Welcome to Gaia! ::

Jessan felt sick to his stomach. His belly was full from dinner and then the made rush to get to the Sands before the eggs started Hatching. Thankfully, he still had all of his hair and was not the least worried about lice. In the barracks, he quickly stripped down and tossed on his whites. They were a little short and showed off his calf muscles.

With said clothing on, he was marched out to the sands with the other candidates. They loosely formed a circle around the small clutch of eggs. Jessan saw his cousin, Jiriar and moved closed to him. Squeezing his shoulder, Jessan grinned and whispered. "It will be okay. One of us is sure to Impress!"

Then he turned his attention back towards the first egg. In a wondrous display, the egg cracked open and a dark brown stumbled out. The brown made it's way towards where he was and he held his breath. Such a handsome fellow! But then, the confident dragon stopped in front of the boy he barely knew as Sovann. Impression! Letting out his breath, Jessan tried not to stumble from lack of air. He was really happy for the boy. Turning his eyes back to the clutch, he could only hope.
------------
Zhaylan's hands itched for his pencil and pad. He had been in the audience at the last Hatching when a noisy blue had picked him out to be Searched. Clutching his hands to his sides, he tried not to think about drawing or coloring. But it was so hard! That brown that came out of the egg! The looks on the candidates faces. Fear. Excitement. Anxiety.

He was imprinting all of this to memory as more and more eggs began to rock. Looking over, he saw Tersa and Caskeyn sitting in the stands. Bowing his head down, he should have realized that his foster mother and close friend would be watching and waiting to see if a dragon picked him.

Look at all colors! Pretty hatchings! Expressive boys and girls. Sands hot. The few moments of clarity in his thoughts were quickly taken over by his unusual thought process. Once again, Zhaylan's mind became a fog of art as the canvas that was crowding and fighting to be noticed merged with the reality around him. Queens-golds. Special. Must show pride. Happiness. When rock boy Impressed the brown, Zhaylan's mind was busy sketching the scene to be put to paper later.

Aydin yelped when he was quite suddenly shoved back toward the room he and Kadri had been sharing to get changed, eyes wide. The Hatching! This time they would actually be GOING!!

Excited and nervous, the teen actually put on his robes backward at first, but thankfully realized that before he ran out the door. Cursing under his breath, he straightened himself out and then darted for the Hatching Grounds, getting there just in time. And along the way he sent Rynin a very firm message to find something else to do for a while... since he didn't need to get into trouble with having her pop in where she wasn't allowed to be.

Standing on the sands now beside his twin, he shifted from foot to foot as he stared at the eggs, trying not to have both his feet burned by the end of this.

It was only with repeated promises of a minute-by-minute relay of the happenings that Annelie was able to get the not-so-little queen to stay put and make it to the Hatching sort of on time -- ‘Sort Of’ being the key phrase there.

Annelie slowed down from her running just as applause broke out across the grounds. The young woman raised her hands and clapped as well before her mind was interrupted with a sudden but familiar whine.

Annneeelieeeeeee… what’s happening?!

Annelie dropped her hands back to her sides and moused around the perimeter of the crowd of spectators. She got up on her toes, but the broad backs of some of the men were just… so broad. She tip-toed around again until a few people inched apart and she managed to squeeze through. Only a few younger, shorter on-lookers stood between her and the main spectacle now, and she gave a small clap once more.

A brown impressed one of the boys. Not sure who, though…

Oh, how wonderful, Mine! What’s his name? Who’s his bonded? Maybe I know him! Annelie this is so exciting – can’t I come?

I don’t know, Yan, I couldn’t hear and I can’t exactly ask. I don’t know who the boy is, and it’s doubtful that you know him. …Aaand no, no you cannot come. You’re too young still.

But it’s so boring to just sit here… Who’s the bonded? Do you know him?

Anne gave a sigh. Yansanth… I just said I don’t know him. And you don’t either. Now shhhh and wait till the next one hatch—nevermind.

Nevermind? Mine, what’s happening? Oh tell me, please!
A green now. Kind of haughty, though… her and Astarteth will probably get along. She impressed another boy. Don’t know who. Annelie reported, her words kept short as she continued to watch. Yansanth didn’t have the best memory in the world.

Oh a green! We haven’t met many greens, Mine… And who’s Astarteth? Do we know the boy? Mine, is the Queen big and scary? They’re so huge…

Annelie didn’t comply with a response.

From the stands, Merya watched closely as the brown made his choice. Beru wriggled in her arms, and she hushed her with calm thoughts and a gentle scratch on top of the head.

"Aren't you excited, pet?"

She wished Saren wouldn't call her that. Turning to him, she put on a calculated expression of glee and nodded. "Of course! I'm just...I need to see everything. I might never get this chance again, so I have to save all the bounce for later." She offered him an apologetic smile. "I'm sure I'll flail about it for hours afterwards; I know you like that."

The tailor laughed and kissed the top of her head. "You know me too well. All right. ...He's wobbly, isn't he? Like a little baby herdbeast."

He's not at all like a herdbeast, Merya thought viciously, and if I were his rider I'd hope he'd chomp you for suggesting it. Years of practice, however, meant that the thought was hidden behind a giggle and a relapse into silence. Beru, who had felt her mistress' anger, gave a little "sqrrrr..." of annoyance and burrowed more deeply into the embrace.

"Funny little noises they make - dah!" Saren whipped his fingers away as Beru snapped at him. "Whoops. No, not food. Daddy's fingers."

Merya, irritated at how proprietary Saren was becoming, did her best to focus on the hatching instead. Beru was hers. Come to it, she was hers. Oh, why couldn't Beru have managed to chomp him in place of a dragon to do so? The moment she got the chance she was cutting him loose - she had what she wanted now, and no amount of further gift-showering was worth being his little wife.

And then the little green Impressed, and he was out of her mind as she gave the first genuine grin of the day. There was something about dragons, wasn't there?

Beru's little mental nudge, a picture of herself looking particularly shiny and clean, might as well have been and firelizards; there's something about us too.

Watching as the dragons began to impress, Dorinelic felt...happy. Under all of the seriousness that was the hatching, it was so...good. So right. Like things fell together in perfect tandem. falling back, he watched over some children's heads, smiling. Picked or not, to be a part of this...it was a whole new level of living.
Unable to hold back, he chuckled as the green brushed the others aside to find its chosen. It was like a flitt that had just seen its master for the first time in a long time. It was right.

Nan had finished dinner early in order to rejoin her beloved circle in the back of the kitchens. The circle, however, was not peeling potatoes, but washing dishes tonight. Most of the staff was darting in and out of the kitchen, bringing out new food and adding more dishes to the pile next to the wash basins. The Nose didn't seem too bothered to be here and not out there listening in on who was saying what. And she had good reason not to be bothered. The kitchen staff had ears sharper than a hungry tunnelsnake, and they would let her know if anything exciting happened. So far, dinner had been relatively tame.

She had just reached for another plate when one of the servers rushed in, beckoning to her eagerly. "They're hatching Nan! They're hatching! Leave those and hurry! Go go go!" Nandeli was on her feet as fast as she could manage, and joined the rest of the Candidates as they made their way to their quarters. She paused to clasp her fingers in her robe – she'd worn the same one now for years – and took a deep breath. "For luck," she murmured, and then yanked it over her head. Her curls were tied back as she made her way towards the Hatching Sands, filing in with all the rest.

As soon as she was there, however, Nandeli was back to her usual self. She made her way towards the front of the group, pausing to give Kiriwar a good luck nudge, before dashing off to bother her favourite troublemaker before the eggs hatched. "Don't forget to breathe!" she whispered to Sovann as she passed him, grinning and giving him the thumbs up. Hopefully the little fisher boy wouldn't faint at his first hatching. She would just have to pass that one around. Blame it on the presence of so many hot boys in the Hatching Sands. You wouldn't believe how many things could be blamed on good looking men. It was simply astounding.

Several others were wished good luck by the infamous Nose as she passed them, before she finally settled herself at the front of the group of girls. It was then that she saw the little brown making his way towards... Sovann?! Well what do you know! She beamed in the direction of the newest rider, clearly incredibly pleased. A green hatched next, making her way towards Erisi – haha she knew it! – and Nandeli quietly joined in the cheers of the riders. Two down, and so many more to go!

As she was edging up fully towards the front, she bumped squarely into a girl with a long braid, about an inch shorter than Inaari was herself. Blushing profusely, she was startled to see that it was one of the girls that was at the lake with Nan and the naked boys the other day. Tugging lightly at the ends of her hair, the Holder smiled gently as a green dragon hobbled over to another boy, this one unknown.

"It looks like such a lovely thing. I hope I can be so lucky." The words were softly spoken, but clearly at Braid Girl. "I'm Inaari. Is this your first?"