Under the Desk

Writers: Eimi, Shelly
Date Posted: 13th February 2006

Characters: Corvera, Kaiafel
Description: Corvera gets the shock of her life when she discovers that someone is lurking in her office...
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 10, day 3 of Turn 3

Corvera sighed and rubbed her neck absently. She had spent most of the day touring her new Weyr and meeting people, but she hadn't yet dared to be seen entering Jaela's old office; she had a feeling that that space was still much too personal for most of the residents to see a new goldrider occupy it yet. Instead she stole in there at meal times or late at night if she couldn't sleep, there were few people in the halls at those times.

She gingerly walked around the office, uncovering a few glows to brighten the room as the natural light faded. She was getting pretty good at doing the routine in the dark - three steps in the door, left two steps to avoid the small table, forward again for two steps to the first basket of glows and so on. It gave her a sense of familiarity with the room. None of the furniture was hers, the hides were all filed according to someone else's system, even the scent in the room belonged to somebody else.

Kaiafel watched Corvera's feet as she moved around the room, uncovering glows as she went. He had never been afraid of the dark, so hiding under the desk hadn't bothered him. But he had almost started to wonder if the Weyrwoman would ever come to her office. He also wondered if she liked sweet things, and if her dragon was bigger than Calyth or not...

Corvera uncovered the last of the glows and went to sit at her desk, whman would ever cy become clutered with an obnoxious number of hides since she had last been in.

The little boy saw this as his perfect chance. He reached out and grabbed the legs of the woman sitting in the chair. "Good afternoon Weyrwoman!" he cried with childlish glee.

The Weyrwoman let out a startled scream and jumped onto the desktop to get away from whatever it was that had grabbed her legs - which resulted in sending the entire pile of hides fluttering to the ground.

"Little boy!" She gasped, still slightly out of breath from her scare.
"What _are_ you doing under there?" Her tone was more curious than angry.

"You are so funny!" Kaiafel rolled on the floor laughing at the delightful chaos he had caused. Corvera slid off the desk and crouched to look the little man in the eyes. "It seems you know who I am, but I don't know you. What's your name?"

"My name is Kaiafel," he said, still laying on his back, but reaching his hand out politely. "Pleased to meet you."

The Weyrwoman was a little shocked by his sudden politeness, but went with it anyway. "It's nice to meet you, too. Now just what _were_ you doing under my desk in the dark, hm?"

"Hiding," he smiled proudly. She jumped even more than Jaela. He was _good_ at hiding!

"I see..." Corvera put a very sneaky look on her face. "Well you know, Kaiafel, that by hiding instead of seeking, you didn't find my secret supply of cookies!" She winked and pulled open a drawer very slowly.
"Would you like one?"

"You have _cookies_ in _here_?" Kaiafel asked with wide eyes. He jumped off the floor quickly.

The goldrider had never been very good with children, but she had quickly learned that any child can be won over with sweets. "You only get one if you come out from under there and come with me to find your fosterling or whoever else is probably missing you right now."

"I'm not missing," he said reaching into the drawer. "But if you want I can take you to the kitchen to get more cookies."

** What a charming child.** Corvera adorded Kaiafel already. "If you'd like to take me, I'd love to go." The hides could always wait for another day.

"Do you have a gold dragon?" Kaiafel asked, little crumbs of cookie tumbling from his mouth as he spoke.

"I do." Corvera nodded. "Her name is Mnaiath. Would you like to meet her some time?"

"I can wash her. I'm good at washing gold dragons." He looked up at her skeptically. "Is she bigger than Calyth?"

Corvera couldn't say that she had ever seen Calyth, but Mnaiath had always been a bit smaller than other queens. "Mnaiath is probably smaller than Calyth was - but there's still plenty of her to wash!"

"Do you like sweetrolls?" he asked as his hand sneaked back into the drawer for another cookie.

"Not as much as I like cookies." This time she reached for one, too.

Kaiafel chewed the cookie thoughtfully. "I like both. And cake too."

"You like anything sweet, don't you?" *Typical weyrbrat.**

He shook his head. "I don't like redfruit."

"Fair enough." Corvera began to wonder if Jaela had to go through the same process with this child.

"You don't come here very often, do you," the boy state, almost accusingly.

"Not if there are a lot of people around. I like to work at strange candlemarks." It wasn't a lie, exacly, and how would the child know the difference?

"Why?" he asked, turning his his big brown eyes up to meet hers. "You don't like people?"

Seh shrugged. "I'm still new here; I guess I just feel out of place. But I'll get to know this place soon and then you won't have to wait under my desk so long to scare me again."

"Good, 'cause you took a loooooong time." Kaiafel rolled his eyes for emphasis.

Last updated on the February 14th 2006

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Under the Desk