Logs:Mail Call
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| RL Date: 8 November, 2013 |
| Who: Rh'mis, Telavi |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Tela is the bearer of unwelcome mail. Rhey dodges. |
| Where: Weyrling Training Cavern, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 15, Month 3, Turn 33 (Interval 10) |
| Weather: Steady, today's snowfall sticks, creating dunes on the bowl floor. |
| Mentions: I'zech/Mentions, Quinlys/Mentions, Rone/Mentions |
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| Weyrling Training Cavern, High Reaches Weyr Mail call! Of all her duties, this may be one of Telavi's favorites, not that most weyrlings get as much mail as she had-- but then, they probably open a far higher percentage of theirs. Her hair is neatly clipped up in a series of looping braids, far longer than it perhaps should be considering Solith's age, and she's ensconced in one of those clawfooted chairs with the sack on her lap. Rh'mis never gets any from the usual delivery, and yet today must be a special day, because right at the end, there's his name! Oh, what she holds up isn't the care package that a few of the weyrlings get upon occasion-- even some who have always lived here, from usually-proud family and friends-- but it's a good-sized hide envelope, not quite flat. It's been enough sevens now that surely even Rhey has started to become accustomed to this 'new name' business, and yet it takes a nudge from one of the other weyrlings to dislodge him from the square of floor he's taking up. "Hm?" follows a start, one that nearly wakes a now-napping Rosvelth-- but not nearly enough, since even having his head forcibly removed from the boy's lap doesn't actually disturb him. Looking bewildered, he makes his approach. "Ma'am?" There must be some kind of mistake. The greenrider, newly returned to her duties, smiles up at him as though this is no surprise at all-- and it isn't, because she nods to the chair next to her and hands him not just the envelope, but her own precious fountain pen... which she will expect to get back afterward, thank you. "Hidework. It's what the others filled out when they were first Searched, those who didn't live here before," and a shrug of eloquent shoulders implies confidence that Rhey can draw the correct conclusion. Except it isn't just hidework; the not-quite-flatness turns out to be from a wrapped-up bit of hard candy, the sort of thing one might pick up at a Gather. That fountain pen gets an admiring glance, but only for a second. "And if I can't read and write?" is the weyrling's first attempt at escaping this trap, even as his fingers are feeling out the hardness at the bottom of the envelope, not to mention the pen's gentle curve. "You can tell me the answers and I'll write them down for you," Telavi says, blue-today eyes bright: is that what he's going to claim? He wouldn't be the first. This trap has teeth. Rhey frowns, evidently at least temporarily beaten - evidently, because a moment later he sits, shaking the pages out of the envelope (and the candy, too, though it earns less interest than the actual pages). "Why do you need to know all of this?" he wonders, tone pleasantly (neutrally) curious. Telavi says, her own tone curiously (cheerfully) pleasant, "Next of kin, that sort of thing." Her pause is cheerful, too, complete with a dimple. "Also connections: it helps to know if someone might already be well-informed about a particular topic or area-- though I understand you're not a crafter?-- or people, even. Or if your great-great-grandson comes looking for information someday." Or who's related to whom for flights, but she skips right over that part. "If they haven't already, they'll get your measurements for clothes, and the healers will want to look you over, too. It's a pain, but it's all routine. Mine was after the Hatching, too." Rhey is too careful a boy to let his jaw drop, or even to let his feelings share themselves, unintentionally, within the blue of his eyes or the set of his mouth. Still, "And if I've no next of kin? No information to share?" That he's lowered his gaze to scan the pages more intently at least means he doesn't need to look at Telavi directly. "Were you hatched from an egg? Even your dragon has parents. If you were fostered, those count, though," and Telavi says that with a quiet sort of emphasis. The young weyrling doesn't have to look at her; she'll look at him. "I wasn't fostered." But nor does Rhey seem to have anyone he wants to list: he's uncapped the pen, now, and for a moment seems about to suck the tip in a way that suggests it's a habit, but no, he remembers in time and draws it away again. "I don't have anything to write. Can't I just say that, and be done with it? I just want to start again." Beat. "Isn't it enough that everyone thinks I'm a thief?" There aren't any tears, but there could be. With mild exasperation, not just due to the firelizard who's suddenly shown up on her shoulder and started to crawl into the sack, "Everyone doesn't think you're a thief. If anything, Rosvelth stole you." Telavi considers him, even as she holds the mouth of the sack a little wider so it's easier for the bronze but he can still think he's getting away with something. She avoids adding emphasis, quiet or otherwise, to, "You wouldn't be the first to start over, one way or another." Under his breath, "Maybe he shouldn't've," is audible, but just barely. Rhey blows out an audible breath, and then, his expression nearly as truculent as a toddler's, he scrawls out a name in the appropriate box: Rhikios of Nabol. See? She's winning. "Enough people think I'm a thief. They watch me. And the ones who didn't Impress, who think I stole him, too. I'm just a kid from Nabol who got messed up in Rone's stupid army. That's all." "Well, they shouldn't, because it's not like you have a choice." Maybe Telavi's the soft touch of this group; certainly she crinkles her nose. And then she says, a touch more quickly than it really deserves, "Remember your Turnday. That should be there, too." If they're going to check in with this Rhiklos, she doesn't say, doesn't even imply. "Try telling them that," says Rhey, who can be - or at least seem - as moody as any teenager, when he wants. Even so, he's dutiful enough in writing down a date, one that would make him relatively recently turned eighteen, though he surely can't be anywhere near that old. "You can send them to me if you want," Telavi says easily, "...If you think it'll help," which really is the kicker, and by her tone, she knows it. Nor does she question the date, what she can see of it, much as she hadn't addressed the name he'd given for his father or, indeed, the existence of his mother; perhaps she's lazy. Perhaps she has her priorities. Perhaps she has an idea of whether it will do any good. "No. It's fine." He has his pride: pride that has him straightening his shoulders and drawing up his chin, as if he's just remembered that he's not a kid anymore; that he doesn't need anyone to defend him. He also doesn't even need to be prompted to fill out the next set of boxes, though the truthfulness of his answers remains questionable. "Should I write down my former occupation as 'army conscript,' or will that upset people? Soldier?" Beat. "Thief?" "That," Telavi says, "would be interesting to have on record. Don't you think? And you may write down all three of those if you like. There's room." He'll have seen she's not unflappable, but just now, there's no flapping going on. "You may even specify whether 'thief' applies to your opinion of what you did as a conscript or what you did before, if you like." Dutifully, Rhey writes down all three of these occupation... and then adds a few more: layabout, streetkid, pain-in-the-ass. And in brackets, next to 'thief'? 'According to Rone.' Evidently Telavi can read that scrawl even from her angle, because her smile's positively dazzling. Of course, then she goes and starts poking at the sack on the side... but then a little paw's poking back at her through it, so at least the firelizard must not mind too much. Evidently feeling pretty smug about the answers he's just given (and likely, Telavi's smile), Rhey continues to expound on his past in varying amounts of detail by way of answering further questions. "Why do they make you go and see the healers? I'm not sick." "You don't have to be sick to have a problem they want to know about," Telavi says with the easy authority-- borrowed, probably, but still!-- of someone who's heard that question asked and the question answered before. Oh, she might put a touch of ominousness to it, particularly when she adds, "Or even one you don't know about. But! If you don't have problems, it shouldn't take long, they'll be reassured, and you'll be on your way." If there's any of it that involves noting identifying details that aren't limited to ordinarily visible stats and scars, why, that's something else that's not need-to-know. For that matter, maybe Telavi doesn't even know. "Perhaps they'll tell me I'm not fit to be a Dragonrider," says Rhey, almost too cheerful. He's still writing. Apparently his mother was stolen by traders? Or was that his little sister... he can't seem to keep the names straight. "Maybe! They'll take Rosvelth back-- does he like a nickname, by the way? Are you happy with 'Rhey' too or does it just seem that way? I refuse to call him 'Rossie'-- and pop him up... well, never mind that," Tela says, evidently drawing some boundary for assistant behavior, at least for assistants more junior than I'zech. Still no need to point out those changing names, though whether she tells the story to Quinlys or lets her discover it on her own remains to be seen. 'Rossie' makes Rhey's nose wrinkle, but 'Rhey' clearly makes him happier. "Rhey is fine. He - I don't know. He hasn't said." And Rhey? Rhey hasn't asked, that much is clear. His pen hovers over the page, but he's not rereading what he's written. Instead, "I'm not sick. Or injured. And I don't need new clothes, either. How long do I-- that is, do we-- have to stay here?" "Mmm, you do. You really do. Or will if you don't yet, anyway. Besides, it's one of the few perks," you know, besides having a dragon. Perhaps Tela's poking at the bag isn't enough for her. "You don't want to catch a cold and then get pneumonia and die and have Rosvelth die, I hope. Or what if you have a weak heart that you didn't know about, Rhey? Or lungs, or mobility issues, or who knows what? Just finish the hidework and then you can go." Ingenuous rather than guileless blue eyes smile at the weyrling. "'Mobility issues,'" repeats Rhey, with all the dubiousness a teenage boy can muster. But Tela's words have lit the light at the end of the tunnel, and so those eyes - equally blue, but less smiling - drop back towards the pages. If his hand hovers over the 'occupation' section again, he doesn't actually go so far as to add any further details there; instead, he doggedly moves on. "Do you often torture your firelizard? Isn't that the kind of question healers ask?" It gets a fleeting smile, but no further commentary; his actual questions, though, those Telavi will address. "Is that like, 'Have you stopped beating your weyrmate?'" She says it so lightly. "No, he likes it. He's not so dumb he wouldn't go between if he didn't." Indeed, when she stops, there's an importunate nudge back from within, and Tela's not so mature that she won't lift an eyebrow at Rhey: see? And while she's at it, just as cheekily, "They might. If you don't survive it, be sure to let me know." 'Weyrmate' seems to make Rhey uncomfortable, somehow, though it's difficult to really place how: it's not that he stiffens, or that his expression changes dramatically, or that he stops writing. He's just... uncomfortable. He doesn't so much as smile at that lifted eyebrow, though, after a breath, he's able to part his lips into something of a smile and go: "Right. Ha. Maybe I'll haunt your dreams, or something. Can I go now?" Telavi's caught the scent of something interesting, her mouth pursing briefly; but he's a kid, so not only does she not follow up, "Maybe you will," contains not an ounce of concern. She doesn't look down at the sack whose mouth she's started to reopen. "You can give me those back now. And... maybe you heard," but in case he hasn't, "Get sleep while you can. Exams are coming, running and all that are going to start ramping up, and you'll be busy. All right?." The firelizard doesn't emerge from his sack, or at least not more than a bit of tail. And for no real apparent reason, "Say hello to Rosvelth for me." Rhey caps the fountain pen, and sets it down very precisely in the middle of the page in front of him, as if to broadcast the fact that he hasn't stolen it - hasn't even considered stealing it, maybe. He stands, taking that piece of candy as he does, and says, "I'll keep that in mind." Rosvelth may have to find his own hellos. But would he take back the pages, if he could? Telavi doesn't snatch any of them back, just sits there, half-lounged. The hard candy's not a large one, but it's prettily twisted, the orange stripes proving sweeter than the tangier yellow should anyone eventually eat it. The pages? They're worthless - they don't even get so much as a backwards glance. It may, in fact, be that Rhey's mother wasn't beaten half to death by Rone in front of young Rhey. Or stolen by traders. Or... Chances are someone will eat the candy, though for now it simply gets tucked into a pocket as he strides away. Let the healers collect real answers; as for certain weyrlingmaster's assistants, and possibly even Quinlys herself, whoever else overlaps with late shift can share an entertaining read. |
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