Over the last week, Alyena's temper had been growing shorter. She was normally a very mild-mannered young woman, and her sudden fits of anger at innocuous things - like dropping a piece of fingerroot on the floor while cutting it - were so out of character for her that even she recognized it: Henriettath was proddy.

So it was not particularly surprising when she rose. She'd been fussy that morning, demanding unusual care from Alyena to make sure every inch of her hide was thoroughly cleaned and oiled, and she'd curled up on the western rim of the Bowl to soak up the sun. Alyena was sparring with her clutchmates and the older riders in their Wing; the boys had stripped to the waist despite the chill in the air, and the girls were wishing they could do the same.

She'd just finished a bout and was standing off to the side, bent at the waist with her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath, when a jolt shot through her. She frowned, straightening and looking up toward where her dragon rested on the peaks above. The gold hadn't moved. Henriettath...? she questioned very softly, not wanting to wake the sleeping dragon.

A second jolt and she knew the gold's eyes had opened. And a third... "Shards!" she gasped, staggering back a step and looking around wildly. Someone shouted from the Lower Caverns and riders came boiling out - the gold riders flinging themselves onto the backs of their beasts and going between as soon as they were far enough off the ground to do so safely. The males on the ridges were stirring and crouched, watching the young gold with avidly-spinning orange gazes.

The ruckus disturbed the gold, who almost violently uncurled to hiss after the departing females of her color. But realizing they were gone and she was alone with the pick of the Weyr's males waiting for her to choose one of them, she snorted and stretched leisurely, showing off for them. Alyena snapped back to herself for a moment and realized that the male riders were eying her just as hungrily as their dragons were eying her gold and they were moving to surround her. She started backing up, moving toward the weyr that had been designated as hers. One of the older riders grabbed her arm and shouted at her, "Don't let her eat!"

"I know!" she snarled back at him, jerking her arm free. Hetty roared her challenge to the males, a hint of anger in her voice to echo her rider's dislike at being grabbed. The gold plunged off the rim and struck out toward the feeding grounds. She swooped low over the herds, causing them to panic and scatter. She repeated the maneuver two times before picking out a herdbeast that had separated from the others. She dropped on it, her weight snapping its spine; the creature threw its head back to bellow in pain and Hetty ripped its throat out.

Don't you DARE eat it! Blood it only! BLOOD! Alyena gasped, her mental strength almost not sufficient to the task as Hetty snarled her anger. A battle of wills ensued as her prey's blood seeped into the ground, a battle which Alyena finally won and Henriettath reluctantly spat the neck muscle out and lapped at the blood. The herdbeasts were stampeding now, nearly colliding with the fence on the far end of the fields before swinging back around; in blind panic, they didn't realize they were running straight back around toward the gold. By the time they neared her, she'd finished the first; as they swung around again to run away, she leaped over at them and pulled down another beast. Again, Alyena fought with her and forced her to only blood her latest kill. The rider thought there would be a third kill, but abruptly Henriettath lunged upward, screaming her challenge to the males as her wings thrust her higher in the air and she swung south and east toward the ocean, angling ever higher.

D'ver and Bronze Vorith

D'ver had been busy in his weyr. While he knew he needed to do some more practicing with the weapons, he also knew full well that his riding straps were more important. He had managed to have them get close to snapping at one point, and glowered at them in the process. Regardless, his first duty was to his dragon and so he worked on fixing them up so that they could ride without any risk. Not that he hadn't known full well that Henriettath was close to rising. He'd noticed how irritable the girl was, and he knew full well what that meant. They'd only talked about it often enough over the past little while.

Of course, a second later he also noticed Vorith rising from his spot and moving closer to the edge, eyeing the queen. She hadn't fully woken yet, but the bronze was still interested in her. ~Henriettath rises,~ the beast responded to the unasked question.

D'ver frowned, so much for fixing that strap. With a sigh he dropped the work he'd been doing and mounted his beast just long enough to get down to the training grounds, where plenty of others had already surrounded the young queenrider.

A second later he felt himself slowly get overcome by his beast's lust after the gold, the large bronze turning towards the queen and watching her interestedly until she launched into the air. Within seconds his own frame leaped up and his wings pushed him skyward. With an answering roar he chased after the queen in her new direction, pulling his mine with him as they strove to be faster, stronger and smarter than the other males.

Bronze Rilath
Rilath had been frustrating his rider for the last couple of days. He'd practically glued himself to Henriettath. L'nex couldn't complain too much, since every other bronze and brown in the Weyr was doing the same thing. The young bronzerider knew full well what it meant; after all, they'd participated in several green flights since they had transferred. However, having a dragon who insisted on being as close to the proddy gold as she'd let him made it sharding difficult to get in and out of his weyr.

Fortunately, they were at weapons practice with their Wing when Henriettath finally rose. The electrifying sensation that shot through him, however, occurred as he was being beat around the practice ring by one of the greenriders. He was backing away frantically from a flurry of staff blows and the shock sent him staggering. At first, he thought he'd just tripped when he realized he was on his back, but then an ache in his shoulder and the greenrider leaning over him anxiously brought reality home the fact that he's missed a block and had gotten clobbered.

About then, the vocal challenge went up and he saw a golden blur flash by overhead. He cursed and scrambled to his feet, waving his opponent aside as he sought out Alyena. It was impossible to see the girl, seeing as how she was significantly shorter than pretty much everyone else in the Weyr, and almost every bronze and brownrider was clustering around her.

Rilath felt a similar surge of resentment. He was Henriettath's clutchsib. He'd known her for longer than any of these other males! He didn't like the competition. L'nex started trying to shove his way through the crowd to get to her, causing a couple of others to shove back and the male dragons to hiss at each other.

But then she was off! Rilath bugled his answer to her challenge and lurched from his perch to chase her. He was younger than any of his competitors except for his clutchsibs, but he was smarter than them! He was Wingleader! The pair roared into the air after the fleeing gold.

K'then was just shooing his newest batch of youngsters off to clean up and get lunch when Baroleth intruded into his thoughts with a brisk Get our gear. We fly to Benden.

Why?

He could feel his Bronze's annoyance at the question and rolled his eyes even as Baroleth delivered news that surprised him. Henriettath rises. Baroleth had shown an unusually keen interest in their most recent Gold and he'd also known her maiden flight was close. Which was why he'd been glad to be busy with the Xanadu weyrlings and have little time to visit. Of course, there was no arguing with the large Bronze that glided down nearby and eyed him impatiently. Get on.

"And what if I said no you pushy brute?" K'then grumbled, though found himself grabbing his riding jacket and helmet and approaching the Bronze who crouched low to allow his rider to mount. K'then was barely settled, much less safely strapped in, before Baroleth launched into the sky causing K;then to give an undignified yelp as he hastened to fasten his safety straps before Baroleth got too high into the sky. The Bronze rumbled irritably at the delay and wasted no time blinking into the cold of between when K'then relayed the image.

They came out in the sky over Benden and Baroleth dipped down to land in the bowl, snorting at the waste of precious seconds it took to deposit his rider on the ground where he belonged. Luckily, Henriettath was still lapping greedily at her second kill but it wasn't long before she pushed off from the ground with every able Bronze and Brown after her. K'then was, thankfully, on the ground when Baroleth leaped back into the air and barely had time to locate the mass of riders around Alyena before his Bronze's lust hit him.

Baroleth snorted at the hissing going on above him, with K'then not as close to the rest of the group, he felt no real desire to engagein whatever contest was going on. Instead, he used their distraction to his advantage and focused on gaining a bit of ground while he had the chance.

The young gold, though confident in her lust, was not nearly as skilled in flying as the older dragons. She hit a thermal and, instead of riding it higher, punched through it, only to lose altitude on the other side. Belated instinct told her she needed height, not speed and distance, and she started searching for another - she couldn't turn back to the one she'd passed through without running into the pack of males chasing her. Besides, one or more of them would likely have taken advantage of the thermal to get above her!

She sensed the rushing updraft as she swung toward the southern face of a nearby peak and strained upwards in it, seeking to make up for her earlier mistake. She started spinning her body like a corkscrew as she powered her way up, thinking to disorient and confuse the males and make herself harder to catch. The air began to turn chill, a bite made more noticeable by the heat flushing her hide. A second chill swept over her - not from a change in the wind or passage through another cloud, but from a shadow overhead as another dragon moved between her and the sun.

The second Baroleth had hit the thermal, he rode it upward until it would not longer lift his bulk and leveled out, using his altitude to his advantage. He kept an eye on Henriettath as she struggled to reach a new thermal and gain height. He watched when she hit one and it carried her upward, closer to his level and he saw his chance. Of course, Hetty had to make things more interesting by corkscrewing as she rose higher and he had to time his approach carefully to avoid catching her at the wrong angle.

Once he was within range and just above the Gold, Baroleth waited for her to level out and dropped in from above, intent on taking the Gold by surprise and giving her no means of escaping. If he was lucky, no other male would have gotten close enough to Hetty to catch her.

Vorith had stayed slightly back, just far enough to watch as Baroleth rose higher on the thermal. With that idea in mind, the younger bronze followed suit and used the advantage. He was younger, in better condition (as far as he was concerned) and he felt he would be better able to out fly the older male.

Once he was high as the thermal would take him, he followed after the queen striving to put himself closer to the gold than the older bronze was. Lucky for him, he managed it just barely when Henriettath found her second thermal. His eyes never left her form as she cork screwed up in an effort to confuse them. However, he hadn't quite gotten close enough for it to work on him and as chance would have it... he made it into the perfect position to catch her with her more focused on rising than on watching the males.

With that in mind he strove to try and catch her, angling himself over her and trying to move in for the catch.

Rilath considered his only competition to be his clutchbrother. However, like Henriettath, he was inexperienced in the way of flights and although he realized her mistake before leaving the first thermal, he was far enough through it that he wasn't able to use it to billow him up as high as his competitors. But that put him above the golden prize as she powered into the next thermal and he followed her into it.

She was only barely larger than he was, so he flung himself upwards with it, but sticking to the edge and allowing himself to rise somewhat more slowly than she did. His plan was to grab her as she darted past him, but she decided to corkscrew on her way up and foiled his initial grab for her, resulting in him ending up behind her and forcing him to fight to gain altitude and a new vantage point for catching her.

But then she reached the top of the thermal and the air started cooling, not giving them the boost they had been using. He used the brief respite he'd gotten taking the slower way up to try to push just past her, placing himself closest to her and immediately above her. This position was ideal for catching her and winning the chase, and he lurched forward with limbs outstretched to do just that...

Henriettath squalled in surprise as she was suddenly surrounded by bronzes, each seeking to snatch her out of the air. In a last desperate move, she twisted and angled down, trying to dive and gain some speed to get away from her erstwhile suitors. Unfortunately, she didn't realize that there was one dragon who had been slightly below and behind her for several moments, and her maneuver practically put her into his claws: bronze Rilath.