Things Not Revealed (1/2)

Writers: Avery, Yvonne
Date Posted: 1st August 2017

Characters: Kapera, J'nus
Description: Kapera and J'nus have a serious chat.
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr
Date: month 12, day 22 of Turn 8
Notes: Mentioned: Cyradis, D'hol, Jeyme, Chaysea
Notes: part 1 of 2

Kapera

The one good thing about what had happened at River Bluff had been how
busy it made the goldriders. Kapera had been involved in talking with
Chaysea about what they could afford to send without depleting their
own reserves, tallying the lists of supplies they'd sent to River
Bluff to make sure they didn't lose track of any of it, and listing
out what they would need to re-stock after this mess ended.

By busying herself with Lower Caverns-related goldrider tasks rather
than Wing ones, and using Chaysea as a go-between, she'd been able to
avoid having to spend too much time around Cyradis. And when they had
encountered each other they'd both been too tired by the weight of
their response effort to think about any interpersonal issues.That was
an improvement from the sharp cooling it had suffered after the
arguments of the last sevenday.

It was a candlemarks after sunset and the Dolphin Cove weyrbowl was
surprisingly quiet. Perhaps everyone was tired emotionally and
physically after the mixed demands of their own Weyr's needs and
running support. Kapera felt tired herself, but it wasn't a physical
exhaustion. It was a mixture of feeling both burned out emotionally
and like she had an odd vulnerable aching in her chest.

She had tried to go to sleep early - and alone - but she'd just laid
there with awful visions playing out behind her eyes. After a
half-candlemark of failure, she stood up and resolved to leave her
weyr. She looked down at the v-necked silk slip that barely covered
her breasts and nethers, and briefly contemplated just walking the
halls in it. **No need to make Cyradis _more_ angry,** she thought.
Then pulled a light silk robe over it and tied it at the waist for
modesty. Then she padded along the inside corridors until she reached
a familiar weyr and knocked on the door.

It took a few moments before the door opened. J'nus held it wide so
that Kapera could come in. "Hello, beautiful. It's been a while."

She stepped inside his weyr and waited till the door shut before
turning around to face him. The compliment brought a touch of a smile
to her lips. She always appreciated being called nice names, and it
was especially warming as opposed to the harsher ones being flung
around lately.

"It's been a long few days," she said. Though it had been much longer
then that. But there were excuses, always excuses...

"I'd imagine," the bronzerider said dryly. He let his gaze wander down
from her face to take in the goldrider's wardrobe. Generally when
Kapera came by this late in the evening and was dressed like that, she
had one thing on her mind. It was flattering that she'd found her way
to his weyr and not D'hol's. Or someone else's. "Here for a nightcap?
I have... redfruit juice."

"That sounds good," she said as she strolled farther in to find a
seat, thinking she could use something cool and refreshing.

What had happened at River Bluff had given her nightmares of a similar
thing happening here, of injuries to herself and Riyanth, or to J'nus
and Kopth. She hadn't gone in person but the draconic images were bad
enough. She didn't know if they had gone at all, either.

"I dropped by because I wanted to see you. Make sure you're okay," she
added, feeling silly as she said it. It sounded lame and forced.

"Why would you be worried about me? I should be asking that about you."
J'nus followed Kapera into his weyr and poured her a glass of juice. He
usually asked for two glasses now, just in case she stopped by. More
often than not it meant that he had two glasses to himself. He set the
jug aside and turned to hand the goldrider the glass. "Like you said,
you've had a long few days."

She took the glass and settled on a chair.

"Have you been to River Bluff? Seen it in person?" she asked. "I haven't
but I can't stop thinking about - what if that was here?"

"I've been," the bronzerider said grimly, settling into the chair
opposite her. "It's... bad, Kapera. Don't go if you don't have to." The
cliff face had obliterated the entrance to so many weyrs and caverns,
and he hadn't been able to shake the image of Lenala and Vilarth crushed
beneath the mountain. /Between/ would have been a kinder death. "I can't
imagine... I hope it doesn't happen here. Nobody deserves that."

"I keep imagining Riyanth refusing to leave her eggs, and that it was
me. Or I imagine that you were asleep in your weyr, and we tried to get
to you, and we couldn't," she said, her voice vulnerable. They were
hideous images, and they'd been keeping her up at night.

J'nus flashed a brief smile. "You know I'm a light sleeper. And Kopth
and I would come for you and Riyanth."

She'd come here seeking reassurance that he was alive and well. She
hadn't expected to bring up what was bothering her in truth, just to
distract them both from what they'd seen over the last few days. And
yet the moment she'd laid eyes on him the truth had tripped off her
tongue.

There was a simple sincerity in his words that touched her. "I trust
you. We'd save each other."

And then she didn't know what else to say, suddenly.

She trusted him - to save her life, to tell him vulnerabilities she
didn't open up about. But she also concealed things from him. She
hadn't mentioned what had happened with D'hol directly even though the
fallout from that seemed to be circulating all over the Weyr, in ways
that her dalliances with others never seemed to draw attention. And
she'd been carrying the secret from earlier this Turn for months
without telling him. Long enough that it had caused some things to
cool, and he didn't even know why. Had he even noticed?

There were times they had comfortable silences, but this one had
stretched on long enough that it probably wasn't anymore. The spectre
of things she hadn't talked about with him seemed to hang in the air,
invisible but with weight.

The silence stretched until J'nus reached across the space between them
to take the goldrider's hand in his own. He ran his thumb over the back
of her hand but couldn't quite look her in the eye. "Well. What happened
to River Bluff Weyr was a freak accident. And River Bluff Weyr is so
much more geologically unstable than here. I'm just glad that we have
the room to take on the extra people and dragons. It's going to be very
different with so many more people under the cliff."

The pressure of his hand against hers was soothing. She half-closed her
eyes and let her head loll back.

"I remember when we- when Dragonsfall had to send riders here, after the
Fall accident. I guess opening Dolphin Cove to River Bluff is paying it
back in some way. Chaysea and I were trying to figure out where to put
everyone. It'll be a bit tight for some folks. Good thing we have large
dragons and can't be moved out our weyrs."

"No, thank you." J'nus chuckled a bit and looked around his
overstuffed weyr. Packing to move from Dragonsfall Weyr to Dolphin
Cove had been an epic endeavor. "I'm not moving again any time soon if
I can help it."

Last updated on the September 2nd 2017

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Things Not Revealed (1/2)