Logs:Snowballs By The Lake
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| RL Date: 7 October, 2013 |
| Who: Lansha, Quinlys |
| Type: [[Concept:{{{type}}}|{{{type}}}]] |
| What: Quinlys' weyrlings run laps. Lansha and his friends attempt to relax. |
| Where: Lake Shore, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day {{{day}}}, Month {{{month}}}, Turn {{{turn}}} ({{{IP}}} {{{IP2}}}) |
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| Lake Shore, High Reaches Weyr The rest of the bowl may be barren, grass barely surviving at best, but here by the lake, it's brilliantly green in the warmer months: thickening and thriving in the silty, boulder-dotted soil just before it transitions to soft sand and thence to the cool, clear water itself. A large freshwater lake fed by a low waterfall, it not only provides warm-weather bathing space for humans and dragons, but has one end fenced off as a watering hole for the livestock in the feeding grounds. The water there is often muddier than the rest of the clear lake, whose shallows drop off abruptly several yards out into deep water, and whose edge undulates against the coarse-hewn bowl wall: here close enough to just be bramble-covered rocks, there far enough away that a narrow land bridge divides the main lake from a smallish pond. Between are several rocky outcroppings that form excellent makeshift diving points, though only one -- across the bridge -- has a set of narrow, slippery, quite possibly tempting stairs. High winds whip through the bowl and whistle up the walls around the spires. It's pretty miserable outside, today, between high winds that the bowl walls haven't managed to block out, and yesterday's snow throwing itself around madly as a result. Weather is no reason for young dragons and their weyrlings not to be hard at work, however, and thus Quinlys, too, can be found supervising from the relative shelter of one of the boulders along the lake shore. "One more lap," calls the Weyrlingmaster, voice raised against the wind. "And then you can go in and warm up. Make it a quick one!" Lansha strolls over toward the lake shore, accompanied by a gaggle of other weyrbrats, mostly boys, but a few girls have tagged along. A few others have Candidate knots like the one Lansha's sporting. Lansha and a few others look to have recently bathed, but they haven't quite washed off the lingering odor of having just mucked out the stables. They unroll large beach towels and sit, beginning to relax and unwind after a long day of chores. A couple of the weyrlings, miserably cold and looking exhausted, stare at Lansha and his compatriats as they pass them, not that they have time to talk: the sooner they finish their lap, the sooner they can get indoors! Quinlys, though, even partially protected from the wind, raises an eyebrow. "If you people freeze out here and leave us without candidates for those eggs, I'll murder you all," she notes, with a surprisingly straight face. Some of Lansha's compatriots start at *him*, as if this was his idea. Lansha, on the other hand, seems undaunted and waves cheerily at Quinlys. "Sorry, ma'am, I thought it'd frozen by now, we were going to see if we could skate on it. Lansha mouths "Sorry," at the passing weyrlings, grimacing at their discomfort in commiseration. He sits down on one of the towels, beginning to chat with his friends. "No, it looks too thin to skate on, better not risk it," he tells one, who looks crestfallen and drops her skates on a towel. There's only so much watching-of-weyrlings Quinlys can do without looking bored, even with the relative cuteness of dragons only a handful of months old attempting to trail after their riders through the snowdrifts. "Give it another sevenday or two," she says, voice raised against the wind, apparently intending to invite herself into the conversation between Lansha and his friends - never mind the age and rank difference. Lansha smiles and nods at the Weyrlingmaster. "Sounds about right. Then they can skate across it instead of running around it. I'm Lansha, by the way. New Candidate." He points at his knot. "I know who you are." Quinlys' smile edges towards 'smug', though that's not terribly unusual - the red-haired Weyrlingmaster has a reputation for looking smug. "There's not so many of you I can't keep up with it. For now, anyway. Though the Nabolese refugees," many of whom are sleeping in the second cavern of the candidate barracks, "do make it a little more difficult." Idly, then, "This clutch'll be too big to slide on the ice, I guess, but Iesaryth's lot won't be. There's nothing more adorable than baby dragons on the ice." Lansha giggles at the mental image. "Have many Nabolese been Searched? I haven't seen many of their Candidates. I know one of them, I wonder if he was Searched." Two of the weyrbrats take advantage of Lansha's distraction and sneak up behind him, one holding a large snowball. Lansha seems oblivious. Quinlys, who surely isn't oblivious to that snowball, nonetheless says nothing about it - instead, she lets her gaze past idly by the two weyrbrats, with just the hint of a smile in place. "A few of them have," she says, after a moment. "I think some people feel that if they're going to be here, eating our food, they can at least help fill out the ranks. Which one is it you know?" Lansha's reply is nearly lost in a high, almost girlish shriek as a snowball is stuffed down the back of his sweater. "RyiieeeeEEEEE!!!" He shoots to his feet and runs around the towels, shaking the snowball out of his clothes. He turns towards the culprits, open-mouthed. "You little-augh!" He bends to make a snowball of his own, then chases after the others. "I'll get you for that!" He tosses a snowball, rather lamely, toward the offending weyrbrats. Now is a good moment to feel sorry for Quinlys' weyrlings who, despite having no doubt seen the beginnings of this snowball fight, have no choice but to keep running. Matters may well be made worse by the way Quinlys drops now, too, to pack together her own snowball - which gets through into the throng without any apparent destination in mind. Chaos ensues as a full-blown snowball fight erupts among the weyrbrats, snow flying in every direction. Much of it is directed at Lansha, who seems to be the ringleader of this little group. He decides to defend himself with a towel, which he wraps around himself in a futile effort. He gasps at Quinlys, "Not you too!" and tosses a snowball in her direction. Quinlys may not have expected to get a snowball sent at her, not with the power of rank and authority behind her; her squeal is correspondingly girlish, and very much not professional. A couple of the weyrlings stop short, just staring... and then begin to laugh when Quinlys recovers herself, and sends another snowball into the fray. "I'll get you for that!" Lansha squeaks and ducks under his towel again, warding off a few more snowballs. He changes tactics, grabbing a passing boy his age with a Candidate's knot and tackling him, pulling him down. Soon the whole gang is in a big, snowy pile-on, still smacking each other with snow. The boy Lansha tackled leaps up, hands clamped over his butt, but with a grin on his face. He kicks snow in Lansha's face. "No pinching!" he yells, laughing. As willing as she is to get involved in a snowball fight, there are limits: as the group goes down into a pile, Quinlys steps back again, into the relative protection of her boulder. The weyrlings are finally beginning to make it back round, and so, in the end, it's probably good timing: "Any of you hurt each other, I wasn't here, and I knew nothing," she warns, raising her voice to be heard over the wind and the general noise of such a game. "I am going inside where it's warm. Weyrlings, you're dismissed!" Some of them will no doubt join the fray. And why not? The wind and cold and hard work of the day have sapped the weyrbrats of their remaining energy and the snowball fight dies down as quickly as it began. "Oh, you know you love it," Lansha snarks at the other 'brat. He collapses into the pile. "Inside, that's a good idea. Too sharding cold out here. C'mon, let's go get some klah." He and the others collect themselves and their towels. Lansha waves at the weyrlings, then at Quinlys. "Nice to see you, Weyrlingmaster!" He trudges through the sand and snow back toward the caverns.
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