The three of us turned our attention to the forgotten man in the room.

Bishop Canterbury smiled politely at the sudden attention directed toward him but held firm.

Lord Bane flapped his wings.  "By all means, do tell us," he ordered impatiently.

"Yes, we can keep a secret, right Lawrence?" Lady Musa winked at me.

"If that is your wish, goddess," I bowed politely.

His concern ameliorated, the Holy One's lips loosened.  "It took a while for undercover investigators of the Church to identify this contact.  We know that the elves, in general, do not trust humans," Canterbury began.

"Right, because the elves have long lifespans and even longer memories passed down from generation to generation.  And what happened to the drows could easily happen to them as well," Bane interrupted.

His lover gave her a stink eye, and the demon lord shut his mouth immediately.

"You are correct, milord," the old cleric nodded and continued.  "So while Tregome is an important market town for the elves, the elves do not linger and stay in Tregome for long.  This is why we do not have any elves as shopkeepers in this town, even though the other nonhuman races have set up their shops here.  We know that the elves have rented a room across from your own at The Noble Lady, Lord Mulligan, and they have prepaid for that room for three years.  Before this arrangement was accepted by the inn, the nominal owner had contacted me personally for permission to accept this arrangement."

My curiosity was piqued by the term "nominal owner."  If Vern, the orc, wasn't the true owner of The Noble Lady, then who own it?  I filed the question in my mental to-do list and focused on Bishop Canterbury's impromptu lecture.

"I was just as puzzled by this proposal as Vern was.  While I understood the desire of the elves to set up an outpost in Tregome, they could have petitioned the Church officially and we would have welcomed the Elven Nation setting up an official embassy within our town.  However, they chose not to do so.  Since I recognized the importance of welcoming the elves to Tregome as traders, I gave Vern my approval and requested that the long-term lease to be made on terms that were more favorable to the elves.  Specifically, I granted a waiver of the usual tithe of ten percent on the transaction and also offered a matching ten percent rebate against future tithe owed by the establishment," the cleric revealed.

Lord Bane whistled at the generous terms.  "How much is a week's rent at The Noble Lady?" he asked out of curiosity.

"Twenty-one silver pieces," I replied immediately.  I would know since I was renting my room for exactly a week.

"Let's see  . . . there are fifty-two weeks in a year.  The yearly rent is one thousand ninety-two silver pieces," the demon calculated out loud.  "Three years' rent is three thousand two hundred seventy-six silver.  Twenty percent of that is six hundred fifty-five silver and twenty copper pieces.  That's a hefty amount you're forfeiting on behalf of the Church," Bane remarked.

I was very surprised to discover that the demon lord was able to calculate numbers so quickly without using pen and paper (or a calculator app on my smartphone, in my case).  The little guy had many hidden talents!

Lord Bane noticed my incredulous expression and smirked while tapping the side of his head lightly with a black claw.

"If you boys would kindly allow the bishop to continue," Lady Musa scolded us gently.

"Yes, once I gave permission for the elves to rent the room long-term, I decided it would be prudent for the Church to keep an eye on them in case they plotted to harm the human residents of Tregome," Canterbury said.

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"Hold on!" I raised my voice a bit more forcefully than I intended.  "Let's backtrack for a moment.  You just said that an elf had prepaid for a room for three years in advance at The Noble Lady.  How can you impute the action of one rich, eccentric elf merchant onto other elves?  I'm not convinced that this so-called Elven Nation has established a base of operations at Tregome," I voiced my deep skepticism.

Frankly, I refused to treat elves as one monolithic group where elves acted in concert with other elves and worked against the interests of non-elves.  Elves were individuals, like humans, who acted primarily in their own selfish, personal interests.  To lump all the elves together simply on the basis of race was racist thinking in my opinion.

I quickly recalled when the late Captain Peng showed up at The Noble Lady, and he took me to meet with the Bishop for the first time.  While his eventual successor, Maisen, and Kalistra accompanied me, the cat girl was forbidden, via a magical ward, from stepping foot onto church grounds.  She was excluded on the basis of her nonhuman race.  This incident left a sour taste in my mouth because I recognized that the Church of Britannia was engaging in a form of institutionalized racism against nonhumans.  Thus, while I had to join the church because it was a prerequisite to being recognized as a legitimate pursuer of the crown, I should nonetheless maintain a healthy distance from the church because I strongly disagreed with their policy.  To wholeheartedly embrace the Church of Britannia meant embracing this institutionalized racism, and that I simply could not do.

My sour sentiment must have shown itself on my face because the bishop nodded slightly to me as if he was accepting my unstated rebuke.  "When the first elf, Yewseine, moved in, I arranged for an undercover investigator of the Church to rent the room next to his.  The Noble Lady also had new 'temporary help' to assist Vern at the inn.  We kept our continuous, around-the-clock surveillance for a year and we saw that the room had many occupants or visitors over that period of time.  But the room was NEVER unoccupied and workers were not permitted to enter the room to clean it.  Furthermore, the elves started bringing plants and flowers into the room; if you look into the room through the window from outside, you could see that the walls are covered with plant life," Canterbury explained.

"Is Yewseine still there?" I asked.

"Of course not," the old cleric shook his head.  "I told you before that the elves do not stay in Tregome for long.  He left after the first week.  But apparently, the last occupant of the room would pass on the key to the next occupant.  You can infer, from this passing of the key at least, that the elves have some sort of arrangement to stay in this room.  Additionally, I don't know of any elven trader who is wealthy enough to prepay three years of rent.  But surely The Elven Nation would have that kind of wealth to make the payment."

"If we know that representatives of The Elven Nation occupy that room, then why don't I simply knock on their door and talk to them?" I asked.  "Wouldn't the direct approach work best, particularly in my case as the representative of Lady Musa?"

"They won't talk to humans," the bishop sighed helplessly.

My brows rose at his comment.  "But I've talked to two elves already—Bjoukia and Bjoukin.  And they even helped during the Were-Hunt!" I argued.

"It is a puzzle," Bishop Canterbury nodded in agreement.  "But those two elves are different.  First, they are adventurers.  Second, they are fairly young and probably on their Sojourn," he added.

"Sojourn?" I asked.

"When elf children reach their first century of life, elven custom requires them to leave their Forest to learn more about the world at large.  They call this journey 'The Sojourn,'" Lady Musa finally stepped into the conversation.

"But aren't the elves concerned about catching the same disease as the drows did from their interaction with humans?" I asked.

"The High Elves developed an inoculation against 'the chap,' as they called this disease.  Unfortunately, there was no cure," the goddess replied sadly.

Suddenly, the church bell tolled again, denoting that it was five past noon.

I was shocked by how rapidly the day was ending.  I still needed to return to the dojo for a meeting with the grandmaster!  "Okay, getting back to the issue of making contact with The Elven Nation, if I can't get the elves to talk to me then how would I be able to ask them for help?"  I was concerned that the faction quest was destined to fail!

The old cleric smiled at the question.  "The Church assigned spies to follow all the elves in Tregome.  It turned out that every single elven visitor met with one particular half-elven shopkeeper," he hinted.

There was only one person that fit his description.  "Roen, the signmaker," I answered immediately.

The bishop's smile widened.