The hell? Bolin said the herbs for the twilight sleep were rare. That’s why Enturi ruled out a back-alley source like Mýldir for the twilight sleep when we were investigating Norien’s murderer. Looks like Enturi was wrong. We all were.

“How did you get herbs for the twilight sleep?” I ask. Mýldir’s eyes narrow in suspicion.

“Smuggler,” he says shortly. “How do you know about the twilight sleep?”

“Came across some several days ago when investigating the death of a murdered whore for my old boss, Jet. I was with a dwarven healer who knew what it was. The killers had drugged her with it so they could have their way with her before they killed her.” No need to tell him the rest of the story.

“You mean Norien?”

“Yeah, you know her?”

The thin elf nods.

“Sure. I like the Bouncy Tart. I’ve spent a fair amount of money there. She was one of my favorites.” He frowns. “They must have gotten ahold of my stuff somehow. I’m pretty sure I’m the only seller here. I wonder if Jeamo’s been selling some of what I supplied him?”

I gape. “You were Jeamo’s supplier?”

“Yeah . . . . You know him?”

“I met him once.” Interesting. Seems like Lynae hasn’t told all of her fellow conspirators everything she’s been up to. “But I’m willing to bet he wasn’t reselling the twilight sleep. He’s the one who murdered Norien. Him and an elf named Calmorien. He’s dead now, though.”

“Dead?” He seems surprised. Then his eyes widen in understanding. “Oh. You killed him, eh?”

I shrug.

“Sorta,” I say. Chasing Jeamo down into a sewer where he was nabbed and impregnated by an egg stalker and died while Lynae was trying to save him kinda counts as killing him. I decide to fish a bit. “So, what did Jeamo use the twilight sleep for?”

Mýldir shakes his head.

“I don’t know,” he says with a ring of sincerity. “I didn’t ask. He was willing to pay a lot of gold to get it, so I got it.” He shrugs in his turn. “Doesn’t matter now, does it? He’s dead and we’re getting out of here.”

Mýldir lapses into silence, staring out the opening in the tower wall. After a few minutes, he moves and gestures for me to look. I take his place and gaze out over the grime and filth of Elftown. Nothing I haven’t seen every day of my life. I look past the buildings to what lies beyond.

Here, in the afternoon sun, I can see over the sea wall. There are a few ships moving through the water, banks of oars propelling them toward the human port to the left, across the wall. One appears to be making for the entrance to the Elftown harbor. I wonder if that is the ship bearing food for our trip home.

Beyond the ships, far away to the north, a dark green spit of land juts out into the sea. Somewhere beyond that, days or even weeks of travel away, are the elven homelands.

“We deserve to be as free as the rest of our people, even if they have forgotten about us,” I mutter. But I am not sure I believe it.

“They haven’t forgotten about us,” Mýldir says softly. The import of his words slaps me like a shorted whore. There’s only one way he could know that.

“You’re from outside.”

He shakes his head. “No, I have spent my entire life here.”

“Then how do you know that they have not forgotten us?” 

“I was told.”

“By whom?”

“From someone who was sent to us. Someone who has helped us put our plans together.” My mind is racing with the possibilities. The smuggler he mentioned earlier? Could it be Jeamo, working both sides, helping the elves plan an escape while spying on them for the humans?

“Who?””

The other elf stares at me curiously and shakes his head in denial. ”If you have not been told, it is not my place to reveal this other’s identity,” he replies.

“Fine. So what is this, some sort of rescue operation from the Elven Council? What took them so long?”

“This is a freelance effort,” the herbseller says carefully. “It is not sanctioned by any elven authority. The Council still adheres to the treaty it made with the Ruran Empire.”

I feel the bitterness welling up as it did when Bolin revealed that the elves had won the war. But while Bolin didn’t know why we were sold to servitude in this slum in the peace treaty, Mýldir might. Maybe this time I will get an answer.

“Why?” I hiss. “Why would the Council let us rot here for so long? Why abandon us to the humans in the first place?”