Search Story of Thazin

Thazin raced up the stairs to his parents weyr, bubbling with barely suppressed joy. He had just come from Talor Cliff, where he had been searched for the odd clutches of the many queens. Pausing outside, his older sister, Mea, came storming out. He flashed a smile at her and burst into the room.

"Pa, they searched me!" He yelled, pleased at the effect it had on his parents. Both turned to stare at him, mouths hanging open and eyes wide with astonishment. Thazin waited for them to congragulate him, tell him what a great thing this was, but they just sat and stared. "Aren't you going to say anything?" Thazin finally asked, shifting from foot to foot uncomfortably.

"Thazin, how on earth did you get searched?" His mother finally demanding, sounding more like the weyrwoman she was than the mother she wanted to be.

"Nora and Mitanth searched me this morning, while I was visiting Tai." Thazin sulked, referring to his other older sister who had been searched eariler in the week.

"But, how?" She asked again, sitting down in her chair and looking at Thazin's father for support.

"How did you get searched." Thazin asked sulkily, knowing that his mother was more referring to his age and stunted growth. At 12, Thazin looked more like a ten year old, but thought like a 16 year old.

"Thazin, we're more worried about you not impressing once you get on the sands. Even if you impressed a white, you would have trouble getting up and down. Your brother didn't get searched till he was 18! You're only 12."

"So?" Thazin demanded. "Maybe I'm supposed to impress a white! Maybe I'm not supposed to impress at all, but I was searched. Why can't you just be happy for me!" He yelled, turning and running from the room as fast as his legs would carry him. He went onto the sands, which held a small green clutch, and sat down, watching the sun play along the hardening edges of the eggs.

The mother, a rather large green, watched him closely for the first while, but after he didn't move she settled down to rearranging the eggs.

"Would you search me?" Thazin asked the green, knowing he wouldn't get a response. But the green turned from her eggs and looked hard at Thazin, her eyes whirling slowly as she studied him. Thazin leaned foward, almost expecting to hear her voice, but nothing came. That's why after he leaned back and someone spoke behind him, he jumped up in the air and looked down at his feet, abashed.

"She says you would make a good rider, but she wouldn't search you for this clutch. You don't....match any of the eggs."

Thazin looked up into the smiling eyes of the green rider. She tossled his hair before turning to her green and cooing about how good she was looking and how she was doing so wonderfully. Thazin rolled his eyes as she went on and left the room, wandering slowly around the halls. A couple of fire lizards flew past his head, and he started sulking again, wondering why he didn't have one.

Plopping down on the step leading to the weyrbowl, Thazin closed his eyes and tried to imagine him and his dragon in some special place where no one could tell them they weren't big enough or strong enough. They would be, big enough and strong enough, and they could tell people what to do then. He could see the soft roll of the hills in front of him, could feel the wind rippling his hair. His dragon was beneath him, and Thazin stroked his strong neck. Their weyr was behind them, and they had the entire lake below to themselves, along with all of the weyrbeasts. As Thazin continued to imagine this scene, he could almost feel a pressure building in his skull, almost like other dragons wanted to see what he was seeing, share with him the happiness and peacefullness of this place. Angrily, Thazin pushed them out of the way and went back to thinking of just him and his dragon, though what colour he couldn't quite make out, unless he....

"Mom and Father are looking for you." A deep voice called, amusement seeming to be the most prominent emotion in the voice. The picture crumbled in Thazin's mind and he opened his eyes to glare at his older brother.

"What do you want, M'zen?" He asked softly, exhaling and looking around for his brother's bronze.

"Yoseth says you made a nice picture in your head and he wants to go there. What were you thinking of that caught my dragon's attention?"

Thazin sat up a little straighter and lifted his chin. "I was searched for Talor Cliff eariler today and I was thinking of what me and my dragon would do once he was full grown." Thazin said, not connecting that Yoseth had seen and he thought that dragons were trying to.

"You were imagining a place?" M'zen asked softly. "Yoseth said it was a real place, Thazin. You better not be lying."

Thazin decided that he didn't want to talk to M'zen anymore, seeing as how he didn't even acknowledge the fact that he had been searched. "No, I wasn't lying, and yes, I was imagining. I have to go in now, so I'll see you later."

"Thazin, I wasn't trying to be curt. Congragulations on bring searched, it's about time! But I'm trying to figure out how you can see a place so clearly and make my dragon want to go when you're only imagining."

"I don't know, M'zen. Mom and Father didn't seem to want me to be searched, so I was thinking of myself and my dragon, a white, I think, cause he'd be small like me, in a place where it wouldn't matter what they thought. I just want to be a dragonrider, M'zen! Like you and Tai, and Mea will be. But everyone says I'm too little or too young. I just want to ride a dragon!" Thazin finished emphathetically, amazed when felt a great deal of eyes on him and M'zen was standing back in alarm.

"What did you just do?" M'zen asked, his eyes glazing over as he talked to his dragon. "Yoseth says that he could feel what you were feeling. What did you do, Thazin?"

"I don't know what I did, M'zen! I don't know what I do half the time that gets me in trouble, but I do it!" Thazin yelled angrily, wondering what all the pressure in his head was. He tried to push it away, but it was like trying to push water away from you when you were in a lake.

"Thazin, calm down! You're scaring half the dragons in the weyr." M'zen said worriedly as dragonriders starting pouring out of doors to get to their distraught dragons.

"I'm sorry, M'zen. I didn't mean to." Thazin said softly as the pressure eased on his mind.

"I know you didn't 'Zin. Hey, what are you doing back here if you were searched?" M'zen asked, glaring down at his little brother. Thazin grinned back up at him.

"I talked to Falora after I was searched, cause I was visiting Tai, and she said I could come get some stuff and then go back."

"So, what did Tai tell you about the clutch?" M'zen asked, lowering his voice and moving closer.

"That they're doing something to the eggs. Like, seven queens layed, so they're letting some people to mess around with them so greens can lay queens and stuff." Thazin said, moving closer and lowering his voice as well.

"So, what happens if the white you impress is the same size as, oh, say, a queen?" M'zen asked, looking around to see if anyone was listening.

"Well, since I don't even know if I'm going to impress, I don't know. But if I do, mine is going to be special, M'zen. I can feel it. Didn't you feel it about Yoseth? That he was going to be special in someway?" Thazin asked, referring to the huge bronze. With a soft rumble, the bronze landed beside them and shook his head. M'zen looked at Thazin carefully and smiled.

"Yoseth says your right. They're doing something and all of the eggs are going to be special, though maybe some more than others."

"You don't think they'll make them all big, do you?" Thazin asked softly, wringing his shirt in his hands and letting his brow crease in worry.

"I don't think so." M'zen said, if only to reassure his small brother. With a pat on his head, M'zen decided that he needed to take Thazin back to Talor Cliff. "Why don't you go get your stuff. Yoseth and I can take you back to Talor Cliff."

Thazin's face broke into a grin and he nodded his head once before racing off to his room. His bare feet thudded along the stone floor and he heard dragons bugling happily. He wondered if they felt as good as he did.

Opening his room, Thazin slid to a stop when he saw his parents sitting on his bed. He swallowed once and looked down, refusing to meet their eyes.

"Thazin, we're very proud of you. Don't get me wrong, but....I don't want you to be disappointed if you don't impress." Thea said softly, wringing a piece of cloth in her hands as she watched her son. Thazin ran his hand through his short blond hair and smiled.

"I don't want you to worry, mom. I'm gonna make you and father proud. Same as M'zen and Tai."

"We don't want you to think you have to impress. Thazin, you're 12! You have so many years ahead of you." M'zin said quietly, placing his hands on his sons shoulders and shaking him gently. "We are proud of you the way you are, and if you don't impress, it won't change the way we feel."

"But I want to impress!" Thazin said fiercely, pulling away. "I was chosen for this clutch for a reason, dad! I'm supposed to be there. I have to be there!"

Silence fell upon the room and Thea and M'zin looked from one another to Thazin. Thea suddenly sat up straighter and her eyes glazed over. With an irritated sniff and a fierce frown, she cleared her throat and looked at her weyrmate. He nodded. Thazin knew that Avianth and Altarath had just spoken to them, but he wasn't sure about what.

"Fine, you can go." Thea said shortly. "It seems that even Avianth and Altarath are insisiting you go, so I suggest you pack so your brother can take you."

Thazin felt his throat close off and he smiled brightly, hugging both his parents fiercely before stuffing some clothes in a bag and rushing off to find Yoseth and M'zen.

"M'zen, M'zen! Avianth and Altarath talked mom and dad into letting me go." Thazin finished breathlessly.

M'zen smiled brightly and shook his head. "Mitanth was here, with Nora. I told them that I wasn't sure if you would be going and Mitanth had a talk with Avianth and Altarath about telling mother and father to let you go. For some reason, they want you pretty bad, little brother."

Thazin grinned as he followed M'zen to Yoseth and scrambled up the huge bronze to sit behind his brother. In the familiar feeling of lift-off and gliding, Thazin silently thanked Avianth and Altarath. Just before they flashed between to drop Thazin off to impress though, Thazin could have sworn that all of the dragons back at the weyr were rooting for him, and that Avianth and Altarath had replied.



Thazin in one of many candidates for the special underground clutch!