Freedom Cont.

[Flamewolf]

The twig, though slightly flimsy, was the perfect size for drawing in the sand. Keldara was enjoying herself as she drew long, arching lines in the warm sand, smiling slightly as her drawing of a fire lizard came into being. She paused when she saw a shadow overcome her, and looked up to see that the bronzerider had come over. She quickly finished the drawing, put down the twig, and leaned on her hands behind her as she gazed up at him.

She followed his gesture to a tree with some of his clothes on it. She looked back to him again. "Okay," she replied. She might have to take her boots off, and maybe her shirt (she had a bathing suit under it, fortunately; she had been planning to take a swim in the lake later on that day), so she was glad for the idea from M'kel.

She shook her head. "Nope, never. You forget, dragonriders haven't been here all that long now. Though I'd love to try it. Why do you ask?" she inquired, glancing to the bronze dragon that was still in the water.

[etoile]

A petite, seafoam green dragon burst into the warm air over the water, and the rider shuddered with changes in such extreme temperatures. Looking down, the rider waved down at everyone. "Way to wait for me!" Robika hollered down playfully. She was a little late for the little field trip, but she had only just got the message that L'kas and M'kel were taking a group of candidates to the cove. And since Kmarath had a similar mindset, they had agreed that a trip to the cove would be very fun. They had left Emanor, who was sleeping in the middle of Robika's half-made cot. The green had managed to find the kitchens, and gotten herself chased out with a broom after the cook found her hovering over a platter of meatstrips.

Daintily, Kmarath spiraled down, landing in the water, sending small ripples in every direction. The water is very nice, the green remarked. My greetings, Seath and Tirenth, she politely said to the bronzes. Robika looked down into the water, sighing. "Could've landed a little deeper, couldn't you?" the greenrider said, rolling her dark eyes.

Yes, actually, Kmarath replied, moving further out. Robika hollered her protests. "KMAR, STOP IT RIGHT NOW!" she yelled, which the green did, but didn't bother moving back to shore. Sighing, Robika gave everyone a sheepish look. Now, time to swim, Kmarath said, a smug tone in her voice.

Laughing, Robika took off the jacket she had worn for the trip between, but dressed for the occasion of swimming with a tank shirt, and shorts beneath her pants. Unsure of where she'd keep them, she tucked them under her arm, diving and swimming single-handedly (literally) toward shore, where she threw her clothes on the ground. She looked up, hands on her generous hips. "Well, that was exciting," she announced, wiping at the water on her face.

[Shikai]

Myra walked slowly along the beach, admiring the ocean, the sand, the lush Southern Continent flora, and the sky. She was definitely glad that she had found the courage to volunteer, somehow, because this was certainly worth it! The tall girl turned as M’kel’s voice broke the air that had just previously been filled only with the sounds of nature. She nodded at his suggestion to hang unnecessary wet articles of clothing on a nearby tree, and trudged through the sand toward it. Realizing that she had said precious little to him, which could well be regarded as rude, she opened her mouth, clearing her throat softly to prepare her voice for use. “That’s – that’s a good idea. Thank you.” She said, stripping off her wet jacket, and removing her boots as well.

Myra listened politely as the bronzerider continued, telling them that Tirenth wanted a bath. It was clear that M’kel was asking them to aid him in bathing his dragon, and it was not at all an unreasonable request, she thought, after he had, for whatever reason, brought them all to the lovely cove. Besides, she hadn’t bathed a dragon before, and how often was one asked to do it? A slow smile spread across her face, and she took a few steps toward M’kel, sizing Tirenth up. He was a big bronze, that was to be sure! But then, she supposed, she had always been told she was big too, for a girl. Nothing compared to a dragon, of course! It was clear that bathing such a large creature would be made much easier with more ready hands, and would be an immense task for only one. Although dragonriders, she guessed, had to do such things often enough that they must be somewhat used to it. All the same, she would be glad to offer her assistance. It would give her something to do in return for the trip, which would make her feel much better, much more useful.

“I’d…be very happy to help, M’kel.” She said, with strength in her voice despite the soft volume. Her enthusiasm for the work was apparent in her face.

Myra looked up, startled, as another dragon suddenly appeared from between. A green, with her rider calling enthusiastically to them. She swam through the waves after her dragon landed like the others, in the water, and was soon upon them.

“Hello…” Was all that Myra said, bemused.

[Journye]

L'kas tilted his head as he listed to what Elkie would need to do her dance "I have some rope in one of the sacks on Seath's straps," he said with a nod toward the couple of sacks tied to the straps. He looked up as the green and her rider appeared and grinned. Seath bugled a welcome to the two.

Cael purred and shifted to rest on Elkie's shoulder if she allowed it, nuzzling against her hair. L'kas looked back at the candidate and smiled "So when do you want to preform your dance? I know that Seath will want to swim while we are here, but he wants to help you dance," he said as he glanced at the bronze who was shifting from foot to foot excitedly, causing small waves of water to lap at their calves.

Seath calmed down slightly so that L'kas could reach the sack with the ropes inside. He took them out and held them out for Elkie to inspect "Will these work?" he asked as he started to wade out of the water, his boots becoming uncomfortable in the water.

[etoile]

Elkie brightened immediately when she heard that L'kas had rope. That was a relief- she didn't trust vines, but it wouldn't have stopped her. So she was grateful that there was something stronger. Wood, on the other hand, she thought with a frown, had to be just right. Too thin, and it would break. To thick, it wouldn't be easy to dance on something that bulky.

The dancer allowed Cael to land on her, more than pleased that he liked her enough to do so. She stroked his hide absently, finding it cute that he nuzzled her hair. She was wearing her thin, dark hair down today, as Elkie sometimes would. She had no reason for a bun lately, seeing as there was no bar. But she might have to make a makeshift bun when she found some appropriate wood.

She glanced over at Seath, grinning. "Oh, I won't be ready till I find a bar!" Elkie laughed. "And once I do, I'll still have to make a trapeze, which won't take too long, and after that, I'll be ready whenever he is," she told them, assuring the bronze that he would have plenty of time for swimming. She looked up at L'kas. "You want to swim, or want to help me find some wood?" she asked playfully.

--

Robika gave the girl who greeted her an airy salute. "Candidate?" she asked, blonde eyebrow raised, but she was smiling.

Kmarath, however, had dived under water, looking like a sea-snake, a seafoam green serpent who was perfect with the water. Mine, please get these straps off, the green asked, eyes whirling. Chuckling, she said, "Sorry- my green wants me to get her undressed. I'll be right back!" With that, Robika darted back into the water, running slowly and awkwardly through the waves before kicking off and swimming to Kmarath.

[M'kel]

As it began to appear that neither M'kel nor the two candidates were making their way off the beach, Tirenth kicked up a cloud of sand in the water impatiently. His youthfulness was still quite obvious at times, for the bronze lacked the wizened maturity of elder bronzes, but his attitude was mostly playful in nature. However, as soon as a certain, sparkling green burst out of between, his agitated movements stopped, and he sank self-consciously into the water. Welcome, Kmarath, he rumbled sheepishly.

The bronzerider chuckled at his dragon's antics, shaking his head and glancing down at Keldara once again. He was surprised to note that she had sketched a fair likeness of a fire lizard in such a short time, and he murmured appreciatively. As she spoke, seemingly oblivious to the reason behind his query, M'kel's surprise faded and his charming smile appeared once more.

Before he could inform her, though, Myra reappeared. She'd followed his suggestion of stripping off excess layers, and her words confirmed that she had understood his meaning. "Yes, Tirenth would love a bath. Thank you for your offer. Keldara, if you'd like to join us...?" He left it at that, beginning to make his way towards the water.

Robika struggled out of the sucking tide just then, although she looked markedly more pleased with the drenching caused by her dragon than M'kel had. M'kel grinned in response to her exclamation. All three dragons had plunged straight into the cove, riders ignored. It seemed that Araelen's dragons had been needing a day such as this for a long time. They hadn't stolen away from the Weyr for a day since jumping forward, and the dragons were as eager as their riders for a day of fun and relaxation.

Robika turned and plunged into the water once more, and M'kel began to follow suit. "I'll race you to 'im," he called to Keldara and Myra, fully aware that he had the advantage of already wading out into the ocean. Chortling at this, the bronzerider plunged into the seething surface, confident that the girls could never beat him. In this, M'kel was as youthful yet as his dragon. Too much boyish arrogance, still, to be sure.

[Flamewolf]

Keldara looked up and smiled at the bronze's playful actions. The candidate stood up, stretched, and looked to M'kel. "Sure, I'd be glad to," she said. Taking off her boots and shirt, she hung them on the tree and started to walk towards the beach to hear M'kel challenge her and Myra to a race.

She laughed and frowned. "That's not fair, you're already half way there," she called out to the bronzerider but started to run anyways. Having not been running in the sand for quite sometime, she was unused to the sand, so she stumbled quite a few times. But the candidate just laughed at herself and continued on, amused at the least.

She finally splashed into the water, the water swirling around her ankles. She paused for a second, then continued on. The sand underwater was taken away by the tide, giving her an odd feeling of her sinking, but she continued to run, splashing in the water, behind M'kel. She hadn't a clue as to where Myra was at the moment, but before she could look behind her, a wave crashed into her legs. Startled, she couldn't keep her balance, and she fell backwards.

The water splashed up and over her. Keldara quickly held her breath as she went underwater, her eyes accostomed to being underwater, so all she saw was a lot of swirling water and foam. Once she found her arms and they stopped moving, she placed them firmly on the sandy bottom of the water and pushed up. She quickly gasped for breath and stood up before she could fall down again, whiping water from her face. Then she started to laugh again.

[Shikai]

“Candidate?”

Myra nodded in response to the other woman’s guess. She supposed it must be easy to tell the dragonriders from the non-dragonriders, especially as candidates were usually much younger. And, because of the time jump the dragonriders had made to even be in that time, she had yet to see a dragonrider younger than twenty turns of age. Of course, there was also the obvious absence of dragons to set candidates apart. Myra watched as the woman turned back as suddenly as she had come upon them, calling something about her dragon wanting something taken off.

M’kel seemed to follow the greenrider, for he was also heading back toward the water, except that for him, it was to bathe his dragon. After M’kel had gone a few yards, Myra realized that she ought to follow, for she had offered her assistance in bathing Tirenth. With a grin, she began to move toward the water as well.

She was surprised when M’kel, a dragonrider, and thus in Myra’s mind, a sort of demigod as they had before existed only in stories and in the fantasies in her head, challenged them to a race, just like a regular boy back at the hold. Such behavior forced Myra to change her preset concept of a dragonrider: they were not so far above the average human; their position not so distant and exclusive. They were human, with very human personalities and tendencies. That came as a sudden, and very pleasant surprise for Myra, because if dragonriders were human, then maybe, just maybe, she had a slight chance of becoming one herself. Was she good enough? She had never really thought herself good enough for anything much before, due quite possibly to the sort of inferiority complex her past had given her. Maybe she was good enough for something.

Right now, it had yet to be seen if she was good enough at racing. Myra didn’t really like racing, or anything competitive. She found that working together yielded much better results, and was much more fulfilling than constantly working against each other, trying to undermine others. But this was but a harmless race, and besides, she liked running, swimming, anything where she got to move about and work hard. She was accustomed to being outdoors, with wide, open spaces to run in, so she was in very good physical condition.

Myra’s long legs propelled her forward quickly, and she took long, easy strides to cross the last distance to the water very well. Swimming, however, was somewhat new to her, and so she moved as quickly through the water as she could while running, but found it ineffective as she found herself in deeper water. She inverted herself, doing the best she could to propel herself through the water using strokes of her arms and kicks with her legs. She honestly didn’t care whether she won or not, for she was simply running and swimming for the fun of it!

[Journye]

L'kas kicked his boots off, tossing them far enough from the water's edge to keep them from being washed back into the water, he would pick them up later. He waded back to Seath and grinned to Elkie as he started to remove the bronze's straps so that the salt water wouldn't ruin the tanned hide.

He chuckled at her comment and smiled broadly "I'll help you find some wood," he said with a playful smirk and wink. He put draped the straps and the sacks across his shoulder and headed toward the shore once more "I don't know how the feline population is now a days or how wild they still act. It would really look bad if I let one eat one of our beautiful candidates," he said in all honesty and besides he would rather spend time getting to know the candidate better.

Cael was greatly enjoying the attention since L'kas was usually too busy to pet him and play with him. The little brown continued the nuzzle into Elkie's hair, his tail loosely wrapping around her neck, the tip tapping lightly.

Seath rumbled happily and walked out to deeper water so that he could dive under. He reveled in the cool water and the dappling sunshine filtering through. He came up from air and spread his wings out to help him float, his tail tip flicking slightly. He looked at the green and rumbled a greeting Hello Kmarath, welcome, [/i] he said happily.

[etoile]

Elkie smiled. "Thanks!" she beamed, grateful that she didn't have to look alone. Especially when he mentioned felines... The wild ones frightened her. When he briefly described her as beautiful, she blushed, but smiled shyly. That certainly wasn't what she was expecting. Sure, people said that sometimes when they tried to convince her to sleep with them (which she never did), but he wasn't trying to get into her furs.

Unsure of what to say in response, she stroked Cael harder. She loved how he wrapped his tail around her neck in a loose choke-hold. She was often jealous of how others got this, but now he was going it with her! Elkie scratched his eyeridges, well pleased with him.

"All right! Let's go look!" she announced cheerfully, discarding her shoes as she ran as fast as she could through the warm sand into the closest clump of trees she could find. It was starting to stick to her feet that had been soaked from the seawater, she thought with amusment. She paused, and turned back to face L'kas, beckoning him with a teasing grin.

--

As Kmarath rumbled happily to Seath and Tirenth, Robika put herself through the duty of trying to detach the saddle while clearly out over her head. She treaded water as she raised her arms to try and unbuckle it, but to no avail.

Tryin a new tactic, Robika tried launching herself onto the green to unbuckle her from there, but she groaned as she kept sliding on the slippery hide. Annoyed, she looked back over to the merry troupe of candidates and riders.

"Anyone want to give me a hand?" she hollered, lifting a hand up and waving. She cursed her short stature- if only she had longer legs...