Hollow Between Heartbeats
Dragonsfall Weyr
Amber Hills Hold
Vintner Hall
Healer Hall
Hidden Meadows
Dolphin Cove Weyr
Dolphin Hall
Emerald Falls Hold
Harper Hall
Printer Hall
Green Valley Hold
Leeward Lagoon Hold
Barrier Lake Weyr
Sunstone Seahold
Citrus Bay Hold
Writers: Duskdog
Date Posted: 16th May 2025
Characters: Chandrany
Description: Chandrany fails. Again. Just like she always does.
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr
Date: month 6, day 26 of Turn 12
Notes: Mentioned: Farangen, Panitath, Loseth
The Sands were clearing.
Chandrany stood frozen for a long moment, her feet stinging where the heat had bitten through the thin soles of her sandals. Around her, the weyrfolk roared their celebration for the last Impressing pair -- a golden swell of noise that felt like it came from a different world, as if she were underwater and the rest of the Weyr was far above. She barely heard it.
The last hatchling had paired off, a bright little green, chirping her delight as she bumped into her rider and sent him sprawling backward in the sand. Around Chandrany, the other candidates shifted, murmured to each other, beginning the slow, stiff-footed walk back toward the barracks.
Chandrany didn't move.
She stared across the Sands -- now strewn with broken shells and scorched, trodden sand -- and felt her heart hammering against her ribs, hard and hopelessly fast. Her throat felt as if it had closed up. Her stomach was tight, something inside fluttering uncomfortably.
Another Hatching. Another day standing in the heat, hoping so hard it made her chest hurt, only to be left behind again.
She clenched her hands at her sides, feeling the grit of sand sticking to her sweaty palms. She wanted to be better than this. She wanted to be gracious, proud for her friends who had Impressed. Proud for _Farangen_, who had wanted this as badly as she did. She wanted to pretend it didn’t matter.
But the ugly knot of anger and disappointment rising in her throat made it impossible to lie to herself.
She exhaled hard through her nose, squared her shoulders, and forced her feet into motion. Many of the other candidates were still filing out politely, heads bent, whispering or just shuffling silently, grappling with their own failure. Some looked dejected; a couple looked as angry as she felt. Chandrany cut straight through them, head high, strides longer and faster than she needed, barely keeping herself from shoving through a knot of weyrbrats clustered near the exit.
Let them stare. Let them think she was furious, or bitter, or just plain childish.
It’s not like they would be wrong, after all.
She heard someone call her name -- a girl’s voice, another candidate, warm and apologetic -- but she didn’t stop. _Couldn’t_ stop, unless she wanted to break down in front of the entire Weyr so that they could all know what a fecking _toddler_ she was.
The heat of the Sands gave way to the cooler air of the weyrbowl, but Chandrany barely noticed. She stalked past the waiting crowds, ignoring the curious glances and sympathetic smiles. She didn't want sympathy. She didn't want soft words and promises that _it’s okay, next time will be different, your dragon just hasn’t shelled yet_.
She wanted to scream.
She wanted to _belong_.
Her hands were trembling by the time she pushed into a Lower Caverns entrance and ducked down a narrow side tunnel, one of the many that spinnerwebbed off from the cavern’s main paths. She half-ran up a stone stairwell, the slap of her sandals echoing off stone walls, until she found herself at the upper storeroom she sometimes snuck into -- a place tucked away behind the kitchens, half-forgotten and always blissfully empty.
Chandrany yanked the door open and slipped inside, pressing it shut behind her.
Only then, in the heavy dimness smelling of old grain and dust, did she let herself sag against the wall. And only then did she admit that she could feel the sting behind her eyes and taste the burn of tears in her throat.
She thumped the back of her head against the wall once, twice, three times, trying to will the feeling away. "You're fine," she whispered fiercely. "You don't need this. You don't--"
But the words cracked in the middle, and for a few miserable seconds, she just stood there, breathing hard, fists pressed tight against her thighs.
It shouldn't matter so much. She _knew_ it shouldn't.
There would be other clutches, other chances. Panitath and Loseth’s hatchlings weren’t the only dragons that would ever grace Dolphin Cove's Sands, nor would it be Panitath’s last. And Chandrany was only eighteen -- plenty of candidates didn't Impress until twenty, twenty-one.
Plenty of good, strong, stubborn people had to wait longer than this.
But none of those facts mattered right now, because every Hatching she stood and failed made the little whisper in her heart louder:
Not enough.
Not good enough.
And no matter how hard she fought it, it was starting to sound more like the truth.
She scrubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands, furious with herself.
Tears didn’t fix anything.
Tears didn’t change the fact that the hatchlings had walked right past her â€" some without a glance, some with a flicker of curiosity before they moved on to someone else.
(Someone _better_.)
Tears didn’t change the fact that her _best friend_ had walked away with a dragon, and she hadn’t. He’d looked so happy. Euphoric, in that moment. She’d seen that look on plenty of other newly-Impressed before, but seeing it on _his_ face had felt like a slap in the face, a _betrayal_. He’d gotten what she craved so badly, and what he’d gotten was taking him away from her. He was leaving her behind, as surely as the hatchlings had. He would forget her. She wouldn’t be good enough for him, either, anymore.
She _hated_ him.
She _hated_ that sharding hatchling. That stupid green. That rotten, ugly creature who didn’t think she was worth even looking at, but took her friend away from her like he was _hers_ to steal.
She shouldn’t hate the dragon. It was a _dragon_. It was a _baby_. It wasn’t rotten and it wasn’t ugly. How could she hate a baby dragon? How could she hate her _friend_?
It wasn’t their fault that she wasn’t good enough.
It wasn’t the first time she had failed, and she had seen plenty of friends Impress and leave her behind. She had always known that Farangen Impressing before her -- or Impressing when she _never_ did -- was a possibility.
She just hadn't expected it to hurt this much.
She was stupid for falling for it again. Stupid for hoping. Even after her failure as a harper -- even after telling herself she'd learned better -- a stubborn little ember had still been burning inside her, whispering: _this is different. You’re meant for this._ But it always turned out that the dragons didn't agree.
Chandrany squeezed her eyes shut and inhaled slowly through her nose, counting the beats. One. Two. Three. Four.
She pictured herself like a tree, her feet rooted deep into the ground, unmoving, unshakable. Or… the trees that took root here in the sand of the cove weren't like that. The trees in the sand bent with the wind, and withstood storms that would uproot even the mightiest of hardwoods.
Which did she want to be? Immovable or adaptable?
Anything was better than this, at least.
She’d stood through worse than disappointment.
She’d survived shame before.
She knew how to take a blow and stay on her feet.
When she opened her eyes again, they were still wet -- but her spine was straighter, her jaw set firm.
The world hadn't ended.
It felt a little like it had, here in the small, still storeroom -- out on those Sands -- but it hadn’t.
Somewhere outside this room, the Weyr was already moving on. Riders were celebrating. Weyrfolk were carrying food and drink to the feast. The newly Impressed weyrlings were already clustered around their dragonets, beginning their new lives. Farangen was out there, feeding his (not stupid) little dragon. She wondered what name he had settled on. After turns of hemming and hawing on it, he had finally picked something a few months back, and she had laughed and poked and bullied him about it because she thought it was stupid, and he hadn’t brought it up again.
Maybe that’s why the dragons didn’t want her. Maybe that’s why _he_ would be glad to leave her behind. Because she was a bully.
_No_, it didn’t help to think like that.
_The world hadn’t ended,_ and Chandrany was still here. Still standing. Still stubborn enough to keep going.
Because giving up just wasn’t in her.
Last updated on the May 26th 2025