You're Tacky and I Hate You

Writers: Iluva, Sia
Date Posted: 2nd October 2026

Characters: K'valas, A'garyn
Description: K'valas and A'garyn try to introduce their dragons like two felines
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 3, day 4 of Turn 13
Notes: Mentioned: N'dhavi, Karcalanth (not by name), D'miran, M'sar, R'zen (not by name)

K'valas

A'garyn

It took a while before either K'valas and A'garyn's free time overlapped in a way where both dragons were both awake and (somewhat) agreeable to finally test the waters.

Not that Sazikoth was ever agreeable when it came to A'garyn.

}: I don't like it.:{ Sazikoth grumbled as she landed right outside the weyrling barracks. She wasn't so big that she couldn't fit into the barracks yet, since the younger browns and bronzes were close to her size or bigger now, but sticking her in an enclosed space with them wasn't a good idea.

"You don't have to like it." K'valas told her. She dropped to the ground in a sulk and nearly tossed K'valas off her neck as he tried to dismount. The shock of landing too hard on his feet jarred him from his ankles up his back, and he reached out to her for support. Well. At least A'garyn hadn't seen that. "You and Talarcheth are going to share a ledge-"

}: We will not! :{ Sazikoth hissed. }: They already take up too much space. That's _my_ home.:{

Just inside, A'garyn's months-long resentment had come back to bite him. He was still waiting at the curtain for his dragon, who (yet again) effortlessly plucked her image from his mind and grew smug with the inflamed sense of irritation suffusing most of A’garyn’s memories of her.

}:See? I have everything I need to know.:{ The bronze grumbled from the comfort of his wallow.

A’garyn rolled his eyes. **You just like pointing out how angry I get when I think of her, even when I don't want you to. You can form your own opinion of her.**

}:I can't wait.:{ Talarcheth replied, not at all sarcastically.

“Come on.” He headed for the weyrbowl anyway, where, just as they emerged, the bronze’s head shot out of the dark and over his rider’s shoulder, hot breath and warm hide pressing in. Talarcheth’s attention momentarily shifted to the man at the green’s side, as it often did. The rush of emotion around K’valas annoyed Talarcheth. Almost as much as A’garyn’s assessment that he didn’t understand any of it. Almost as much as the insistence he would need to share space with another dragon.

That dragon. His eyes whirled faster as he looked her over, as A’garyn’s steadying hand met his jaw. “Hey. Want to go over by the waterfall?”

Sazikoth glared right back at the tiny (to her) bronze and considered how little force she'd need to knock him over.

**Don't.**

}: He is small.:{ she observed, not even bothering to hide the faint curl of disdain, }: It wouldn't take much.:{

"Sure," he said, a beat too quick to be casual, brushing imaginary dust from his palms like he hadn't just nearly eaten dirt on the dismount. Something for both dragonets to do that wasn't glaring at each other, the water drowning out their conversation for any eavesdroppers. The Weyrlingmaster office was nearby, too, far enough to avoid immediate detection but close enough that Fianwyth was visible on the ledge above.

Sazikoth grumbled as she stood again and made sure to shove her shoulder against K'valas before stalking ahead, tail and nose held high.

"She's protective." He said by way of excuse as they walked. "Not that I'm any better." His mouth twitched, but there was no real humor in it.

Talarcheth snorted, nonplussed, though it was clear from the way his gaze tracked slowly between the pair that something bothered him. }:He seems almost fully grown, why does she treat him like a hatchling?:{

**You just heard him say protective,** A'garyn said, and fixed his eyes on the mist over the waterfall, not wanting his own thoughts and feelings to bleed over any more than they had.

}:That is what he said. It is not what I see.{: As if a little more than a month out of his shell were enough to determine the shape of the green’s behaviour more than what her own rider had. To Talarcheth, however, it was. He half-considered darting ahead of the group to evaluate her more fully, or perhaps to show her how to lead, but he was hardly convinced it was worth his time. He didn’t seem to register that his own proximity was built on the same instinct, as for the moment it meant he could get a better look at the other man, staring at K’valas over A’garyn’s shoulder with eyes turning slightly more orange. What was even so interesting about him?

A'garyn sighed.

“She's growing,” he offered stiffly and ran his knuckles along his dark beard. His glance over at K'valas mirrored the bronze’s for a moment, though it lacked any of the hardness, any of the distrust, the searing skepticism. Aside from mealtimes they barely saw each other. “You look good. I’ve been in the barracks so long I’m seeing glitter in my sleep. He’s very demanding.” Though there was little bite in it.

K'valas huffed a laugh this time. "Yeah, well. I bathe regularly now." His tone was dry, easy enough on the surface. He couldn't describe that he _felt_ good too, in a way he hadn't in a long time. The physical demands in weyrlinghood were hard at first, but his body had grown and adapted with the help of regular meals and rest. "I could say the demands go away, but I'd be lying." He said.

Sazikoth crouched near the water's edge and took off in a spray of dirt and river water, gliding for about two wingbeats before landing on the opposite side. She folded her wings with exaggerated precision and fixed them with an imperious glare from the other side of the waterfall.

**This isn't behaving.**

}: You said I didn't have to like it. I'm not liking it.:{

“I'm not too worried about it.” A'garyn assured him casually, the hint of a smirk there; the training was a challenge, and the demands were all part and parcel to it. Even with the stress and the strain and the dull ache in his body when he slept, it felt like they were building something a little more with each day, not just the desperate clawing to survive it. “I… like it, actually.” he admitted, in a way he wouldn’t to anyone else. “Sometimes. That might change the closer we get to actually flying Thread.”

Talarcheth stopped. Stared across the water at the spectacle. Immediately decided he had better things to do. With a snort at A'garyn like Sazikoth was clearly proving his earlier point, he stalked along the bank up toward the noisy spray of water over stone. His tail tip twitched with cool distaste, belying his readiness to instigate something himself as he innocently set about dragging a wingtip along the surface.

}:You are not that interesting.:{ He told her, a draconic sneer in his voice. }:But. Petulant, yes. Small-minded, also yes.:{

A'garyn pressed hard against his mind, and the bronze hissed back at him as if it were an unfathomably deep betrayal. “Shit. Well, this is going well.” He muttered, his brows creased. Something pulled uneasily in his stomach. **Get back here.**

}:No.:{ came the bronze’s flat answer.

K'valas' gaze lingered. A small smile pulled at his features to meet A'garyn's smirk. Pride and sadness settled as a weight in his chest. He hadn't thought for a moment that A'garyn wouldn't Impress bronze, if given the chance. He'd been bred for that life from the start. Even now, sleep-deprived and tense, he still looked confident and composed.

The curse Sazikoth hurled at Talarcheth echoed in his ears. Instead of drawing attention to it, he nudged a loose stone into the river with the toe of his boot. "We have a while to build them into it. Sazikoth got used to Zolta coming in and out, she'll get used to you and Talarcheth."

Across the water Sazikoth's tail lashed once.

}: I considered eating her.:{

**Do not.**

Talarcheth trekked along the water's edge until he was all but enveloped in the roaring spray at the base of the falls, a dark glisten in the mist. His displeasure sharpened at the curse and he fired that back at her, then two-fold for his rider. Just a harsh blaze against A'garyn's being that refused soothing.

A'garyn exhaled and sank down into a low crouch on the balls of his feet. He rested his elbows on his knees, hands hanging loose before plucking at blades of grass in idle contemplation. Still he stared at Talarcheth-- that one storming eye fixed on them, otherwise his back turned.

“Yeah. You're right.” He glanced up at Kav in a one-eyed squint, and for a long moment he just looked at him, like he had so many times before. Easy harmony wasn’t part of any expectation, but it was frustrating nonetheless. Then he shook his head and stared out at the water. “Zolta isn't hard to get along with.” The corner of his mouth did quirk-- quick affection rather than amusement. “Now there's two of us. He's stubborn. It's going to take him a while to come around, too. It's been a long few months. It's good to see you, though.”

"It's _going_ to be a long few months." K'valas added. "I don't think we're going to see much of each other until we're both in the Fighting Wings." The irony burned. A'garyn had Impressed right before the worst of the restrictions started lifting for the senior class."You should come see my weyr, once you can get further away from the barracks. It has access through the inside, so you won't need to get around Sazi."

A’garyn couldn't help but smile at that part, though the whole thing still felt strange. His heart pounded. A part of the weyr belonging to either of them. An actual space, not a cramped corner somewhere. Privacy from other people. A ledge. And a door.

“I will,” he said, firmly, just as soon as he could get there. “What’s it like? You really got a kitchen and all that?” He looked up from the water at K’valas again, unhurried, as though the conversation were about something mundane, run-of-the-mill. His eyes, however, were unguarded. He looked further over his shoulder then, at the great stone ledges stacked behind them. “Which one’s you?”

"Shells, not a kitchen." K'valas said. "A hearth big enough to put a kettle on, and a washbasin. Family weyrs get all the space. Still, it's bigger than anything we've had before." He cast his eyes upwards, trying to remember which one was his. "Do you see the ledge where N'dhavi's bronze is sitting? We're to the right."

}: I won't share with him, either.:{ Sazikoth complained.

A'garyn nodded as he studied the ledge, noting its distance from the rim, its angle in the sun. Apparently immune to the cold of the falls but not his rider's thoughts, Talarcheth immediately sent a harsh, wordless protest. A'garyn resumed plucking at the grass again, wrestling with the urge to offer some semblance of understanding. **I know.**

}:Then you know I cannot like someone who doesn't like you. And I won't occupy space with her, either, if there is even any left to fight over.:{ They were not so different in size now. He would be massive and imposing like his sire one day, whenever that was-- _although_ that would make shoving her off the ledge much easier. More satisfying. His tail flicked. Too bad it was not now.

**She'll adjust.** A'garyn spared a glance across the river at her, imperious on the far bank, keeping it brief because Talarcheth was also staring at Sazikoth through the veil of vapour. **You will, too.**

Talarcheth's big paw struck the passing water like it was in on all of this, too. }:Unlikely.:{ He snorted.

He tore his gaze away from both dragons and relaxed his thoughts, but it didn’t shift what was always in his chest, and, however easily it sat there now, with K’valas so close, that longing was always louder in his absence. A’garyn stood with a careless flick of his hands against his thighs, as if it might loosen any of it with the grass. It would be a while before their dragons had to deal with each other directly, but the waiting only added to its weight. “I’ll bring rum or something when I can visit.” He said, with no mention of where he might get it. And he knew he shouldn’t. It would probably cause an all-out hissing fit. But his shoulder brushed K’valas’, bumping it affectionately, wanting to linger, though in the end it didn’t. “Once those two have stopped sizing each other up.” He studied him quietly. “What's it like having all that space to yourself?”

Sazikoth stared back. Her tail swished slowly in the dirt. K'valas' gaze tracked the movement, recognizing it as a feline-like preparation to pounce. The game hadn't ended when she'd gotten too big to be stopped, and he didn't fully trust her not to 'play'. He leaned into the touch, just enough to briefly press back into A'garyn's shoulder. "It's quiet," he said at last, "I keep expecting to find out that they accidentally gave me too big a weyr. I didn't have anything that size at Shadow Mountain."

He didn't want to think about that. "It doesn't feel real."

“Yeah.” A'garyn smiled faintly at the return of contact, enough, for now, and yet it was not nearly enough. “I get that.” Much in their lives felt that way now. A turn ago he wouldn't have known if it was stranger to have dragons or that, at this moment, theirs were staunchly opposed to one another in almost every way.

Behind them Talarcheth was sizing up the river, energized by the signs of threat on the other side. His tail swung in return, hard slashes carving the mist as he broached the water's edge, eyes quick.

**Stay there.**

The bronze hissed. It was not that wide of a river.

**Stay, Talarcheth.** A'garyn didn't need to look. Another firm mental prod had the young dragon grumbling, lying flat against the wet bank in a splotch of burnished glitter. No less poised. “The quiet's real, even if the rest of it doesn't feel like it,” he added to K’valas, then frowned, shaking his head. “The barracks is so sharding loud, I can't hear myself think. Not sure I'd sleep if I wasn't exhausted.” His expression smoothed again. “I look forward to seeing it-- seeing you.”

"Soon." K'valas promised, even as Sazikoth hissed a }: No!:{ between his ears. "Come anytime. Lessons got much better once I didn't have to see everyone all day." M'sar, in particular, although sometimes when he listened on the ledge he could still hear the boy shrieking at D'miran.

“I will,” A'garyn repeated, letting the ledge pour in one last time and cement deeply in memory. “I’ll send Z first and make sure you’re there.” Even as he said it, he felt her attention spike. It lingered, hopeful, ready, a soft pulse that slowly faded until she finally curled back up wherever she was. “The class is… alright. A lot of younger ones.” He hoped K'valas was right, in any case. He nearly smiled then. “But there’s this one kid… he’s spikey.”

The noise that escaped K'valas' throat could have been an attempted laugh. "What, like a plant?"

A'garyn snorted. “Well… yeah, actually. Kind of? Like a plant that could be poisonous, if you handled it wrong. It's funny, but…”

Last updated on the October 28th 2026

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You're Tacky and I Hate You