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Astarteth had just alerted Kallista that there were other people approaching when C'ren angrily moved so he could see the eavesdroppers and spoke outloud. Kallista had just settled with her green, ready to enjoy the moment when Ceylith moved towards her rider.

She was not privy to the blue's exchange with his bonded but Astarteth picked up on Vox's cheery disposition and the mood change between the older green and her rider. Those girls think bad things. They were watching you.

"Watching me do what? Get out of my dirty clothes so I don't stink?" Kallista remarked with equal heat in her voice. She held tight onto Astar as she stood up and moved to see who the spies were... She recognized the two chattering girls from one of the Candidate lessons and sitting at the tables together but did not know either of their names.

Bad girls. Bad girls. Astarteth's eyes tinged with red as she flapped her wings at them.

It would do neither hatchling nor weyrling any good to get too worked up. Trying to remain calm, perhaps the girls had an explanation. Especially since they had another's fire lizard. Moving to an almost defensive stance, Kallista waited to see what the two girls would say.

Elae instantly looked guilty at being caught spying, but she covered herself well. After all, one couldn’t be a gossip without getting caught occasionally. “Oh… Hi!” she said cheerily, waving as if she had just noticed the Greenrider and Weyrling. “Yeah, I found your little firelizard wandering around. I thought it would be a good idea to return him to you. You know, being a good citizen and all that.” She attempted to affect a veritable aura of respectability and failed miserably.

Vox didn’t seem to notice as he flapped his way over to His once more. He did, however, do his best to cuddle up to C’ren, completely missing out on the anger for several moments. Or perhaps he was merely trying to get rid of it. One thing was for sure: the fact that the blue firelizard was currently curling up around the dragonrider’s shoulders failed to make him seem imposing. At all. Elae tried to hold back a giggle at Nan’s questions and failed miserably.

“Interrelations.” C’ren repeated the word flatly and with a certain amount of derision, like a housewife who had just discovered a particularly large trundlebug inside the house. “You know, you girls could use a certain amount of lessons in that as well. For example, where I come from, it’s considered rude to spy on people. Also considered suicidal, considering Ceylith here and all.” Technically, he had no proof that they were deliberately and maliciously doing anything at all. Perhaps they really were just returning Vox.

But he wasn’t going to count on that. He knew Elae, after all, and had made a slight effort to keep track of her, just as he did with most of the ones he and Ceylith Searched. “You know, I really hope you weren’t spying. We’ve got quite enough Candidates here these days. More than we need, really. I hope I won’t have to register a complaint with your Candidatemaster.” A mild threat, when you got down to it. No matter how many Candidates they had, they could always use more. At worst, the girls would get stuck with extra cleaning duty, or perhaps numbweed picking duty.


“Spying? Perish the thought, Greenrider C’ren! Nan and I were simply walking by when we noticed you and Kallista. We merely thought you would be relieved to be reunited with Vox.” Aha! The threat confirmed at least one thing in Elae’s mind; C’ren felt threatened! How adorable! And, since he felt threatened, something was going on. It had to be!

"Really? Where do you come from, if you don't mind me asking?" Nandeli never passed up an opportunity to get information straight from the person. Records could be deceiving, especially since the general human populous had a talent for lying. She would know. "And why ever would we be spying on you? That's not to say you're boring, since I'm sure you do lots and lots of exciting things every day, but after a Hatching I doubt you would be doing anything really. Not to mention, to accuse us of spying you would have to admit you were doing something you shouldn't be, wouldn't you? I mean, why else would a pair of innocent girls like us be watching a greenrider go about his business if he wasn’t doing something interesting?" She studied her nails with an expression that could have possibly been bored.

Suddenly, it appeared that a thought had occurred to her. She looked up, head tilted to the side like an inquisitive hatchling. "You aren't doing something interesting and secretive, are you?" C'ren wouldn't tell her of course – Elae had already told her that he acted like a cynical old man – but she had learned that if you talked enough people eventually got fed up with you and left. Usually they forgot to punish you, which was an added bonus. This technique proved very effective Kallista, who looked particularly angry. Probably because they had interrupted her secret alone time with C'ren. Oh Nandeli was onto you two, you could bet on that.

Though she was used to having people storm off in a huff, she hadn't factored in upsetting the dragon. She didn't mind so much when people got angry at her (especially when she was only searching for the truth) but little hatchlings were another thing entirely. Dragons, she had always thought, were innocent creatures. It was always better to avoid upsetting them simply out of principle. "I'm sorry your little green is upset by our interruption." That was probably the most honest thing she'd said all day.

“Actually, I do mind.” Blunt and to the point. If they really wanted to know, they could just look it up. C’ren didn’t mind overly much people knowing his history---it wasn’t like there was anything Pern-shattering to hide---but he felt like being difficult. “Oh, I’m sorry. I must’ve gotten spying confused with ‘watching and following someone else while they’re not watching’. That is more along the lines of stalking, now isn’t it?” And that, as far as the Greenrider was concerned, was far more serious than spying.

“I don’t know why you would spy on me… not unless you’re spying on Kallista. Why don’t you answer that question?” Acid practically dripped from his voice. Luckily it was only metaphorical acid; if it had been actual acid, the rider probably would’ve had a fit over the mess. “And you’re upsetting both Astar and Ceylith.”

In his mind, that was even worse than stalking or spying.

Not that Ceylith looked particularly upset. The calm Green attempted to remain as such in order to comfort the younger hatchling, but it was troublesome. Occasionally, her eyes would swirl with yellow or, even more rarely, orange. C’ren was upset. Kallista was upset. Astar was upset. That sort of thing got to an emphatic dragon like Ceylith. She let out a soft wail before trying to comfort the little Green.

It’ll be alright… you will eat good food, not those girls. You deserve better, right? Don’t worry; C’ren will take care of them. He’ll report them to… to… oh, what’s her name. The Candidatemaster person. She’ll take care of them.

Oh, this was marvelous! C’ren and Kallista were clearly hiding something! And what else could they have to hide besides a tryst? It was delightfully salacious, wasn’t it? Still, she could tell that their chances of getting away unpunished were diminishing with every minute. The longer they stayed, the more likely it was that C’ren----or Kallista for that matter, or even both!----would report them.

Putting on a decidedly wounded expression, Elae pouted. “Well, we were just trying to be nice. We did just come here to return Vox, you know. We just happened to pause because we didn’t want to interrupt such a nice little scene. Since you two went off over here, we both figured you wanted to be alone. Not our place to interrupt such a thing. But now that you’ve been reunited with Vox, Greenrider C’ren, we will take our leave…” And go look up the records. There had to be something there. Flashing a smile at Kallista, Elae continued, “And good night to your little beauty, Kallista.”

She had had a feeling he would say that. Sigh. Boys could be so troublesome, no matter how old they got. This one must be in his late twenties and already he was such a stick in the mud. Honestly. What did a girl have to do to get some decent information around here? Clearly she needed some new tactics when it came to these greenriders. Maybe she should befriend some tall, dark and handsome men. Every greenrider liked their men tall, dark and handsome, right?

Following Elae's lead, Nandeli's expression moved from innocent to hurt. How could he accuse her of stalking? Didn't he know that she was the best information collector the Weyr had to offer? Well, see if the whole Weyr didn't know he was two-timing a pair of girls who were here to be candidates. She might have kept the secret for a day or two but this one was going straight to the kitchen staff once she and Elae confirmed their suspicions. And if he wanted to tattle on her then she would just have to tell the Candidatemaster that C'ren was picking on them because they didn't Impress Greens and Kallista had. Clearly he was just disappointed that Elae, the girl he had so painstakingly Searched, had not Impressed and was taking out his frustration on her. Nandeli had a story for everything.

Kallista got a cheery wave at her back, before Nan returned her attention to C'ren. "Unfortunately, we do have to leave. If you'll excuse us, Greenriders." Nodding to Elae, she turned and began heading back the way they came. Since C'ren wasn't going to tell her where he was from then she and Elae were just going to have to find out on their own. He would have spared himself a lot of trouble by just answering her question, but men always had to be difficult. While they were still in earshot, Nandeli called over her shoulder, "You really did look nice together in your little private moment!" Always the supporter of secret relationships.

With them dealt with, Nan nudged her friend. "To the Records?"

Khunoth considered taking a swipe at the haughty green, then reconsidered. He was a larger dragon, after all, and may hurt her. A long sneer accompanied the thought, and he merely sniffed in response to her comments. Tada was noticeably uneasy, and she trilled uncertainly when he shifted away from his green clutchsister, nearly unsettling her. Charity? Hah! Small ideas for a small mind. Go ahead and keep thinking that you silly wherry. He said, mantling his wings in minor irritation.


Gh'lan wondered how serious Haanyath's temper towards flits could be, given how young she was, but decided that he would heed the warning. His call to Khunoth went mostly answered, just a rumble in the back of his mind that reminded him of a distant thunderstorm. Inadvertently, he was struck with the best way to describe his new life partner. A storm cloud, boiling over the horizon ready to spew lightning and rain at any moment. Blessedly, neither Khunoth nor T'ka noticed his sudden thunderstruck [removed](mostly since T'ka had already walked away and Khunoth was dwelling too much within his own superiority) so he quickly finished filling his plates. Weaving back to the table proved a little harder then he though it had any right to be, but he did eventually make it back; sitting down with a dull thump right next to T'ka. Tada was on the table in an instant, leading Gh'lan to believe she had betweened there, and was staring at the plates of meatrolls intently. Grinning, he waved her over to her own plate and resumed his conversation with T'ka.

"If you don't mind my asking, " he started, taking a bite out of a meatroll. "Where'd you come from before?" He continued, chewing thoughtfully while watching Khunoth watch him and Haanyath. You'll go cross-eyed doing that Khunoth.

Unlikely.

Look who's throwing insults now. Loathsome green. Khunoth snarled, flashing his barely formed baby teeth at Haanyath. He stayed where he was though, sitting back on his hind legs proudly, matching his clutchsister's smug look tit for tat with a glare of his own. He certainly didn't need a bench or his rider to defend him!

Gh'lan started at 'smith' but kept quiet long enough to let her finish. He could sincerely sympathize with her, as he often thought he should have made journeyman himself, but he couldn't fathom being targeted like she had. All the women he'd ever dealt with had been nice enough. Granted, he hadn't met more then two or three smithcraftswomen, and all three of them had been quite intimidating, the nice ones he realized.. had always been holders. "That, is a real shame T'ka. Not sure what else to say to that." He said, watching Tada gobble a meatroll morosely. "Especially since I to was a smith, though not in the traditional sense." When Tada looked ready to inhale a particularly large piece whole, he absently took it from her and broke it into pieces before continuing. "You'd call us Starsmiths these days, we watch the skies and predict what we can from them. " Not that he had done a great deal of predicting, just copying notes and drafting timetables for the arrival of thread. unlike many holders, his craft, like the Dragonriders, KNEW thread would return.