Morning, Day 11
(A beach just north of Jasra Warren)

      Tanami used a piece of driftwood to stir the heated embers of the small 
cooking fire she'd started.  The fire blazed up, just right for cooking.  
Now, all she had to do was wait for her breakfast to arrive.  She let out a 
small sigh of contentment as she scanned the sky overhead.  Another clear, 
cloudless day with little wind.  That would mean a calm and relatively warm 
day below the surface as well.  On some days - particularly recently, with 
the terrible storm that had come through - the shallow coastal waters were so 
choked with stirred up silt and sand from the bottom that it was almost 
impossible to see - let alone breathe.

    She reflexively touched the nearly invisible gill-slits along her 
neck...they were still red and sore from the sand she'd breathed in when the 
hurricane had caught her and Kethriss by surprise in the shallows.  With 
their gills clogged by the bottom-muck the storm had dredged up, they'd been 
forced to the surface and had to ride the storm out there until they'd been 
able to make their way out into deeper water where the sea-floor was deep 
enough to remain undisturbed.

     A movement from the corner of her eye caught her attention, and she 
turned to see a small trout flying through the air in her direction.  She 
sprang up, running forward to catch it against her chest.  *Thank you,* she 
called. *But next time couldn't you just bring it up here yourself?*

     A mental chuckle reverberated through her mind, as she watched the 
blue-green seadragon broach the surface a ways offshore, her wet scales 
sparkling in the sunlight.  [I could,] Kethriss agreed, [but then I'd have to 
walk all the way up to where you are.  It's much easier just to toss it to 
you.]

      *Lazy!* Tanami teased her dragon.  

     [Efficient,] Kethriss corrected her.

     *Have you eaten yet?* Tanami asked, as she examined the fish Kethriss 
had provided for her.  She was pleased to note that this one didn't have any 
teeth marks on it, which told her that the seadragon had shocked rather than 
bitten it.  Kethriss, whose insides were well suited to eating an entire 
fish, bones and all, had had some trouble with the notion that her rider 
didn't want to spend time picking crushed fishbones out of her meals.

     [Not yet,] the seadragon answered.  [I'm going to swim around that point 
of land ahead of us.  There may be some bigger fish there.  The ones in this 
area are rather small.]

     *All right, just don't be too long,* Tanami told her.  She sat down on 
the sand and began to clean and gut the fish her dragon had provided.  

     Like all of the sea people, Tanami spent relatively little time on land. 
 But some concessions were necessary, since even the most dedicated 
land-hater wasn't likely to want to make a steady diet of raw fish.  At home, 
in their beautiful underwater city, there were specially constructed 
air-domes that could be used for such purposes as making fire for cooking 
meals.  Out here in the wilds, she just had to rough it.  Besides, she was 
trying to keep her head above water as much as she could until her gills 
healed up.

     She sighed softly to herself, remembering her home.  She'd been happy 
there, and something inside her longed to return.  But at the same time, she 
knew she couldn't.

     Oh, they'd accept her back readily enough...but Kethriss was another 
matter.  She'd heard somewhere that many of the "landers," as her people 
called those who lived on the shore, joined with dragons as she had.  But 
among her people, this was a vanishingly rare occurrence.  Wild seadragons 
were vicious and predatory in the extreme, and her people were careful to 
avoid them as much as possible.  Her own joining with Kethriss had been 
entirely accidental, of course...she'd happened upon the just-hatching clutch 
while gathering a medicinal seaweed near the shoreline when she'd heard a 
voice calling her....and from that day on, her life had changed.

     Not that her people hadn't accepted her after that day...nor, even, did 
they shun Kethriss.  They knew well the difference between a wild and joined 
dragon.  But the simple fact was that there was no place in their city for a 
creature the size of a seadragon.  That meant that while Tanami had been able 
to go out during the days and spend as much time as possible with her 
soulmate, at night - when the waters turned pitch dark, and no one willingly 
left the protection of the city - Kethriss had had to remain out in the open, 
where predators roamed who could even endanger a seadragon.  For the first 
year, she'd worried about Kethriss' safety every night.  Then, finally, it 
had become too much for her.  She'd decided that she and her dragon needed to 
be together, even if it meant abandoning her home and family and living out 
in the wild and uncharted seas.

     It had been almost a year now since she'd left home, and at first it had 
been very difficult, a struggle even to survive.  Had it not been for 
Kethriss, she'd have never made it.  But the seadragon was an excellent 
hunter, and had made sure her rider never went without food.   The many 
dangers they'd encountered, they had braved together and somehow survived 
them all.  But still, there was the loneliness.  She knew that she was closer 
to Kethriss than she could ever be to any other living being...and yet, 
lately, she'd found herself wishing for more.  Kethriss felt the same way, 
she knew...for while there were many seadragons, she'd never encountered 
another like herself, and the wild seadragons refused to associate with her.

     As for Tanami herself...well, she'd met and talked to sailors on those 
strange wooden ships that the landers used to travel the seas, and even 
learned to speak their language to some degree.  Still, those were only 
passing associations, and she wondered if she'd ever find a place she could 
call home...

     [My rider, I think you should come see this!] Kethiss called excitedly.

     *What is it??* Tanami asked, wondering if there was some danger.

     [Come see,] the dragon told her.  [I'm just on the other side of that 
point of land near you.  And you won't *believe* what's here!]

     Tanami quickly took a bite of her barely-cooked fish before sprinting 
down the beach to join her dragon.

* * * * * * * *

     Kethriss stared in amazement at the scene before her.  One of those 
funny wooden things that humans used on the water was floating near the 
shoreline, and it looked like the humans were going to pull it up on 
land...but the most amazing thing was that there were two *seadragons* here, 
pulling on ropes to move it.  Both were males, she quickly noticed, and both 
were quite good-looking - but the thing that really caught her notice was 
that she could sense that these weren't wild dragons - they were like her!!  
She swam closer in her excitement, and the next thing she knew, the smaller 
one - a hatchling, in fact, had entangled himself in the ropes while the 
other one - older and larger, but still extremely young - was pulling hard on 
the other side. 

     Then the older seadragon noticed her, and his eyes went wide in 
surprise.  He started pulling harder, and the wooden thing moved with him - 
but tangled the hatchling up in the other rope. The big wooden thing,  its 
bottom now dragging on the sand, was tilting crazily from side to side as the 
two young dragons pulled it to and fro.  Kethriss giggled at these strange 
goings on, and hoped her rider would arrive soon.

* * * * * * * *
Ansel
(aboard the Marquesa)

     Trying not to laugh was one of the hardest things he'd ever done....he 
felt sorry for poor Corwin, of course, and could certainly sympathize with 
him...Ansel wasn't a sailor, and his own stomach was lurching badly from the 
rocking deck.  But seeing what had happened to that nasty G'ret was just too 
much.  So Ansel did laugh.  "Haha, look at G'ret!" he said.

     And abruptly realized that a laughing and seasickness did not go 
together well.  G'ret was cursing Corwin, the Marquesa, and the world in 
general while wiping Corwin's "present" off of himself...when Ansel's stomach 
gave a final lurch and he hurled also...right onto the unlucky G'ret, who'd 
moved down his way to get away from Corwin.

     Ansel gulped.  "Um...sorry!" he told the loudly swearing G'ret, and then 
retreated quickly from the railing.  

     [Ansel, Ansel!] Khamorray cried.  [Come see!!]

     Groaning, Ansel made his way to the other side of the ship - and stared 
in wonderment as the slender head and neck of a seadragon broke the 
surface...and it *wasn't* Sy or Khamorray!

     The crew of the ship had seen the newcomer too, and were dashing madly 
to pick up whatever weapons were readily available.  Just then, Corwin's 
voice rang down from his vantage point up in the rigging.  "Stand down!" he 
shouted to the pirates.  "That's not the queen!"

     Dolfis, meanwhile, had seen the dragon too, and was standing in the surf 
near the Marquesa's bow.  "No, it isn't!" he shouted at the men on the deck.  
"I should know, I got a closer look at the other one than I wanted to!  No 
weapons until we know if it's hostile or not!"

     Ansel, watching the dragon emerge from the water, knew also that it 
wasn't the queen - this one was not so large as the queen, and looked 
younger.  As she waded out of the surf and onto the beach, he could see that 
her scales were more iridescent than metallic-looking.   At first he thought 
this might be Jismin returning, but the coloration on this one wasn't quite 
the same.  

     *Hello!* he called out using his mind, the same way he'd always talked 
to Varaenna.  *I'm Ansel, Khamorray's rider...um, welcome to Jasra...*  He 
stopped talking as, with a sudden jerk, the ship's keel grounded itself on 
the sand.

     The seadragon looked curiously at him, as she sat down on the sand.  [I 
am Kethriss,] she replied, glancing around to study her surroundings.

     [And I am Syngnath!] Sy proclaimed, hurrying out of the water with 
Khamorray just behind.  

     [Greetings, little ones!] Kethriss said, bending her neck down to touch 
noses with each of them in turn.  

     By now, Corwin had climbed down the rigging and joined Ansel and Griffin 
on the deck.  "Is he friendly?" Griffin asked, clearly worried.

     "She's a she," said Ansel.  "Her name's Kethriss."

     "Syngnath says she's like him...and Khamorray." said Corwin.  A joined 
seadragon!"

     "Well then," said Griffin, thinking aloud, "maybe we could persuade her 
to help us get this vessel the rest of the way up onto the beach.  She's a 
fair bit larger than the other two."

     Corwin shook his head.  "The Marquesa's far enough up on land now that 
we can get some of the other dragons to haul it the rest of the way up with 
no problem.  I'd be more interested in knowing why this one's here...and if 
she's got a rider."

     The rider in question had, by now, arrived on the scene.  Tanami stood 
on a small rise overlooking the beach, staring in wonder at the ship, the 
people, the dragons...and the towering heights of the warren that rose in the 
distance behind them.  

     *Kethriss...what *is* this place?* she asked.

     [Well, it has seadragons...Syngnath and Khamorray are very nice.   
And...they have riders too, just like me!  Syngnath says they live up there, 
in that high, rocky place!]

     Tanami stared up in wonder, her sharp vision picking out the shapes of 
yet more dragons perched on the heights.  *Those are all joined dragons?* she 
asked.

     Kethriss nodded.  She clearly enjoyed being the center of attention, 
with the two smaller seadragons on either side of her competing for her 
attention.   [Yes, all of them...even the ones who live on land instead of in 
the water like us.  My rider...do you think we could stay...at least for 
awhile?]

     Tanami's eyes widened.  *With...landers?*  Still, she didn't have the 
prejudice against landers that so many of her people seemed to have.  She'd 
gotten along well enough with the sailors she'd encountered on their ships.  
But here...there were so *many* of them....

     Still, perhaps she owed it to herself at least to find out who these 
people were, and what sort of place this was that had so many people and 
dragons living together.  Working up her courage, she walked out onto the 
beach and approached the beached sailing vessel.

* * * * *
Ansel

     "I think we've found her rider," said Ansel, grabbing Corwin's arm and 
pointing at the woman walking down the beach in their direction.  Dolfis had 
by now climbed up onto the deck, and came up alongside them.

     "Is that what I think it is?" the pirate captain asked, noting the 
woman's greenish-tinted hair.  "One of the sea-people?"

     "I'd guess so," Corwin responded. 

     The woman stopped and peered up at the railing.  "Hello!" she called up. 
 "I am Tanami, rider of Kethriss.  What is this place?"

(Tag anyone who wants to meet the new arrival)

NRPG: I expect that these two will be staying awhile, so I'll send out a bio 
on them in the morning!  

Submitted by:

John

Tara & Varaenna
Ansel & Khamorray
Tanami & Kethriss
Jasra Warren