Difference between revisions of "Logs:Rain check"

>---< Diving Cliff, High Reaches Weyr >--------------------------------------<
  Thrusting out from the shadow of the mountain, this long and narrow       
  clifftop might once have been a ledge, but a pile of bramble-strewn,      
  graffiti-chiseled boulders where a weyr's mouth would have been suggests a
  reason for its abandonment long ago. Though its views of the eastern bowl 
  are grand, particularly the lake itself and the yawning air entrance to   
  the hatching sands, its location makes the diving cliff unique: jutting   
  some ten or twelve feet above the deepest part of the cool, clear lake.   
                                                                            
  Especially in summertime, many climb up the narrow stairs to seek the     
  thrill of a swift fall into the water, but those who just want to enjoy   
  the view can take those same stairs back down: carved directly into the   
  bowl wall, worn and crumbling and slick from use, but enough for the      
  careful to get the job done.                                              
                                                                            
  Warm sunshine and cloudless skies make for a beautiful day and pleasantly 
  warm evening. A breeze tempers the heat with no humidity lingering in the 
  air.                                                                      
 -----------------------------< Active Players >-----------------------------
  K'zin        M  23  6'1"  muscled, brown hair, brown eyes              54s 
  Laine        F  17  5'4"  trim, dark hair, grey eyes                    0s
 ----------------------------------< Exits >---------------------------------
                                  Lake Shore                                
>--------------------------------------< 8D 6M 37T I10, summer afternoon >---<

It's early in the afternoon still, and that pleasant sunshine and blue sky has brought many out into the summer day to enjoy the weather. From the vantage point of the diving cliff, the lake below looks busily occupied, with dragons and people alike--but up here, there's only Laine. The candidate is in cuffed drawstring pants and a sports top, and there's a thick, reed-stuffed mattress (spotched with dust; looks like she's been dragging it around) pulled up against the bowl wall. Laine is some ten feet up the wall, hanging from her fingertips, one foot in a tight leather shoe scrabbling against the rock. With a disgusted grunt, the tanner lets go and drops. She lands, crouched, on that mattress with a whump.

Laine's movements haven't gone unnoticed, but when you're a dragonrider, you've got priorities. When you're a bronzerider that includes the lengthy process of satisfying your dragon's desire for a bath. Taking advantage of the warm of the day (which doesn't necessarily equate to warmth in the water), K'zin has been at that for quite some time. Then, of course, the oiling, his brown gaze drifting from the lake short to where Laine is as he works over the hide. Once Rasavyth's dull bronze is sufficiently slathered (subsequently the shirtless man too), K'zin makes his approach, silent at first, taking in her style of dress, and the mattress closer up just as she drops onto it. He folds his arms across his chest and regards the younger woman thoughtfully.

The lake is for bathing dragons, yes, but for a group in the water it's also for fun. As the obligatory wet blanket of the group, Faryn's been floating rather idly through the water until quite recently, when they've devolved into fun that Faryn's participating in. Their catcalls follow her up, challenges to her pride, and she flicks them an inappropriate gesture before she disappears up the stairs and pops out on the diving cliff. Ostensibly, she's supposed to be diving, but her attention is taken up by both the shirtless bronzerider and the...what is the tanner doing, anyways? She squints, curious, then gives her thoughts words when it seems she's not interrupting a conversation, "Are you trying to scale the weyr?"

The candidate straightens, her back to the stairs so both Faryn and K'zin go unnoticed, and brushes her hands together. She's still on that mattress, hands on her hips, and for a long silent moment she scrutinizes that rock wall, head moving slowly as she traces some invisible route up the craggy stone. It's Faryn's voice that startles her, and Laine turns: her unexpected audience receives a lifted brow, round-eyed expression of surprise, but she seems willing enough to answer, "I'm trying to scale this wall." Her tone and body language, that sweat on her brow and her flexing fingers, suggests it's a perfectly reasonable thing to be doing. Isn't it?

Brown eyes move to Faryn as she approaches and speaks, but he doesn't do so himself until Laine has answered. "This wall's hand-holds suck," K'zin comments casually. "Though," he goes on to allow, "Your hands are smaller than mine, so you might have better luck. How long've you been a climber?" His question is curious, though his eyes flick back to the woman in age and he offers a smile, "K'zin," and a hand; manners!

"Ah. Okay." Faryn's answer comes shortly, though her curiosity isn't quite sated. "Why?" It's K'zin's statement that seals it, though, and there is dawning in her eyes. Wet blanket that she apparently is, she says, "Oh. For fun? That's...a lot like actual work." Which is fine, apparently, because she still smiles, takes a few steps towards the wall, and slips one of her own hands into the gaps. For K'zin, she can say, "Faryn." Manners combo!

K'zin's words have earned him a long, thoughtful squint from Laine as she steps to one side to allow Faryn room. "For fun," the candidate confirms with a chuckle, then points to a lower cleft in the rock that Faryn might be able to wedge her foot into. "Foothold there. Not if you're barefoot, though." Laine's pained expression probably gives an idea of why that's a bad idea. Now that she's had time to match K'zin with climber in her head, Laine reponds. "On and off. Two, three years now? This one isn't so bad, 'cept for a weird move somewhere--" her hand drifts upward: about ten feet upward. Grey eyes scan K'zin again. "You climb?"

K'zin considers the women, his unanswered hand rising to scratch a finger across his brow and push through his hair. "Yeah," to Laine, followed by watching Faryn's hand on the wall. "Actually," this totally sounds like a line, which might fulfill one of the other priorities on a bronzerider's list, "I have a climbing wall in my weyr. If you guys want something a little easier on your hands for practice."

Faryn's already distracted, unfortunately; manners half-combo. She sticks her (bare) foot into the wall despite warnings that she maybe shouldn't, lifts herself, and then immediately takes her foot out. Yes. That hurts. But she's hanging with strong arms from the first hole and a second her hand instinctively found, looking at the ground beneath her. "Feels higher than it is," she says, then lets go, whoomping herself to the mat and glancing at K'zin with a grin. Yes, that sounds like a line. And maybe not an unwelcome one. "Do you?" she says. "This is a thing now, is it?"

Laine's cringe is sympathetic to Faryn's bare feet, but while Faryn's dangling, the tanner lifts her hands as though to catch her should she fall. She does spare a sidelong look back over her shoulder at K'zin. But Faryn makes it down safely, and Laine drops her arms to her sides and turns. "You would," she murmurs, laughter in her eyes, but doesn't look adverse to the idea, even if girls are usually told not to go into private weyrs with strange men. "It's a thing. For us sad plebes with no wings, at least. And apparently for some with wings."

K'zin has a nose-flinch of sympathy that echoes Laine's as the feet are observed but he doesn't make any move that suggest he's about to force better decisions on the barefooted climber. He lets his arms drop to his sides a moment before his hands don't seem to know what to do from there and then find his hips. "It is. A thing." If he's hitting on them, it's been an awfully long time and Laine's words make him flush. "If it helps," he adds to the younger girl, "There's a door that closes so you don't have to see the inappropriate murals while you climb." He glances back toward his dragon then the women, deciding. "Do you guys want to come check it out?" is finally the offer.

Standing away from the wall now like it's done her some great disservice, Faryn's not going to complain when she was plainly warned; but she'll stand there, on the outside edge of that one foot, curling her toes in and out as if it will relieve the pain. "I'm not a plebe," Faryn says, her tone unoffended. "Runners are fast; climbing this is high. It depends what you're looking for." She chances a look at K'zin, to see if he's kidding. Perhaps she even catches a bit of his blush, a bit of his awkwardness. If she does, that is the root of her next comment. "Climbing a wall and inappropriate murals? You know the way to a girl's heart, don't ya?" And then, "You mean now?"

"Oh, your smutty mural?" Laine asks brightly of K'zin, clasping her hands together. "That's fine. I've seen," she stumbles suddenly over whatever she was going to say. Is that's a flush creeping across her cheeks? "--stuff before." Lame finish. But Laine soldiers on through. "I'll come check it out, sure." The candidate sounds a little less self-assured and casual than she'd like, maybe, still pink in the cheeks. In any case, Laine turns to Faryn and spreads her hands. "What do you say? Buddy system. If he's a," (sotto voce, behind her hand) "total creep then at least there's two of us."

"What can I say, bronzeriders always get the girls." K'zin manages a half-smile that makes him look more goofy than charming in this moment. "You ride runners?" He asks of Faryn with lifted brows before nodding and making a gesture toward Rasavyth. "He wants to head back up anyway." There's a pause, "If I do turn out to be a creep, Laine, and you end up Impressing, I'll have a whole turn to-- uh. Creep. At you." It's an odd finish, to be sure. One that prompts a rosier hue to his dusky cheeks.

"Train them, too," Faryn affirms. "I used to race them," emphasis on the past, "but there's not a lot of interest in that, here." She disregards it with a shrug, waiting for Laine's answer. There's no denying her delight when the candidate agrees to the trip, though Faryn's quick to put on airs of helplessness, if they're going to be going sotto voce. "Oh, but whatever would I be able to do?" she asks, putting a hand to her forehead dramatically. The grin immediately following is wicked, especially now that they're both blushing.

Laine's mouth pulls to the side and her eyebrows go up, eyes trained on Faryn; her interest is piqued, but she doesn't comment on the runner-training. She laughs outright at Faryn's dramatics--and maybe a little at K'zin's awkwardness--and shakes her head. "I take it back. He's obviously harmless. And apparently a weyrlingmaster?" That's directed at K'zin, an inquiring tone turning a statement into a question. The candidate kicks at her cumbersomely large mattress, and notes, "I'll need to be back before dark. Gotta drag this back to stores before someone notices."

"Yeah?" K'zin is pleased by the news. "Maybe we can go riding sometime. Haven't had a riding companion who really wanted to be there or do more than just sort of walk along in a long time. Too long." The bronzerider tells Faryn just before he squints. It's not the usual look of someone talking to a dragon, but he must be because he makes a face, regretful. "Assistant," he tells Laine, "but newly so. And apparently I'm wanted to do some duty or another." He doesn't need to say that staying in Quinlys' good graces for as long as possible is preferable to the alternative. "Rain-check though? I'll even take your mattress back to the stores since I'm apparently heading there anyway." He offers an attempt at a winning smile for both of them.

Edyis makes her way up the steps to hear rain check and dark eyes study the trio there with a twist of dark brows. "Rain-check?" On what seems to be the implied question, but she makes sure to get out of the way. "What have you all been up to?"

Faryn brightens quickly, at that. "Really? That'd be...nice. Maybe even nicer than climbing, honestly. Though that might be fun as well." All that's really missing is air quotes around "climbing," with the way she says it. She seems, nevertheless, to appreciate both gestures from the bronzerider equally. "Since you're harmless," she adds, with a glance at Laine, then, "Hi, Edyis," is for the scribe-turned-candidate, a flick of the fingers for a wave. "Laine's scaling the weyr, and K'zin's being a creep. I'm just here to swim. Innocent, in all things."

"I'll take a rain-check. Assistant weyrlingmaster." Laine drawls the title with a lazy, not-quite-mocking salute, although she does look somewhat disappointed--did she want to up to K'zin's weyr? Laine must just really like climbing. That crestfallen little frown, though, is cleared at K'zin's offer of atonement. She grins, lopsided, and balls one fist on her hip as she glances at the mattress. "That'd be awesome. It's an unwieldy old thing." Then there's a former scribe picking her way up the steps and Laine turns that smile on her. "Edyis! Ditto," Laine jerks a thumb at Faryn. What she said.

Everyone knows Laine just wants to see what's behind the locked door. "Oh, they're going to come visit my weyr." K'zin tells Edyis as she arrives, slanting a lopsided smile at her, "Don't tell them, but I've got truly nefarious purposes. You can come too, if you like. Have a look at my murals." Whenever it ends up being. He gives an affirming nod to Faryn's version of events, too; so creepily helpful! Or not. The grin is turned to her in turn in affirmation of the riding. "Two rain-checks for you," he offers her. Unwieldy though the mattress decidedly is, with a flex of muscles all too obvious given K'zin's oiled and shirtless state, he's managing to get it up to where it's resting on his head and bowing over it, hands extended to support it a little awkwardly. "I'll make good on it," are his parting words of promise before making toward the eventual destination even as Rasavyth takes graceful flight. Just because they don't get to go doesn't mean he has to delay his desire to be home. Even if he definitely could help K'zin with that mattress (at least across the bowl). Worst. Lifemate. Ever.

"I do not buy your claims of innocence." She states eyes are glittering with dark humor. She turns to watch the shirtless rider leave with a disapproving click of her tongue, looking between the two girls again. "Especially if you are letting him whisk you off to his weyr." There might be just enough mirth in her expression to suggest she isn't entirely serious.

"A whole two," Faryn says wistfully, even as the bronzerider lifts the mattress and takes his leave. "I'm a lucky gal." For Ed's cynicism, Faryn has a brow raise and a frown. "Are you questioning my integrity?" she wants to know, and if she mimics Laine's hand-to-hip posture, it's unintentional. "I will have you know, I came up her to escape mockery, and was unwittingly solicited. By a bronzerider. Who is, yes, okay looking. It couldn't be helped." Enough of that, though. "What brings you?" To this place near the lake on a beautiful day.

"There was no whisking." Laine lifts one finger in their defense, glancing over at Faryn. "There was talk of whisking. No actual whisking took place." As evidenced by two women and no bronzerider. And no mattress. Admittedly: "there may be scheduled whisking. In the future. But I like to climb things--rocks! Like to climb rocks. Not things." Especially not things like oily, shirtless bronzeriders. She continues, a bit lamely, "And he has a climbing wall." Beat. "Ostensibly." That blush? It's back. In full force. Laine shuts up.

Edyis grins. "No merely your innocence." There is something playful and utterly unserious in the words. "Two girls, a bronzerider, and a mattress... yeah that doesn't sound suspicious at all." She's teasing, it's obvious now. Laine's blush? "I wanted to enjoy the sunshine. Maybe go for a swim if the lake has warmed enough."

Faryn smiles at that, shrugging. "That could still be fun," she says, and as for her embarrassment? Nothing, except maybe some color on her ears that could, arguably, simply be a sunburn now that there is sun to do any burning. "It sounds like a novel. A terrible novel. The Harpers would be so ashamed they'd scratch it from the records forever, but it would live on in tales told by underground harper rings." Edyis' plans seem to remind Faryn of her own, and she scoots towards the edge of the diving cliff to peek over. Several moments hang, then someone down below notices and there is indistinguishable sound from the lake below. "I was supposed to dive," she says, and there's that obscene gesture again. "They can wait."

"Yikes. That does sound bad." Especially Faryn's novelized version of events. Anyway. Laine steps up into that small rocky cleft that did a number on Faryn's foot earlier, and tests her weight on a handhold above her head. But she backs down again, probably for the lack of a mattress to break her fall, and wheels around to face her two companions on the diving cliff. "Why not?" Dive, that is. "I'll jump if you jump. And Edyis wanted to go swimming anyway." The tanner volunteers Edyis to jump, too. How thoughtful!

Edyis eyes the drop. "I think I will watch you two if you don't mind." Skeptical of the water, and that drop. It is awful high after all. "Underground harper rings, I like the sound of that, perhaps one day you'd find it in every seedy tavern and backwater brothel." She manages with a straight face.

Given the time, Faryn could probably spin a better web of her tale about underground smut harpers, but she suffices with a mischievous grin and glint to her eye, never bothering to elaborate. "I was just going to say no because I prefer your company," the apprentice admits, "at least over theirs, right now." Another glance downward. The look that Faryn gives Edyis is both incredulous and disappointed, her head tilting off to the side. "But you wanted to swim," she says, beseechingly. "Why would you come up here if not to jump off? If we do it together?" Cue: puppy eyes.

"I do mind, in fact." Laine sniffs, crossing her arms and tapping one foot. Though her posture says annoyance, her eyes are bright and her voice, rich with laughter as she sweeps Edyis with a long look. "You came all the way up here just to pretend like you don't want to jump? It's way faster. And we'd jump together," the candidate echoes Faryn, flashing a conspiratorial grin at the latter. "We'd jump, you'd have to trudge all the way down to meet us. So lame." Peer pressure: making teenagers do stupid things since the dawn of time.

"I would rather not," Edyis answers primly, "I can climb down just fine, it isn't any bother. I came up here because it looked like interesting things were going on and I was my usual nosey self." She admits truthfully.

The puppy eyes have failed, and Faryn's future in persuasion is gone. She glances from Edyis to Laine, then back. If there's a conspiracy there, it's brief and for Laine alone - something in the way her glance cuts back between scribe and cliff's edge, then back very briefly to Laine. It's then that the herder puts her palms together, prayer-style and beseeching, and approaches Edyis, a pleading note to her tone. "Please, Edyis? I even said please, and that's...you know. Really hard for me." True, and maybe that's the hint that Ed should pick up on - that any sort of please from Faryn must mean something is afoot. "Puh-leeze," she emphasizes, moving closer, and now she's in range to actually reach out and touch Edyis...if a plan falls in place.

And Laine's peer pressure obviously isn't influential enough to sway Edyis, even as she extends a tentative hand to tug at Edyis' sleeve. The tanner's saying something ("-- that walk is so long. Such a bother --") but even as she rambles in that staccato-fast speech of hers, she's acknowledging that clandestine sweep of Faryn's gaze with a covert little bob of her head. "Friends don't let friends walk down stairs." Laine's hand circles around Edyis' wrist, now: not firmly, but surely. That other hand curves around Edyis, hovering inches away from her lower back. Does Edyis notice? Grey eyes seek out Faryn's brown.

It is too late, when Edyis feels that hand on her wrist, the contact causing the young woman to turn wide eyes on to Laine. The please from Faryn, that too should have clued her in but when it clicks...

No turning back now. Faryn's overjoyed to note that Laine's cottoned on to her nefarious plans, and at once her own hands spread - again, almost beseeching - but instead they grab Edyis' other wrist, counterbalance Laine's hand by pressing between her shoulder blades, and with the other girl's help they can propel Edyis' forward towards the edge. It's not a dive - far from it, when you're dragging another person along behind you - but the whoops of delight from the group below does not seem to be working on any sort of scoring. Down, down, down they go, and likely hit the water in an uncoordinated heap.

It's an artless process, forcefully propelling Edyis forward and off the cliff--there's no cannonballs or opportunities to plug their noses or pose in midair--but, as promised, all three make the leap together. Or the clumsy fall, as it is. Laine laughs as they plunge, but the sound tears out of her like a shriek of delight, breaking only when they splash into the lake. When Laine bobs to the surface, treading water, she's sputtering, but grinning ear-to-ear.

It's a high softly shrill shriek as down, down down they go, but it's as much a sound of delight as surprise as down, down down, into the waters of the lake they go. Edyis comes up sputtering, but also she's laughing. "Remind me never to get on either of your bad sides." She grins, "Of course this means payback. When you both least expect it." Starting to slog in toward shore.

Faryn's laughter doesn't come right away; she's focused on getting Edyis in the water, at first; then falling, secondly, and catching her breath before they hit. It's when she surfaces, her hair flat against her head, that she is laughing: genuine, amused, rare. "Oh, man," is all she can say to Edyis' threats, but she's still grinning widely, "I dare you." She, too, is wading for the shore, where her towel is probably waiting. She swims easily on her back until the water's too shallow, saying, "You liked it, admit it."

"I admit nothing." Edyis feigns stoicism, but laughter wins out. "That was fun." She admits, slogging onto the shore. "I'll take that dare though.

Laine, too, begins to splash for shore, her thick hair rumpled and tousled in every direction after she runs a hand through it. She's not as graceful a swimmer as Faryn, but she makes it--finding her feet under her, the candidate shimmies off excess water and eyes Edyis with a laugh. "We'll see." It sounds like a challenge. But: "I need a towel. I'll see you guys later. Faryn," her partner in crime gets a tip of an imaginary hat before Laine traipses off, dripping.