After all the pots are ready, we spend a few days delivering and placing the smash bombs. The incendiaries we will place the morning of the escape. Within Rien’s territory, we use his safe rooms. Elsewhere through the slum, we deposit the smash bombs in shabby tenement rooms that he and his agents have rented.

We deliver them in twos and threes during the morning rains, when the streets are starting to get busy, but the rain keeps everyone minding their own business. Mýldir and I, accompanied by two guards. Mýldir plays the part of the merchant. I am the laborer, carrying the pots. The guards are there to keep off any elven robbers and make us look respectable to any human patrols.

It’s my first time above ground in a few days. As soon as I step out, I am assaulted by the rain and mud, the noxious smells of piss and shit and tannery vats and smelter smoke, mixed with sea salt, the harsh sounds of pounding out metal, the creaking of ships, the screaming of scavenging gulls. The tenements look more ramshackle, the elves more thin and scraggly, their cloaks and hoods more filthy and ragged than I remember. I didn’t miss this. Any of it. Maybe I am turning dwarvish, because I can’t wait to deliver these bombs and get back underground.

When the rains end each midday, we return to hiding. I then spend the time until the evening meal with the other enforcers, learning archery. Lynae hasn’t gotten me a bow, so I take turns using the bows assigned to others. Within a few days, I can hit the targets reliably from twenty paces. Muilon sets up targets in the cell hallway, so that we can practice firing at a greater range. But it’s not much farther. There is no way we will be able to accurately fire at any distance. Guess we’ll have to wait for the humans to run up close, and then take them out.

The day before the escape, Mýldir and I finish placing the smash bombs. Together we take the last one to the sacrificial altar in the Hall of Law. It is just the two of us; there is no need for the guards to accompany us here. He jumps up onto the altar and places the bomb next to the wall. I am surprised to discover that he has assigned one of the incendiary bombs for the rune. He sees my look of surprise and laughs.

“Turns out I was able to cobble together enough for one more. When this baby goes off, it will break this wall into rubble. That’ll be the end of this nasty rune. And most of the rest of this place.” He hops down off the old altar and moves toward the door, glancing back to gesture for me to follow. “Come on.”

He leads through the Hall and up the stairs to the ruined tower, stopping at the same hole where Enturi and I watched the humans come in and leave again the night they killed Jet.

“Take a good look, Arq,” he says, looking out. “In two days, this will be nothing but ashes and rubble.”

I look over his shoulder, but my mind is elsewhere. Three floors below, in the chamber at the base of the stairs. Where Lynae paralyzed us.

Ironically, her betrayal probably saved our lives in the long term. If we had been hidden here in the Hall of Law on the night of the escape, we would have been unaware of what was happening and cut off from the main escape route by the row of burning tenements that I’ve helped Mýldir prepare to keep Elftown free of immediate human intervention. We should be thanking her. But the fact that the elf-girl was able to take both of us out so quickly still rankles.

“Where did Lynae get the egg stalker poison to take out Enturi and I?” I figure this information is right up Mýldir’s back alley.

“She found an egg stalker victim with eggs inside. She broke the eggs, cut off several stingers from the little insects inside and brought them to me. I extracted the poison. The day of your capture, she came to me, and I applied some of the venom to two needles for her to use. It was quite effective, I hear.” 

It was. But only because she knew its effects were temporary and she knocked us out before it wore off. There would be a lot less venom on a needle than on the stinger that slammed into my chest in the sewers.

“The egg stalker poison doesn’t last very long.” I remark. “Not nearly as long as the twilight sleep. That lasts half a day or more.”

“It doesn’t have to last very long. Just long enough for the eggs to be implanted. Once that happens, it doesn’t matter if the victim regains the use of his limbs. He can’t remove the eggs without killing himself.” 

The alchemist pauses and looks at me frankly.

“We thought about using the twilight sleep,” he admits. “But the herbs must be ingested, so as a poison it is less versatile. And it takes longer to work. The paralysis isn’t immediate, but gradual. Besides, I am almost out. I want to keep what’s left of my limited supply in case it’s needed before the escape.”