written for @Spring_Renewal
May. 5th, 2024 01:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chanter1944I'll edit, if I need to, when the glass or so of wine is out of my system. Then I'll link to the relevant comm. Fic begun a few days ago but finished in an enormous splurt of choruster-biased scribbling tonight. All related imagery is probably obvious. Credit for the dragon's name in here goes entirely to either Neil Young, or to that man's parents, or both. Take your pick.
ETA: A few edits made, mainly to avoid word duplication.
a High Reaches lad at Igen Weyr, Ninth Pass Turn 11
He has twenty and four Turns and a handful of months when he asks one of his agemates, by now three Turns and more lifemate to a steady blue on the larger end of that color's spectrum, to ferry him from home without spreading the details far and wide. Yes, High Reaches Weyr is his home, in this time or any other, but Igen Weyr has a clutch on the sands now, thirty healthy eggs at least two sevendays out from hatching, and a last chance is likely exactly that. It's Turn 11 of the Ninth Pass, and all he can do is ask.
His bronzerider sire and his brownrider grandfather, his brownrider uncle and his single cousin, six months out of the weyrling barracks now with a bronze as pale as the other in the immediate family is dark, might still lay their expectations on him, but Igen Weyr is far away - from the looming memories of dead T'kul and fled Merika and dragonless Kylara, farther than he's ever gotten at a stretch before, and call him silly, call him ridiculous, call him a featherheaded fool but the weight of those best ideas he's had driven into his skin might just be a little less in the desert. He'll take it. For a last likely chance, he'll take it. He'll grab it with both hands.
He doesn't do anything like cry when Weyrwoman Nadira and Weyrleader G'narish agree to his candidacy. Not a bit, he doesn't. His eyes sting, dry, on his refusal to blink, until he's got an inocuous stretch of bare wall to take his gaze. It's only then that he lets his eyelids flutter. His vision dazzles, sandy; his shoulders square. He's on his own, he is, now, in this desert place that's leagues and wingbeats and ages from home, out of the shadow of T'kul's strictures and his bones and his ideas, and his father and grandfather's ideas, and the lineage beyond them that's looming over his shoulder and painting his back with copper and Cromcoal and brass and dammit, he's got one chance left. He's going to take it. He's on his own, now. He'll make the most of it or hate himself for not trying.
He meets every green's eyes, come hatching day, that he can. Some don't get near enough for it to be realistic - two about dash for their chosen boys on the other side of the white-robed circle before he can even turn his head, and one's clever and stealthy enough to almost circumnavigate the entire grounds before he sees her, and by then she's a full quarter turn off his right shoulder and Impressing to a lad near on his own age, but Igen born, Igen raised, and pasttime to nowtime like himself - but each green he can, he tries for. Honest, he is, frank. Not brazen, in that way, despite the bronzes who get equal treatment as they go by, a one, and a two, and a violet-eyed third who nearly clips him with a wingtip as he rushes past, jubilant, to find another local fellow beyond him - and the browns, four in a rich mud and healthy sandy rush and a fifth on his own, an indeterminate, dizzy span later, who draw the same potential welcome - not brazen, not one bit, simply plain. He's quiet about it, but the truth is obvious on his face from the moment the first shell fissures with hairline cracks, two ragged breaths from spilling a blue to the cavern floor and making a transplanted Istan a weyrling after seven of that hopeful's own failed, bluntly admitted and bruise purple in the sound, candidacies at home. This time, this time, he will not discriminate. He will rule no one out.
He looks toward that first blue, too. Not that the blue looks back; he's got his chosen in his sights from the moment he stands up, and it's radiantly obvious. Still, he makes the effort, tries to meet hatchlings halfway. He will reject no one. Call him frantic, or foolish, or truthful, but today he refuses, finally, to lie in his thinking; no dragon is lesser, and today he'll admit it. His father is like as not swearing at him from the ledges for his desperation, his folly, and his grandfather's probably in counterpoint, with the rest of the men in his family providing backing laughter and descant curses but he can't hear them, the sands are so far away from the tiers and what's more, the desert sky is making him bold, is making him honest, a balance to the Igen Weyrleaders' own twofold welcome harmony and why the Harper terms are rising in him now, spilling out of his memory, he doesn't know and doesn't mind, because one blue is dashing past him and crashing into the fellow to his immediate right, pale golden sand hair to his shoulders and joy on his face, bloodless, blazing harmless and bright and brilliant, and one green is glancing at him, brief and assessing and faintly apologetic before she all but bowls over the nobble-kneed pipsqueak down the row to his left and transforms him into a grinning young person with a purpose, black bangs scattering all over his face in a way his dad would call unflattering and his grandfather would advise to wipe away with a sleeve before the Holders or the girls see but that to him looks like triumph, unapologetic and rough and right, and a sixth brown is staggering, tail swinging until he steadies, straight into the third son of cotholder Tanners from Igen's own territory and a fourth, dark bronze like congealed blood on a dueling ground is sniffing his shins, flickering his eyelids and snorting him out of contention so he can turn a dark-skinned failed Smith apprentice's snarl into a dropped jaw of amazement and isn't that right, isn't that proof enough he's tried, he didn't look away and a blue is reeling past him to the kindly Igen Weyr cook's son down the line, a boy kind like his mother, like the greenrider that lad remembers, lost ten Turns ago now but fondly kept in hearthside stories of recollection, kept in half a name, kept in pride and another blue is, a blue is, a blue.
A blue is saturated, light-rich, shining bright as anything he's ever seen and true as summer music in his ears, a blue is knocking him to the sand with a look, a blue is welcoming him, candid, sear like the heights of the skies in this weyr he barely knows, storm washed clean, pale and heated and as bold as innocence not brushed aside, dazzling, accepted, celebrated, a blue is nuzzling him, gentle and soft to his skin, first bare and then broad, ever-silk hide's contact against the whiskery stubble he'll apologize for, unnecessarily, later, a blue is wanting him, choosing him, selecting him, unwavering and deliberate and intelligent and free, a blue is destroying his family's expectations with one look, blowing them high as the sand-scoured sky, as the vaulted Igen hatching ground's ceiling, with a moment's glance and an intention; a blue is Neyith, Neyith, a blue is Neyith, forever, bright as a rest day's morning of stories, a blue is Neyith, tears on his cheeks like a welcome storm, a blue is "Neyith! Neyith!"
His father can and may well curse him later, shame him for his weakness, express his disappointment, wave his own wishes in his face but he won't care, Neyith's rider, he won't care. He won't be listening, Neyith's rider. He won't give a solitary damn, won't have room for a single sniff of his grandsire's dismay, his cousin's superiority tinged with either pity or bewildered understanding or both at once, and when his uncle's wobbling tries for brusque commiseration land, they've got the cushion of a life bond to steady them, to warm them. Neyith's rider, he's under the desert sky, and he's left poor dead foolish T'kul's cinch straps and posture corrections behind him, he has, his whip lashes, his part segregations, his vocal biases, his forced weak tenors, his half-drowned mountain baritones gasping for air and dragging on coral shoals, his bobbling basses, his failing highs, his and ever-present, ever-remembered, sour Merika's ruined breaths, their lasses ringing on the edge of alto and striving for audibility, their, her, sopranos pinging off sharp notes to the starboard side of welcome, their, her, warm seconds doused to chill in kitchen sink dregs and wrung laundry drizzles spattering on the floor - Neyith's rider, he's left it all. He loves his family, of course he does, but he's gone from the old Reaches in one, he has, and he's taken his resonance to the desert with him. Neyith's rider, he's fled for the lowlands, the storm's aftermath, the ozone of clear air, the sharp stops and the candor - Neyith's rider, blue Neyith's rider, he's leapt for Igen's welcome and caught hold and launched, he has, for quietly unbiased space. Neyith's rider, he had everything to find, this once, and so he has; Neyith's rider, he's alive.
ETA: A few edits made, mainly to avoid word duplication.
a High Reaches lad at Igen Weyr, Ninth Pass Turn 11
He has twenty and four Turns and a handful of months when he asks one of his agemates, by now three Turns and more lifemate to a steady blue on the larger end of that color's spectrum, to ferry him from home without spreading the details far and wide. Yes, High Reaches Weyr is his home, in this time or any other, but Igen Weyr has a clutch on the sands now, thirty healthy eggs at least two sevendays out from hatching, and a last chance is likely exactly that. It's Turn 11 of the Ninth Pass, and all he can do is ask.
His bronzerider sire and his brownrider grandfather, his brownrider uncle and his single cousin, six months out of the weyrling barracks now with a bronze as pale as the other in the immediate family is dark, might still lay their expectations on him, but Igen Weyr is far away - from the looming memories of dead T'kul and fled Merika and dragonless Kylara, farther than he's ever gotten at a stretch before, and call him silly, call him ridiculous, call him a featherheaded fool but the weight of those best ideas he's had driven into his skin might just be a little less in the desert. He'll take it. For a last likely chance, he'll take it. He'll grab it with both hands.
He doesn't do anything like cry when Weyrwoman Nadira and Weyrleader G'narish agree to his candidacy. Not a bit, he doesn't. His eyes sting, dry, on his refusal to blink, until he's got an inocuous stretch of bare wall to take his gaze. It's only then that he lets his eyelids flutter. His vision dazzles, sandy; his shoulders square. He's on his own, he is, now, in this desert place that's leagues and wingbeats and ages from home, out of the shadow of T'kul's strictures and his bones and his ideas, and his father and grandfather's ideas, and the lineage beyond them that's looming over his shoulder and painting his back with copper and Cromcoal and brass and dammit, he's got one chance left. He's going to take it. He's on his own, now. He'll make the most of it or hate himself for not trying.
He meets every green's eyes, come hatching day, that he can. Some don't get near enough for it to be realistic - two about dash for their chosen boys on the other side of the white-robed circle before he can even turn his head, and one's clever and stealthy enough to almost circumnavigate the entire grounds before he sees her, and by then she's a full quarter turn off his right shoulder and Impressing to a lad near on his own age, but Igen born, Igen raised, and pasttime to nowtime like himself - but each green he can, he tries for. Honest, he is, frank. Not brazen, in that way, despite the bronzes who get equal treatment as they go by, a one, and a two, and a violet-eyed third who nearly clips him with a wingtip as he rushes past, jubilant, to find another local fellow beyond him - and the browns, four in a rich mud and healthy sandy rush and a fifth on his own, an indeterminate, dizzy span later, who draw the same potential welcome - not brazen, not one bit, simply plain. He's quiet about it, but the truth is obvious on his face from the moment the first shell fissures with hairline cracks, two ragged breaths from spilling a blue to the cavern floor and making a transplanted Istan a weyrling after seven of that hopeful's own failed, bluntly admitted and bruise purple in the sound, candidacies at home. This time, this time, he will not discriminate. He will rule no one out.
He looks toward that first blue, too. Not that the blue looks back; he's got his chosen in his sights from the moment he stands up, and it's radiantly obvious. Still, he makes the effort, tries to meet hatchlings halfway. He will reject no one. Call him frantic, or foolish, or truthful, but today he refuses, finally, to lie in his thinking; no dragon is lesser, and today he'll admit it. His father is like as not swearing at him from the ledges for his desperation, his folly, and his grandfather's probably in counterpoint, with the rest of the men in his family providing backing laughter and descant curses but he can't hear them, the sands are so far away from the tiers and what's more, the desert sky is making him bold, is making him honest, a balance to the Igen Weyrleaders' own twofold welcome harmony and why the Harper terms are rising in him now, spilling out of his memory, he doesn't know and doesn't mind, because one blue is dashing past him and crashing into the fellow to his immediate right, pale golden sand hair to his shoulders and joy on his face, bloodless, blazing harmless and bright and brilliant, and one green is glancing at him, brief and assessing and faintly apologetic before she all but bowls over the nobble-kneed pipsqueak down the row to his left and transforms him into a grinning young person with a purpose, black bangs scattering all over his face in a way his dad would call unflattering and his grandfather would advise to wipe away with a sleeve before the Holders or the girls see but that to him looks like triumph, unapologetic and rough and right, and a sixth brown is staggering, tail swinging until he steadies, straight into the third son of cotholder Tanners from Igen's own territory and a fourth, dark bronze like congealed blood on a dueling ground is sniffing his shins, flickering his eyelids and snorting him out of contention so he can turn a dark-skinned failed Smith apprentice's snarl into a dropped jaw of amazement and isn't that right, isn't that proof enough he's tried, he didn't look away and a blue is reeling past him to the kindly Igen Weyr cook's son down the line, a boy kind like his mother, like the greenrider that lad remembers, lost ten Turns ago now but fondly kept in hearthside stories of recollection, kept in half a name, kept in pride and another blue is, a blue is, a blue.
A blue is saturated, light-rich, shining bright as anything he's ever seen and true as summer music in his ears, a blue is knocking him to the sand with a look, a blue is welcoming him, candid, sear like the heights of the skies in this weyr he barely knows, storm washed clean, pale and heated and as bold as innocence not brushed aside, dazzling, accepted, celebrated, a blue is nuzzling him, gentle and soft to his skin, first bare and then broad, ever-silk hide's contact against the whiskery stubble he'll apologize for, unnecessarily, later, a blue is wanting him, choosing him, selecting him, unwavering and deliberate and intelligent and free, a blue is destroying his family's expectations with one look, blowing them high as the sand-scoured sky, as the vaulted Igen hatching ground's ceiling, with a moment's glance and an intention; a blue is Neyith, Neyith, a blue is Neyith, forever, bright as a rest day's morning of stories, a blue is Neyith, tears on his cheeks like a welcome storm, a blue is "Neyith! Neyith!"
His father can and may well curse him later, shame him for his weakness, express his disappointment, wave his own wishes in his face but he won't care, Neyith's rider, he won't care. He won't be listening, Neyith's rider. He won't give a solitary damn, won't have room for a single sniff of his grandsire's dismay, his cousin's superiority tinged with either pity or bewildered understanding or both at once, and when his uncle's wobbling tries for brusque commiseration land, they've got the cushion of a life bond to steady them, to warm them. Neyith's rider, he's under the desert sky, and he's left poor dead foolish T'kul's cinch straps and posture corrections behind him, he has, his whip lashes, his part segregations, his vocal biases, his forced weak tenors, his half-drowned mountain baritones gasping for air and dragging on coral shoals, his bobbling basses, his failing highs, his and ever-present, ever-remembered, sour Merika's ruined breaths, their lasses ringing on the edge of alto and striving for audibility, their, her, sopranos pinging off sharp notes to the starboard side of welcome, their, her, warm seconds doused to chill in kitchen sink dregs and wrung laundry drizzles spattering on the floor - Neyith's rider, he's left it all. He loves his family, of course he does, but he's gone from the old Reaches in one, he has, and he's taken his resonance to the desert with him. Neyith's rider, he's fled for the lowlands, the storm's aftermath, the ozone of clear air, the sharp stops and the candor - Neyith's rider, blue Neyith's rider, he's leapt for Igen's welcome and caught hold and launched, he has, for quietly unbiased space. Neyith's rider, he had everything to find, this once, and so he has; Neyith's rider, he's alive.
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Date: 2024-05-05 10:31 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2024-05-14 04:38 am (UTC)(I want to say that you've caught the feel of a Hatching as well as I've ever seen it written -- nevermind that neither of us nor anyone else have ever been to one! At least -- not in this particular dimension, we haven't. Elsewhere, who knows?)