Dragonsfall Weyr
Amber Hills Hold
Vintner Hall
Healer Hall
Hidden Meadows

Dolphin Cove Weyr
Dolphin Hall
Emerald Falls Hold
Harper Hall
Printer Hall
Green Valley Hold
Leeward Lagoon Hold

Barrier Lake Weyr
Sunstone Seahold
Citrus Bay Hold

Elsewhere on Pern
NPC Weyr
River Bluff Weyr
Seacraft Hall

Story Listing
Series Listing

Weyrling Training

Writers: Rochelle
Date Posted: 30th November 2009

Characters: R'syl
Description: R'syl decides to check the weyrling barracks to make sure they're ready for the new weyrlings.
Location: River Bluff Weyr
Date: month 6, day 1 of Turn 5

R'syl rubbed the back of his neck, trying to ease some of tension in his muscles as he plodded forward across the bowl. The Hatching would be any day now, and while the insane number of candidates he had found himself overseeing fussed and mumbled among each other, he was trying to get things ready for the new weyrlings that would soon shift his workload.

One last stop, he promised himself tiredly. Then he would go to bed.

To be completely honest with himself, this last stop wasn't necessary. He trusted his staff completely, and he couldn't imagine a way that they might have overlooked this particular duty with the excitement of the Hatching so near. He was reasonably certain that he had a report on his desk somewhere stating something about it being finished already.

But it was sort of on his way to bed anyway, and he always felt better double checking anything major like this. It would only take a moment, and it would be one less thing that he would have to worry about while attempting to sleep.

The weyrling barracks doors were closed firmly, the wide expanses waiting silently for the day soon when dozens of newly paired weyrlings would come stumbling through the doors for the umpteenth time in an endless cycle. R'syl smiled as he opened the door, inhaling the scents of cleaner and fresh laundry.

The long barracks was lit only by a few, well placed glows, placed there to save the electricity but still provide enough light for the weyrstaff to work or illuminate dark corners should they find it necessary. And while it seemed unlikely that the glows were for the laundry worker, R'syl could see that only about half of the cots had bedding neatly stacked at their bases.

He walked down the rows of cots and dragonet beds, so small compared to the one he saw his lifemate in every morning, yet so large compared to initial size of the amazing young dragons that would soon tumble from their eggs and into the arms of their lifemates. He smiled softly at the thought, surveying the nearly finished room with a tender, expectant yet terrified feeling that reminded him suspiciously of how he'd felt the first time he'd surveyed the nursery waiting for his children.

In a matter of days, the expectant silence would be filled with the sounds of new weyrlings and dragonets, all of them tired, excited, confused, and filled with questions, stumbling around as they tried to make sense of the suddenly brighter, shinier new world they found themselves in.

R'syl stopped by a bed somewhere in the middle, not really paying attention to his surroundings as he watched the scenes playing out in the golden glow cast shadows of his mind's eye. He'd been one of those weyrlings once, more turns ago than he cared to count. He could barely remember those days, the blur of excitement and terror and wildly swinging emotions, but they were still there, as inextricably part of his memories as his beloved wife and Usaeth's hatching. He'd been an entirely different person then, a cowed, terrified boy suddenly confronted with this strange creature he barely knew but was suddenly the most precious thing in the world. He'd forged his bond to the bronze on the Hatching Grounds, but it had been cemented, shaped and guided into something much more than that boy could have ever imagined in a room very like this one, half a world away.

He missed those days sometimes, when he saw the amazing inner glow that radiated from some of the new weyrlings in the days after a Hatching, that shine in their eyes that always seemed only a few blinks away from tears of wonder. Because he remembered that feeling, and wished that he could remember more of it.

The cot shifted underneath him as he forced himself to stand and finish his walkthrough of the weyrling barracks, noting that the only thing left appeared to be the remainders of the laundry. Everything was clean, all hints of the previous multicolored inhabitants cleared out, and all the wallows had been taken care of already.

As he turned his head away from one cot, he thought he saw a glimmering green form from the corner of his eye, overlaid with a blue and bronze one in the same place. R'syl chuckled to himself.

This was a building constructed for weyrlings, and that was all it had ever been used for. He had not been here for many clutches yet, but apparently the few he had coached through their training had made a mark on him already. Those retinal echoes had been the colors of the dragons who'd grown in that wallow, his mind supplying the young dragonet for him when reality had failed.

That was probably a signal it was time for him to go to bed. He eyed the row of unmade cots longingly for a moment, and when he felt his gaze slip to the wallow beside one particular one about halfway down, didn't fight the vision of a lovely young bronze, his own Usaeth as a hatchling, curled tight into a ball beside him.

Faranth, but the bronze lump had been cute as a baby...

Shaking his head, R'syl turned and started back out of the barracks towards his own weyr. There was no need to conjure imaginary dragonets to fill the hall with their jeweled hides. The barracks would be full again soon enough, and when they were, he would be ready.

Last updated on the December 1st 2009