((Open to anyone! Candidate, Weyrling, Dragonrider! Come talk to Wappy! He's friendly!))

Scrape, Scrape Scrape...

The grating sound of metal on wood was an unfamiliar sound in the Lower Caverns, and the faint smell of sawdust and wood shavings filled the air. Back to the wall, head lowered, sat the culprit who was producing the sound. He paused for a moment from his work, palming what looked like a small carving knife and a small block of wood in one hand and stretched, a languid one, extending his arms outwards, rolling his head back and sighing.

Waparvan was used to chores. Living as an Apprentice at the Harper Hall was filled with them; cleaning out the kitchens, sweeping the dusty hallways, refilling the glows, and attending class after class on controlling one's voice, techniques in drum building, tanning, carving and weaving to build instruments. Some days after class, his fingers ached, bled and scabbed from the work they did, strumming against guitar or sanding down wood. The aches the young man felt were always local; his hands, his arms, sometimes his neck would crack from being in one position too long. But the fatigue he felt here at Kharasi Weyr was a different one.

When Waparvan accepted his new title at Candidate, handing his Sr. Apprenticeship knots back to the Master Harper as he left Fort Hold, he though things weren't going to change that much. Harper's were well seasoned, well traveled, well educated folks. The Weyr was a stronghold of structure, so naturally, Waparvan assumed the chores would be like the ones he had at home. Within the first week of his residency in the weyr, he had found himself on hands and knees, mucking out the weyrling barracks of dragon excrement. A few days later, after shouldering what felt like a dragon sized bag of glows to the storage area, he was sent off, with only a moment to breath, to help scrub the hearths in the kitchens.

His mother had chided him, warned that if 'by the first egg,' he stopped practicing in carving small instruments, she'd come after him. "Just because you're in a Weyr with all those shardin' dragons, means nothing to me." Always the obedient one, Warparvan sat carving. Stretching his legs out, he swung his head back, propping his legs up onto the table he was sitting at, tipping his chair back slightly and returned back to his work. At least it was quiet here, and hey, he'd rather have his hands bleeding than his trousers stained. Right?

Scrape... scrape.. scrape

Wren was walking about the Weyr, head held perhaps a bit too high, swiveling back and forth with wide staring eyes. She absently felt her hair swish her back as her eyes continued to look everywhere. She had just returned from the Candidates barracks where she had dropped off her meager belongings.
Her eyes continued to gaze in wide eyed wonderment at the walls and caverns she passed. She heard a dull persistent noise but in her awe-inspired state she didn't really take any notice of it, just shoved it to the back of her head to think and mull over later. She looked up at the ceiling above her, continuing to walk as the noise seemed to get louder.
Apparently, she shouldn't have been looking at the ceiling at that moment, but it's opposite. For right in her meandering path was a set of stretched out legs and feet.
Her foot got caught up by one of the legs and down she went, head still looking up and arms flailing to try to break her fall. She let out a high pitched "Oooo!" She managed to bring her arms in front of her so that her face didn't hit the stone floor too hard.
She laid there a moment before she felt her palms start to sting and one of her knees to throb.

Ignorant to the coming and going of the lower caverns around him, Waparvan was oblivious himself, hooded eyes following the dexterity of his hands. A cut here, a carve here, the only important focus was the misshapen block of wood. He wasn't expecting to speak to anyone, let alone have anyone run into him...

WHAM The pressure of Wren toppling over his legs knocked his teetering equilibrium out of sync. The chair he was sitting on, hardly built to withstand the weight of a man on two back legs, gave way, rocking back and forth for a few seconds. Waparvan windmilled his arms desperately, but gravity, as usual, won and he whip lashed backwards.

BAM. CRACK His head connected against the wall and to the floor hard, enough to knock the wind out of him and send both the knife and wood block out of his hands and skidding across the floor. His face contorted and he let out a low groan.

"Sha-ardin.. Shar- Shar- Shards." He blinked a few times, trying to get the stars from his vision, and he rolled over, pushing himself up onto his knees. His vision was still blurred, if only for a few seconds, and he closed his eyes to block out the light.

OW.

"Are you alright?" he asked, rubbing his brow with a free hand. "Whoever you are. You okay?" He pushed himself upright onto his feet and extended a hand towards Wren's direction blindly.

"Just don't be dead, a-right?"

Wren let out a low groan as she used her stinging hands to flip herself over onto her back. She blinked up dazedly at the ceiling for a few moments then realized that someone had talked to her. Probably the someone whom she had tripped over. She closed her eyes in another wince as she realized belatedly that she had caused this mysterious person to make loud noises in their fall. She prayed that nothing had broken.

She opened her eyes to see a calloused hand extended towards her. She grasped it and with its help stood up, wincing as her knee protested under the weight.

"I'm fine, but I feel bad. I'm so sorry for tripping over you! I wasn't looking where I was going, and I'm so sorry!" She was babbling, but to her mind, she didn't know who this person was. Suppose this stranger was in charge of ... something! And because she had been a dimglow and tripped over him, what if she couldn't Impress? Her first day here, and already she might get kicked out!

"I'm so sorry! Are you ok? Did I break anything?"

A low, amused chuckle escaped Waparvan's lips as he helped Wren up, an instinctual reaction to his own embarrassment. Already a hot, crimson blush was running across his face, his hands getting clammy, his brow starting to collect tiny beads of sweat.

"It's... quite alright." He was smirking, a knowing, timid smile as he helped her to her feet, relinquishing her hand to his own brow, grinding his thumb into his temple to try and reduce the throbbing.
"My head's really thick, so honestly, a crack on it every so often probably does it good." He winced slightly as he switched hands, placing his other thumb against his other temple and continued to rub.
"But it does hurt. No way around that."

"What are you doing with your eyes in the air anyhow?" he chided teasingly, "I hope you don't spend most of your time during the day like that. Unless that's how you meet people." A final rub and he opened his eyes, blinking against to light of the caverns. It was then when he noticed the white candidate knots around her shoulder.

"Oh! You got one too." He gestured with his hand towards her shoulder. "Me too," he pointed back to his, touching it with a hint of pride in his voice. "We're twins then."

((I assume she's wearing her candidate knots too. ^^; If she isn't please tell me and I can change the post. :P))

(( you're fine! Candidate knots it is! ))

Wren smiled slightly. "No, that's not how I meet people. I'm new here, so I was just looking around. And, um, looking at the ceiling." She smiled slightly at how much of a dork that must have seemed. Even she thought that had sounded a little daft.



She glanced towards her shoulder where he was gesturing with a curious look. Then looked at his shoulder and it finally dawned on her. "Oh! Candidate knots! Yes, I just got mine. So you're a Candidate, too, then? How exciting!" Her face took on a big grin in her excitement to meet someone else who was in the same lowly position in the Weyr as her, an awkward transition from a normal Pernese to Dragonrider. "My name is Wren! I'm from a weaver hall!"

He looked sheepishly amused as Wren explained her actions, and he chuckled again, furrowing his brow in amusement. He had remembered his first time returning to a weyr since he was young. The way his neck craned back as he drank in the heights of the caverns. It way the dim glows hit the rock face made the walls climb forever.

"Well, just some friendly advice for the future. Don't always look up, because next time, you might run into something much bigger than me. Something, not human, if you know what I mean."
He was teasing. Her sheer embarrassed amused him to no end. At last, someone besides himself for once that felt silly. Oh, well, he only meant it in good fun.

He extended his hand to her own greeting. "It's a pleasure. And I'm Waparvan..." he gave her hand a firm squeeze. "I was a Senior Apprentice at the Harper Hall, but you know, situations change. But well met Wren. It's good to meet someone here." He gestured to his knots again. "If I don't impress, I'll go back and walk the tables to Journeyman. Or I hope so.

He turned back to pick up the chair and his knife and block of wood from the ground and gestured Wren to join him at the table. "So you got here today then? This must be a change for you?"

(( alright, last post for the night. I'll reply to you tomorrow. And is it Wa-par-van or Wap-ar- van or something else?? ))

Her eyes got a little wider. "Do... do dragons walk around in the lower caverns?" Her wide eyes changed as she teasingly frowned at him. "Wait. If I was looking up all the time, I'd see them anyways."

Wren grabbed his offered hand and shook it very warmly indeed. "It is very nice to meet you, Waparvan! And don't worry, I'm sure you'll Impress." Of course, she was saying this just to be nice, she really had no idea what qualities dragonets looked for. "You were Searched for a reason, you know, so you'll do fine."

((Aw. Good night! And it's pronounced Wa-pir-vin. I know it's spelled completely different than it sounds, but spelling it any other way would make his name look a little silly 9_9 I just say blame it on his dad for having a silly name himself and for his mom for sleeping with him. ^^ I just call him Wappy myself))

He laughed, a small smile slowing forming across his lips as she caught his bait, and then realized he was poking fun at her. "Okay okay, you have some logic there. Dragons are so shardin' big that you probably see them before you smacked into them. But they are tricky fellows. They'd find humor in it probably."

His smile diminished slightly into a well knowing smirk and he nodded as Wren reassured him of his future success. "Well, I'm glad someone has faith in my attributes, but you know, it wouldn't be the end of the world." he paused, rubbing the back of his head softly to test it's tenderness. "But you're right. The dragons saw something in me. They may be on to something. But remember, it's not their decision really, but those little tiny babies inside those eggs. I was told it took my father two times to impress his bronze... "

Squinting one eye in deep though, Waparvan looked unsure. "I'm not.. really sure though. I haven't seen him ever, so I can only assume what I was told was true."

Le shrug.

Wren shrugged. "Well, if your father Impressed a bronze, then it must have been worth the wait." She smiled as if that would prove her point.

She looked down at the block of wood he was holding and swung a leg to sit down at the table, not to close to him nor too far away. A nice friendly chatting space away. "So what's that you're doing?" She nodded in the direction of the wood block, noticing that it was in the process of being carved. "What are you trying to make?" She leaned forward to put her forearms crossed upon the table top and her hair swung forward to drape over the shoulder farthest from Waparvan.

"Oh, this?"

Lifting the piece of wood for her to see more clearly, he turned it in the light. It was about three fingers in width, a hands length and clearly in transition between it's original form and it's intended.

"Well," he said, picking up the small knife in one hand, beginning to cut wood in curly scraps from the block, "When I had initially accepted my search here, I had been told, quite curtly from my mother, whose a Master Harper there, that if I didn't spend some time practicing carving instruments, that she'd flay my hide."

He paused from his cutting, looking up at Wren again and motioned towards the block in one hand, "So, this, hopefully, will be a flute or pipe of some sort. Nothing special or fantastic, just something to practice on."

Wow, the young man thought to himself as he stopped talking, way to bore the audience here.

"So what's your talent? I'm sure you known your way around a loom then? At least, you'll be ahead of me in sewing together your candidate robe. I can't stitch for my life." he quipped, flashing a small, amused smile.

Wren dutifully looked closely at the carving block, trying to envision some sort of musical instrument. There was an awful lot she didn't understand about making instruments.

"How would you carve a hole in the middle?" She tried envisioning different ways, and the closest she could come to a good idea was drilling a hole.

She turned her hands palm up and looked at her finger pads, calloused from long hours spent plying needle and thread. "I'm decent at a loom, but it's not really my favorite thing to do." She turned her hands over, not wanting to remember all the careless times she had inadvertently pricked her finger with a needle. "I'm much better embroidering, making cloths more beautiful, like adding a trailing vine to the bottom of a skirt, or sewing on sparkling beads..." She trailed off, thinking about all the times that she had taken pride in a work done well.

She jerked her head up from staring at the table top, snapping out of her reverie. She smiled sheepishly. "I wouldn't call it a talent though. And I would be glad to help you with your candidate robe." Although she had a suspicion that she wouldn't just help with it, she would probably do the whole thing herself. She'd rather have it done right then half-assed.

How do you make the hole in the middle?

Waparvan's chest puffed slightly, and he rolled his shoulders back. Oh, good! A chance to show off what he knew best. He wasn't a braggart, not even close, but when women and a topic he enjoyed came up, he figured he wouldn't hold back too much modesty. Flaunt what you got, right?

"Well.." he dragged out the end of the word, flipping his wrist around to show Wren what was the start of the indentation at the top of the block. "As you shape the block into a cylinder shape, you slowly take the tip of your knife and scrape out the middle." He demonstrated it to her, taking the tip of his small knife and digging it into the wood in a clockwork motion. When he dug enough out of the indentation, he flicked it away onto the ground.

"Over time, you just do this on each side until there's a really flimsy barrier. Then you can just take a rod or something and break it. And Volia! Instant flute. Well.. with the exception of carving the piping holes and all that."

His face, flushed with excitement, and slowly started to blush again. "Do you want to try it? I can help you try a few cuts here or there if you want. This is only for practice, so really, mistakes are okay." He glanced up at Wren to meet her eyes for a moment before looking quickly back down to his work.

He nodded in agreement as the other candidate described her work. He had no real knowledge on weaving, or sewing, or looming. When he heard he had to sew together the pieces of fabric the candidate master had given him when he had arrived, he blanched. 'Shards' he had figured, 'I'll probably be stark ass naked on those sands before I could sew these robes together.'

"Oh," he breathed, glancing at Wren's hands as she palmed them up to look at. "I told you, we're twins.." He placed one palm up to show his own scabbed and calloused hands. "I guess we have more in common than these candidate knots now right?"

(( I had to laugh, picturing a candidate buck naked on the sands. :lol: ))

Wren listened attentively to him describing the making of a hole in the middle of a wooden flute. She smiled shyly at him. "That is so much simplier than I would have guessed. I would have probably gone and broken the whole thing, my way. Or just made two halves and tried to glue them together." She gave a little chuckle at herself.

He sure does blush really easy, she thought. Ignoring it, because she didn't want to embarrass him further, she eagerly grabbed the block of wood which was now a flute in her minds eye. "Ooh!" she squealed. "Could I try?" She wasn't about to grab the knife from his hand, though. She angled her body towards his and leaned a little closer, in anticipation of her new lesson. She may not be the smartest girl, but she liked learning new things.

She looked down at his hands, seeing them also calloused and creased from hard work. A small smile slowly turned the corners of her mouth. "Well if that's all it takes to be 'twins', then I guess this is one huge family we're in." She glanced up to look into his eyes, a very faint blush staining her cheeks. She prayed that it was too dim where she was sitting to notice. "Besides, I would hope we have more in common than our hands."

(( Aw. :D I have such a dirty mind about that last comment. *shushes self* Good thing Waparvan is a gentleman. I love putting him in situations where he blushes!! Because everything makes him blush. =D Maybe one day, he'll grow out of it. ^^))

Trying to be polite and not show himself as suddenly startled, Waparvan started only slightly, pulling one now empty hand back from Wren. He wasn't expecting her to grab at the piece of wood so eagerly and he sputtered as she took it away from him.

"Okay... okay okay.. so lets start with rule one."
He turned the knife over so the handle was in Wren's direction, and he palmed the blade carefully. "Work slowly and don't rush. Otherwise you," he motions a finger in her direction, "or me, might get sliced open, and I am no healer." His brows raise upwards and he gives her a stern, knowing glance.
Sure, she was a lady, and sure, she was cute enough to make him blush quick. But if blood is suddenly added to this equation, this budding attraction he was starting to feel in the pit of his stomach was going to go away. Fast.

"Now, take the knife, and hold onto that handle firm, and take the tip of the knife and angle it into the wood indentation." He imitated with his free hand, rotating his wrist in a counter clockwise motion. "Apply pressure and once you got a bit of wood carved out, you flick it out of the way."

He let Wren to the practice of carving out the hole of the flute, and he watched her with a bit of amusement, and well... admiration actually. Most girls in the Harper Hall came to learn how to train their voice. Sure, they took classes in instrument construction, but they either weren't very good at it, or at least, didn't show much interest. The thought of a girl being excited to try and master the art of making a flute... with his knife? He was like a werybrat that just got into the sweetstick supply.

"Well, I can only assume we are twins off of the little information I know of you." He responded, failing to catch the blush in Wren's own cheeks. He was too intent on watching her practice.

"So tell me your story. Where are you from, what do you like to do?"

Wren gingerly took the knife, handle first from him, careful not to wrench it out of his hands like she had accidentally done with the block of wood in her excitement. She tried to listen closely and watch at the same time his demonstration.

She gave a curt nod. "Ok, I think I've got it." She tried angling the knife like he had said. She applied a little pressure and then immediately flicked the knife away from them both, being vary careful. She looked down at the itty bitty dent she had made and frowned down at it.

"Let me try again." Once again, she placed the knife edge against the wood, promising herself she'd do better this time. She steadily applied more pressure than before and she was thankful when the knife bit deeper into the wood. Then she tried to flick the wood shaving away like he had done so effortlessly. Once again she frowned in frustration. This time, the knife was stuck and would not want to flick outward. She would have to saw her way back out.

"Perhaps this is why I wasn't sent to the Harper Halls," she said with a sarcastic grin. "It's stuck," she added. She handed block of wood with knife stuck in it back to Waparvan. "Maybe I'll be able to teach you how to sew better than you taught me how to carve."

"Where am I from?" She shrugged and watched him extricate the knife from the wood. "Just some small weavers hold. Not really too much of a story there, actually. Not too exciting, either. What do I like to do?" She had to think a moment before answering his question with a smile and another shrug. "This. Just talking to new people, getting to learn new things. Although, I don't think they'll be accepting me into the flute makers anytime soon. What about you? Your turn!" She looked at him expectantly and waited for his 'story' and what he did for fun.

(( this has pretty much been accurate of my experience of TRYING to carve. And is Wappy afraid of blood??

((Waparvan will scream like a little girl at the sight of blood. Well, not really, but he doesn't like it one bit. ))

As Wren plopped the block of wood back across the table, Waparvan couldn't help but laugh, collecting the piece back and began wiggling the blade back and forth until he was able to pry it back with a little pull.
"Trust me.. it takes a lot of time and patience. And trust me, those masters are bearing down on you like hungry wherries. So we have to practice." To busy his hands, he started where Wren left off, glancing up at her from time to time as she talked.

"Well, I'm glad I'm keeping you entertained." he responded with a grin, "Usually I'm not all that talkative. I'm a better listener more than anything else." He motioned a hand absently as a side thought as he carved,

"You know, how 'bout I just make this for you. For your efforts. You were a good sport to try. Then you can have a little flute pipe. I'll give it to you as a new friendship gift eh?"

When she finished her own story, he shrugged, "My ma's a harper, my da's some dragonrider somewhere off in Telgar Weyr. Never met him really, and my mam seems a bit bitter by the whole experience. Was really angry when I accepted my candidate notes. Born at Telgar Weyr actually, don't remember much though. Spent most of my years being all musically inclined at the Harper Hall. That's about it really for my history, ya know."

The effects of sitting in the chair for as long as Waparvan had were starting to hurt, and he shifted in his seat, stifling a yawn as he did. "As for likes, you know. I like listening to people, doing Harpery stuff. Found out recently I'm /not/ a fan of manual labor, but I do enjoy dancing and being social. And you know, meeting the pretty girl here or there doesn't happen to hurt either." On that note he flashed a saucy grin Wren's way.

Oh Behave

Wren listened to him talk, punctuated with him stopping to carve and listen to her babble on. When he came to the part where he said he'd make her the flute a delighted smile overtook her face and her light blue eyes shone.

"Really? You'd make me that?" Just the thought of someone making something for her, something so thoughtful make her day. A day already pretty good considering that she was now an occupant of a Weyr and waiting for eggs to be laid. A friendship gift! "You know," she added, her bright smile now turning a shade mischievous, "this means you'll have to teach me how to play it."

She smiled a little more to herself, watching him carve and listened to his past life before becoming a candidate. She was happy at making her first friend at the Weyr. Suddenly, she wasn't as lonely for home and all her friends at the weaver hold. Life didn't seem as daunting, as challenging. She felt sure that if she could make a friend just by walking carelessly about, everything else wouldn't be as hard.

"Not a fan of manual labor?" She snorted. "Who is? Besides, look at me!" She held out an arm for him to inspect. "See how pale I am?" Indeed, it didn't look as if the girl had gotten out in the sun for more than the time it took to scurry to a shaded spot. She didn't want to mention to him how she needed more exercise, didn't want to point it out if he hadn't noticed yet. She looked down at herself with a bit of hopeful disappointment, the flesh around her middle too ample in her opinion. True, all the extra-ness made her bosom even larger, but she was thankful that she was now a candidate and would be put to work doing such a hated thing as 'manual labor.'

She brought herself out of her self criticism and looked back up at Waparvan, then quickly back to the unborn flute. "We'll have to dance and be social sometime." Her cheeks flushed scarlet and she looked up at Warparvan to see if he had caught her slip. "I didn't mean-not like that! I meant have fun together!" She blushed even more, realizing that she was digging herself into a hole here. "Talking!" she almost yelled, more in frustration at herself than anything else. Besides, she added angrily inside her head, 'socializing' like how it might have sounded was strictly prohibited at her rank.