Aravae's delicate protest sent a vaguely familiar feeling through him, one that he had known his entire life but one that he couldn't quite place. Anger, perhaps? No. He could never be angry with her, especially not now, not at a time like this. "My lady, you don't.."<span style="font-style: italic">You don't understand,</span>he wanted to say. He couldn't say that in good conscience. She understood perfectly well the repercussions of this invasion, perhaps moreso than he did. "Aravae, if you do not leave this place, you be put in danger. If you were to get hurt, or gods forbid<span style="font-style: italic">die</span>, who would lead the people then?"<br/><br/>It wasn't particularly a fair thing to say, to put that much pressure on her in such a sensitive situation, but it finally struck him just what that distant feeling was lacing his words. For the first time in his hundreds of years of life, Feron felt afraid, truly afraid. He had been scared before, everyone had experienced that in some form or another, but this... this was something different. It choked him, pulled his mind in millions of different directions all at once. He feared for his mother, his siblings, his home village. He feared for Aravae, feared the inevitable war. Most notably, though, he feared for Terisys.<br/><br/>It was then that Aravae rose from her perch, her hand resting gently against his face to pull him from his thoughts. She pushed herself up on her toes and ghosted her her lips against his own.<span style="color: #87CEFA">“Have faith my love,"</span>she reassured him, the whispers of a smile on her lips.<span style="color: #87CEFA">"The world has not ended yet. We still yet have the possibility to prevent disaster.”</span><br/><br/>Feron's hand came up to curl around Aravae's own, squeezing ever so slightly before kissing the palm of her hand. He stayed like that a moment before bringing her hand down between them, clasped in both of his own. "That we do," he agreed, albeit reluctantly. Be it like him to err on the side of caution, about everything in general but particularly about this. He studied her hand intently, as if the past few moments had made it suddenly so much more interesting. "I suppose the people will want answers as to what we're going to do." He paused, looked up at her. "Has he decided on the best course of action?"<br/><br/>By 'he', Feron was referring to her father, His Eminence King Lorien Delsaran, lord and divine protector of Terisys. A man of thousands of years, and wise even further beyond his years. His Excellency had seen many things; the founding of Kainen, the Dragons and the war they brought, the coming peace after the war was over... but Feron had to wonder, in all of his years, if the king had ever seen anything like this. He cursed himself in the back of his mind for thinking such things, but he had to wonder if the king even knew<span style="font-style: italic">how</span>to respond to their oncoming threat. The king was wise, moreso than any other man he had ever met, but he was also old.<br/><br/>Elves do not die of old age. In fact, left alone, they do not age at all. Magic, imbued in every single Elf of pure lineage, takes a heavy toll on the body. For every spell you perform, you trade a little piece of your life. Sporadically used, magic has no visible effects on the body, but over time it ages you, depletes your energy. The king had been thrown into the unfortunate circumstance of being required to use magic in heavy amounts for years as the war between the people of Eredon and the dragons ravaged the land. His body was frail now, no longer fit for battle even though his mind was the same as it ever was. In the end, Feron would follow the king wherever he should lead them, but he had to wonder if all of his years of being unfit for war had taken any toll on his strategic abilities.