Logs:More Lively Than Benden
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| RL Date: 24 January, 2013 |
| Who: Ainslee, Leova |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: The day after Hraedhyth and Iesaryth's flights, dragonhealers fix their tools and speculate. |
| Where: Dragon Infirmary, HRW |
| When: Day 19, Month 11, Turn 30 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Anvori/Mentions, Azaylia/Mentions, Brieli/Mentions, Hattie/Mentions, R'hin/Mentions, Taikrin/Mentions |
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| It's-- been hectic. Ironic, so close on the heels of acknowledging that dragonhealing is hardly a full-time profession: but like most things in life, long stretches of boredom are punctuated by moments of sheer terror. Or in this case, intensity: Ainslee's returned after grabbing a night of sleep, food and a brief afternoon drill (more for wing solidarity than to actually get things done, reassuring wingriders that whatever else may happen, Hailstorm is choate and will remain untouched regardless)... and now. Now the redhead is back to roll bandages, check inventory, and wrinkle her nose oh-so-cutely at U'sot at every opportunity. Things are winding down, the ichor and chaos mopped away in triage aftermath. Now most of the aides have removed themselves, U'sot's secluded in his office, and Ainslee is settled Indian-style on the ground, sorting through precious, rare-metal dragon needles, checking for any imperfection on the large half-moons in various gauges and slopes. Notably, an unmarked bottle is settled next to her, only half-capped. No drill for Glacier, but then, they wouldn't have had one anyway. Besides, the wing's splintered, though Taikrin is most definitely one of theirs. No solid sleep for Leova, who'd left late and wound up back early. She's skipped the bandage-rolling, but at least she's of some use now, going over the needles that haven't passed muster with files of varying fineness. Now, tiredly, her voice altered from earlier even while encompassing the exact same words: "What do you make of it all." Not just the injuries, anymore. "Hmmm." It's a quiet noise, tired despite the sleep. Ainslee squints at one of the smaller hooked needles, holding it up against the closest glow to check the angle of the curve, a finger tracing for any roughness. "It's... certainly more lively than Benden." Understatement of the turn. "I don't think I've ever seen a bloodier lot. Comes from the convicts, you think?" Half-lilted question, a thoughtful glance over to the other greenrider. There's a regular, quiet rasping sound: not breathing, but rather, metal against metal, finer and finer until at last it's a chamois Leova rubs them against. It's like boiling a firelizard, some say: the trick is to raise the temperature slowly so it doesn't notice. "Mm," she says. "'Lively.'" Then, "Don't reckon it's the convicts, no. Half-forgotten, actually, what with the exiles," and murders. "But maybe. Two queens, separated or no, is what I'd think. And Hraedhyth in no way peaceable, moreover. Though you have me wondering if the chaos opened it up for Szadath, or the other way around." She glances sideways too, lets her gaze linger. "How does this affect your egg-studying plans? Or your staying plans." Ainslee nods along to Leova's statement. "Haven't heard so much about the exiles." Other than the bit about Iolene, but most of Pern has at least heard about the Saga of Reaches Weyrwomen. "Only ask because of Taikrin," she comments off-hand, the statement self-evident. "The timing, though..." The redhead shakes her head. "Women syncing, sure. Teaser studs to bring mares in heat. I thought I'd heard it all, but... simultaneous rising, that's something." Headshake. "I wouldn't have thought it possible, though... if the one baited the other, I guess I could see it short-circuiting proddiness." A wry look to the other; "Don't have much choice, do I? Plus," she reflects with the mind that only a dragonhealer (or maybe mad scientist) would have, "It's a study in individual differences, now, isn't it? Or maybe bloodline differences. See if there's any difference in clutch times." /Grimace/. "Hope they don't try to both set down at the same time." Since that's *exactly* what High Reaches needs: two irritable clutching golds snapping at one another across the Sands. Convicts... but Leova's only briefly distracted, just a single-shoulder shrug and then she's back to business. "They're so close in age," she says finally, sparing a swallow from the flask she frees from her vest: not something she's been steadily drinking from. This is something new, or rather, something newly brought out. In the end, all she says is, "Not surprised, anyhow. There's a reason why we tell other queens to /get out/. Keep telling them, remember Fort, that's not a legend like old Ramoth." The needle stashed safely, she reaches for the next. "Think they'll both overlap on the sands, their clutches... but yeah, hope not laying at the same time, kicking up sand, who knows what. And comparing clutch size, of course, hm?" This time, when she glances at the other greenrider, it's short-lived but far closer to a grin. "Can't complain about getting 'Reaches blood for Iesaryth, for all that her sire was too, Leiventh as who chased Hraedhyth. Wouldn't that have been a tangle?" Ainslee offers an amiable shrug: Leova's right, of course. "Fort." She just has a wince: she does remember that. (Who wouldn't? They all thought Elaruth would never fly, after.) The somber moment passes in a flurry of a snort, highly amused. "But we all know," lashbat, lashbat, "Size doesn't matter." She shakes her head again, moves another needle into Leova's to-boil-as-a-firelizard pile. "Oh, Faranth," the redhead mutters, taking a swig of her own bottle. "At least if he had, he had the grace to chase Hraedhyth. I wouldn't imagine many would take a fancy to a Monocoan happening to fly the gold from Monaco, High Reaches rider or not." Locals, man. They've been giving Ainslee *all* the good gossip. The other greenrider murmurs, half singsong, half as though it were Rhonda sitting on the floor right there, "That's what they'd like to think." She catches herself smiling, her gaze goes briefly distant, and then she shrugs and lets it loose after all. "Reckon not. Former Weyrleader here, or not. Glad you catch these things." She slides her boots forward, heels scraping stone, and checks a point quite delicately. "Ever been weyrmated, Ainslee? Left anyone, back Benden way?" A laugh, that selfsame husk to wry alto. "Though I will admit that quality does win out over quantity, every now and again. The clutch after mine was four dragonets larger, took two months longer to finish training. Talk about a cluster." The greenrider arches her back with a subtle popping noise, shifts to lean her weight back, half-propped up on her elbows: a strange pose, but relief for the lower back for sure. Necessary. "I've heard nothing but conspiracy stories this morning," she admits to Leova: "I had no clue who R'hin was, except that he was a bronzerider, before last night." Ainslee doesn't like to admit lack of knowledge, but the truth is worthwhile upon occasion. Such as the next moment: her smile is still there, but reflective and inward and a little sad. "Someone left me, back at Benden. Nothing quite as sour than a love gone bad... especially one that was good, for a while. You know?" A flicker of green-tinted gaze towards the older greenrider, inquisitive, multi-layered. "Granted," Leova teases back, the wave of her chamois like a handkerchief. "Now, two months longer in total, than yours took in total? Or were they just, hm. Rotated, two months around the Turn." Talking about that, her gaze drifting towards Ainslee and back again, out to the world back to the metal, it's simple to say quite genuinely, "I'm sorry." It's just a slight pull to her mouth, not the wryer sort of tug. "My weyrmate, he's not happy. The fights, like last night. The not-knowing. We thought, after this... things'd be cleared up, one way or another." "Total," Ainslee replies, succinct for a change. "They were just dumber." Maybe not the most grammatically brilliant of sentences ever stated, but... For the moment, it works. She closes her eyes, leans her head back, looking for all the world like someone stuck in a really bad yoga pose. Does Pern even -have- yoga? It should have. Just for Ainslee. She nods at the 'sorry', accepting without comment, though a brief smile suffices for a thanks. "Yeah. You know /some/ bonehead is going to say there's no way to tell, so what's another turn or three for living in uncertainty?" Her frown expresses what -she- thinks of it. It's a rough laugh that does Leova good, open and at-ease all the way down. Not that it can last long, not with the rest, but it's still a stretch in its own right: Ainslee, yogi master? Certainly the more usual kind of stretches are familiar enough that Leova doesn't seem surprised at Ainslee's antics. "Plenty of boneheads," she agrees. "What do you think? How would you tell." It's not quite casual. Not quite a test. But there's a hint of the dragonhealer's cadence, now, to her low voice. Ainslee squints her eyes up at the ceiling, a smile for Leova's laugh - which fades at the question after. "If I were pushed to make a stand, to draw a line in the sand," she murmurs... A pause. A hiccup in time. She'd shrug but her weight's on her elbows, communicated through her shoulders, planking her down. "There was only one daughter of High Reaches that rose in the sanctity of High Reaches." Her voice is simple, her political leanings evident in the liberal smattering of second comment: "Just because Taikrin rides brown - just because she's a /woman/," an unusual ferocity underlying that, "-shouldn't discount the fact that the flight was won /here/. The bronzes of High Reaches chased Hraedhyth." And lost. It's an intriguing ferocity, given how Leova's looking. But she asks, quite quietly, "How critical is it to you that she rose, here? That the bronzes lost. Here." Ainslee shifts, the better /to/ shrug. "I like Brieli," she states, baldly. "I don't know Azaylia. But you leave the weyr when another gold is proddy, in this situation... isn't that, I don't know. Implicit? Implicit that you yield, you give, you back away from the prize to be claimed?" Specific women aside: "'Prize'. 'To be claimed.' Would you have them stay, and risk a fight, prove themselves by blood?" The way Leova says it, it has its own rationality. Ainslee snorts, lightly. "Do you think the bloodshed would have been any less?" She gestures, negligent, towards the corner where the last ichor-stained towels sit, ready to be laundered. More seriously: "I think if you've half a notion that your lifemate may be proddy - a big if, granted - and you /want/ what is to be claimed--" Significant, that, she doesn't change her wording. "--you don't walk away without a..." She would say fight, but that's not exactly what she's going for; she falls silent as result. Leova's nodding, agreeing, and yet... and yet. "The thing is," she starts, slowly. "The thing is that the two of them, they're friends? Or at least, they come off that way. The riders. And the queens, they'd been good to each other, as these things go. And I'd hate to see them pitted even more at odds." Her voice is a shadow. "We already lose too many." "Nothing is ever as easy as it looks on paper," Ainslee gloomily agrees. "Makes me more than glad that my Kalaith hatched green." Freedom isn't just another word for nothing left to lose. The last soft comment has her visibly flinching: there's such a world of pain, here, this weyr of the Spires... this weyr of sorrows. She's silent, in homage of the truth. Eventually she'll straighten, rearrange herself, tasked with finishing her row of inspections. There will be alcohol. And commentary. And maybe even some crude jokes, masked in sarcastic jibe. But always, a willingness for comraderie, and the truth, as muddied or incoherant or embarassing as it may be. (And ichor. Isn't there always?) |
Comments
Azaylia (Dragonshy) left a comment on Fri, 25 Jan 2013 07:58:49 GMT.
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Oh I liked this. Ainslee's views seem to beget Leova's and... Hm. This was a really interesting read.
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