Mountains of Desire

Writers: Eimi, Rochelle
Date Posted: 7th January 2007

Characters: R'mer, D'rue
Description: R'mer finds D'rue's romance novel, and is unwilling to believe that it actually belongs to a man...
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr
Date: month 1, day 4 of Turn 4

R'mer threw his pile of hides on the table and watched it slide across the smooth wood and onto the floor. He rolled his eyes as he got up from the chair. It had felt so nice to finally sit down! After that sharding meeting, he would have much rather just taken a nice long nap. Those things always wore him out. But he rose and carefully gathered the sheets up from the floor. And his reader. He had to find the children's reader he had tucked between the hides for practice.

Crawling along the floor to reach under the table he finally felt a bound book with the tips of his fingers. Funny, he didn't remember it being bound with leather... Pulling it out he looked at the hide-bound cover. This was _not_ his reader! He must have grabbed the wrong stack! Well then whose was _this_?

He opened the cover and looked at the title page. Sounding out each syllable carefully he made out the title. "Mo-ooo-tans... Mo-oo-tanes... Mow... Mountains. Mountains of Desirey." **'E' at the end and you read the vowel's name** he reminded himself. "Des-aye-r. Desire! Mountains of Desire!" **Huh?!**

Just what kind of a book was this? He flipped through it carefully. In the middle were a few illustrations. A woman collapsed in a man's arms as he carried her towards a remote mountain cot. The woman looking over her shoulder at the bearded man, covering herself as she bathed. The man standing between her and a ferocious feline with his belt knife ready to attack. The woman caressing his now clean shaven face. Looked like a _girls_ book. Cracking it open to a random page he began to read the first few lines he could find.

"Desss-an-dra" **must be a name** "Desandra...looked up...into the...eyes...of Sal-i-... Sal-ivan." Another name he assumed. They must be the couple in the pictures. "She could hard-ily...hardly br...breath...breathe? She could hardly breathe...as...she...felt him look-king into her... sowl. Sowl? Sool.. Soul. His vo...vo-ice...voi...voice was... ssssssoft and gen-tle as he whis-per-ed, 'Every thing I have done, I have done for you.' Dess...
Desandra felt her-self pull-edd into him as she... fin... fine...
final...ly... finally gave in to her deep-pest... deepest des...
desir...es...desir-es...desire-es...desires."

What in Faranth's name was this wherry dung? He dropped it to the table and wiped his hands on his trousers, almost ashamed to have touched it.
**Must belong to a greenrider.**

~*~

"Any of you ladies recognize this book?" R'mer called from the door of the girls side of the junior weyrlings barracks. He recognized the charts in the stack as ground drills, and since they were well past that point, it must belong to one of them. "It's called 'Mountains of Desire'? I don't know what its about since I haven't opened it... Anyone? Anyone at all? No?" Maybe they were down at the beach...

D'rue was about to enter the weyrling barracks when he overheard the senior weyrling calling into the girls' side of the barracks, and he froze. 'Mountains of Desire'...? His heart sinking, he raced inside to his cot, and began rifling through his pile of hides... which weren't his. Faranth! But wait... A basic reader? Did it belong to weyrling with his book...?

Slowly, he gathered the hides back into a neat pile, and tucked the book under his arm. Nonchalantly, he strolled back out of the barracks, and past the senior weyrling. He caught a glimpse, feeling his heart sink.
Yes, the dogeared copy was his... Swallowing, he dove around the side of the building to wait, his heart hammering in his chest.

R'mer stepped out into the sunlight, carefully tucking the book and stack of hides under his arm. If they were't in their barracks, perhaps they were down at the beach? Or in the Dinning Hall? Shards, he really didn't want to be screaming 'Mountains of Desire' through the crowded carvern at meal time!

D'rue waited until the senior weyrling passed him before he caught his attention. "Psst! Over here!"

"Yeah?" R'mer asked, turning to see who called him. "Oh hey. Yeah, you're the boy from the meeting, right? Who asked all the questions?" R'mer recognized him from the candidate class he had to go to. "You Impressed?"

Shards! He knew who it was, and worse! He remembered him! "Y..yes." He admitted cautiously. "You're looking for the owner of that book?" "Yeah, you know where she is?"

D'rue had a moment of relief before the sense of panic came back. R'mer thought that the book belonged to a girl! He could just pretend... but he was holding the rest of R'mer's hides. The other weyrling would almost certinly know something was wrong... Shardit!

"Yes." He said finally. "I know the owner of the book." Maybe he could still get it back without him knowing...

That was a relief. He didn't have to go searching through the whole Weyr to find her! "Who is it? I have to return this to her."

D'rue's mind raced, but it had gone suddenly blank. What was wrong with him? He should be able to come up with something to tell R'mer that would keep him from realizing the book was his! But nothing was coming...

"Uh." He said intelligently. "Um..."

R'mer waited for a few moments as the boy stuttered and stammered. "All right, how about just a description. Something to point me in the right direction maybe."

**Shardit, shardit, shardit!** D'rue hung his head, hoping that the senior weyrling couldn't see him turning red. "It's mine." He mumbled.

"I'm sorry?" R'mer asked, sure he had heard him wrong.

Was he _deaf_? D'rue clenched his fists, taking a deep, unsteady breath... and paused. The primer. If it belonged to R'mer, the bronzerider didn't really have the right to ridicule him, did he?
Slowly, he raised his head to look R'mer in the eye again, and after a pause said politely. "May I have my book back, please?"

"You must be thinking of a different book. Maybe someone else picked up your stack." R'mer checked the boys knots with a glance. No, he wasn't a greenrider, or even a blue. "This one is a greenrider kind of book. Not a... a _man's_ book."

D'rue stiffened at the insult, but managed to keep his voice somewhat even as he replied. "A _real_ man can read whatever he likes."

"Naw, this is harpery, drippy, romatic women's kind of mushy stuff. I mean, come on, the title is 'Mountains of Desire'. No man would be caught with this wherry dung in hand unless they bent towards the 'pretty' colors if you know what I mean."

D'rue clamped down on his feelings, sensing Wisarth stirring in the back of his mind. He couldn't let him know he was upset! He'd managed to figure out that much in training... "And how do you know what it's like, unless you've read it?" He asked reasonably, trying not to grind his teeth.

"I've read enough of it..." This boy didn't seem to be backing out of his claim over the book. Could it really be _his_? "So you mean to tell me you actually _read_ this stuff?"

"I read everything I can." He answered truthfully. "The subject doesn't matter." **Much...** He amended silently. Just because he _preferred_
romances didn't mean he had to admit it... "And what do you read, if you think that this is 'greenrider' material...?" He left the sentence trail off, deliberately easing the primer forward so that R'mer could see it easily. If it did belong to the bronzerider...

"Whatever I feel like," R'mer shrugged, noticing his primer in the boys's hands. Shards. D'rue saw the flash of recognition at the sight of the primer, and felt a moment of triumph. "Really?" He said blandly. "Then this wouldn't be yours. I found it mixed in with some hides when I grabbed the wrong bag."

"Well, yes, it was in my stuff," the bronzerider shrugged, fighting down the blush that he could feel threatening. "But I'm just looking it over. I'm thinking of sending it home for my siblings to use as a reader and I figured I'd better make sure it was of good quality. There's certainly no tales of blithering harper romance in there."

Shardit! He knew the bronzerider was lying, but it was a perfectly plausible one that might actually be true... Hmm. "In that case." He said mildly, praying frantically that he could pull this off. "I propose we trade bags. I know I would like my book back, and I'm sure you would like your worksheets. There are an awful lot of them." He commented idly as he flipped through them, finding one covered in beginning volcabulary and holding it up. "Fine," R'mer growled. "You've probably been missing your book. After all, its probably the closest thing to a woman you've ever had."

After holding it so tightly in check, D'rue's temper finally snapped.
"I've had more women than you, bronzeboy. And at least I can read the notes they send! So if you want your little kiddie book back, you'd better hand over my 'blithering' romance!"

R'mer crossed his arms across his chest. "Oh, so you think you've had more women than me? How many was that, exactly?"

D'rue snarled, faces flashing across his memory as he started to spit out an answer to the challenge, but cut off when Vree appeared from /between/ and dove at the bronzerider, shrieking in fury. And something stirred in his mind, a confused panic...

His face drained of color, and he suddenly felt as if he'd been doused in ice. "Wisarth!"

}:You'd better stop. Wisarth is upset,:{ Hanunth warned his rider.

R'mer was hit by a stab of guilt as he held the book out to the boy. "Here. Take it."

D'rue snatched the book back without a word, thrusting the primer and worksheets at R'mer as he raced back into the barracks, trying to find something resembling reassurance and calm in the mix of fury and panic he was feeling. He could hear the panicked cries of the tiny brown, and the numerous confused ones as his clutchmates picked up on his feelings.
**Wisarth! It's all right! I'm coming! It's all right!**

R'mer hid the primer among his papers as best he could. That little girly brownrider was bound to spread the word all over now. He _knew_
it had been a bad idea to practice in public.

}:But you're a great reader now,:{ Hanunth reassured him. }:Why are you afraid to show everyone how smart you are? I've always known it. Other people would want to know it too.:{ If only people were as forgiving as dragons, R'mer thought as he stalked back towards the privacy of his own weyr.

Last updated on the January 9th 2007

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Mountains of Desire