i will the moon to flight [t’san]

[Avu]

It was a very good thing that Riaren was so patient with her.

Meira was fully aware that soon Riaren would be unwilling to put up with her affections, in public or otherwise, but for now her son seemed content to lean against her side, standing up in his chair: His entire body was pressed against Meira’s, a slice of buttered bread half-eaten in two chubby hands, his head lolling against her shoulder. One of the goldrider’s arms was wrapped loosely around her son (her right, which made eating with her left rather difficult). She would have actually preferred to just be able to hold Riaren, just keep him like that forever and not have to let him up, but he had some sense of dignity, even as young as he was.

It was dinnertime for most of the Weyr, late enough in the afternoon that the sky had darkened into pinks and purples, and Meira was tired. There was no Mimic to deal with, fortunately, though she loved the Salamandyr – he’d gone off to pick up Doppelganger and visit Lilitu. He’d been all but attached to his faaavorite green since Simper’s death. Riaren, fortunately, didn’t seem to have picked up on her exhaustion (why she was so tired, she didn’t even fully understand), and was happy – happy enough that it lifted Meira’s mood a little, too.

“…’n Daddy’s kite was so pretty. Can we go see it again, please?” His voice was quiet, but high in pitch with his energy – Meira didn’t know how he wasn’t tired yet; he’d spent much of the day climbing all over Jingth, who had just…tolerated him, for the most part. Riaren just kind of…bubbled at the moment, and it made Meira feel more tired in comparison. “Soon? Mimic wansta see it too, he said.” An important nod, one butter-smeared hand coming to curl around his mother’s shoulder.

“Sure. After M’ta gets better, okay?” Her fork was set down by the half-empty plate, Meira reaching across to encourage Riaren to actually eat instead of just…bouncing with plans of seeing his favorite brownrider. “Riaren, you need to eat.” As he took an obedient bite, Meira couldn’t help the kiss she dropped onto his forehead lightly; it was strange, even to her, how much she liked to be able to hold her son, be physically close to him. Reassuring, in a way; relaxing, even if having Riaren around brought about a whole new set of worries.

Making sure her son ate wasn’t exactly a difficult task, and wasn’t even one that demanded all of her attention, but she still watched carefully – which was probably why she didn’t notice the T’san nearby.

[Ember]

T'san had taken his time getting his food despite how hungry he was. He'd spotted Meira on his way into the main hall but he was a fair bit reluctant to join her for dinner. There was no doubt in his mind that the very young child next to her was Riaren, her young son. The problem was that he was quite uncomfortable around young children. More so with babies than one turn olds, but young was young. The only babies he felt comfortable with were animal babies but that was because he was the son of a beastcrafter.

With a sigh the Wingsecond wandered over anyways. He considered Meira a friend at the very least so he ought to meet her kid sooner rather than later. As he got closer he was able to overhear a little of what the boy was saying and it made him smile despite himself. He hung back for a moment, interested in observing the interaction. Meira didn't seem to notice him so he stood off to the side and eavesdropped quite shamelessly. It would be rude to interrupt, wouldn't it~?

When they were done talking and the goldrider was focused on making sure her son ate he closed the distance to the table and sat down across from Meira, saying as he sat, "Hello there, Meira." He glanced at the boy as if he hadn't just been watching him. "You wouldn't be Riaren, by any chance, would you?" The brownrider smiled in an attempt to not be a scary man. Isn't that what kids thought about random strangers? Bah, he just didn't know how to act around the kid. Riaren. Right, calling him by name would be a good first step.

The blue firelizard snuggled safely inside T'san's shirt - yes, that bulge at his stomach was a firelizard, not some kind of weird deformity - crawled his way up to the neck of the shirt and poked his head out. Between the sheer number of people and a salamandyr yelling at something, Nevroti had gotten too nervous to remain in sight and crawled into His' shirt. The brownrider had learned quickly to wear at least two shirts to save his skin from getting scratched or having the odd feeling of hide brushing agaisnt his front. The only problem was that it made him feel all the more gross at the end of the day because of the sweat. Yuck. Thankfully he had his own private bathing room.

[Avu]

People shared tables all the time, and generally, Meira didn’t talk very much to people she didn’t know that ate near her. It wasn’t meant to be unfriendly, but for the most part she just liked to spoil Riaren, and she wasn’t comfortable just starting to talk to whomever happened to sit nearby – which was more or less why she didn’t immediately look up from Riaren when she did catch movement approaching in the corner of her eye. Not until she heard the greeting and her name in a voice that was actually familiar to her. (Ironic how just knowing her name wasn’t automatically equal to acquaintance anymore.)

Regardless, it pleased her that T’san had chosen to sit with them, and the smile that curled involuntarily at the corners of her mouth said so. “Hey,” was her soft response, and her arm tightened around Riaren reassuringly, almost automatically. That T’san even remembered her son’s name was surprising (in the best possible way, but still; when was the last time she’d actually mentioned Riaren to him?). Said son was currently studying T’san, green eyes bright with undeniable curiosity; his head lifted from Meira’s shoulder in order to examine the person who knew his name better.

“Yeah.” Riaren smiled. “Hi.” One hand rose, fingers wiggling at T’san; the gesture was far from shy – Riaren just wasn’t. People were friendly, he liked people – he didn’t see why he should be shy. His gaze didn’t linger long on the brownrider, though, sliding down to the blue firelizard in his shirt. How odd. Riaren liked firelizards – his daddy had four (and a Salamandyr), one of whom seemed to like being around his mother – but he’d never seen one down someone’s shirt before. “Why’s he there?” he inquired, crinkling his nose curiously, pointing.

“Riaren,” Meira murmured, glancing at Nevroti (and yes, she admitted she was curious too) before offering T’san a smile that was faintly apologetic. “Don’t point, please.” As he obediently dropped his hand, she added, “This is T’san – he’s a Wingsecond” – or so she thought. She wasn’t really sure, since goldriders weren’t involved with wings anyway. Meira just knew what Jingth passed onto her. “He’s a brownrider, too,” she added. T’san could probably tell Riaren so himself – but she wasn’t really sure of how comfortable he’d be around Riaren. She hadn’t even been comfortable around children until Riaren, anyway.

“Really?” His smile widened, and Riaren glanced towards T’san, confiding, “I like browns best, I think. What’s ‘second do?”

[Ember]

At Meira's return greeting he turned a smile on her before he was distracted by her son again. At the greeting the brownrider's smile grew a bit and he glanced at Meira with something akin to pleasant surprise when the boy looked down at Nevroti peeking out of his shirt. At the finger-pointing the blue tilted his head out of curiosity and distrust. This one made His nervous for some reason but he couldn't see why. All the same, he sent His loving thoughts with a thin thread of suspicion of the boy.

The brownrider let Meira take over for a moment as he returned his firelizard's loving thoughts with ones of reassurance. These were good people. Well, Meira was at the very least. He was certain her son was a good kid too. He blinked in surprise as he heard his title. He very rarely saw the need to wear his knots and he didn't think it was a detail the goldrider would have paid attention to. At Riaren's reaction to the tidbit that he rode a brown, T'san grinned and nodded. "Yup, his name is Dsoleth. If you want - " and here he glanced at Meira questioningly " - you can meet him at some point."

The question of what a Wingsecond did had him pausing for a moment. How to explain it to a kid...? "Wingseconds help the Wingleaders run their wings. We check up on the riders occasionally, help run drills, send riders out on Sweeps, mostly boring stuff," he told the boy with a wink. "Oh, we also do paperwork, which is reeeeeally boring." It seemed Riaren's attention had been succesfully removed from Nevroti so the brownrider didn't answer the earlier question. No need to hold back the conversation on such a small detail.

As T'san waited for any questions Riaren - or Meira, if she didn't already know - had he thought that his meeting the boy was going better than he'd expected. He knew there was no real reason to be wary around young kids and once he got to know them he'd probably be fine with them. He'd never had reason to be around them though. Not to mention it was probably a per kid basis, not a 'know one and like them all' kind of thing.

[Avu]

Would it be considered rude that, after that initial introduction of T’san to Riaren, Meira didn’t want to say anything else? She wanted them to get along – the two of them, without her in the middle to ease the awkwardness. And – well, she kind of expected it to be at least a little awkward at first, but surely that’d go away sooner if they just dealt with it than if she made it worse? Or…something. Leave mindhealing to Raebeli and all: Meira was probably overcomplicating things. It wasn’t like children just over one Turn thought in such terms anyway.

In fact, Riaren didn’t even think in terms of ‘awkward’. The invitation for him to meet Dsoleth made the little boy tilt his head to one side, studying T’san for sincerity for a moment before he smiled widely. “I want to,” he returned. “’S he nice? Will he talk to me?” Not many dragons did, he knew. Checkoth did; Jingth never had, and he was fond of the gold, too (he just happened to like Checkoth a little better, that was all), and he wouldn’t be really upset if this new dragon didn’t. That wasn’t to say he wouldn’t be euphoric if he did, of course.

“Can I?” he added, remembering to glance at Meira for permission – rather belatedly.

“If it’s not too much trouble…?” Meira’s response was more to T’san than to Riaren; her gaze had fallen anxiously on the brownrider’s face. She’d never think Riaren was trouble, but she wasn’t quite biased enough not to realize that some people would. “You don’t need to worry about Dsoleth talking or not,” she added, quietly, even though Riaren, being closer to her, would hear her anyway – “Jingth doesn’t; he doesn’t mind, really…”

Riaren fidgeted slightly, opting to take a bite of his bread. Once he chewed and swallowed, he leaned against Meira’s side again before he continued, quite content to chatter at T’san. “Are all brownriders ‘seconds? Or…” His nose crinkled. “Are all ‘seconds brownriders? I know my Daddy’s not…” And his ‘Uncle’ wasn’t either. Even if Riaren thought they should be Weyrleaders because they were the best, his parents and his Uncle.

[Ember]

T'san smiled inwardly at Riaren's reaction. Weybrats. Most of them liked dragons well enough. It made Dsoleth a very handy tool for distracting young kids. At the questions he frowned slightly. "He is nice but..." Talking to other people wasn't something his brown did very often. It was mostly reserved for emergency situations or people really close to T'san or Dsoleth himself. His ex-weyrmate was one the brown had occasionally talked to. Saved time when they'd been talking about T'san, teasing him the way only they could.

When Riaren asked Meira for permission the brownrider nodded. "No trouble at all. I think the big guy would like some attention. Nevroti ignores him and he's not satisfied with just me anymore, it seems," he said, a thin thread of amusement in his voice. Dsoleth wasn't really that lonely. He added, "I also doubt he'd talk to you. You can try asking him if you want, though." At the very least, the brown would respond to the question somehow. A headshake was better than nothing, wasn't it? Eh, what did he know.

"Hmm, neither one is quite right. In most cases Wingseconds are brownriders because bronze dragons have quite an ego. They don't often like being around other bronzes. There are some bronzes who can tolerate it though. Generally the odler the bronze the more tolerant they are." He paused, considering what he'd heard about the wings recently. "Not all brownriders ever become a Wingsecond. Some just aren't meant to lead in that way. The wings change around a lot to try and give a lot of brownriders the chance at being a Wingsecond but still some don't end up as Wingseconds."

The man sighed slightly, knowing he'd feel guilty if he didn't mention it. "I don't think I'll be Wingsecond much longer." He was torn between being genuinely disappointed that he was losing his special rank and glad that he could go back to being the lazy butt he was. Nevroti rubbed up against his chest in an attempt to comfort His. Why so upset? Wasn't it a good thing? Ah, but without His rank he didn't have as much to be proud of. Then again, pride and T'san never had been very well acquainted.

[Avu]

But. The ‘but’ caught Riaren’s attention and his head tilted up – just short of a jerk; his lips turned downwards into a faintly scrunched up frown. It faded, melted back into a smile with just a hint of mischief behind it as T’san went on, though, and Riaren nodded. “I’ll ask,” he echoed, leaning his head against Meira’s shoulder so that he was looking at T’san sideways. “’vroti,” he added, trying to wrap his tongue around the word and not quite managing it. “Nnn’vroti?” His nose scrunched up, before he peered, questioningly, at T’san, hopefully widening his eyes – if the brownrider would just say it again, he was sure he’d be able to get it…

Meira turned her head slightly, just enough to press her lips against the dark curls that leaned onto her shoulder, lifting her hand to touch Riaren’s, encouraging him to continue eating. Fascinating as T’san was, as any new person was, Riaren still needed to eat, please. As he obediently raised the last pieces of bread to his mouth, she smiled against his hair, turning back to T’san. The look on Riaren’s face made it quite clear that he hadn’t the faintest idea of what he was putting into his mouth – he was just listening, just listening, even if he couldn’t understand it all, the politics and the jealousies of wings and of bronzes.

He didn’t say anything immediately after the explanation, just tilted his head a little closer to Meira and smiled, nodding slowly. The smile vanished immediately, back into the confused frown, at the man’s next words, though, before he lifted his head from his mother’s shoulder, pulling free of her grasp, and lowered himself from the chair so he could duck under the table to T’san’s side. Meira let him go, blinking in bemusement before she looked back up at T’san. She couldn’t help the question, a little upset on his behalf – much the same way she’d been annoyed when she’d learned goldriders were no longer on wings. “Why not? I thought the Wings were just redone…”

Well, not just, but still – a wing was supposed to learn to work together, trust their wingmates, and she didn’t really see how that was going to figure if they were constantly being shuffled around.

Riaren, meanwhile, had managed to pull himself onto the bench next to T’san, scrambling up with the awkwardness that came with climbing onto something bigger than he was, and wiggled up to the brownrider. One of his hands sought T’san’s, and he whispered, “I bet if you ask you can be a Wingsecond again, but if you aren’t, it’s okay. My Daddy isn’t, and he’s the best ever. He works in the ‘firm’ry. You could, too?” His Mommy’d be happy if he did, probably; there really weren’t enough people that were Healers and that would be good. Yes, yes?