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Rigel shook his head. "Not since we came here, to the Four Lands," he said solemnly. "The rest of the world ... is dangerous. Our island, where we lived for so long ... was overrun by demons, and it's not safe there for anyone anymore. Many other islands are inhabited by demons as well, and there's no way to know until you go and see for yourself ... and there's no coming back from that."

"We lost our son to the demons when he was still a youth," Soronume added quietly, "and we very nearly lost Serenity to one here. She was lucky to have come away only blinded. Though no one else in these lands has seen a demon before, they all know about them, and what they can do. No one in their right mind would risk it."

"That ... is a difficult question to answer," Rigel replied quietly, folding his hands on the table in front of himself. "It began ... well, during the First Age, actually. Only a matter of centuries after we elves were first brought into the world. Not all of the Valar were good ... one Vala was far from it. Rather than seeking our good, he sought to destroy us. When our race was still young, he created his own race ... the demons. Like the elves at first, but black, living embodiments of evil."

"One of the reasons the Westland Elves cut off contact with the Southland elves in the first place, actually," Soronume put in sadly. "Because they associated our darker colourings with the evil of the demons."

Rigel nodded. "It was disgusting, actually. Thank the Valar that most of them are dead now. Rather than accept exile, we, along with a large group of both Light and Dark Elves, sailed ... we thought the demons had been vanquished during the war between the Valar. We were wrong. Few were actually killed by the demons ... most of them were turned and joined the demon ranks. Few of us survived to escape the island, and now it is only Soronume, Serenity and I who are left."

Elnara leaned close to Lore and murmured, "And that was the censored version."

She knew it caused her grandparents too much pain to go into any more detail than they did ... and now she knew why. They had experienced it ... and she hadn't known before that she had had an uncle on her mother's side.

Lore nodded at that trying not to cough, partly because that had not been the first time he had been referred to Sir Valdemar for the same reason.

"Perhaps I will," Lore agreed, deciding to not venture into more uncomfortable territory, "It's our second day here so..."

Elnara couldn't help but giggle. "It was past noon when we arrived," she pointed out defensively, reaching out and pretending to smack her grandfather upside the head, "and it was pretty chaotic yesterday."

"We met lots of people yesterday," Idhril said excitedly. "We met Ninako and some of Mama's brothers and my aunt and some cousins and a really tall man that reads books just like Papa does!"

Of course, not having met Sir Valdemar in person yet, she couldn't remember his name and thus didn't know that it was he whom her great-grandfather had just recommended.

Idhril giggled. "There was a lot of books!" she nodded enthusiastically, heading over to sit with Lore. "Lots and lots and lots ... and lots of papers, too, there were papers everywhere! On the desk, on the chair, on the table, on the shelf, on the books, on the floor ..."

Elnara laughed. "Yes, Sir Valdemar's study was quite a mess," she agreed. "But then ... as I recall, he was always like that. So into his work. I'm still amazed that he can manage to find what he's working on all the time."

She grinned across the table at Lore. "If you ever pick up that habit, I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave your work at the library," she giggled.

Lore chuckled, "I'm sure I won't get that bad... at least not papers."

Books on the other hand, as they were his preferred form of reading, was another thing all together. Seeing as he tended to have piles of them.

"They're neat!" Lore protested mockingly looking like he was offended, "They are piled up into neat stacks according to subject."

Now if he could find the right stacks was quite questionable and he knew it.