"I imagine that will be a tremendous help!"

"Of course. But--should something like the Bragollach happen again, it is far preferable that she be able to help wherever she's needed most, without having to deal with the concern that she's leaving us helpless."

"Oh, definitely. Does the city have non-magical defenses?"

"Yes, we've been taking advantage of my birth world's more advanced weapons technology."

"Oh? I suppose with magic for basic needs, your world's Men would not have been subject to the challenges that handlcapped the Men of this world."

"We've also been around much longer."

"How long?"

"Mm, I don't think we've determined for certain? Tens of thousands of years, though, to be sure."

"Wow. That is even longer than the Eldar."

"Oh?"

"We've been around about eight thousand years of this Sun, if they'd been counted that way back then."

"And our sun is billions of years old."

"That is very strange. How do you know?"

"It's general knowledge. I don't know exactly how one goes about learning the age of a star."

"Your sun is a star?"

"Yes. Not a terribly large one, even."

"I see."

"Much bigger than our planet, though."

"What an interesting arrangement."

"It's certainly different from what you have here."

"Imagine what you'd have thought if you'd have landed in the time of the Trees!"

"Oh, that it was wonderfully beautiful, I'm sure."

"It was." A bit longingly.

"It doesn't sound as though we would have been very useful, though. I'd rather be somewhere I'm needed than somewhere I'm superfluous, however paradisical."

"Yes, that was the impulse that stirred many of us to leave."