| It wasn�t long before she reached the oceanside, with it�s sand and cliff lines shore, and the few scraggly trees that punctuated the cliffside with shade. This was where Raeniel felt most at home, most at peace with being still. Here she could sit for hours and contemplate the water, the tiny fire-lizards that made their home here, and the occasional dolphin pod hunting in the distance. Of all creatures Raeniel most admired the ship-fish dolphins, with their freedom to move across the oceans of Pern without any inhibitions. They never had real work to do, and were so happy, and so at peace. Raeniel would give anything to soothe her restless soul and be at peace too. She sighed, if she was going to find some unguarded flit eggs, she�d better get to work. She took some small meat scraps from a sack that she had brought with her, and began to scramble down the cliffside. They weren�t for hatchlings, they were lures for the adult queens who would be guarding their clutches. Green eggs always died with the tide on this beach, and Raeniel wanted to try for a queen�s egg besides. Lashini deserved more than a green, a color that all her agemates had already. Vralon Hold was a good place to witness mass fire-lizard owners. Even Lashini�s mother, and Raeniel�s stepmother, Bevera, had three of the creatures to herself. All blues true, but Bevera�s massing of the animals represented what most of the Hold people had. Raeniel placed a the meat scraps in a few select locations where the fire-lizards would be most likely to smell them. Already several of the queens, all resting protectively near their buried clutches in such a way that it would be immpossible to find the clutch unless you stumbled upon it, and even more impossible to tell which queen had lain which clutch, were watching Raeniel intently. Their bronzes only brought them fish, but this girl was leaving them fresh meat. How enticing. Raeniel knew it would only be a matter of time before the tiny queens moved from their half-hidden perches and sought out the food. She tried to keep it far enough away that she�d have a bit of free time to scrounge about in the sand and find a decent egg. The queens wouldn�t protect another queen�s clutch, despite how they went about setting up their nests. So if Raeniel could just get one female to the food, and figure out where her clutch was�� Most of the meat gone from her sack, Raeniel moved halfway up the lowest cliff, one that sloped �easily� onto the beach and could be more easily called a hill than a cliff, and which had several shrubs to hide behind, and concealed herself. She watched impatiently as the few golden flits chirped at each other, perhaps trying to decide what to do about the free food. But Raeniel knew they were stupid creatures, and would take it eventually. Just give them time�..There! One of the smaller queen, settled alarmingly far from the others, launched herself and flew for the largest patch of meat. Raeniel smiled slyly, luck was with her today. Pushing her hair behind her ears, Raeniel slid quickly down the cliffside and towards the general area the young queen had just vacated. If she hurried�. Raeniel reached the spot the queen had been obviously guarding, and immediately saw the place where the sand was distrubed. Obviously she was a first time mother, otherwise she would have done a better job concealing her clutch. But Raeniel didn�t think much about that, and she plunged into the sand quickly. She had no time to waste, not when the Mother might see her and come shrieking back. Young or not, that golden flit would have claws and teeth to be reckoned with, and Raeniel valued her smooth skin, and didn�t wish to blotch it up with scars from an angry fire-lizard. Raeniel reached the eggs without trouble, and gently pushed through them, looking for the largest, or one that might give an indication for being the queen�..No such luck. They all looked pretty much the same, and the ones at the very bottom had been sucked dry by tunnel snakes. Hopefully the whole clutch wouldn�t be ruined. Now why would I care about that? Raeniel asked herself as she picked up one of the eggs, seeing as how they were all pretty much the same, it didn�t matter which one she took, and quickly poured the sand back over the clutch. The other queens were watching the girl warily, and edges closer to their own eggs. They wouldn�t move for the meat now, not until Raeniel was gone. They were more experienced than the young one who had foolishly left her clutch. Bronzes and the rest brought food, there was no reason to leave one�s clutch in questionable circumstances. But Raeniel was already halfway up the �cliffside� before the young female realized she�d been taken advantage of, and came screaming back towards her nest. Raeniel could hear her pitiful cried until she reached the pond, where they abruptly stopped and were replaced by one startled cry, (obviously the female realizing an egg had been stolen), and then silence. Raeniel didn�t know why she was relieved. She also didn�t know why she took the flit�s egg out to examine it better. Maybe if she had hurried home, and thrust the thing into Lashini�s arms, Raeniel wouldn�t have Impressed it. Maybe if she hadn�t taken the one on top, most hard from the sun�s heat. There was a whole list of �maybes�, but one thing was sure, as Raeniel studied the rough shell surface, she felt it began to wobble, and then to crack, and that was this flit was going to hatch into Raeniel's unwilling arms. Raeniel was in slight shock, and knelt beside the pond, knowing she didn�t have time to take this egg home, and not wanting to risk the innocent creature by running with it anyway. She would watch it hatch, make sure it flew away for some food, and then she would return to the beach. She had all day to find an egg for Lashini. But something happened that Raeniel did not count on; as the tiny creature broke it�s way through it�s shell, Raeniel realized this was no ordinary flit. At first she�d thought it was brown, and was relieved she hadn�t been able to take it home afterall, but glints of bronze, and then of black, seemed to catch the sunlight as the hatchling broke from it�s shell. It tumbled into Raeniel�s hands, crying hungrily and confused by it�s surroundings. It revealed itself to be some unknown colour that Raeniel had never encountered�although overall it reminded her of the old marble floors her birth mother had had in the Main Hall when she was a child. Marble. A marble fire-lizard. Raeniel stared at it in wonder, and without needing much prompting (the creature�s fierce hunger cried were enough), Raeniel dropped to her knees and scrambled about in her pouch for a few remaining meat scraps, and fed them to the creature, showing it love and admiration. The fire-lizard gulped the meat from her hands, and cried for more. Raeniel was worried it�s piteous noises would draw it�s mother, but decided against it. Raeniel dug in her pockets to find the wrapped meatrolls and bread she had brought with her for lunch. She stuffed those down the bottomless bit of a hatchling, and kept sending it wanting thoughts. Eventually she felt something, closer to tingling than anything else, tickling at her mind, and she felt suddenly that this tiny creature was hers now. Raeniel smiled. She had done it. She had Impressed a fire-lizard of a color that no one else had. She had heard of rares among fire-lizards, and knew how �rarely� they occurred. Chances were something like this marble wouldn�t hatch again for a very long time. The baby, still whimpering with hunger, but calming after being fed, snuggled itself against Raeniel and curled into her arms. Raeniel stroked the dainty wings, praising the tiny creature for it�s beauty. Raeniel knew that this would ensure the fire-lizard wouldn�t second-guess her choice and leave. The baby crooned restlessly as she began to fall off to sleep, and Raeniel bent down to kiss the tiny thing. How precious she was. She. This �thing� is definitely female. Raeniel decided, and then smiled. Females were so much more interesting anyway. She whispered comfortingly and quietly to the sleeping baby, and assured her that there was more food waiting. Raeniel began to walk slowly, as not to jar the creature, back towards the Hold. As she walked, she hummed a soft tune, hoping again to keep the fire-lizard interested in her. The song was an old one, about the dragon queen Yasamoth, and her rider Corra. It was sad overall, for it told of how Corra stayed alive even when Yasamoth died of some accident during clutching. The song said Corra nearly killed herself for grief, and had gone to the hatching groundsd, where Yasamoth�s last clutch, was hardening, and planned to do it there, where Yasamoth�s body laid. But the golden glint of the new queen egg caught Corra, and seemed to hold her there. Yasamoth wouldn�t want you to die. The egg said to the woman, and Corra realized that by staying with the eggs, as Yasamoth would have done, she�d be doing her queen a great honour. Corra stayed, and the eggs hatched, the queen chosing Corra�s own daughter, Geralai. Raeniel had always liked the song, not for the words but for the slow, sweeping melody that haunted you deep in your bones. �Corra.� She whispered at the fire-lizard as she reached the gate of the Hold. �Your name will be Corra.� And the marble flit nuzzled herself deeper into Raeniel�s arms, and the girl knew this baby was hers for life. Never would the two be parted�ever. continue.... |