[DL-J] Setting Sail For A Three-Hour Tour
By John Pepper trissana@aol.com
Ansel & Khamorray
(Late morning, day 19, the beach below the warren)

/snip from Taylor's post/
Belarade held onto the dragon's neck as it dove deeper, instinctively trying
to hold her breath before she realized suddenly that she didn't need to.
Quickly she reached up to grab her glasses before they floated away. What
sort of magic was this? She assumed that it was due to the seadragon but
wasn't sure. Under reefs and through seaweed, Khamorray swam, giving Bel an
underwater tour of all his favorite places and fish.
/end snip/

Khamorray cavorted happily through the water, chattering at Belarade
like a draconic tour-guide until he remembered that she couldn't hear a word
he was saying. It seemed normal to him to have a rider who could talk to any
dragon, and often had to remind himself that the vast majority of riders
could speak only to their own dragons.

[Menia, I'm trying to show your rider around down here,] he called back.
[Could you pass along what I'm trying to show her? She seems interested but
it's hard for me to tell her about all the fascinating things here if she
can't hear me.]

[Khamorray, what are you doing, trying to drown my rider?] Menia
demanded. Apparently she'd been so busy talking to Ansel that she hadn't
noticed where Bel had gone.

[Not at all!] Khamorray assured her. [As long as she's touching me, she
can breathe just like if she was walking on the beach. That's part of
seadragon magic, you know.]

[No, I didn't know that!] she replied. [Does it work on dragons too?]

[Well, yes,] Khamorray said, after thinking for a moment. [Syngnath took
Iris deep underwater not long ago, when they had a mating flight.] He made a
slow, banking turn to follow a school of brightly colored fish. [These are
tigerfish,] he said to Menia, as he craned his neck around to look at Bel and
take note of the rapt look on the human's face. She was wisely holding her
glasses with one hand, using the other to secure her hold on Khamorray; he
wasn't sure that seadragon magic extended to keeping a human's glasses on her
face against the tug of the underwater currents. [And these,] he said, as he
allowed himself to sink a bit deeper toward the bottom, [are seabrush plants.
They're quite tasty, at least to seadragons...] He expected that Menia would
be passing this information along to Bel, but the red dragon abruptly
interrupted him.

[Do you mean to tell me,] she said impatiently, [that all I had to do
was hold onto your tail and I could have breathed underwater instead of
paddling around on the surface like a piece of flotsam?]

[Hm, yes, I guess you could have,] Khamorray said, wondering why he
hadn't thought of that. He had a mental vision of Menia's black eyes glaring
at him in exasperation.

[And you don't think that *might* have been useful while we were playing
with those silly dolphins?] she asked pointedly.

On the beach, Ansel tapped Menia on the neck to regain her attention.
*Is something going on?* he asked.

Menia turned toward him, flashing a broad and very toothy grin at him.
[No, nothing at all,] she replied. [So anyway, getting back to
business...you don't have a cuddlepartner right now? That is too bad, a
handsome human like you...]

Ansel blinked in surprise. *Most dragons tell me that all humans look
alike to them,* he told her. *Except their riders, that is.*

[Oh..um, well, that just shows how *very* handsome you are, that it
would cause me to take notice of it,] Menia replied in a quick recovery. [So
anyway, as I was saying, what do you think of my rider?]

*Oh, she's very nice,* Ansel agreed.

[Nice,] Menia repeated with a sigh.

[Menia, are you passing along what I'm saying to your rider?] came
Khamorray's mindvoice from offshore.

[I'm actually somewhat busy,] the red dragon began, then once again began
to grin widely. She turned to Ansel and crouched as low as she could. [Come
on,] she said. [Since my rider is riding your dragon, would you like to ride
me?]

*Ride...you?* Ansel asked, taken aback. He'd ridden Varaenna before,
but that had always been with Tara aboard, and he knew his sister had to
constantly rein in the queen's natural inclination for aerobatics. *I've
never ridden a dragon by myself. Khamorray can't fly yet....*

[Then the practice will do you good,] Menia said, all but scooping him
up onto the tip of her nose and leaving him to scramble down her neck to
where the ridges were large enough for him to hold onto. [Don't worry, we're
not going far!]

*Well, okay, if you say sooooooooooooo!* Ansel started to answer, then
was taken by surprise as Menia immediately launched herself into the air.

[Flying is great fun,] Menia told him, turning her head to give him a
knowing wink with one huge eye. She flipped over into a tight turn, and for
a horrifying moment Ansel was sure he'd fall off. But he quickly realized
that since Menia was banking into the turns, the centrifugal force alone was
sufficient to hold him in place even without a saddle.

Deep underwater, Khamorray was still giving Bel her tour. [And that is
a sea bass,] he went on, pointing a claw at a large fish ahead of them and
then angling his course so that he passed beneath it. He heard Bel gasp in
surprise as the fish passed within a couple of feet of her. [Menia, I really
think your rider would get more out of this if you would translate for me.]

[I will do better than that,] she told him. [Come to the surface.]

[But I'm right in the middle of my tour...]

[Surface. Now.] Menia said, in a tone that brooked no argument.
Khamorray began to rise, wondering what the red dragon was up to.

Up above, Ansel was clinging fretfully to Menia's neckridges as she
zigzagged back and forth. *Are you looking for something?* he asked her.

[Yes, I am,] she replied, scanning the water. [That dragon of yours is
almost invisible when he's below the surface.]

*That's seadragon magic, I think,* he told her, making a note to ask
Corwin for confirmation. Suddenly he saw a plume of water rising above the
surface, like a geyser on the ocean's surface. *Thar he blows!* he laughed,
pointing at the disturbance on the surface.

[I see him!] Menia cried happily. [Hang on!]

*Why?* Ansel demanded. *What are you going to dooooooooooo......?*

He cried out in surprise, but the cry was snatched from his mouth by the
rushing wind as Menia closed her wings and dove. He had to cling frantically
to her neckridges to avoid floating off of her as he suddenly found himself
virtually weightless in the dragon's dive.

[Wheeeeee!] she shouted happily as the water rushed up to meet them.

Khamorray heard Bel shout something in the human language that he
couldn't yet understand, and saw Menia plummeting toward the water.
Apparently she was telling her dragon to behave herself, for at the last
minute Menia pulled out of her dive. Instead of plunging headfirst into the
water, the red dragon skimmed it's surface. Because of her high speed, she
skipped and bounced across the surface much like a flat stone would after
being cast by a child. The young seadragon saw his rider clinging to Menia's
neck, his face ash-white. Khamorray crash-dove, taking Bel with him, to
avoid having her bump into him as she splashed to a stop.

[Wasn't that fun?] Menia asked Ansel, turning her neck to make sure her
passenger was still aboard.

*I think so,* he said with a sigh of relief that their wild ride had
ended, just as Khamorray surfaced alongside them.

"Hi!" Bel called, waving. This cute dragon of yours has been giving me
a tour underwater. I had no idea seadragons had magic like that!"

"Menia has been giving me a tour too," Ansel said wryly. "I'm just
waiting now for my stomach to catch up with me."

"Sorry," the girl giggled. "Remind me to tell you about the time she
dumped me into a haystack after we moved to Xylian!"

[I'm surprised to see you back in the water,] Khamorray remarked to the
red dragon. [I thought you liked it on land better.]

[I do, but I have to try out this new thing,] she told him. She let
herself drift over so she and Khamorray bumped sides, then swung her neck
over across his. [Okay, time for you to switch over,] she told Ansel.

Ansel gratefully climbed over onto his own dragon's neck, expecting that
Belarade would switch places with him. She apparently thought so too, but
Menia withdrew her neck and swam away before she could do so.

"I thought she wanted me to come back to shore with her," Bel said,
sounding a bit perplexed. "Guess not."

[So what are we doing?] Khamorray asked Menia, equally perplexed.

[We're continuing the tour,] the bright red dragon replied, swimming
around behind Khamorray and extending her claws to grasp his tail. [I want
to see how this works!]

Khamorray passed Menia's idea along to Bel, who nodded happily as Ansel
settled himself on the seadragon's neck and put his arms around her to help
hold her in place.

[Verrrry good,] Menia purred quietly as she took note of this. [Let's
get on with it,] she told Khamorray. [And do take your time. Let's make
this last awhile.]

[Oh, of course!] Khamorray said happily as he submerged, taking Menia
and the two humans with him. As he did so, he bowed his neck just slightly
to press the two humans a bit closer together.

(Tag Taylor - looks like an interesting tour shaping up, eh?)

NRPG: I have another post (maybe two) coming out very shortly, to get things
moving with the diplomatic meeting and also with Kay's return. With luck, I
should be caught up shortly. :)

Submitted by:

John Pepper

Ansel & Khamorray, Maritime Wing
Jasra Warren