"Isn't Shuenrv's clutch taking a little...longer to
hatch than usual?" Lian asked his superior one day, as he was bored of sitting
around with nothing to do.
The Master Archivist grunted and glared at the
young archivist. "You'd better not let Shuenrv hear you say that. I think she'd
get out of control if she thought there was something wrong with her first
clutch. Now get back to work."
"I've already finished." Lian sighed.
Kurin blinked. "What about the clutch records? And the History section? The
Armadas?"
"I've done all of that. And I ran out of books to read again."
The Master Archivist sighed. "Lian, you need to get a life."
Fortunately, it wasn't long after that, when Shuenrv happily announced
that her clutch was hatching, and the aspirants assembled outside the Deep
Caverns to await the new arrivals. Lian went too, to record the new pairs, and
he sat in the back against the wall, impatient to get it over with. He looked
over the single aspirant-then did a double-take, and realized the two adult
draks assembled were aspirants as well and not just spectators-make that
aspirants.
The human was a young women, bouncing around in excitement. That
would be Wynsie.
The other two were draks, one from Dun Keiba Castle, the
other from a place called Ryslen, but had returned to his birth castle of
Drockh-Tallahn to Pair. They were Tornanex, an algae mutation male drak, and the
other was Chesean, a mud.
Shuenrv's head snaked around the entrance of the
Deep Cavern, jaw gaped in a proud grin of motherhood. "You can come in now." She
allowed the three aspirants and Lian to follow her into the Deep Cavern, as
eager to show off her children now that they had hatched as she had been
overprotective of them before. A group of young draklings prowled around the
Cavern, playing hide-and-go-seek.
"Childrrren, it'ssss time now." Their
mother called to them, motioning to the aspirants with one wing.
"But we
haven't found Allerrrrvan yet." A female ore drakling piped up, but her siblings
squeaked excitedly and ran to the assembled aspirants.
A slim gold-and-white
colored drak jumped out from behind their mother with a gaping grin. "Herrre I
am! I won!" He exclaimed, only to realize that none of his brothers or sisters
were interested anymore. He huffed in irritation, but went to join his siblings.
The female ore sat at the feet of the algae-colored drak, Tornanex and
craned her head up to look at him. "I think you'rrre prretty-looking, Tornanex!
My name's Korchanrv!"
Her rain sister, meanwhile, had gravitated toward
the librarian Wynsie. "Hi therrrre, Wynsie! I'm called Sianrv, and I'd
like to come with you, kay?" The woman readily agreed with her new drak.
Lian had noticed by now that there were two draks still unpaired, while only
one aspirant was left. One was the ever-playful day named Allervan. The other
was a somewhat quieter but mischeivous-looking male earth.
Allervan
quickly snapped up the mud drak, announcing that he'd paired and was going home
with Chesean, which left the other male drak. Tornanex glanced at it
uncertainly, and said. "I could take him back with me, too, if you want."
"Me too!" Wynsie piped up.
Lian just shrugged. "Whatever he wants to do.
I don't care." He hadn't noticed, but the earth drakling was eyeing him with
keen interest now, and started to grin.
"I wanna go with you, Lian!"
The
archivist's head shot up at that, staring at the drakling gathered at his feet.
"What? No! You can't pair me! I'm an archivist, I don't want to be a
knight!"
The drakling was obviously ignoring him. "I'm Kortrvan, Lian.
And anyway, you don't want Mom to get mad at you because you left me on my own,
would you?"
"No, I guess not..." Lian said, eyeing the large Wind drak
nervously.
"Grrreat! Let'ss go, then!" Kortrvan exclaimed innocently,
pulling gently on Lian's sleeve.
The archivist-turned-knight sighed.
"Stubborn drak..."
Draklings
Tornanex and
Female Ore Korchanrv (Trainers: Mud Melani and Desert Amiladu-Taykah)
Wynsie and Rain Sianrv (Trainers: Xalali and Fire Verenayat)
Chesean and Male Day Allervan (Trainer: Wind Shuenrv)
Lian and
Male Earth Kortrvan (Trainers: Dranal and Fire Delsayat)
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