"What makes you think our war would take place in the Sundered Lands?" said Screech, smiling pleasantly. "No; we'd fight our battles in your world, where the extensive collateral damage wouldn't bother us in the least."

"Good point," I conceded. "All right; suppose I do take this on. How do you propose to pay me?"

"Not with any of the usual means of payment," said Screech. "You wouldn't trust any of them, and quite rightly.

"I propose to pay you… with information. I know something you don't know. Something that you definitely need to know. Because it involves a real and present danger to the whole of the Nightside and because it involves you personally. Something very old and very powerful and quite appallingly terrible has come to the Nightside. You'll know the name when I say it; though it isn't what you think it is. Get me safely across the Nightside to the Osterman Gate, and I'll give you its name. Believe me, John Taylor; you need to find this thing before anyone else does."

I looked at him thoughtfully, saying nothing. Never trust an elf…

"If you wanted to pass unnoticed through the Nightside," I said, finally, "why come as an elf and draw attention to yourself? Why not hide your true nature behind a glamour and pass yourself off as just another tourist?"

"Appear as a human?" said Lord Screech, looking down his nose at me. "I wouldn't lower myself. I have standards. Do we have a deal, Mr. Taylor?"

"You're almost certainly not who you say you are," I said. "You're probably not even what you claim to be. And you're proposing to pay for my services with a secret that may or may not turn out to be of any practical use. Have I left out anything important?"

"Only that any number of truly unpleasant individuals will quite definitely try to kill the both of us all the way to the Osterman Gate," the elf said cheerfully. "But then, that situation's normal for you, isn't it?"