Dares you shouldn't have taken (Cait/Dalonia)

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

Ancalanath, I did not ask for your assistance! T’kar mentally snapped, tightening his grip slightly on Dalonia’s wrist to prevent her from yanking the hand from his grasp. As a reward for that, he got shoved by her free hand as soon as Ancalanath landed. He twisted slightly on the wrist in his grasp, raising it higher to prevent getting shoved again.

Too bad! Ancalanath retorted, growling.

“He’s a dragon, not a lizard,” T’kar stated, with as much dry amusement as he could muster, under the circumstances. It wasn’t much, but there was a touch of humor, at least. “and even if I wanted to feed you to him, he doesn’t eat people.” T’kar might have continued, but the woman did the one thing that not even a crazy person could expect to get away with; she drew steel on a dragonrider.

T’kar started to reach for his own knife, bitterly regretting the fact that he’d used his right hand and not his left to seize the woman’s wrist. He didn’t want to let go now, which would enable the woman to settle into a true combat stance, and likely take a swipe at him too, what with the mood she was in.

Be ready, Ancalanath commanded.

T’kar had a vague idea of what the RR Flame was planning, but before he could even start to ask if he was right, the dragon lunged forward, grabbing both Dalonia and T’kar in his forelimbs and swooping back up to the ledge of his weyr, where he promptly deposited both his rider and the Wherhandler, and swung his head in between them, hissing a warning to the woman that was abundantly clear, given the amount of fang he was displaying.

T’kar rolled smoothly upright, coming up on the far side of Ancalanath’s head from the woman. Ancalanath… he began.

She could have killed you! Ancalanath snapped, not taking his eyes off the offending wherhandler. She can stay here until she apologizes!

T’kar knew that tone. There was no way that anyone was going to reason with Ancalanath until the dragon calmed down. With an internal sigh, the Kingrider resigned himself to a long morning.

[Cait]

A hiss was the only indication that Dalonia felt the increased pressure on her wrist and her lips curled in some demented sneer as the dragonrider corrected her. “Lizard.” She hissed again. Okay, so she was a little out of it at the moment, but she’d been well and truly cornered…trapped even. And like some canine caught in a snare she was prepared to gnaw her own hand off to get free. In short, she was digging her own grave with each fear driven moment.

Before she could make a move, to either strike out at the one holding her in a surprisingly strong grip or twist her hand free, the lizard decided that he’d had more than enough of her insubordination and craziness. The Flame lunged at the pair of them and snatched Dalonia up in one of his foreclaws then with a mighty down stroke of his wings that drowned out the sound of Dalosk’s throaty protests, he launched into the air.

Dalonia felt her throat close and her fingers went numb, the knife slipping from her fingers before they’d even cleared the ground. Her eyes went wider than one might think possible and she suddenly felt cold, as though she’d just emerged from between. It was sheer, unrelenting terror. And when Ancalanath deposited her unceremoniously on the ledge of his weyr, she rolled to her feet, a wild look in her eyes. With some strange almost feral sound from the back of her throat she launched herself at the dragon head that appeared in front of her and like she had with Dalosk so long ago, she pulled back and slammed the heel of her palm whatever bit of the dragon she could reach.

Thief and Klutz blinked in above the ledge and began to scold and screech and in general be annoying. Below, near her post, Dalosk bellowed his rage but stayed put. Despite the state of his handler, he knew a dragon would not harm his woman. Besides, he also knew that Dalonia would kick him if he disobeyed her so he was going to stay put. But woe to any who dared to attempt to get past him because he would unleash his fury upon them.

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

Star rose up from T’kar’s shoulder and added his own high-pitched bugle to the general cacophony. The little Crimson’s intent was almost immediately obvious, for two more firelizards flickered in, a Black and a black-haze Brick, who promptly swooped at the DarkBlue and Brown who had invaded their territory, along with the aggressive-human-female.

Ancalanath pulled his head back about two inches, startled by the impact of the woman’s fist on his nose. That was something he’d never experienced before, and even in his anger it was puzzling, for as he would never hurt a human deliberately (unless that human was trying to hurt T’kar), it startled him that a human should attempt to harm him intentionally.

T’kar had no sooner come to his feet when the woman’s two flitts appeared, followed immediately by Shadow and Boot in response to Star’s bugled command, and then there was a resounding smack, and he felt a brief flash of puzzled pain, concentrated mostly on his nose.

T’kar lunged forward, intending to grab Dalonia’s arm and drag her away from Ancalanath, who at that same instant snapped his head forward, his lips peeling back from his fangs as he started to swing his head towards Dalonia.

[Cait]

A tense and slightly crazy situation only seemed to go from bad to worse as the air above the ledge turned into a duck, dive and hiss war between Thief, Klutz and T’kar’s firelizards. It was utterly ridiculous really and unfathomable to some that something could get so out of hand so quickly. But with the added noise and the overwhelming feelings of agitation and fear from the firelizards mixed with the rage of the wher below mingling with Dalonia’s own buried fear and defensive nature, it was a wonder that things hadn’t straight up exploded yet in the predawn hours of the morning.

Of course, that wasn’t to say that any second she wouldn’t entirely snap. In fact as Ancalanth pulled his head back slightly, dumbfounded by the woman’s actions, Dalonia stood there in a defensive pose, her chest heaving and her heart pounding against her ribcage in an attempt to escape what was sure to be a swift death at the claws of a rather irked dragon.

While her heart couldn’t escape, neither could Dalonia and her face disturbingly pale, she fumbled at her belt for a knife that was hundreds of yards away. Her eyes began to water—from holding her eyes so wide and not blinking, ALRIGHT!?!?!—and her hands shook almost uncontrollably. She was struggling to cling to her remaining shred of sanity but when Ancalanath swung his head around with fangs bared , she lurched towards the edge of the ledge only to have a vice like hand close on her arm and jerk her away from the riled dragon.

“Don’t touch me!”

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

Under any other circumstances, shock, if nothing else, would have ensured that T’kar released his grip when the Wherhandler shouted at him not to touch her, but these were not any other circumstances, and, in truth, getting the woman away from Ancalanath before something happened was of higher priority than playing nice, even if his temper, slow building and slow to rise though it was, had allowed for courtesy in the moment which, having reached it boiling point, it did not.

Ancalanath hissed, his own much quicker temper already boiling over. He was echoed by T’kar’s three firelizards, though whether they were echoing the dragon or T’kar’s own anger was more than even an expert would have been able to tell.

The hissing snapped T’kar out of his anger; he’d spent the better part of a year as a Weyrling learning to be the calm one in those situations which riled his huge RR Flame friend, and that early training asserted itself immediately. He took a couple of deep breaths, in and out slowly, reasserting his control before he did something to further the ridiculous situation, although, all things considered, he kept his grip on the Wherhandler’s arm tight enough to prevent her from pulling away. Irrespective of how the woman was acting, it was T’kar’s duty to make sure that she didn’t fall off the ledge, since it was Ancalanath who’d brought her here.

“Relax,” T’kar told the Wherhandler, meeting her eyes with all the calm he could muster. His tone sounded like water that had been left between, and he knew it, but there was only so much he could do, what with the anger that was still seething beneath his surface. Recalling what Z’der might have said in a (at least moderately) similar situation, he continued: “How’s about we start this whole thing over.” Despite his phrasing, it wasn’t really a question, as his lack of rising inflection made rather obvious.

[Cait]

Though she’d never admit it and would likely argue with her fists if anyone pointed it out, Dalonia flinched when Ancalanath hissed, a big fat teardrop spilling over and making a track down her pale cheek. The woman tried again to twist away from T’kar but he held her in just the right spot. For a moment his face seemed to shift and change between three familiar faces—Barrek, Derron and Elarren—before settling back into the sharp-nosed features of the RR Flamerider. But it was enough to elicit shudder and Dalonia let out a low sound; one unique to captured prey who knew there was no escape.

She’d learned quickly that to fight her brothers meant getting hurt and though she was aware that T’kar wasn’t her brother the same logic seemed to apply. She’d let him teach her his twisted little lesson and then go hide in Dalosk’s den for the rest of the night.

The haze of panic began to dissipate as the man’s cool voice cut over the sound of the squabbling hoard. Green eyes continued to water as she met his gaze though no more tears made a break for it. When T’kar spoke again, Dalonia didn’t so much as blink. Far below, even Dalosk settled as his handler put her walls back in place brick by pale brick though try as she might, she couldn’t stop the sporadic tremors that sped through her body.

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

Something was wrong. Something was fundamentally wrong with how the Wherhandler was acting and responding. Nervousness T’kar would have been perfectly willing to believe, after all, she had just gotten snatched up and dropped on a ledge by a king dragon, but this, no. This almost blind panic act, there was something wrong.

The Wherhandler seemed to relax, or at least start getting herself back under some semblance of control, as he spoke more calmly, leaving him to wonder how he had managed to, seemingly, so completely misjudge the situation. Or at least, misjudge the woman’s reactions after he showed up; the rest of the situation, well, it would seem that he, or perhaps the Weyrling master, was going to be having a conversation with the child who’d been involved, there was still the fact that threatening to kill the boy was over the top. First though, he had to deal with this part of the situation.

“Now, are you alright? Nothing pulled or torn?” Now that he was regaining control of his own temper, his words came out a little warmer, although they were still on the cold side of the accounting. He maintained his grip on the woman, waiting for a calmer response, so that he could be sure that she likewise had regained control of herself before he let her go.

[Cait]

If the Flamerider only knew--and he likely never would--how fundamentally wrong Dalonia's upbringing had been, things might have made a bit more sense. After all, she'd had been raised by her two thieving brothers and their emotionally retarded ringleader on the rough and tough streets in the far North. After her brothers had been dragged along by Barrek into Tiberax's employ, she'd been told horror stories about dragons and dragonriders and despite the fact that she now knew most of those stories to be false, that fundamental fear of the entire institution was still there. It was the reason behind her surly nature--well part of the reason--and her defensiveness.

Though when the situation didn't seem to escalate further as she half expected it to, Dalonia continued to put herself back together. Though she remained rather tense, her expression and even her eyes were now guarded. However, when T'kar spoke again, asking after her welfare she did appear momentarily shocked and then the suspicion crept back into her features. Was this some sort of twisted joke? Putting as much space between them as his grip would allow, paranoid and certain that he was going to come after her, she glanced sideways at the ornery RR Flame for only a second then back again.

"Release me, Dragonrider."

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

T’kar would dearly have loved to keep a hold on the WherHandler until she gave an actual answer to his questions, but based on shock with which she greeted them, and the general suspicion that she was behaving with, a more calmly delivered “request” to be released was probably as good as it was going to get. In light of that, T’kar let go of the woman’s arm and stepped back, giving her a little more space. He whistled Star, Boot, and Shadow back to him, so that the woman’s two flitts could return without interference from his three, although he had to tap Star’s nose to get the Crimson to stop hissing.

Ancalanath hissed again, a warning to the WherHandler to behave herself. He stopped the hissing when T’kar gave him a quick glare, but his tail tip kept twitching.

T’kar sighed quietly. This was going to be a long morning.

[Cait]

Before T'kar could even pull his hand back, Dalonia skittered across the ledge almost to the very edge, keeping a wary eye on Ancalanath. When the man's three firlizards were recalled, Klutz dropped away first, intending to land on the woman's should only to slam into it and nearly tumble to the ground before her claws grabbed hold and she hauled herself up. Thief, however, rose higher and clung to the rough face of the rock.

Tense as she was, it was no wonder that the WherHandler jumped when the obscenely large dragon hissed at her, fingers twitching. If only she had a weapon she wouldn't feel so vulnerable--a state that was hard to handle for the woman. As she hovered near the edge of the platform, Dalonia struggled to find her voice again and when she did it came out as a hoarse croak. "What do you want?"

[Ghost of Fire (Fëanáro)]

Make that a very long morning. T’kar still had one hand on the side of Star’s neck, while Shadow clung to his back and Boot took his other shoulder. He didn’t like that the woman was ignoring his questions, but she appeared to be far more scared of Ancalanath than any reasonable person should be.

“Right now?” T’kar asked, arching an eyebrow. “I’d appreciate it if you moved away from the edge so you are less likely to fall. I’d also appreciate an agreement not to attack foolish Weyrlings, or, at least not to continue attacking them once it’s obvious that they are not intruders.”

How about an agreement not to assault Dragonriders?

Ancalanath…

Ancalanath didn’t bother responding.

She didn’t actually attack me until the very end there, and she seems a little nerved up about something, so I’d put it down to that.

Ancalanath’s yellow-red eyes whirled faster, then slowed. This time, he stated, raising his head and sitting back on his haunches to give the WherHandler some space.