I didn't quite know what to do, so I did what I always did and retreated into my work. I couldn't stop the enemy that Isha and Atie had described, I couldn't destroy half a village in one moment, but I could get there one day.

My current project was much the same as I'd already done, to make crystals of all the colors of the rainbow. It would serve as a good exercise at the very least, practice until I could make something more potent. One by one I worked to make the tiny particles of magic conductive material, setting them into tiny diamonds and on my wall.

There was another use for this as well, training. Over the years I'd found that uses of magic became easier as they continued. Fire and force for me were now fairly straightforward, easier, more powerful. Even if I didn't have concrete measurements I knew that using magic made that magic more potent, like exercise. This was something I was keen to exploit; I would make myself stronger though hard work.

I spent days locked in my workshop going bit by bit into these lights, each created and then locked in a prison of diamond, until one day I was disturbed once more. The little bell I had installed to call for me if I was needed jingled and so I made my way upstairs. I wasn't fully prepared for what I saw there.

My friend Ian hadn't been around for some time, but that wasn't totally unusual. He was a guard and sometimes he needed to go on longer missions here or there, but he was returned now. He sat in my kitchen now, and at a glance I could see things had not been well. Across the front of his body there was a large patch of newly grown skin, much of his gut covered in pinkish flesh. Across from him Isha was preparing some drinks, looking worried.

“Ian, what happened?” I asked as I saw him.

“Just got back form the West, war happened. They sent me home to heal up and get more gear. That's why I'm here my friend, your armor probably saved my life.” He looked sad and worried, something new for him.

Some time ago I'd made Ian armor from shells, something that would hopefully protect him if the worst came to pass, and it seemed that it had. Even if that were so, though he was still sitting here, which meant that there had been at least a partial success there.

“The armor?” I inquired.

“Stopped the fire long enough for me to live. I hope you don't mind but I left it back with the others, even damaged it might save someone else's life,” he scratched his head in slight worry as he spoke, as if I'd care about that.

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“Good, then it is fulfilling its purpose. I'll see about making you some more, but when do you need it?” I asked. “Oh, and do you need any changes?”

“No rush, I may look better, but the healers tell me there's still a lot underneath that will take time to fix, weeks before I'm back to my old self. The leaders also want to go over every moment of the fighting with me, things are strange out there Justin, very strange.”

“How so?” I inquired.

Ian spent the better part of the next hour telling me how the enemy was using all kinds of new tactics. There were too many magic users for one, far too many, but they were being used as fodder. They were weak, nothing more valuable than another soldier, and if he was judging things right, very young. The fighting was still only in the beginning stages, only skirmishes here and there, but where it happened was unbelievably violent.

What I needed was a magical armor for him, but I didn't have it, and no way to get it. I worked over some of the ideas in my head, but there were limits to what I could do. At the very least though I could make him some new armor, something to protect him again should he end up fighting once more.

When he was finished I bid him well and sat there thinking for a bit, but my thoughts were disturbed. A small hand touched my arm and suddenly I realized that Isha had come to sit with me, snuggling closely. She did this sometimes when I was out of my lab, during meals or breaks, though I took few of either.

“How bad is it?” she asked.

“I don't know,” I answered honestly. “But I suspect it is bad.”

My house was now a constant place of work. Ida worked on cloth and the many arts surrounding it, struggling to make better and better pieces, to perfect the techniques so they could be taught. Chien constantly worked on ideas for tools and things that could be implemented instantly, grabbing the low hanging fruit I knew of one by one. There were few of those left, but the ideas needed to be spread, and he was getting expert at that. Atie for her part had happily fallen right back into pottery, spending her days working clay into shape.

Then there was Isha. Over the last week that she'd been living with me she'd taken sort of a caretaking role. Her magic was specialized towards food and small household things, and so she began to see to all of that. She went to the market to get the needed materials and foods, made sure there was always a meal if someone needed it, cleaned, and generally kept everything running smoothly. It might not have been the most glamorous of jobs, but even I could tell that it was making everyone's lives easier.

More importantly than that though was what she did at night. Each night she laid down beside me, finding a crook against my chest and fell asleep there, something which brought me an unbelievable peace. It stilled my thoughts to have her with me, calmed my mind so it couldn't race, and let me rest better than I had in a long time. Nothing sexual had happened between us but it didn't need to, being able to sleep was more than enough for me.

“Elia... Justin,” she said as she leaned against me, still having problems with my new name.

“Yes?” I asked.

“Do you remember what you told me before you left the village?”

“I remember all of our conversations,” I answered. With a perfect memory that wasn't a lie either, if elves didn't remember something it was merely a momentary thing, we could always look back and see what had happened.

She was speaking now of a promise I'd made to her. I'd told her that if she joined when my mother and father broke away that I would tell her my secrets. It had been said at the spur of the moment, but I'd meant it then, and if she asked I'd have to decide if I was a liar or not.

“You don't need to tell me everything, but I'm worried. You spend all day locked in that room of yours, the one you won't let anyone else in, barely coming out. Can you at least tell me what you're doing that's so important?”

“That isn't a secret, or at least not a big one. I'm trying to make tools that use magic,” I told her. “That or better materials, but it is slow going.”

“How can a tool use magic though?” she asked.

“Would you like to see?” I offered, I'd told her that I would share everything with her, and in that moment, this seemed like such an unimportant thing that showing her my lab would be nothing.