking up at Naika in surprise. “Where did you learn to do that?”

Naika shot Zara a scathing look, and Zara recoiled, recalling the things she’d done to the half-elf with all too much clarity.

Having finished the portrait, Naika turned the page and offered the book and the charcoal to Farhana, who eagerly took both and began to draw her own much-less-detailed portrait of Naika.

“Zara,” Theron said. He came to stand beside her, leaning his hands on the table. “I’m glad to see you’re all right. When I heard the night elf had escaped—”

“He escaped?” she said, feigning surprise.

Theron nodded gravely. “I worried he would come for you first. You were the one who captured him, you were there while we were questioning him, and you are the least able to defend yourself, out of the lot of us. You’d be the perfect target if he sought revenge. Are you well?” Giving her a sympathetic look, he rubbed a hand on her shoulder, almost like he was placating a small child.

Frowning, she pulled away to straighten her hair, slowly, to avoid offending him. Being treated like a delicate flower had been novel and even enjoyable at first, but she was quickly tiring of it. “I do not see why he would come for any of us when he could just leave. He probably ran as far away as he could.”

“You should know better than anyone how savage they can be.”

She gave him a short smile. “Well, I am fine.”

Basira had disappeared into the kitchen and now returned with a plate of ox meat and potatoes with spicy sauce. It turned out that Ardanian food was wonderful. It was one of the things Zara liked most about Ardani so far.

“You don’t seem very upset by any of this,” Theron observed.

Zara looked down at her plate as she stabbed her fork into a bit of potato and dragged it through sauce. “I do not care for torture.”

“None of us care for it. But sometimes we must do things we don’t like for the greater good.” Theron leaned down, looking at her closely. “I’ll bet youdounderstand the night elves better than the rest of us,” he said, as if this was the first time he’d had that thought.

“That is probably true,” Zara said patiently.

“Do you think he’ll be back? With others?”

“They probably will move on to another village. One less well guarded, perhaps.”

“But they will want revenge on us for taking one of theirs.”

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