"What's up, uh… Ancient Sage of the Eldunar? Alliance of necessity much?"

{Elf — Level 1025 Elite}

The silver-haired elven sage simply gazed at Ashtoreth, their feelings inscrutable. "You would be the Queen of Earth?"

"Only according the system!" Ashtoreth said. "Right now their real government is… well, it's sort of like a military junta, but with civilian leaders in charge of the warlords instead of the other way around. Anyway, you probably want us out of your hair, yeah?"

"If I understand your turn of phrase correctly… then no. I won't be bothered if you stay in my hair overlong."

The elves had received Ashtoreth and her crew in a vast interior space made from polished, rose-colored stone. Huge pillars rose up around them, supporting a painted ceiling that must have been almost a hundred feet high.

In the distance, she could see that the structure had no outer walls, opening instead onto a panoramic view of fields upon fields of colorful crops and flowers.

Elves, Asthoreth thought, suppressing a frown. Here they were with the cavernous, tranquil chamber overlooking idyllic plains.

No wonder the humans were enamored with them, when they had presentation skills like this.

"Thanks for helping us out, Ancient One," she said to the elf.

The elf inclined his head slowly, but said nothing else. Was he waiting for something?

"So, uh… how are we doing this?" she asked.

"Step forward, each of you," he said. "I will weave my spells around you and disguise you as elves for your trip."

"Right," she said, stepping out of the teleportation circle that had been inlaid on the floor.

The sage drew a slender ivory wand from seemingly nowhere, then began to move it with slow, sleepy gestures. Ashtoreth felt a slight tingle as his spell took hold.

"There may be those at the market who see through my illusions," he said. "But this is all well. The true deception is that Ashtoreth detects as human, but is both human and archfiend. To those eyes that pierce my spellcraft, you will simply detect not as elves, but as human soldiers who have been sent into the broader cosmos to seek aide and information. It is doubtful that anyone will surmise that you are Earth's Monarch."

"The old, 'put a secret behind another secret so they stop looking when they find the first secret,' strategy," Ashtoreth said, flashing him a smile. "Nice."

Again, the elf inclined his head, face almost completely expressionless. "I've changed your appearance so that no-one will recognize you by your face. I'll do the same with your allies, though I doubt it would be necessary even in your case."

"Yeah, probably not," Ashtoreth said. "We never left much in the way of witnesses, and I don't think the human bossmen put any pictures of me up." She paused, then added. "Yet."

The briefest flicker of emotion seemed to cross the elf's face, a slight twitch that vanished as fast as it had come. A moment later he lowered his wand. "My spell is complete."

"Great! Thanks!" Ashtoreth turned back to her party, then conjured a glamour of a mirror so that she could see herself and grinned at the unfamiliar elf looking back at her.

"Check it out! I'm a curly, round-faced redhead! Say," she said, turning back to the sage as one corner of her mouth curled. "Did you make me the redhead because of the myth that gingers don't have souls?"

More than anything, this seemed to break the elf's composure. He blinked, pulling back a little. "...What?"

Ashtoreth cackled, and the sage began to equip the rest of them with disguises. Very soon Hunter, Sadie, and Frost were all elves with varying shades of brown hair and smooth, unblemished skin. Kylie went last, and when the sage was finished she stepped away from him as a strawberry blonde, rosie-cheeked elf… who still had an acute case of resting lich face.

"Before you leave… there is a matter that I would much like to discuss with you."

Ashtoreth resisted the urge to shut him down. Could anything good come from an elf making an extra request? But he was helping them…

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"Uh. Okay."

The sage inclined his head in a nod of respect. "I hope you know, Ashtoreth, that my kind have incredibly mixed feelings regarding you."

She pursed her lips, amused but also a little annoyed. He hadn't used any of her many potential honorifics, after all.

She gave a little tilt of her head. "Mixed? Really?"

The elf nodded slowly. "It is very likely, should things continue as I expect them to, that you will continue to get a sense of only my people's long-held rage, only the distaste we feel at having to work with one of your race, even at arm's length. But this is deceptive."

Ashtoreth narrowed her eyes at the sage. "You're telling me that your bossmen are going to be jerks to me… but as a trick?"

It was almost totally imperceptible, but she thought she saw a tug at the corner of the elf's mouth. He was… amused?

"Not an intentional deception as such," the elf said, inclining his head. "But rather the results of an internal struggle that my entire species must face."

"Because you're helping the humans, who I've also helped?" She glanced at her disguise in her conjured mirror, then added, "And I guess helping me, too."

The sage spread his arms, palms facing up. "The oldest of us reign," he said. "Our memories are long and precious to us. We will not easily cast aside those instincts, honed by history, which insist that we distrust you. But mark me: many among us, even those who may outwardly disdain you, are fostering a soft, gentle candle flame of hope."

Ashtoreth blinked. "Uh, okay. Yeah, that's me all right! Bringing hope to… elves? Sorry—are you sure?"

This time it was the sage's turn to blink. "Am I sure?" he echoed. "Such a strange thing to be asked, for one my age. As if my utterances are ever the result of anything but careful consideration."

"I dunno," Sadie said, cutting in. "Humans run their mouths without thinking about anything like, all the time. And anyone who thinks that age is any cure for it hasn't watched any of the boomer shit that they put on, like, channels and stuff. Those guys are fucken nuts."

Silence filled the massive chamber for a moment. Ashtoreth suppressed a smile as everyone's attention slowly shifted toward Sadie.

Sadie sucked in a breath through her teeth. "Was that… did I do the thing? Should I have not said anything?"

"Maybe not?" Ashtoreth said.

Sadie winced. "Sorry."

Ashtoreth turned back to the sage. "Sorry if we offended you. I only asked if you were sure because, like, it's sort of hard to believe, you know? Elves, infernals. Eldunar, Hell."

The elf raised an eyebrow. Then he let out a short, clear laugh. "I feel, and feel strongly, that it is your right to know more than you do at present. And my very presence here today shows that I am too valuable to be set aside merely for saying that which is unpopular."

"Nice," she said, giving a nod of approval. She could appreciate a man who was so good at what he did that he couldn't be ignored.

The sage simply continued. "My people will treat you badly, Ashtoreth. The oldest and wisest among us have known for a very long time that if Hell is to fall, it will be from internal strife. But your species has always been unified—more so even than elves or dwarves."

"All right, hold up," Ashtoreth said. "Because I'm really feeling like I can see a contradiction, here."

"Yes."

"You can clearly see that I'm necessary to your ultimate goal of defeating Hell. But now that I exist, you're super upset."

"Yes," said the sage. "We hate your people—and we have cause to. My peers can't stand to see the chance they've wanted for so long if that chance comes in the form of an archfiend, even if it couldn't come as anything else."

"Great," she said. "Good. Okay. You know when the psychics went into my mind, they tried to get me to sign a contract first? Not a binding one. Just words."

The sage blinked. "That is… unfortunate." He raised his hands, steepling them in front of his throat. "But still, I beg you, Ashtoreth: weather their pettiness. We need you to, even if most of us don't realize it."

Ashtoreth blinked. He begged her? It was such a strangely intense word for him to use.

"Uh… okay," she said.

"Thank you," he said, gently bowing his head. "Now: I will send you along our warp conduit to the far side of the Eldunar Empire. It should be no trouble for you to manage the rest of the teleports yourselves. The sage inclined his head. "Fortune upon you as you venture forth… saviors of humanity."

As always, it was incredibly hard to tell through his muted affect, but Ashtoreth couldn't help but feel that there was an ironic tint to the last phrase he'd uttered before she moved back into the circle and he cast his teleportation spell.

* * *

"Phew!" Ashtoreth said as they touched down on a lifeless, craggy wasteland made of sharp rocks and shadowy chasms. "Can you guys believe that guy? Honestly, can you believe any of this?"

"Sort of?" Sadie answered.

"I'm not really sure I see the problem, Ashtoreth," said Frost.

Ashtoreth groaned and reached up to rub the base of her horns. "The problem is that this is it," she said. "My plan worked. I actually saved Earth from Hell, and what's my reward? My reward is elf politics."

She let out an exasperated sigh. "No wonder I'm not happy."

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