A Little Piece of Gold [Kila]

His eyes opened. Darkness clogged his view of everything, as usual, but he still tried as he always did to see through night's curtain. His brain rolled on to remind him of his other senses: he inhaled the dry air of the cramped room, heard the suspicious creak of wood in the bunk frame, and the sudden texture of bedfur beneath his fingers made them twitch in surprise. As soon as he realized where he was, he became preoccupied with leaving the spot. That too was as usual. The only addition to his pre-dawn routine these days was the presence of his harper roommate. Qosis was under the impression that Cysrel did not mind. Or maybe Cysrel rose even earlier; he had never really looked.

But he was a quiet conductor of his morning affairs. He had the courtesy to gather his things for the baths without light, by touch alone. He knew every bump in the stagnant prison of the barracks by now. When he returned to dress he tipped just one of the glows open by a fragile margin, carrying on under the dominant green of the light. He swiveled the basket shut before he left.

Outside the barracks entrance rested some coagulated bands of snow, the Bowl otherwise empty of the stuff for several days running. Qosis stamped the snow and kicked it aside with his boot, so no one might slip on it later. He could not tell what kind of morning it would be yet, save "largely cloudless." The only star risen to prominence so far was the one glowing red, too distant to achieve Pern's dawn.

Pale shadows of the moons dusted him with weak lunar greetings as he crossed the empty Bowl, effecting no more than an oily glimmer down the sleeves of his closed jacket. Qosis glanced up for the eyelights of dragons, but saw nothing. He made his way to the dining hall. The assignment was a familiar one: decorating tables with the appropriate plates, cups and silverware. He hated it. The route was too known to him now. The effort involved was so minuscule his mind was left to wander strange places. No one he knew was there today. He refused to associate with the drudges that took their places.

Finishing quickly, he stalked back out the yawning mouth of the dining hall and then stopped as pink light suffused the eastern sky. Where had he been headed? Back to the barracks, to suffer as usual his ugly thoughts of late? Shells, he had not even erased a fraction of the energy built into his awakening blood. His body felt boundless in its strength and potential, while his mind was seemingly forever shackled by just one recent reminder of things long dead. He needed to run, or find the storage caves deep below this disgustingly bright Weyr Bowl where there were still bags of supplies to be hauled from one place to another. He would do both, he realized. The remainder of the day was a Rest-er. He would do both. Running would be first. A little wide-eyed, he turned to the south.

And ran. His heart stopped trying to jump out of his chest somewhere along the bridge overarching the tail of the Weyr Lake, but continued to tick uneasily as he flanked the feeding grounds. A runnerbeast whinnied just as he rounded the stables, and Qosis actually veered a few steps away in surprise. It had sounded so loud, like the horse was screaming in his ear as it drove up behind him. He continued to move half-turned toward the stables, to see if he could pick out the offender.

Instead he witnessed a glowing shape larger than any dragon he had seen sailing down onto the feeding grounds. Even with the stables in the way he could pick out the high shining points of the wings, and a brief shot of wild eyes. Then he fell to one knee as the scream of the creature crashed into him, and he covered his ears, but it did not seem to help. And the noise never stopped. It even sounded as though joined by others, small and large, but none so great as the first. Before his ears began to bleed, Qosis broke for the storage caves across from the stables. Like a wher driven from the golden dawn, he sought the lowest and darkest place he could find for his shelter.