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“Give up the daylight, Dalinna,” the woman grumbled, pushing the mop into the corners of her office. “Bond with a watch-wher, Dalinna.” She dipped the mop back into the hot, sudsy water, splashing it all over the floor. “You’re just as important as the dragonriders. Pern needs you.” With every comment, she scrubbed harder, imagining it as the handsome young brownrider who had persuaded her to start up the Wherhold to begin with. “Never mind, Dalinna, my brother’s girlfriend somehow pulled hundreds of dragons out of her arse. You don’t matter after all.”
Dalinna jumped when someone cleared their throat behind her. “Whermaster? Is this a bad time?” Bennofen asked. He had his official weyrhandler uniform on, freshly-pressed and immaculate, in stark contrast to Dalinna’s frayed dress and damp apron. She pulled a rag out of her pocket and wiped her hands, smiling at the newcomer. He and Bennofen stayed in the doorway, wisely avoiding the soapy mess.
“No, I was just…” she started, gesturing at her office.
“Complaining?” he suggested dryly.
“Cleaning,” she corrected him, stepping carefully over to the other two. “Let’s walk and talk. I’m Dalinna, handler of gold Dalinnesk. And you are?”
“Fynasrado. Uh, call me Fyne,” he answered nervously. “You think I could really be a wherhandler? At my age?”
Dalinna looked him over. He was… forty turns, at most? It was hard to tell with skin so weathered from the sun, but she only saw a sprinkling of gray hairs. “Yes, you could. We’re not dragonriders - we don’t have to throw bags of rocks at each other. Watch-whers are much more efficiently sized and easier to care for. More self-reliant, as well. No need for youth or a muscular physique… though both are appreciated.” She winked, causing the potential applicant to blush.
“Whermaster Dalinna,” Bennofen chided, “serious candidates are hard enough to come by without you scaring them away.”
The whermaster huffed and swatted his arm. “There are far scarier things around here than a fat old lady, Bennofen. What really matters is if he’s willing to be up at night, and if he wants to work with our little darlings. They are in the nesting chamber again, I assume?” She held a hand up to her ear and nodded, answering her own question.
The closer they got, the louder it grew - an eerie wail that rose and dropped in pitch, echoing off of the stone hallways. It reminded Fyne of a few years back, when there had been a sickness among the goats. Unlike with the goats, it was impossible to determine whether this yowling reflected pain or joy. It just… was. “There aren’t… I mean… there aren’t ghosts here, right? I know this place was used way back in the Second Pass,” he asked, growing more and more uncomfortable the closer the noise became.
“Don’t be ridiculous!” Dalinna replied as they approached the nesting chamber. “You just walked in on choir rehearsal!’