Page 8 of Dark Elves of Ardani

Basira looked unconvinced. “All of them?”

“A good bunch of them. There’ll be more—there are always more—but their days are numbered. We’ll make the Shield Mountains safe again, however long it takes.”

“I hope you’re right. The things I’ve heard about them…” She shook her head again. “And the one with the behelgi is still terrorizing travelers. He was seen on the road south of here just last night.”

Theron nodded gravely. “Don’t try to fight them. You won’t win. If they come—”

“I know,” Basira said.

“And don’t let the girl go outside at night.”

Zara realized he was talking about her. She was sitting back, sweating under her many cloaks, her thoughts distant. She realized she’d been passively waiting for them to decide what to do with her.

She didn’t like being treated like she couldn’t hear them. Avan and Kashava had never treated her like she was made of glass, or like she couldn’t think for herself. But she was so accustomed to being told what to do that sometimes she forgot to form her own opinion. It was something she’d struggled with for a long time.

Supposedly, she was not a prisoner here. She shrugged off the extra cloaks and set her mug on the nearest table. “Do you mean to keep me here?” she asked evenly.

Basira looked down at her in surprise. “No one is going to keep you anywhere you don’t want to be,” she reassured her. “But you’re welcome to stay here as long as you want. Free of charge, of course. We’ve got travelers and Paladins staying in all the rooms at the moment, but you could take the shed in the back.”

“Basira will take good care of you,” Theron said. “And we’ll be back in a few days to check up on you.”

“You are leaving?”

He nodded. “Evil doesn’t sleep. We must keep rooting it out if we’re ever to live in peace.”

She went to hand his cloak back to him, but he wouldn’t take it.

“Hold on to it,” he said, with his usual easy smile. “Paladius’s symbol will protect you.”

Zara watched him leave, then glanced self-consciously up at the new stranger she’d been left with. Basira frowned a little at the door, but smiled warmly when she turned to Zara.

“Now that he’s gone,” Basira said, “what would you like to do? Is there anything you need?”

Those weren’t questions she was often asked. “I…”

Basira beckoned her toward the door. “Come. I’ll show you the shed.”

She brought her around the back of the house, toward a tiny wood building in a stand of pine trees. She pointed to a man cutting wood behind the inn, and a young girl sitting at his side. Both shared her dark complexion and frizzy hair. “My husband and my daughter, Tahir and Farhana.”

They both looked up at Basira and Zara as they passed, but Basira, perhaps remembering Zara’s discomfort when presented with too many people at once, ushered her onward without stopping.

“The family who originally built this place had several generations all living together. They added this for one of their sons when he got married, I believe.” She unlocked it with a brass key, then threw the door open wide. She made a face as the smell of damp and dust hit their noses. “Gods. It’s a little worse in here than I remembered.”

Zara peered inside. It was dark, and somehow seemed even colder than it was outside, but there was a fireplace waiting to be lit. There was a bed with no mattress propped up vertically against one wall, and a jumble of crates and boxes along the other. Apparently they’d been using the space for storage. She could see why Basira didn’t find it appealing when compared to the comfort of her inn, but to Zara, the space seemed filled with possibilities.

“You are really letting me stay here?” she asked. She had never had a house all to herself.

“You’ll have to come into the main house if you want to use the kitchen,” Basira said apologetically. “I know it’s small, but once you light a fire, it’ll keep warm. And you’ll have some privacy here, at least.”

“It is not too small. It is perfect.”

Basira smiled, handing her a key. “Do you know how to cook?”

“Of course.”

“Great. Everyone in our household helps with chores. You can help me in the kitchen. Maybe you can show me something new. I’ve never had elven cooking before.”

“I can clean and sew, too.”

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