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Kara shook her head, "Blunt as always I see," she gave Donovan a look even though she had to agree with it, "Hmm... how long as it been?" she mused, "Serenity left when Elnara was very little... Elnara is twenty now, but so much time has passed.... and... I don't think the humans here live as long as the humans in the cities of Gaia."

Lack of medicial and health resources would do that, and they didn't have to labour as much physically.

Donovan mused on this, the one thing he had to be taught was to take all factors involved, there was still a lot he needed to learn about this land. He hated when his facts were only half baked.

"Possibily," Donovan mused, "However... and I could be wrong seeing as I'm doing this with only half the knowledge I normally have, but... if it was a wealthy elf, it should be worse than this. Somehow I would gather another elf would be more influncial in trying to hound Serenity than this," he rubbed his temple a bit, "It's risking one's neck in threatening her family, even if she is a shapeshifter... granted... the past two decades or more of upheaval I've heard happened in this place has really done a number on the security around here. Slavers attacking in large groups, and then these guys getting through. Right now it could be anyone or a group of someones, it's not that hard. The queen needs a hunter to clean out the rats, they're starting to get annoying."

"You're wrong in one of your assumptions," Ulrich interrupted them, looking at Donovan. "You think it's been going on for the last two decades ... in truth it's been going on for centuries. It's not that it's getting any more frequent lately, it's just that it's getting more personal to the Aldrich family."

He paused. "Except for that one time ... that was pretty bad, I'm sure you must have been told something about it ... Ulani's cousin was killing off the family one by one in order to usurp the throne." He shook his head sadly. "Ulani was his target when he was finally killed ... and he nearly succeeded."

Though of course the aftermath wasn't so bad ... that was when he had proposed.

"Donovan a lot of things annoy you," Kara finally said with wrly amusement, "Anything that makes things more difficult than need be is annoying to you," she chuckled and tugged on his sleeve, "Falling in love was annoying to you."

She knew this to be a fact, because Donovan was an all business person, but not anymore. Well, he was, just now in a different context.

Donovan raised a brow, "I never said there weren't," he replied back rolling his eyes at Kara, taking her hand so she would stop tugging, "I just meant, as long as there is no trouble. We always run into trouble on trips, it would be nice for once not to do so."

Which was unusually true, not that Donovan fully minded, it was just that running into vampires on the last trip was well... annoying.

Ulrich was about to reply when the front door opened and two elves stepped in: one very tall male, with short black hair and copper skin, sharp eyes and angular features, strongly muscled. The other was shorter, a youth of about ten years of age, skinny, but one who had a strong appearance, fairly muscular arms, and a carried himself as a fighter.

They were chattering happily together as they stepped inside, but the taller one stopped when he saw the visitors, and the younger, upon seeing them, clapped his hands excitedly.

"Kara and Donovan!" he grinned, making the transition between languages easily. He ran forward and hugged Kara around the neck. "You're back! Did you bring Thalion-tol and Nara-thel with you? Did you?" He stepped back and looked at them excitedly, his eyes dancing.

Donovan smirked looking the youth up and down, well someone had grown he thought, but then again it had been six years, but still. This was a suprirse.

"Kara, you shouldn't be surprised, you're use to fast growths," Donovan teased her.

Which was true, Daeron's growth was normal compared to her children, or it was a lot like her children's only it was caused by a time gap rather than fast growing.

"That chatterbox wasn't told we were going, we've only planned a short trip anyhow," Donovan replied casually.

He was somewhat grateful that they were with Ulani and Ulrich, otherwise he mused things could get ugly. Not that.. he never talked with Ruel, but still...

"Though Triton, Yue and I will drop by the palace on the next trip," he told Daeron, "So you can talk to him then... Elnara.. is... busy," he lied, one of the few times he would because the kid didn't need to have parental problems now, and as much as he didn't like Ruel, he respected family ties... even if Ruel did not, "But maybe she will evenually."

Like... only with Triton, Celebor and maybe some other people giving her puppy dog eyes to go into the portal with them.