Right After All

Writers: Rebecca
Date Posted: 19th April 2006

Characters: J'ren
Description: J'ren remembers his sister.
Location: River Bluff Weyr
Date: month 11, day 16 of Turn 3

J'ren knew he was in for a bad night. It had been seventeen turns
since his sister a died of the fever. He thought about going to
Aminna, talking to her. Or maybe that foster mother. In the end he did
neither of those things. What he did do was find a bottle of wine and
curl up with Kenaranth. Thread wouldn't fall for another four days. He
could get drunk tonight.
~~~~~~~~~
Jarren was running down the corridors, searching for the infirmary, he
knew it was near but he couldn't find it. He continued in circles,
growing desperate. He had to find it, Elaren
needed a healer, if he could find a healer she would be all right.
They'd made her better before. He turned a corner, there it was. He
rushed past other pleading for help. He grabbed the arm of the nearest
healer.

"Please healer, Elaren is sick. She needs help!"

The woman wouldn't even look at him. He begged, "She needs help!" he
told her again and again that Elaren needed her. The woman turned
away. She didn't even hear him.

The eleven turn old boy fled, crying. He rushed back to Aminna's
quarter's, maybe he could help her. He wished Aminna was home but she
was with her weyrmate. He didn't dare take the time to find her. His
rushing footsteps slowed as he neared the bed where he's left her,
tossing and turning in her fever. She was tossing anymore. She was
still and pale. "Elaren! you have to wake up! Elaren please!" he
pulled his sister close, she was no longer burning with fever, her
skin cool and getting colder.
~~~~~~~~~

J'ren woke with a start and a pounding head, getting drunk had
accomplished nothing, he'd dreamed away. It was the one he only had
on this day, each turn. He knew that the dream was wrong. He'd found
the healers easily, they'd come when he asked. He hadn't been ignored.
Knowing that when awake had not changed the dream, not in seventeen
turns. He knew it was guilt and he knew that Aminna carried some guilt
of her own. The foster mother might belive that Elaren may have lived
had she been there but knowing how Aminna felt changed nothing. J'ren
still blamed himself.

Dropping the empty wine skin in the wastebasket he walked out on to
the ledge. He knew that most weyrfolk, certainly all of his wingmates
believed that nothing troubled him. It was a deception he had crafted
to keep the mind healer away. He looked over his shoulder, smiling
sadly as he say the dark shape that was his bronze. Kenaranth knew his
grief, Kenaranth had known from the day he chose the awkward fourteen
turn old. The bronze knew and loved him away. Kenaranth was the reason
he was wingsocnd of Torrent. If it wasn't for his constant love and
reasureneces, J'ren would still be a wingrider. After his promotion
he's recived a short note from thier father congraualting him on his
new knots. J'ren had wondered if the bronzerider had still been that
bitter over the death of his weyrmate. It was the last note of anykind
that he's heard from the man. Not too long ago he had his bronze had
been killed by thread. J'ren still didn't know if he should grive or
not.

Elaren would have loved Kenaranth had she gotten to know him. She
loved dragons. Often too ill to play with other children, J'ren had
taken her to the weyrlake to watch the bathing dragons. Once, she'd
been well enough to wash a blue. She's smiled for days he remembered.
She even talked of a time when she would no longer be ill and that she
might impress a dragon of her own. Then she had smiled at him and told
him that one day he'd impress, a great bronze. In that she
had been right.

Last updated on the April 22nd 2006

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Right After All