Oya and Oshun Elek
Oya is the more outgoing, on the left, with a bit more of a sarcastic view of life. Her slightly older sister Oshun on the right tends to watch first and speak later. Neither of them looks particularly their age, most people who meet the small girls think they're only around 12 or even younger. How wrong they are...
They have two other siblings, twin boys who are now just turning 8. Their parents both come from family lines which favor twins, and so their likelyhood of twin children is also pretty strong. Whether either of them wants children is something they have not spoken about. They have a huge extended family, and both girls love their large family gatherings.
"They're doing just fine. If you'd watch their guild training you would know that."
"I'm the one in the guild, properly Figar, you're still an artist who decided he liked looking at the stars..." Ashtet nudged her husband, and then they both straightened like caught school-kids when the guild masters glared at them. Figar grinned under his red mustache and Ashtet giggled privately.
Oya and Oshun were about to present their project findings. They'd been looking at the star charts -- the new ones, not the old-world ones -- and decided that the path which the locals had taken from their own old world involved a seriously twisted set of calculations.
"If they had to come around the sun," Oya said, "they would have landed in another season. But we know that they didn't, they landed during the spring in the northern hemisphere."
Oshun continued, her more quiet voice made clearer by the room's layout. She didn't much like being on display like this, she'd much rather be making charts in her study. "But we also know that their journey took a certain amount of time, and if they'd come straight, or what appears to be straight, from their world, they'd have reached this place in winter of the decade before."
"So why did they come around such an erratic path?" Oya posited, for the masters to think about. "Well, I think it wasn't so much a planned thing. You see these markings on the charts?" She indicated a small dotting of red and brown objects. "Those might be small moons or a trail of asteroids. Those could seriously damage the crafts!"
"Just like rocks below the surface of a shallow bay," Oshun added. "You might not see them until they're right under your ship's prow, and then it's far too late."
"So the travelers had to have known about those objects. They plotted their course around this way, south," she indicated a strange loop under the star system, "and they landed after a long circuit around the planet."
"But why would they have taken such a long route this close to the system?" Asked one of the masters. It was possible that he'd never even thought about how his own ancestors made it to Alskyr. "It would seem to me that the route above would have provided a clearer path."
"Ah!" Oshun said, grinning, this was her field. "Because the tilts of the other planets in the system would get in the way, clearly. If ... Where's that beautiful orrery?" Someone moved in a piece of ancient workmanship, something rumored to have been made just after the planetfall. She took the planet-model and turned it so everyone could see. "This is not a completely accurate model, because they needed to make the gears move right. The right way to look at it is this: these two far out planets," she indicated them with a pair of pointing fingers, "are actually stuck in orbits way out like this..."
Oya and Oshun went on for another hour, keeping everyone in the guild entranced. The theories seemed sound, if a little unorthodox. At long last, the Masters of the navigator's guild approached the girls. "Well, we've come to the decision that you two would make fine additions to our guild. Your parents have obviously instilled in you both a true understanding of our work. Now, if you could only apply it to the seas or ground..."
"But they don't need to do that, necessarily," said a stranger's voice. "Ah, sorry I'm bothering you all, but I've got to make this quick. I've been sent on search for Moon Shadow Weyr, and I need to see the younger students..."
Shocked, the guild masters conferred again. "This is highly unusual. At this point they'd be considered our apprentices. Or even masters of their own specific fields given their--"
"Yes yes, let the man speak his peace," said another, a grumpy older man who had always been fond of the girls -- at least since they arrived several years back. He'd suspected they were more than just new arrivals to the island. "They could just as well use their knowledge upon a dragon's back, now couldn't they?"
Mutterings went around the room, but the search rider nodded. "Yes, I was going to point that out. Thank you sir."
The guild masters then turned to Figar and Ashtet. "It's their call," said Figar. His dark skinned wife nodded her head, intent on seeing her daughters' reaction to this all.
It looked like they were taking it far better than she expected. Oya was beaming, her eyes darting from her sister to the rider and back. Oshun was gazing at the orrery again, spinning the planets around idly but her face showed that she was thinking deeply-- probably about how to see the world from above...
"We want to go," Oya announced, and her sister did not stop her.
"I would like to ask something," Oshun said, a moment later. "Can we still be in the Guild? As riders?"
The clump of older men and scattered women made a quick huddle. They certainly knew how to keep their words quiet, because none even close to them heard how they came to their decisions.
"We agree that you ought to remain in the guild." Their representitave said. "If you manage to bond to dragons, I would like to have you head up a special team of aerial navigators. Unless you're going to be needed to fight."
At that thought, Ashtet went half-pale. She hadn't realized they did fight menaces here on Alskyr, ones which might not be so dangerous and deadly as Thread, but were certainly frought with their own thrill and worry.
"There are many wings to join, and some are not fighting wings. I'm certain that the Caer here would approve of you keeping them as riders for your guild." The search rider said. "Now, maybe if you want to finish up your ... um, ceremony here, I'll be waiting down in the yards. I'll take you to the weyr when you're ready. You'll want to pack some things, we can arrange for transport of larger items if you need them."
The girls gleefully ran to their parents, after bowing and thanking their superiors in the Guild for their blessing.
"Do well," their parents both said, "make us proud," added Ashtet. "You will come back to a fine spot in the Guild either way!"
What happens next?
