A Pleasant Distraction

Writers: Avery, Heather
Date Posted: 8th January 2015

Characters: D'kere, Talwynn
Description: The couple turn frustration to more pleasant ends.
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 10, day 8 of Turn 7

Talwynn had been starting to get used to sitting in D'kere's weyr
after dinner, sharing a quiet moment together. It was a little
worrying, actually, how fast he'd gotten through her sharp defensive
barriers, and how quickly she'd begun to treat this as a new normal. A
Turn ago she would have laughed in the face of anyone who would have
said that she would ever wind up happily spending time with a man who
she might be interested in. No, she'd always thought herself too
independent for this.

But today she didn't find his presence relaxing, or reassuring, or nice.
Because
he was doing it again. That thing she hated.

"Could you _not_ do that?" she snarled.

D'kere froze, his knife stilling against the piece of wood that he had
been whittling into something that resembled a runner. At first he
wasn't sure if she was talking to him, but since they were alone...
Who else could she be talking to?

"Um..." D'kere blew softly on the piece of wood, sending shavings
floating to the floor. "Not do what?" He looked up at her quizzically.

"The _tapping_," she said, looking over at him.

D'kere tested out the blade of his knife with his thumb and then
looked back at Talwynn, "Tapping?"

"Your foot. Is tapping." Her tone was short, as if she expected he'd know
what she meant already.

The bronzerider arched his eyebrows and then looked down at his left
foot, which admittedly, he had been jostling up and down a bit as he
hummed a lively tuned and whittled. Stilling the offending appendage,
D'kere glanced back up at Talwynn, "My apologies, milady." He
murmured, inclining his head to Talwynn before turning his attention
back to the piece of wood in his hands.

Humming. Tapping. Had he ever made this much noise before? She
couldn't remember it - of course, not that she'd always been used to
spending this much time inside of his weyr before. It was a new habit
that was becoming nice, but today it was becoming annoying.

Everything was annoying, really. Noise. Light. People. At least she
didn't have regular duties - it felt like her skin was crawling with
the irritation she was practically radiating.

And now D'kere was making fun of her. Talwynn compressed her lips and
let out a little unhappy noise.

D'kere knew enough about women to know that sound was not a good one.
The bronzerider sighed softly but didn't look up from his whittling.
Talwynn had been pricklier than usual lately and he had been trying to
stay on her good side, an impossible feat he was realizing. He figured
she was just being proddy, especially with the way Kenirath had been
glued to her green's side lately.

His guess was right, not that the greenrider consciously understood
that. She hadn't been as observant of her dragon's cycle as maybe she
should have been. Retired riders, especially ones with crafts that
shifted their schedule, sometimes got a little isolated from the
rhythms of the active duty riders. Talwynn in particular didn't
usually see her dragon interacting with others, since she slept
through much of the day and they no longer reported to group drills.
So she hadn't seen Riveth posing for the attention of the others,
gathering her own miniature court before dropping into slumber as it
grew dark.

Her leg twitched in unconscious mimicry of her green's tailtip
outside, which knocked over her cane, which clattered far too loudly
to the ground and echoed in the weyr.

"Shards and shaffit," she muttered, kicking it with one foot so it
bounced back up and she could grab it.

D'kere watched Talwynn's fit of frustration like a man looking at a
thorny bush. He wanted to help but he was afraid that if he got too
close he would end up all tangled up in the snarly, prickly vines.

"Is there, uh, anything I can get for you?" He asked somewhat meekly.

She calculated the odds of getting up and getting there on her own,
and sighed. As much as it galled to admit it... "Could you pass my
cane over?" she said, trying to keep her tone even. "I'm apparently
not useful tonight."

D'kere set his whittling aside, and retrieved Talwynn's cane. Taking
it to her, he bent and pressed a kiss to the top of her head, "Is
there anything _else_ I can do for you? Help take the edge off of that
frustration?"

Taking the edge off of it sounded appealing. Maybe if his hands were
all over her, her skin would feel less prickly. "I think that could be
arranged," she said, hands reaching up to pull him closer.

Last updated on the January 27th 2015

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A Pleasant Distraction