Bequet (pron. bee-kwett)
Female, age 19, Sr Apprentice Minecrafter (forge, metal working)
Dragon: Standing at Opal Moon Weyr
5'9", built strongly but not overbearingly muscular (though her craft might have made her so). Very darkly skinned, almost charcoal colored, with fluffy, short hair that is a silvery grey tone, perhaps that color because of her profession but more likely because of the dyes she finds in the ores... her eyes are a bright greeny shade, and are smallish. She has a strong face, very sharply defined, but not chiseled. Her favored clothing is soft cloth dresses, in whatever current style she can find, though she will settle for whatever shows off her shape and muscles best. She is attractive but looks rather dangerous to be around. Though she loves wearing dresses, she is not often able to afford them -- and she must wear her protective leather gear when she is working.
Bequet *is* dangerous to be around. She is silent, more than quiet. She always appears to be scheming, but she may or may not really be. She can be viscious, but is also fiercely competitive and will always defend a friend. She will be good for a fighting wing, should she bond a fighting dragon. Her sharp attitude and keen senses would aid her if she bonds a queen - though that hope is far from her mind, it has occurred to her she might try for one.
She was born in the mountains not more than 100 miles away from a weyr, the last of a small family beset by many generations of trouble. When the mine she had grown up in was found to carry precious metals as well as the more mundane fire stone ores, the greedy holders to the north of the mine took quick control over it, and kicked out this long-standing family. Her parents are clinging to life, though it is only a matter of years before they are both too old to survive. She has one older brother, who has gone missing, but is not presumed dead, it may be that he has bonded somewhere. Bequet was allowed to remain on in the mine, since her apprenticeship was almost finished.
Bequet's single goal besides Impressing and fighting threats to her home is to avenge her family. That she is almost a Journeywoman forge worker is almost lost on her now, but she will always carry the skills she's learned with her.
"Bequet, it's done. And that blade cannot get much thinner." He grunted, half informing her and half pleading with her to stop. "What's to be done now, is in the hands of strangers."
The dark skinned young woman spun and growled at her Master. "You want that? You think they can manage the mine better than you?" Her fury was so strong that even the experienced and very large bodied man stepped back from Bequet's side.
"No. I don't. You know I don't. But you also know I'm old, and I'm not going to be working this land much longer. If they want to bring in someone else, to do this job, they'll do it. I'm ... too tired to fight it now."
Bequet wanted to scream, wanted to lash out. But then she saw the haunted defeat in her master's eyes, and she finally quelled her anger. "Master Collins, I'm sorry. This mine has been in my family's blood for generations."
"And in mine," he said, tiredly. "Your uncle and father trained with me, right beside me."
Bequet doused the blade she'd been working on into the bucket beside her anvil, and blinked when the steam shot up out of it. The smell of the forge had never bothered her -- something that her master admired. Not one of those pansy-assed northerners could stomach the smell. They might be strong enough to lift hammer to metal, but if their stomach turned when they walked into the forge, they would never be a blacksmith.
But Bequet on the other hand... There was a strong girl. A lady in her own right - she never shied away from work nor from socialization. And not the grungy kind that the boys in the class were apt to afford, either. She had a sort of class below her angry, hardened exterior. It was being worn away by this work, Collins decided. But perhaps there was a chance that she'd simply be able to leave this life and get on with her own.
She had other ideas of course. Her family rested in their cottage not far from the mine's secondary entrance. The entrance which had been their safe haven when they first arrived more than one hundred years before. The sky fell with thick dangerous spores, and they survived by digging in to the side of the very mountain they were trapped upon.
It turned out to be a cavern filled with ores and now metals and precious gemstones. They never dug quite deep enough to find those stones until it was far too late. They'd parceled out the work and the profits carefully enough in the beginning, but it was her father's era when others started to get grabby. They'd arranged for her uncle to be killed, she knew that much. It was no accident that he was found "buried" among sharp stones in a part of the mine which had been stable for decades. It was her first experience with death. It was not her last.
Three other workers and apprentices in the last fourteen years had met their fate by declining an offer here or refusing to be paid off there. Her own parents had been injured -- her mother by a real rock slide, and her father... Well, his legs hadn't given out by themselves. They had a metal bar to help them along, crashing into his knees when he refused to give the deed to Amarast from the Hold.
The deed turned up missing from their home anyway. Perhaps there had never even been one, but there was usually some kind of claim, and Bequet truly wanted to get it back from Amarast and his group of Lordlings. If she had to climb into their hold and break their kneecaps herself, she'd do it.
When the steam cleared and the metal was cool enough to touch, Bequet held up the knife blade. It was by far too thin to be a good combat weapon. But... She looked at Collins from around its paper-thin edge, and his bearded face was gruff.
"Don't think it, Bequet. Don't think it. It's not worth it. What sort of woman -- or man -- can kill another for profit? You don't want to become just like them, do you?" His words were low, to the point, and they struck Bequet like a bolt.
She swallowed back a curse, but kept the knife blade to insert into a hilt later. The handle would be important - if she were to have a proper Lord Gutting knife, it would have to hide the blade and look like something else entirely...
