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Lady Siren's weyr

As the daughter of Lady Holder Mirage and strangely telepathic dragonrider E'tan, Siren has always been pulled in several directions at once. Her upbringing? Very private and well-educated, among the Holders at Paveh. Her father has rarely seen her, but his mental voice often touched her as a young child. However, when she grew older, his voice turned a bit odd and she knew that something was brewing with his camp. Though he is still a trusted member of the Protectorate, in fact a very close friend of Shard's, there are many others who believe that Siren's father E'tan is a danger to the world at large, or at least to certain portions of it. What that danger is, or how it may manifest itself, is something that Siren herself wants to know. But she will not endanger herself unduly to get at any information. Tall and pale, her skin does not burn in the sun, though it does not ever seem to tan. Her rich ebony-wood hair is usually styled simply, and her vibrant blue-violet eyes are careful and observant. Her face is a mask, rarely betraying anything but contempt for things around her, but in her heart, she has the best good for Pern in her. At 17 turns, younger than her other, Impressed, half-siblings by more than three turns, Siren has had a rather private life with her mother, and she cherishes it.

"Mother, do you think this color is right?" Siren asked. Mirage turned away from her embroidery and blinked at her younger daughter. The pottery she was glazing was nicely done (of course, everything her hands touched had to be nicely done!) and the colors which Siren held up in her smirched hands would look quite striking together, once burned on in a kiln. "I think they will work," Mirage said. The full, pleasant lips of her daugher moved into a rare smile, and both went back to work. The pottery which Siren was becoming known for would be fired later in the day, at least some of the pieces. These pots would have to sit for a while, letting the glaze turn in the air and dry, before being fired. The clever way that they had to stay out in the air 'just so long' would make the glaze deep, cracking on the inner portion and still solid and smooth on the outside. An innovation which the glazers and clay-crafters of the area had complimented the young girl on. Siren finally finished, and was careful when she wiped her brow not to get too much clay and glaze on her forehead. She was almost literally covered in clay from head to foot already, and Mirage always admired that in her last daughter. She was not afraid to get dirty, this tall healthy girl. That would come in particularly handy, if Mirage's instincts were right. Her father was a dragonrider by choice, not by accident, after all. Mirage knew things about her daughter -- and her daughter's father -- which no one suspected. She kept them to herself, and she did not betray E'tan's knowledge. Nor did she agree with him, necessarily, but she knew what he wanted, and she agreed at least that their daughter would be important either way, in the end. To oppose him, or to join forces with him. Mirage sighed, as the fair-skinned girl bathed herself and squeezed the water out of her hair the way one would squeeze a wet shirt. "Don't you dare fling your hair up young lady!" Mirage said, before her daughter could do just that and possibly ruin her embroidery. "Well, mother, working on a pristine piece of white cloth in a potters den is hardly a wise choice of venue..." Siren said, with a chuckle and a grin on her face. "I won't. But I'll drip all over you and your embroidery if you don't put it down!" Mirage laughed and did as her child bid. It was never difficult to see what Siren wanted, at least for Mirage, but then they often shared exactly the same mask of a face, during a gather or dance, or meeting. With her precious banner now placed aside in a bag, Mirage rose and went to her wet daughter's side. "Yes, my dearest?" Mirage said, and Siren waggled her eyebrows. "I've made something for you. I think you will like it." She presented her mother with a fine piece of pottery, glazed deeply brown-red, which looked a little like a beetle. It was rounded on the top, and had holes into the interior, and the top came off to reveal room to put thread and needles. The six little feet on it were stable, it was a masterful work. "All it really needs," Siren commented as her mother put it away happily, "is a metal clasp. I'm no good at putting things like that onto my work, you know. So you're going to have to find someone to do it for you." "I think I can do that," Mirage said, and picked up her bag. "Come now, there is a runner race going to happen and I want to see it." "You know that I would rather stay away from the smelly beasts," Siren turned up her nose, but followed Mirage anyway. "You would think that you're Kalkin's daughter with that attitude," Mirage chuckled. "Now, stay with me here. I've placed marks on that white runner, and I want to make sure that I don't lose too much..." *** Two sevendays later, when the glazed pots were finished and the kiln in use for other students, Siren unveiled her works for sale, at a gather. Paveh hold was busy, the season for runner races was well underway and there were many visitors from the neighboring cotholds who came to lose their hard-earned marks on those races. Three of her bowls and five small mugs had already sold, and Siren was well into her bartering-mode. She was pleased both with her work, and her salesmanship. She was able to wheedle a good price, while not getting a reputation for being too much of a mark-lover. That, and her work was actually of a caliber that the Journeymen from the pottercraft nearby were having trouble keeping up with her, made her grin even wider. She wasn't even an apprentice, in the craft. They knew it, she'd never been shown, she was just a natural. It made some of the students seethe with jealousy. Their Master was out at the moment, getting ready to lose more money at the races. So one of the boys who had been apprenticed for more than six turns and never had the results of this girl's natural talent, came around the back of her stall. Quietly, he slipped under the cloth backing, and looked around in the dim ante-chamber of wares. Out front, there was a thinner cloth between the table and the wares, where Siren stood and chattered with yet another high-paying customer. With disgust, the boy took a moment to reflect. Which direction to swing? How many of those flying shards would hurt him in the process? He no longer cared. When he did start swinging, was right when the cheering of the crowd nearby grew to a huge pitch. The shattering wares, the thudding of the wooden bar into the support beams of the tent, they were hardly noticed among the cheers of the crowd. *** "You were lucky you weren't badly hurt when the tent came down," Kalkin said, tending to his love's daughter. The elder man had put just enough numbweed on the girl's wound to keep her from wincing, when he applied the stitches to her forehead. A long but shallow gash along her hairline had been caused, when the tent collapsed. Her immediate reaction to duck was coupled with the flying pottery on the table before her, and ... Tears rolled down her face, but they were hot, angry tears. "I can't believe their Master won't even chastise them. I KNOW who did it, and I KNOW they're going to go home gloating!" Siren grimaced, and Kalkin looked at her with a crooked eyebrow. She relaxed her face again, a very good patient. "But what can I do?" She sighed. "I don't want to have to start accusing them... They'll all stand together. I mean, if I had done something like that to someone, I'd band together and lie..." "I know," Kalkin muttered, "believe me, I know..." He finished the stitching, and applied another thin coating of numbweed, as well as a paste for disinfection, before putting a loose bandage over her head. She'd want to put a more fashionable hat over it, probably. To Kalkin's surprise, she did not. She looked at the older man, with serious, steady eyes. "What would you do then, if you were me?" His raven eyebrows shot up into arcs, and he blinked. She knew very well what he might do... What he had done often enough, and what he was capable of... "My dear, you could just continue to produce better work than they, and make sure not to sell it near their booth..." He recommended, softly. But he saw the fire behind her eyes. ... Eyes so like Mirage's... And yet so filled with E'tan... He knew the blond man, her sire, well enough that he also knew that he'd be treating her wounds if she DID what he thought she might. "You could get into more trouble than it would be worth, Siren," Kalkin said, holding his strong, long hand over her shoulder. "Let them be. They are jealous -- and they have good reason, in case you had not noticed." With that said, a smile crept back over her features. "You're right, uncle Kalkin, you're right..." She put her warm arms around him, and he so wished that she wouldn't call him that... *** The second day of the gather was better than the first, at least for Paveh Hold. For the runners were in full swing, and the tithes they collected for the Protectorate were paid in this sevenday among all the weeks of the year. Wines from around the South came and went, jerky and smoked fish were traded from the coast and far inland, sons and daughters of Lordlings were introduced and paired off too young to know better... And Siren sat with her mother, blandly watching a runner race. She did not quite detest the animals, but they were smelly and sweaty and messy. Not that she didn't mind getting dirty with her pottery of course, but... They were just... Icky! All that hair and spittle! Kalkin shared her view, as well as the high seats with Siren and her mother. He tapped Siren's shoulder from around Mirage's back, and leaned his head around to nod a little, indicating something beyond the bleachers. There walking around was a potter-boy, trying to sell his wares to the crowd. "A mark for two mugs! Fillem with cold wine! Fillem with water! Mark for two mugs!" Kalkin blinked without much further expression on his long, lined face, and Siren's eyes narrowed into slits, with a slightly demonic smirk upon her lips. She vanished from the booth, where the shade protected the higher ranking lords and ladies' skin from the harsh sun. Creeping around, behind the bleachers, Siren reached the area she'd seen the boy walking. She was not sure if he was the one who had ruined her stall and all her wares, but ... he was selling the same exact kinds of mugs and bowls which the rival booth had, and that was enough evidence for her. She waited just in the shadow of the crowd. Someone nearby was arguing that a mark for two of these 'inferior' mugs was far too much, that more like five of them might make up for it... And all the man did when the mugs came crashing down onto the metal and stone bleacher stands as the boy tripped up, was laugh... Siren snuck back around the bleachers, smiling to herself. She could contain most of her slightly uncalled-for pleasure, but not all of it. "That was hardly necessary," said a man, "But you certainly seemed to enjoy it." Gasping, Siren looked to see a tall rider, full in gear, standing with his arms crossed before his chest. He was a young, rather cute man, with a lock of hair dangling over one blue eye and a smirk on his face. Siren immediately sized him up and decided she liked him, just in general. He'd have to prove himself useful, to get anywhere more than that! "Would you care to join me at the pastry and wine tent? I hear they're serving some new berry wines from Ablan, and that would surely scare away the parching in my throat..." He said, and Siren nodded. So he knew his charm... That was a bonus! She allowed him to flirt, learning his name, K'lon, and that he rode a blue dragon. Siren smiled at him over a chilled mug of Ablan's good cherry wine, while he tried out their new berry-cherry concoction. They shared a small pie, as well, and Siren wondered absently if the people in Ablan Hold ever got tired of using cherry for darn near everything... The wood, the pies, the wine, the bread... everything had cherries in it! "So, my dragon would like to meet you," K'lon said, abruptly. Siren nearly choked, and K'lon offered her a napkin and a small sip of wine. "Why would that be, K'lon?" Siren choked out. "Because I'm here on search, and I think you're going to make a great candidate for Reunjriti Weyr's fist clutch." Siren bit her lip, and stared at the man. She blinked, and then... Her eyebrows went up slowly. "Reeeeaaaly..." She said, and took another long drink. Moments after meeting the cheerful talkative blue Dansenth, Siren knew that he wasn't fooling. He was serious. She was Searched! "I... shall have to go tell my mother then... That I'm off to ... Where? Reunjriti... Where IS that? I've never even heard of it..." She wandered away as K'lon chuckled with his dragon joining in.

Siren waited quite a while, as she was one of the first candidates on the sands at this weyr. But at last, when the time came, she watched as a beautiful grassy-green snout poked from its egg. I am Servoth, and you are meant for me! With a gasp of delight, and a sweeping mental image from the dragon, Siren embraced her bond.

"I knew you'd come to me, I'll show you the world!" Siren laughed. The sleepy, hungry dragonet looked up at Siren with whirling blue-green eyes. I see many things through your mind already. Where are we? Who is that man? And why do I want to ask you to scratch me? Laughing still, and scrubbing with her strong fingers, Siren explained what she could, until the dragonet slept.

Though the other dragons from the clutch didn't seem to notice, and most of them were all right, it seemed apparent to Siren that something was very wrong with her bond. She was getting no bigger, and did not seem to want to mature. It was when she stopped eating that Siren demanded to go to the dragon's infirmary - only to find that Reunjriti's grasp on its weyrhood had vanished. With trembling hands, Siren tried scratching the last itch that Servoth expressed... Her skin had long since gone stiff and dark, some of it had even blackened. Siren knew that her dragon was going to die. But... she was a strong young woman. It had been months since their bonding, and it never quite seemed as right as she thought it should. She'd been so excited to stand, but then, this... Her heart broke when Servoth exhaled a long, slow breath and did not take another. There were no other dragon young, and ... it was going to be a long long trek home. What happens next?