Chapter One "Jekkal? Remind me again why we're doing this." Ginilian droned at me for the twelveth time. Or at least that's where I stopped counting. "You know on Teva if anybody wants to live here they abide by our circumstances. If we want them to live here we have to abide by theirs. This is one of those cases were we abide." I hissed at her. I would've leaped at her and ripped the throat out of that Drigus's horse neck. Fortunately for her, you need legs to leap, something I lacked. Then again, I did have a cobra's ribs. And cobra don't need legs to leap. I shook the thought from my hooded head. It was difficult enough just putting a weyr together with as many people as we had. I didn't want to see how we'd do it with one less. I rubbed the egg from the Weyr. It still hadn't hatched. That's it, Jekkal, I thought, This is the last time you deal with this many empty sections at once. Either start looking for places that don't require this or go back to that Tomagotchi. "Hoooooo." I groaned. I was not going to resort to 'it' again. I put a dragon orb down on the ground for it when it came. Along with a few things it would eventually use when the time came. I collasped on my wings and looked around. Fairly decent for a weyr. Whoever was going to live here wouldn't be dissapointed. "We're done." I moaned. "Now everybody go back to your own lands. I need to sleep." "How come we've never seen your weyr, Jekkal?" Salistine asked me. She rubbed her small griffin head against my hood. Her cousin, Falirae, was right next to her. "Because I don't need a weyr or a cave. I need skies and grasslands and forest. I live outside of the sections because I'm a guide. I'm in charge of this area. Everyone lives here because I let them. Sure, I could go around, kick everybody out of the rifts, and then have it to myself. But I don't. So I live inside the empty sections until the eggs or dragons come. Then I live in another section. That's why you live in an aviary and I don't live anywhere. Call me a homeless hobo, but that's the facts. I don't mind it. I do mind your asking." I splurted out before I could realize just what I said. "Oh." Falirae said, a little plowed under. "I thought it was just because you thought your cave was uncomfortable." "Well," I said. "Until that Gemmite comes this is my cave, and if you'll stay here tonight, you'll make it comfortable." I smiled. The two griffins fell asleep in my arms.
Chapter Two I woke up the next morning with a weight on my head. I arched my neck up a bit, letting the egg roll to the hay. "Already? Man, Even I think they'd have woken me up." I groaned. Well, I told myself, You know the Gemmites have powers. Maybe they used them to keep you asleep or erase your memory of them coming. Either way, you've got yourself an egg. I laid it in the lush grasses, covered by a woolen blanket I remember using when I first came here. So long ago, from my own past... I shook it from my head. Why was I thinking about it when I had an egg to worry about? I spiraled around it. It was the only egg that was here. The other egg from the Starmeadow had just hatched. Maybe I could sit on this one the entire week before it hatched. I laid there for about three hours until it started moving. It never hatched, only shook. I remember what they said at the Moonstone Weyr about that. it was quite decieving. It would shake almost the entire time until it hatched. It kept me awake. I hoped the egg had been delivered late.
Chapter Three "WOAH!" I said as I was bucked off. That Gemmite was storming out like a volcano. I was glad this was the last to deal with. The ticondas had come, and there was no Pernese to travel to the cliffsides for. I watched in awe as it came out of the shell. It was so CUUUTE! With that pretty gemstome right in between the eyes, and just the overall thrill of a newborn... I would've swooned. A cold breeze shook me awake. "Great. No hatchling lives through this weather right out of the egg." I hurried her away to the small cavern. It was covered in blankets and straw. "Awww... you're too pretty to be nameless. What'd you like me to call you? Tekisia?" "Uh-huh-huh-huh-huh." it said, probably just giggling. But I didn't care. "Okay, Tekisia. Auntie Jekkal will make sure the cold doesn't do a thing to you."
Chapter Four "Shucks. Your Gemstone fell off." I said, picking up the black stone. It was flat on one end and pointy everywhere. I decided to polish and shape it. I started working, when I first saw it. I kept scraping off the black covering, shaping gently, until it was a rounded diamond box four inches on all sides, and an inch thick. I stared at it for about five minutes in disbelief. Tekisia was a white Gemmite! Her black stone that lay between her eyes until she grew up was simply a coating, like an amethyst before it could be polished to reveal the purple heart. I stung the gemstone on a necklace, using parts of the black coating and pieces of the white stone I had removed while shaping. "Teh-kess-e-AH!" I screamed, loud and slowly so she could hear it fron the other side of Rivi. "What, Jekkal?" She said, landing on all fours. "I guess you are an enhancer, after all." I said, slipping the necklace over her head. "I polished off that gem for you." "You haven't seen a thing yet. take a look at what I've been working on." She said, leading me back to her weyr. There was a stack of leaves in the back. she pulled them out one by one. "Wow! You did this all on your own?" I said, looking at the puzzles she designed. "Yep. Try them out tonight, will you? I want to see if they're any good." "Sure." I flew off, back to my weyr that I had been keeping for some time. I stayed up the whole night trying to figure them out. |
