Exploration (2/2)

Writers: Dana, Eimi
Date Posted: 12th May 2006

Characters: U'kaiah, Traelyn
Description: Keeping the promise he made a sevenday before, U'kaiah takes Traelyn out for a day of fun
Location: Elsewhere on Pern
Date: month 11, day 21 of Turn 3

The bronzerider leaned back on the blanket, pillowing his head on his hand and absently chewing the piece of redfruit he had packed as part of their picnic lunch. "Look at that," he said between bites, pointing towards the ceiling of the man-made cavern. "Even the ceiling is carved. It looks like constellations, doesn't it?"

"Mmmm. They sure do." Traelyn linked her fingers behind her head and studied the carvings. "Do you know what that one's called?" she asked, jutting her chin out to gesture to the one on the far left.

"Hmmm," he said thoughtfully as he studied the pattern. "I used to be good at this game."

"Used to?"

U'kaiah shrugged. "I used to know a lot of their names. I guess I haven't been looking a the stars for a while though."

"That's what we should do sometime," Traelyn grinned, propping herself up on a forearm to look down at him. "We should stargaze."

"What, this isn't fun enough for you?" the bronzerider asked before taking another bite of redfruit.

She blinked, then frowned down at him. "Did I say it wasn't?" Of _course_ she was having fun. Shards, she couldn't sharding remember a time when she had been so relaxed. And to be here with him, U'kaiah, her best friend, the both of them shoving their cares away just so they could be together and share each other's company like they used to... It brought back memories. Good ones.

"Trae, I was kidding," he said frowning back. "When did you get so sharding serious, huh?" U'kaiah then winked and pulled her down to his side, pillowing her head on his arm. "Now come on and tell me what that constellation is called before it drives me nuts."

Grinning quietly, she rubbed her cheek against his arm before looking up to study the night sky detailed in stone. "Well...you see how some of the constellations look smaller than the rest? I guess that means that those are further away from us... I _think_ that one's called Astrum Aur...Astrum Auriga." She wrinkled her nose as her tongue slipped over the unfamiliar, strange words. "Shards. Constellations are called the weirdest things."

"Yeah they are. And they're never named after things they actually _look_
like. That would be so much easier." Sometimes U'kaiah thought the ancients were really silly people, making things so much harder than they ever needed to be. Geniuses to be sure, but there is such a thing as taking it to extremes.

"Wouldn't it?" she sighed. Then she tilted her head to glance at him out of the corner of her eye. "But not everyone has your intellect, U'kaiah.
They think it would be too easy. But we know better, don't we?"

He wasn't quite sure that was a compliment. "Yes, well, stars are pretty to look at, but there are plenty of other things I understand better."

Snaking an arm around his middle, Trae laughed. "And when did _you_ get to be so sharding serious, hmm? I was teasing you."

"Oh, I'm not so serious as all that," he chuckled as started tracing lazy patterns on the back of her arm. "It's a truth, really. I don't know much about stars. I like looking at them, but the more I know about them, the less... amazing they seem."

"Mmmm. I know what you mean." She paused, her eyes wandering over the etched constellations. "I guess it's true what they say: ignorance can be bliss."

"Hmmm. Sometimes." He reached up for his pack and used that to pillow his head as he turned on his side to look at the goldrider. "Why didn't you ever craft, Trae?"

Shifting, she brought one knee up, her eyes still focused on the ceiling -
but not really seeing it anymore. "Nothing really interested me. All I wanted was to ride a dragon, U'kaiah. I wanted it more than anything. It was all I could think about...all I could focus on."

U'kaiah could understand that. He had only crafted to waste time until he Impressed anyway. "Well, what would you have done if you hadn't Impressed?"

Traelyn turned her head to look at him. "That's a good question," she murmured. "I guess I never...thought that far ahead." Then a small grin hinted at the corners of her lips. "Not Impressing wasn't an option for me." Sometimes she could still remember those Hatchings of aching disappointment when she'd been left alone out on the Sands, unpartnered. But to share her life with Nyith... All those bitter days had been worth waiting for her golden love.

He had felt much the same way. U'kaiah has always felt destined to be a dragonrider. Not just a dragonrider, a _bronze_rider. It still didn't calm the fear he felt each time those eggs hatched at that he would not be chosen. But he didn't have to worry about that anymore. Now he only had the future to worry about. That was far more uncertain. "What do you want to do when this Pass is finished?"

Shifting, she moved to lay more on her side, pillowing her cheek on her arm. "When the Pass is finished..." her voice trailed off for a moment. For the Pass to be _finished_... To never again have acknowledge that anxiousness always present in the back of her mind. To never again have to fear for the lives of others. To never again have to tally up injuries, deaths. To never again have to count each dragonrider pair like a Holder would count herdbeasts. To be _free_ from all that...it would be like going back to her childhood days.

But when this Pass was over, she wouldn't be a child.

"I don't know, U'kaiah," she murmured softly. "Do you know what you want to do?"

The bronzerider smiled as a far off look crept into his eyes as he looked fifty turns into the future. "Well, if I survive this Pass, I want to do what we're doing right now, but anytime I want. I want to get my Master's knots, and I want to explore ancient places like this one and not have to worry about drills and hidework."

"Mmmm... We'll have so much time, U'kaiah. I've forgotten what it feels like."

"Mmmhmmm," the bronzerider hummed thoughfully. "We could sleep in. Take long trips without worrying about Thread. Stop counting friends after a Fall."

She fell silent for a long moment at that last. "Yeah..."

He gently traced a finger along her cheek. "It won't last forever, Trae."

Leaning into his caress, her eyes flickered to his. Offering him a small smile, she moved closer. "I know it won't."

"At least we'll be still young enough to enjoy it," he smiled. Seventy-four turns wasn't really _that_ old. He should enjoy a good thirty or fourty turns yet once the Pass was finished.

A pale brow rose. "You call being in our seventies _young_? By then, your hair will probably start to get all silvery." Her small grin teased him.

"I've been told silver hair is supposed to look distinguished on a man,"
he said with a snobbish tone in his voice. "Are you suggesting I wouldn't be handsome anymore with silver hair?"

She snorted, her dark eyes glinting up into his. "Men look far more 'distunguished' than women when they reach that age, U'kaiah. Trust me. You'll still be able to melt young girls' hearts."

"Are you saying I melt young girls' hearts now?" he asked teasingly.

A laugh. "If you haven't realized that by now, I think you might be a bit dense."

"Well, I'm not sure if I can trust that you're not just trying to make me feel better. It didn't exactly work on you, after all." He smiled as he remembered all his vain attempts at wooing her when they first met. She turned him down cold every time. Thank Faranth she did.

"Ah, but I'm a woman. Not a girl."

"Oh, I see," he laughed. "I'm good enough for a girl who knows no better, but not good enough for a woman like you, huh?"

"Maybe." Traelyn grinned impishly at him. "Maybe not."

"Thats all right," U'kaiah said with a dramatic sigh. "When I'm seventy-turns-old, I'll be wanting a girl who doesn't know any better anyway. They'd be less likely to kill me than an old woman who's forgotten what she's supposed to be doing," he said with a saucy grin.

"And what exactly do you mean by _that_, hmm?"

"Oh nothing, nothing at all," he replied with large innocent brown eyes.

"Uh huh. And you're not going to fool me with those eyes of yours. I know you too well."

He chuckled. "Scary, isn't it." His face turned a bit more thoughtful as he looked into the goldrider's eyes. "It is almost scary, you know. That you and I have known each other only... six months or so... and yet we _do_ know each other so well."

She gazed back at him, a hint of a smile twitching at her lips. "Does it scare you, U'kaiah?"

"Oh, you're just making fun of me now," he said as he rolled onto his back again with a sigh. Women never seemed to be able to really take him seriously. Even Jaela just laughed at him. **Shards, just try to have a meaningful converstation with a woman...** he thought with a sigh. "Forget I said it. Why don't you tell me the name of that constellation there."

Silence. Then, as her fingers brushed against his, she murmured, "I wasn't making fun. I was serious."

"How about that one right there?" he asked pointing up at a group of stars at random. Too much seriousness was bound to make them both uncomfortable, after all.

Shards. With a quiet sigh, Traelyn let it go and turned to stare up at the ceiling again. "I don't know. Why don't you guess this time?"

Last updated on the May 13th 2006

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Exploration (2/2)