Log: In which Szadath definitely searches at least one candidate
Date: Evening, day 9, month 4, turn 26 of Interval 10
Summary: Taikrin drags Nathalia, Sibella, and Rhaelyn out into the cold and rain because Szadath's got a funny kind of feeling. Sibella, at least, leaves with a new knot for her trouble. Rhaelyn? She IS trouble.
NorCon MUSH - 7/21/2011
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Living Cavern, High Reaches Weyr(#350RJs)
Stalactites hang high above this enormous cavern like a jagged chandelier or an inversion of the Spires themselves, but shadows cling to them instead of light. Below lie great tables arranged in rows, each large enough to serve a fighting wing, while in the nooks and alcoves around the cavern's edge sit more sensibly-sized tables, from six- and eight-seaters down to intimate spots for just a couple of diners. The only really open space is around the kitchen entrance, smelling of food and rarely quiet, and by the nearby serving tables with their long buffet of the day's offerings.
Tapestries on the smooth walls -- some faded and others newly woven -- only slightly mute the sea of sound when a meal is in full swing, but they add cheerfulness augmented by the glowlight from wall sconces and the centerpieces of each table. Still, shadows always creep along the ceiling and into the mouths of the exits -- the myriad small hallways at one end of the cavern and, at the other, the twisting tunnel to the bowl near an array of coathooks and and hatracks -- and late at night, when the glows are allowed to dim, the chamber can seem very dark indeed.
Contents:
Sibella
Nathalia
Rhaelyn
Obvious exits:
Inner Caverns Kitchen Bowl
"But you said you care for more children than most mothers..." Rhaelyn begins to defend herself and then just waves off a hand, "Doesn't matter anyway." As to impressing her friend? "Oh please...Thank you, but no thank you." At least there's an attempt at her being polite. And yes, for some reason, she looks amused, head shaking from side to side before she sips her wine.
Sibella and Nathalia sit at a table fairly far away from the hearth, lit not by the fire but by glows. Rhaelyn sits alone at a table near the fire, but is turned toward the other two women, apparently a part of the conversation there. It is late evening, a few hours after the usual dinner-time, and there are only a few others coming in and drifting out to and from a late meal. Sibella claps her hands in the delight she had previously considered expressing. "Oh, now you've got me all excited. Thank you, Nat, for making my ow-ow all bettah." She giggles - her baby voice is ridiculous - now a bit slap-happy after reeling from one emotion to another.
"Just shut up Rhae, before someone else messes that pretty face of yours." There is an Icy look from the smith, who is acting strangely calm, she's loosing that temper though. "Yes we get it, some of the shit that happens here would never happen on your precious little island, I'm sick of hearing it. I am sick of trying my shelling hardest to be kind to someone who has proven at every point they aren't deserving of it. Go back to whatever rock you crawled from." Nat takes a long sip from her mug. Fortunately Sibella's chipper attitude is helping the woman calm down before she does something she might regret. "Really Sibella, don't worry about it, the least I can do for someone I call a friend."
Out of the evening, dripping wet and irritated about it, strides Taikrin. She shakes herself like a dog just inside the doorway, scrubbing a hand through her short hair to remove some of the water, then scans the living cavern. Her gaze lingers on Rhaelyn, but she doesn't immediately head that way. Rather, she ducks into the kitchen and emerges a moment later with a meatroll and a mug of klah. Now in possession of her treasures, she plops down in one smooth motion in a chair at Rhaelyn's table and offers the exile girl a smile that's all teeth. "Rhaelyn, ain't it?" Her attention flicks towards Nathalia and Sibella, eyebrows twitching at their apparent agitation, then flicks back.
Rhaelyn stays turned around in her chair, her expression not changing as she sizes up Nathalia but gives a dramatic roll of her eyes. She even opens her mouth to unleash something more when her table is being invaded. Invaded! Turning around she watches toothy Taikrin, "You know I am." She says, Rhaelyn that is. She swirls the wine around in the glass, watching the brownrider cooly.
Sibella regards Nathalia with a mixture of awed respect and amusement. Now, /this/ was unexpected from what Sibella had thus far seen from the woman. Sibella looks back and forth from the two; Rhaelyn, the bitchy - seeming to Sibella - exile, and Nathalia, the quirky, apparently hot-tempered smith-gone-candidate. She shrugs, then gives Nat a dimpled grin. "I'm glad you call me a friend," she laughs, "I'd hate to have that lash you call a tongue aimed at me!" At Taikrin's entrance, she gives an absent wave, unsure as to how Taikrin's, er, personality might add to the atmosphere.
Watching the brownrider there is an odd quirk of Nat's brow as she plops herself down at Rhaelyn's table. The eyeroll is simply met with that cold stare, and the smith simply decides to Ignore the exile brat from that point on. Nat shrugs. "You were a friend to me when I needed one, I look after my friends." She takes another sip of Klah and just shrugs at the comment about having a sharp tongue, eying the scene in front of her with interest.
"Reckon I do at that," Taikrin concedes as her grin quirks wry. "You're a slippery a girl as I've seen. You'd think that you might be afraid of me or somethin'." Towards the end, though, the brownrider seems distracted: she glances over at Sibella and Nathalia again, with a frown. She makes an attempt to focus on her klah, taking a couple of gulps, before she sets the mug down with a thump and sighs heavily. "Faranth help me," she mutters. Louder, "Y'all're both candidates, right? Y'look familiar."
"I'm not afraid." Rhaelyn assures in as mild a tone as there ever was. "But I don't want to confuse you again." When the brownrider looks away to the other two her lips thin and she looks back over in that direction too, tossing icy blades in that stare.
Sibella decides quickly that her best course of action is to simply ignore the other pair in the living cavern, instead reaching over to fiddle a bit with some hair hanging down near Nathalia's temple. "Are you okay with the length of the hair here? I hope it doesn't get in the way, but it frames your face so well." Even as Nathalia seems distracted, Sibella just keeps to herself, reaching for the pitcher of klah set at the table and pouring herself a heaping dose.
"Candidate, yes." Nat offers with a shrug. Nat just laughs at the look Rhaelyn is throwing her direction. "Yes honestly it's perfect, kept out of the way all day today at southern." She grins allowing Sibella to act as a mild distraction. "Not to many holders there though. We had the run of the place." She laughs.
"Confuse-- what?" Apparently having trouble following the thread of the (short-lived) conversation, Taikrin frowns her confusion back to Rhaelyn. "I ain't confused; just wanted to make sure we had some things sorted out, like. Make sure /you/ know what's what. /You/ ain't a candidate too, are you?" Insistent, she gestures between Nathalia and Sibella. "Both of y'all?"
Turning back to Taikrin, the exile girl tries to straighten out the confusion, "Last time I tried to be nice to you, you insulted me. I can see what being friendly to you gains me. So?" A pause, "What?" Her nose crinkles at the implication that the brownrider is going to put her in order. "I haven't been picked out by a dragon. Yet." There's no mistake by her tone that she expects it to happen anytime now.
Rhaelyn pins her name to that.
Sibella chuckles sedately at Taikrin's slight confusion. Breaking her 'ignore' rule, she says to Taikrin, "No, dear, I'm not. Don't plan to be, anyway. Why? You hear somethin' I don't know about?" She gives an ironic grin, then continues the casual conversation with Nat. "Oh! Well, I've never been out of the Weyr, so... anything'd be new! Having the run of the whole place... it soudns lovely." Sibella hasn't had an 'alone day' in quite a good time, with the bustling crowd of the Weyr. Out of this reverie, she hears Rhaelyn's 'I can see what being friendly to you gains me.' and cannot /help/ but burst into raucous laughter at this. She covers her mouth, but this only muffles her giggles.
"So that's her game." Nat whispered more to herself than anyone. The smith nods thinking on it a moment. Before Sibella's giggle becomes infectious, Nat has to admit, Rhae's idea of friendly is quite hysterical. "Just me then I guess." She offers at Sibella's explanation to Taikrin.
At Sibella's first comment, Taikrin lets out a rough bark of laughter -- though it doesn't seem to be altogether kind. "Hear somethin' you don't know about-- you're flamin' right I do. She's all toothy grins again, particularly at Rhaelyn's assumption. "/Yet/, eh?" Food forgotten, she pushes back her chair and rises to her feet in a sharp motion. "Alright then. Seein' as how I'm the only one who's allowed to be hearin' voices that you can't, y'all're gonna have to listen to me. Y'see that rain out there?" She gestures towards the dark depressingness that is outside, "I want y'all to head on out. Candidate can come too, since she's-- you know, a candidate. Good baseline. Who searched you, girl?"
You'd expect Rhaelyn to be all dancing feet at the prospect to get put under the dragon's nose. But a look slides out towards the exit, the rain, the mud. She wraps her arms around herself and hunches down into her seat a little. It's no good though, her ambition is stronger than her good senes to stay warm and dry. Getting up she carefully pulls on the lovely fur coat she's been borrowing.
Sibella is now the one confused. The exile seems to know exactly what Taikrin's playing at, so why doesn't Sibella? Her look of utter beffudlement, apparent, Sibella stays in her seat, looking to Nathalia helplessly, since she's the 'candidate' in question.
"Zaxameth and Warucori" Nathalia offers with a shrug, scooping her shells into the bag they came out of. She stands, drawing to her full height, which isn't much comparatively. "Baseline?" She asks with a lift of her brow. "Come on Sibella, this should be really interesting." Nat heads out the door, not really minding the rain and the muck.
Nathalia heads to the bowl.
Nathalia has left.
You head to the bowl.
Western Bowl, High Reaches Weyr(#250RJs)
The bowl's vast dirt floor extends in a rough oval from west to east, only sparse clumps of grass surviving between the crisscrossed pathways of daily traffic. To the northwest stand massive gates to the world beyond, allowing people, livestock, and tithes to pass beneath some of the seven jagged spires that stand sentinel over that area of the bowl. In late afternoons, their spindly, fingerlike shadows stretch over that end of the bowl all the way to the living cavern's hulking brass doors in the far north.
Eastward, the bowl sprawls on toward the lake, sloping slightly downward to allow runoff from rain and snowmelt, but to the south it's caged by more cliffs of dark, rough-cut granite. Rocks poke up from the ground here, a few large boulders and many smaller outcroppings worn smooth in spots by time and use. A few ground weyr entrances dot the wall, the most frequented ledge set up like a patio while the largest ledge services the Weyrleaders' complex, directly beside the huge entrance to the hatching sands. A more human-sized entrance, left of that, leads to the galleries.
Heavy, driving rain makes everything a wet and muddy mess today.
Contents:
Nathalia
Szadath(#1824Qabep$0)
Obvious exits:
Living Cavern Inner Caverns Garden Patio Ledge [Sky] Galleries Weyrleader Complex East Bowl Weyr Entrance
Rhaelyn heads in from the living cavern.
Rhaelyn has arrived.
Sibella heads in from the living cavern.
Sibella has arrived.
Taikrin brightens perceptibly when Nathalia mentions her searchers. "Cori and Zax, huh? They do good work. Our clutchsiblings, you know? You'll do just fine." And lingers behind, to usher all of her victims outside-- she'll even make an attempt to reach down and pull Sibella by the arm; she seems quite intent on this. At least Szadath is crouched just beside the entrance, lambent eyes glowing blue in the darkness. The rain doesn't seem to bother the hulking brown in the least; he even half-extends a wing when Taikrin dashes outside for the brownrider to shelter under. "Okay! Good. Szad was tellin' me he thought one of y'all might be good for the eggs. Wasn't sure if he was just feelin' Zax's candidate or what, though, so-- gotta be sure. Check you over."
The silken furs are drawn about her more closely and she huddles into the cold. There's just the smallest shake of her head as she listens about Nathalia's search dragon and rider. There's even just the smallest frown when the already-candidate gets to step up first. Her arms crossed over her chest adjust rather primly as she watches.
Sibella gets a case of the shivers, although she'd had the foresight to grab her cloak from the back of her chair and throw it about her shoulders. Then, she starts to understand what Taikrin is doing. "Wait... no, Taikrin, you don't need /me/ here! I'm almost too old!" Despite her protest, Sibella actually allows Taikrin to pull her along, brows pinched in an anxious spasm. What if... Sibella again looks to Nathalia, helpless.
Nat grins, happy to have earned the Taikrin seal of approval apparently. "Thanks, that is good to hear." She offers in reply. She lifts a brow at the explanation, offering a grin. "Well glad to assist then." She resists sticking her tongue out at Rhaelyn's displeasure, but instead minds her manners. "Come on 'Bella, don't argue with a rider and a dragon, you almost never win, and if you do, it's a trap." She laughs.
"Almost too old? Eh, you don't have to tell nobody. I won't. Don't know as the hatchlings care, much." Taikrin pauses, looking to Szadath, who just rumbles noncommitally. "He don't think they do, neither." She pauses a moment, frowning, then slaps Szadath hard on the shoulder, "You wanted 'em out here, get to it!" The brown jolts himself out of his fixed stare, rumbling again, then proceeds to snake his head towards Natalia. It's not a threatening movement, exactly, but with his jaws parted in a gap-toothed draconic grin, it might be a little intimidating. In the meantime, Taikrin asks, "What're y'all's names, again? Don't know as how I caught 'em. Bad with names, me."
"Charming." Mutters Rhae at the tongue sticking out but manages not to try and trip anyone who passes by her to get to the dragon. She falls in line with the other two, not too close. "What is he, looking for exactly?" She cuts in on the introductions of the other, holding herself back from pushing her way forward but it's an effort.
Sibella smiles briefly at Nat's use of Sibella's nickname, which of course Nat has never heard. And her slap-happiness re-instills itself as Taikrin speaks to her. "Well... /almost./ But I'd hate to have a dragonet stuck with an old lady like me!" Even as Szadath regards them all, Sibella is drifitng back to another time, when she was much younger, standing before another dragon on Search... Then Rhae asks the crucial question, and Sibella snaps back to the present to hear the answer.
Nat just laughs at the dragon grin, returning it with a wide mischievous smile of her own. "Nat" she offers, quite unbothered by being so close to one of the large beasts, after all she'd spent most of the day around Zax. She eyes Rhaelyn with a measured glance, and offers a look of friendly encouragement for Sibella. "You're not that old for farnath's sake." She laughs.
"It's-- it's hard to give it words. Szad don't use 'em for this." Taikrin is caught off-guard enough by the question that she forgets to be mean and mocking, for a moment. "Kind of a feeling, like? He ain't the best at pickin' it out, but if there's more'n one together, I guess it's-- stronger?" She shakes her head, returning her attention to Szadath has he tilts his head this way and that at Natalia. He seems satisfied with something, because he lets out a low chuff then swings his head over towards Sibella and begins the process again while his rider narrates. "Sort of like... if you're standin' in a hallway tryin' to figure out what door someone's playin' music behind, or... where a smell's comin' from. He knows what's gettin' off-- Nat, yeah?-- so now he's checkin'."
"Really?" She watches the candidate get checked and it seems fine, her eyes narrowing slightly, "If one dragon says that he doesn't sense it, does that mean that person isn't a candidate? Maybe not high quality enough?" She's watching with interest at just how it's done. Hearing about it in classes is one thing, this is altogether different.
Sibella nods at Taikrin's comparison, then remembers that Taikrin had asked for names. "Oh, and I'm Sibella. Bella, like," Sibella mimics Taikrin's inflection on the last bit, aiming it toward Szadath as an introduction, more so than toward Taikrin. Of course, it's an unfortunate day to be in front of a Search dragon, Sibella thinks as she runs her hand through her dirty, weighted-down waves-that-were-ringlets.
Nat eyes Rhaelyn, but doesn't say much, instead she just watches the brown inspect Sibella.
From her nice, snug, dry spot under Szadath's wing, Taikrin watches the whole procedure with smug amusement. "Some're better at it than others," she acknowledges with a one-shouldered shrug: it's not her problem. Her gaze shifts towards Rhaelyn, studying the exile girl intently. "If a dragon can hear it from some in a set, but not others-- well, likely they don't have it right then. People can /change/-- someone who didn't have it at fifteen might have it at twenty, he thinks, or else the other way 'round. But..." In the meantime, Szadath swings his head towards Rhaelyn, grunts, then swings back to Sibella. He repeats the action a couple of times, then turns to rest his head by Taikrin, as if conferring. Even though the words themselves must be only in their heads, there is a significant amount of gesturing on Taikrin's part, and quite a lot of twitching and tail-lashings on the brown's.
Rhaelyn narrows her eyes at the grunting brown and sniffs right back at him for the effort. While she waits for what the final word might be, she adjusts her jacket and hunches in the rain that drizzles on down.
Sibella keeps her patience in control, even though she has a dimple twitching slightly each time the dragon makes a move. It could be her day! Well, the beginning of many days, which she hadn't dreamed of dreaming of. Sibella regards Rhaelyn, herself, trying to pretend that she doesn't notice the internal conversation between the lifemates. Rhaelyn is just the right age, and another exile on the Sands? That'd be bonus for the Weyr.
Nat listens to Taikrin's explanation. Surprised that the process seemed so different from her own search. She just shakes her head at Rhaelyn, not much to say about that one's actions really. She hoped she'd like the outcome, though from the amount of time it was taking, she wasn't sure she'd like the answer. Still she doesn't falter keeping that easy smile until the verdict is passed.
"... /trust me/." That last bit is audible as the pair break up, Taikrin crossing her arms over her chest and looking smug while Szadath looks, well, inscrutibly draconic. "Yeah, he was definitely feelin' the same thing." From the safety of under Szadath's wing, she looks from Sibella to Rhaelyn, then while still smiling her big, toothy grin at the exile, says, "Sibella, yeah? You can go and find one of the headwoman's assistants and tell her that Taikrin and Szadath want you to stand. Reckon your friend Nat here'll help you move your stuff? Y'should consider yourself lucky-- more'n three quarters of Szadath's candidates ended up with dragons, last time." While she seems genuinely pleased with herself and Sibella, there is something dirty in the smiles she keeps shooting at Rhaelyn.
Rhaelyn's reaction is a little too cold. Also, it's a little too unemotional. She regards the dragonrider and the smiles she keeps dishing out, also with a marked lack of response. Instead, she watches and calculates. First watching for the new candidate's response and then the old candidate's response. All the while she's not saying anything, but someone in that group might be feeling the hairs on the back of their neck standing up, mabye all of them, it's downright creepy. "Right." At last she meets Taikrin's eye, holding the gaze without smiling.
Blink. One. Blink. Two. Twice Sibella blinks before Sibella makes a move, and this is to wrap Taikrin up in a very comfy hug, and then to rub Szadath's jaw. "My thanks, love. I'll do my very best not to fail you." Or myself, she adds silently. To Nat, overjoyed but containing it very well now, she gives the broadest grin her features can muster. "Oh, Nat, what sort of day this has been! I can almost see a dragonet stumbling toward me to tell me that her name is Sivith." The grin softens into a smile, then Sibella grabs Nat's hand, saying, "Oh, you will help me move, won't you? I haven't seen the barracks in /ages/ and won't know where to go, now, with all the people there." Then, before Sibella can run off and start driving everyone insane with her gleeful screeches, she turns to Szadath and Taikrin, saying to both, "Thank you, both of you, for one last chance I never thought I'd have."
Nat offers a congratulatory grin to Sibella. "Well you heard the woman, let's go get you squared away." Still something about the whole thing leaves the smith uneasy as her eyes shift between Taikrin and the exile. "Well that's a bit of relief," she whispers aside to Sibella and Nat seems eager to play show the 'newbie' around for the second time this week. "Yeah, cot near mine is still empty." She offers still studying Taikrin and the brown with an unreadable expression. Finally she snaps out of it, "Right well, let's get you moved then." She offers a wave to the brown rider before heading off to help the older girl move.
"Sorry, Rhaelyn." If Taikrin is intimidated by the exile girl's stare, she doesn't show it; rather, she returns that gaze right back, look for look, and bares her teeth in a predatory smile. "Sometimes, you know, people change and then the dragons change their minds. Reckon I can give you some tips, if you're so inclined." It's probably a good thing Sibella appears with her huge, then, because it jolts Taikrin out of confrontation mode. "Flam-- uh, sure, no problem." The brownrider doesn't seem much inclined to return the hug, much to Szadath's amusement; for his part, the brown is relishing the attention. "The, uh, headwoman can help y'all out if somethin' comes up. I'll tell her you were helpin' out, Nat. Sure she'll appreciate it." See, she /can/ be nice. When it suits her.
"Save your breath." Rhaelyn says breazily as she turns back to the living cavern. "Congratulations." Is offered in parting and she heads back inside, eager to dry off and warm up.
As the pair move away, Sibella can be heard muttering something to Nat, controlling her volume even through her excitement, glancing back once more to look at Taikrin and Rhae.
Summary: Taikrin drags Nathalia, Sibella, and Rhaelyn out into the cold and rain because Szadath's got a funny kind of feeling. Sibella, at least, leaves with a new knot for her trouble. Rhaelyn? She IS trouble.
NorCon MUSH - 7/21/2011
-----------------------
Living Cavern, High Reaches Weyr(#350RJs)
Stalactites hang high above this enormous cavern like a jagged chandelier or an inversion of the Spires themselves, but shadows cling to them instead of light. Below lie great tables arranged in rows, each large enough to serve a fighting wing, while in the nooks and alcoves around the cavern's edge sit more sensibly-sized tables, from six- and eight-seaters down to intimate spots for just a couple of diners. The only really open space is around the kitchen entrance, smelling of food and rarely quiet, and by the nearby serving tables with their long buffet of the day's offerings.
Tapestries on the smooth walls -- some faded and others newly woven -- only slightly mute the sea of sound when a meal is in full swing, but they add cheerfulness augmented by the glowlight from wall sconces and the centerpieces of each table. Still, shadows always creep along the ceiling and into the mouths of the exits -- the myriad small hallways at one end of the cavern and, at the other, the twisting tunnel to the bowl near an array of coathooks and and hatracks -- and late at night, when the glows are allowed to dim, the chamber can seem very dark indeed.
Contents:
Sibella
Nathalia
Rhaelyn
Obvious exits:
Inner Caverns Kitchen Bowl
"But you said you care for more children than most mothers..." Rhaelyn begins to defend herself and then just waves off a hand, "Doesn't matter anyway." As to impressing her friend? "Oh please...Thank you, but no thank you." At least there's an attempt at her being polite. And yes, for some reason, she looks amused, head shaking from side to side before she sips her wine.
Sibella and Nathalia sit at a table fairly far away from the hearth, lit not by the fire but by glows. Rhaelyn sits alone at a table near the fire, but is turned toward the other two women, apparently a part of the conversation there. It is late evening, a few hours after the usual dinner-time, and there are only a few others coming in and drifting out to and from a late meal. Sibella claps her hands in the delight she had previously considered expressing. "Oh, now you've got me all excited. Thank you, Nat, for making my ow-ow all bettah." She giggles - her baby voice is ridiculous - now a bit slap-happy after reeling from one emotion to another.
"Just shut up Rhae, before someone else messes that pretty face of yours." There is an Icy look from the smith, who is acting strangely calm, she's loosing that temper though. "Yes we get it, some of the shit that happens here would never happen on your precious little island, I'm sick of hearing it. I am sick of trying my shelling hardest to be kind to someone who has proven at every point they aren't deserving of it. Go back to whatever rock you crawled from." Nat takes a long sip from her mug. Fortunately Sibella's chipper attitude is helping the woman calm down before she does something she might regret. "Really Sibella, don't worry about it, the least I can do for someone I call a friend."
Out of the evening, dripping wet and irritated about it, strides Taikrin. She shakes herself like a dog just inside the doorway, scrubbing a hand through her short hair to remove some of the water, then scans the living cavern. Her gaze lingers on Rhaelyn, but she doesn't immediately head that way. Rather, she ducks into the kitchen and emerges a moment later with a meatroll and a mug of klah. Now in possession of her treasures, she plops down in one smooth motion in a chair at Rhaelyn's table and offers the exile girl a smile that's all teeth. "Rhaelyn, ain't it?" Her attention flicks towards Nathalia and Sibella, eyebrows twitching at their apparent agitation, then flicks back.
Rhaelyn stays turned around in her chair, her expression not changing as she sizes up Nathalia but gives a dramatic roll of her eyes. She even opens her mouth to unleash something more when her table is being invaded. Invaded! Turning around she watches toothy Taikrin, "You know I am." She says, Rhaelyn that is. She swirls the wine around in the glass, watching the brownrider cooly.
Sibella regards Nathalia with a mixture of awed respect and amusement. Now, /this/ was unexpected from what Sibella had thus far seen from the woman. Sibella looks back and forth from the two; Rhaelyn, the bitchy - seeming to Sibella - exile, and Nathalia, the quirky, apparently hot-tempered smith-gone-candidate. She shrugs, then gives Nat a dimpled grin. "I'm glad you call me a friend," she laughs, "I'd hate to have that lash you call a tongue aimed at me!" At Taikrin's entrance, she gives an absent wave, unsure as to how Taikrin's, er, personality might add to the atmosphere.
Watching the brownrider there is an odd quirk of Nat's brow as she plops herself down at Rhaelyn's table. The eyeroll is simply met with that cold stare, and the smith simply decides to Ignore the exile brat from that point on. Nat shrugs. "You were a friend to me when I needed one, I look after my friends." She takes another sip of Klah and just shrugs at the comment about having a sharp tongue, eying the scene in front of her with interest.
"Reckon I do at that," Taikrin concedes as her grin quirks wry. "You're a slippery a girl as I've seen. You'd think that you might be afraid of me or somethin'." Towards the end, though, the brownrider seems distracted: she glances over at Sibella and Nathalia again, with a frown. She makes an attempt to focus on her klah, taking a couple of gulps, before she sets the mug down with a thump and sighs heavily. "Faranth help me," she mutters. Louder, "Y'all're both candidates, right? Y'look familiar."
"I'm not afraid." Rhaelyn assures in as mild a tone as there ever was. "But I don't want to confuse you again." When the brownrider looks away to the other two her lips thin and she looks back over in that direction too, tossing icy blades in that stare.
Sibella decides quickly that her best course of action is to simply ignore the other pair in the living cavern, instead reaching over to fiddle a bit with some hair hanging down near Nathalia's temple. "Are you okay with the length of the hair here? I hope it doesn't get in the way, but it frames your face so well." Even as Nathalia seems distracted, Sibella just keeps to herself, reaching for the pitcher of klah set at the table and pouring herself a heaping dose.
"Candidate, yes." Nat offers with a shrug. Nat just laughs at the look Rhaelyn is throwing her direction. "Yes honestly it's perfect, kept out of the way all day today at southern." She grins allowing Sibella to act as a mild distraction. "Not to many holders there though. We had the run of the place." She laughs.
"Confuse-- what?" Apparently having trouble following the thread of the (short-lived) conversation, Taikrin frowns her confusion back to Rhaelyn. "I ain't confused; just wanted to make sure we had some things sorted out, like. Make sure /you/ know what's what. /You/ ain't a candidate too, are you?" Insistent, she gestures between Nathalia and Sibella. "Both of y'all?"
Turning back to Taikrin, the exile girl tries to straighten out the confusion, "Last time I tried to be nice to you, you insulted me. I can see what being friendly to you gains me. So?" A pause, "What?" Her nose crinkles at the implication that the brownrider is going to put her in order. "I haven't been picked out by a dragon. Yet." There's no mistake by her tone that she expects it to happen anytime now.
Rhaelyn pins her name to that.
Sibella chuckles sedately at Taikrin's slight confusion. Breaking her 'ignore' rule, she says to Taikrin, "No, dear, I'm not. Don't plan to be, anyway. Why? You hear somethin' I don't know about?" She gives an ironic grin, then continues the casual conversation with Nat. "Oh! Well, I've never been out of the Weyr, so... anything'd be new! Having the run of the whole place... it soudns lovely." Sibella hasn't had an 'alone day' in quite a good time, with the bustling crowd of the Weyr. Out of this reverie, she hears Rhaelyn's 'I can see what being friendly to you gains me.' and cannot /help/ but burst into raucous laughter at this. She covers her mouth, but this only muffles her giggles.
"So that's her game." Nat whispered more to herself than anyone. The smith nods thinking on it a moment. Before Sibella's giggle becomes infectious, Nat has to admit, Rhae's idea of friendly is quite hysterical. "Just me then I guess." She offers at Sibella's explanation to Taikrin.
At Sibella's first comment, Taikrin lets out a rough bark of laughter -- though it doesn't seem to be altogether kind. "Hear somethin' you don't know about-- you're flamin' right I do. She's all toothy grins again, particularly at Rhaelyn's assumption. "/Yet/, eh?" Food forgotten, she pushes back her chair and rises to her feet in a sharp motion. "Alright then. Seein' as how I'm the only one who's allowed to be hearin' voices that you can't, y'all're gonna have to listen to me. Y'see that rain out there?" She gestures towards the dark depressingness that is outside, "I want y'all to head on out. Candidate can come too, since she's-- you know, a candidate. Good baseline. Who searched you, girl?"
You'd expect Rhaelyn to be all dancing feet at the prospect to get put under the dragon's nose. But a look slides out towards the exit, the rain, the mud. She wraps her arms around herself and hunches down into her seat a little. It's no good though, her ambition is stronger than her good senes to stay warm and dry. Getting up she carefully pulls on the lovely fur coat she's been borrowing.
Sibella is now the one confused. The exile seems to know exactly what Taikrin's playing at, so why doesn't Sibella? Her look of utter beffudlement, apparent, Sibella stays in her seat, looking to Nathalia helplessly, since she's the 'candidate' in question.
"Zaxameth and Warucori" Nathalia offers with a shrug, scooping her shells into the bag they came out of. She stands, drawing to her full height, which isn't much comparatively. "Baseline?" She asks with a lift of her brow. "Come on Sibella, this should be really interesting." Nat heads out the door, not really minding the rain and the muck.
Nathalia heads to the bowl.
Nathalia has left.
You head to the bowl.
Western Bowl, High Reaches Weyr(#250RJs)
The bowl's vast dirt floor extends in a rough oval from west to east, only sparse clumps of grass surviving between the crisscrossed pathways of daily traffic. To the northwest stand massive gates to the world beyond, allowing people, livestock, and tithes to pass beneath some of the seven jagged spires that stand sentinel over that area of the bowl. In late afternoons, their spindly, fingerlike shadows stretch over that end of the bowl all the way to the living cavern's hulking brass doors in the far north.
Eastward, the bowl sprawls on toward the lake, sloping slightly downward to allow runoff from rain and snowmelt, but to the south it's caged by more cliffs of dark, rough-cut granite. Rocks poke up from the ground here, a few large boulders and many smaller outcroppings worn smooth in spots by time and use. A few ground weyr entrances dot the wall, the most frequented ledge set up like a patio while the largest ledge services the Weyrleaders' complex, directly beside the huge entrance to the hatching sands. A more human-sized entrance, left of that, leads to the galleries.
Heavy, driving rain makes everything a wet and muddy mess today.
Contents:
Nathalia
Szadath(#1824Qabep$0)
Obvious exits:
Living Cavern Inner Caverns Garden Patio Ledge [Sky] Galleries Weyrleader Complex East Bowl Weyr Entrance
Rhaelyn heads in from the living cavern.
Rhaelyn has arrived.
Sibella heads in from the living cavern.
Sibella has arrived.
Taikrin brightens perceptibly when Nathalia mentions her searchers. "Cori and Zax, huh? They do good work. Our clutchsiblings, you know? You'll do just fine." And lingers behind, to usher all of her victims outside-- she'll even make an attempt to reach down and pull Sibella by the arm; she seems quite intent on this. At least Szadath is crouched just beside the entrance, lambent eyes glowing blue in the darkness. The rain doesn't seem to bother the hulking brown in the least; he even half-extends a wing when Taikrin dashes outside for the brownrider to shelter under. "Okay! Good. Szad was tellin' me he thought one of y'all might be good for the eggs. Wasn't sure if he was just feelin' Zax's candidate or what, though, so-- gotta be sure. Check you over."
The silken furs are drawn about her more closely and she huddles into the cold. There's just the smallest shake of her head as she listens about Nathalia's search dragon and rider. There's even just the smallest frown when the already-candidate gets to step up first. Her arms crossed over her chest adjust rather primly as she watches.
Sibella gets a case of the shivers, although she'd had the foresight to grab her cloak from the back of her chair and throw it about her shoulders. Then, she starts to understand what Taikrin is doing. "Wait... no, Taikrin, you don't need /me/ here! I'm almost too old!" Despite her protest, Sibella actually allows Taikrin to pull her along, brows pinched in an anxious spasm. What if... Sibella again looks to Nathalia, helpless.
Nat grins, happy to have earned the Taikrin seal of approval apparently. "Thanks, that is good to hear." She offers in reply. She lifts a brow at the explanation, offering a grin. "Well glad to assist then." She resists sticking her tongue out at Rhaelyn's displeasure, but instead minds her manners. "Come on 'Bella, don't argue with a rider and a dragon, you almost never win, and if you do, it's a trap." She laughs.
"Almost too old? Eh, you don't have to tell nobody. I won't. Don't know as the hatchlings care, much." Taikrin pauses, looking to Szadath, who just rumbles noncommitally. "He don't think they do, neither." She pauses a moment, frowning, then slaps Szadath hard on the shoulder, "You wanted 'em out here, get to it!" The brown jolts himself out of his fixed stare, rumbling again, then proceeds to snake his head towards Natalia. It's not a threatening movement, exactly, but with his jaws parted in a gap-toothed draconic grin, it might be a little intimidating. In the meantime, Taikrin asks, "What're y'all's names, again? Don't know as how I caught 'em. Bad with names, me."
"Charming." Mutters Rhae at the tongue sticking out but manages not to try and trip anyone who passes by her to get to the dragon. She falls in line with the other two, not too close. "What is he, looking for exactly?" She cuts in on the introductions of the other, holding herself back from pushing her way forward but it's an effort.
Sibella smiles briefly at Nat's use of Sibella's nickname, which of course Nat has never heard. And her slap-happiness re-instills itself as Taikrin speaks to her. "Well... /almost./ But I'd hate to have a dragonet stuck with an old lady like me!" Even as Szadath regards them all, Sibella is drifitng back to another time, when she was much younger, standing before another dragon on Search... Then Rhae asks the crucial question, and Sibella snaps back to the present to hear the answer.
Nat just laughs at the dragon grin, returning it with a wide mischievous smile of her own. "Nat" she offers, quite unbothered by being so close to one of the large beasts, after all she'd spent most of the day around Zax. She eyes Rhaelyn with a measured glance, and offers a look of friendly encouragement for Sibella. "You're not that old for farnath's sake." She laughs.
"It's-- it's hard to give it words. Szad don't use 'em for this." Taikrin is caught off-guard enough by the question that she forgets to be mean and mocking, for a moment. "Kind of a feeling, like? He ain't the best at pickin' it out, but if there's more'n one together, I guess it's-- stronger?" She shakes her head, returning her attention to Szadath has he tilts his head this way and that at Natalia. He seems satisfied with something, because he lets out a low chuff then swings his head over towards Sibella and begins the process again while his rider narrates. "Sort of like... if you're standin' in a hallway tryin' to figure out what door someone's playin' music behind, or... where a smell's comin' from. He knows what's gettin' off-- Nat, yeah?-- so now he's checkin'."
"Really?" She watches the candidate get checked and it seems fine, her eyes narrowing slightly, "If one dragon says that he doesn't sense it, does that mean that person isn't a candidate? Maybe not high quality enough?" She's watching with interest at just how it's done. Hearing about it in classes is one thing, this is altogether different.
Sibella nods at Taikrin's comparison, then remembers that Taikrin had asked for names. "Oh, and I'm Sibella. Bella, like," Sibella mimics Taikrin's inflection on the last bit, aiming it toward Szadath as an introduction, more so than toward Taikrin. Of course, it's an unfortunate day to be in front of a Search dragon, Sibella thinks as she runs her hand through her dirty, weighted-down waves-that-were-ringlets.
Nat eyes Rhaelyn, but doesn't say much, instead she just watches the brown inspect Sibella.
From her nice, snug, dry spot under Szadath's wing, Taikrin watches the whole procedure with smug amusement. "Some're better at it than others," she acknowledges with a one-shouldered shrug: it's not her problem. Her gaze shifts towards Rhaelyn, studying the exile girl intently. "If a dragon can hear it from some in a set, but not others-- well, likely they don't have it right then. People can /change/-- someone who didn't have it at fifteen might have it at twenty, he thinks, or else the other way 'round. But..." In the meantime, Szadath swings his head towards Rhaelyn, grunts, then swings back to Sibella. He repeats the action a couple of times, then turns to rest his head by Taikrin, as if conferring. Even though the words themselves must be only in their heads, there is a significant amount of gesturing on Taikrin's part, and quite a lot of twitching and tail-lashings on the brown's.
Rhaelyn narrows her eyes at the grunting brown and sniffs right back at him for the effort. While she waits for what the final word might be, she adjusts her jacket and hunches in the rain that drizzles on down.
Sibella keeps her patience in control, even though she has a dimple twitching slightly each time the dragon makes a move. It could be her day! Well, the beginning of many days, which she hadn't dreamed of dreaming of. Sibella regards Rhaelyn, herself, trying to pretend that she doesn't notice the internal conversation between the lifemates. Rhaelyn is just the right age, and another exile on the Sands? That'd be bonus for the Weyr.
Nat listens to Taikrin's explanation. Surprised that the process seemed so different from her own search. She just shakes her head at Rhaelyn, not much to say about that one's actions really. She hoped she'd like the outcome, though from the amount of time it was taking, she wasn't sure she'd like the answer. Still she doesn't falter keeping that easy smile until the verdict is passed.
"... /trust me/." That last bit is audible as the pair break up, Taikrin crossing her arms over her chest and looking smug while Szadath looks, well, inscrutibly draconic. "Yeah, he was definitely feelin' the same thing." From the safety of under Szadath's wing, she looks from Sibella to Rhaelyn, then while still smiling her big, toothy grin at the exile, says, "Sibella, yeah? You can go and find one of the headwoman's assistants and tell her that Taikrin and Szadath want you to stand. Reckon your friend Nat here'll help you move your stuff? Y'should consider yourself lucky-- more'n three quarters of Szadath's candidates ended up with dragons, last time." While she seems genuinely pleased with herself and Sibella, there is something dirty in the smiles she keeps shooting at Rhaelyn.
Rhaelyn's reaction is a little too cold. Also, it's a little too unemotional. She regards the dragonrider and the smiles she keeps dishing out, also with a marked lack of response. Instead, she watches and calculates. First watching for the new candidate's response and then the old candidate's response. All the while she's not saying anything, but someone in that group might be feeling the hairs on the back of their neck standing up, mabye all of them, it's downright creepy. "Right." At last she meets Taikrin's eye, holding the gaze without smiling.
Blink. One. Blink. Two. Twice Sibella blinks before Sibella makes a move, and this is to wrap Taikrin up in a very comfy hug, and then to rub Szadath's jaw. "My thanks, love. I'll do my very best not to fail you." Or myself, she adds silently. To Nat, overjoyed but containing it very well now, she gives the broadest grin her features can muster. "Oh, Nat, what sort of day this has been! I can almost see a dragonet stumbling toward me to tell me that her name is Sivith." The grin softens into a smile, then Sibella grabs Nat's hand, saying, "Oh, you will help me move, won't you? I haven't seen the barracks in /ages/ and won't know where to go, now, with all the people there." Then, before Sibella can run off and start driving everyone insane with her gleeful screeches, she turns to Szadath and Taikrin, saying to both, "Thank you, both of you, for one last chance I never thought I'd have."
Nat offers a congratulatory grin to Sibella. "Well you heard the woman, let's go get you squared away." Still something about the whole thing leaves the smith uneasy as her eyes shift between Taikrin and the exile. "Well that's a bit of relief," she whispers aside to Sibella and Nat seems eager to play show the 'newbie' around for the second time this week. "Yeah, cot near mine is still empty." She offers still studying Taikrin and the brown with an unreadable expression. Finally she snaps out of it, "Right well, let's get you moved then." She offers a wave to the brown rider before heading off to help the older girl move.
"Sorry, Rhaelyn." If Taikrin is intimidated by the exile girl's stare, she doesn't show it; rather, she returns that gaze right back, look for look, and bares her teeth in a predatory smile. "Sometimes, you know, people change and then the dragons change their minds. Reckon I can give you some tips, if you're so inclined." It's probably a good thing Sibella appears with her huge, then, because it jolts Taikrin out of confrontation mode. "Flam-- uh, sure, no problem." The brownrider doesn't seem much inclined to return the hug, much to Szadath's amusement; for his part, the brown is relishing the attention. "The, uh, headwoman can help y'all out if somethin' comes up. I'll tell her you were helpin' out, Nat. Sure she'll appreciate it." See, she /can/ be nice. When it suits her.
"Save your breath." Rhaelyn says breazily as she turns back to the living cavern. "Congratulations." Is offered in parting and she heads back inside, eager to dry off and warm up.
As the pair move away, Sibella can be heard muttering something to Nat, controlling her volume even through her excitement, glancing back once more to look at Taikrin and Rhae.