Post by Desert on Aug 18, 2011 1:09:36 GMT -5
It's been said
It's cold beyond the sun
Have you ever been there?
Weyr: Zhivhiri Weyr
Song: Beyond the Sun, Shinedown
Name: E’zera
derivation/meaning: Hebrew עֶזְרָא; Ezra, Old Testament prophet
Age: 32
Gender: male
Sexuality: pansexual heteroromantic
he can congress with anyone regardless of sex or gender identity, but tends to form romantic attachments to the opposite sex exclusively
Rank: frostrider
Communicating thoughts of ways
To never have to speak again
Let me be the fire in your head
Appearance[/b]
E'zera is lean and compact. Not especially big nor small, he stands at a respectable 5'7" with his limber bones bearing wiry muscle. His frame isn't completely devoid of subcutaneous fat, which would make regulating his body temperature in the frigid Weyr more of a challenge; instead, the sharp definition of his musculature is softened with enough insulation to keep him warm. He is not out of shape, nor especially overweight, but had he lived in the more hospitable climes of Pern, he could afford to shed a few pounds of mass.
Every Pernese human has a mostly homogenous mix of genes from the original terran stock, but the ones that expressed themselves in E'zera are slightly unusual. His skin is a tawny mocha hue, darker than the normal tones seen in the North. It is reminiscent of the dusky skin tones borne by the terran Inuit people; indeed, E'zera's broad facial features, with an aquiline nose, full lips and a solid jaw also echo that parallel.
His hair is a deep, glossy black, with the raven's-wing blue undertones derived from several old terran bloodlines. It is naturally thick, and would be coarse were the strands not sleek and straight. He most often wears it long enough to trail just between his shoulder blades, and usually works it into a thick braid at the back of his head, with smaller braids framing his face. If he is feeling decorative, he might stud these braids with colored beads.
Across the left side of his upper body, covering the pectoral muscle and arching over his shoulder to fan out over his shoulder blade, where it continues down his arm in a sleeve that ends just above his wrist, is an intricate tribal tattoo. It closely resembles tattoos from the old terran Maori culture, and E'zera is rather proud of it, even if he doesn't often have an opportunity to show it off.
In terms of wardrobe choices, E'zera prefers colors that camouflage him with the Weyr's icy environment. Whites, grays and blues make up the majority of his clothing. He has a few black items, and has a fondness for some shades of green, but he generally avoids warm colors. Also, though this is as much from necessity as preference, he generally wears clothing that covers his arms and legs. Even in the brief summer when the temperature in the Bowl is nearly balmy, he is usually seen with long pants, though he does sometimes take an opportunity to flaunt his tattoo with a sleeveless tunic.
Personality
At a casual encounter, E'zera is an easygoing, laid back man. Perhaps forgettable, perhaps distant, but pleasant to shoot the breeze for a while. He is casually acquainted with almost everyone in the Weyr, knowing them by name and face (he is somehow quite good at remembering identities) and would say that he is friendly acquaintances with the rest of his wing. This is how he prefers it; having a wide group of people with whom he can have a nice conversation, and then be left to his own devices, is his favored lifestyle. He doesn't call anyone 'friend', because that means that they occupy a closer position to his vulnerable core than he is comfortable.
E'zera is not cold nor insensitive, but he holds people at arm's length. Since Kaila's death he has been descending into misanthropy, and has shied away from emotional commitment or dependency. His dragon is the only close tie he has at this point in his life, and he has no intention of changing that. He has nothing against other people, for his experiences have never been so unpleasant that he has become a bitter cynic. His worldview did not shift catastrophically; he is too realistic to let himself descend into pessimism. The world goes on no matter his personal trials; some might find this truth harsh, but he takes comfort in the fact that the sun will continue to rise even without Kaila there to help him greet it.
In many ways, E'zera counts himself lucky. He knows himself well, and he knows that his own laid back temperament and realistic outlook kept him from turning his grief inward or out, turning him bitter or depressed. He let his grief run its course and put it behind him, allowing himself to heal from that blow. He knows that his introverted tendencies have increased since Kaila's death, and recognizes that this is a psychological defense mechanism to keep anyone from hurting him. He sees no reason to change that; he is content with his life and lifestyle as it is.
I've been known
To travel much too fast
Is that you in the distance?[/color]
History[/b]
Enizera was born into a family of nomads. They shunned the safe confines of the Holds for a life of freedom roaming across the Icy Wastes. They made a living mostly by hunting and trapping for food and pelts, which they either used or traded to the Holds for non-meat staples such as grain. They also traded with the carved bone and nonprecious greenstone ornaments that they specialized in making. Many looked at them askance for their odd ways - they were not like the Traders, who took their wares all over Pern; they were said to be holdless vagabonds, and primitive savages.
But in the far north, there was little choice. Herds couldn't easily sustain themselves in the same place for long, so domestic animals were rare, and the wild herds roamed far and wide. There was much to be gained from fishing off the ice that extended klicks from the shore, which also took them far away from 'civilization'. And in their home range there was little to fear from Thread, as long as they found a cave in which to shelter themselves; there was little around for most of the year other than snow, sea, and ice. Threads would freeze or drown, and even in the summer, the permafrost would keep them from proliferating.
So it was with this lifestyle that he was raised. Enizera spent his youth wandering the endless fields of ice and ocean, the open sky vaulting above him as free as the blanket of white always surrounding him. He tolerated the periodic visits to the Holds, for their static ways of life, while intriguing, did not appeal to him. he was born with a free spirit, and hated being confined in one place for too long. He learned to make their stylized jewelry and carved for himself a hei matau of greenstone.
One day when Enizera was in his thirteenth Turn, his family was making a stop in Coast Hold. Enizera and the other youths of the group were wandering in awe, dazzled by the grand architecture that somehow managed not to disrupt the natural beauty of the cliffside bay. They came out into an open courtyard where a small half-wing of tundras were gathered, looking slightly miserable in the [relative] heat of the summer.
Enizera was not one of the ones that sidled closer to the dragons, but when the tundras looked up at the handful of children eying them with wary fascination, he was one of the ones that got their undivided attention. Soon, the tundras' riders came trotting back, bemused at the fuss.
Thinking they would be punished, the children averted their faces sheepishly. Eventually, they were convinced to take the riders to the family elders; it took quite a bit of cajoling on the tundrariders' part to gain permission to Search Enizera and the other two that had been singled out, but when it was mentioned that the tundras might be tempted to snatch the children up regardless, they got their wish.
Enizera was in the Weyr for two Turns, growing increasingly resentful at the strict rules about wandering off. He couldn't even explore the unused tunnels deep within the Weyr; one shot at that and after being lost for several hours, his sorry hide was hauled out of the tunnels. He knew not to do that again unless he particularly favored having another claustrophobic panic attack.
Then, though he had been losing hope that anything would ever happen, the fateful day came. That Hatching was no different than the other ones he had attended, other than the number of canon colors steadily waning. The first dragonet to hatch was a roly-poly frost, whose frame was already notably thick and stolid. A few of the candidates giggled as the frost nearly got stuck on its back; only the vestigial wings kept it from rolling all the way over.
The frost struggled upright and plodded straight into the male candidates. His wobbly, deliberate pace meant that the boys had plenty of time to get out of his way, though he did trip over his oversized paws several times and nearly impaled someone on his horn. One such person was Enizera, who saw the frost's horn flash a hair's breadth from his most tender region. Much to the amusement of the other candidates, he leaped back with a yelp, falling on his rear almost at the same time as the frost hit the floor ingloriously.
The frost rolled onto its belly, gathering its feet, but it didn't rise. Instead, it turned to look at Enizera. He eyed the dragonet warily as it extended its head, but the frost only rested its chin on his knee. I didn't hurt you, did I? I'm sorry, Mine. Walking is hard. Can you help me?[/b][/color]
Over the course of weyrling training, E'zera slowly grew accustomed, not only to the shaggy beast with whom he shared his thoughts, but to the notion of staying in one place. Gavrielsith is just as much a homebody as any other frost, but E'zera taught him that "home" can have a very broad meaning, and he doesn't mind as much when they leave the Weyr for a while. Gavriel softened E'zera's discontent toward being cooped up, though the association never entirely rid him of his deep-rooted wanderlust.
A Turn or so after they graduated, the two of them found their better halves. Their hearts were captured by a greenpair from an earlier Hatching; Kaila and Sarith were playful young ladies that drew the two boys out of their shell. Seeing Sarith curled up against Gavriel's furry belly was not uncommon, as the cold-hardy big frost offered the young green the warmth her body so craved.
There were many difficulties in their way. One of them was that Sarith, a green, took to the sky when she Rose, rocketing high into the atmosphere where Gavriel had no hope of following. The first time she Rose after they paired up, Gavrielsith barreled across the snow-crusted glacier, casting his eyes high into the sky toward the green streak and her aerial pursuers. He nearly plummeted into a crevasse in the ice; after that, E'zera recalled the loyal beast. Even though they couldn't be together when Sarith Rose, something that caused considerable strain between them, they did the best they could for several Turns.
Then, the inevitable and the unthinkable happened. Kaila's wing was out on a sweep when, from out of nowhere, they were hit by a blizzard. It was an instant whiteout that gave the mostly canon-color wing no time to respond; some of them were lucky enough to between back to the Weyr, but many others were too disoriented and storm-battered to make the transfer. Several had their riders torn from their shoulders, and refused to leave until their rider died from exposure, the pair unable to locate each other in the howling wind and snow.
The Weyr keened for the loss of the last of their bronzes and blues, and all but a pitiful few greens and browns. None of those greens were Sarith.
The frostpair was inconsolable for months after that. They began to spend most of their time outside the Weyr, for the memories within those tunnels were too painful to bear. They isolated themselves from the rest of the Weyr until such a time as the wound began to scar over, leaving them still aching, but better able to go about their lives once more.
Since then, the intervening seven Turns has provided a balm for the wound; hurt that had once frozen into apathy has thawed again into acceptance, and they have moved on. They have resigned themselves to bachelorhood; Gavriel will chase an unpaired female, if she is not looking for a committed mate, for the purpose of sexual release, but no longer are they looking for love.
Parents: father Enikan, mother Anzera
Siblings: elder brother E'ran of glacier Uzyrith, younger sister Nikka
Bring what's yours, I'll take what's mine
And meet you on the other side
We'll leave a sign so anyone can find us
A better place, a sweeter time
We won't need any wings to fly
A place beyond the sun[/color]
Dragon Name:[/b] Gavrielsith
derivation/meaning: Hebrew גַבְרִיאֵל Gavri’el, Strong Man of God
Color: frost
Gender: male
Age: 17
Personality
At first blush, Gavriel is a typical frost. He isn't the most verbose; he prefers to stand back, observe and judge before he enters into a given situation. Anything he says is given thought before it leaves his mind, which means that he affects a deliberate, slow mode of speech. This leads many to believe that his mind works as slowly, which is untrue. For a frost he is quite bright, though more than that, he is clever and wise. Some things do escape him, but if there is anything he is good at, it is thinking things through thoroughly. He has enough good sense to go around, which in many ways is more valuable than a high IQ.
Some take him to be as dull-witted as some of his brothers and sisters, but they really need only catch him in the right mood to hear examples of his surprisingly sharp wit. He has a dry, quirky sense of humor, and never fails to catch even E'zera off-guard with his witticisms. He dispenses puns (most of them so awful they're genius) along with gems of wisdom; often the two are combined into one brow-slapping statement. He favors adages, and is fairly adept at thinking up new ones that sound poetic and well-used.
For Gavriel, the words 'never' and 'impossible' does not exist. If he gets it into his head to do something, then he's going to do it no matter what. Stubborn perseverance is a defining trait of his; there have been times when even E'zera has been unable to dissuade him from something he's set his eyes on. This drove him out across the ice every time his beloved green Sarith Rose, no matter that he was always kept from her by sheer vertical distance.
Though he was driven to frustration with every Flight that Sarith flew, one thing he never did was ask her to land and give him a victory he did not earn. He has firm principles that he will not violate even at the personal distress of watching another male twine necks with his beloved. And despite the stress this put him through, never once did he consider leaving. His love outdid the flares of jealousy.
Though generally an affable, easygoing beast, Gavrielsith has drifted into introversion since Sarith's death, and like his rider, he favors venturing from the Weyr's confines for solitude on fairly frequent occasions. He and E'zera wander the tundra, rarely speaking to each other; both lost in their thoughts and recharging from the daily grind of rubbing elbows with a Weyr full of other people. Unlike E'zera, he will rein in his temper and remain cordial to those whole welcome has run out, but the forced politeness sometimes reverts to bluntness. He never snaps or lashes out in anger, but he will drop his manners and outright tell someone to make themselves scarce if he is tired of them.
Appearance
Though not the largest frost in the Weyr, Gavrielsith is on the larger end of the spectrum, pushing forty meters in length. With a thick, muscular neck, a broad chest and wide-set shoulders leading into a barrel chest and solid hindquarters, this is not a dragon who is easily dislodged once he digs his claws in. He is shorter and heavier than most frosts close to him in body-length, giving him an especially low center of gravity.
In coloration, he is easily told apart from the other frosts by the fact that the dorsal stripe of midnight blue extended its jagged streaks further down his sides than most, such that they tickle his belly fur and mesh in a pattern much like the stripes of the tigric felines so far away in the Southern jungles. They streak across a hide that resembles a sheet of ice frozen overtop a bank of snow: pure white overlaid by a silver-gray tingeing that looks nearly metallic. Gavrielsith goes to great lengths to keep the thick fur covering his legs and underside clean and immaculately white, even suffering E'zera to comb it to keep ice from matting into it.
Resembling great icicles jutting from his back, the dorsal spikes that decorate his back ridges fade from navy through to a silver-white, echoing the color of the thin membrane that stretches between the spars of his vestigial wings. These once-wings, anchored to the slope of his shoulder, rotate with the action of his forelegs, and are useful to E'zera to help him climb onto the great beast's neck. They dwarf the prominent dorsal ridge that arcs back from the crest of Gavriel's neck, which was trimmed down when he was a younger dragon to keep it from interfering too much with his rider's perch.
Besides the vestigial wings stabbing into the sky from his shoulders, perhaps the most notable feature on Gavriel's body is the horn curving back over his skull. The base of it forms a very effective armor plating across the entire upper surface of his face, as much defense as offense. The curved horn tapers to a wicked point, and E'zera takes care to keep the serrated front edge sharp. It resembles a great sword blade, and there is nothing better to clear ice and snow accumulated at the Weyr's entrances.
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Gavrielsith: midnightblue
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