Author's Note: Fixed a few mistakes in the first chapter. I don't own Pern, Dragonriders of Pern, the whole idea of Pern's entire world, etc. Oh, and free virtual cookies to anyone who reviews. ;)

Daya woke to a loud pounding on the kitchen door. Normally, people would use the dinning room door, so this must have been important.

Daya struggled into a house coat and heard her parents across the hall doing similar. She scurried quickly into the kitchen, her parents not far behind, and yanked open the door.

One of Daya's friends, a young boy, stood grinning from ear to ear in the doorway. "It's hatched! It's hatched! We have a new watchwher! It's hatched!" Then he scampered off to the next house.

Sharth, Daya's father, went back to his room to struggle on some real clothes. Being the master of the Hall, it was his job to check on both the watchwher and the boy it had bonded. Daya shrugged on some clothes of her own and started to follow her father when he spun around to stop her.

"No, Daya. You're not coming."

"Oh, come on, Dad! You wouldn't let me see the egg, the least you can do is let me see the watchwher!"

"No, you're not- Oh shards!" Out of the corner of his eye, Sharth had seen the crowd surrounding the shed. That, and the trouble Yuellan, previously known as the Candidate, was having with the watchwher. "Shards, people! Give the boy some room!"

Daya used the distraction to wiggle her way into the crowd, and, hidden by the chaos, slip inside the shed.

The watchwher had been trying to escape the shed, but in the bright light of day it would hurt its photosensitive eyes. Yuellan didn't want the poor creature hurt, and was shoving the great head of the watchwher from the other side of the "door." Daya's entrance immediately distracted it, giving Yuellan some quick relief. Watchwhers were strong!

The beast turned its ugly head to Daya and licked her face happily. "Be good," she whispered back. It butted he knees with its knarled head playfully. Daya responded by scratching its eyeridge affectionatly and then becoming serious again. "I'm going to have to leave. I'll come visit again, I promise, but you have to be good for Yuellan. Understand?"

It gave a gurgling grunt as if it did.

Daya gave it a pat on the head and started feeling the dark walls for a door; she wouldn't be able to escape the shed quite as easily as she had entered. As the watchwher settled itself down in the middle of the floor, Daya heard an odd, hollow, thud. She expertly cleared away the straw lying on top of where the sound had come from at her feet. Carefully feeling the floor, she found a latch and pulled. The trap door easily opened, but gave a slight screech in the process. She quickly clambered down the hole and made a mental note to "acquire" some more oil.

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Daya managed to get out of supervision with promises and good behavior. She and her gang quickly started up their mischeif again in response. They stole some hot breads from the kitchens, started riding around a few runners (for which they were quickly caught and scolded,) and Daya managed to get her oil. With only a little effort, she managed to smuggle it into her room and left it carefully hidden on top of the trap door in her closet.

When sent to bed that night, after the usual check-up from her parents, Daya escaped down into the crawlspace. It only took a short while of searching before Daya had the right door, and then she crawled carefully out to the waiting watchwher.

As soon as it laid its oversized eyes on her, the ugly beast charged in that direction. Yuellan rolled over in his sleep, but didn't wake. Daya shushed the watchwher and closed the trap door before quickly oiling it. She tiptoed around Yuellan and greeted her new friend properly, with a short hug and a scratch on the eye ridge.

Daya played with the young watchwher for a while, even feeding it some of the mush, before once again disappearing down her rabbit hole and re-appearing at her own house. She went to sleep, and all too soon for her, she was being woken up once again.

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Days continued to pass in this fashion, though rumors had started to spread. Everyone was mystified by Yuellan's lack of bond with the watchwher, though the watchwher apparently was doing fine. People were also speculating by how big the creature had grown, (occaisonally they would see it on midnight-walks,) much larger than they were used to. The Harper was growing annoyed by Daya's constant sleep issues during lessons, and more rumors, in the way that rumors go about, started branching off from that as well.

"She's helping plan an invasion and Yuellan is in on it! The watchwher isn't a hatchling at all, either, it was sent by the invasion to spy on us and is actually a small adult!" Or, "Yuellan and his watchwher go into Daya's room at night and tortcher her so she is unable to sleep! But the watchwher likes Daya, and grows distant from Yuellan." A more common and logical, but still incorrect one: "Daya is doing bad in classes, so she takes night classes, but they don't work either! And who knows about watchwhers? They are strange creatures." The list went on and on.

One day, Yuellan came up to Sharth, looking nervous. "Master Sharth, I, uh, have some troubling news…."

"Is it about the watchwher?" he immediately asked, becoming nervous himself.

"Yes…. I tried to get it to tell me its name and…. Well, it seems to know its name, but wont tell me!"

Sharth's relief was obvious. "Oh, is that all? I'm sure it's nothing."

"Sir, I don't mean to contradict you, but…."

For the very reason of caring for a watchwher in the future, Yuellan had been sent to a school to learn how to care for them. He learned their lore, how to communicate with them, even how they saw heat instead of the colors and pictures our eyes show us. He was very good at the class, which was why he had been chosen to become a candidate for an egg and why the price had been paid. There had still been a risk, but they hadn't thought it very high. They had been right, but it was obvious to everyone that something was wrong.

"Don't worry about it, lad!" Sharth replied. "If it continues in a week or so, then come see me. But just once…. Well, it's not much to worry yourself over, now is it?"

"That's just it! It has been a week! I waited to be sure, but…. I couldn't wait any longer! I think that, somehow, it hasn't bonded to me, but to someone else!"

The cool air that had been surrounding Sharth shattered. "But… How? It's not…. Not possible…. Who?" he blubbered.

"That's part of the problem, sir. I don't know who." Of course, he had a fairly good guess, but he didn't add that.

A/N: Sorry it took so long. I forgot I hadn't posted this…. I'll add a longer chapter soon, I promise! I just had to wrap this one up without giving to horribly much away…. (Though I bet some of you can already predict the ending ;) )