If wishes were Dragons

Writers: Kaysea, Vix
Date Posted: 3rd May 2007

Characters: Tayette, Hartam
Description: Tayette visits Hartam and they go for an interesting walk
Location: Vintner Hall
Date: month 3, day 28 of Turn 4

Bhervehan had disappeared out to the kitchens so Tayette made herself useful and walked around wiping down each table in turn, whether they needed it or not. She enjoyed doing the menial tasks, it gave her a chance to be busy, and also to disappear into the background. No one really took much notice of a drudge, unless they were another drudge or the boss of one. So even here, at the Tavern, she could blend into her surroundings.

As he walked down the steps, Hartam's mind was on a song, a new rhyme, little more than a couplet, that was prodding at his thoughts, begging to be written into more. He paused, eyes fixed on the room, on the movement of the woman below, thinking only of that rhyme. Another notion wriggled into his mind, "She would have a suggestion."

He stopped and blinked. **She?** Now he realized who it was he saw below him, working as if she belonged here and had been here since the opening.
"Tayette?" He walked slowly down the stairs.

"Oh!" Tayette turned around, she had been lost in her own little world and hadn't heard his footsteps, but his voice couldn't be mistaken. "Hartam."
She said his name, just once, but a smile lit up her face. "Good morning."

He could not help but return her smile. "Good morning to you as well. What are you. . . I'm surprised to see you here."

"I came to see you, I hope you don't mind?" a look of uncertainty marred her face, "I. . . I was at a loss for something to do, and since to day is a free day for me. . ." she bit her lip, "If you have anything planner, I can.
. . go?"

By this time he had crossed the room to her side. "I am absolutely delighted that you're here, I would like nothing better than to spend time with you, and this. . ." he touched the cloth in her hand, "is what confused me."

"Oh." she gave a small delicate chuckle, "I felt out of place, standing around whilst Bhervehan was busy, and so I thought I'd help out." She shrugged, "It's not a big thing, but it helps me blend in if I'm kept busy."

"It might help you blend in, but then your absence might be noted as well.
I've found that if once I take on a task, I'm later expected to keep doing it."

"Oh no. . . " she shook her head and laughed softly, again, "No, Bhervehan knows I work at the Hall. I told him earlier, so it's not as if I'll be here often enough to be _expected_."

He chuckled with her. "So . . . you have a free day and I'm not needed here until evening, so what shall we do with this time?"

"I'm not sure, and I really hope you don't mind my being here?" she looked at him again from beneath lowered eyelids. "Call it madness..." she smiled slowly, "but I'd like to hear more of your songs. Happier ones.' she added, hastily.

"My dear Tayette, I am delighted to have your company." He grinned broadly.
"Truly. As to madness, I would hope that it did not require madness to hear my tunes." He gestured around them. "I'm afraid that if we stay here you'll be tempted to start working. Shall we go for a walk instead?"

"A walk sounds. . . nice." though in truth, she would have preferred staying in these surroundings, she hadn't been alone with him since the day they first met. "And no, not really madness to hear your voice, or your songs for that matter, just as long as they aren't similar to your latest. I don't think you want me bubbling again."

"Everyone needs a good cry now and again," he stated simply, though to himself he added, **and some have more reason than other.** "However, we'll keep the songs upbeat today." He retrieved his gitar from where he had placed it on the stage. "Shall we go?"

"Yes, please." she smiled, and for not the first time, since she had met the Harper, she wore a genuine smile. "You really don't' mind me coming to see you? You're. . . the first person outside the kitchens, I have - wanted to talk to."

The harper found himself blushing at this. "Truly, m'lady, I enjoy your company and am flattered that you wish to visit me. I've met quite a few people since moving here, but most of those are related only to my work.
It's nice to leave it behind and to relax for a while."

"I just wanted you to know..." Tayette glanced quickly at him before averting her eyes, "You make it easy to talk to you."

He gave her a sidelong glance, wanting to look at her, but not wanting her to feel that he was staring. "I'm glad to hear that, because I enjoy listening to you."

"I'm not sure how much you know about me..?" that was a question she had been longing to ask, but couldn't, even now, phrase it quite so boldly. She wasn't naive enough to believe he hadn't heard any of the rumours, either.

He held the door of the Tavern to allow her to precede him through it. "I know that you enjoy my music, but that it makes you cry. I know that you're a very conscientious worker and like to keep busy. And I know that you have a beautiful smile but that you don't use it nearly enough."

"And _I_ know how diplomatic a Harper can be." she gave a quick rejoinder.

He shrugged and smiled. "I was told that you had a difficult past. Aside from that, I didn't pay much attention. I prefer to allow my friends to share with me their own stories."

"It isn't a very nice story; and certainly not suitable to tell while spending a pleasant afternoon walking in the sunshine." she shook her head, refusing to allow thoughts of her past taint a pleasant day spend with a new friend.

"The past can remain in the past if that's what you wish." He stretched his shoulders and lifted his face to the sun. "And very little could mar a day such as this."

"I don't' want to talk about my past - not today anyway, but...tell me something about yours?"

Now there was a difficult question - he spent most of his time listening, hearing about other people's lives, and avoiding talk of his own. "There's not much to tell. From an early age I knew that I wanted to be a harper, so I apprenticed. Since then, I've devoted most of my time to music and teaching. I'm really a very dull person."

"So where did you grow up?"

"I was born on a holding near Jade Harbor but went North to study. I still had an uncle at the northern Harper Hall and my mother wanted to maintain some sort of contact with him. My journeying was done on that continent so most of my life was spent far from here." He decided to venture a question.
"So where did you spend your childhood?"

For a moment Tayette froze inside, her gaze darted from one point ahead of them to another, not settling at all. Her heart raced, but with a calming breath, and her gaze steadied on a small clearing up ahead, she thought back to a happier time, her life had been so good back then, so new.

"I grew up in a small cothold about three days out, between here and what was Amethyst Cliff Hold. As far as I know both of my parents are still alive, and I think I have a sister at the Weyr, but that could be wrong, my source wasn't the best." she shook her head, maybe she had said too much, it was hard keeping the bitterness from tingeing her voice.

He nodded to what she said. "I have relatives living not too far from here -
at least not with so many dragonriders traveling about - but I haven't seen them for Turns. While I was living in the North I stayed in touch as I could, but now I rarely write to them. I really should do better at that, but keep telling myself that I'll get in touch when I have more time or have something more to tell them."

"I won't be doing that." Tayette shook her head. "There's nothing left there for me, and hasn't been for a long time." Regret was tinged with something darker, but she held herself in check.

"I can understand that." He kept his voice light, looking ahead to where they were walking. "I don't intend to contact all of my kin. I really have very little in common with them."

Talk of her family brought everything back, but nothing greater than their disappointment. "It's not that I don't _want_ to, you see..."

Now he ventured a glance at her. "Rifts are not always irreparable, Tayette.
Sometimes tensions can be alleviated enough to allow reconciliation."

"..my family disowned me." Some tensions may be reconcilable, but she knew this one never would be.

"I see. I also see it as their loss." He filed that bit of information away, wondering if family opinions had or could be changed. He did not want to give her false hope, but could research the situation privately.

"They didn't see it as a loss, unfortunately they saw me as a slur against their names." She tried to sound indifferent about it, but it still hurt more than she would ever admit. It had been bad enough the pain she had travelled through, but to have lost her family as well, too much to bear.

"Those who are not in the middle of a situation often tend to judge and to dwell only on how it affects them," he commented. "I truly wish they could have stood by you and helped you through your pain."

"I'm not even sure if they know where I am now. They certainly didn't show concern when I left the cot."

He paced beside her, silent for a few steps. "You could send them a letter, if you want. If they're interested in re-establishing ties, they could answer it. If not, then they could let it go."

"No..it's," she reconsidered, but no, "it's been too long. I'm no longer the young girl they turned their backs on."

Hartam nodded. "Only you can know whether it would be worth the effort and possible disappointment of trying. In the meantime, you have a new and - I hope - happier life here."

"I have a new life, yes..." she went quiet, considering his words, and if her life were actually happier where she was now, "If happier means safer, more peaceful, then yes, I have a happier life now."

"That's a start toward happiness. In time perhaps you'll grow more comfortable and trusting."

"You think?" she asked, casting him a sideways glance. "I suppose to some extent I have become more comfortable, and even more trusting, though I am used to human failures more now, than I was when I was younger." She considered him for a moment, "I've developed comfort and trust with you..."

Though surprised by that remark, he smiled softly. "I'm happy to know that, Tayette. Your opinion means much to me."

"If I hadn't, I would like as not, be hidden away in my quarters on a lovely day like this." She had that much to be thankful for. Her new found nerve was still in its infancy, but Hartam was helping to develop that, whether he realised it or not.

"I'm glad. Besides, if you were hidden away in your quarters, I'd probably be sitting at the Tavern instead of enjoying this lovely day."

"Surely not!" Tayette stopped and looked at him, "I thought, on that first day, that you must look for inspiration in the scenery around you. It was so fitting that you were outside, putting the words to your music."

"Alas, dear lady, but it's true," he intoned melodramatically. "I tend to stay indoors, plucking the strings of my gitar as I listlessly play old tunes, unless I have a task outdoors or force myself to go. Perhaps it's a protest to all of those turns of journeying, but I've become somewhat of a recluse."

"No, I'd never have thought it." Tayette was rather surprised at his admission. "You mean, when I have been spending restdays in my room, wishing away the lonely hours, you have been sitting in your rooms here, twiddling on your gitar and staring into space?"

"Not always," he admitted. "Sometimes I sit by myself and play my gitar, but other times I work. I could have more time off from my tasks at the Tavern, but if I did, I'd waste them, so I work instead. However, perhaps I should take advantage of restdays and visit you instead."

"I'd like that, or I could come and talk to you here, or listen to you compose?"

"Any time you wish."

"Like now?" she smiled across at him, and indicated the small copse they had arrived at. "See, all set out for us," she said, "pointing to a fallen tree. Even somewhere to sit."

"It looks perfect, doesn't it?" He moved to the center of the area and turned, looking about. "Is this a favorite of yours? During those times you do get out?"

"No, not really." she shook her head, there are more secluded areas, for privacy and contemplation. "This is just pleasant, and comfortable. The children of the Hall come here to play sometimes." she looked around, "Often you find toys they have left behind."

"Children playing." He sank down onto the fallen tree, resting himself in the crook of two branches. He could feel his mind detaching, settling into that place where it went when ideas touched him, nudging him to rhyme a tune. "Describe what they would do here."

Tayette shrugged, "Oh, I don't know, playing dragons and riders. Flying through the air. And some little girls over there, just playing with their rag dolls."

She tried to picture the scene last time she had been here, what had they been doing? "I remember they were pretending to save each other from Thread." she shivered at the memory, for some of these children, they would spend almost their whole lives fighting against the thing that rained down on them each sevenday.

"Saving each other from Thread." He shook his head sadly. "When I think back on my childhood. . . play was so much more innocent then. Life had so much more innocence to it."

"It's new to them, it's new to all of us." she conceded, "but I think their pretending, may take some of the fear from them? Does that make sense?"

Hartam nodded. "Yes, I remember from teaching the younger classes how their play mirrored their emotions - fear and sadness as well as happiness and dreams. But that doesn't stop me from wishing that they did not need to deal with this particular threat."

"I'd rather none of us had to." she had been out with the crews on a number of occasions and disliked being anywhere there might have been Thread.
Luckily the Weyr kept the chances of Thread burrows to a minimum.

The man chuckled, his gitar now resting on his lap and his fingers idly plucking at the strings, though he was unaware of this, so ingrained was his music into everything he did. "I'd rather none of us had to endure any type of unpleasantness. But you know that old saying: 'If wishes were dragons . .
.'"

"Well, that happens all the time. These children may wish now for a dragon of their own, and who knows...some of them may get their wish."

"True - but many more will not. Will they become discouraged when they don't get what they want?"

"Discouraged? I don't think discouraged would be the description I would use. Disappointed, maybe. But most of us bury our disappointments, and just get on with life, don't we?" she asked, knowing that sometimes it didn't matter how deep you attempted to bury something, it was never truly gone from you mind, or your heart.

"We do, but so many dreams are set aside, so many fail us." He sighed heavily and then forced a smile. "I don't know why that hit me the way it did, the thought of children playing at such adult games."

"It's a way of maturing, I think. One way the mind can adjust to adult thoughts. Don't you remember mimicking the adults as you grew up? I know I did. I played 'house' and played at having bab.." her words caught in her throat. She had played at having babies with her friends, all of them assumed they could have babies of their own one day. One day...

Hartam found himself regretting his own morose attitude and where it seemed to be leading her. "We never know where our lives will lead, do we? What we plan early on may not be what is actually in store for us. When that happens, it's sometimes difficult to move on, but it's what we do, what we need to do."

"Yes, it's what we do." she gave a small nod, and brushed a tear from her eye. "Goodness me, I always seem to cry in your presence." she gave a half laugh. "Sorry Hartam."

"Don't be sorry, Tayette. Everyone needs a place to cry and to get out those emotions. I feel privileged to be one who can offer you that."

"I shouldn't be crying after all this time." she dabbed at her eyes again, "But you know, not being able to have a child was worse than being ostracised for the lack of a child."

"I imagine that it was. You had your own pain - and instead of being understanding and helping you through it, those around you made it worse."
He reached out and took her hand in his. "And as to not crying 'after all this time,' some pains remain as fresh as yesterday."

"The pain of not having a child will always be with me." His hand was warm and a comfort to her, as were his words. "But the pain of being ostracised by my family, and the cot? That has long gone." She was adamant that she had wiped the pain from her forever on that score, just as she had wiped the physical pain her husband had caused her.

"It's better that way," he told her. "After all - we can't change the attitudes of others, we can only change our own." Though he hoped that she had truly put it behind her, he doubted that was so. It was easy to say such things when far-removed from the situation, but if confronted by those who had judged her, he doubted that she would be so matter-of-fact about it.

"You're right." she nodded in agreement, "And I could have never influenced their opinion of me, but I can make changes in my own life, and have done so. I'm here - aren't I?"

"That you are!" He squeezed her hand and grinned. "And I am very glad of that."

"So, sit and play and let's see what you can make of the children's games, in song." She gave her eyes on last dab on her skirt and smiled brightly back at Hartam, returning the squeeze of his hand before releasing it.

Last updated on the May 6th 2007

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If wishes were Dragons