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Character Name: Cetalese
Age: 20 (18 at creation - Last Update: April 2013)
Gender: Female
Sexual Orientation: Heterosexual/Bicurious
Craft/Rank: Holder
History: Cetalese is the oldest of three children, born to Darcet and Alise of Tillek Hold. As the oldest child she was responsible for her siblings while her parents earned money with labor or through Hold crafts and learned as much as she needed to to help her mother keep the house running. She had a few good friends at her Hold that she spent time with when she got some free time, but preferred her small group to having some huge conglomeration of aquaintances. When she was twelve, Ceta's life was upended as her family moved to look for greener pastures in the south. At Iteos Hold Ceta was forced to make a new start, which was difficult for her both because she was still required to keep up with her now much older, less tolerant siblings and because of her naturally subdued personality. She still managed to make a bare handful of friends that she saw when she could, mostly girls who had their own Hold tasks to perform and understood how "hard" life was for them all. That is, all of that applied until she was Searched.

The Search itself was fairly unremarkable. A bunch of young adults and children stood in a line, among the few picked was Cetalese, and then off to the Weyr she was wisked, among tears from her parents (half because they would miss her, and half because who would they find to watch the kids now?). Still, she knew she was going with her family's blessings and was instilled in the Candidate Barracks with no pomp and circumstance what-so-ever.

Now she spends her time trying to get acclimated to Weyr life, which is thankfully growing easier with every day. So far, though, making friends has been fairly low on her priority list, not that she's had the time anyway with her around-the-Weyr duties, and she tries to think as little about the upcoming Hatching as possible. Thankfully, Ceta isn't afraid to adapt, so at least the upcoming Hatching and the notion of restarting life a scant half-decade after she had already restarted doesn't seem daunting to Ceta in the least.

Description: Deep green eyes are the feature that bring Ceta the most attention. Although she is pretty as a whole, her dark emeraldesque eyes are generally the first thing that people notice about her. She has thick, curly hair extending to mid-back that is often described as "unmanagable", but is a rich chocolate color bordering on ebony. The hair frames her oval-shaped face and accents her olive-toned skin. Her nose is almost too strong for her looks and her mouth is a bit too wide for her face. Cetalese stands at 5' 5 3/4", but despite the strange place she stopped, it doesn't appear that she'll be growing any taller. Ceta's hands are covered in numerous little scars, some faint and some obvious, from years learning to do all sorts of household tasks with sharp objects and helping to raise the occasional small animal.

Personality: Ceta harbors a quiet joy and strength-- very quiet. Her happiness might shine in her so others can see it in her expression, but an exuberant or attention-grabbing action is extremely rare for her. Her quietness amplifies her calm personality, the combination creating a relaxed, soothing listener, but also creating a slew of problems for her. Unfortunately, because Ceta tends to bite her tongue, even when she shouldn't, she appears to be somewhat of a sheep and that places her into situations where she gets pushed around by more dominant personalities. It's just easier to take it than make trouble when the problem would otherwise pass over quickly. She hopes that becoming a dragonrider will give her more of the strength she needs to be able to speak up when she sees something foolish or wrong, because otherwise her silence can put those around her in danger-- or let others place themselves in danger. The last thing she wants is to see anyone suffer, even if they've done wrong, because she considers everyone capable of a second-- or third-- chance and wants to be able to provide them with that opportunity. As many times as they need it, really, unless the offense is so great there's no way she can convince herself that they deserve forgiveness.

Despite this habit of keeping her mouth shut, Ceta is not a complete pushover-- inside, anyway. She may seem that way when confronted, and she likes to keep her thoughts to herself unless directly asked for them, but even when she's bowing out of the way of aggression her mind is working on a way to correct the problem without the confronter knowing about it. That's where that quiet bit of strength comes in. One could call her the ultimate diplomat, one who doesn't need recognition for her actions and rarely says more than a few words to bring everything to as clean a conclusion as she can make. As long as she knows she's corrected the problem so it ends up at the best possible solution she can manage, she's happy. And she's usually pretty unhappy when she can't.

She is an observant young woman, which comes in handy with guiding problems to the correct solution behind people's backs, but her softspoken personality is is coupled with a shyness she is hard put to overcome. She knows people think she's pretty, so she can take compliments in stride as long as they don't completely surprise her, but the most that will get the person is a smile, a quiet 'thank you' and the silent continuation of whatever action they interrupted. Most people don't know that beyond the formalities Ceta actually has a fairly strong voice. It's just a little hard to draw out.

Ceta also happens to be a workaholic, and not in the good sense either. She'll literally work until she's completely useless if there's work to be done, putting her friends, her wing, and her weyr at a disadvantage if they need her for any reason. Unless someone pulls her away or is keeping an eye on her, Ceta would just keep working on the problem or task until she's bone-weary and faint from hunger or worse.

She can adapt to any situation with considerable ease, which would come in handy for Flights if she were to be paired with a male dragon who chased a Rising female. Even if the rider were female, Cetalese wouldn't mind sleeping with a female in the aftermath of a triumphant Flight, even though she otherwise prefers men. Since Ceta has little interest in relationships in general-- and likely will always be fairly comfortable with just living for herself-- she would also have no trouble if she ended up Bonded to one of the Atypical neuter dragons.
Other: N/A

Possessions:

• Casual clothing
  
• Gather dress
  
• Dragon riding gear (jacket, pants, boots, helmet, gloves, straps)
  
• Cot and bedding
  
• Pot of oil (dragon)
  
• Plain hairbrush
  
• Towel
  
• Leather belt
  2 1/4" wide and made of thick wherhide with sturdy metal buckles. Stained a deep almost reddish brown.
  
• Belt pouch
  Simple and functional, these have a single pocket with a bone button toggle. Standard brown, a bit on the large side. Big enough to hold a small jar of numbweed.
  

Cetalese hurried in the wake of the drudge, her smudged clothes a testament to the Candidate chores she had been pulled away from. Most days, Ceta would never have considered abandoning her work, but this was an emergency. She was just grateful that the Headwoman had been kind enough to send a drudge for her.

The Headwoman smiled fleetingly as Ceta entered. She gestured at the hearth and returned to her work. Ceta wouldn't have had time to smile back even had the Headwoman continued looking at her. The two firelizard eggs by the hearth-- the discovery that had somehow cemented her friendship with Eliza over a week ago-- were rocking rather furiously in their pots. No wonder someone had noticed enough to send for her.

"Where's--" Ceta stopped the question and turned at the sound of running footsteps. She smiled slightly in relief as Eliza arrived, the drudge that summoned her doubtlessly left far behind. For her friend to miss the hatching of their first flits would have been catastrophic. Pieces were beginning to chip off the shells and Ceta's attention was almost fully back on the eggs. Eliza's approach registered only vaguely as Ceta's egg gave a moment's pause before the flit inside apparently attempted to kick through one side of the egg over and over again without success. A chunk finally broke off and an irritated trill sounded from inside.

The little one was tired of waiting. As Ceta reached for the bowl of meat scraps without looking, the baby began throwing its full weight against the broken side of the shell. A deep green wing broke through the side of the shell and Ceta heard her flit let out a piteous whine as it became stuck and was left resorting to kicking with its feet in an attempt to break through. Ceta held her breath as, eventually, the Green shattered the shell into chunks and fragments, leaving only the partial shell underneath in any state of wholeness.

The tiny ball of hide now free of its shell was a rich, dark leaf green. Her eyes were scarlet with hunger and whirling fiercely as she shook her injured wing gingerly and then swung her head about to take in her surroundings. The membrane of her right wing was spotted with ichor from where the sharp edge of the broken shell had nicked it. The Green's eyes fell on Eliza, being handed a bowl of scraps as Ceta had been, and clambered out of her shell. Her attention was suddenly distracted by a much closer piece of raw meat being dangled out to her. Ceta shook it slightly for encouragement, and her Green was all too happy to redirect her feet towards the nearer source of food.

Then came the feeding frenzy: Trying to keep up with grabbing only one piece of meat at a time and keeping the Green's mouth full. Ceta had intended to try to watch Eliza's hatching egg as well, but it was quickly apparent that she wouldn't have the time to look away if she wanted to keep the ravenous-- though surprisingly not vicious-- little creature attached to her.

By the time the flit was full, tired, and curling up wearily against Ceta's arm, Eliza had already bonded to her own green-hided beauty. It seemed Eliza had been right about the contents of the eggs. No more than Greens, but that suited Ceta just fine. Cetalese caught Eliza's eye and smiled with restrained excitement at her friend before looking down at her yet-unnamed flit and daring to stroke a finger against the slightly damp, soft hide of her side. That damaged wing would need to be seen to so that the tiny cuts wouldn't result in anything more severe down the line.

The Green was completely oblivious to Ceta's attentions, whether they were stroking or observations, and stirred only slightly when Ceta treated her wing membrane with a thin layer of numbweed, wrapped it loosely just to keep the numbweed from wiping off anywhere else, and then scooped her into her hands for transport back to the small area in the Barracks that Ceta had already set aside for... Veralidaine. That was pretty. She could call her Daine, for short, but such a gorgeous little creature needed an equally stunning name.