Author Notes:
All belongs to Anne McCaffrey, of course.
This is the only fanfiction I think I will ever write. I've been dying to write it since I finished reading The Skies of Pern all those months ago. Plus, everyone, dragons too, talked about how big Zaranth was for a green. I'm a sap for love stories within bigger plots, I guess, otherwise I don't think I would have written this. Critiques are much appreciated. I hope that you enjoy this ficcy as much as I did writing it. :3
Spoilers? For The Skies of Pern, only.
The humming had intensified, causing the already chaotic bustle of white robbed candidates to begin sprinting toward the Hatching Ground. There were only forty-two of these candidates, for there were only twenty-seven eggs, soon to be hatchlings, which could be Impressed. A ways beyond the Hatching Ground, a large audience had already gathered, with more rushing in to find what decent seats there were left. The seating was not as spacious as one of an official Weyr would be, but it would do considering this was to be the only Hatching Honshu would ever see.
I cannot believe this is really happening! Tai said to Zaranth, an infectious mirth emanating from the thought.
I can, Zaranth answered, almost taut with nerve. My daughter, they're coming for her. She will be my only one.
Zaranth, Tai soothed. This is an honor for us, for you. Cherish it, for I doubt we'll be allowed to cut you from fighting Thread anymore to allow this. Though I don't believe many think this is right.
I know what they think! Zaranth retorted resentfully. Ramoth approves. She approves and says that I deserve this. That I deserve my daughter.
Just calm down, at least! Tai pleaded, seeing the yellow of Zaranth's eyes begin to swirl into orange. These candidates are newcomers; many have never even seen a dragon. You must not scare them. Your hatchlings have need of them.
Though Zaranth had no answer for her Tai, her eyes returned to the worried yellow it had been before.
Tai knew that green fire-lizard mothers were supposed to be poor in attention to their clutch, but Zaranth was different from them. Zaranth had stayed with her eggs each day, reveling in her time with them, guarding each one with a viscous glare she had readied. Zaranth had adored, and often cloaked behind her lively wings, her queen egg. The one no one believed she could lay.
It may have been Golanth's doing, Tai thought to herself, being quite careful as to keep her thoughts out of reach of Zaranth. Keeping her calm would be best now. He is a bronze after all.
The miracle of Zaranth's impregnation had stunned the rest of Pern. When F'lessan had asked allowance of this attempt from Lessa, as a celebration of Honshu's habitability, Zaranth's telekinesis discovery, and the newfound Dragon rider Astronomy study, Lessa had merely agreed to the proposal thinking little of it. The Green dragons were bred to be infertile anyway. However, Zaranth was no ordinary Green, as her size and discovery would credit. F'lessan suggested that maybe it was some renewal of the fire-lizard's natural state.
"Simply remove the firestone," F'lessan had said, "and there you go. A Green dragon less sexually active than before and fertile."
Nevertheless, once the removal of firestone had taken place, Zaranth's sexual cycles became less frequent and the next time she rose, she had been delighted to reveal she was going to be a mother.
Oh, Tai, Zaranth had crooned, they will be so splendid. With Golanth my mate, I'm sure I'll lay a queen.
Tai had been reluctant to tell her green, that although she did conceive, it was doubtful that she would lay a queen. Tai did mention, however, that her eggs may be smaller than those laid by a queen dragon.
Why ever for? Zaranth wondered in a perturbed tone. I was flown by Golanth. He will sire many good sized eggs.
I will, Golanth had interjected with faithful assurance. They will make many proud.
Tai shook her head, driving her thoughts away as the first of the favorably sized eggs began to crack.
Lessa had a good view of the Hatching Ground. On her left was Benden's Weyrleader, F'lar, and her weyrmate. On her right, her son, the head of Honshu, rider of bronze Golanth, F'lessan. F'lessan looked ecstatic whilst looking around the filling Hatching Ground. Occasionally, the pupils of his eyes going wide, the sign he and his dragon were conversing, F'lessan would grin wider than he already was.
"You look very excited this fine Hatching Day, F'lessan," F'lar commented with a good natured smirk.
"Of course!" F'lessan remarked, rounding to face his father. His face still illuminated by his childish excitement. "This is no ordinary Hatching Day!"
F'lar only shook his head in agreeance as F'lessan's attention went back to looking everywhere.
This is a good day for her, Ramoth relayed to Lessa.
I suppose this green deserves this honor, Lessa, knowing which her Ramoth meant, surmised blankly.
She does, Ramoth said with firm affirmation. Zaranth helped dragon-kind much, and she is very brave. Even if she is a green, this honor she has earned.
I thought your guarding her with Mnementh after the feline attack was her honor?
Oh, Ramoth said acutely for a dragon, that was from me and Mnementh only. This honor is different.
Lessa thought for a moment, before asking another question of her golden giant.
You mean that this is from all the other Dragons of Pern? The people would never have allowed this, that much is certain.
The only reply Lessa got from Ramoth was a feeling of diversion.
At that point, F'lar must have noticed Lessa's conversation with Ramoth had ended and said with a caustic smile:
"I didn't get a straight answer either."
"Shouldn't we be used to these antics by now?" Lessa responded with a slight smile pulling at her mouth.
A reverberate crack ended any more conversation.
The candidates were all present; the only thing was to wait now, not that there was going to be a long wait. There were four girls cowering away together from the abnormally extravagant green, Zaranth, who had her head level with the queen egg at this moment, challenging the girls. Her eyes were a torrent of yellow. Three of the girls were brunette and one was a fair red-head. Other girls were mixed in with the boys, awaiting nearer to the other eggs. None were looking at each other. They were only looking at the eggs before them, which finally began to move.
With only twenty-seven eggs, and forty-two candidates, including the queen's candidates, at least fifteen of the candidates would leave Unimpressed. A sad truth, but the hatchlings would need variety. No one wants to bear witness to a hatchling's journey between.
The eggs had begun to shake violently now, and the sound of claws could be heard from the inside of many. An ear-splitting crack heralded the hatching of the first hatchling of Honshu's only Hatching Day and Zaranth's only clutch.
"Figures," a burly man in the audience said cheekily to his similarly burly brother beside him. "The first hatchling is only a blue!"
This blue hatchling had his poor head covered in his eggshell still, one single piece alike to a hat. After he shook free of it, he turned his bright eyes to the white robbed candidates before him. He called out shrilly and wobbled forth to find his life-mate. Two greens hatched as he reached the candidate crowd. The blue hesitated for a moment, his mother encouraging him with a low hum of her own, and he pushed aside two girls that blocked him from his One.
A cry of bliss arose from the boy the blue had chosen, a lanky freckly boy with sandy hair.
"His name is Syreth!"
With cries of joy as the two greens Impressed, three other eggs hatched bearing two browns and another blue.
The brown to hatch first went to a boy cowering on the ground, after a run-over from one of the greens, and the boy's face brightened into ecstasy. So the boy proclaimed:
"His name is Velith!"
More of the dragon eggs hatched, and the dragonets Impressed successfully. However, none of the eight more that had hatched were bronze, so many within the audience were beside themselves with the assumption the only dragon of worth that Golanth had really given the green had been the unhatched queen. The mother dragon picked up on this, and roared ferociously over the audience, her eyes whirling a malicious red. The non-dragon rider members of the audience shrank away with audible fear from the green's fury. Fortunately, the rider brought her back to her senses before any of the risen audience could escape and cause panic.
As if trying to alleviate the crowd's anxiety, the next hatchling, a bronze, broke through its shell and gave a youthful bugle. The green mother, Zaranth, bugled a heartfelt welcome to her and Golanth's bronze.
The bronze proudly strode to candidates, snarling at those that got in his way; his teeth new but sharp. He ended his short trek before a boy with hair a charred Thread black, gave another bugle and butted the boy with his head. The boy looked to be in disbelief, but nevertheless stroked the wet bronze. Tears left his face streaked as the boy choked out the dragons' name:
"His name is Nielenth!"
At the "th" of Nielenth, the queen egg shifted suddenly, and all eyes were upon it. It trembled and rocked but finally a wing broke through the egg. The queen's head came right after it, tearing through the lingerings of her egg shell. The queen's mere presence commanded total attention, which every soul (other than the Unimpressed)gave willingly. The young, already glimmering queen swung herself around and inquired at her mother. Zaranth bent her head and gave her queen a gentle hum of the dearest affection. The queen crooned, swung back around, and then switched her jeweled eyes to the four girls before her. She sighed as she came to them, as if she knew none were for her. Alas, the queen hatchling still examined them each.
As she backed away from them, her eyes yellow with displeasure, she gazed at the still available females amongst the other eggs. The queen suddenly gave an exasperated cry and made a dash over to them. There was one still Unimpressed green, and the queen lunged at her. The green hatchling had been approaching a girl with dark curly, close cut hair. The green wrenched free of the queen's jaws that gripped her left foreleg, and hopped over to the four that the queen had dismissed.
The girl the queen had won looked at the queen with eyes alight with love.
"My Mianth!" the curly haired girl cried as she clung to queen's neck.
Zaranth gave a heartening croon, and Golanth bugled at their union.
Only the injured green remained, for the rest dragonets had already hatched and impressed during the queen's ordeal. This green hobbled as best she could up to the four girls still dwelling around the queen's eggshell. One of the girls had started crying; she seemed to have been the youngest of the queen candidates. The green, ignoring the hopeful eyes of the red-head and the other two girls, staggered as fast as she could up to the crying girl. She lifted her emerald head to the girl's face, and nuzzled it.
"Qith, yes, I'll stop crying," the girl whimpered, and as she wiped her eyes, she stood taller. She then gathered Qith's head in her arms, cradling it. "We'll get you fixed up."
After that, the rest of the candidates were left with no more dragonets. Disappointment and heartbreak was evident on all faces left standing, but the Hatching was over. There was nothing else except the celebration feast.
Tai and F'lessan sat with hands intertwined as dinner was being cleared away.
"They had a fantastic clutch," F'lessan remarked, gazing into Tai's sad green eyes.
"They did," Tai agreed, nodding. "I only wish Zaranth would cheer up, though…"
"She will," Lessa said.
Tai and F'lessan jumped. They'd been oblivious to all else around them.
"Ramoth assures me she will," Lessa continued as she sat to join them. F'lar wasn't far behind. "Zaranth's children will do Pern a great duty before this Final Pass is over."
"I'd tell her so," Tai began with a knowing smile. "But I'm afraid you've already done that."
"Yes, I have."
F'lessan laughed. "Golanth's pretty smug with himself. He's very happy with the bronzes."
"I was surprised that Zaranth even laid a queen egg," Lessa admitted, looking a little abashed. "Though Ramoth - and Mnementh - both assured me that of course Zaranth would lay a queen egg."
"Zaranth had a very small clutch, but all the eggs were of good size," F'lar added. "Since we have plenty of active queens right now, the number wasn't important."
"Did you think she would have less?" Tai asked with concern furrowing her brow.
"Well, I did," F'lar told her honestly with some qualm. "But Zaranth's size should have factored into my mind more. I suppose the whole green laying eggs idea threw me."
"It threw more than you," Lessa said with amusement twinkling in her fierce eyes. "I know many of the other Weyrleaders and Weyrwomen refused to come."
F'lessan and Tai looked at one another, and then gave both Lessa and F'lar grateful though somber smiles.
"We're glad that you came," F'lessan said, and Tai nodded with her green eyes slightly glazed. They were silent until a whimsical tune had begun and a few people had begun to invade the dance floor. Many new weyrlings included.
F'lessan cleared his throat, "Well, Tai! Let's dance!"
"They'll be wishing they had been sleeping tonight," F'lar commented watching the weyrlings. "Rather than dancing the night away. Those dragonets aren't going to wait to be fed."
Lessa had only nodded in response, and then rose.
"Let us go home," Lessa suggested to her weyrmate.
"Let's," F'lar agreed quietly.
As the biggest and second biggest dragons left Honshu, bearing their beloved riders with them, many bugles, youthful and mature, wished them a safe journey home. The stars twinkled overhead, and the remaining Dawn Sister shone brighter than them all in the Pernese night sky.
Author's End Note:
Whoo! Well, I'm open to questions, as I know that this fanfic may cause a rise to many. Don't hesitate to review, I'd be happy to explain anything. Thanks a lot ;)!~
To Brownriderco: Thanks for pointing out the Yokohama was the only Dawn Sister left! I've fixed the ending, there.