Someone interrupts him in the middle of afternoon training to notify him that a stranger materialized out of nowhere a few miles away and looks human, except rather healthier than they tended to be, and also possibly has powers. 

Illia rather wishes Odette were here. Even leaving aside her the fact that her sister was just plain better at magic than she was, her own specialization of Effort doesn't leave her terribly prepared to gather information about where the fuck she is. Well, it's not like she's an incompetent at Sympathy. She ascertains the direction of the nearest people, and starts walking.

They stare at her from their ramparts. Young, definitely human-looking, definitely alone, definitely apppeared out of nowhere. It has to be a trap, but if so, why have her appear out of nowhere? Why not introduce her more naturally, where the other Men were?

Some kind of fortress? Where are they, the Germanies? But the architecture is wrong for a Schloss. Nowhere she recognizes, then, which bodes ill for her ability to communicate. Lovely.

She keeps walking. 

"I'm going to ride out," he says. 

"Wouldn't we rather have the walls, for a fight?" his father asks, frowning. It's not an 'I order you to stay right here on this battlement" so that's practically a yes but -

"I'll take two hundred men. If I lose I won't lose fast, and you'll have more time to get a good defense ready here, shoo the civilians out -"

This makes his father look even less happy, but it's good sense so a few minutes later he's riding out with two hundred men.

Holy shit are they riding horses? Who even does cavalry anymore? Is this Poland? She stops, puts her arms up--it doesn't matter practically, since she's a mage, but it still works as a gesture of intent--and tries, "Hello. I apologize for intruding, and I promise it wasn't on purpose," in Ashkenazi. There are people who speak Ashkenazi in Poland, right, she's pretty sure.

She surrenders, which is mostly what he'd expected, and says something in a language he doesn't speak, which is not what he expected. He has the men only half-encircle her, in case it's some kind of trap.

Hello, he says. This is Eithel Sirion. Identify yourself, please.

My name is Illia Zavier. I and my sister Odette are students of magic at the University at Genosha, in the Free City of Genosha. Recently we were assaulted by a mage with greater experience and power than ourselves, and my sister was forced to teleport us away. I don't know where I am, why I'm here, or why she isn't given that I am.

Well. That is not the story he was anticipating. More like "I'm lost and helpless", but perhaps they anticipated that'd be too obvious. 

This is Eithel Sirion, he repeats himself, of Beleriand. I have not heard of Genosha; it may be very far east of here, where there are mortal civilizations not known to us. Can you teleport back?

I can't teleport at all; my sister is a more gifted mage than I. Genosha doesn't have a fixed location. It flies. And I've never heard of Beleriand.

Ah. 

"Sorry, kid, but you're almost guaranteed to be an agent of the Enemy so I'm going to ask you to walk in a different direction" seems too harsh, probably just because he's been told he's almost guaranteed to be an agent of the ememy and it's still a painful memory. 

Let's head north, he says instead. We have a guard outpost there. With a garrison of only forty, she can only do so much damage assuming she turns out to be what she obviously is.

Um. Okay. Why do you have horses, anyway?

They are - the fastest way to travel, for those of us without your sister's magic, and useful in massed combat when the other side only has foot soldiers. Do your people not use them for warfare?

I think they still do in Poland? But not because it's a good idea. We have--and she shows him an image of an armored wheeled thing. It only takes a little magic to operate, well within the capabilities of even someone who never went for hedgewitch.

We don't have those. Do you know how to build them?

Um. Yes, but I am slightly leery of telling you how if you don't already know, given the circumstances. The word "circumstances" is accompanied by a mental image half-circle of unfriendly-looking people on horseback.

You do not think we could currently best you in combat, but if you taught us your capabilities then we could?

I think that if your reaction to a single stranger showing up in the vicinity is to send out a large number of fighters, there's probably an active conflict, and I should learn more about it before I give anybody anything.

I have knowledge, but first you have to earn my trust. A nice reversal. Except - still a rather obvious game, compared to some of the ones this enemy has played. Who was subtle enough to seed in all of his own prisoners the conviction that they still were, and then attempted impersonation by claiming to be a stranger from a distant flying city?

There is an active conflict. 

What are the sides?

Dry laughter. Us and the Enemy.

That...is a reasonable description of most conflicts.

Thus my amusement. The Enemy is known as Melkor, or Morgoth, but these are scarcely more descriptive than my first answer. Morgoth means 'the dark foe' and Melkor 'he who arises in might'. 

Why are you at war?

He wants to destroy everything in the world and fill it with his twisted abominations. We would like to stop this from occurring. He also killed - by now it's a long list - my grandfather, my brother, my uncle, my cousin, indirectly a sister-in-law, and many friends.