Elves

Long-lived but slow-growing, the Elven species on Lasair isolated itself from human civilization hundreds of years ago. Now divided into clans of beings nearly unidentifiable as being related, the Elves of Lasair quietly watch the world from their enclaves, waiting for the world to need them again… or to be susceptible to conquest.

Origins

The first elves to walk the world were created several thousand years ago. During this long-forgotten age, a race of Giants ruled the world, having forged order out of elemental chaos. During their efforts to build their society and solidify the world, they magically created a number of subservient species to fulfil certain roles. They created the elves to serve as builders, to be many hands helping bring the will of giants to fruition. For millennia these first elves lived under direct control of the titans, without any understanding beyond their tasks.
The giants' civilization would one day fall, however, bringing much of the world back into a state of primordial chaos. As the works of the giants were destroyed, most of the elves' lives were snuffed out as well. Some small number were spared, finding themselves in pockets of stability and order left behind, or perhaps finding that they were capable of creating that space similar to the giants' ability (though on a smaller scale). Regardless of how, though, this small number of elves would one day grow.
As the elemental rage spent itself, and the chaos of the age began to subside, the few remaining species created by the giants began to emerge back out into the world at large. The elves by now had begun to discover their magical nature, begun to understand the power that they were capable of. As they grew and established their own control over parts of the world, they would rise to become one of two dominant powers in the world - along with the Dragons.

Elves in Lasair

Pre-Fall

In the millennium before the Dragonscourge, the elves lived in a series of small cities ranging up the coast of the continent. The undeniable masters of magic, the elves’ cities floated in the sky seemingly unsupported by architecture or even terrain. Below them, the lesser races (including the humans) subsisted on agriculture, fighting petty wars over insignificant patches of land, but the elves remained ever above it all, confident in their mastery of the magic of the world. Even as an Empire arose on the eastern shores of Lasair, they mostly remained apart from the world.
Elven society was heavily caste-based at this time: elves were expected to fulfill specific roles. Offspring from between castes were highly discouraged, though on rare occasions that a cross-caste pairing occurred, some effort was expended to find the ideal place for the newly-created elf.
Remnants of elven culture are further kept alive by small segments of human society. The spiritual path of The Virtues was partially derived from elven codes of honor; the path’s sacred texts are written in the elves’ formal language (though humanity in general doesn’t realize this fact, simply referring to the language as Lumina and assuming it is a remnant of a pre-Dragonscourge human society).

The Dragonscourge

While the elves could effectively keep themselves isolated from the increasing mass of humanity, another ancient and powerful species was not nearly as lucky. The Dragons, enormous beings of nearly pure magic, did not have the fine control of the power to isolate themselves entirely from the weaker species. As humans encroached further into the wilds, they would inevitably interact with the dragons, and in many cases slay them. The dragons became fearful that they were losing the struggle for resources in the world and would soon be outnumbered in ratios impossible to overcome. The rulers of the draconic race chose what they felt was the only rational option for survival: a war of extermination.
The dragons attacked humanity with the intent of genocide. They bred beasts, investing them with their blood to create dragon-like monsters that would carry out their will in battle or as slaves. Waves of dragonkin swarmed over human lands, led by dragons unleashing their full magical wrath, eradicating humanity wherever it was found. Not all humans were immediately targeted, however. Even while being wiped out, some humans felt they could ensure their survival by worshipping the dragons as gods, pledging to carry out their will in exchange for their lives and power. The dragons gifted their most ardent followers with an infusion of dragon’s blood, creating a creature not-quite-human but able to use some fraction of the dragon’s magical power. The “Wurmborn” could infiltrate human settlements and betray their species by attacking on behalf of the dragons.
While the elves ignored the insignificant human wars, the dragons’ attack was an entirely different sort of war. The dragons were unleashing magical power to such a degree that it threatened the stability of the elves’ constructs and way of life. They entered the war on the side of the humans, providing magical support and firepower. The elves also chose to do something that would have a profound effect on the world for a thousand years: they taught select humans how to access and wield the power of magic, creating the first mages.
Taking the step of teaching the humans magic may have saved those humans, but it also ensured the downfall of the elven civilization. Seeing that the humans were becoming able to wield the magic of the elves forced the dragons to take the preemptive step of directly targeting and attacking the elven cities. The worst excesses of the war took place as whole squadrons of dragons attacked the towering spires, flames from both directions lighting up the sky for miles around.
In the end, it was this final offensive that spelled the end for both races and damaged much of the land. The known elven cities all fell to the ground, crumbled by the magical onslaught. The dragons, expending so much of their power to attack the elven cities, soon fell before the united mass of humanity’s survivors. As the war ground to an end, the dragons found themselves destroyed, and the elves’ power was but a fraction of that before the war… and now the humans possessed magic as well. Scars of the Dragonscourge littered the land, and the elves discovered they had no place in a changing world.

Exodus

Realizing they could no longer isolate themselves magically, the elves chose to isolate themselves geographically. The long divide within elven society finally came to the forefront as none of the castes could agree on where to migrate. In the end, each caste chose to depart to a different place in the world, isolating themselves from the others and sundering the elves forever. Over the coming centuries, the isolation and different environments chosen by the castes led to them becoming more and more different, to the point that today the elven sub-species only vaguely resemble each other.
The elves left the land open to the scattered human tribes, and departed to the corners of the continent, never to be heard from by humanity again. Their civilization largely passed into myth, and today most humans are only reminded of their having existed by the occasional birth of a half-elf, a reminder that elven blood once flowed along the land.

Today

It is difficult to speak of the elves as a single race any longer, as their outlook, goals, and even appearance have become divided in their centuries of isolation. Some generalizations can be made, however.
Each pocket of elves works to keep itself isolated from the outside world, safe from whatever predations may exist. Magical isolation, such as maintaining an enormous invisibility sphere, or physical isolation, like living within an impenetrable forest, have become the norm for the elves. Some elven settlements even retreated deep into areas of the land that were heavily damaged by the magical predations of the scourge, using their talents to keep themselves safe from the extremely dangerous environments that simultaneously keep them isolated. In general most care little for the outside world and do everything they can to keep that world away from their door. In most cases this is not difficult, as the human civilizations that exist have yet to expand much beyond the boundaries of the old, pre-scourge, human empires.
A few of the elven settlements, however, try to monitor the world, if only to ensure that they can see major threats coming. Every hundred years or so, these settlements will send out scouts to see what the state of the world is. They will attempt to infiltrate the human lands, take stock of the situation, and report back home. In each case the scout is magically protected in cloaks of illusion to ensure nobody takes a second look at them, and every care is taken to keep the continued existence of the elves a secret from the world.
The motive of these elves’ monitoring of humans varies. Some do so out of curiosity," while others believe that someday a major threat will arise and humans will require their assistance once more. A third dream exists amongst some elves as well: eventually the humans may weaken to the point that the elves will be able to once again rise to dominate the world. These elven sects believe that they must maintain their ability to take advantage of any disaster that strikes humanity… or even that they must strive to cause such a disaster.

Biology

The elven species is inherently a magical one thanks to their origins at the hands of the giants. This origin, similar to that of Dragons, places their existence beyond the understanding of most mortals. Their lives - and indeed their life cycle - is far different from that of humans.
Elves are essentially immortal - their lives run for thousands of years. While the elves who remained after the Titans' fall were slain in the Dragonscourge, there are still a small number of elves who remember the earliest days of their civilization. Even after the sundering of their society, there is a longing for a return to their days as the undisputed power of the world.
Unlike mortal species, elves do not biologically procreate. They do not have a gender - which can be endlessly confusing for some humans - and their society has never placed a high priority upon growth. Unlike the dragons, though, elves do periodically feel a desire to create new life. Some speculate that this falls within their original design - elves in general are driven to creativity of all kinds.
When an elf wishes to bring a new life into the world, they seek out those with whom they may have formed a close bond. This may include teachers, fellow caste members, or those with whom they have shared a particularly strong experience. When these beings have been gathered, the group will pool a small spark of their magical essences together, placing that unified spark within a vessel of some sort. This vessel is usually organic in nature - waterlilies are a favorite - and all elven settlements contain a pool within which these vessels will rest. Within the vessel, the new life grows and is eventually birthed into the world. A newborn elf will take several decades to reach adulthood, doing so under the tutelage of its primary parent (the one whose desire to create life began the process) as well as any number of teachers and guides.

Half-Elves

This procreation process is not limited to including elves. During the height of the Imperial Era, it was rare but not unheard of for Humans to be included within an elf's call for partners. This was most common between magical teachers and students, though other elf-human connections did sometimes occur. When a human is included in the life-giving process, however, a very small chance occurs of the offspring being born mortal.
When such a child was born, elven society would ignore it. Its lifespan would be measured in centuries rather than millennia, it had mortal drives and desires, and would much more resemble its human parent's personality. While the elven parents would maintain some contact with the child, they would invariably be passed into the human partner's care to be raised with their people rather than that of the elves.
This practice ended with the Dragonscourge and the sundering of elven society. Elves today are far too xenophobic to consider including mortals within their life-creation. This does not mean that half-elves are no longer born, as half-elves born pre-sundering would themselves create life in the mortal fashion. Through mating with humans, elven blood was passed into many family trees, and when sufficient elven blood finds its way into a newborn (possibly with some confluence of magical energy - the process is random and not well-understood) a human will be born with decidedly elven features and qualities.
These reminders of pre-fall elves are looked upon with curiosity in human lands - and disgust from the elves. To the elves, these mortal scions represent an irresponsible and self-destructive age.

Goblins

(Main Article) Some of the scattered elven castes have also experimented in another form of life-creation. Harkening back to their own origins as a magically-created species, and desiring subservient beings to handle tasks from construction to farming to (potentially) war, some elves tried creating new life forms. 
In most cases, they were able to successfully create new life that was fully functional and (somewhat) intelligent and fully mortal. However they almost always failed to create a species that fit their desires. Whether too independent, too aggressive, or too weak, most of these attempts at new life did not meet what their creators wanted. Rather than exterminating the burgeoning populations, they would be released into the world, outside of the elven enclaves, to find their way.
These creatures ended up being extremely well adapted to very specific niches - similar to the elves themselves - and would end up thriving, growing into populations which are significant. Most lack any ambitions beyond existing in some communal fashion, so they are largely unknown to those who don't venture into their lands, but occasional interactions will happen with varying outcomes.
A handful of times elves have been successful in their attempts, but the tale of those species lies elsewhere...