Part 1: Arwith

"Oh Mirrim, you were right!"

Scowling, Mirrim hauled a heavy pot out of the soapy water, and let it clatter loudly against the others already dripping dry on the drainer. Then she rattled a pair of long metal tongs against the cutlery still left in the sink. Friends or not, if she made enough noise, perhaps she could convince Talina that she hadn't heard her... and if she could do that for long enough, the young weyrwoman would more than likely go away again before Manora spotted her empty hands, and found a job for her to do. Even queenriders weren't above that the day before a hatching, not with all the work involved.

Talina did not go away.

Even more annoyingly, she'd picked up a drying cloth from somewhere, and had now positioned herself at Mirrim's elbow ready to start drying dishes.

"Well that's new," Mirrim muttered to herself. She was hard pressed to remember the last time she'd witnessed Talina working on a chore that didn't benefit either her or her queen; indeed, Talina often remarked on how glad she'd been at leaving Ruatha's kitchens well behind her.

"Hmm? This pot? Looks more dirty than new to me."

Mirrim hadn't thought Talina's hearing was as good as that. She snatched the pot out of Talina's hands, and plunged it back into the water, doing her utmost not to look at her friend's face any longer than she absolutely had to. She'd been avoiding her all morning, but it seemed that Talina was still - still! - wearing that appalling smile. Shells, now she was humming, too! Perhaps she could persuade Tolly to provide some kind of distraction? Mirrim concentrated on the little brown firelizard, trying to express her need adequately in a manner that he could still understand. Sure enough, he and Reppa blinked into view almost instantly, only for Reppa to dart into the soapy water with a splash and start tugging on a ladle that was twice as long as she was, while Tolly merely perched on the lip of the sink and eyed her quizzically.

?The big one? he seemed to be saying ?noise? ?splash?

?No, not the big spoon. Message? she thought back firmly, picturing a scrap of hide she'd left on her cot.

?Message!? He gave a squawk and vanished.

Well, there was no way of knowing if that had worked or not until he came back again. Mirrim rescued Reppa from her losing battle with the ladle, gave the pot a final wipe over, and handed it back to Talina with a sigh. "Here you are. All clean."

Talina cradled the pot in one arm, and with slow, careful strokes began to dry it off. "It was wonderful, Mirrim, utterly wonderful. Oh, if only you knew!"

Well, she did. As did most of the rest of the Weyr, she suspected. Few people were thick-skulled enough to ignore a gold's rising, and certainly not those who had firelizards looking to them. The only person in the Weyr who'd never felt the echoes of dragonlust before had been Talina herself - these days, even weyrling queens were taken out of their Weyrs when one of the other queens rose to mate. Not that there were many of those in the other Weyrs; weyrling queens or inexperienced young women. Pilgra had once told her that the oldtimers considered it very bad form for a queenrider to cling onto her virginity, waiting for her dragon to rise. Even at Benden, it hadn't been considered wise... at least until Kylara and Brekke between them had set two very different precedents that no-one wished to repeat. A queen's rider shouldn't act like a green dragon, and she certainly shouldn't fixate on one rider to the exclusion of all others. No, it was all for the best, so almost everyone agreed, if Talina came to her queen's first flight with as few expectations as possible. So long as a queenrider had the basic knowledge of what to do, everything would work out just fine. It had worked for Lessa, hadn't it? And what was good enough for Lessa ought to be good enough for anyone.

Ha.

Still wiping at the same pot, Talina dreamily continued. "And to think, I'd never have known who to choose if not for you!"

"I'm happy for you," Mirrim lied. She fished out the last piece of cookware lurking at the bottom of the sink and tipped in the next load to soak, wishing with all her heart that Talina had never thought to ask her about the subject in the first place. Why couldn't she have spoken to Lessa, or one of the other queenriders?

Well, that question answered itself. Lessa was Lessa, no-one spoke to quiet, introverted Celina (even if she had got herself comfortably settled with D'nol long before Valenth first flew Lamanth), and it would be a hard, cruel person who ever thought to discuss a queenflight with Brekke.

Instead, Talina had come to Mirrim. The poor holdbred weyrwoman had got herself woefully confused. It was all very well telling a young weyrwoman to leave the chasing to the bronzes and their riders, but everyone knew that dragons usually mated with whoever their riders most wanted them to. And how were you supposed to decide who you wanted when you weren't meant to want anyone in the first place? It just wasn't fair! Mirrim hadn't meant to convince Talina that T'gellan was the best choice for her... Except, somewhere along the way, between recounting the flaws and virtues of every last one of the Weyr's bronzeriders, and the thousand and one little things that no-one else would dare say or even take note of in the first place, she had.

In hindsight, the reason for it was obvious.

"Ah, there you are!"

Mirrim couldn't help herself; she spoke T'gellan's name just as fast as Talina did, beside her. Both women turned. T'gellan was crossing the kitchen toward them, weaving through the bustling workforce of the Weyr and intermittently being tugged along by the collar by a fluttering brown shape that was none other than Mirrim's own Tolly. Mirrim's heart sank. This was the last thing she'd wanted!

T'gellan cleared the last stack of shelving, and shooed the firelizard away. "There now, Tolly, I can see her quite clearly from here!" He held out his arms as Talina launched herself into them, and gave Mirrim a wink over the woman's shoulder. "Kind of you to send Tolly to find me, Mirrim. You're a good friend."

Mirrim smiled sickly back at him, greatly relieved when the pair turned away together. 'Friend' was marginally better than 'little sister' she supposed, or any of the other endearments he'd relentlessly teased her with over the Turns. Not but that she'd not done the exact same to him... but now that she'd started being honest with herself, it was as clear as a gold egg on the sands that she'd not looked on T'gellan as the older brother she'd never had for a long, long time. Well. Talina might not be Weyrbred, but she was, and so was T'gellan. Flights were flights, nothing more than that, and so there was no reason at all why she couldn't just tell him how she felt about him.

It ought to be easy, really - she'd never been afraid of telling people what she thought of them, and T'gellan was as honest a person as she was.

So why couldn't she bear the thought of doing it?

Mirrim turned back to her pots with a grimace, determined that she wouldn't hide her heart any more. Somehow, she'd find the right words to say, and the right time to say them.

Instead, she found Path.

Part 2: Path

Mirrim sat slouched on the rocky ground at the south side of the weyrbowl, torn between tears and laughter. Part of her had almost been amused hearing Jaxom's various misconceptions. At least he didn't think that she shared the sexual propensities that Path was on the verge of developing, even if he was acting more and more like the back end of a bull herdbeast with every passing day. Honestly, the boy was so full of himself for finding that holder girl, you'd think he thought he'd invented sex... and it was pretty obvious, really, what he was compensating for. All the same, today was the first time a dragonrider - even a rider of a half-grown runt like Ruth - had expressed an
accurate opinion about her virginity in Turns. Just because Path was a green...

There were women in the lower caverns who could rival a green for their appetites... but had any of them ever Impressed? No!

All through her weyrlinghood, it had been the same thing over and over and over. Don't trust the greenriders to think outside their trousers, or even to think at all. Everyone got the lectures on self-restraint, the rules about looking to your dragon's needs first and foremost, and keeping your hands and other body parts to yourself until your dragon had matured... but it was always, always, the greenriders who got the worst of it.

Oh, she wouldn't change Path for all of Pern and everything in it, but the simple fact remained that greenriders were nobodies as far as the Weyr was concerned, and weyrling greenriders were the lowest of the low. It was only after Impressing Path that she'd truly realised that, when she went in an instant from being Mirrim-who-everyone-knew-they-should-listen-to, Mirrim-Manora's-apprentice, to Mirrim-the-greenriding-freak. It hadn't taken the Weyr long to make up their minds about her. Before she'd got Path settled that first day, even before Lessa had finished tearing strips off her for daring to Impress a fighting dragons, half the Weyr had already decided she was a devious sneak who simpy must have interfered with Path's egg, while the other half had more charitably assumed that she was just so close to a green dragon in spirit herself that Impression was inevitable. And she and Path had had to live with that, ever since.

Mirrim stared blankly across the weyrbowl. Out on one of the queens' ledges, a gold and bronze lay sprawled beside each other, necks entwined. Arwith and Monarth...

"Who's the lucky rider?" she muttered, echoing Jaxom's hurtful words.

She couldn't get the conversation out of her head. Had Path shown a preference? Of course she had, and it wasn't the very-much-out-of-reach-right-now wingleader's bronze. There was P'serek's brown that flew in K'net's wing, and a couple of young blues: one about five turns older than Path from one of Lamanth's clutches, and Roshoth from their own clutch who everyone thought would make Searchdragon eventually. They'd be alright, she supposed, although Roshoth was really too young to be in with a chance. As were F'lessan and Golanth, thank Faranth! There were a few other blues, too, but their riders would be far happier if their dragons chased one of the other green dragons. Mirrim had discounted most of those ones right off.

More of a concern to her were all the other dragonriders, the browns and the bronzes, the ones she'd spent the best past of the last month - if not the best part of her life - needling mercilessly in the hope of putting them off. Not that that would matter to all of them. Some of the bronzeriders were dumb enough to have confused her behaviour with flirting. Others rarely looked further than their own egos, and, much like Jaxom, would be more than happy to take an uppity greenrider down a peg or two. As if she could help being who she was! All that time spent with Manora and Brekke, apprenticed to them just as much as Menolly was to Robinton or Jaxom was in the Hold - was she meant to forget overnight everything she'd learned while growing up? Shells, she'd practically been trained not to take any nonsense from anyone, to be confident and smart enough to tell the dragonriders what to do when they lacked the sense of little green dragons to do it themselves?

Even that hurt. How greens were meant to be flighty and silly and flirty and sl...

"You okay, Mirrim?"

It was T'gellan. He planted himself down securely on a patch of bare rock beside her before she could shove him away.

"Fine!" she snarled. "How's Talina?"

T'gellan rolled his eyes. "Oh, you know."

"No. I don't know."

And that summed up the entire problem fairly well, as far as she could tell. She'd never asked it to happen this way, but she'd managed to fixate herself on him as well as Brekke ever had on F'nor. Stupid of her - green-dragon-stupid, some would say, and she'd give them what-for if ever she caught them doing it - but at least she was weyrbred enough not to ever let it get in the way of Path's needs. Why, though? Why had she never just told T'gellan how she felt about him? Sure, she'd had to stick to the weyrling rules when Path was young, but they'd been part of the fighting wings for more than long enough now. She'd had opportunities aplenty, but all she'd done was brush him aside... well... half a dozen times in the last week or two alone. Looking at him, sitting beside her and talking, she realised that she still had a chance to make things clear, right there and then. It would be utterly futile, as far as Path's rising went, but at least he'd know.

"Funny. You had her figured out pretty well the last time Arwith rose. What's changed?"

She'd been so lost in her own thoughts that it took a little while for his words to register, and when they did the shame of her past tactlessness stung her to the core. She'd tried very hard to forget that conversation. She hadn't meant to hurt them, Talina or him; how was it possible that the honest truth could so often sound so horribly unforgivable!

"Nothing," Mirrim said, all thought of confessing her care for him gone in an instant. "I can't change, and you can't change, and nothing in this whole Weyr will EVER change."

"I see a girl on a fighting dragon."

"A girl on a fighting dragon. I'm not going to be a girl much longer, T'gellan." She pushed herself to her feet and did her best to walk rather than run away.

"That's not what I... Argh!"

T'gellan's words met deaf ears. Mirrim didn't care if that wasn't what he'd meant. It was all pointless anyway, and besides, Path would need her soon.

A few dragonlengths away from him, she turned to look back over her shoulder, hoping that he was following her. He wasn't.

Mirrim continued trudging across the bowl, intending to go as far as she needed to until she could make out Path dozing on their ledge, high, high up the southern face of the Weyr. It was a typical weyr for a young pair like them; they didn't get much sunlight, even at this time of year. She kicked at the loose stones in front of her, sending them skittering ahead of her feet.

I hope it's the wildest flight since Mnementh first flew Ramoth

And so what if it was? She was starting to hope that the whole Weyr would hear her and her Path, just like they'd heard Arwith the other day. Why shouldn't they hear her? Why shouldn't they listen to her? Her beautiful, honest Path, who wouldn't have anyone but her. She wouldn't be flown by just anyone, either. Only the strongest, the swiftest, the most daringly acrobatic.

Dry mouthed, Mirrim came to a halt, and peered back over her shoulder. Path wasn't sleeping any more. The green dragon was perched on the edge of her ledge, wings outstretched and ready to fly. Mirrim almost reeled at the sight of her dragon, so beautiful she was, such a perfect encapsulation of their twinned spirits, bright and fiery and determined. Special.

Path!

I know what to do. It's time.

Mirrim could feel the dragon's instincts pulling on her, too, as Path leapt from the ledge. This was nothing like the urges she'd felt through Reppa and Lok, the mild stirrings that she'd always ignored when she'd had to, and relieved with her own fumbling as well as she might when she couldn't. Her whole body was throbbing with it, and she was eager for more. Time? It was past time, for this, for her, for them both. There was a noise in the air beside her, of dragons bearing their riders closer to where she stood. Part of her still wanted to laugh. Poor Jaxom, thinking she'd be apprehensive about this moment - she was a dragonrider, she knew how it would work out.

But first, she needed to hunt.

The herdbeasts had already been terrified into landbound flight by the blooding males. There was a preponderance of bronzes there, just as she'd suspected; men and dragons making the most of the rare opportunity presented by Path and herself, the lack of the usual conflict between the natural urges of rider and dragon. The sight didn't please either Path or herself. Their riders were likewise milling confusingly around Mirrim, wary of the glare she was giving the whole fardling lot of them. There were a few leers amongst the crowd, some men old enough to be her father, some earnest younger faces... Mirrim had half a mind to poke out her tongue when she spotted F'lessan and Roshoth's K'toran, only it came out as more of a snarl. Ignoring the other dragons, Path had selected and killed her prey. The taste and heat of the blood hit Mirrim viscerally, thrilling and repulsing her in equal measure. She concentrated on the former, concentrating on Path and what they both needed to do.

Drink, Path! Drink it!

Path scarcely needed the encouragement, but Mirrim gave it anyway, throwing herself wholeheartedly into her dragon's appetites. For blood, for flight, and eventually for sex. The flight lasted the longest of the three, a spiralling, frenzied pattern of wings of every colour, darting and climbing, diving, circling. High and fast, Path attempted to make of her flight a demand for a victor worthy of her and her rider, both.

Far sooner than either of them had hoped for, Path's flight was cut short. However young and fast she was, however in tune she was with her instincts, however much Mirrim had willed her on, there was no denying the fact that Path was inexperienced when it comes to mating flights, and they were easily caught and won.

Neither Mirrim nor Path were entirely satisfied by the flight, nor by the bronze who'd caught them. He was certainly not lacking in experience in chasing - or catching - female dragons of either colour. What had been lacking? Mirrim tried to puzzle it out as she disentangled herself from Path's pleasured fatigue, and the expected aches and small pains that she was only now sensing deep within her own body. Physically, it had felt very good - extremely good - but the intense oneness she'd felt while flying and mating as Path was fading now, and there was certainly nothing of the sort between herself and... him. Shells, Lessa would kill her for this! Short of Mnementh himself, there weren't many worse dragons that could have caught her and Path.

They separated. Thankfully, beyond a few whispered words of praise in her ear, he didn't choose to linger.

Next time, she and Path would both do better, Mirrim decided. Flights were flights, and they had plenty more ahead of them both. By next time, she promised herself, she would have told T'gellan how she felt. A small smile grew on her face. Path would rise at least twice more before Arwith ever did.

And why, indeed, should she even wait for Path? No-one expected that of the other greenriders, did they?

Her mind made up, Mirrim, rider of green Path, walked back out into the main caverns with her head held high.

AN: this is a prompt fill for a realistic loss of virginity scenario involving Mirrim and Path's first flight and a less than spectacular end result.