Lethan is poking around with his staff, feeling around, exploring. And in that exploring, he's heading for that short stair to the upper ledge, 'seeing' where it leads.

Spotting the slowly moving figure on the Star Stones below, Thesy urges her blue to move closer, to see who is up there at such an unseemly hour. But as Sardrinth glides down, close enough for his rider to recognize the man with the poking staff, a wave of fear, intense, breathtaking, washes over the rider, leaving her voice hoarse and crackling as she shouts, "Lethan, for the love of little dragons, don't move any further!", not even sure he will even hear her over the distance.

Lethan 'looks' above him and all around, "Whaaaat....?!" He heard, and sounds rather like a teen who's been caught doing something he really shouldn't.

Sardrinth glides down and lands smoothly a little away from Lethan, instantly folding his moonlit wings back to his spine, while Thesy swiftly clambers down, breathless, her cheeks flushed with the wind and the nasty shock of seeing the blind man wander around this place all by himself.

Sardrinth turns his head, taking a good sniff as you gently slide down his neck and land with a soft thud.

Lethan leans onto his staff, waiting on the dismount and all and the yelling to begin.

Thesy leans against her lifemate's reassuring shoulder, waiting to get her breath back, the blood still singing in her ears and her heart in her throat. Those blue eyes, usually cheerfully bright, have darkened to almost black, sparking with anger and, yes, sickening worry. After a little while, neither her nor Lethan moving or speaking, the bluerider hisses, "And what, by the first egg, do you think you're doing up here all by yourself? Do you have any idea what could have happened? You could've tripped and there's nothing but dragon lengths of thin air once you take a wrong step, and nothing but spikes to land on." A brief pause for some more breath catching, "Or are you testing a new trick?" Arms folded in front of her chest Thesy stands there, frozen with a rage she couldn't really explain and glares at the trader.

Lethan says, "Exploring....I do it quite alot you know....and I'm careful about it, I feel around to be sure there's somewhere to put my next foot....." He sighs and shakes his head, "You know, just about every step I take could end in a fall, or worse, but I can't be afraid of the world.....Not when I live in it so deeply. I'd never have lived this long if I was afraid of every step, or where any path might take me. I can't be afraid to....to live. To push my limits, to do what other people do.....I don't expect you to understand....."

Thesy listens to his words intently, her head tilted sideways a little but there's still that spark in her eyes, though the anger seems to have left them, leaving only the worry she can't seem to get rid of. But why? Again there's that sensation of irritation and uncertainty about her feelings for Lethan. Finally she gives a deep sigh and, pushing her hands into the pockets of her trousers, walks over to him. "Yes ... I think I do understand, at least a little of it." Yet all of a sudden her hands come up and grip his arms, giving him a shake, "But do you have any idea what a shock it gave me to see it was /you/, walking around here, knowing your next step could bring you to a sudden death?"

Lethan grabs back, eyes going wide. "So you're going to shake me there now?" His own moment of panic fades slowly. Even if his staff clatters down to the broad lower ledge. "Jays Thesy....! I mean....I know you like me but....Did I really worry you -that- much?"

Her gaze fixed on his strange angular face with those endearingly beautiful, unseeing eyes, Thesy lets go of his arms and gasps for breath, this time more out of surprise and a sudden awareness. Drained by the receding shock, she almost goes limp in his hold but straightens herself quickly. "I ... was," the words come hesitatingly, almost inaudible, "I ... well", the rider clears her throat yet her eyes can't seem to be able to leave his face. Taking a deep breath she finally manages to get the rest out in a rush, "You were heading directly towards the edge!"

Lethan points, grinning a little as she stammers, "I was heading up the stairs.....You know, the ones you just came down...? The wind up here's amazing, the way if flutes through the spires, the eye of the star stone.....it smells of stone and snow and fresh air.....and the wind caresses you, draws you up, to where it can touch you all the more....It gusts, teases....like the sweet caresses of a new lover....attentive but unsure......Here....sit on the step....and close your eyes.....and be...."

At last relaxing, Thesy sits on one of the steps and rests her chin on her propped up hands, taking in the breathtaking view, the pale mauve dawn sky with a few tiny clouds sailing along, the tips of the spires turned into flames by the rising sun and deeply inhaling the fresh cool air, already scented with the smell of spring flowers, new grass and a tinge of the sea. With a pang she becomes aware that the young man at her side can't see any of this beauty and, again, pity for his impediment and a longing that he /could/ see, make her sigh deeply. "The sun's just rising."

Lethan smiles a little, not quite...seeing it that way. "Do you trust me?" He eases himself down next to you, "Can you hear the music? Kh'et's practicing on his ledge so that he doesn't wake Ragis....and there's the little chitters of the waking flits and the children coming from below.....Trills and croons from waking dragons and the whispers of their riders......The wind is from the south....and it's warm with the promise of summer.....but the night's chill hasn't fully been blown out of the still air, so everything's crisp and tangy sweet.....Like a redfruit just before it's fully ripe.....The heaviness of night's curtain is lifting, even the wind is lighter with the coming purples and oranges in the east.....The world is alive and waking.....can you feel all that? Can you taste it?" He's smiling softly, an honest, charming smile that is wholely caught up in his words.

Closing her eyes a little reluctantly ... she'll never get tired of watching a sunrise but now she eagerly wants to concentrate on just her other senses than her sight ... Thesy leans back, resting her elbows on an upper step and listens intently. The music is heard instantly, the harmonies making their way up through the morning air but it takes a little while before her ears catch other sounds .... Alymath already taking her morning bath, her happy crooning unmistakable ... and yes, there's Pyrene's voice rising over children's laughter and chattering, faint yet easily heard once you're not distracted by the awesome view of a spring's sunrise. "That is incredible...", the rider whispers, an expression of child-like wonder on her face, turned towards Lethan, "All those sounds .... it's like the world has it's own kind of music, no?"

Lethan beams nodding, "Very much so.....Its full of rhythms and harmonies people miss because their too busy going through the motions....Sometimes, dear Thesy....I think you're too busy saving the world to savor it....And -that's- a pity....." He gently puts his hand on your arm, lips remaining partly open. "I really didn't mean to scare you....I'm sorry...."

"Well, you wouldn't thank me, if I rather came up here savouring Pern's own music instead of riding a Fall, huh?" Opening her eyes again, she grins at Lethan, "But I do come here a lot when the sun's rising. It seems to give me strength and comfort for the day coming." A shoulder is lifted in a little shrug, "If you know what I mean ... it makes it seem easier to deal with all those big and small things I usually have to deal with." Once more her lids close and she holds her face into the wind, inhaling deeply.


Lethan says, "Well, there are times for duty, and there are times to just let the world be......" He nods, "I do.....With me it's either the wind or running water....a little trick of a stream, but not the rush of a waterfall.....that's just too busy and loud....It reminds me that there's more to life than what can be seen with eyes.....and that I have a richer sense of things than most of the people who can see the colours in a tapestry, or the shape of the mountains."

"Right, but being, at least for the time being, wingleader /and/ dragonhealer, you can be sure that there's always someone who wants something." Thesy laughs softly, enjoying this unpredicted gathering after all. Although in the back of her mind she still wonders why she particularly fancies the young trader's company. But for the moment she doesn't want to think about the why, only delight in his presence, "I also have always enjoyed water. There was a little stream back home where I used to spend hours when I was off duty, just laying in the grass, listen to its murmur and watch the clouds in the sky." Her voice trails off, the rider obviously cherishing some reverie.

Lethan smiles, "I can imagine it....you there with a put of wheat grass between your teeth, barefooted....." He trails off for a moment, his head turning off slightly. "What colour are your eyes? Your hair?

Something rarely heard ... Thesy giggles! "Oh yes and a halfeaten redfruit and always a book ...." At his last words she turns around, facing her companion, "Hair's black, cut short and curly. And my eyes are blue, rather a dark one." She grins up at Lethan, "Though I've been told they turn black when I'm angry."

Lethan chuckles, "I've heard that mine go bright green.....Black hair and blue eyes, huh? Tinker colouring....." An eyebrow peeks playfully, before he murmurs, "Always manage to pick the ones with black hair....."

"I don't think I've ever seen eyes of a colour like yours ...", Thesy hesitates, suddenly shy again, "They're very beautiful." Those last words come in a somewhat mumbled way, the girl not really used to make compliments to a man. His last words though she didn't hear properly, so she laughs, "I'm afraid ... no tinker blood in this gal, just the good old Keroon holder one, though mixed with a little Weyr blood from my father's side. S'gren, my uncle has the same colouring though my younger siblings, except Anthea, come more after my mother."

Lethan ducks his head a little, "Thank you....Uh..." He actually blushes ever so slightly as he returns, "The way the oil mixes with your scent....it's more intoxicating than my mother's perfumes.....or the rotgut my father brews in the little kegs under the cot in the vardo......And I'd lay marks with a Bitran that your face is beautiful, even if most don't take the time to see it....." He takes a deep, long breath. "Keroon's a far cry from here.....I loved wintering there as a child.....I could just run with out too much worry.....and there were kids my age, even if I couldn't play ball with them....One of my sisters would sit with me and tell me what was going on......"

Her eyelids lower, the long lashes fluttering while a deep red sets the girl's cheeks aflame, "Ummmm, thank you. I don't think anyone said something like that to me."Though she isn't quite sure about the second half of the compliment. Rotgut, really! "Yah, I do miss those wide plains from time to time, no matter how much the 'Reaches have become my home over those last years." Thesy pauses briefly, her gaze wandering over the impressing panorama, "And I felt rather trapped here at the beginning with walls everywhere and I awfully missed the view over miles and miles of nothing but rolling green land." She turns back to look back at Lethan, "I'm glad to hear you enjoyed your time there."

Lethan chuckles and shakes his head at himself, "Alright, so I don't always have so silver a tongue....It's hard to compliment a woman you care deeply about without getting something wrong.....Especially when you can't weave tapestries with the colour of her eyes......I can understand that, I get that way sitting too long in the caverns....I'm too used to being outside I think.....sometimes even the woods around Lemos feel oppressive.....I did, and I got into alot of trouble there with the other lads, you can be sure...." He chuckles some more.

"Yah, there's a tough bunch or so I've heard." Thesy laughs, remembering a few incidents herself, "But my family doesn't live in Keroon proper but has a small hold some way up the Keroon river." There seems to be a small tremble in her laugh though, his words, the first ones, having touched a string within her, sending a warm wave through her body and making her voice a bit unsteady. "And? Have you settled here yet? You seem to have made a lot of friends in no time at all. I hear your name mentioned ever so often and everybody seems glad you've decided to stay." She gives him a little half smile, suddenly glad he can't see her, the uncertainty, the fear he might tell her he's about to leave again ...

Lethan winces a little at the question of him staying. "Iiiiii....don't know....It's against Tinker nature to settle in one place.....I don't think Ris would do it if he didn't have Zaqith to take him anywhere he wanted to go on any whim or need.....I've never stayed anywhere more than a season.....I've got friends all over the place.....Friends alone aren't enough reason for me to stay here over anywhere else....But....I do have extra reason to stay....I think......"

With her heart pounding in her ears suddenly, almost deafening all other sound, her throat so tight that the words come out like a wherries croak, Thesy whispers, You do?" and her glance fastens on those aquamarine counterparts of Lethan's while the rider holds her breath as she waits impatiently, trembling faintly ...... Jays, what's the matter with her, what /is/ going on?

Lethan 'glances' off, voice barely above a whispers, "I hope so....." He takes a deep breath, "There's this woman here....who I can't get out of my mind when I'm not around her.....to me, her conversation's more addictive than those cookies down in the caverns.....her voice is like music, touch is like soft suede.....I actually started dreading the arrival of the next caravan, because I know I'll have to leave her......"

And he continues, "And for all this, I'm afraid she doesn't feel the same way....I've never been as good with the ladies as I usually pretend.....I usually say the wrong thing when it matters most.....And I'm terrible out of practice....."

Sitting up, every muscle as tense as during flying a Fall only different, Thesy folds her arms around her knees, her gaze, just as unseeing as Lethan's own at this moment, fixed on the crags and spindles at the other side of the bowl. So he has found someone who might replace his lost love after all ..... She stays silent, the wind's whistle and the people's voices down at the bowl floor the only sounds ... Too afraid to ask who he's talking about, too afraid it might not be her again, she waits with her hands damp, her throat dry and her heart heavy in her chest ....

Lethan swallows hard, turning his face to you. "So does she? Does she see past the masks? Does her heart ache at the thought me going back to my people?"

The grip on her knees tightens even more and Thesy is grateful for the wind to freshen up, cooling her burning face. Looking into those eyes she seems to be drowning in, she clears her throat a few times before she manages to whisper, "You're asking me? How would I know?" Although she can feel that she's the one he means .... this time she has to be sure ...

Lethan says, "Because you are the only one that -can- answer, Thesy......"

"Me?" The whisper can hardly be heard among the wind, "You mean ...." Thesy feels as if a heavy weight has been lifted from her chest, allowing her to breathe freely again, as if the sun shines even brighter, as if the air has taken on a sweeter scent and the wind's a special caress to her face. So this time it is for real, this time it's not idle talk or light flirting with an easy prey by a bored bronzerider .... "But don't you know? ... Can't you /feel/ how happy I would be, if you would stay?" She puts a hand to her cheek, her heart beating like a harper's drum and, with eyes as bright as the sky above them, she looks at Lethan, as if trying to imprint his image to her mind and adds in a soft, timid tone, "If even for a little while?"

Lethan nods, "You...." He nods more. "I dream of you when I sleep, Thesy.....I don't wait in the living cavern for Ris anymore, I wait for you....." He smiles and shrugs a little, "I always assume that....that's just wishful thinking...or....hearing things I want to hear......I mean, no man lays himself out wanting to be rejected.....and....in the deals I make, I'm very shrewd.....I'm all the moreso with my heart....That's why I've been so reluctant to tell you.....to ask you....and with who I am....with what I do....than I'll be expected to leave.....I didn't want to risk your heart too, because I couldn't live with myself if I caused you pain....."

Moved beyond words by Lethan's speech, Thesy sits still, just looking at him and as he falls quiet she reaches out and ever so gently puts a finger on his lips, "Shhhh! I know you can't stay here forever. I always knew. But stay for the summer to give us a chance?" She smiles and takes her hand back, shifting on the hard step, "This time, trader, it's not an earthbound woman you've dreamt of or waited for in the caverns .... this time it's a rider, able to come and see you in the blink of an eye, no matter where you are." Now that he has declared his feelings, she feels oh so light, so jubilant inside, she could embrace the whole world.

Lethan starts slightly at the finger, but he listens just the same. "The summer, at least....I like the people here, and.....it's kind of nice, waking up in the same place, the constant supply of food....And.....well, you're here too.....When that season comes to an end, we can talk more about such arrangements....."

"Oh, so you give it a try?" Joy filling her warm contralto voice as she gives him a radiant smile, "Just stay as long as you feel comfortable and happy here. I wouldn't want you to do so just for my sake." The rider chuckles, inwardly still surprised by her sudden boldness, "With this big lad," and her chin jerks towards the peacefully slumbering Sardrinth, only his ceaselessly twitching tail indicating that he's well aware of his lifemate's inner uproar, I can be with you before you can cough trice, if that's what we both want."

Lethan nods, but still has to ask, "How would you know where I was at on any given night? And could you actually stay the whole of the night? Wouldn't that be quite a strain? And you usually sleep at night, so you'd be tired anyway.....Even if things don't work between us, I won't want you risking yourself....."

"Well, there's always the chance you'd impress a fire lizard while you're here. You could send it? Since it would hatch in the Weyr, it wouldn't have any difficulties to find the place." Thesy ponders various ideas quickly, a little disappointed by his urge to think about everything that might happen instead of enjoying the moment and each other's company. "And Sardrinth can communicate with every dragon on Pern, if necessary." Then she gives Lethan a lopsided grin, "As for staying the night .... don't worry, riders do have an ability to be in time wherever they're needed."

Lethan asks, "But don't flits use images? How could I give a flit an image I won't ever have?" He thinks a bit, nodding as he considers. Though the news of timing surprises him. "Really? How?" He really knows very little about 'ridering'.

"Erm ... I've heard that people without sight use their hands to get an image of something or someone?" Thesy seem a little uncertain about this. "Besides, dragons can talk to fire lizards and it would know Sardrinth?" The young rider frowns a little, having expected a different reaction than all this questioning when she revealed her feelings but this Lethan seems to want to take care of every eventuality that might occur. Oh well .... But she seems quite reluctant to answer his question, you don't discuss timing with someone not a rider, "Well, lets just say we can, ok?"

Lethan would really rather put it off, but you brought it up so.....He hrms, "Well....if I can actually manage to impress one...." He nods at the hint to let the timing drop, "Trade secret.....I see....I won't ask further...."

Becoming aware of Lethan's uneasiness about the flits, Thesy hastily changes the subject, "Well, we'll see, yes? By the way, aren't you hungry?" Still she has the feeling that an important moment has gone by when he started asking all those questions. Stifling a sigh, she just casts him a glance, inwardly puzzled and suppressing with some difficulty the urge to touch him, to get touched by those slender hands, to feel him closer. "Want me to fetch something and bring it up or shall we go down for a little snack." There's no doubt that she prefers the solitude of this place to the bustle in the living caverns.

Lethan considers a bit, "I can wait.....Unless your hungry of course.....I mean, I wouldn't want to keep you from your breakfast...."

"Oh no, I'm not hungry ...", At least not in a physical way. Thesy smiles, "And I have the day off, Ciera leading the wing today." She tips her head at Lethan as an idea comes to her mind, "So, we could even go on a little trip somewhere, if you would like?"

Lethan oh's somewhat brightly, "Well....here's nice.....It's secluded enough without being confining....." Oh yeah, mister 'you can tie me up for a mark' worries about confining? "I uh...I don't want to overstep any bound here, and push you away....and...while there are times when getting slapped can be....fun.....Would I be out of place if I put my arms around you...kissed your cheek?"

Thesy can all but avoid a relieved sigh, she has been thinking already he never would ask, though asking wasn't exactly what she was expecting. So, with a soft laugh, she replies, "No, no I wouldn't. Oh dear, seems like you've caught many a slap in your past. What kind of woman did you date, huh?"

Lethan sighs himself, more relived that you can know. His tentative hands slide to, then up your arm. "Uh...lots of different types....though fiery was the most common trait, and they were really all in my younger days....I really haven't done anything like this since I was seventeen or eighteen....."

Once more there's that tingling sensation where Lethan's fingers touch her bare skin, sending tiny ripples along her arm and as she leans closer, she murmurs, "Oh yeah, right. I forgot what an old man you are!"

Lethan says, "I'm twenty-seven, and the first time I was with a woman...fully with a woman I was 12.....Once I started seeing Daola, I stopped seeing other women....."

"At 12! Now that's rather early, no?" Tentatively Thesy leans even closer, her shoulder now brushing Lethan's ever so gently, her head turned towards his expectantly.

Lethan blushes and chuckles, "Well....I had to keep up with the other boys.....Granted, the other boys were three and four turns older than me.....but...." He takes a deep breath, feeling the warmth of yours on his face. He seems to consider a moment but then leans closer to you, slow and careful. His lips just barely touch yours, a little on the too high side, but the aim isn't' that bad considering.

A hand snakes up Lethan's arm, curling around his neck and gently pulling him closer while Thesy moves her face up a little so that the aim is reached. A sound close to a soft moan escapes her as she leans into his embrace, her other arm moving around his waist. He's been teasing her for long enough, now she'll get her revenge though it won't be hard on him. With a passion probably surprising the trader she returns his kiss, her young lithe body arching towards his, delighting in each passing moment .....