Looking Forward to This

Writers: Jane
Date Posted: 25th September 2014

Characters: Azyn, Ryell
Description: Azyn and his wife set out for Emerald Falls on a riverboat.
Location: Elsewhere on Pern
Date: month 9, day 3 of Turn 7
Notes: Mentioned: Gethara, Azzy, Rarden, Tehera; Azyn's intro

Azyn jumped a handspan off the deck when the riverboat's steam whistle let out a
loud blast, laughing at himself, but aware that his main feeling was one of
relief that he and his family were on one of the more pleasant legs of their
journey to their new home.

"I could end up a widow if they toot that thing again," Ryell murmured, her
rounded face alight with amusement that didn't entirely conceal her exhaustion.

Azyn patted his chest and shook his head. "Still ticking - and look, we're
underway." He reached out an arm and slid it around her waist, drawing her close
beside him where he stood at the rail. "You'll like the riverboat journey."

"I take it you mean I won't be sick for the whole time?"

"Have to admit I'm hoping you won't."

When they had first married they had taken a ship North and Ryell had been ill
for the entire journey. He had thought - they both had - that her pregnancy had
been the reason, but other voyages had proven that Ryell just didn't take well
to sea travel. The last crossing had not been an exception to the rule and the
quarters on the ship had not made it any easier.

"Did you like our stateroom?" he asked, thinking of the open and airy bedroom
and living room which, though they couldn't be considered expansive, were
beautifully fitted out and gleaming with cleanliness and care.

Ryell nodded. She leaned her head against Azyn's shoulder and hoped with all the
energy she had left that the motion of the riverboat would be more tolerable
than that of the ship they had left before dawn.

"And they said there was plenty of hot water for baths, if you'd care for one."

"I would," she admitted. "Though I'll probably fall asleep and drown."

"Perhaps you'll need me to supervise to make sure that doesn't happen." His dark
eyes met her light ones and they smiled at each other. "Do you want to try to
eat something?"

"No." Ryell's tone was firm. "Ask me again at midday." She leaned on the rail
and enjoyed the mild breeze that relieved some of the near-tropical heat. "Have
you been on riverboats somewhere else? Or on this river before?"

"Somewhere else, long ago."

For a master printer Azyn had moved around more than most in the craft. Ryell
was still mentally plotting all the places he had been; Holds and Halls, both,
and she knew at least one of those moves had been on her behalf.

That one had been worth it, she thought, and hoped he thought so too.

"Are you looking forward to this?"

"The riverboat journey?" He smiled when she shook her head and didn't bother to
ask her to clarify her question. He knew what she was asking. "It's not the
Hallmaster appointment I dreamed of when I was younger but the Printer Halls are
all very small. This Hallsecond role is in a Harper Hall, and they tend to be
bigger and more influential. So, yes, I'm looking forward to it - and very
pleased to get it." Even snuggled up against Ryell he couldn't help thinking of
his first wife, Tehera, who had lost her chance to apprentice when the Craft Ban
had been promulgated and he added in a gentle tone: "They're accepting female
harper apprentices in this Hall."

Ryell patted his hand at her waist, knowing exactly why that was so important to
him.

Azyn had been a widower for over a decade when he had married her but she knew
from the way he talked about his first wife that they had been very close. Ryell
often thought that many of the things she enjoyed about life with the master
printer were things developed in his thirty Turn long marriage to Tehera. She
was the heir to the good relationship Azyn had had with a woman who had died
before she was born.

"Are _you_ looking forward to this?" he asked. "Back in the South."

"Hmm. I might have been spoiled for life down here," she said, thinking of the
differences between even the quite insular life in the Halls in the Northern and
Southern Continents. "But, still. Nothing has really changed. I still have you,
and the children -"

"And Gethara."

She grinned. She couldn't think how they would manage without the children's
foster-mother. "And Gethara," she agreed. "And my apprenticeship." A much
interrupted apprenticeship, with first Azzy's birth and then Rarden's. But it
had been two Turns now since she had weaned her son and she was starting to feel
like she was making progress toward her journeywoman's knots. She just hoped
that what she had been learning would fit well with what the printers at the
Harper Hall were teaching. The skills should be the same but moving about had
taught her that there were always differences that had to be discovered and
accepted. "And this," she said, patting the polished wood railing with a
cautious affection. "It's hardly wobbling at all."

Azyn released her and stepped away, holding out his arm. "Shall we go for a
walk, then? Down to see the paddlewheel now its turning?"

She slipped her arm through his and looked down the balcony that ran almost the
length of the riverboat, admiring how level it was, and stable.

"I'd like that," she said with a sigh of relief. A twelve day journey up-river
to Emerald Falls and their new home, and there seemed to be every possibility
that she wouldn't be sick the whole way.

Last updated on the October 19th 2014

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