Schemes

Sarrintha set down the last box of her sister's things on the floor of her new den and took a moment to stretch the aches out of her back. They'd been at it all day, but it was finally done. All the new furniture, all of Meilora's personal possessions and treasures, and a extra, extra large dragon bed now filled the main room of a den that was half the size of their living room.

The furniture had been set down in no particular order, other than the human-sized bed, which now filled ninety percent of the small bedroom attached to the rear of the den, and the boxes were piled up in little towers like stalagmites breaking up the narrow rivers of floor still visible between the furniture islands. It was a small, cramped space designed as little more than a starting zone for a new rider just learning the ropes. It was perfect. It was Meilora's.

Jealousy was a familiar friend to Sarrintha. Growing up in the Warren, she had no shortage of examples of better lives, better families, better choices. Though she loved her family fiercely, she often wondered what it would have been like to have a normal family. The kind where she and her twin, Alyenka, were the only kids and they had a normal number of parents. Then again, no other family in the Warren could summon up a small army to deal with problematic people.

There were definite pros and cons to being born into the largest family in the whole of Lanutha (possibly the whole of the world, though she knew they didn't hold a candle to some of those weird Nexus families). Seeing her sister, her younger sister bond before her? That was a definite con. Worst of all, her parents weren't even upset by the underhanded way in which Meilora had gone about getting herself searched.

Honestly, befriending a hathydra. It was reckless and dangerous and she'd even gone into the deep tunnels of the Warren. That was just straight up illegal. What rankled most of all was that Sarrintha hadn't thought to do it first.

"Alright, you're all set. Are you sure you don't need anything else? I can help you with a grocery run," Aleynka, the literal golden child of the family and Sarrintha's twin, said. She stood with their newly minted dragon riding sister, hands on her shoulders like the motherly older sister that she was.

Alyenka had a foot of height on Meilora, mostly due to her digigrade legs. The curving rams horns, just like Sarrintha's own, added a few inches as well. In contract, Meilora and her twin, Teilora, were among the most human looking of the Ferrin brood. Short, thin, perfectly normal, save for the green wings sprouting from her back. She gazed up at her older sister with a beaming smile.

Behind Meilora, seated on the floor with tail curled around her lanky legs, was Meilora's new bond. The little cream coloured dragonet looked normal enough. For now. Sarrintha knew soon she would start growing more heads and take on more features of her hydra heritage.

As if she could feel the weight of her thoughts, Ydyhinelou turned her head to face Sarrintha and narrowed her eyes.

Sarrintha narrowed her eyes right back.

"I'm fine, really. I'm just down the hall from you guys anyway. I'll be over all the time," Meilora promised.

Alyenka drew Mei into a hug, signalling to Sarrintha that they were preparing to leave. Meilora needed to learn to live on her own for a bit. Just like her twin, Teilora, who'd taken off to a distant mage tower years ago.

Ugh. They were so independent. Rubbing everyone's faces in it too. Like Sarrintha couldn't also be that independent if she didn't have a gaggle of younger siblings to look after.

Sarrintha navigated the sea of boxes and furnishings until she stood next to her siblings. When Alyenka released Mei, Sarrintha drew her into a grizzly embrace, earning an "eep" from the smaller girl.

"If anyone hassles you, you let me know," she whispered in Mei's ear.

Mei let out a short, nervous laugh and returned her sister's squeeze, though not quite as forcefully.

"Always, Sari. You'll be the first to know."

Sarrintha, Sari to her siblings, drew back and held Mei at arm's length. For all her grumpy displeasure over how things had played out, she was still immensely proud of her sister. Though she refused to acknowledge it, a small part of her was deeply concerned for her as well.

She'd be just down the hall, she told the irritating little voice in the back of her head. Right nearby. Nowhere near as far away as Teilora.

Yes, but they were leaving, the voice argued. Soon, more siblings would fly the nest too. And then where would she be? Still at home with her parents? All alone with no progress to show for her life.

Sarrintha promptly told the voice where it could shove its doom mongering and fixed Mei with a tight smile.

"Love you, sis," she said.

"Love you both," Mei replied.

The moment the door shut behind them on the way out, Sarrintha dropped back into her dark musings.

Meilora had to sneak around to get herself searched. She'd gone out and done a thing and it had paid off in spades. Every time Sarrintha snuck out as a youth, she just got in trouble. Every late party, every young love, every mini adventure, always ended with her parents cracking down on her. Then again, she had been a very difficult and willful child. Even she could admit that. Eventually she'd learned to follow Alyenka's lead (mostly) and had settled down. She completed her education, helped with the siblings, and did all the things a good older sister was supposed to do. Yet always in the back of her mind ticked away a clock. How long until she got searched? How long until it was her turn to shine?

It had never occurred to Sarrintha to pursue some other form of employment. Despite her parent's urging, she'd never taken an interest in anything that took place on the ground. She was the first born of dragon riding parents. It was her birthright to stand for a dragon, dammit. It was all she wanted in life.

Yet here she stood, still stuck on the ground, while her sister soared on to a brighter future.

"I know that look," Alyenka said, interrupting her downward spiral.

"What look?" Sarrintha didn't take her eyes off the tunnel in front of her. It was a five minute walk back to their family den. Five minutes for her to figure out what to do with these swirling, uncomfortable emotions.

"That look," Alyenka said pointedly. "The one that says you're plotting something."

"I don't plot," Sarrintha countered.

"Fine. Scheming."

"I don't scheme."

"You are always scheming. You scheme in your sleep. You scheme over breakfast. You scheme about your schemes."

"Okay, if you say scheme anymore, the word is going to lose all meaning," Sarrintha retorted.

"Schemey Mcschemerson," Alyenka teased.

Sarrintha juked to the side, bumping her shoulder into her sister. Alyenka lost her stride and stumbled for several steps, giggling like the maniac that she was the whole time.

"Alright, but seriously, what's up?" She pressed once she regained her composure.

And because Sarrintha knew her sister would not let this go, she decided to drag her into her death spiral of thoughts.

"Doesn't it bother you?" She asked, giving her golden twin a sideways glance. "That Meilora bonded first?"

"No. Should it?" Alyenka countered.

"We're older. Some would even say we're too old to be candidates now."

"Yeah, but those people are old-fashioned. Did you hear about that fourty-year old cleric who bonded at a flurry?"

"Exactly," Sarrintha hissed. "But at the same time, we should've been tapped a decade ago. Even Mei only got to attend that clutch because she did something stupid and got caught."

"That's not what got her searched though."

"No, but it got her in front of the dragons who needed to search her. We've lived all our lives around Dracoth, Merlinth, Onithris, and Sunaka, but none of them are search dragons."

"Aren't the search dragons just supposed to know when you're ready? I figured they'd just send mom and dads a letter or something."

"Yeah, so did I, and maybe that's the problem." Sarrintha stopped walking as a new thought, a new scheme, struck her. "All this time we've been doing things by the book, but if you listen to all the older riders talk about how they got here, none of them waited for a dragon to swoop out of the sky and pick them. They all did something to change their own fates."

Alyenka stopped walking several steps after Sarrintha. She turned to face her sister, and the quiet inquisitiveness that had marked her face during their walk transformed slowly into fatigue.

"You're not going to do something stupid, are you?" She asked.

Sarrintha answered with a fierce smile.

"Sari, we're supposed to set a good example."

"This is the best example," Sarrintha countered. She turned abruptly on her heels and began quick-marching back down the hall. Over her shoulder, she said, "Tell mom and dads I'll be back later. Love you, bye!"

Then she started to run.

"Sari!" Alyenka barked.

If she looked back, she knew she'd see that disappointed look on her sister's face. It might be enough to cause her to falter. So instead, Sarrintha put her head down and barrelled on forward. If she paused to think, if she considered the consequences of her soon-to-be actions, all would be lost.

What Sarrintha didn't expect in her mad dash into the future was to hear footsteps thundering up behind her.

"If you think I'm letting you do this alone, you're crazy! I'm going to follow you and report back to mom and dads everything you do," Alyenka shrieked.

Sarrintha let out a matching, wordless shriek and picked up speed.

***

K'lter hadn't necessarily wanted to be head search rider when he'd been thrust into the position. He'd been happy following Ki'yeal's lead. Then Ki'yeal went and got himself hitched and moved off-world, and the only remaining Audil who could 'take the throne' so to speak was too young. So it fell to the next oldest and most experienced search rider; K'lter.

At the time, he'd been thrilled to take up the mantle. It was an esteemed position previously staffed by the most recognized family in all of Lanutha. That joy had lasted a few months before fatigue set in.

These days, decades later, K'lter was resigned to his position as the adult in a room of rabid, dragon-crazed fan boys. So many people came to the Warren now seeking fame and fortune as a dragon rider. Most of them he turned away at the door. Those few who got through went through endless rounds of testing and qualifying before they could even think about standing before the search dragons.

All the dragons had to do was give them a good sniff.

::That's not all of it,:: Penorith countered.

::Oh yeah? What do you do that's so hard?:: K'lter shot back.

::Well right now I have to put up with someone shouting 'search me search me search me' over and over again. At least you get to kick people out of your office. I'm not even allowed to drop them off a cliff.::

K'lter's head came up. His eyebrows crashed together and formed deep crevices of confusion across his brow. He had been half-heartedly picking through today's latest mailed in applications while arguing with his bond. So many of these deeply personal and tragic tales of why only a dragon could fix someone's life sounded so much the same that he would not be surprised to learn they'd all copied off each other. They were easy to assess while also debating the value of a day's work.

Penorith's statement, however, did not fit into their routine daily banter. Penorith did not need to listen to petulant children screaming at him. That was K'lter's job. Penorith, the calm and immovable force that he was, did not ever threaten to throw people off cliffs either.

K'lter pushed up from his desk quickly enough to cause his chair to scrape audibly across the stone floor. He couldn't detect any alarm or anger coming off his bond, so he didn't run down the dragon tunnel. He did speed walk though, eager as he was to see what the hell Penorith was talking about.

Due to his position and his tenure at the Warren, K'lter had one of the coveted dens available in the Warren itself. When he stepped outside, he stepped onto the flight fields, rather than a ledge hanging out over the mountain side of New Warren. Here on the fields, the dragons napped or played or practiced as they desired. Penorith himself preferred to bask in the sun while sprawled out over the entrance to their den. He was not there today. Instead, K'lter spotted his cloudy blue bond seated several feet away, head swivelling to and fro, as a pair of purple and golden women circled around him.

"Search me!" The purple woman barked at Penorith.

"Sarrintha, stop this!" The golden one pleaded. She made a lunge for the purple one's arm. Sarrintha dodged it with the expert grace of a dancer.

"Search me!" Sarrintha shouted again.

Penorith lifted his attention from the bickering women and fixed his bond with a look. A ghost of red coloured the edges of his violet eyes.

::See what I put up with?::

"Would either of you mind explaining what's going on here?" K'lter demanded as he approached the odd trio.

Immediately, the two women stopped what they were doing and whirled around to face him. The golden one made a small sound of surprise. The purple one grinned triumphantly.

"You're the head search rider, right? I know you are. I've seen your face everywhere. I'm getting searched today, and that's that." Declaration made, Sarrintha planted her hands on her hips and waited.

"And you two are…?" K'lter asked.

"We're-"

"Sarritha Ferrin," the purple one cut in sharply. "Daughter of Talitha, M'lor, and T'lor Ferrin. My parents are long standing riders. Mom even flies in the Primus Wing. My sister, Meilora, just bonded too. My point is, we've got strong, dragon riding blood and I deserve a chance to try. I'm not leaving here until I'm searched."

The golden one pressed her hands over her face, as if she could will herself out of existence by simply not looking at reality for a little bit.

K'lter stared at the two women in dumbfounded silence. He spent so much time arguing with farmers, goat herders, and lordlings from other princelets, that he never thought to search within the Warren's own borders anymore. He just imagined anyone who wanted to be searched at the Warren had been already. Though now that he thought about it, that was a stupid notion. There were always more dragon rider brats coming of age, more families blending together in dens, more new comers settling in and becoming Warrenites. The Warren never had a shortage of new blood. He could blame the lapse on his less experienced search riders, who were supposed to find the easier targets, but that would be disingenuous. They took their lead from him, and he simply didn't think to look inward these days.

Now that he gave them a good, hard look, he did recognize these two as well. He'd watched them grow up in spurts and bounds, along with all their other siblings. Everyone in the Warren knew of the Ferrin family. Everyone expected the whole brood to be dragon riders some day too.

"Right. Okay," K'lter said as he gathered his thoughts. "You know there's an application process, right?"

"For outsiders," Sarrintha countered. "I don't need temporary housing or a background check. I want to be searched the old fashioned way."

::We have never searched anyone by having them yell at me,:: Penorith grumped.

::That's not entirely true,:: K'lter countered. He could think of a few frantic searches in the past.

"Okay, you've got a point. I'll need to adjust the application process. That said, yelling at my dragon isn't going to make the process go any faster. You'll be searched when you're ready."

::Oh, they're ready,:: Penorith said.

K'lter choked on his own tongue.

::Excuse me?::

::They're all ready. The whole Ferrin family is worthy of standing. I assumed you would just know that because… you know…::

::No, I don't know. Explain it to me.::

::Well, everything she just said. They all have strong, dragon rider blood. In fact, all the rider brats do. I figured you'd just call them up when they came of age. Didn't think I needed to announce it.::

K'lter raised a hand and pinched the bridge of his nose. He felt a headache coming on.

::Do you understand that the entire family will want to have a go at us if I tell them they've been qualified since forever?::

::Then don't tell them that part. Duh.::

"Well?" Sarrintha demanded.

K'tler realized he'd been standing there, unmoving save for the slow, deliberate massaging of his fingers, for several minutes.

"Yeah, okay. You're searched," he said.

Sarrintha let out a whoop of joy and hugged her sister. Penorith snorted and rolled his eyes, but at least his mental threads felt less stressed than they had a minute ago. K'lter, meanwhile, turned around and marched back into his den to write two letters.

The first letter he sent to the creative design department to be turned into a poster and plastered around the Warren and New Warren. The poster welcomed any and all dragon rider children to apply for searching, declaring that they were naturally exempt from the tedious application process due to their upbringing.

The second letter he sent directly to the Ferrin den. It read as follows:

Talitha, T'lor, and M'lor,

Hi. 

From the desk of-

I hope you're all doing well. This is just a quick letter to let you know that all of your children are hereby officially (or unofficially) searched. Yes, even the infant. Whenever you feel they're ready to stand, bring them down to my office and I'll get them sorted.

Cheers,

Head Search Rider K'lter

Teritus Wing