"Caithe helped."

"Fair point, thank you. Caithe helped James sit on the silly people."

"And let us be fair to them, they had some real grievances with each other."

"Aw. Yes, all right, fair respect to the powerful people that have worked very hard to help save the world, they had some real grievances with each other and my chipper irreverent gloss over does not do them justice."

He smiles.

She smiles back.

"So. James rounded up Destiny's Edge with Caithe's help. He met a sylvari called Trahearne, and together they got several different organizations to make nice with each other, and then formed a guild called the Pact. They all went and killed a different Dragon, named Zhaitan, who doesn't super matter anymore because he's dead. Yaaay. Then there was a period of time that was kind of boring, and then a sylvari named Scarlet Briar did many bad things, including waking Mordremoth up. So now everyone is about all caught up. Any important details I left out before we move on?"

"I met a few people who have been around while dealing with Scarlet," he reminds her. "Kasmeer, Marjory, Taimi, Braham, and Rox."

"Ah, right. Sorry, and thank you. I don't think I know them well enough to explain them very well, but they definitely helped and were a proper adventuring party together."

"Should I explain them to our audience?"

"Yes, please. Save me. I do not know them at all."

He grins, then begins explaining.

"The Scarlet story is a bit longer than that but I will try to be brief. The first public actions she took were in charr and norn territory. We did not know this at the time but she was behind an alliance between the dredge and the Flame Legion—ah, do you perhaps want to explain those...?"

"Yeah, I can explain them. The dredge are another race of sapients—there are rather a lot of them in Tyria—who used to be enslaved to a xenophobic somewhat omnicidal group of dwarves, and then stopped when dwarves did. Dwarves are now basically extinct, because most of their race sacrificed themselves to stick it to the dragon Primordius a couple hundred years ago. The remainder of which were the xenophobic dwarf clan, whose major leader was then summarily killed off, and the group never recovered. They have since died off, and will not be missed. The dredge, now being free, are still sorting out their government and trying to figure out how to rule themselves, but generally don't think very highly of non-dredge, because," wince, "no one had come to help free them from their slavery. Their government's currently in a state of war between a totalitarian dictatorship, and a totalitarian military dictatorship. So uh. Yeah they're having a bad time, I'm realizing as I explain this that maybe I should help them out.

"The Flame Legion is a faction in the charr that essentially is the reason why charr and humans are bad at making nice. They used to be the hot shit—somewhat literally—and had the charr worshiping a bunch of evil fire elementals for power, with them in charge at the top. This worked out great for the charr at first, what with how there was a lot of kicking humanity's collective ass, except that also all of the charr were essentially enslaved to their fiery masters, Flame Legion included. They stayed in charge through a mix of magical power, treachery, and various evil deeds. But eventually somebody," she smirks, like she knows precisely who, "made those elementals go away, thus losing the Flame Legion their major leverage. The rest of the charr then tossed them right out and informed them that they did not require any gods anymore. Ever since, the Flame Legion have been scrabbling to try to find a way back into power, but the rest of the charr are not having it.

"There. Works?"

"I do believe so."

"As I was saying, the dredge had allied with the Flame Legion—they were calling themselves the Molten Alliance—and were digging deep into the underground and attacking charr and norn settlements. Braham Eirsson was a displaced norn, and I helped him retake his town. Rox, a charr, also helped against the Alliance as part of her tests to join Rytlock's warband—she was called Rox Whetstone, then."

"Warbands are a big deal for charr, they're very military based. A warband is their social safety net, their group of allies, their family. They usually grow up together, train together, and spend a good portion of their lives working together and trusting their lives to each other. So a charr that doesn't have one is in some degree of trouble. They can join a new one, but it's rare and difficult. Oh, and the norn have come into conflict with the dredge, because they've been forced south by the Dragon Jormag, and now the dredge and norn both want to live in the same cold and mountainous area."

He nods. "Rox had lost her warband in a mining accident, is why she didn't have one," he explains.

"I met Kasmeer for the first time a while later, on an island that was being used to host refugees from the Molten Alliance's attacks. She showed up as a noble, saying she wanted to see the vacation resort that was being built there, but I knew her family had been ruined by her brother's gambling. I tried to keep an eye on her but more pressing matters demanded my attention and I lost her. I found out later that she had been working with her girlfriend, Marjory Delaqua, to investigate the place.

"Marjory herself I only met later, in Lion's Arch, when I helped her investigate the murder of one of the councilmen. We were led to a band of pirates called the 'Aetherblades' whose captain was vying for councilman position, but it turns out she was doing that on Scarlet's bidding—but we did not know that at the time."

"I am mildly impressed that Scarlet had her fingers in so many pies. Proverbially. She was a very busy woman," comments Aestrix. Then she remembers that she's helping with making this clear to the audience. She—almost explains the wrong thing about Lion's Arch. Two hundred and fifty years ago it might have been Kryta's capital, Aestrix, but it's not anymore. Instead: "Uh, the council in question is the council for Lion's Arch, a pirate's haven. The council was also made of other pirates."

"Marjory and I managed to capture the Aetherblade captain, Mai Trin, with the help of Inspector Ellen Kiel, who later became the next councilman," James continues. "So that was that, but we had not found out about Scarlet yet.

"A while later, the Queen threw a celebration in honour of the ten year anniversary of her coronation, and Scarlet revealed herself there. She tried to kidnap the Queen and—" He visibly winces, then, before sighing and continuing. "She killed a lot of people. She hijacked the Queen's exposition of watchwork knights, but ran away on an Aetherblade ship. We also suspected she was the one behind the Molten Alliance, because she used teleportation technology similar to what we had found amongst their hideouts."

Aestrix doesn't really have anything to add, here. ... Well, okay, one thing.

"Do you want a hug? I promise not to impale myself on your shoulderpads."

"—well, I don't think I would say no."

"All right." She gets up from her chair, then holds her arms out in an offer of hug that he is free to accept.

He chuckles a bit but stands up and hugs her. He's warm.

It's almost like he's on fire, or something.

"You realize the silly spikey shoulder bits and copious fire are not conducive to hugs, right?" she informs him.

He laughs. "Are you trying to get me to undress?" he asks archly.

She sporfles.

"No!" she laughs. "I can't see anything of yours anyway, I would get nothing from you undressing except the knowledge that you're undressed. I am informing you that your armor is impractical."