The sun was high up in the sky, its rays falling on the trees of the forest like a warm blanket. Some of these rays slipped between leaves and branches and found intricate wooden houses below them, with a select few among them even having the fortune of slipping into one such house through a small window on the roof of it.

Kali groaned, she felt the sun warm her face and even through closed eyes; it was evident that dawn had passed a while ago. She cracked open her eyes and yawned, then promptly coughed as a handful of pink hair got stuck inside of her mouth.

"Urrrhhh," the owner of the locks, a tiny bundle of warmth that Kali hugged to her body as she slept, started stirring as well.

"Morning," Kali croaked as she flipped onto her back. She held up an arm above her head and on the tip of her index finger she conjured up some water and let it stream into her mouth.

"Morning," Lexy said as she turned around and looked curiously at the groggy princess.

"Want some?" Kali asked after a few gulps, feeling her throat and mouth lose that morning dryness.

"nu-huh," Lexy shook her head.

"Okay," Kali groaned, "It should be noon soon," she narrowed her eyes at the tiny window, "we should get dressed."

"Eh?" Lexy's eyes went wide and the tiredness quickly fled her face as she lifted the fluffy blanket they slept under and her face went red, right to the tip of her ears.

Kali sat up, leaving the blanket behind as naked as she was on the day she was born. After a quick search, she found her clothes in a corner. She put them on with a sigh, leaving the jacket for later, and stayed only in her pants and long-sleeved shirt for now as she slumped down on a chair next to the table.

She noticed a pink head, the face a shade pinker than the hair, peek out from the bedroom and look at her weirdly.

"Yeah?" she tilted her head as she pulled her mug left on the table from yesterday's dinner towards her and filled it with some more water, "you can come out, you know?"

"Umm," Lexy's ears drooped, "clothes?"

"Oh," Kali tilted her head, "OH, right, sorry, I'm much too used to not caring how other women see me."

Kali's cheeks reddened a bit too. Ancestors knew she was shameless as a kid, and turning into a teenager made it even worse. She thoroughly enjoyed being bathed by a gaggle of beautiful maids at every opportunity she got and she always tried to push her fathers' boundaries with when could she walk around naked and in front of whom.

It took her a second to realize that Lexy probably didn't share her free nature and that finding herself naked embarrassed her to death, as not caring about her state of dress was normal to Kali.

"Give me a second," Kali jumped up and collected Lexy's clothes and put them into the bedroom, "Here, and sorry for startling you."

"I-it's alright," the girl said before pushing the door shut to get dressed alone.

She must think I'm some kind of deviant, Kali lamented with a sigh as she poured water onto her face, letting the cold liquid refresh her. It's just a habit, damnit. I always slept naked. Who doesn't sleep naked? Even those silk night-clothes were so stuffy.

"We really should get you new clothes," Kali noted as Alexis came out of the room, looking everywhere but into Kali's eyes. Kali, of course, used her cleaning enchantment on the girl's clothes, but it couldn't fix wear and tear.

"Hmm?" Lexy looked at Kali for a moment at that, but quickly looked away again.

"I never asked, but how old are you?"

"thirteen..."

"Damn." Kali closed her eyes. With the girl being this meek and small, she assumed somewhere along the lines of 8 or 10, but with how malnourished she was when they found her and the Awakening messing with her body...

"Is that bad?" Lexy asked nervously.

"No," Kali said quickly, her gaze snapping at the girl.

"Do elves sleep without clothes?" that's a long sentence. Kali wanted to congratulate her.

"Nope," Kali said with a shrug, "but I always did, or well, I don't really know, I never had much of a chance to ask all that many elves what they sleep in."

The girl pulled out a chair and hopped onto it, her feet dangling in the air as she did so.

"Why do you look different from the elves here?" Lexy asked again, surprising Kali.

"Well," she thought, "because all the elves here are Autumn elves like you and the twins and I am a Winter elf, we live on snow-capped mountains but I wanted to see the world instead of being bored to death up there."

"S-so we are not the s-same?" Lexy's voice trembled a bit as she looked Kali in the eyes.

"We are still elves," Kali smiled. They were not the same but Kali felt closer to the girl than her own parents so it didn't mean much, "and we are friends, right?"

"F-friends?"

"Mhmm," Kali nodded, "you know, Winter elves are very weak physically compared to Autumn elves, we barely weigh anything so we are fast, but we can't hit hard."

Lexy tilted her little head curiously.

"Then there are the Spring elves. They live far down to the south and they are more similar to Winter Elves in that they are very light. They are the best Archers on the continent as far as I know."

"Summer?"

"Yeah, there are Summer elves too," Kali shrugged, "or were now, I guess. They fled the continent long ago and we still don't know where they disappeared to."

"What can I do?" Lexy asked.

"As an Autumn Elf?" Kali smiled and nodded, "As you age, your legs will grow much stronger. Autumn Elves are known to outrun almost anything, and there's a story of one kicking a Troll's head off so forcefully that it couldn't regenerate."

"Wooow," Lexy's eyes widened in both awe and excitement, that must be bullshit though, Ly'Riel moaned so much about having to burn those disgusting things to ash to be sure they wouldn't regenerate. Not to say she still stank a month after fighting a small group of them.

Kali almost snorted as it reminded her of how her Master summarized the four Elven races and the two noble ones.

Winter Elves were quick and the best ambush predators on the face of Aetheria.

Summer Elves were brutes who could shatter rocks with their bare hands while also being as stubborn as one.

Autumn Elves were the fastest and could cleave rocks in half with a kick, but they were cowardly.

Spring Elves were the best archers on the planet but they were arrogant a fault.

Next, we had the two Noble races: the Eldar and the Eladrin. To Kali's knowledge, each species was divided into three grades of sub-races: common, Noble, and Royal.

Royals were...complicated and Kali could go on for hours and hours to explain it all, but the most compact version was that as far as she knew there were only four Royal elves alive at the moment, her, her two siblings and her father. She heard rumors that she once had an aunt but she knew better than to ask her father when even the slightest reference to her got courtiers and advisors flying off the side of the mountain.

"Then there are the two Noble Elven races," Kali continued, "they are almost perfect opposites of each other to be honest."

"Noble?" A disgruntled frown appeared on Lexy's little face.

"Not in the same way humans have nobles, these are Nobles," Kali said gently, "they are superior in most things to the four previous races but just like them they have their specialties and correlating eccentricities, Eldar are the most sociable people you'll ever meet, they thrive in an intellectual crowd, in large towns and centers of knowledge. Almost all of them live for Change, Technological and Magical advancement and science with very few outliners," like Master.

"The blue ones?" Lexy tilted her head and Kali did a double take.

"Yes they tend to have skin colour ranging from light blue to gray or even light purple with glowing silver eyes. How did you know?"

"I saw one once… when he came...to th-he- vill-*sob*" Kali quickly went over and hugged the girl closely as she tried to calm her with gentle back rubs.

"It's alright," she whispered, "you are safe now," she squeezed the little elf close, "I'm sorry I asked."

"Sowwwyy," Lexy squealed once her sobs abated, but her eyes were still red and wet.

"You did nothing wrong," Kali reassured her as she cleaned off the girl's face with her sleeve, "we are friends, right?" she received a shaky nod, "that means I'll help you no matter what."

"B-but," she sipped, her knuckles going white as she clung onto Kali's clothes, "you'll l-leave m-me here."

Kali's heart jumped into her throat as a deep pit formed in her stomach. She felt like a noose was tightening around her neck. Children were the most perceptive at the most unfortunate times.

"You wouldn't be safe with me," Kali said with a grimace, not that she was lying, of course but it felt like an excuse nonetheless, "many people want me either dead or alive Lexy."

"I'll protect you," the girl said with a sob, "we are friends."

The layered armor Kali built around her heart shattered as she felt a tear slip down her cheek, "And that's why I can't let you come with me," every word felt like it weighted a ton on her tongue, "I could barely escape last time they caught me," she winced, "I'd hate myself if you got caught because of me, or worse."

"B-b-bbu-tt," tears were pooling at the edge of Alexis' eyes again, threatening to come falling at a single wrong word.

"I can promise you that I'll come back to you," Kali put her palms on both sides of Lexy's face and made her look into her eyes, "I swear I'll come back Lexy, but I need to get stronger, much stronger if I want to live with any semblance of safety and freedom, until I am strong I'll have to live like a rat, running from place to place and that is not a life I'd want for you, for my friend."

"I-i," the young elf bit her lips, "I'll get strong too," her sky-blue eyes shone with childish resolve, "I don't want to be weak ... again."

"I'm sure you will be the strongest elf in a few decades," Kali smiled as she pulled the girl's head into her chest and gave her a heartfelt squeeze.

"I will," she sniffed one last time as she cleaned her eyes and nose with her sleeve.

Kali smiled at her. She dreaded that conversation for the last few days, but it went better than she expected.

----------------------------------------

"Oh, COME IN," Kali shouted as she heard a rhythmic knock on the door a few minutes later.

"Good day to you two," said Virendel as he stepped into the small living room, his nostrils flared for a moment before his eyes focused on the cups held in the two girls' hands, "Oh, I see you made use of our cocoa beans? I didn't think it grew anywhere close to the mountains?"

"It didn't," Kali caressed the warm cup, one of her last memories with her mother was making this together one evening after she managed to get her hands on some preserved beans and fresh milk, "I only had it a few times but it stuck with me."

"I see," he nodded slowly. One didn't live for a thousand years without learning to pick up social cues, it seemed, "if you are ready master is willing to receive you all afternoon."

"I'm mostly ready," Kali said as she took in the last mouthful of cocoa, swirling it around in her mouth to savor the taste before swallowing it, "let me just get my jacket."

"I-i'm ready," Lexy said after quickly drinking all of her own.

"Ah, is it disrespectful if I bring a dagger?" Kali shouted out from the bedroom.

"No," Virendel answered, "though only if it doesn't have withering enchantments on it, Master despises those."

"It doesn't!"

"Then it is fine."

"Alright," Kali said as she came back out of the bedroom, now with her belt around her waist, her dagger tucked in its holder and her jacket thrown over her shoulders.

She considered throwing it into her spatial ring, but it wasn't something she wanted to flaunt, even if she mostly came to trust the others. There was trust and then there was showing off a royal treasure. A spatial ring by itself wouldn't be too out of place or even that unusual. Anyone considered well-off could get one, but if anyone noticed how large the space inside Kali's was, then she might invite some undue trouble onto her head.

Then there is that bracelet, which is surely even more expensive, never heard of an Artifact that could heal old wounds or make your overall health better.

Kali hopped out of the house first, looking around curiously as the harsh midday already started to warm her skin. Her clothes were less and less fitting for the climate with each traveled kilometer. The village was every bit as mythical as Kali hoped it'd be, though looking at the fearful faces of the locals shattered her daydreams. Kali loved books, she's read a lot of them over her thirty years of life. Books were like magic. They took her out of the boring castle on a dreary mountaintop, flew her through the magical landscapes of Aetheria and introduced her to a bundle of intriguing things.

She wanted to be in a village like this so many times, a secret village hidden by powerful magic only accessible to the mystical trees whom only the very few remaining druids knew even a little about.

Then there was the trope of a secret master hiding in such villages, protecting it from the shadows, a crouching tiger or hidden dragon. Kali's mouth twitched at that, she'd read that idiom in a book imported from a certified 'faraway land', she didn't know where it was just that it was beyond the Azure Expanse, a treacherous Ocean to the East of Iasira which barely any sailors dared to brave.

Of course, this also gave way to a gaggle of fantastical books about various heroes journeying into the unknown and finding anything from a land made of gold to people who could turn into foxes. One even talked about a dreaded Vampire Lord lording over a continent of various species.

Vampires were a touchy subject in the Winter Kingdom. Kali knew they were somehow important and involved in the kingdom but not much beyond that and the occasional people visiting her father who had suspiciously short ears and even more suspiciously glimmering blood-red eyes.

While Kali was daydreaming, the trio collected Vorgnar and arrived at the mysterious Arch-druid's dwelling. Kali expected a hole in a large tree, or maybe a house built between the branches of trees. What she found herself looking at was a simple house. It was triple the size of the one she and Lexy stayed in sure but it was still just like that.

"Master," Virendel knocked on the door with a twitch of his eyebrows, "I have brought my guests over to meet you."

"Oh did you now?" A muffled voice as sweet as honey and sharp as a viper came from behind the door before it snapped open, "Well, hello to you three."

"Hi~" Kali tilted her head curiously, the woman was what you'd see next to the name 'Eladrin' in a dictionary. She had soft green skin and dark green hair cascading down her back, one reminiscent of fresh grass while the other of the evergreen forests up in the mountains. She barely had enough clothes to cover her hips and breasts which Kali's gaze lingered on for a moment before flickering up to stare into the woman's phoenix eyes, they were slitted like a snake's and shining in a hateful yellowish orange color.

"I am the village's Alchemist, you can call me Avariel or granny for you little one," the Eladrin said with a gentle smile thrown in Lexy's direction who stilled and slid behind Kali who shifted uncomfortably as this brought a less kind gaze upon herself.

"Who might you be?" she intoned as her venomous eyes held the young princess in their grasp like a startled deer in front of a dragon.

"Kalitra," she managed to squeak out, but the woman's gaze didn't abate as a frown crested her brows.

"Master please," Virendel interrupted with exasperation clear in his voice, "I didn't spend two hours recounting everything yesterday for you to bully my saviors."

"You are right," the woman turned on her heels and kicked the door wide open behind her, "come on in, we have some things to talk about."

"Thanks," Kali muttered as she slid up next to Virendel with Lexy close on her tail.

"I'm sorry about her," he sighed, "she... well... just know that she is a good person deep down. Without her, this village would have ceased to exist centuries ago."

"The crouching dragon is eccentric," Kali muttered under her breath. That is two cliches in one woman, plus she barely wears clothes, that's three.

"Come sit," the woman led them up to a large table made of a still-living tree trunk, treated and shiny, but it still seemed just like normal wood. However, when Kali slid her hand across its surface, she felt tiny streams of mana flowing through it.

The table was circular, so there wasn't any seniority or politics thing that the tutors hammered into Kali's thick skull. The woman plopped down first into a seat and Virendel took a seat next to her. When Vorgnar stepped forward and sat perpendicular to the woman, Kali sighed a bit in relief and sat next to him with Lexy sitting next to her. Staring ensued.

"You haven't introduced yourselves yet," the woman noted and Kali blinked in surprise. She'd get chewed out for that by her etiquette tutor for days.

"I'm Vorgnar Severus," the Daemon said with a stoic mask on his face.

"Your kind is rare around these parts," Avariel noted with a nod, "thank you for saving my clumsy disciple."

Vorgnar just grunted and nodded.

"I'm A-Alexis."

"Good to meet you, Alexis," the druid smiled at her before turning her gaze to Kali, who opened her mouth to speak.

"If you have nothing new to say, then don't repeat yourself." her words died in her throat and her mouth closed awkwardly as she stared down into her lap.

I'm sure she knows I lied about my name. Hopefully she won't press it. This is already awkward as hell. Why did I want to meet her again?

"I heard your little group wants to leave soonish and head for the border," the druid flickered her gaze between Kali and Vorgnar before stopping on the man as Kali just shrunk back under her venomous stare.

"Yes."

"Do you know how you'll get through the Imperials?"

"We'll manage."

"Will you take the child with you?"

The man glanced at Lexy, then at Kali, who shook her head without looking at Avariel.

"No."

"So you are leaving another mouth to feed to us."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because she'd die with us."

"Won't she if she starves here?"

"Will you starve her?"

"Of course not!" the woman flared up, "My apologies, of course, we will take care of the child, this world is too harsh for them to live alone in."

Kali just caressed the increasingly nervous Lexy's hand under the table, though it was mutual, as Kali too felt her straining nerves relax slightly as the girl held onto her hand.

The woman and Vorgnar went back and forth for a while and Kali grew a bit bored, she propped up her chin with her palm and looked all around the room, finding curious vines and plants growing out of the walls, glowing berries hanging from the roof, hardy moss covering the floor acting like a rug and so on. As she was shaken out of her reverie, she stared intently at a vine that twitched every few seconds, causing a similar twitch in her ears.

"Yeah?" she asked as she looked askance at Vorgnar who elbowed her.

"The Alchemist asked you something."

"Y-yes?" Kali glanced into those slitted eyes again and unlike before, she found an intense stare.

"Where did you get that ring?" her words were so unlike the flowery words or sweet tone from before that it threw Kali for a loop.

"This one?" Kali pointed at the blocky spatial ring first.

"No," the woman said with a touch of irritation, "the silverite one."

"It's from my Master," Kali reflexively said as she clutched the ring protectively before her eyes went wide. Damn it, why is my mouth so loose? If she recognized something from it, she might know Master and as far as I know, he only took me on as a student in the last thousand years.

"Don't you dare lie to me girl," the woman stood up as her venomous glare returned several folds, Vorgnar was on his feet and ready to fight to Kali's side but they were beyond fucked if the woman wanted to kill them, 'never fight a druid in their grove' was one of the first rules of staying alive.

"I can feel Zadkiel's mana in it, did your bastard of a Master do something to my son?" she growled as the whole house vibrated with mana, making Kali's ear twitch violently despite the mind-numbing bomb the woman dropped on her head.

"WHAT?"