Sylvan Weyr

[Carni]

G'ram, former Weyrleader, writes on the first day of the 7th Pass:

We are without a Queen, my bronze is growing old and so are many other dragons. No Weyrlings fill the Barracks and many Candidates aside from a stubborn few have returned home. The Weyr has turned quiet, the riders are depressed, the dragons lifeless. Not even the Greens seem to be willing to rise these days.
I have send a group of riders whom I trust to find a way to the North, using ancient maps. They are our last hope, but I have heard nothing for two Months now. I start loosing hope. A Queen from the North could save our Weyr. We face extinction now at the beginning of a Pass. Egg heavy Queens should be laying in the sun, their swollen bellys glowing in the light. Now is the time when a Weyr should grow strong just before the first Thread falls... We are growing old instead. Two days until the silvery menace falls. Two days left... R'len promised me that they would be back by then. I still have a little hope left. We will fight Thread in two days. A queen will come and join us!

[Carni]

A'der, Bronzerider, writes on the fourth day of the 7th Pass:

The Weyr is still in shock. We lost G'ram yesterday when we fought Thread... He must have been sick for a long time without telling any of us. No one saw either of them being hid by Thread... our Weyrleader just went between and never returned. I am trying to pick up his work but it is hopeless. We are... hopeless. R'len did not return and I believe he is dead. I cannot send another group of riders, we already are too few. Yesterday, in the midst of the battle, I thought that our prayers had been heard. That the North has send us a Queen to save us.
I first saw something red in the corner of my eye, something huge and when I turned, I saw it was a dragon. The size of my own but more graceful, feminine. I know, the bright red of her hide is nothing we ever heard of, but that moment it was the most beautiful color I have seen. It must have been a female and going by her size, a Queen! A Queen that would save us, no matter what her color was!
...and then... I saw her flame.
I thought it was an illusion, another dragon flaming from behind her... but then I saw it again. She flamed. A female that flamed could not clutch. She was nothing but an overly large Green. How could her rider make her chew firestone? How could she dare to ruin our only hope? I think, that moment, I hated her. For teaching me that there was no hope anymore, that I was betraying myself... and for making her dragon chew firestone. A Green could not keep a Weyr alive, had she never chewed firestone - but her dragon could have! At least long enough to find another way to survive!

[Carni]

A'der, Bronzerider, writes on the fifth day of the 7th Pass:

The Red and her rider have returned. I think I will call her Crimson from now on, for the lack of a better term. 'Red' sounds just too normal. I was right about her size, her shoulder reaches the same height of my bronzes. She is not as massive, her body slender and feminie. It is a shame that she is chewing firestone. Her color and gender are an open provocation to everyone, some of the other riders already discussing about throwing her out. I can't. We need every rider we can get. Even if it is a huge crimson. Her name is Dafnierth.
Her rider is... scary. Her hair is blonde, her eyes blue, something I have not seen often... but it is not the color of her eyes, it is the coldness inside them. Those eyes are dead eyes. She wanted to speak to the Weyrwoman and the Weyrleader... When I told her that we have none, her face did not show any emotion. As if she was made of ice... She asked about other Weyrs we could recieve transfer Queens from and I explained our situation. And then... the other riders started asking where she came from. She did not say much but from what I understood it seems as if she came from the future... where the dragons are larger than ours, her Crimson being the size of a Brown and not a Bronze. Many asked if she could go back and bring us a Queen but she denied those requests. Seeing her fight two days ago, I think she has fought Thread before... That means she has crossed more than twohundred turns to reach us... I wouldn't take that risk again either. I wonder what she fled...

[Carni]

A'der, writes later on the same day:

Our dragons discovered that her Crimson is only two Turns old and has not even risen once before... It caused an uproar and a dozen riders demanded that Theresa should stop feeding her dragon firestone, hoping that the Crimson could still clutch. Every single dragon, no matter how small or sickly, would help us a little. She ignored the riders and asked instead if we had tried to stop feeding firestone to Greens. I... I had to inform the Weyr that... yes, we had tried. But none ever clutched. Theresa smiled as if she hadn't expected anything else. The Weyr went quiet again. Quiet and depressed. No one is really happy to have her and the Crimson here, but she fought alongside our wings and they will start accepting her. They have to. We are all sitting in the same boat now. I hope we can fight until the very end... die standing rather than live kneeling...

[Carni]

A'der, writes two sevendays after the Crimsons arrival:

She has risen - the Crimson has taken to the sky. Many males refused to chase her, confused by her odd color or grounded by the heat that has begun to rise on this continent. Thankfully, my own dragon refused to chase too. I had a longer discussion with Habit, our current Weyrhealer, displaying some of my most recent worries and I am grateful to have her in this position. Two dragons were wounded during the flight, pushing themselves much too far but the wounds seem harmless, not caused by the Crimson going rampage on her chasers. The flight was short but good, something less I have to worry about.
Habit mentioned the possibility that the Crimson could still clutch even while chewing Firestone. I am not sure if I want that, not sure if I want to survive the Weyr due a clutching mutant. She is a mutant after all. Some elderly riders are probably feeling the same... cutting the Weyr in two halves - one supporting the Crimson, one not - would be desastrous. We need all the power we have and cannot waste time on fighting each other. Thread is on the horizon, we need to be united...
...but what will the price for our survival be?

[Carni]

A'der, writes on the first day of Summer - the Hatching day:

I had a council-meeting right after the Hatching occured, so I will try to remember the most important details of this morning. Dafnierth' cursed clutch of fourteen hatched. It begun well, with a brown that, while being quite orangey in color, was healthy and strong. But normal is not a word I can use for the dragons that hatched after the brown did. Three new colors are running around in my Weyr now, three blasted new colors and half of my Weyr is tempted to throw them out. I managed to cool them off for a while but I am not sure what they do if those live and graduate from Weyrlinghood. 'Too young to survive on their own', 'an act of cruelty', will not work forever. The council has decided to give them names that accompany the crimson that clutched them, names that sound odd when compared to the rest, names that will always seperate them. Instead of Black, Grey and Purple, the new colors are called Sable, Chrome and Mauve from now on. They will be carefully watched during their Weyrlinghood so that we can find out where they belong. Most riders will prefer having them in their own seperate wing while others have already begun to accept them. Either way... Sylvan is not the place it has been yesterday anymore. Something has changed. And I'm not sure if it'll be good.
I still have not talked to Habit who has proven to be one of my most reliable subordinates, but I believe she does not know much more than I do. Nobody was able to take a closer look at the dead Crimson hatchling before Dafnierth picked up her lifeless body and carried her between. Maybe the Crimson is not a stable mutation. Hopefully the other three are - currently I don't really care about the color of their hide, I just hope they can chew firestone and flame Thread like all the other dragons under my command. I need more fighters to fly against Thread, otherwise all our other riders will burn out and die little by little from exhaustion.

Maybe I should ensure a few more bronze chasers upon Dafnierth' next flight, she might be able to produce larger clutches if caught by one, especially if it's not her first clutch like this one. Fourteen was good - more would be better. Yes, even if there are more freakish colored dragons... I need more dragons to fight thread. The Weyr is already in turmoil as it is - a few more of those will not make much of a difference anymore.

I hope this turns out well... The Summer should be a time we all enjoy... but somehow I believe there will not be much to be happy about...
I will try to keep this information consealed as long as I can, the Hold does not need to know about our internal problems. Currently they believe it is not too odd to have a few unusual colors in our Weyr, thinking it might just be rare instead of 'unheard of'. I hope I can buy us enough time to settle these things before the Hold begins frowning at us.

I believe they will expect Theresa to be our new Weyrwoman... Maybe I should take her to a few offical meetings just to keep the Holders from frowning at us...