The pain had long subsided, but was still so fresh in her mind that sometimes Qenda would wake in the middle of the night, crying out. Her younger siblings would harldy notice, bundled up as they were, but still she felt bad for the noise. It had been six years before, that threadfall, her wounds had healed within months. But still it was hard for her to go out uncovered, always glancing up or trying to cover herself. She knew she wasn't all that pretty, and with the scars too...

She was still only thirteen when she demanded her tattoos. She'd been drawing things for years, dragons and flitters and the like, even going so far as to put decorations on small cakes that looked like a flight of dragons. Another clan wandering around the island had an inker, and he did an admirable job interpreting her art.

"Never be scored again," he said, putting the finishing touches on the 'wing' of the third green dragon on her right arm. The blue ones on her left had been done the day before. It still stung, but it was fresh pain, real pain. Pain that she could use to her benefit, and not just feel sorry for herself about.

"That's the idea," Qenda said to him, and her mother paid the man two marks for his work. She heartily approved, after all there was no more hard-fisted man in the family to prevent it. Artistic ventures around him were useless at best, dangerous at worst. Qenda's mother had taken herself to the local harper, to ask about what kind of protection she could expect from the man - after they'd been abandoned in threadfall after all.

The harper hooked them up with a judge, and even though the pair weren't handfasted officially, she was given a 'divorce' which allowed her to take the children away from him forever. He'd tried once, only once, and wound up being chased off by a group of angry locals. Qenda's mother was an adept baker, the children were charming, and more over, Qenda had been threadscored because of his actions - the locals felt obliged to make sure that didn't happen again.

But Qenda was still shy, and still never spoke of why her father had always chosen her to beat, always yelled at her for no apparent reason, always threatened her first. It was that he suspected - but could never prove - that she'd stolen his recipe!

His - Qenda laughed at that when she thought of it. His recipe was just scribbles on wherhide, to him. But to his father, her grandsire, it meant the world. A master vintner in his old age, her grandfather had intended to bring at least Qenda into his field, but other things - his own son among them - interfered with that idea. So when he died, he instructed her privately to take that recipe, he knew where it was hidden, and not let her father have it. He actually instructed her to destroy it if need be, but she could never bring herself to do that.

Long hours, she would gaze at the thin hide, it was time worn but in good shape for having been written no less than fifty years before. The little lines only made a certain amount of sense to Qenda, she could read but more numbers and glyphs than full on instructions and words like this was. She knew there would be a ratio of three 'somethings' to one 'something else', and that it would be best put in a wood-lined barell, and that keeping it there at least three seasons would be best for it. This wine... she'd tasted it before, she remembered its smooth texture - even as a young child she and her younger sister got to taste it - she remembered how it smelled, and that it reminded her of her grandfather.

As she put it aside once more, she was yet again reminded that this was also the key to her own pain. Had she left it where it was, against her grandfather's wishes, those men who her father had promised the scroll would not have exacted their requirements to the runners. Whatever it was that her father owed them, it was valuable - too valuable, perhaps, for a merchant and his caravan without runners to pull their carts, and few other animals capable of that feat, was not going to live very long.

How had he betrayed their family with debts like that? She didn't know. Even her mother never knew, but somehow the man had gotten in very deep, and the fact that runners were so much more valuable than any scrap of paper led Qenda to believe that they were just thieves anyway. They had walked a long way after that, with daily beatings for her, and beratement at every turn. They made it to the peninsula from the mainland after days of travel, late for a gather that had long since moved on, and then... threadfall.

Qenda's family lived a simple life, on this island they now called home. It was windy, a busy shipping port onto the main land nearby, with fishing craft and even a dolphin pod. She held no interest in many of those coastal things, however, prefering the more grown and wild lands up on the hills. There, she could see the way the farms and gardens were laid out, smell the bread baking from her mother's oven, get the occasional flitting scent of roast meat from the main cothold... Life was good here. She was glad that they'd been allowed to stay on.

Her father had moved them from place to place often, and she suspected it was as much because of his duties as a merchant (such as they were) as him getting kicked out of everywhere they went. He was an unpleasant man, she'd gotten some of her looks from him, a thin and angular body, rich black hair. He wasn't an unattractive man, but he had no other good qualities to hear her or her mother speak of him. The youngest in the family, her brother, was probably too young to remember the threadfall, only an infant still clutching their mother's bodice as she ran screaming after their father who rode off on that last runner.

But here... Oh! Off in the distance there were dragons, frequently now because of the threadfall being more and more common. That fall that hurt her, it was so early in the season that they hadn't been prepared very well. Plus, out in the open like that near the peninsula that was closest to this island, there was nowhere to hide and little of value to protect.

Qenda looked at the dragons with longing, like any girl, but kept her feet on the ground. She was a good worker, a smart girl but with sadly little education. She helped with the cooking, and enjoyed making treats for the little ones most. She enjoyed their laughter, but sometimes when they would bring their playmates to the house, she would get stared at - sometimes cruelly mocked until her mother scolded the child not to do so.

Would she ever stand proudly with these scars and her tattoos?

Of course she would... she was sixteen when the search riders came, and only a few weeks older when she stood on the sands of a nearby weyr for the first time. She wasn't chosen by a dragon, and while it was a tearful event she saw how many of the brave and hardy riders had thread scars themselves. Qenda went back to the cothold briefly, but was told to expect to be called upon again for another clutch when they found one. She would have remained on at the weyr, but they already had plentiful cooks and weyrbrats to handle things.

Dragonhope riders came next, and they eagerly accepted her into the kitchen ranks as well as in the candidate classes. She was sent on to Falas weyr, when they knew there would be need - a little clutch with odd parents seemed to suit her well.

It was at Falas that she saw another Dragonhope-sent boy, Vinyanni, and all the weird feelings inside her welled up whenever she saw him. Not just that he was cute, he was almost always smiling even when he was chiding someone for whatever reason. He was shorter than some of the others their age, and since Qenda wasn't all that big to begin with she was more comfortable with either younger kids, or smaller teens. He complained about the chill at Dragonhope - she kind of liked it, but then she wasn't from a hot locale where he had been brought up!

And ... he was a vintner. A senior apprentice by the looks of his knots, which he still sported proudly around the weyr. They'd been told at Dragonhope that even if they did impress, when they came back to the weyr they'd have other duties if they wished, and he could easily continue making wines.

Qenda clutched the purse which she'd kept the scroll bearing her grandfather's secret wine recipe, tightly. Every few days they would have a class together or have to work on firestone tossing, and she was trying to be bold... trying to just fit in, really. Qenda loved the idea that she was searched, and loved the hard work. She found that mucking weyrs and learning about dragons was a lot of fun, she even got into the dragon-healing classes. But she would need to read much better than she did, to really go anywhere with that.

She figured she'd have time to learn more, if she did impress. It would become her life, she thought, if she could just make others happy, healthy and safe. Her family would love to see her upon a dragon's back... who wouldn't?! Still here was Vinyanni, giving her a look and not like the other boys.

Qenda knew she wasn't as pretty as the girl sitting beside her, and she wasn't as homely as the chubby boy to her left. Vinyanni scooted that boy down a bit, nudged himself in, and started eating with her as though he had something on his mind.

He did, of course, and she was a bit embarrassed to realize that she'd looked like she'd had a secret all this time. Maybe others didn't notice it. But he certainly did. He didn't look at her like the others, he looked over her scars and dwelled on the tattoos when he saw them, but his eyes went right back to hers when they spoke.

He taught her a new version of dragon poker, one which she'd heard the weyrling master was happy with because it involved learning practical things like formations and field movements, rather than just a bunch of holder intrigue nonsense. And then, he bet her something she could hardly resist.

If he won, she'd tell him her secret. If she won, he'd stop wondering. That sounded like a good arrangement, but she almost blurted it out right then and there. She would tell him, regardless of whether he won that bet or not!

Of course he did win, because he was a much better player! And, it was late at night! How groggy they were when he finally helped her stand and stretched and headed off to his own dorm while she went to the girls room. She promised she'd tell him the next day. It was busy, filled with typical candidate activities, but the afternoon was free, and their bathing together seemed almost entirely natural and safe to her.

Her heart raced, obviously they wouldn't be getting any closer than just washing the firestone and ash from their skin, but... He was growing into a fine strong man, with a light dusting of body hair, and a few adorable freckles here and there. She felt like shrinking from all but him - even here where he could see all of her. Skinny and little, scarred and inked, but he didn't seem to care.

So she showed him, in the purse she carried to the weyr, the parchment that had her grandfather's recipe on it.

His face lit up so much, as he read it over. She could tell that this was the right path, she'd never be able to do anything with it but gaze at it and remember... But he... he might be able to reproduce it, and she'd be able to taste that wonderful wine once more!

He kissed her... he kissed her on the neck, gently, he didn't care where the scars were, he liked the dragon tattoos, he listened to her story without interrupting and he said he'd even defend her if her father had ever been near him! Qenda's heart fluttered, and she promised him that if they were to be riders, they'd ride together. And he promised her that he'd find a way to make that wine, show her what each of the ingredients meant... And that would be wonderful!

***

Falas's hatching came achingly slow, but she had time to learn more and explore a new place with her now-close friend Vinyanni. Though the parents of this clutch were white on white, it appeared most of the hatchlings would be reasonably normal... Maybe not for size, for the bronze that hatched first was very tiny indeed!

Along with a blue, a little green hatched, and Qenda thought ... maybe... there was a glimmer in those whirling orange eyes that --

The girl was near tears with joy as Lerhineth placed her forepaws on Qenda's legs. Of course it was you. You are mine.

They went off to get Lerhineth some food, and to start Qenda's education properly. She was a bit sad, Vinyanni hadn't impressed... But then that could only mean that perhaps his dragon would come from another clutch.

Lerhinath, Clutch 12 - Syobeth & Mixuith

Color: green
Color Size: green
Length: --
Height: --
Genetic Code: Xg WDF XgWDF rr bb Hh LL UU C1C2 T1T1 Oo1 (ss N2N2) M1M2