The World of Pern(tm) copyright (c) 1967 by Anne McCaffrey.
The Dragonriders of Pern(r) is a registered copyright.
An online session, recorded by permission of the author for the benefit
of members unable to attend.
=======================================================================

January 14, 1999.  PernMUSH.  E'vrin's POV.
--
Your location's current time: 22:57 on day 21, month 10, Turn 25, of
the Tenth Pass. It is a autumn evening.
Cast:  E'vrin, Kassima.

After time spent talking and comforting with Sabra, E'vrin visits his
other lover at Telgar, and we get surprising sullenness and admissions.
=======================================================================

You fold your wings and land on Lysseth's ledge, then make your way
into the weyr proper.

You slide down Sharath's shoulder and foreleg to the ground.

E'vrin pats his mount's shoulder, murmurs something, and then moves
for the weyr entrance.

No green dragon sits outside on the ledge, and so perhaps it's
unsurprising that Kassi looks up with surprise from her work. "E'vrin!
G'deve--forgive me for nay getting up, but...." She waves towards the
basin of salt water that she's currently soaking her feet in. "Lyss,
sleeping wench, didn't warn me. Is all well?"

"Well enough," E'vrin gives distracted answer, rubbing his arms as he
enters. No riding jacket, just his shirt's white-bright sleeves: he's
a bit blue around the edges. "...Your feet. What's wrong?"

"Swollen ankles," answers Kassi. "Common symptom, I fear. I've had a
lot of work to do and less time to do it in; you know how that
goes... where's your jacket? You must be freezing!"

You say "Hmm? Oh, I forgot to grab it. Sorry."

Kassima snorts at that, scooting self and basin about on the box she
currently perches on. "Hardly something to apologize for, but if you
wind up freezing yourself to death, I'll drag you back from the final
*between* myself to give you a firm piece of my mind. Come in; sit?
Tell me how things go with you? And what brings you up to the Icy
Wastes tonight? Just missed a greenflight, lucky you."

"Sharath passes on his regrets," E'vrin replies with more of his usual
dryness. He's still distant, though, even while obeying, finding a
place to sit and warm. "...Just wanted to see you, I guess. I waited
until Sabra was asleep, then I crept out past her and Ivarath, and
here I am." Distracted.

Silence. A moment of it, then another. Kassi's eventual response is
polite and serene, though not quite the same as earlier amiability: "I
see. Well, good to hear that things are still going well with her and
you." Pause. Then, "And a'course, I'm always glad t'be seeing you. You
seem as though something's on your mind, however."

E'vrin grunts and scrubs a hand over his brow. "She is, actually. Is
that something you wanted to hear?"

Kassima smiles slightly. "Depends on the perspective. From one, aye."
A sigh. "Y'know... mayhaps you and she should make a more serious go
of it. Love, weyrmating, happily ever after, etcetera; you sound
well-suited." Still that serene politesse. "Just a thought. And I'm
nay going t'be playing matchmaker beyond that, I promise you."

E'vrin looks up, visibly started. "I don't love her. She doesn't love
me. There's none of that there, and we both of us know it, Kassi. I
love /you./" New rue twists his mouth and voice. "Even if it's
impossible and you don't love me. I'm used to the futility."

[Is her perpetual don't-love-me attitude finally beating him?]

"Do you?" Kassi brings a beringed hand up to massage her temples,
setting down stylus. She looks, quite honestly, wearied to the
bone. "Forgive me. 'Twas being snide. Y'know, 'tis funny... it still
makes me feel good t'be hearing you say that, though I know someday
you'll find out otherwise. Shouldn't, but it does."

E'vrin slumps back in his chair and folds his arms over his
stomach. "Well, let me cross that river when I come to it, all right?"
Some sullenness has crept into his tone. "Is it so bad that I can make
you feel good, then?"

[Off kilter from the talk with Sabra and from his new, hard duties.]

"*I* would say nay, but I do rather have a bias," Kassima
admits. "You'd be a fiendishly easy person to love, you know. As
you've probably figured--" A grin creeps across her features. "Judging
by the gossip I hear from my Wingriders who go up Igen's way, about
women flinging themselves at you. But I'm digressing. Tell me of
what's concerning you, why don't you, if'n 'twould help t'be easing
it."

"Flinging," E'vrin mutters after a flinch. "Faranth forfend. --Oh,
nothing I can tell you, since it was given to me in confidence. Sabra
and I swapped stories from our pasts. Pieces of mine are scrubbed
fresh and raw now inside me, bothering me all over again. It'll
pass. I don't know why I came here. Wasn't to burden you anew."

Kassima slides her feet from the salt bath and, leaving wet
footprints, pads from her place at the fancy table--where it might be
surmised judged by the scorched Records upon it that she was working
on reconstruction--to a perch on the edge of the bed instead, which is
closer. "You never burden me," she chides him, quiet but sincere. "You
know that, bronzer. If'n there's aught I can be doing--listening,
providing alcohol, whatever--you know I'll do it and gladly, hmm?"

Absurdly, moisture flashes flat in E'vrin's eyes, and he pushes both
hands' heels up over his face. "You honor me," he mutters hoarsely,
"and I wrong you. I know. I know. Stars above, Kassima, I'm so tired
all the time. Please, forgive me anything I say?"

There's a creak as Kassi pushes herself off the bed, stepping with as
much alacrity as she can to the side of the chair, where she
half-kneels to slide her arms around the man in a gesture of
comfort. "Honor, 'tis nay; 'tis what anyone would be deserving, and
you're forgiven without the asking. Cry yourself out, m'dear." A hand
reaches to smooth at his hair. "If'n 'twould help. Soul-weariness is
sometimes eased by it, and I'm guessing 'tis the kind of tired you
mean."

"No, no, I'm not going to cry. I'm not /that/ tired!" E'vrin finds a
smile and deploys it, solidifying under her touch. "Sirocco Wingleader
P'ter tapped me this past sevenday as his 'second, you see, and I've
been swimming in hides and drills for him since."

Kassima's brows fly up, and she grins broadly enough to qualify it as
a beam. "Why, E'vrin, that's fantastic!" she enthuses. "Felicitations
t'you! Shells, a'*course* you're tired; starting out as Wingsecond is
sharding awful--being grounded and having endless time for hidework
was all that saved me--and wait'll you try Wingleader... gah. But
that's wonderful news!"

You say "Well, I don't think it 'wonderful,' but I'm pleased, I
suppose. Some looks askance, some uncertainty -- it could be worse."
His shoulders lift, drop. "I'm tired, that's for sure. It does ease up
soon, doesn't it?"

Kassima suggests drolly, "Try it as a younger female greenrider, in a
Wing that's never had a female Wingsecond *or* a greenrider. A'course,
most of the Wing trusted P'tran's judgment implicitely. Just a
reminder that things could always be worse." Sinking to a full kneel,
she rests her chin on the armrest of the chair. "'Twill nay ease up,
precisely, but you'll get used to it. 'Tis only until it becomes
routine that 'tis so very much of a hassle. That *is* incredible
news. I'd break out a bottle of something t'be celebrating, but I
don't know whether you'd care t'be drinking all of it yourself."

E'vrin tips his head against the chair's back, rolling around to keep
his eyes, long-lidded, on her. "I'm past the need for celebrating it,
but thanks all the same. It seems rather pointless to drink alone, to
my mind. I'd rather just ... sit. For a while: I shouldn't leave Sabra
to wake up alone. It's rude, wouldn't you say?" He's hesitant, talking
about one lover to another.

"Celebrating knows nay limit of time or place," Kassi philosophizes,
"but I agree, save for during things such as 'lizard flights, in which
case I have a great, great deal of practice at drinking alone." Black
lashes drop to veil her eyes, but she responds simply, "I suppose
'twould be rude, aye." No extraneous comment here. Not given to
displaying negative emotion, that doesn't mean 'delighted' is the word
for her when this subject comes up.

"I shouldn't have said anything," E'vrin comments regretfully; his
hand brushes hesitation over her cheek, below the lashes, to seek her
chin and rub a finger beneath it. "It's a new situation for me. An odd
one, too. Are you jealous?"

Kassima closes her eyes briefly, and exhales in a quiet sigh. "Can't
say I *like* it, if'n you truly want t'be knowing, but I know I've nay
claim t'be getting upset." A snort escapes: wry amusement. "And,
i'truth, whatever she looks like, 'twill wager you aught she's a sight
more attractive than I am anymore, so I can't even say I blame you."

E'vrin holds her chin firmly in his hand now, and he tells her with
all gravity, intense and sincere, "You're carrying my first
child. Nothing is more attractive to me, love, believe that." His
fingers brush her skin again, and he shifts pensive. "You two help me
balance; I can't easily explain it, but I have need of you -- and
Sharath! -- to ground me. He's my fire. She's my tutor. You're..."

Kassima's own eyes glimmer suspiciously for a moment. "You see," she
whispers, "why 'twould be too easy t'be loving you." Taking a deep
breath, she supplies ironically at the subject switch, "The token
lunatic madwoman? Every good romance needs one, for comedy's
sake. Nay, seriously--if'n you need her, then I shan't begrudge you
her bed, or aught else."

"I may need her and even want her," E'vrin grants after a moment, "but
I don't love her, and two out of three doesn't a full romantic comedy
make, does it? Besides--" and he aims for levity with conscious effort
"--you play the madwoman so very well. You shall have your next child
by that Trevor, and start your own Bloodline of lunatics. Hmm?"

Kassima quirks a half-smile. "Some women are easy to want, I hear,"
she allows, a touch cryptically. "Ah, but hadn't you realized? I *am*
a madwoman. Ask m'Wingriders. Lunatic through and through. However, I
am *nay* lunatic enough for *that*! Please, E'vrin, grant me *some*
credit!"

E'vrin grins and slouches back further in the chair, nudging her with
his knee. "He does have a roguish sort of attraction, I hear from /my/
sources among your Weyrfolk...."

Kassima snorts at that. "Please. One doesn't earn a nickname of Iron
Maiden for attracting easily, m'dear. I find him frightening, and
little more--you should just hear some of his ideas. On second
thought, you definitely shouldn't."
Kassima muses, "Though, I have to admire a man who'd be willing to pay
many marks on frivolity. 'Tis stupidity, but an admirable
stupidity. So long as you're the one making the profit."

"And you'd know from profit, dearheart. Come on," pleads E'vrin then,
caught in the mood. "I'll make a deal: you lie back on the bed and
tell me Trevor tales while I rub your poor aching feet. You're allowed
off the proverbial hook only when you fall asleep."

Kassima has to laugh at that. "All right," she accedes, "all right, on
*one* condition--" Holding up a finger, she requests, "Nay one crack
about the parts involving mirrors!"

E'vrin laughs, "Deal, deal," and starts to help her up and over to the
bed.

Kassima accepts the help gratefully. To be quite honest, she needs
it. "All right," she begins, sitting down with another creeak. "It all
started when I saw him telling Schmitt that she should Stand...."

[So, he rubbed until she fell asleep, then he returned to Sabra and
 hopefully got some sleep, himself.  Log ends.]