Bailyn walks in from the Courtyard.

Sitting in a chair near the wall, Erakkin is holding a mug of steaming klah in his hands. Looking up he sees a face he recognizes, but doesn't offer any greeting of any kind, but takes a sip of the klah instead.

Bailyn proudly walks into the gathering hall. "Hello, Erakkin." Her face is set as to say, 'One day this young man will say hello to me when I see him' She brings a seat near and sits down. "How are you?"

Bailyn
With her thin figure, Bailyn looks taller than she really is. Her face is heart shaped, and long golden hair flows around. Almost reaching to her lower back, it's pulled up halfway with a piece of light blue ribbon. Her long bangs hang over the sides of her face with a slight curl. Showing past her lovely hair are two oval brown eyes, both rather large. Long thick black lashes come from each eye, brushing against her bangs. A small turned up nose and thin light red lips fill in the rest of her face. Her neck is small, leading to a large chest and thin torso. Both legs are short and muscular. Her skin is an olive color, making it simple to tan. At around 5'5, Bailyn doesn't look as if she works hard.
Bailyn is fitted in a playful red slip dress. It is sleeveless, with a normal neck line. Fitting around her body is starts to flow just below the hips and ends mid-calf. On her small feet are brown sandles, that may have seen better days. Hanging losely on Bailyn's thin waist is a lovely dagger with a pouch behind it.
Bailyn's single twisted red and white shoulder loop shows that she is a Smith Senior Apprentice.
Bailyn is 18 Turns, 5 months, and 15 days old.

Erakkin watches as the one with golden hair take a seat near him. With all this space in here, why did she have to sit right near him? Shrugging, he takes another sip of klah, then speaks, "fine." Which he was, really! No need to elaborate on the fact.

Bailyn flashes a smile. Slowly she gets up grabs a mug and pours some klah for herself. After watching it steam up, she sits back down and takes a sip. "That is good."

Erakkin nods in agreement. Yes, klah was good. This boy had practically been raised on klah, having had his first taste of it when he was only four or five Turns old. He leans back in his chair a bit, crossing his legs at the ankles, still holding his mug with both hands.

Bailyn smiles at Erakkin, nothing big, just a slight smile. Somehow she thinks she'll get through to him. "Did you enjoy the class yesterday?"

Erakkin looks up at her, then nods, "aye, t'was fine," he says, speaking a bit louder than usual. Which would be above a mutter. Taking another sip of klah, he suddenly realizes that she's actually smiling at him and freezes, the mug still at his lips. Now why would she be smiling at him?

Bailyn raises two eyebrows, and lets out a slight giggle. "What?" She brushes her cheek with the palm of one hand. "Do I have something on my face?" Trying as hard as she can to find out what is wrong, she pulls back all her hair from her face.

Erakkin blinks slowly, discovering that he's still got a mug at his lips, then lowers it, as he shakes his head at the other's question. "No," is his only answer, then looks into the mug, sticking his finger in there to get out a non-existing bug. Diversion tactics always worked for him.

Bailyn looks at her hands quickly, still making sure. Shruging at last she takes the mug and starts to drink, but sees Erakkin playing with his. Or something. "Is there something wrong with the klah?" She doesn't dare want to drink it if there is, and the way it looks, something might just be.

Glancing up, Erakkin shakes his head, then takes a swig of the klah to prove it. "Naw, t'is fine," he says reverting to his mumbling again. He swallow the rest in one big gulp, then puts the mug away on teh table before realizing that now he has nothing to occupy his hands, and crosses his arms to get them out of the way.

Bailyn shrugs and takes another drink. Well, now what? "That is good, I'd tell Dennia if it was.." Another drink. She looks at Erakkin, who still seems to be seated, and not walking off. "Soo...." Oh, nicely put.

Soo? What? Erakkin shrugs, waiting for her to continue, as his fingers start to twitch slightly in his armpits, where she couldn't see them. Raising an eyebrow ever so slightly, he lets her know that he's waiting for her next comment.

Bailyn drops Olivia.

Bailyn lets her feline go, taking another drink. She always has things to talk about, but now. She chalenges Erakkin's look with one of her own.

Dennia walks in from the Balcony Landing.

Dennia wavies at Erakkin and Bailyn

Dennia walks to the Kitchen.

In a silent contest, Erakkin would always win, and he says nothing now as he's leaned comfortable back in his chair, looking at the other. Even if he glances to the side as he hears footsteps, then back at the Bailyn.

Bailyn knows she can win, so she puts the mug on a table, and crosses her legs. Sitting up taller she folds her arms and smiles playfully at him. Her eyes gleam.

Erakkin doesn't need to actually be staring at people to win, so he gets up to get himself an orangefruit, which he peels with the help of his knife. That would be one good thing, living down here in the heat. Fresh fruit. Returning to his seat, he slowly tears out slices to pop in his mouth, still not saying anything.

Bailyn shakes her head at him, then gets her mug to take a drink from. After a slow sip she replaces it, the only sound being the 'klank' of the glass on the table.

Erakkin follows her movements carefully, his fingers seeking to seperate slices of the orangefruit from the rest and bring them to his mouth. If anybody wanted this boy to talk, they would have to ask him questions. Only rarely did he supply information on his own.

Bailyn looks right into his eyes, that happen to be the same color as her own. Her face is set in a determined way. Small ringles fall down, almost covering her sight. She doesn't move them, but they listen and stay to the sides of her eyelashes, wich hardly blink.

A twitch begins near the corner of Erakkin's mouth as she stares into his eyes. Not really used to have people - well girls - stare him into the eyes. Looking down at his orangefruit, which was almost gone, he picks out the last two slices stuffing them in his mouth, chewing them slowly. Nothing was going to make him speak voluntarily.

Bailyn doesn't dare move where she's looking, but sits back slightly, moving her legs a bit to get a better seat. A smile comes to her lips, but she bites her bottom lip down with her teeth slightly, and decides not to move it, until the right time.

Having finished his orangefruit, Erakkin looks around to find a place to dump the peels. Seeing a bucket near the foodtable, he walks over to investegate and finds it to be just what he was looking for. Throwing away the orange peels, he snatches up a meatroll on his way back, then sits back drawing one leg up under the other.

Bailyn laughs to herself, not outloud, that is. Keeping her eyes right on him, she lets her lip go, before licking them slightly. If he can't even look at her for more than minutes, than she has already won.

No, Erakkin doesn't lose because he's not looking at her. It wasn't a staring contest, after all. It was a silent contest, something he was an expert at. Taking a bite of the meatroll he makes half of it dissapear into his mouth and he glances up at her, just in time to see her stop biting her lip. One corner of his mouth is raised, though only a fraction of an inch.

Bailyn knows this isn't a staring conetst, but it may work to her advantage, because, staring, she can do. Her lips are now back to the determined grin, giving her right cheek a small dimple. Not moving her eyes from his face, and ketching his eye whenever he looks up at her, she waits for him to talk.

Bailyn goes home.

Dennia bustles into the hall and picks up a mug of klah before sitting across from the dour Erakkin. "Hey there. Settling in?"

More girls... Err, women. Erakkin shrugs, considering saying something now that Bailyn is gone, and their silent contest over. For now. He shoves the other half of his meatroll into his mouth, chewing slowly, as he watches the woman across from him.

Dennia seems to take the silence as a personal afront and sighs, looking into her mug as she does. Brightening with a thought, she looks up and asks, "Find any new friends, yet?"

"Not yet," he says, finally breaking the silence, if only for one of his short comments. Meeting friends wasn't why he'd come here, and besides he hadn't met all that many people yet.

Dennia oh's sympathetically, but doesn't lose her smile. She leaves her mug on the table and pulls her feet comfortably onto the bench with the rest of her and hugs her knees to her chest. "You will, I'm sure. You're all settled into the dorms and have lessons all set up?"

Erakkin nods slowly, observing the woman's motions. "Aye," he says, scratching the back of his head. He'd already had one lesson, only moments after he'd been accepted to the Craft. As for settling into the dorms he hadn't had much luggage with him.

Dennia rocks just a little and keeps smiling. "I'm here if you need someone to talk to, or just be with. I know it's hard getting used to being away from home for some. And if you need clothes or anything else, see me, too. Or Headwoman Arakiel." Dennia stops and giggles lightly "You might do better talking to me, though," she cautions, "The headwoman is given to bad temper occasionally.>"

Erakkin had met Headwoman Arakiel, or at least seen her his first night here. And he'd already decided to stay out of her way, if at all possible. "New clothes," he mumbles, more to himself than to her, but he could use a new tunic instead of this old one, he'd inheireted from his older brother. "Aye, I'll do that." His voice loud enough for her to hear him this time.

Dennia fairly beams at even such a short answer. "Good," she says perkily and reaches for her mug. "The food to your liking?" she asks and drinks.

"Aye, better'n home," Rakki mumbles, licking his fingers to get the last taste still lingering on his greasy hands. And the fruit here was fresh, even this time of Turn. "Klah ain't bad either..." See? He does talk, just not very much.

Dennia seems pleased. "They do work hard in the kitchens. Smiths need good food, all that work you do," she says with nods. As if remembering an unacceptable part of being a smith she scrunches up her nose. "They haven't had you cleaning forges yet, have they? I don't know why they have to be cleaned so often, the nasty things. Play havoc with the clothes and then everyone has to bathe for hours to get the soot off properly, you know," she starts to babble, then stops, blushing slightly.

Erakkin shakes his head, "Ah only 'came 'n 'prentice a coupla days ago," he notes, wiping his fingers off in his trousers. He hadn't even had much time to explore the place yet, and he hadn't been given any chores to do yet. And he wasn't about to mention that to anyone. Not just yet.

Dennia giggles and shakes her head "Like that would stop them? They decide one of their old forges needs to be cleaned and they'll grab the first apprentice knot they see to clean it," she goes on. "And I've seen them try to grab drudges, too, some of 'em. Nope, cleaning forges is something they do far too often," she goes on, finally stopping to drink from her mug. "You'd think the forges were more important than apprentices, the way some of them go on about it. And not just here, either. Same thing for the forge in the wery. Yup."

Erakkin blinks. One, twice, thrice, not knowing what to reply to her rambling about forges. But then cleaning forges - in Rakki's mind - is still better than going down a deep dark mine. Much better!

Dennia has an audience who doesn't try to stop her, and she just smiles at him. "It's not fun at the weyr, you know," she says. "Every time a rider gets hurt you /know/ and it's always so sad." She hrm's at Erakkin. "You werent' from the weyr, were you?" she asks, "I honestly have forgotten where you said you were from. I can be so forgetful..."

Erakkin shakes his head. No, he wasn't from the Weyr. Never even been /close/ to a weyr in his intire life. "'m from Bitra," he notes, wondering again where to put his hands, then stuffs them in his armpits.

Dennia tilts her head as she watches Erakkin place his hands and opens her mouth to comment, then stops, deciding to not embarrass him. He might just have cold hands, hrm. "Well, if you ever go, be prepared," she says, starting slowly as her mind is distracted by those hands. "Bitra, you say," she picks up speed and smiles again. "You don't seem to fit the things I heard about Bitra," she comments. "I've heard all kinds of bad things and you don't seem like a bad person at all. But then, you've left there, haven't you, so you're one of us now and not at Bitran at all," she says with a beaming smile at having worked that out satisfactorily.

The twitch at the corner of Erakkin's mouth starts again. He'd heard the things they said about Bitrans too, but if she didn't think he fit them, well then that would be her oppinion, right? True, he'd left, but that was to get away from the mines, not Bitra.

Dennia watches Erakiin's mouth now, as if facinated by the twitch. "You alright?" she asks, leaning forward.

Erakkin shrugs, and stands, his hands disappearing from his armpits to his pockets. Walking away, he doesn't offer her any explanaition as to where he's going or why. Too many questions!

Erakkin goes to the Balcony Landing.

From the Gathering Hall below, Dennia just sighs and mutters "They are always so busy."