A Special Afternoon (part 2 of 2)

Writers: AmajoS, Estelle
Date Posted: 12th April 2019

Characters: Benna, L'keri
Description: L'keri decides it's time to introduce Benna to his children.
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 10, day 16 of Turn 9
Notes: Directly follows 'Really Great or Really Scary'

L'keri

When they arrived at the brownrider's weyr, there were two children
already waiting by the door. A boy of eleven or twelve turns slouched
against the wall, his strong resemblance to L'keri only marred by the
resentful scowl on his face. The little girl had been skipping back and
forth across the corridor, humming to herself. When she spotted them,
her eyes lit up and she hurtled towards L'keri with her arms outstretched.

"Daddy!" She collided with his legs and wrapped her arms around them
tightly.

He bent down and scooped her up for a hug. "Hello, darling. How was class?"

"Oh, it was fun! We learned a new song, and I got to have a go on the
drum, and then we practised our reading and the journeywoman said I was
very..." She noticed Benna and blushed, hiding her head against his
shoulder.

"Eluri..." He set her down and gently encouraged her to look up. "Arten.
This is my friend Benna, rider of green Henerath. She's come to spend
the afternoon with us."

The boy rolled his eyes, which L'keri supposed was not the worst
reaction he could have had to the news. Eluri looked at Benna with wide
dark eyes. "Good day, ma'am," she said shyly.

Benna squatted down so she was closer to eye-level with the little
girl and said, "It's very nice to meet you, Eluri," with a big smile.
She turned the smile on the older boy and said, "And you as well,
Arten." Arten certainly seemed as sullen as L'keri's comments and
general air of worry on the way to his weyr led her to believe he
might be. She just decided to ignore the sullenness and hope that it
went away after a while. Not the most inspired plan, she knew, but she
wasn't sure what else to do. She stood, "I've been looking forward to
meeting you both for a while now."

The boy made a scoffing sound and turned on L'keri with a challenging
look. "Can I go now?"

L'keri took a deep breath and counted to five. He wanted to get on
better with his son. And, he had to admit, he'd hardly given the boy
reason to want to spend time with him over the past Turns. On the other
hand, there was no reason for him to be so rude to Benna. "I'd like you
to stay, Arten. At least for a short while. You can play with your
friends later."

Arten gave his father a contemptuous look, though it wasn't clear
whether it was at the idea that he might want to play, or that he had
friends at all in his unwanted new home. "Fine."

"Well...let's go in." L'keri held open the door of the weyr..

"Can we say hello to Rhalith?" Eluri asked hopefully. She glanced at her
brother. Whatever he might think of their father, she knew he loved
L'keri's dragon as much as she did.

"Of course," L'keri said, relieved. "He's in his couch." As she ran in
to greet the brown with Arten following and doing his best to look
indifferent, he looked at Benna and mouthed "sorry" under his breath.

She shrugged. It wasn't unexpected and, while she would have liked to
have been instantly liked by both children, that was expecting a bit
much. Benna bumped L'keri's shoulder with her own and gave him a
smile. "It could have gone worse," she mummered quietly.

L'keri put an arm around her waist and squeezed gently. She was right,
but they still had the rest of the afternoon to get through, and he was
worried that Arten was only just getting started.

They followed the children over to the couch. Eluri was standing on her
tiptoes, reaching up and happily scratching at the bottom of Rhalith's
jaw while the sleepy brown puffed warm air at her to make her giggle.
Arten stood back a little, watching. He wasn't quite smiling, but his
expression was less guarded than before - until he saw his father
approaching.

"Either of you want a drink? Juice?" L'keri asked.

"No."

"Yes, please!" Eluri gave Rhalith a last pat and skipped over to join
them. She seemed a little less shy now, as if the dragon's presence had
given her confidence.

"Okay. I'll get some. Why don't you two get to know Benna, while you're
waiting?" He headed over to the back of the weyr, where he'd left a jug
to cool.

Arten ignored his father's request and went to stand at the outer
entrance, looking out moodily over the ledge and radiating hostility.
Left on her own, his sister's shyness returned, but she did pluck up the
courage to ask a question.

"Are you in my Daddy's wing, ma'am?"

"No, I'm in Cobalt Wing," Benna replied with a friendly smile. She'd
make friends with at least one of L'keri's children today, she hoped.
"We came here from River Bluff Weyr after the earthquake."

"I was born at River Bluff," Eluri said solemnly. "But I don't remember
it. When we left, I was a baby." She wound a long strand of dark hair
around her finger. "Arten remembers it. He says it was nice there."

She smiled at the boy, "It was nice, wasn't it? I miss it a lot,
especially this winter. It's a lot colder here, don't you think?"

"Yes. It's cold." Arten's voice dripped with contempt. "That's what you
get for living up in the mountains in the middle of nowhere."

"Arten, don't..." Eluri gave her brother a pleading look.

"Dunno why anyone would want to live here. Unless they got kicked out of
their last Weyr for being a drunken idiot."

"That's enough, Arten," L'keri said sharply, returning with the drink.

The boy ignored him and turned to Benna. "He's told you about that, right?"

She glanced at L'keri. He hadn't told her anything about that, or
really gone into detail about why he'd come here from River Bluff at
all. She hadn't actually ever asked either though. And, really, did it
matter? If he hadn't been here, she wouldn't have met him and she
thought that would have been a real shame. She wasn't sure what to say
to Arten though. Or L'keri, for that matter. Things had escalated
quickly and she felt a bit out of her depth.

The brownrider had gone very still, clutching the glass in one hand. "I
wasn't kicked out and you know it. I was having a bad time, and they
thought I'd be better off here." His voice was low, with a slight tremor
as he fought to control his anger.

"A bad time?" Arten retorted. "Is that what they call staggering in to
your wing meeting twenty minutes late, completely wasted, and telling
your Wingleader he's an pompous wherry's ass and your six-Turn-old
daughter could do a better job of leading the riders into Fall?"

L'keri saw the tears gathering in Eluri's eyes, and decided he'd had
enough. "All right. Fine. Go and do whatever it was you were going to
do. But we're going to talk about this."

"Right," the boy said caustically. "You'll probably get drunk and forget
about it." With that, he stormed out of the weyr.

L'keri let out his breath slowly, cursing himself for an idiot. He
should never have brought Benna into this. He'd known how Arten might
react. Realising he was still holding Eluri's juice, he crouched down
beside her. "Here you are, sweetheart." He looked up at Benna. "I'm
sorry. He's finding it hard to settle in."

Benna felt a little like she had just witnessed a volcano eruption or a
tornado. "Did you really tell your wingleader he was a pompous wherry's
ass?" Her voice was somewhere between appalled and amused.

"So they say. I don't actually remember it myself," L'keri admitted. It
was a pity, really. He wished he could have seen the look on his former
Wingleader's face. "In my defence, he _was_ a pompous ass. And we'd just
got the news about River Bluff, so...it wasn't a good day, altogether."

She shook her head a bit in bemusement. What was she going to do with
this man-child of a brownrider she seemed to be falling for? Well, she
supposed she couldn't blame him too much. Some people handled bad news
better than others. Deciding not to worry about it, Benna turned her
attention to Eluri. "Hey," she said to the little girl, her tone
conspiratorial, "I need your help with something very important."

Eluri was clutching her drink, her lip trembling as she tried to fight
back the tears. She hated it when her brother and father argued. Every
time they were together, she hoped it wouldn't happen, but it always
did. There was something about Benna's tone that calmed her, though, and
drew her attention. She looked up, sniffed and brushed her eyes with the
back of her hand. "What's that, ma'am?"

"Your father has promised that we'd play some games today, but I don't
know which one to pick. Will you help me decide?" Maybe she could
still make friends with one of them today. Maybe the other would just
take some time.

"Okay," the girl said shyly, the tears receding at the thought of
playing a game with her father. She didn't get the chance very often. "I
like cards. Well, I like looking at the pictures, but I'm not very good.
Arten always wins."

"You could play with Benna, if you like," L'keri suggested, going over
to a shelf to fetch a selection of games. "You can try and defeat me. If
you dare."

Eluri looked up at Benna. "Can I?"

"Absolutely. I think, between the two of us, we'll make him eat those
words. What do you say?" She held out her hand for the girl to shake.

A wide smile broke over the girl's face. Although at first glance she
looked very little like her father, in that smile she resembled L'keri
almost as much as her brother did. She reached out and shook Benna's
hand. Then, she tugged at the greenrider's sleeve to lead her over to
L'keri's couch.

"Right then." L'keri dragged a chair over to sit opposite them at the
table and shuffled the pack of cards with a snap. "It's the two pretty
young upstarts against the invincible brownrider. What shall we play?
Rummy?"

"I think beating you at Rummy would be great fun. Don't you agree, Eluri?"

She giggled in delight at the funny face her father made at that
comment, and moved closer to Benna, leaning in so that she could see the
hand of cards L'keri dealt them. She wished Arten could have been there,
but her father was, and he was happier than she'd seen him. It was
enough to make this a special afternoon.

Last updated on the April 16th 2019

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A Special Afternoon (part 2 of 2)