Excerpt:

"So," Andre said, leaning forward. "It is finally time for introductions. Who wants to go first?"

Terran reached for a bottle of wine, and the cork popped out at his touch. He reached for a glass, which frosted immediately, and he poured the wine in.

"My name is Terran Edwards." He said. "I'm a jack of all trades. I'm equally talented in all three trees - fire, wind, and ice of course. I assist on assassinations for a living, and since I live in a den of hotheaded firewolves, I usually end up playing the support roles. Oh, and I also enjoy cooking, when I have the chance."

Terran poured another glass and passed it off to Charlie. So, that was how it was going to go.

Charlie accepted his glass, and tipped it toward the space between Cordell and Andre.

"My name is Charlie Edwards. Terran is my cousin, on my father's side. You Navardians inherit your mother's names, but in Pyre, we inherit our fathers'. So it goes. I'm currently the main offensive for our family - we're called Torches - and naturally my talents lean towards the fire tree. I'm a tier-five, by the way." He said, sounding rather smug. "Volcano's my specialty, but I don't get to use it often unless I'm razing entire villages, and not too many have the gold to afford such a luxury."

"It's such a shame." Terran said fondly. "You love that spell."

Charlie smiled back at him. "I do... I do."

The next glass of wine went to Andre.

"I am but a simple bee-keeper." Andre said, smiling widely. "But on occasion I also do slightly more profitable work, like forge documents, seduce the unwilling, terrorize the public, that kind of thing. I also like to play cards. Oh, and I believe everyone here already knows this, but my name is Andre. Andre deLarge."

And Terran poured Cordell his glass, and Cordell looked at it warily. He took a sip and realized that the wine was considerably warmer than the glass, which tried to stick to his lips. So Terran had heated up the wine, which made the cork pop, and then chilled it back to room temperature with the glass. And no spells! Well, no spoken spells anyway. That was interesting.

"I'm Cordell." He said, and then stopped. He didn't know how to sum up his life like the others apparently were so masterful at, but he offered up what he thought was the most useful piece of information so far. "I, er, like pies."

"Pies?" Charlie asked, a little unable to keep the judgement out of his voice.

"Yes." Cordell said with a sudden rush of determination. "Pies. Love 'em. Flaky crust. The filling. The mixture of happiness and trepidation you feel when you first cut into a pie. They're round in the beginning, but then with the first touch of a knife, the perfect circle falls into shattered pieces, all angles and spills. It's like destroying art, but you get to eat it too. It's wonderful."

"I... see." Charlie said, eyeing him askew. "That's... very nice. Thank you for sharing."

"You're welcome." Cordell replied, tipping his glass towards him.

"And now for the small matter of whether you two gentlemen need to die in a soonish manner." Terran said.