====July 26th, 2013
====Kyara, Zannen, Liareth
====A follow up to Differences. Kyara takes Liareth's find to her brother for discussion. It isn't exactly pretty.

Who Kyara, Zannen, Liareth
What A follow up to Differences. Kyara takes Liareth's find to her brother for discussion. It isn't exactly pretty.
When There is 1 turn 8 months and 2 days until the 12th pass. (Backdated)
Where Central Bowl, Igen Weyr

Central Bowl
Cradled, childlike, in an easterly mountainous embrace, the steppes of the central bowl nestle cozily between lake and weyr. The latticework of dusty adobe paths spider out from the southerly Weyr Road, the wagon-ruts of which curve lazily to the northeastern bazaar, the adobe sprawl of the New Weyr reflected in the lake that dominates a large portion of outdoor Igen. A small footpath, just as abused, ambles away from the shores, travelling over rock and hill to the northern dragonet complex and branching itself due west to end at the entrance of the blessedly cool inner caverns. One cracked path, faint with disuse, leads southeast to the crumbling ruins of Igen-that-was. All around, the dizzying heights of the caldera's sharp-sloped sides are pocked here and there with ledges, the weyrs' draconic occupants needing no path to guide their way.


Yet another cloudy day, and yet another opportunity to wander taken. Kyara waits at the edge of the Bazaar for the lanky, sandy-haired boy that is her brother to emerge from the milling shoppers. Sitting close at hand is Liareth who, as usual, has plenty of commentary to offer concerning the passersby, smells wafting from the stalls, various firelizards perched above. One facepalm from her lifemate is enough to indicate how well their talks about tact have been going.

Finally, Zannen shuffles out from the crowd - bearing food. Grinning, he hands his sister half a small loaf of stuffed bread, which she accepts with glee. “Oh Faranth, I love you,” comes tumbling out before it’s shored up with a large piece of the stuff, and she chews silently for a bit as they turn and start for the Bowl. She’s really looking forward to finding a moment to go through the Bazaar by herself again.

“Hi, Liareth! How goes it?” Zannen greets his sister’s green, offering forth his hand. Yes, he did make it to the Hatching (despite Kyara not really noticing), and he’s had a few opportunities to be around her dragon, even helping to bathe her once.

Lia is quite aware of Kyara’s fondness for her little brother, and consequentially she likes the boy as well. She whuffles in his hand happily, then stops with a puff of finality into his palm, looking up at her lifemate.

« He smells like what I found in the Lake earlier! That would explain a few things. »

» Exactly, love! «

« Well, show it to him! The sooner you have your answers, the better. You’ve been far too troubled over this. »

» I’m getting to it. I’m not done eating yet. «

The trio ambles onward as Zannen talks about his latest adventures as a stowaway at Igen Weyr. He’s stopped wearing his knot, but he’s been down at the river by Igen Hold frequently, offering an extra hand to the fishermen and boat builders as needed. “I hear there’s a Dolphineer wandering around here somewhere,” he adds around a mouthful of meat, “but damned if I’ve met someone who knows who it is. Besides, I doubt the beasties ever come upstream. It’s pretty swampy out there; you seen it?” Kyara shakes her head, her mouth too full to answer at the moment. “Anyway, it looks like a nice ride out in the middle. We should get a boat out there sometime.”

She swallows, washing her meal down with some water before chuckling a bit. “I’ll be having too much fun in the air by the time we’ve got a moment for it,” she answers, rubbing fondly at Liareth’s eye ridges. That time can’t come soon enough - for either of them, it seems. “But once we’re settled in as full riders…we’ll see.” She looks sideways at her brother, evaluating. Yes, he’s still growing, now a couple of finger-widths taller than her rather than one. And he seems…more restless. “You know,” she observes with a sigh, “you could head down to Southern. Your knot’ll be recognized down there, and there are most definitely Dolphineers for you to keep studying with…”

She trails off as Zannen shakes his head, and he smirks appreciatively at her. “Practicing the craft is just as important on a river as on the ocean, even if I won’t get a chance to be around the dolphins. ‘Sides, if all us Oldtimer crafters run off to Southern, who’ll be around to help change minds up here?” She shrugs at his point; had she not Impressed, she would have chosen to stay on and attempt changing minds, too. “So,” he asks off the tail end of a rather obnoxious burp, “y’ said you needed to talk to me ‘bout something?”

Kyara, with a shake of her head, lands a heavy swat to her brother’s arm, while Liareth utters a light grumble of disdain. Manners? What are those? Boys. Of course, Zan isn’t habitually rude. He’s just around his sister, that’s all. They’re within sight of the Lake now, standing at an innocuous flat point somewhere between the Central and North Bowls. She pulls out the pouch Liareth dug up on the shoreline a few days ago - now dry, and weighty with its original contents. “My curious lady here found that the other morning,” she says, tossing it to him. “Buried in the sand on the southern edge of the Lake. Something to hide, Zan?”

The boy catches it, wide-eyed as he opens it and peeks inside. “Fardling Carenath’s ba- She found this? I’d tossed it out in the middle!” Or so he thought.

“Would’ve been better to toss it in the midden,” Kyara grumbles off the end of a light snort, folding her arms. “Or the river, on one of your trips down. No surprise it ended up somewhere else entirely. Dragons probably riled it up from where it landed, got it hooked on a talon.” She turns away, quiet for a long moment before heaving a laborious sigh. “I knew he passed it off to you. I saw him do it, after he tried to give it to me. Since he knew you were coming, too.”

Zannen rubs his forehead, muttering a few curses under his breath. Here she goes again. “C’mon, Kya. Jerrig cared about you. A lot. I didn’t want him to think you were just gonna forget-”

I have to forget,” she hisses, whirling around to face her brother and coming within a long step of him. “There are things, people, we have to forget because there’s no going back to convince them that coming here, now, is the right thing to do. They made their choice; we made ours. I could have lived the rest of my life without that little reminder-”

“Aw, don’t get all sharding bent outta shape. I’m the one who tried t’ get rid of it so you wouldn’t have to have the reminder,” Zannen snaps back, frustration coloring his cheeks. He was trying to be considerate.

How can one tell when Kyara is well and truly upset with a person she cares about? A rarely heard accent slips past the clean cant of her Harper schooling, making her sound very like her father-the-sailor’s daughter. “Well, if y’ hadn’t brought the sharding thing with you in th’ first place,” she grates, Big Bay clips and rolls just breaking the surface, “we wouldn’ be having this issue now, would we?” Hearing the Bay tones coming through makes her jaw clench, and she tries to rein it in, pulling the schooled voicing back over the old habit.

“You’re bein’ stupid!” Zannen barks at her, throwing up his hands irritably. His volume rises as he continues on, face gradually darkening. “I know what’s gotta be done; I’m not an idiot, Kya! I felt bad for the guy, y’ know? He didn’t want you to forget ‘im, and I figured since you cared for ‘im, too, y’ might want to remember at some point. But I’ve seen how you’ve been trying to distance yourself from the past, so I thought I’d get rid of it once I saw that y’ don’t want to remember, so ‘scuse me for tryin’ to save you the sharding pain!”

It wasn’t even your BUSINESS!

“He made it my business! He didn’t know what else to do!”

“Maybe he should’ve told me-”

HE DID TRY TO TELL YOU!” Zannen punctuates this last by shoving Kyara, breaking their proximity by half an arm-length and eliciting a low growl from an orange-eyed Liareth. “You gonna keep trying to take out your issues with Jerrig on me? Eh? As if I really have anything to do with it?” He spits on the ground, away from where the green is crouched with a mildly thrashing tail. “Faranth, I wish I’d never seen this bloody thing!” he growls, looking as though he might hurl the pouch away again.

Just as Kyara is about to open her mouth to retort (and possibly shove him back; white knuckles indicate the definite chance she might), Liareth is suddenly there, flooding her mind roundabout with heat and tranquil waters devoid of chatter. The green’s mindscape, solidly centered in the comforting realm she reserves solely for her lifemate, is nevertheless bright with firelight dancing over deeply-carved reliefs in an almost chaotic shadow-play - a sign that the mood is anything but calm here. « Kyara, » she intones, her melodic soprano firm and brooking no argument, « you are hardly being fair to him, and you know it.»

» Please leave me alone, Liareth. «

« I will not. » Heat rises slightly again, shadows undulating over stone-bound scenes of stoic, stubborn, strong-willed women standing to speak before unsettled crowds. « Think on his intentions, misplaced though you think they’ve been. Consider the truth of things before you speak again. He has no fault here. This is all a matter of your own heart and mind. I ought to know, shouldn’t I? »

Before she can say anything to either Lia or Zannen, Kyara visibly deflates, tears suddenly springing to her eyes as she realizes her lifemate has the right of it. Of course it’s been all her own issue. She knows that, as much as she tried to deny it. It’s just so much easier to pass it off onto someone else, to try to make it Jerrig’s fault and not hers. And since he isn’t here and Zan is… “You don’t, Zan,” she manages, her voice rasping on the weak side past her tears . “I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair of me.”

“Sharding right, it wasn’t!” Zannen watches his sister’s face, his eyes moving to Liareth as the growing green pads over to sit closer to him. He considers her quietly for a long moment, breathing deeply to calm himself a bit before he realizes Kyara is swiping at tears. He shakes his head (he hates it when girls cry around him, especially his sister), chuffing as he pulls her into a hug. “Maybe you’d better deal with this sooner rather ‘n later? You’re the one who told me stuff that gets you all upset like this isn’t good for her.” He gestures to Lia, who touches her nose briefly to fingers that get close enough for it. Once she steps away, he digs into the pouch and takes out the smooth, black stone. “What exactly is this, anyway?” he questions, running a finger over the symbol on the flat side. “And what’s this mean?”

With a resigned exhalation, Kyara holds out her hand for the stone, letting a crooning Liareth come up under her arm as she flips it over a few times. “Jerrig’s worry stone,” she answers quietly. “He always had it, when we were busy doing nothing. Half of it was worn away on my account, he said. This,” and she runs her thumb over the worn marking, “is a symbol made of the letters of my name. See?” She outlines the components of the mark with a subtle shake of her head. Some might consider this creepy - in a way. But knowing Jerrig for as long as she did, Kyara knows the carving is nowhere near creepy, for him. It was one of the only ways he knew to deal with her being on his mind. One he didn’t explain until that last day. Damn him.

Zannen ponders the stone for a little bit longer, finally snorting. “People in love are so weird,” he mutters, trying to ease the tension. When Kyara looks sharply at him, he jerks his shoulders up to his ears. “What? That’s what he told you, right? That he loved you?” She looks away, but answers with a subtle nod. “Did you love him?” This time, when she looks at him, she's startled, her mouth open slightly as if she caught her automatic answer on the way out. Looking slightly sheepish, he kicks at the sand, his eyes flicking away from hers only briefly. “You never did say one way or the other, so…”

“I…” Kyara considers carefully, as she’s done with this question many times before on her own. Every time, she never seems to find herself closer to an answer. “Yes,” she gets out finally, swallowing past a growing lump in her throat. “Just not the same way he loved me. I loved him as my mentor, my friend, my…protector, sometimes. He loved me…as someone he’d have married. Or so he said.”

“You didn’t believe him?”

“We…” Kyara’s eyes become pained, shining with tears again. “What was I supposed to think, him telling me that well after I’d made my decision to jump forward? I just…ended up feeling like he was only saying it to try getting me to stay, to change my mind. I was confused, I was conflicted.” She glances up at him through her eyelashes, keeping her face down so as not to be seen crying. “He tried to kiss me, you know.”

Zannen screws up his face. Who wants to picture their sister kissing anyone? This whole being in love thing (or whatever it is) is really just beyond him… Relenting after the look she gives him, he asks, “So why didn’t you let him?”

“What would it have meant, Zan?”

“I don’t know! Faranth…” He scrubs at his hair, wondering once again at how much girls seem to load meaning into something he just finds fun. The few times he’s had the opportunity, that is. “Maybe it would’ve changed his mind so that he would’ve come with you?”

“I doubt it,” she chuckles humorlessly. “Like I said, I’d made my choice by then, and he’d made his. It…it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“If you believe that, why does it bother you so damn much?”

Kyara throws up her hands, decidedly spent on the matter. It really is time to let this go. For good. “Maybe because I wanted to be kissed, and I didn’t let myself. Most people have been by the time they’re my age.” She eyes him knowingly - yes, Zan, she’s aware she’s well behind her little brother in this particular area. “Maybe it was because I was afraid to come forward and wanted to be convinced to stay somehow. And yet I didn’t let it happen…because I felt it was more important to come here, and I didn’t want to risk getting attached.” Yeah. She’ll go with that last one, even though there’s a sliver of truth to the former.

“So…do you regret jumping forward?” Zan ventures cautiously.

Kyara shakes her head. True, she misses the rest of her family, and there have been things about coming forward that have been highly infuriating… but would she have had the chance to Impress, had she not taken this journey? She came to help as a Harper. Now she has a chance to help - and to meet an ancient threat head-on to protect people - as a dragonrider. “Not at all,” she replies confidently. “Do you?”

“Nope,” is his simple, smiled reply. He hasn’t had the best time of things either…but damned if he hasn’t been on an adventure so far! “So that’s settled then. And I say, either read the letter in that tube, or don’t, but whatever you do, get those things gone as soon as you can. We’re movin’ on, Kya. You can’t think like a crafter or holder anymore when it comes to guys, anyway, right? Being a rider now and all. You’re going to tell me no one’s caught your eye since coming here?”

She smirks up at him, the faintest glint of amusement - and acknowledgement - in her eyes. No use lying, on that front. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

“Uh-huh. See?” he laughs, clapping her on the shoulder as they begin a slow walk northward. “It’s not as much a problem as you’re letting it be, then. Time to move on. Focus more on the pretty bronze riders.”

Giggling, Kyara gives Zannen a good whack. For all his joking and not “getting it” because he’s younger than her, she’s surprised at the wisdom her little brother can spout off from time to time. Then again, she shouldn’t be. They’re definite products of their parents, these two.

« Well, now that we have that mostly dealt with… » The firelight surrounding Liareth’s quiet pools has dimmed considerably, replaced by easy, inspiriting humidity and the soothing crackle of raised wall sconces below a twilight sky, faint fingers of steam spiraling upwards. « Are you going to read the letter? »

» Yes, love, I will. Soon. «

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