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In the brief moments after the last meal of the day and the eventual collapse onto her bed roll, Renna liked to slip away to the library of Ista Weyr, weaving through the crowded, cavernous hallways like she had lived there all her life. Tonight was like any other night. She clutched a glowbasket in one hand and dragged her fingers softly over the scrolls with another. It was one characteristic of her mother's that Renna was happy to have -- a love for reading and writing. Her mother, of course, had made that love a bit too aggressive, forcing her daughter to memorize verse after verse at an age when most children were out playing in the dirt. Her mother, Olira, was convinced that Renna's destiny was to be a Masterharper like her. And perhaps she was right. Only time would tell. But the young Candidate refused to accept that path without at least trying for her dream; she could never begin the path toward walking the tables until she first stood on the Sands.

Still, despite all of Olira's faults, Renna loved her mother, and on certain nights when the loneliness crept in too deep, she would come to the library to read the histories that her mother sang about at Ista Hold. Selecting a scroll, she gently placed it down on one of the angled podiums, locking it into the scroll rest. These tables were made for reading scrolls, and Renna had been standing at podiums like this for much of her life. Setting the glowbasket beside her, the dark-haired girl let her mind still to a whisper and quietly began to mouth the words of a scroll that she already knew by heart. It was a moment of peace for her, and a moment of connection with her distant mother.

Vaguely aware of the few others that milled about, Renna read line after line, until her words took on a form. Soon, she was singing, but it was so faint, so quiet and breathy, that you would have to be standing quite close to her to even hear it.

The scroll before her was one of her favorites -- a recounting of the early golds of Pern. When her mother performed it, she chose a haunting melody that carried through the halls. Of course, she hadn't done so in ages. If she could avoid it, Olira would not perform any song that uplifted dragonkind. Of course, it WAS impossible to avoid, and so she tried to hide her disdain. Renna could hear it in the warble of her voice, the scathing hiss of her vowels. She thought of her mother's voice, how they would sing together, their voices rising in unison and -- wait a second!

Renna could swear that she did hear singing, but it was nothing like her mother's voice. Just as quickly as C'mor had joined with her, Renna faltered, immediately stopping. Oh, shards, she hadn't even heard him approach. How embarrassing. She hated for people to hear her sing, especially when she was only half-aware of singing in the first place. For several awkward seconds, she stared hard at the scroll, as if she was having a hard time reading a few lines. Then, finally, she whispered, "Sorry, I... I didn't realize I was... singing." Her eyes flickered back to the page, knuckles going a bit white from her grip on the podium.

The young Candidate was not uncomfortable around men, not at all, but she was always uncomfortable when she felt someone had caught her in a compromising position -- oh, such as... mid song.

Renna felt a prickle of relief that C'mor did not draw attention to the singing, that he too had gotten caught up in it. It made her feel more at ease, and as such, she loosened her grip on the podium. "Hello, C'mor. I'm Renna," she said, bobbing her head slightly in greeting. Tilting her chin toward the gold flit, she added, "And hello to you, Gilden." Renna had always wanted a flit, but her mother's distaste for dragons spread to most animals. Firelizards were a bit too close to dragonkind for her tastes. One time, Renna and some friends of hers had found an abandoned clutch left by a green, and together, they worked for candlemarks to save them. Six flits made it out of that nest alive, and though Renna hoped that she might get to keep one -- a small blue she'd liked especially -- her mother refused, turning it over to a woman from the kitchen instead. Renna let her eyes linger on the flit for several moments before returning to C'mor. He seemed nice, and was decently handsome. Renna liked a strong jawline, a broadness in the shoulders. Her main focus, of course, was on finding her lifemate in a dragon, but C'mor certainly did not hurt to look at -- the fact that he recognized her favorite scroll on the spot only added to his charm.

"Yes, it's about those who first rose, the early Queens of the earliest Weyrs." Her fingers stroked the edges lovingly. "It's my favorite. It describes our society's shift toward matriarchy... in a way. Or at least describes the reverence given to the Mother Dragon. Even the way it is written... it is wistful, romantic. Whoever penned this scroll loved golds in such a way that it made them... poetic." She shrugged, realizing the exuberance of her words. It was a scroll she knew better than many of the others.

Her eyes moved to the scroll that C'mor studied, but the writing was too faint. She could not read it from that distance. Part of her wanted to ask what it was, but she felt slightly competitive. He had readily identified hers -- though it was a fairly popular scroll -- and she did not want to fail to identify his correctly. Nope, she'd rather be silent. Allowing a whisper of a smile, she traced the lines on the page and then, to fill the silence, added, "My mother is a Masterharper. The scrolls have been rolled into my veins, as it were." Her lips parted as if to say more, but she closed them slowly, inhaling a quiet breath.

There were so many things that Renna wanted to say about having a Masterharper for a mother. She wanted to recount all the times she had been woken up in the middle of the night and ordered to recite the Hymns. All the times she'd been pulled away from her play to take vocal lessons in the musty back room of the Hold. All the times her mother had forced her to perform in front of her friends. Every harper needs an audience! The words rang in her head like daggers. She would not share any of them. Renna was a fairly protected girl. Instead, she merely said, "Yes, it is nice." Renna thought of the blood in her veins, how it mingled with a dragonrider's blood, and how both of her parents' occupations would have no effect on whether or not a dragon chose her. A depressing thought, certainly.

Renna welcomed the change of subject on to what C'mor was reading. When he admitted his unfamiliarity with it, Renna stepped beside him, hovering over his shoulder. She was a bit tall for a girl, but the difference was not so great to make her feel as though she were dwarfing him. "I vaguely recall my mother mentioning scrolls like this, the less sung about scrolls. I must confess that she rarely sought out new territory with her own Hymns. She preferred to do the crowd favorites." Keeping her eyes on the scroll, she asked, "What drew you to pick these out?" Sometimes Renna would pull scrolls at random, but more often, she found herself going to those that she knew she loved. In this way, C'mor was much more of a scholar than she.

"I've only been here since a few Sevendays after the last Hatching," she said, tucking a loose piece of hair behind a pierced ear. For a moment, she hesitated to tell C'mor she was a Candidate. It was not that she was ashamed of it; she simply felt like it created a divide between Rider and Candidate that could be awkward at times. There she was, trying desperately to acheive what he already had. It was a strange dichotomy, but one that anyone living in a Weyr was likely quite accustomed to experiencing. Still, eventually, she added, "I'm a Candidate. Have yet to see the Sands though." C'mor was clearly a rider, but Renna didn't pry further. Instead, she continued to eye the scrolls with interest.

Renna felt her heart flutter against her ribs at the mention of a Queen rising. Was that true? She hadn't noticed any glowing Queens wandering around, but truth be told, it was not often that she saw golds wandering the halls at all. She hoped C'mor was right; she hoped it more than anything else. Trying to keep her cool, she continued to eye the scroll, eventually taking a few steps out of C'mor's personal space for a more casual conversation. "I've done that before, gone to the scrolls for guidance. What better to teach us than our own history, right?" Renna had gone searching for many things, mostly about dragons and the different theories of how Impression worked, but ever since she came to the Weyr, Renna felt more free to look at things she had avoided back at the Hold. Namely, she had read up on the history of riders who had perished between, constantly searching for more information on what might have happened to her father. In the records of Ista, she found his name mentioned as someone who perished during weyrling training. Renna had cried the rest of the day, even skipped her chores to be alone. It was not a scroll that she would unravel again... not for a while.

"We've had whole baskets of peeled tubers end up ruined or stolen, but the past few Sevendays, things have been all right," she said with a shrug. Renna had heard about the covert mischief going on at the Weyr. Lots of theories going around, but the way Renna saw it, she just wanted it to stop. Anything that piled an unfair amount of work on her made Renna agitated. She had no idea who was behind the random acts of destruction, but she was happy to have them happening less and less frequently. At any rate, she really was not keen on the idea of picking up the weight of everyone else. The kitchen was bad enough as it was. "I'll keep an eye out," she explained, retreating back to her scroll at the podium. "Honestly, the kitchen has barely slowed down, even with the transfer of many riders and Candidates to other Weyrs. I sit in a corner and peel tubers all day, and there are always more tubers to go. Unless you feel inclined to be up to your elbows in peels..." She smiled, picturing C'mor literally covered in tuber peels. Not a terrible look for him, probably. "That's a lot of responsibility for you to have. I mean, all on your own trying to clean up the mistakes of others and all that, you know. Did you just take that upon yourself to do?" In Renna's mind, being a dragonrider was a full time responsibility. It was surprising to the young Candidate that C'mor had time to help with chores. Still, Renna would never ask C'mor for help, even if she needed it. It simply was not in her nature. She would just let things get so terrible that someone would notice the issue and force help on her -- but asking for it? No way.

Renna nodded, not wanting to speak too long on the subject of helping everyone else. It was not that she was lazy; she just felt busy enough already. Besides, all of her free time was dedicated to watching the dragons in the Bowl, sneaking off the library, and attempting to work on her physical fitness (though she feared she'd never be as good about it as Moira). She didn't want to have to say 'no' to C'mor if he asked her directly to help. That would make her look bad, wouldn't it?

Thankfully, C'mor did in fact move on to a new topic. "Yeah, the scrolls can, I don't know, calm me down sometimes. They're always the same, even when everything else is changing." After she'd said it, she felt stupid for it. It seemed like a bit much to divulge, and Renna liked to think of herself as a relatively protected person. But it was true. So many changes were surrounding her. It was nice to have something be permanent.

Her ears perked up at the mention of riding. Well, he had mentioned it... so she could ask about it, right? "Have you been a rider long?" she asked. "I mean, I only ask because you don't look too much older than me." Renna didn't like what that implied about herself as a non-rider, but she was interested in hearing about his life as a rider.

"Oh, wow," she said, twisting one end of the scroll to reveal more of the text. He was a very new rider, very new. In her mind, Renna pictured herself in his shoes, spending free moments in the library, all the while having a conversation with Hers. It was a dream... a lovely one. "That sounds wonderful." Renna fingered the edge of the scroll for a moment. There were a thousand questions that she wanted to ask, but she didn't want to look immature or desperate. It was a thin line to tread with dragonriders -- all she wanted to do was drown them in questions and then beg to see their dragons.

"I heard horror stories about the last Impression..." she began, trying to find a path to ask the questions in her head more smoothly. "What was... yours like? I've never even attended a Hatching as a viewer. I've lived at Ista Hold all my life." It seemed like a plausible enough question, hopefully one that wasn't too prying.

The glowbasket beside her podium cast flickering shadows over Renna's face. She hoped it might help to hide her interest in the story, how she hung on every word. Truth be told, she had a decent poker face, but the idea of having a little extra help in looking less desperate made the young Candidate feel more secure. She'd heard many stories, but not from someone who had actually ended up Impressing. "Good Queen," she murmured, fighting the urge to explode with questions. What did it feel like to suddenly hear His talking? How did his life change? Is it a difficult adjustment in life? How was weyrling training? And what was it like going between? Renna had read about all of these things before, but she desperately wanted to experience them, to breathe life into those stories until they pulsed in her own veins.

She kept all of these feelings to herself, and instead added, "I've read scrolls on some of the worst Hatchings in the history of Pern -- ones that left many dead. Dragonets fighting with each other, a spooked Gold rampaging into a crowd, terrible stuff. Now with Touching I suppose that number has gone down, but... I think I heard something about one egg that did not hatch after a Candidate touched it at the last Hatching? Terrible stuff, quite terrible." She bobbed her head toward the scroll, traced the familiar words with her eyes. "But you found Yours. So it is all worth it, right?" Renna smiled slightly, more wistful than happy, and then dropped her eyes back to the scroll.

After a moment, she allowed herself to voice a quiet fear that rattled in her mind. "Have you ever stood on the Sands... and failed to Impress?" He had His now so she didn't see the insult in posing the question, but honestly, it was something that plagued Renna. She had battled her mother -- lied to her even -- just to get here. It had taken five turns of work to get to Ista Weyr, to even be eligible to stand. Her greatest fear would be that, after all of that, none of it would matter. Hers would not appear, she would age out of Candidacy, and her life would lose its meaning. She did not envision another path for herself, never had. It was a terrible risk to take, but one that she felt she could not avoid.