The moral of the story is....?
Rhae has to learn the moral of the story. Zev offers some /wild/ suggestions.
When: Morning-ish Day 13, month 6, turn 26
Nighthearth, High Reaches Weyr
With its entrance located between the kitchen and the living cavern, this tiny bubble cavern is cozy, always kept warm and is filled with comfortable chairs and a small round table. At the far end, there's a hearth, outlined in ruddy, aging bricks, where a pot of stew simmers in the evening hours. Generally quiet, the nighthearth is the haunt of insomniacs and those seeking quiet from the bustle of daily Weyr life.
Obvious exits:
Inner Caverns
Zev heads in from the inner caverns.
Zev has arrived.
Even though it's summer and people are out enjoying the warm weather, the mornings are still a bit chilly and it's early enough now that the sun hasn't warmed up the landscape enough. Rhaelyn has secured one of the padded chairs and is lounging in it like a cat, bare feet and legs curled up against one arm while her shoulders and head rest on the other. There is a hide in her hands, her eyes fixed on whatever is written on the page.
Zev is into the nighthearth with a bowl of some sort of hot cereal that he's calling breakfast and a small roll of hides to look over. Designs for a few pieces of furniture comissioned for a distant holder that wants them made out of the light, dense woods harvested up around Reaches. "Hey there Rhae, how are you today?" He asks as he passes by her and takes up residence in the next closest comfy chair.
Rhaelyn's pale eyes drift up from what she's reading and there's an inward draw of eyebrows when she spots who is greeting her, "Zev." Her fingers tighten on the hide that she's reading. For a moment she resumes her reading, rolling a bit more of the hide between her fingers. "Doing fine. Just...reading this balad." She tosses the hide onto a nearby table in disgust.
Zev sets his hides down on the table next to his seat and starts in on his breakfast. "What's it a ballad about?" He asks curiously, leaning forward to take a glance at the hide when it's tossed onto the table. "Some teaching song, or something else?"
"It's a teaching song I /guess/." Rhaelyn sounds disgusted still. "I am supposed to tell the moral of the story." Morals being something she is soft on. "Apparently this if one of the traditional stories."
Zev hmms and reaches towards the ballad, "Mind if I take a look, see if it's one I recognize. Who do you have to tell the moral of the story to, this some sort of lesson they're sticking you with now?" He doesn't sound all that happy with the idea. The treatment of the exiles has gone from cautious to overzealous the past few seven-days in his mind.
"They want us to be trained and educated." Rhaelyn shrugs up her shoulders, sounding disgusted. "I have lessons from the weyr harpers. Reading. Writing." She motions with a hand towards the hide with a sniff. "I'd think you would be pleased to see the weyr taking such an interest in our 'wellbeing'."
Zev looks over the hide long enough to get the drift of the story. "Ah... well, this is an interesting one." He looks up and grins, "Holders sometimes look at this one and say that everything Kylara did was wrong... but that's not the moral of the story, really."
"Isn't it? The moral I mean. That if you're not 'nice', you'll get what's coming to you in the end?" Rhaelyn sounds amused but also disgusted. "They told us that she was a weyrwoman here. At Highreaches." Her nose crinkles up, "The harper said that she was evil. But if she was evil, how did she impress a dragon? It seems...odd to me."
Zev nods a bit, "She wasn't evil, truth is she was a strong woman. That rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, but sometimes it takes strength to lead. Her big flaw was that she was careless sometimes, and that ended up costing the weyr two queens. Anytime something like that happens you can be sure the person responsible will be vilified up, down, left and right."
"Do you think that will happen to those Fort goldriders?" Rhaelyn asks curiously. Oh, the girl /has/ been doing some research. She makes it sound like a careless question though, as though it's just popped into her mind right then. "I hear they weren't smart enough to get their gold's clear of the weyr. Wonder what 'balads' and 'morals' we'll learn from that." She gives a small nod of her head about her being a strong woman, "The song makes her sound weak though..." She la-la-las a couple of the more telling lines of the song with an eyeroll.
Zev hmms, "Well, no doubt they've been yelled at thoroughly. At least they kept them from killing each other, so they'll likely not end up in some teaching ballad four passes from now. But still, that's horrible, sounds like their training wasn't very complete. Or they both did a poor job of letting the other queens know how close thier own was to rising. As for Kylara, I think she was strong in doing what she wanted, but ignored a lot of responsibilities."
"From what I understand, a Goldrider doesn't have to do drills or sweeps. Their main responsability is to keep their gold safe. How hard can /that/ be." Oh, Rhae's disdain for such weakness. "I think they should make a balad for those Fort dragons." There's a little smirk, but as she's no harper, she doesn't detail just what it should say. "So, you think the moral of the story is...If you're careless, it'll be your ass?"
Zev nods a bit, "Yes, that probably is a good moral for the story, if you're careless it'll be your ass. Though you might want to dress it up some to get past whoever they've got teaching the class. You know, take the moral to heart, don't be careless with your answers." He shifts a bit, "Those two fort queens, they were both pretty young riders weren't they? I wonder if at least one of them just didn't know enough about the sexual connection to their rising queen, just wasn't experienced enough to feel the cues and know she was dangerously close to rising."
"Right. I'll flower it up pretty-like." Rhaelyn assures Zev as she reaches for the hide to roll it back up. "I got into touble enough with my 'lackluster' responses to other questions." Her opinion that they grade her on her enjoyment of the material? "Ridiculous!" As for Zev's suggestion about the goldriders she just stares, "You've got to be kidding...."
Zev shakes his head as he pushes his bowl of now moderately cool cereal around a bit and takes a bite. "Mmm, nomph." He swallows, "No, not kidding. Talk to any of the riders, the whole thing about flights and judging your dragon is that whole emotional and sexual tangle. An inexperienced rider wouldn't have a clue if what she's feeling is some weird upset stomach or the side effects of her dragon's awakening libido. There are some stories about a period of time where the queen riders were kept in the dark about everything... the first flight was often traumatic for them."
Rhaelyn's cold look at Zev is hightly skeptical, boarding on disregard for his comment. "Oh. right. 'Sexaul tangle'." She wiggles her fingers at Zev. "Please, you want me to believe that because those golderiders were...or /may have been/ virgins, that they caused that because they didn't know enough about sex? And your...solution? Rabid screwing right before they go out onto the sands to make sure they are....anointed and know the...ups and downs?"
Zev chuckles a bit and gives a shrug, "Well, yes, that's what I'd want you to believe. It's what I happen to think is the truth. There was a time when they only let girls circle around the queen egg, and there was a rather common practice of having them get to know the bronzeriders beforehand going on the sands. Things have changed since then, but the whole process wasn't complete foolishness." He puts away his bowl of now congealed cereal only about half eaten, "As for my solution, I don't think going crazy is what I've suggested, just enough to know the water is wet of it all."
"Yeah, I bet those bronzeriders got to know the girls /real/ well." Rhaelyn drawls, her tone dry as Igen sand. "What happens after the hatching? To those deflowered girls who get left on the sands?" She rolls her eyes, "Your 'concern' is so sweet. But really, you don't have to worry about /me/. I'm in tune enough with my sexuality. No tangles here." LIkely her sex is as cold as between anyway.
Zev smiles as he answers, "Well, more than a few stay at the weyr and stand again for the next several hatchings. Once searched, that's pretty much always an option. And if they never find a dragon, there are jobs to be done and this is home for many by that point. Some do go home as well, though not as many as you might think."
Rhaelyn rolls her eyes, "Right. I guess some of those girls might. They are desperate. One of them can't stop talking about how being a candidate is stalling her wedding. She's pinning every last hope that a dragon will replace a husband. I imagine she'll beg to stay rather than have that life. But people who have something to go back to? Like Ylynna? I don't expect her to stay."
Zev hmms a moment, "Which group are you in Rhae, do you have something waiting for you once you get yourself free from this whole rescued exile situation and can go on with your life as you see fit?"
Rhaelyn gives it some thought, "I want to be as far from here as possible. I want to have a home of my own to manage and a husband. Hopefully we can un-earth some information about our history...our past...Prove that I have bloodlines worthy of a good match." Her eyes drop though, something on the edge of the horizon that nags at her. "I'm not going to become someone's bed warmer here. I'm no stepping stone."
Zev nods a bit at that, "I can understand not wanting to let something like that become the definition of your life. I don't think it's really a possibility with you, you're too strong a person to let that happen. At least that's how I see it." He sighs a bit, "You think somewhere else is going to be better, or are you hoping somewhere else will give you a chance to be seen as just a person, not as some group that gets labels stuck all over it not of your doing?"
"I think we exiles will always be outsiders here. We have our own traditions and ways of doing things. I think it's wrong that the weyr is trying to force us into the image they think is best for them." Rhaelyn's lips thin, her gaze drifting off into that thoughtfulness again, "Why is their way better than Ylynna dressing me up and showing me off to friends? The weyr wants the same thing. Tame us. Control us." There's no anger in the words, just explaining this vague feeling in her gut. "Zev...did you ever stand?"
Zev shakes his head at the question, "I was never asked to. No dragon even gave me a second look no matter how many times I managed to get myself near one when I heard they were riding search. Don't get me wrong, I love the work I do and my craft... but the thought of being a rider? That's been with me as far back as I can remember. I guess I just wasn't suitable."
Rhaelyn mulls this over a bit, the lack of being searched, "And some people end up on the sands multiple times." The unfairness of this arbitrary selection is clear in her tone. "So...." She looks at her fingernails, "I guess that means you never got a set of candidate robes hm?"
Zev shakes his head, "Nope, never got a set of candidate robes. Which I guess is alright, since a lot of candidates make their own, I've heard." He tilts his head a little bit as he takes a stab back in another conversational direction, "Rhae, seems you've worried about the whole deflowering thing to distraction. If there were ways to learn about all that stuff and in the end you were still nice and virgin for that future husband of yours, would that be more palatable?"
Rhaelyn stirs from her disapointment with a little huff and she doesn't press Zev about the robes. The little flick of her wrist to shoo the very idea away, "Well, right. Why would you have them." Her foot kicks up over the arm of the chair and her foot bobs lightly in time with some inner ticking of her mind. "Huh?" The word 'virgin' draws her from her plotting. "I think 'your' worrying about my virginity is driving you to distraction. I don't want to learn about those things. Disgusting."
Zev chuckles a bit and shrugs, "Perhaps, my own fault for thinking you're cute I suppose." Then he waves it off a bit and goes back in the other direction, "As for robes, while I don't have any, there are a lot of them floating around. If you think you need a set on short notice, I could hunt around for a set for you."
The expression on Rhae's face still says 'yuck', nose crinkled and everything. "I don't think I should be hounded for my sex just because of how I look." There's a little sigh and a shake of her head, "Don't tell me, you'd help me find a robe if I did something for you...." Another fresh nose wrinkling.
Zev grins and laughs a bit, "Well I wasn't going to actually suggest that. Finding you a robe is a lot like keeping an eye out to get you a firelizard egg. Just something I'm willing to do because it's the friendly thing to do. I wouldn't expect anything in return."
A brisk shake of her head dismisses the very idea, "No. It's alright. I don't need one anyway." She pushes her legs off the couch and slowly collects her things, the work she was doing before Zev came in. "The firelizard egg though...you can continue to keep an eye out for that. Now though, I have to get going." There's a twinkle in her eye, a plan brewing.
When: Morning-ish Day 13, month 6, turn 26
Nighthearth, High Reaches Weyr
With its entrance located between the kitchen and the living cavern, this tiny bubble cavern is cozy, always kept warm and is filled with comfortable chairs and a small round table. At the far end, there's a hearth, outlined in ruddy, aging bricks, where a pot of stew simmers in the evening hours. Generally quiet, the nighthearth is the haunt of insomniacs and those seeking quiet from the bustle of daily Weyr life.
Obvious exits:
Inner Caverns
Zev heads in from the inner caverns.
Zev has arrived.
Even though it's summer and people are out enjoying the warm weather, the mornings are still a bit chilly and it's early enough now that the sun hasn't warmed up the landscape enough. Rhaelyn has secured one of the padded chairs and is lounging in it like a cat, bare feet and legs curled up against one arm while her shoulders and head rest on the other. There is a hide in her hands, her eyes fixed on whatever is written on the page.
Zev is into the nighthearth with a bowl of some sort of hot cereal that he's calling breakfast and a small roll of hides to look over. Designs for a few pieces of furniture comissioned for a distant holder that wants them made out of the light, dense woods harvested up around Reaches. "Hey there Rhae, how are you today?" He asks as he passes by her and takes up residence in the next closest comfy chair.
Rhaelyn's pale eyes drift up from what she's reading and there's an inward draw of eyebrows when she spots who is greeting her, "Zev." Her fingers tighten on the hide that she's reading. For a moment she resumes her reading, rolling a bit more of the hide between her fingers. "Doing fine. Just...reading this balad." She tosses the hide onto a nearby table in disgust.
Zev sets his hides down on the table next to his seat and starts in on his breakfast. "What's it a ballad about?" He asks curiously, leaning forward to take a glance at the hide when it's tossed onto the table. "Some teaching song, or something else?"
"It's a teaching song I /guess/." Rhaelyn sounds disgusted still. "I am supposed to tell the moral of the story." Morals being something she is soft on. "Apparently this if one of the traditional stories."
Zev hmms and reaches towards the ballad, "Mind if I take a look, see if it's one I recognize. Who do you have to tell the moral of the story to, this some sort of lesson they're sticking you with now?" He doesn't sound all that happy with the idea. The treatment of the exiles has gone from cautious to overzealous the past few seven-days in his mind.
"They want us to be trained and educated." Rhaelyn shrugs up her shoulders, sounding disgusted. "I have lessons from the weyr harpers. Reading. Writing." She motions with a hand towards the hide with a sniff. "I'd think you would be pleased to see the weyr taking such an interest in our 'wellbeing'."
Zev looks over the hide long enough to get the drift of the story. "Ah... well, this is an interesting one." He looks up and grins, "Holders sometimes look at this one and say that everything Kylara did was wrong... but that's not the moral of the story, really."
"Isn't it? The moral I mean. That if you're not 'nice', you'll get what's coming to you in the end?" Rhaelyn sounds amused but also disgusted. "They told us that she was a weyrwoman here. At Highreaches." Her nose crinkles up, "The harper said that she was evil. But if she was evil, how did she impress a dragon? It seems...odd to me."
Zev nods a bit, "She wasn't evil, truth is she was a strong woman. That rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, but sometimes it takes strength to lead. Her big flaw was that she was careless sometimes, and that ended up costing the weyr two queens. Anytime something like that happens you can be sure the person responsible will be vilified up, down, left and right."
"Do you think that will happen to those Fort goldriders?" Rhaelyn asks curiously. Oh, the girl /has/ been doing some research. She makes it sound like a careless question though, as though it's just popped into her mind right then. "I hear they weren't smart enough to get their gold's clear of the weyr. Wonder what 'balads' and 'morals' we'll learn from that." She gives a small nod of her head about her being a strong woman, "The song makes her sound weak though..." She la-la-las a couple of the more telling lines of the song with an eyeroll.
Zev hmms, "Well, no doubt they've been yelled at thoroughly. At least they kept them from killing each other, so they'll likely not end up in some teaching ballad four passes from now. But still, that's horrible, sounds like their training wasn't very complete. Or they both did a poor job of letting the other queens know how close thier own was to rising. As for Kylara, I think she was strong in doing what she wanted, but ignored a lot of responsibilities."
"From what I understand, a Goldrider doesn't have to do drills or sweeps. Their main responsability is to keep their gold safe. How hard can /that/ be." Oh, Rhae's disdain for such weakness. "I think they should make a balad for those Fort dragons." There's a little smirk, but as she's no harper, she doesn't detail just what it should say. "So, you think the moral of the story is...If you're careless, it'll be your ass?"
Zev nods a bit, "Yes, that probably is a good moral for the story, if you're careless it'll be your ass. Though you might want to dress it up some to get past whoever they've got teaching the class. You know, take the moral to heart, don't be careless with your answers." He shifts a bit, "Those two fort queens, they were both pretty young riders weren't they? I wonder if at least one of them just didn't know enough about the sexual connection to their rising queen, just wasn't experienced enough to feel the cues and know she was dangerously close to rising."
"Right. I'll flower it up pretty-like." Rhaelyn assures Zev as she reaches for the hide to roll it back up. "I got into touble enough with my 'lackluster' responses to other questions." Her opinion that they grade her on her enjoyment of the material? "Ridiculous!" As for Zev's suggestion about the goldriders she just stares, "You've got to be kidding...."
Zev shakes his head as he pushes his bowl of now moderately cool cereal around a bit and takes a bite. "Mmm, nomph." He swallows, "No, not kidding. Talk to any of the riders, the whole thing about flights and judging your dragon is that whole emotional and sexual tangle. An inexperienced rider wouldn't have a clue if what she's feeling is some weird upset stomach or the side effects of her dragon's awakening libido. There are some stories about a period of time where the queen riders were kept in the dark about everything... the first flight was often traumatic for them."
Rhaelyn's cold look at Zev is hightly skeptical, boarding on disregard for his comment. "Oh. right. 'Sexaul tangle'." She wiggles her fingers at Zev. "Please, you want me to believe that because those golderiders were...or /may have been/ virgins, that they caused that because they didn't know enough about sex? And your...solution? Rabid screwing right before they go out onto the sands to make sure they are....anointed and know the...ups and downs?"
Zev chuckles a bit and gives a shrug, "Well, yes, that's what I'd want you to believe. It's what I happen to think is the truth. There was a time when they only let girls circle around the queen egg, and there was a rather common practice of having them get to know the bronzeriders beforehand going on the sands. Things have changed since then, but the whole process wasn't complete foolishness." He puts away his bowl of now congealed cereal only about half eaten, "As for my solution, I don't think going crazy is what I've suggested, just enough to know the water is wet of it all."
"Yeah, I bet those bronzeriders got to know the girls /real/ well." Rhaelyn drawls, her tone dry as Igen sand. "What happens after the hatching? To those deflowered girls who get left on the sands?" She rolls her eyes, "Your 'concern' is so sweet. But really, you don't have to worry about /me/. I'm in tune enough with my sexuality. No tangles here." LIkely her sex is as cold as between anyway.
Zev smiles as he answers, "Well, more than a few stay at the weyr and stand again for the next several hatchings. Once searched, that's pretty much always an option. And if they never find a dragon, there are jobs to be done and this is home for many by that point. Some do go home as well, though not as many as you might think."
Rhaelyn rolls her eyes, "Right. I guess some of those girls might. They are desperate. One of them can't stop talking about how being a candidate is stalling her wedding. She's pinning every last hope that a dragon will replace a husband. I imagine she'll beg to stay rather than have that life. But people who have something to go back to? Like Ylynna? I don't expect her to stay."
Zev hmms a moment, "Which group are you in Rhae, do you have something waiting for you once you get yourself free from this whole rescued exile situation and can go on with your life as you see fit?"
Rhaelyn gives it some thought, "I want to be as far from here as possible. I want to have a home of my own to manage and a husband. Hopefully we can un-earth some information about our history...our past...Prove that I have bloodlines worthy of a good match." Her eyes drop though, something on the edge of the horizon that nags at her. "I'm not going to become someone's bed warmer here. I'm no stepping stone."
Zev nods a bit at that, "I can understand not wanting to let something like that become the definition of your life. I don't think it's really a possibility with you, you're too strong a person to let that happen. At least that's how I see it." He sighs a bit, "You think somewhere else is going to be better, or are you hoping somewhere else will give you a chance to be seen as just a person, not as some group that gets labels stuck all over it not of your doing?"
"I think we exiles will always be outsiders here. We have our own traditions and ways of doing things. I think it's wrong that the weyr is trying to force us into the image they think is best for them." Rhaelyn's lips thin, her gaze drifting off into that thoughtfulness again, "Why is their way better than Ylynna dressing me up and showing me off to friends? The weyr wants the same thing. Tame us. Control us." There's no anger in the words, just explaining this vague feeling in her gut. "Zev...did you ever stand?"
Zev shakes his head at the question, "I was never asked to. No dragon even gave me a second look no matter how many times I managed to get myself near one when I heard they were riding search. Don't get me wrong, I love the work I do and my craft... but the thought of being a rider? That's been with me as far back as I can remember. I guess I just wasn't suitable."
Rhaelyn mulls this over a bit, the lack of being searched, "And some people end up on the sands multiple times." The unfairness of this arbitrary selection is clear in her tone. "So...." She looks at her fingernails, "I guess that means you never got a set of candidate robes hm?"
Zev shakes his head, "Nope, never got a set of candidate robes. Which I guess is alright, since a lot of candidates make their own, I've heard." He tilts his head a little bit as he takes a stab back in another conversational direction, "Rhae, seems you've worried about the whole deflowering thing to distraction. If there were ways to learn about all that stuff and in the end you were still nice and virgin for that future husband of yours, would that be more palatable?"
Rhaelyn stirs from her disapointment with a little huff and she doesn't press Zev about the robes. The little flick of her wrist to shoo the very idea away, "Well, right. Why would you have them." Her foot kicks up over the arm of the chair and her foot bobs lightly in time with some inner ticking of her mind. "Huh?" The word 'virgin' draws her from her plotting. "I think 'your' worrying about my virginity is driving you to distraction. I don't want to learn about those things. Disgusting."
Zev chuckles a bit and shrugs, "Perhaps, my own fault for thinking you're cute I suppose." Then he waves it off a bit and goes back in the other direction, "As for robes, while I don't have any, there are a lot of them floating around. If you think you need a set on short notice, I could hunt around for a set for you."
The expression on Rhae's face still says 'yuck', nose crinkled and everything. "I don't think I should be hounded for my sex just because of how I look." There's a little sigh and a shake of her head, "Don't tell me, you'd help me find a robe if I did something for you...." Another fresh nose wrinkling.
Zev grins and laughs a bit, "Well I wasn't going to actually suggest that. Finding you a robe is a lot like keeping an eye out to get you a firelizard egg. Just something I'm willing to do because it's the friendly thing to do. I wouldn't expect anything in return."
A brisk shake of her head dismisses the very idea, "No. It's alright. I don't need one anyway." She pushes her legs off the couch and slowly collects her things, the work she was doing before Zev came in. "The firelizard egg though...you can continue to keep an eye out for that. Now though, I have to get going." There's a twinkle in her eye, a plan brewing.