Making New Friends

Writers: Eimi
Date Posted: 2nd May 2008

Characters: T'mahl
Description: T'mahl remembers why he just isn't that social...
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 10, day 4 of Turn 4

"Hey, F'dun, scoot over, will you?" B'ser said as he stood, a little unsteadily to his feet. "T'mahl! Weyrlingmaster T'mahl! Why don't you come on over here and join us? We're making room."

The bronzerider stood stunned in the aisle a moment, clutching his mug of ale in hand as he looked at the man with brownrider knots. Did he know these people? Were they really talking to him or did he hear them wrong? "Me?"

"Yeah! Come on, come on, I'll introduce you," he said giving the brownrider's arm a push. "F'dun, come on man, scoot over and give our new Weyrlingmaster some room!" The brownrider reluctantly obeyed.

T'mahl was pretty sure he didn't know any of them, but they seemed a friendly sort. He was just going to sip his ale alone in the corner with his book, but making new friends might be nice too... "All right,"
he finally shrugged, setting his book on the table and pushing down his natural shyness to join the small group of men. "So, how exactly do you know me?"

"Everyone knows you, T'mahl," B'ser grinned, wrapping an arm around the bronzerider's shoulder as if they had been friends for turns. "You're our _Weyrlingmaster_," he said, as if that explained it all.

"Ah, I see." From the man's breath it was obvious that they had been into the ale for a while now.

"This man," B'ser said turning to his companions and pointing a finger in the Weyrlingmaster's direction, "this man here is T'mahl. He's my little brother G'serin's Weyrlingmaster. And he's doing a sharding good job of it too, aren't ya."

"Oh, well, thank you." Now he finally had a common frame of reference to draw upon. "Yes, G'serin. G'serin is a fine young man."

"You bet he is. You _bet_ he is," B'ser agreed enthusiastically, giving T'mahl's back a slap for emphasis. "He's going to be Weyrleader someday. Mark my words."

"Isn't he a bluerider?" one his friends asked with a rather confused squint.

"No, N'lep, he's a bronzerider," B'ser replied with a puzzled snort.

"Really?" F'dun asked with the same uncertain scrunch of his face. "I could have sworn he rode a blue."

"What's wrong with you idiots. Look at his _knots_!" B'ser reached across T'mahl's chest and gave them a tug. The Weyrlingmaster's beer sloshed onto the table as he was pulled ever so slightly forward. "He's a _bronzerider_."

"Ooooooooh!" they both said as realization dawned on them.

"Sorry, B'ser, I thought you meant your brother," N'lep said with a drunked smile.

"What? No! T'mahl here! What were you thinking? G'serin is a _bluerider_. Although," he added with an emphatic shake of his finger, "my brother would make an excellent Weyrleader if he didn't like screwing boys so much. Am I right T'mahl? Am I right?"

"Uh..." The Weyrlingmaster set his mug back down on the table. "Yeah... Sure. He sure would," he finally replied with much more certainty than he felt. It was obviously the answer B'ser wanted to hear.

"You see that? Leaderslip... Eh, _leadership_. Leadership runs in my family." B'ser laid his hand over his heart as if he were imparting some great knowledge on them all. "My great grandfather was a wingleader of some great..." What was the word he was looking for? "Well, he was well known. D'gel. You've heard of him, right, T'mahl?"

"Wingleader D'gel?" Never in his life. But T'mahl could tell honesty was not what was called for in this situation. "A good man, that D'gel."

"Sharding right you are, Weyrlingmaster T'mahl! A sharding _great_
man," the brownrider agreed, raising his glass. "To D'gel!"

"D'gel," his friends agreed as they all clinked mugs. T'mahl suspected his companions could have been toasting to a tunnelsnake's behind for all they cared. They just seemed to want the excuse to keep drinking. B'ser leaned in closer as he gently touched his mug to the Weyrlingmasters. The bronzerider could have sworn the man's breath alone could sterilize surgical tools the way it wreaked of alcohol. "You know, I think D'gel would have liked you, T'mahl. I really do."

"You do, huh?" he asked, wanting to shy away, but the man's arm held him fast. "You had a chance to know D'gel then?"

"Oh Faranth no," B'ser laughed, as if T'mahl had made some incredibly witty comment. "He died before my father had been born. A hunting accident."

"Hunting accident?" T'mahl asked confused. "D'gel was a _hunter_?"

"No no no," B'ser said with a drunken wave of his hand. "No, he was a _wingleader_, actually. But he died in a hunting accident."

"So he hunted for the Weyrhold when he wasn't leading his wing?" the bronzerider asked in an attempt to clarify.

"No no no. No, see, T'mahl, listen to my words," B'ser said, turning in his seat to look the man full in the face as if he had been making perfect sense and T'mahl was just not grasping the complexity of his story fast enough. "He was a _wingleader_, ok? He was not a hunter."

"Ok, yes, fine I get that," the Weyrlingmaster said, feeling his exhasperation rise. "So then how did he die in a hunting accident if he was not a hunter? What was he hunting?"

"Oh. Well, he wasn't actually hunting. His _dragon_ was hunting. He was just riding the dragon at the time and he had a heart attack."

N'lep finally voiced the thought that T'mahl just couldn't bring himself to say. "But if he died of a heart attack, how can that be considered a hunting accident?"

B'ser let out a long, drawn out sigh. "Well, it certainly wasn't on _purpose_, N'lep. I mean he didn't jump on his bronze's back with the intent to keel over, now did he?" The brownrider didn't notice the fact that his enthusiastic gesticulations resulted in beer sloshing over the side of his mug and straight onto T'mahl's book. "And he was hunting at the time so therefore it was a _hunting_accident_."

F'dun squinted at the brownrider over his now empty mug of ale. "Yeah, B'ser I just don't get it. How was it a hunting accident?"

"Right, well," T'mahl said as he rose to his feet and shaking drops of beer from the book. He felt he had had quite enough of a social life for one day, "It's been a wonderful evening gentlemen, but I think I have some duties to attend to. Please enjoy youselves and... Here, F'dun, you can polish off my mug." The man would certainly need it.

Last updated on the May 5th 2008

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