T'am and brown Cheith
The Road So Far!
It all began at Jessaf Hold, in the protectorate of Madellon Weyr, for Tam – a young boy of 14 Turns, dreaming of becoming a brown rider.
Tam was born the son of a modest cotholder at Jessaf Hold, working alongside his widowed father to work their allotted land, and help bring up his young twin siblings, Albon and Gettie. And in early 102, when a green rider, N'jol, and his Kistrith came to Jessaf in search of candidates for Madellon Weyr's hardening clutch, Tam didn't even present himself as a hopeful. Yet it was Tam that Kistrith singled out among all those young people. He almost didn't accept Search – anxious not to abandon his father. But he insisted, revealing that his late wife, Tam's mother, had always dreamed of being a dragonrider – and gifting Tam with her blue feather pendant as a lucky charm.
As a candidate, Tam was assigned a bunkmate – Martom, a confident young Weyrbred lad, who would soon become his closest friend in the Weyr. He also got to know many of his fellow candidates, including the Weyrbred twins Leover and Leoguy; Zielaph, the nephew of a Madellon bronze rider; and Chiliam, a good-natured highborn lad from Kellad.
But he also made an enemy – Gydeton, the blustering, entitled son of Lord Meturvian of Kellad – who took a firm disliking to Tam! Backed up by his crony Varell, Gydeton became the thorn in Tam's side throughout the sevendays of candidacy.
Hatching Day
The dragons' hum woke Martom and Tam on 102.03.17. Following a brief run-in with Gydeton, the pair joined the rest of the candidates for a morning lecture. The Weyrlingmaster, L'stev, gave the whole cohort – increased by three late Searchees to a total of thirty-five – strict instructions about pre-Hatching preparations, including eating, drinking, bathing – and in some cases, getting a decent haircut – and then turned the group loose for the morning. Before Tam left, Martom – keen to prove himself by Impressing on his first attempt – asked him for help procuring some additional confidence in the form of some alcohol.
The one-armed green rider and the thieving queen
Immediately on leaving the candidate barracks, Tam was flagged down by M'shen – a green rider with one arm, a fire-lizard queen – and a problem. His queen, Squiffy, had stolen several pieces of the Weyrwoman's jewellery, and hidden it around the Weyr. M'shen recruited Tam to find it. The quest took Tam all over Madellon, from kitchens to lake to infirmary – but in the end he succeeded in reuniting the Weyrwoman's jewellery set, to general acclaim.
Respecting his elders
In the Weyr's kitchen gardens, Tam encountered R'hren, a former Weyrleader of Madellon, now peacefully retired to potter among his beloved plants. R'hren asked Tam to help him track down the ingredients for a warming salve to help his elderly bronze, Staamath, with his arthritic forepaws. Tam duly located the components of R'hren's salve, winning the old bronze rider's approval in the process.
Gifted a small pot of the salve, Tam offered it to old S'rius, who was equally appreciative of the gift. And while Kisha, the blind old green rider Tam encountered in the infirmary, would have nothing to do with one of R'hren's concoctions, she too grew to approve of Tam – especially after he solved all three of her fiendish riddles!
Southern comfort
Tam met G'kalte – a brown rider and Wingsecond, not to mention Weyrwoman Valonna's weyrmate – in the Bowl, and was quickly recruited by him to help with a diplomatic matter. G'kalte had been tasked with delivering two gifts from Valonna to her Southern counterpart Weyrwoman Karika – but he'd been summoned away to collect his own grandmother, Lady Coffleby, for the Hatching.
He asked Tam to figure out which of the seven Southern dragons visiting Madellon were the correct pair to hand over Karika's gifts. And while G'kalte's brown, Archidath, offered Tam some intelligence on the Southern seven, his advice was somewhat garbled! Nonetheless, Tam unravelled Archidath's confusing suggestions and got the right packages to the right dragons – without being growled at!
A Masterful order
In the dining hall, Tam met his fellow candidate Zielaph, who'd been tasked by his somewhat dim uncle, bronze rider Fr'ton, with delivering a complicated drinks order to a group of Master Crafters. Zielaph had information about their names, beverages, crafts, and fire-lizards – but not in any sensible order!
Luckily for him, Tam solved the puzzle of Fr'ton's confusing notes adeptly, delivering the correct drinks to the correct Masters, and earning a handsome tip in the process.
A rising problem
Tam encountered both Soleigh, whose green Bristath was preparing to rise near the lake, and her weyrmate Maris, who was getting very drunk in the dining hall on account of her fears that Soleigh was having an affair with a blue rider, G'tron. Tam's intervention successfully got rid of G'tron, whose Imdoth was very sweet indeed on Bristath, from the mating flight – not to mention G'pellas, another blue rider, needed in the Harper ensemble – and reconciled the two green riders. Even if Tam did annoy Soleigh, who wasn't impressed with him for prolonging Maris' binge by bringing her more wine!
Kitchen diplomacy
Madellon's kitchens – the heart of the Weyr, and domain of Headwoman Crauva – provided Tam with the opportunity to show off his work ethic before the Hatching. A round of chores duly pleased Crauva, and earned him a selection of goodies warm from the oven.. And the kitchen was also the source of the hotfruit R'hren had sent Tam to find for his warming salve.
Pie-more
Tam certainly indulged his sweet tooth before the Hatching – laying claim to not one, not two, but three different types of bubbly pie Albeit he stole one of them..
Eggs and baskets
A visit to the Archives led to a meeting with Tarshe, Madellon's Weyrwoman Second. When Tam expressed an interested in looking up some Weyr records, Tarshe offered him the loan of a glowbasket – on the proviso that he return it afterwards. Which – mindful of not offending such an important personage of the Weyr – Tam did!
A blue lady
Coming across T'gala, Pern's only female blue rider, bathing her Heppeth in the lake, Tam offered his assistance – which T'gala gladly accepted.
Friend request
Given Tam's age, finding some wine for Martom proved difficult – the Weyr Vintner, Master Saxton, refused to sell it to an underage candidate. His only other alternative was an illicit purchase from the shady figure of Grimes. And L'stev's warning about getting drunk before the Hatching held weight. The Vintner's offering of alcohol-free grape juice gave Tam an idea – and offering it to Martom, none the wiser for the substitution, still had the desired effect of boosting his confidence before the Hatching – without any unwanted side-effects!
Hair today
Mindful of the Weyrlingmaster's orders to be smart for the Hatching, Tam visited Madellon's resident barber, Z'fell, for a trim. But he fell foul of the green rider's perverse sense of humour, and came away with a curious cut – short on top, long at the back – that prompted quite a number of odd looks and laughs at his expense!
A slithery customer
Early in the day, Tam found out about a secret way into the Hatching Ground via storeroom that might allow him a sneaky peek at the eggs before the Hatching. Successfully entering the combination to the lock on the storeroom door, and suitably equipped with a glowbasket, he crawled into a confusing maze of passages.
By a stroke of ill luck, Tam strayed into tunnel snake territory! A huge, aggressive, and potently venomous female tunnel-snake guarded the exit to the Hatching ground. Tam was lucky to avoid being bitten. But ultimately he evaded the snake, dodging past it and slipping out onto the Hatching Sands.
Having survived his encounter with the snake, Tam crept closer to the clutch – close enough to touch an egg – before beating a hasty retreat from the Hatching Ground!
The Hatching
When it came to the Hatching, Tam had an excruciatingly long wait before the very large dark grey egg Hatched to reveal the deep turned-earth brown dragonet who would choose him, naming himself Cheith.
A friend in me
And Tam wasn't the only lucky one. To his delight, Martom also Impressed, becoming the rider of a bright golden-bronze hatchling, Kauth.
Whatever happened to Gydeton?
Gydeton didn't turn up for the pre-Hatching muster, and – Tam's own suspicions notwithstanding – L'stev guessed that he had probably got himself lost trying to sneak into the Hatching Ground through the dangerous ventilation tunnels. Fortunately – Tam supposed – Weyrlingmaster A'len located the missing candidate, but too late for Gydeton, who having been found unconscious, was promptly invalided out of standing!
After the Hatching
"Cheith" by Emily Holland
The Weyrlingmaster was the first to congratulate Tam on his Impression, but it was N'jol, delighted that his most humble candidate had Impressed, who stepped in to help with the immediate matter of Cheith's first meal. That was Tam's first opportunity to speak to Martom, too, and they introduced each other, with considerable delight, to their respective dragonets, Cheith and Kauth. Martom also told Tam that his new name was to be – perhaps unsurprisingly – M'tom.
It wasn't long before Cheith's personality started to become evident. The substantial dark-brown dragonet – chunkier than any other hatchling – had a stolid, non-nonsense character to match, speaking his mind without hesitation or tact.
With both dragonets full to bursting with fresh meat, the newly minted dragonpairs left the Hatching sands for their new home: the weyrling barracks.
Big brother
Another friend Tam made along the way – a young Holdbred candidate, Nichen, whom Tam had encountered in a hopelessly dishevelled state directly before the Hatching – hailed Tam at the barracks – crediting him with his successful Impression of a moon-blue dragonet, Yooth!
Meeting the Weyrleader
As Tam and M'tom wiped the worst of the blood and sand from their tired new dragonets, the Weyrleader, T'gat, came to inspect both boys' dragonets, to ask after their names – and to ask the two new weyrlings how they should now be called. Tam was proud to introduce Cheith to the Weyrleader. And after a brief conference with Cheith, Tam gave the Weyrleader his own new name: T'am, rider of brown Cheith!
Following their audience with the Weyrleader, and the application of oily rags to relieve Cheith's and Kauth's newborn itchiness, T'am and M'tom headed into the boys' barracks to claim the billets that would be theirs for the next Turn. Choosing adjacent cots, the two new weyrlings got their dragonets settled on the couches that they would take months to grow into. But there was no time for them to sit and admire their new dragons. The Weyrlingmaster soon came along to give them their new weyrling shoulder-knots, before chivvying them off to the Hatching feast!
The Hatching feast
T'am and M'tom soon went their separate ways to find family and friends. Many of the riders and Weyrfolk T'am had helped during the day greeted him with warm congratulations as he hunted through the throng – but, at last, he found his family.
T'am's father almost couldn't believe his son's good fortune, completely thrilled to be the father of a dragonrider. And he was even more starstruck when the Weyrleaders came to drink a toast to T'am and Cheith.
The rest of the evening passed in a blur for T'am, and it came as a relief when the Weyrlingmaster ordered all the new weyrlings back to the barracks for a good night's sleep. But en route to bed, T'am was flagged down by a Weyrbrat, Emry, bringing the message that Weyrwoman Second Tarshe wanted to see him in the Archives.
Setting the record straight
Tarshe, tasked by the Weyrwoman with converting candidate documentation into weyrling records, went through T'am's background with him – including much of what he had got up to on the morning of the Hatching – for good and ill. She offered T'am some advice about paying attention to his new classmates and surroundings, lest he fall foul of the Weyrlingmaster's penchant for snap quizzes, and made some observations on Cheith.
A close encounter
On his way back to the barracks , T'am had two peculiar encounters – first, with Tarshe's queen, Berzunth, who seemed quite agitated by one of the visiting dragons on the Rim; and then with a mysterious hooded figure, smelling strongly of what T'am would later realise was firestone, who called him by name – and gave him a curious wooden box.
"The Watchful Queen" by Chris S. Baily
Back at the barracks, T'am decided, on balance, not to tell the Weyrlingmaster about the stranger.
Returning at last to Cheith – billeted between M'tom's Kauth and a slender green dragonet – T'am was too tired to examine the strange wooden box very closely, and put it in his clothes' chest for later examination. But even as he went to sleep – a dragonrider at last, his brown beside him – T'am was struck with a deep sense of foreboding. Who was the mysterious dragonrider in the hooded cloak? And what was the significance of the strange wooden box?
T'am and Cheith's story will continue in Dragonchoice: Weyrling, coming soon!
T'am's achievements
Achievement Unlocked:
CARRY ON WAYWARD SON
I travelled The Road So Far!
Achievement Unlocked:
OUR ROB, OR ROSS
I received a mysterious box!
Achievement Unlocked:
A HORSE WITH A NAME
I have a name and it's a good name and I don't need to fix my name. Probably.
Achievement Unlocked:
THE YIN TO YOUR YANG
Cheith and I complement each other!
Achievement Unlocked:
SUGAR AND SPICE
I've been a very nice person (so far)!
Achievement Unlocked:
EBONY AND IVORY
Cheith and I agreed on something very important!
Achievement Unlocked:
IN TUNE
Cheith and I agreed on something quite important!