"Peace, Jessa, I come here not to sneer at you or look down at you, but to beg of you, my children don't have much longer. Please, please, I beg of you to not tarry any longer than you absolutely must. War is coming far sooner to my people than they realize and they are in no way prepared."

"Ask the silver dragon king to send an emissary in their dragon form to talk to them. We will be traveling slowly, I must unite the humans behind me or your children will be lost any way and so will they. I can't allow that to happen since they will be instrumental in holding off the evil to keep the Moon elves safe. 

"But don't worry, the moon elves will be fighting."

"Silva will be the furthest from the fighting. You might wish to send your children, the women and children that aren't fighters and those to old or sick to fight here to my children." Lady Zira tells her arrogant brother.

"Thank you, sister, that is most kind, especially since you have no love for my children." Lord Kaiston tells her. 

Lady Zira smiles rather nastily at her brother, "Just remember, Kaiston, they have been around Jessa's influence for years and she is their crown princess. They will not tolerate the smug superiorness your children like to believe they have. They will bring them down, just as Jessa has done to you."

"Good, I'm rather counting heavily on it. If she doesn't bring down their haughtiness then they will all die. It is inevitable at this time that some of them, perhaps many of them will die. I just don't want all of them to do so." Kaiston turns his attention from his sister to Jessa.

"Please, Jessa, I know that I didn't give a good impression last time we met, but I'm begging you to please help me save my children."

Dhiren looks on doing his best to keep from smiling smugly at the sun elf deity. "You met him before Jessa?" He would have dearly loved to have seen that confrontation.

"Yes, they seem to like to invade my sleep and make it so that I don't get much rest. He didn't think much of my abilities." At her words there are snickers and guffaws heard from the elves and even the deities have a hard time holding back their thoughts on that.

Kaiston lowers his head in shame, then raises it once more. "I admit, she is good, better than me by far. She had me down and a knife to my throat before I even knew it. Then she didn't even ask me for anything before letting me back up."

Alaric and the Ancient One are scowling at this the rest are still trying to hide their smirks. "You know, Kaiston, that means that you owe Jessa big time and there will come a time when she will likely come to you and make you pay that debt." Lady Silva remarks to her brash brother.

"If she saves my children it will be a debt doubly owed and one that I'll gladly pay. Please, Jessa?"

"I've already told you Kaiston," she intentionally leaves off the honorific. "I will be heading there as soon as I can. We will be traveling slowly since I have need to unite the humans behind me, but I will get there. Like I said before, send an emissary from the silver dragons, in dragon form to your high handed children and see if they will be accepted then."

Kaiston looks down in shame. "The silver queen refuses to consider sending her children there at this time. She said that if my children won't listen to her then there is no sense in sending them into danger sooner than necessary." He looks up and there tears in his eyes. "There is nothing more that I can do without losing them all."

Jessa isn't so cold hearted as to want a potentially strong ally be totally destroyed. "We will get there the soonest we can, but, they aren't going to like what I'll be doing."

"Good, they need a wake up call. If they turn their backs on you there is nothing more to be done to save them and I will have to allow my children to be destroyed." Kaiston says resolutely to Jessa.

"My people have their king and queen, their king believes that his queen is inferior." Jessa's eyes narrow at this. She has absolutely no time for fools that believe that females are less than males. "It isn't an idea that I've fostered, Jessa. I'm not sure how it started but when he took the throne it became more widespread and now most of my people believe it as well.

"They have twin sons and they are both impossibly arrogant, even for my people. Prince, they have become even worse since you last visited."

Dhiren chuckles at this. Then he turns to Jessa, "My cousins seem to believe that the world turns just for them and they are the only ones that matter. All others should give them what they want. Including females, even if they are married or betrothed. I have no doubt that they will desire you, Jessa, that is until you show them that they are nothing. Then they will likely be so shocked that the world doesn't turn for them that their hearts will stop."

Jessa smiles nastily, "Well, it's about time that someone will teach the arrogant bastards a bit of humility then isn't it. Oh, I think that going to Lexin will be something that I'll enjoy after all. Not sure how well your children will enjoy it, Kaiston, but taking down arrogant asses is one of my favorite past times."

Kaiston gives her a bitter smile, "And you do a marvelous job of it. They are the champions of my people. No one has been able to beat them for more than a century. Most don't even dare to try."

Jessa raises an eyebrow and waits for an explanation, "They are afraid that the twins will punish them for daring to be better. Like I said, they take what they want and don't give a shit."

Jessa becomes very serious at this. "I will humiliate them and if they push things too far I will fully defend myself against them. You do understand that, right?"

Kaiston bows his head before her. "These views are not my own, Jessa. My people have long strayed from me and need to be returned or all is lost. Do as you must. If you cannot teach them then they will be some of the first to die. Whether it is by your hand or that of the enemies, it won't matter. Time is too short to be soft about things at this time. They have ignored me, they have ignored the warnings of others. Soon there will come a time of reckoning and if there are any left, that's..." Kaiston breaks down. "Their attitude towards women did start from me, but I never felt as they do. Females have their strengths, my children no longer recognize that and do not treat their females right."

"Oh, no worries on that one, Kaiston, that is one thing that will be changed. Or there won't be any other elves. Can't have your females repressed like that. How have you allowed this to go on?"

"I do not like to castigate, I believed that they would see the error of their ways and listen to my warnings, but they did not."

"If you aren't willing to punish them, there is no need to give them laws or for them to follow the ones in place." Jessa shivers at the lack of order he just admitted to. "Chaos and ignorance runs rampant when laws are ignored. Then something like this happens and they work themselves into a corner where they are likely to die."

"I see that now." Kaiston says defeated.

"We should be ready by tomorrow."

"Thank you, Jessa."

"Alaric, would you please take a list of things for Frosnak to have ready for me when we reach Kyron? I'll need her to travel a short way with us to continue working with Sorsha and Kristoff.

"Speaking of which, has he brought back the traitors?" Jessa demands of them all.

"No, Jessa, he hasn't returned yet. If he has to chase him down it could take some time." Kallen tries to soothe her.

During all this time elves have been dealing with the dead.

Jessa grunts unhappily. "Let me speak to the ones that survived the attack. I need to choose the rest of my guard."

"Once you are on your journey, you will need to not just make alliances with the humans, the copper and brass dragons refuse to talk to me. They said that they are unwilling to fight another war for humans or elves. You will need to do your best to contact them and change their minds, Jessa." Alaric tells her sourly. "You will also need to pick up some gold dragons as guards. Perhaps not as your personal guard, but as part of your retinue. They will be introduced to you by Frosnak along the way." 

Frosnak lands gently and immediately changes back to her human form. 

"Why?" Jessa demands impatiently. She finds it restricting enough to have to have an elvish guard.

"You are our crown princess and will need to be shown that respect." Frosnak says with amusement. "They won't be obvious, we do try to hide. But they will want to protect their princess. They are rather in awe of you and would love to see you in action."

Jessa sniffs, "Yeah right, they want to see if I will become power hungry and if they will need to take me down."

Alaric, Frosnak and even the Ancient One look at her in horror. "They would do no such thing. To do so would mean that they turn from their own laws. They would become rogue and hunted down and killed for doing so."

Jessa smiles nastily at that. "Like Selnik was?"

There is silence at her words. "You heard." Alaric says testily.

"Yes." The one word spoken coldly and succinctly makes them all shudder.

"He is no longer under the protection of the law. He is to be dealt with upon encountering him. If you find him, do as you will, Jessa." The Ancient One tells her.

"Oh, I will, I will. I will do what I've wanted to do since I met him. I'm sorry, Frosnak, but I truly can't stand him."

Frosnak smiles sadly, "It is understandable. He has ever been the hardest of my children to love. He cannot be allowed to further harm his people or others."

Then silence falls as no on has anything else to say. Just the sound of the elves cleaning up from the attack.

Then the ones that were taken to Silva are returned and things become noisy once more.