Peace and quiet no longer mingled as they once did. Nowadays, quiet walked in the company of fear, for the only thing that lurked in unnatural still moments was danger.

It was in such a moment, amidst the tempestuous mood of autumn, when the mornings dawned with a chill fog and the heat of the sun turned the days uncomfortable in the humidity, when the ceaseless ringing of steel in the foundry of the artisan quarters lay at rest, that Temperance looked back on the changes war had inflicted on his people.

Change, Temperance pondered, is not a word that most think of kindly, for metamorphosis always brings with it an inherent level of unease, and it never comes easily. For us artisans, however, it is an essential aspect of life. In some ways, it is who we are, for an artisan is an agent of change, shaping raw goods into a more permanent form, but we are far from the only servants of the natural force.

War, as we are constantly reminded, is a far grander agent, one that alters the very land upon which we walk.

The Moorish people could hardly be considered the same any longer, their fractured state forged by the flames of necessity into something greater than the sum of its parts. There was, all those years later, only one tribe, only one people, where there once had been many.

The festival celebrating their arrival, and the opening of the Tower, a footnote in the history of this war, remained as a memory of what they'd once been, when all of their ancient differences were on display. Each of those cultures, after decades confined to the Sacred Grounds, had left its mark on the reborn people. Countless conflicts had broken out between the once disparate groups, but they were all made stronger for overcoming the struggles.

That wasn't to say every tribe survived. The most stubborn of them, to whom their identity stood paramount, and change anathema, refused to accept others into their squadrons, believing their gifts supreme. For a time, their strength persisted, but the Moors were an unforgiving homeland. Those tribesmen too stubborn to adapt were invariably reclaimed by the mire, those they left behind embraced by their kin. All who survived looked to the martyred and learned to embrace the change necessary to survive in the marshy environs.

It may have taken years, but many of the less combat inspired tribesmen had flocked to the banner of Temperance and the artisans and their mission to unify their peoples' techniques. What had once been a small coalition of like-minded smiths, tailors, masons, and more became a thriving community pursuing greater creative endeavors. Where once trade would have claimed their purpose, the dissolution of tribal lines and the need to put everything the people could spare back into the war effort, theirs had become a calling of survival.

It is hard to imagine there was ever a time when we did not stand united, Temperance sighed, but thankfully the opposition finally relented as people realized the war was no passing season, when the true enemies began to reveal themselves, along with the truth that we were not leaving the Sacred Grounds alive if we refused to adapt. Even bolstered by the gifted, we were limited in what we could accomplish in the space we then claimed.

The Life-singers, praise be to the gifts given of divine nature, never had enough land to sustain us all and, were it not for the endless tide of meat throwing itself at our defenses—defenses that would have fallen in those early days without the tireless efforts of our most respected Heroes—our stores would have run dry, even bolstered by the singers gifts. Confined as we were to the areas, we needed more space to devote to agriculture.

Temperance considered the vast changes the artisans had fought hard to implement all those years ago, after a young man had called a meeting of the greatest creative minds he could find. Some laughed at him, but others shared his vision, seeing the truth that they could become the pillars that held their people up if they would only sacrifice their pride and combine their knowledge, for what good was pride if their people failed to endure.

Still, he thought, if it were not for the Purifiers, praise be to the gifts given of divine water, I do not want to imagine the state of this place in the earliest days, when their whole purpose was bent to eliminating the filth of so many in one place, before we had a chance to properly carve space for latrines between districts. Now, they merely need to keep the water running outwards, and the filth washes itself away. That was truly a gift from the gods that too many remained ignorant of. Ani never did appreciate the impact the gifted had on our way of life, Temperance thought with a pang in his chest. She always was too focused on training.

In the distance, high walls marked the inner defenses of the city, borders that they had long ago expanded to make room for their people to thrive. The Moorish were nothing if not hardy and, even in the face of adversity the likes of which the Ekreeti had no tales, would always find a way to weather the storm, lest they be washed away and forgotten beneath the murk of the marshes.

Such was the way of their home.

Those first defenses, overrun and demolished so many years ago now, raised by the Stone-callers, praise be to the gifts given of divine Earth, but we showed them the worth of worked, shaped stone, proving that walls made of raw material were lacking. We could never have come this far if they were not free to use their gifts to summon stone for us to work, removing the need for their constant maintenance. That was when they finally started to see; that was the hammer stroke that inspired our first wave of new artisans to join the fight.

Temperance lost himself in memory, letting his mind wander those well-trodden pathways. Before long, the Stone-callers couldn't bring forth the ancient stones fast enough, and the masons were able to manage more than the first wall. The makings of our city sprang from the ground, sheltered behind that first bastion of craftsmanship, and the Stone-callers, Purifiers, and Life-singers were free to work together to create sturdy ground upon which to lay the foundations of all that has followed. The bones of the ancient ruins laid the groundwork for our own creation, a city unlike any of which the Ekreeti still spoke, greater than the disparate tribes had ever fashioned.

For the first time, we were able to hold the line, the generals, those esteemed heroes, finally able to step back and entrust the borders to their soldiers, finally able to rest and look to the future. Finally, the Spirit-binders, praise be to gifts given of divine Life, could recover. They were always walking the line between life and death in those days, and to lose even a handful would have been disastrous.

A shiver ran up his spine as a memory older still surfaced, another memory of his oldest friend and their journey here, buried so long in the past. Just another thing she took for granted, not realizing the cost of such things.

Temperance himself had not understood much about gifts in those days, just the basics the Ekreeti spoke of, that everyone was given a spark of the divine, that they might be part of the wondrous world. It all seemed such fanciful words, and I suppose it was. They never spoke of the costs of true gifts in those days.

Gifts, he had come to learn from Willett for the price of his silence on the matter, always came with a cost, a built-in mechanism of balance. That was something Temperance, or any proper artisan, could appreciate. The greater the gift, especially one such as Life-binding, the greater the cost, and to overuse any true gift meant death.

It was the cost that was so rarely spoken of, the gifteds' greatest kept secret that kept the average man thinking them limitless. Temperance supposed it was an important illusion, even if it left him with a foul taste. His life's work had been to forge a shared understanding between artisans, after all. The gifted were far from his area of expertise, though.

Gifted, truly gifted, were rare. The people were bathed in the gifts of the divine, as the divine claimed the gifts of the land, but those truly gifted were blessed by the gods, touched with greater inspiration. That divide was where the community of artisans came in.

We found purpose, bridging the gap between the blessed and the mundane man, allowing those less touched by the gods to keep their people safe.

Temperance couldn't help but reminisce about the things the smiths had accomplished, honing their talents to arm their compatriots. Learning from each other, combining and modifying techniques from all the tribes, we created arms and armor the likes of which our people had never beheld, pieces far beyond anything one of us might have crafted on our own. More importantly still, we struggled together to create something entirely new, a unique style that was wholly ours, allowing each of us to specialize in a field our people needed.

Temperance himself took great pride in the peerless arms he created, having been named the master weaponsmith of his people. His students, under his direction, created the arms that kept the beasts at bay, but he was not alone in his mission.

Our work has let the average soldier step up, taking responsibility for our people with confidence. I can imagine no greater calling than protecting others through the work of these hands.

A rare, grim grin graced Temperance's lips, the only kind that broke his stony demeanor, nowadays, as he considered just how greatly a young man's dream had impacted his people, and the contributions of countless artisans who came to share that vision.

For all we can create alone is nothing next to the efforts of a people united.

The generals worked tirelessly, arranging guard rotations and scouting expeditions, all run by elites, by then. Even if their city had become self-sufficient, it would be folly to turn a blind eye to their surroundings.

Willett massaged his temples as he thought. Strange to find myself longing for the days we only suffered unending attacks from beasts. If only things were that natural.

What had first appeared to be a shuffling of the natural order of their home proved to be an orchestrated attack on the Moorish people from a ruthless enemy.

All these years later, and the why of this war is still a mystery. It was what, six months into our encampment? That the scouts brought back the first report of these men, men reportedly hailing from the deep marshes we once thought to be uninhabitable. If only reality always lived up to our expectations.

He recalled the day the news had broken in the council chambers. The difficulties that had brought had seemed unending in his young eyes, dividing that first council of governance thoroughly. In the days following his sisters' disappearances, Willett often accompanied the Blade Weaver as an attendant, when the ancient warrior was not fighting on the front lines.

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I couldn't believe the way the tribal leaders bickered, while our respected heroes sat stoically, waiting for their chance to rein in the chaos. Together, they hashed out a plan to keep an eye on enemy movements, limiting the risk to our people where they could, and earning their place as our generals, even if the enemy's movements in those days seldom amounted to more than herding waves of beasts towards the Sacred Grounds.

Thank the gods we found a better way and distanced the tribal leaders from the council. They were far too rooted in the old ways, always putting their own people before the People. Our evolution just called for a more…balanced approach to governance and, truthfully, we would probably have fallen to infighting at the whims of the tribal leaders, even with the artisans' marvelous contributions in those early years. A city set against itself cannot flourish.

In the years since, Willett had devoted himself wholly to the collection and study of the People's knowledge, collecting notes on each of the tribes' gifts.

It never ceases to amaze me how diverse our talents became over the ages, even when they were so similar on the surface.

A shudder wracked his slight frame--he never had put much meat on his bones--when he considered the different approaches tribes had taken to the gift of Spirit-binding. The most common, and weakest, methodology was to use one's own reserves to power their gift, requiring time to replenish oneself lest they do irreparable harm, but that was not the only method. Some drew on the land, borrowing the essence of the Moors to save their comrades, but it was the last one that haunted him.

One tribe had honed the art of sacrificing others to empower their healing gifts, and whether the sacrifice was willing or not only affected how effective the healing was. In practice, the usage was hardly sinister, but in a war that seemed to stretch through living memory, it was only so long before necessity tipped those scales. Willett feared the day when his people might be fueled by the lives of their enemies, but some ever-rational part of him claimed it was better them than us.

Sometimes, he hated that part of himself, and he wondered what Ani would think of him. Don't be silly, Will, he thought with her voice, or what he imagined it to be, anyway. Gifts aren't good or bad, and using them to save yourself is the only right choice. You're thinking too hard.

He missed the way she'd tussle his hair in those moments, even as a grown man. He missed Olina's never-ending, frustrating questions.

Willett pulled his thoughts away from the topic like a man grabbing a burning log, returning to more comfortable, academic matters.

I wonder how the transcription is going, he thought.

He had claimed his own seat on the council in the office of the Scholar, a seat created through his own contributions to his people, primarily through his efforts at cataloguing the various gifts of each tribe. One of his first discoveries was how limited each tribe's knowledge was, from what the elders and Ekreeti would share. It seemed as if each held a piece to a puzzle that was so much grander than any of them realized, and that led to his next discovery.

The Ekreeti held far more stories than they ever told. By order of the elders—not of this age, but the distant past—knowledge was to be closely guarded, lest it fall into the wrong hands. It took him years to earn the right to hear most of the stories he now guarded, to earn the trust of the vaunted story-keepers, that he wouldn't shout their secrets from the rooftops.

Since then, he had worked tirelessly alongside the Ekreeti and the elders, unifying their knowledge and creating the first written account, so that knowledge might persist. While the Moorish people had developed a system of writing, they didn't often make tomes because the nature of their home tended to…destroy them, making such items less reliable than even the long-standing oral tradition.

Willett didn't see this as an obstacle, though, but an opportunity.

Hand in hand with the keepers of knowledge, he created the most ambitious school the tribes had ever seen, aiming to identify gifted at an early age and guide them down their paths. Those who studied the histories of his people were tasked with transcribing the tome, that there might always be a current copy for another to learn from.

Gaining my seat was the proudest moment of my life. I always felt guilty, not contributing to the defense of our people, but in that moment, my efforts were acknowledged.

His school went on to bolster the ranks of the gifted with well-trained recruits, and he expanded the school's curriculum to include more than just lessons for the gifted, opening up a school of martial skills run by those too injured or mentally incapacitated by the war. In time, he worked in a training program for children wishing to join the ranks of the artisans.

There were only so many children, and fewer born every year, but there was always hope on the horizon, as long as the sun still rose.

Now, the real trick is making sure all of this lasts.

Willett shook his head slowly, unconsciously emulating the older sister he idolized.

Two friends walked in the amber light of the dawning sun, when the world was painted with the promise of another day. It wasn't an unusual sight, to anyone who paid attention to the world beyond their small sphere. Each appeared contemplative as they circled the parade grounds around the yawning pit the people called the Tower, where their hopes of survival, the young generation's peerless warriors, had been swallowed up. The area, like most of the Sacred grounds, save the Tower itself, had been restored to a semblance of beauty in the intervening years.

No one knew exactly how the Tower returned people, just that those who came back always returned with great power. Legends passed on through each tribe spoke of warriors chosen by the Tower being returned after moments, sometimes months, and stepping from the Sacred Grounds with the power to thwart whatever threat doomed the people of that age.

When the tribes sent their warriors to claim such power, they knew the risk they took, that they might be sending a generation's brightest talents to their deaths, but the wisdom of ages told them it was worth that chance, that the heroes that already walked among them would keep them safe until one greater still returned. Ever had it been the way of the tribes to trust in their youth, to trust in their ancient ways.

The war hadn't even begun in earnest, all those years ago, and no one anticipated how great their need would become, how those sent away would be so sorely missed. The changes wrought in their ways, the unification of their fractured people, were born of necessity, nothing more. It was the only truth that held more weight in their culture than their belief in the ancient ways, was the truth of the unforgiving land: that survival as always possible if the people came together. Always, their ways had been enough and the risks they'd taken had paid off, just as the Tower always sent someone back.

None had returned since the festival, and the Tower sank dark and foreboding. Some few took it as an omen of destiny, that the marshes had finally come to swallow them all.

After a year with no sign of the Chosen, spirits sputtered. The situation had only escalated, and the people felt their absence.

After five years, the elders, a few already replaced by a successor, raised a cairn near the Pit in memoriam, each of the names of the people's lost hope etched into one of its stones, even the Iskaal.

By the time a decade passed with no end to the war in sight, what sparse few, namely the families of the Lost, still held out hope that salvation might come, delivered from the depths of the Pit, began to lose their light.

Just over twenty years later, none spoke of such things. The thought had become a modern legend beyond the memory of many who yet lived.

None, save for the two who walked these grounds each morning, as they had been doing for decades, keeping the embers of hope alight.

After walking together in silence, they stood facing the cairn. Willett, small and gangly next to Temperance's imposing physique, wore the robes of a scholar, as was expected of his position. They were not heavy, rather a marvelous invention of the scholars that was at once both fire and water resistant, allowing him a measure of comfort, even in the constant cloying humidity, affixed to the land no matter the season.

As always, he was the first to break their silence. "I know I've said it before, but it feels strange to think the Skaaldren were outsiders, not so long ago. They've become so intertwined with our people, I couldn't imagine doing this all without them."

"We could not have made the progress we have were it not for their contributions," Temperance responded without looking over. "They are far more specialized than humans, each caste performing its duties with remarkable efficiency. That we once thought them nothing more than the Iskaal warriors shows our ignorance. That is but one more thing this war has forced us to see."

"Would that we needed to learn a little less, old friend. How is Narisse these days?" Willett asked.

"Ah," Temperance said with the barest of smiles, a tightening of his lips more than anything, "You know how she gets, always diving into one project after another. If my apprentices could approach their work with a fraction of her diligence, every soldier would be sporting fresh weapons."

"If she was anything less than what she is, she'd never be able to escape your shadow," Willett replied.

"Marin is well?" Temperance asked in kind, after an almost imperceptible shake of his head, a gesture that always told Willett he felt unworthy of the praise.

Willett was silent for a span of breaths before turning to his friend with a smile he couldn't contain. "She's better than well. She—it seems wrong to find joy in it with the world crumbling around this bastion, but I find myself overpowered—she is with child. Keep it close to your chest; I'd hate to give the other councilmembers any leverage. Gods know they'd love for me to be less involved, but then who would make sure they stayed busy? I swear, half of them forget there's a war going on outside of those walls. You all made them too comfortable here."

Temperance gripped Willett by the shoulders, his hands making the man seem little more than a child. "Always one to hide behind your jokes. That reminds me of someone. I would never dream of telling a soul. That is wonderful news, my old friend! Never be ashamed of what you are feeling; the world could always use more joy."

Willett put his right hand on Temperance's, patting it a few times. "Thank you. Even if my heart knows you're right, my mind struggles with the thought." He paused for a moment, mouth frozen partway open, before forcing out the thought. "I wasn't sure how to tell you, but I'm glad to have you to share the news with."

Temperance's hands fell down to his sides as his face looked momentarily stricken. After a moment, he said softly, and not unkindly, "That is not for you to worry about. That…was never in the stars for Narisse and me; we have known that for many years. Perhaps that is why she throws herself into her work as she does, but we have long come to terms with that reality, and we are blessed with an immense family in the other Artisans and you. A family that is soon to grow," he finished with a soft smile.

Good news was rarer each passing season. Temperance couldn't help but feel energized by his friend's fortune—

A long horn blast split the air, signaling an attack.

They were both moving before the sound died.

"I'll gather the repair squads," Temperance said as his long legs ate up the distance before him. "You had better get to the Academy. Summon your students, make sure they are all accounted for; we don't need any more 'helping' unsupervised like the last attack."

"Their hearts are in the right place," Willett shot back as they ran, "It's not their fault they've grown up with all of this. Anyone would want to help. I just—"

Another horn rang out, long and sonorous and reverberating in their chests.

"On second thought," Temperance said, redoubling his pace, "We may need all the support you can muster."

Water seeped up from the ground around Willett's feet as he ran, until a small wave urged him forward faster than even Temperance's legs could carry him. As he surged ahead, energy visibly crackled along his hands. He'd learned a thing or two himself, in his time studying the magic of his people.

The question was only whether it would be enough.

That second blast was an ill omen, and both knew what it signified. The men of the deep marshes had come to call, and only the gods knew what beasts they had brought with them.

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