Sylvan stood outside, shivering in the early morning chill. Amway fluttered down from the corner of the railing and settled on his shoulder. She curled around his neck in a vain attempt to get warm.

"Are you cold too, love?" He gently scooped her off his shoulder and slipped her into the front of the thick cloak he wore. She curled up on his chest, contented. "I wonder where Firestone is?" he thought idly. Sylvan loved to come out early in the morning, before the weyr fully awoke and began its noisy hustle and bustle. It was also before his twin brother, Torresan, awoke. He got a few minutes peace anyway. A black firelizard flapped her way from somewhere down below, coming screaming at Amway. She growled menacingly and truned to defend herself, but the black pulled away at the last minute, darting around and into Sylvan's room.

"Heckate is the only firelizard I actually hate..." Amway chirped her agreement. Yes, the black was very beautiful, with her sleek coloring. But the little creature seemed to have taken on Torresan's ego as well. She snapped at Amway and Firestone, and Zeus, her own clutchmate! Sylvan sighed, "Well, at least he's not up yet." Firestone popped from between and gracefully glided down to Sylvan's shoulder.

Sylvan held up his finger for Firestone to step on, and he held him at eye-level. "And where have you been? Trying to sweep the wild firelizards off their feet?" The granite creeled softly and tilted his head to one side curiously. Sylvan laughed. "Silly firelizard...." Firestone's gaze shifted to somewhere behind Sylvan, and he leapt from his hand with a sudden chirp and winked between. With a sighed "Oh no" Sylvan turned and faced........his twin brother. Torresan stepped past Sylvan and leaned over the balcony of their shared room, grunting his good morning. The black Heckate sat preening on right shoulder, the smaller blue Zeus on the other.

"Seems like a nice day, huh?" Torresan turned to Sylvan. "Aye, it seems that way." He stepped beside his brother and looked out at the majestic mountainous landscape. Heckate glared at Amway, who had moved onto Sylvan's shoulder, protectively. She hissed and watched the larger black, as if daring it to attack her beloved human. Amway always acted as though she were a dragon and not a firelizard, fiercely protecting Sylvan.

"Why is your little green hissing like that?" Torrean asked, looking cautiously at Amway. "Probably because Heckate attacks her every chance she gets. And her name is Amway." Torresan sighed. "I hate it when you get all defensive of your precious firelizards." He turned smiled smugly, "I think Amway might be just a tad jealous of Heckate, don't you?" Sylvan hated the way he'd accented the firelizard's name. "She is not jealous! Just because you have that sharding black doesn't mean that I or anyone else is jealous! I have a granite firelizard, the weyrleader has a silver gold!"

Sylvan had backed away from his brother and was in a battle-like stance, his face flushed. Torresan held up his hands and stepped back. "I'm going down to breakfast, I don't need an argument this early..." With that, his brother swung around and headed to the Great Hall, waving to a group of his friends and joining them. Sylvan huffed and watched his arrogant brother leave. "I'll show him he's not so high and mighty someday.....I swear I will...." he vowed as Firestone returned and landed on the stone railing.

"What makes him think he is so wonderful anyway?" Sylvan was decent looking, with short reddish hair and green eyes. He was a litte scrawny but a summer of hard labor would cure that. Torresan looked the same as he did.....except for his personality. "That's it! He's more outgoing than I am!" Sylvan thought back to all the Gathers where he'd just stood around, never saying a thing while Torresan had been out chatting and dancing with the others...It just irked him!

Suddenly, a blue burst from between, diving through the masses. It landed in the weyrbowl. A few people stopped to gaze at it, but most continued on. The coming and going of dragons was a regular thing at the new weyr, people being conveyed and stores being moved in and out. There had, however, been an upsurgeance of Search dragons flowing to the weyr as they struggled to up the dragon population. Only recently had there been enough dragons to form fighting wings. So far only two had Impressed, both blues. But one had been a re-Impression and the addition of an adult blue to the Searching team meant that the first open clutch of the weyr was going to hopefully be full. He sighed, "A dragon would be the perfect thing to show that oh-so-wonderful Torresan that I'm just as good as he is." he thought.

Suddenly, the blue looked to him, gazing with an eerie intensity, it's eyes a mix of dark blues and light greens. It looked to his rider and then back to him. Sylvan plodded down into the weyrbowl and stopped to look up at the impressive beast. The dragons rider walked up to him. "You like him?" he asked "Yes.." he said in a far-off voice. He gazed up at the blue, mesmerized by its glowing eyes. "He says you're a possibility, y'know." Sylvan's gaze snaped to the bluerider. "A possibility? Are you Searching?" His hopes soared..."Yes, you're the second he's picked out already. The other is talking to my partner over there." Sylvan looked across the bowl, and his heart sank.

"Torresan....." His brother had been Searched too....."Wh...what weyr is this for?" "Tripaldi....." the blue rider said absently, his mind distracted by the blues searching. "Are we to leave today?" he asked, looking menacingly over at Torresan who was flirting with a pretty servant girl. "Yeah, as soon as my blue here's had time to check the whole place." It wasn't long before the blue had finished and, finding no one else, Sylvan and Torresan waited outside the weyr. He kept slapping Sylvan's back and saying, "We're gonna be dragonriders!" over and over. Sylvan was patient with him, playing along, acting just as excited. He was excited, probably more than Torresan himself. He finally had his chance to one-up his sibling, first born by two minutes. The blue's rider came out of the weyr and they were off to Tripaldi.