All references to worlds and characters based on Anne McCaffrey's fiction are copyright © Anne McCaffrey 1967,2000, all rights reserved, and used by permission of the author. The Dragonriders of Pern(r) is registered U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, by Anne McCaffrey, used here with permission. Use or reproduction without a license is strictly prohibited. For more information, visit the Worlds of Anne McCaffrey.

19-12-00: Counting
You venture down the nice, wide, really rather steep staircase. Down and down and down some more, into the blue-laced...

You venture down the nice, wide, really rather steep staircase. Down and down and down some more, into the blue-laced white of the main hall.

See Allegria. See Allegria staring at one of the paintings on the wall.

See Hanneke, although if Allegria is staring at the painting, she probably won't. The girl skips down the stairs, tossing curls about her shoulders, before coming to a complete halt. "G'deve Craftmaster!" says the perpetually bubbly, with a bob of her head.

See Allegria nearly jump clean out of her shoes. Not quite, though. Close. How can that girl be so blasted energetic? "Evening, Hanneke."

It's a combination of too much klah, to much sweetener, and too much air within the brain. Does wonders. "Did I scare you? I'm sorry--I didn't mean to. I just had to be polite, because Mother told me that it is -always- best to be polite."

Allegria can do politeness. To the proverbial T, in fact. "Better politeness than rudeness, true," she responds. "How are you?"

Sass ventures down the grand main staircase.

Hanneke's face bursts into a brilliant smile, dimples showing. She's far too cute for her own good, you see. "Oh, indeed. Mother always said that, too. I'm good--very good! It's such a lovely time of the turn. How are you? I hope you're good, too."

Allegria spares a glance for the window upstairs. It's winter. It's cold. Alli used to live at Ista. There, it is warm. So, thus..."Lovely, yes." If one likes white. "I'm not too badly." Sass receives a nod, and a slightly wary smile.

Lovely time of turn, Carenath's great patoot. Sass scuffs in rubbing at her poor winter-dry knuckles. "Good af--uh. Is it evening?"

Hanneke, evidently, likes the cold. Either that, or she likes -everything-, and that's possibly just as fearsome. "Oh, that's good to hear. It would be -horrible- if you were bad, or something." The nod is noted, and her tawny head turns, a brilliant smile bestowed upon Sass. "Evening, yes! Isn't it lovely?"

Allegria eyes Hanneke. Watch her fear appropriately. "Evening, Sass," she says, in that tone of voice that screams out 'How do I talk to you when I just broke up with your father not all that long ago?'

For once in her life, Sass gets to be on the far less awkard end of the scale. She addresses the Masterharper directly. "Oh, okay. Byre said he'd see you at dinner, but maybe he'll be late; he's taking a nap. Are you okay?"

Hanneke casts a glance between Sass and Allegria, but her face is as cheerful as ever; if she's noticed any tension, she's far too dense to really realise anything. "She said she's fine! To me." Oh, what a good conversation to butt into.

It isn't tension, per se. It's more awkwardness. Allegria shrugs in response to Sass. "Thanks, but don't wake him up on my account...and I'm fine. Feeling a bit old, but fine." Hanneke gets a peculiar glance.

Sass turns partway toward Hanneke, no doubt a magnet for many peculiar glances. "You're the new one, aren't you. One of the new ones."

Hanneke, if she wasn't Hanneke, would probably be rather blushy right now. All these glances. "Me? Well--Not -exactly- new. But new-ish, I suppose. I'm Hanneke. My mother is Anniye; she's also a Harper. Mother says--oh, well, I suppose it doesn't matter." So she babbles.

Allegria listens to Hanneke babble for a moment, before eyeing the painting she was staring at earlier. After identifying a spot where the paint is flaking and really should be fixed, she turns back around, to listen.

Sass' mouth pinches up, almost smiling. "What's your mother say?"

Hanneke pauses. Then, grandly, without noticing that her audience has diminished--at least partially, she states, "Mother says that we're only new until we know people, and since I know people -- a lot of people! -- I guess I'm not new then, huh?"

Allegria chuckles quietly. "A valid point," she says, before turning to Sass. "Sass, are you going to see your father soon?" Her father. Not Sabin. She's a bit too raw for names right now.

"How many people?" This, Sass reasons, might keep Hanneke occupied for hours, all the better to allow Sass to observe the back of Allegria's head -- which then turns, and faces her. Oops. "Uh..."

Hanneke frowns, her pretty face contorting for a moment. "Are you sure you want to know? I mean--that's a lot of people, and I'm not so good at counting. I need to use my fingers, and my toes. But--" She begins to count. Oh, the joys of being an utter idiot.

"I *could* see him," Sass offers.

Allegria watches Hanneke start counting, before looking back at Sass. "I'll give you a note. He sent me a lovely Turnday present." And poor lonely Alli bawled. But that's beside the point.

Yasmina starts paying attention again.

Sass suggests the unsuggestible, which might be daring but for her plain, softspoken delivery. "You could take it over."

Hanneke is -still- counting. In fact, she's leaning down to count her toes through her boots. Whatever the conversation between Sass and Allegria means, well, she's blissfully oblivious. "I think it's twenty-three," she states, finally, which is a number that can't really make much sense. "But I sort of lost count after twenty." Not enough toes, see.

In the distance, the drums announce the departure of Master Kelson.

"Remind me to get you an abacus," Allegria notes in an aside to Hanneke, the counting wonder. Sass' suggestion gets a wince. "I guess I could." But that would mean seeing Him in person, and that might invoke odd things.

"That's a lot," Sass marvels quietly, all for Hanneke's benefit, though she's trying to eke out some space, some distance between them. It's time, as good a time as any, to talk to Allegria. "Have you sat for your portrait yet?"

"An abacus?" Hanneke states, dully, but, standing up straighter, and pulling her arms behind her, she doesn't seem to be overly concerned with the idea. "It -is- a lot," she agrees, vaguely.

Yasmina walks into the hall from the outside, lowering the hood of her cloack and taking a breif glance around to see who is here, shaking off the cold as she does.

Allegria makes a squarish shape with her hands. "A frame with beads, for counting things," she explains for Hanneke's benefit, before looking over at Sass blankly. "Portrait? Someone wants a portrait of me?"

Hanneke's face shows enlightenment -- of a sort -- her tawny-haired head nodding quickly. "Oh, that's nice!" If she had any idea how to use it, or could learn. Yasmina is noted, and given a brilliant smile, "Hi!"

Sass points at all the other masters, old dead ones, no doubt driven into the ground by their jobs -- but how lovely they all look, immortalized thus in oils and in egg tempera. "You know, the official one. For posterity."

"Oh. That." Allegria wrinkles her nose, before shrugging. "That must be why Tenchi keeps banging my door down." Artists. Go figure. "I'll need to get started on it." As soon as she crawls out from under the avalanche of hidework. The new arrival gets a polite nod. "Hello there."

Yasmina smiles back to Hanneke, mirroring the smile given to her, "Hello there," she says, as much to Hanneke as to the others, but really doesn't recognize who they are.

Sass' gaze drifts to Yasmina at the same time Allegria's does. Her face churns out another fleeting all-occasion smile, and then it's back to cornering the poor Masterharper. "Yeah, you should. Do you have a minute?"

Hanneke digs her hands into her pockets, smiling brightly, but, intelligently, sayint nothing. She's not so good at conversation.

Allegria eyes Sass. "A minute? Like now? I guess. What's up?"

"Let's get it later. It's not important," Sass demurs. Now they have company, plenty of company, and Sass expects their fearless leader to go on leading fearlessly, or something.

Zhaykyrl slips in, pack over her shoulders, owlfeather eyes scanning the room, taking in the crowd, raking automatically over the knots. She bows slightly, curious, moving a bit closer, not interupting just yet.

Another new face! Oh, good, this makes Hanneke less new. Especially since she's meeting new people. "I don't know you -- do I? I'm Hanneke, and you're new. Hi."

Yasmina continues to smile brightly to everyone there, and then turns to Hanneke, "What's going on?"

Hanneke adds, by way of Yasmina, "I don't know. I was counting people I know, for -them-," that would be Sass and Allegria, if one gagued it right. "I think we're just standing around."

Allegria gives another nod, this one to the other newcomer. So many people all at once. Fancy that. "Catch me later, then," she responds to Sass, while watching Hanneke, the one-woman greeting squad.

Zhaykyrl nods slightly to the one who greets her, then arches an eyebrow at the nodder, checking knot. That one gets a slightly deeper bow. "Ma'am..." To both of them.

Sass stares at the painting of Charlton, at the hook of his nose. She's here if Allegria needs her, she supposes, but she'd like to see if Allegria actually needs her.

"Ma'am? You'd better call Allegria," Hanneke waves an arm towards the Masterharper, "Master, or Masterharper. And then there's Sass--She's a Journeywoman. I'm a probationary apprentice, so I'm just Hanneke."

Xian enters from the courtyard.

Allegria chuckles tolerantly at Hanneke, before returning that arched eyebrow evenly. Sass gets a glance, as does the portrait.

Xian wanders into the hall, doing the typical rubber-necking of a newbie to the area. "So /this/ is the hall.." he murmurs to the blue on his shoulder. And those, those would be harpers. Ooooohhh. The group of people get a friendly nod.

Yasmina looks at the newcomer and gives her a smile, and then blinks as she catches the title of one of the older people there and her expression changes a bit, though mostly in surprise, she just gives the Masterharper a smile.

Zhaykyrl smiles slightly, and cocks her head up at Allegria and the others, a serpentine gesture. "Ma'am... Ma'am..." Then back to Hanneke. "I'm Zhaykyrl... I'm rather new here.' she smiles at Hanneke. "Which means even you out rank me."

Hanneke, outranking someone? Oh, dear. That's got to be odd. "I do? I do! Oh, how *nifty*. Well met, Zhaykyrl. Well met indeed!" And bounce, bounce, bounce, indeed.

Sass stares, bides her time, stares, scrunches up her toes, lets them go, and in the minutes that pass it all becomes abundantly clear: Allegria's just not with them today. Sass turns away from the portraits and finds a serviceable voice. "Are you all visiting? You and you and you?" Xian, Zhaykyrl, Yasmina; she points.

Allegria got a present from her ex-fiance. You'd be out of it, too. Sass' sudden taking over causes her to blink a couple of times, before she arches an eyebrow.

Xian gets that typical teenage look of angst as he is pointed out. "Umm..well, you see...I'm here to check out your clay." Don't ask, or perhaps you should. "I didn't mean to interupt, I thought this was a public place and all.." Seven creels a tad as Xian twists his tail nervously. "Oh, sorry guy." How many shades of red can his face turn?

Zhaykyrl nods once. "I am new. Only arived recently. I'd not expected to see anyone so... elevated, so soon." Her tone is formal, but her eyes dance with mischief, she's not half so serious as she'd like any of them to think.

Hanneke, beaming as brightly as ever, shrugs, "Oh, she's just a person, same as all of us. I don't think it matters much, as long a you show some respect." She pauses, then adds, "I've got a class. I better go. Nice meeting you!"

You follow the blue- and brown-carpeted steps up, up, and up some more, gaining a new vantage point upon the great hall even as you pass into the windowed chamber.