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Sorcen's Story:

                Sorcen was born in early winter during the 8th turn of the present pass to Harper Journeyman Allocen and Weaver Journeywoman Sorella.  It was a cold and stormy night, fierce winds driving particles of sleet into the frost-covered walls of the hold.  Allocen paced nervously outside the room where his mate was giving birth, the agonized cries of labor pains from within increasing his agitation. Arms folded across his broad chest, long, calloused fingers gripping his biceps tightly, he wondered if the storm was an omen. The man's 6 foot 2 frame shivered with something other than the cold- a lit fireplace in the wall gave out enough heat to warm the room. The journeyman stared into the fire for a few minutes; the happily jumping flames cheerily sending light dancing across the floor, contrasting the man's somber mood. His klah-coloured eyes were deep in thought. He was not normally superstitious, but there was a feeling in the pit of his gut...

His thoughts were interrupted as the midwife burst through the door holding a precious, blanket-wrapped bundle high for him to see. A strong, loud cry emitted from the blankets as the woman shouted, "A son, Allocen, it's a son!" She laid the bundle carefully in his arms, then returned quickly to Sorella, closing the door again as she entered the room. The man's look went from solemn thought to delicate tenderness as the boy was laid into his arms. All feelings of anxiety gone, he carefully pulled back the blanket to look his son in the face.

            Pale blue eyes peered back at him as he took a peek. A smile graced the baby's entire face as he beheld his father, and a newborn giggle exited his mouth. A shadow of black fuzz graced the child's head, and a small but high-bridged nose ended in a high forehead. Pulling the blanket back more, Allocen smiled lightly as the boy's relatively long fingers gripped his own. He was surprised at the strength of the hand that was holding his index finger. "He has a gitarist's fingers," the man heard himself mumbling, then smirked. Trust him to make a Harper out of the boy...

            "You can see her now." The midwife once again interrupted his train of thought. He looked up, then followed the woman into the birthing room. He looked at his mate lying on a bed next to the wall on his left. Her normally petite figure looked more gaunt than usual under the aqua blanket, but a light of happiness was shining in her emerald eyes. He moved silently over to her and laid the child in her thin arms. "We need a name for him," Allocen reminded her gently. They had kept putting off the decision of a name, but now it was necessary. The woman thought of different ways to combine her name with her mate's. "Sorcen," she said resolutely after a few minutes of thought. Allocen smiled. "Aye, Sorcen it is."

Sorcen was raised in the room his parents shared in Fort Hold. Because Sorella could perform her craft in her own room, she spent the most time with the boy, but it was Allocen who grew closer. Sorcen's face lit up every time he saw his father, and the two would spend hours playing. The man was obviously more than a little pleased when his son showed keen interest in his gitar playing. Hardly had a more natural Harper been born- the child would try to imitate the chords his father formed on any toy he had that remotely resembled a gitar neck, and even some that didn't.

In addition to the music, Allocen had a love for the ocean, and whenever the opportunity came up, he went and brought little Sorcen with him, hoping to instill a similar love for the sea in his son. Al would sit on the beach playing his gitar while the boy waded out into the water, splashing and playing. When tired of playing, he would go up on the beach and watch his father, singing along with any words he knew. When he was 5 Turns old, Allocen gave him his own small gitar and taught him basic chords. The two would then go to the beach and sing and play together- the large bodied gitar Al played matching his baritone voice and the smaller one played by Sorcen matching the alto the boy had yet to grow out of. In those years a bond developed between father and son that few can imagine.

As Sorcen grew up, his skill with the gitar increased, as did his love for the music he could make with it. His father, though inwardly glad his son was pursuing his own interest, worried that the boy didn't get enough exposure to other crafts. He obviously had no interest in weaving, like his mother, but had seen little of the many other crafts. The journeyman was also concerned at the increasing amount of both Harper apprentices and journeymen in the large Harperhall. New apprentices were being admitted only reluctantly, and Allocen feared Sorcen would be disappointed should he not make it. He spoke to Sorella about a transfer to the southern continent, one of the smaller holds that lacked what their home hold had in so much abundance. His mate agreed, and after permission was sought and granted- easily because of the overcrowd- the plans were made.

            Sorcen was excited to make the trip. Allocen's scheme to make the boy fall in love with the ocean worked, and he was thrilled to be traveling across the whole thing on one of those big boats he had seen on the horizon during those days on the beach. As the moment of boarding the ship neared, he raced excitedly back and forth along the jetty in Fort Harbor. Taking an extra half-dragon length for momentum, he ran and hurdled over his father's gitar cases, all seven of them, which stood about an arm's-length apart. He stopped at the end of the line, where his small case stood. He looked pleadingly up at his father. "Can I play, Father, please?" His eyes, which had deepened to a darker azure, begged the man for permission to take out the beloved instrument. Allocen chuckled at the boy's insistence. "Nay, son, wait until we get on the ship. Then you can play until we reach Southern!" At the mention of Southern, Sorcen's excited energy returned, and he began once again to run up and down the broad jetty, his shoulder length black hair flowing behind him.

            The eager boy sprinted up the narrow catwalk to the deck and was soon left tapping his foot impatiently as his parents received tear-ridden hugs of farewell on the jetty below. As the ship pulled out, the child ran to the prow, leaving his parents to take care of his sack and gitar. Allocen didn't reprimand him, knowing he was excited. With his homeland drifting further and further into the distance, he had eyes only for the horizon, trying to see what was approaching. He remained blissfully unaware of what would greet him few months after he and his family arrived.

            The boy adapted quickly to life in a hold much smaller than he was used to. He actually preferred it; his father now had more time for him. Allocen was pleased to see that his son's interest in the Harper craft was not dampened by exposure to other crafts; if anything, it was strengthened. He continued to teach his eager student in his off-hours, continuing to take him on frequent trips to the ocean.

   Allocen woke one morning with the same cold feeling in the pit of his stomach that he'd had the day Sorcen was born. The connection didn't pass by him unnoticed. Something wasn't right, but he could identify no cause for his nervousness. Convincing himself his feelings were unfounded, he brushed them aside and did his best to ignore them as he began his day with breakfast.

Sorcen woke not too long after his father. He had the sudden urge to get outside, and when he passed his two parents eating breakfast, he muttered that he'd be back. He didn't know why he had the sudden urge to get out from under the roof of the hold, but the indoor air felt suffocating. As he emerged, something seemed wrong other than the overcast sky. It took him a moment to identify what was amiss. He figured it out when a wherry suddenly jumped up from its perch and gave way to panic-stricken flight. As the noise generated from its flapping wings faded into the distance, the boy knew what was wrong. It was too quiet. Everything was silent.

"Heyya Sorc!" The shout from his friend disrupted the silence, but it resumed as soon as the words had passed his ears.

"Hey, Fander." Sorcen greeted his friend then motioned for him to be quite. "Listen."

Fander fell silent and cocked his head to one side. After a few minutes, he said, quite matter-of-factly, "I don't hear anything."

"That's my point. It's /too/ quiet." Sorcen looked around, disturbed. "There's no wherries, no 'lizards, no crawlers... not even any wind. The water's still as glass." His unnerved gaze returned to his friend as Fander met his eyes. Rain started falling from the clouds, which were growing darker by the minute. It was a light rain at first but rapidly grew heavier. Fander went inside, telling Sorcen that his parents would get mad if he got too wet.

Sorcen, now alone, winced as a bolt of lightning tore across the sky. The boy looked around fearfully as the rumble of thunder seemed to come from both below and above. It was only when the thunder continued long after it should have died that he realized the sound wasn't the product of lightning. He looked down, the rumble seeming to come from deep below the surface of the ground. What should be firm began quaking violently, knocking the boy off his feet.  Lightning flashed once again, and the ensuing crash of thunder masked the sound of the hold walls crumbling to the ground, and the screams of pain coming from those inside. Flying debris cut his face and arms, and the blood that flowed from them turned into tiny rivers of red as it mixed with the rainwater on the shaking land. He tried to get up but was thrown back down by a second violent tremor. Thunder crashed again and he instinctively drew himself into a fetal position, covering his head with his arms, to prevent further injury from debris. The roar in the air was unbearably loud, and it mingled with the occasional agonized cry. He lay there long after the quaking and noise had stopped, suddenly fearful of the thunder that was growing distant.

When the rumbling in both sky and ground had stopped, Sorcen finally got up, heading through the now-light rain toward the collapsed hold. When the boy of 11 Turns looked for his parents, all he could find were the broken remains of his father's gitar, body crushed and neck snapped, the upper part of the neck and the head held to the rest only by the strings. Rocks and rubble were strewn around and on top of the instrument. He slowly knelt down beside it, trying to get the two halves of the neck to fit back together. He felt a gentle hand on his shoulder and looked up hopefully, then tried not to show his disappointment when he saw that the woman wasn't his mother. He can remember asking the woman, "Where's my father? He's gonna be sad, his gitar's broken." She hadn't answered, and he didn't understand why until many Turns later.

            It took a few sevendays for the knowledge that his parents weren't coming back to sink into the head of Sorcen. While being transported from the disaster back to Fort by a kindly seacrafter, he was in a numb daze, unable to eat anything or talk to anyone. When he reached his former home, however, he went nearly mad with grief. The pain too sharp to allow him to shed a tear, he ran away, out of the Hold, out of the valley. His anguished sprinting eventually brought him into a forest, where he soon got lost. He spent several days in the maze of trees, not knowing how to take care of himself. Surviving off the odd leaf that he /hoped/ wasn't toxic, he stumbled aimlessly through the woods, hoping to find a road.

 When he was on the brink of starvation, a fierce storm blew up, and young Sorcen had no way to get to shelter. Rain drove into his small body, and strong winds nearly knocked him off his feet. A large branch, felled by the heavy rains, struck him in the head on its descent to the ground. Everything went black.

            When he came around after the storm was over, he clawed his way, weak but determined, across the forest floor, finally coming upon a road. He could remember nothing of his prior life apart from his name, and although he had traveled this road before, it looked unfamiliar. Cold, tired, and hungry beyond belief, he lay hunched up on the road, hoping to Faranth that someone would find him.

            Again he was lucky- Lyne and blue Magnolth happened to be making a Sweep of the area and Lyne saw the boy's huddled form on the road. Landing 'Nolth, she saw that he was in very sorry shape and gave him some meatrolls and some water to start off. Once he had been fed and could stand on his own, the dragonrider bundled him up in every extra scrap of clothing she could find for the trip ::between:: back to Ista Weyr, her home. Once there, Sorcen was put in the care of a healer. He had several small cuts all over his body from his grief-blinded race through the woods, many of which had a surprising amount of dirt in them. And there was the frightfully large bump on his head that the boy had no memory of getting. He was under the stern eye of the healer for several sevendays.

            Sorcen and Lyne formed a bond that made them closer than siblings, yet Sorcen was restless. He became a traveler, but for nearly three Turns he never went far from the cothold he lived in. He'd go out and explore for a few days, sometimes extending into a sevenday or two, then return for a few nights. All the time, the curiosity and desire to know his past gnawed at him. During this period of sporadic bursts of traveling, he taught himself to make and hunt with a knife, and became skilled at throwing the weapon. His main diet consisted of jerky he made from tunnelsnakes he killed. Once he had learned basic survival skills-both from trial and error and help from Lyne- he went on a two-Turn tour of the northern continent in search of his past. He didn't go to Southern. It seemed pointless- if he had been on the southern continent, how did he end up here? He told no one of his trip- he just left one morning.

When he returned from the fruitless search, he was met by a very anxious Lyne, who was glad to see him alive after not hearing from or about him for so long. Sorcen told her everything about his travels: the questioning of Hold members, the watching for anything remotely familiar about the landscape, the gathers, the taverns. At the end of the narrative, the rider gave him a handmade gitar, a spontaneous gift that she had wanted to give to a close friend, but wasn't sure whom. The traveler took the instrument with something close to reverence. He had never held one before to his memory, but it felt oddly familiar in his hands. His eyes misted slightly, causing his friend some concern, but the feeling passed quickly, and joy returned to his eyes as he looked down at the gift. Lyne offered to teach him how to play it, but the now 16-Turn-old surprised both of them, though himself more, when he placed his hands on the fretboard confidently and played the introduction to Moreta's Ride.  Stopping himself, he stared momentarily down at his hands, then it hit him. "My father taught me that song..."

            A flood of memories of his childhood passed through his mind all at once. He struggled with the sudden wave, trying to collect enough thoughts to give a comprehensive explanation to Lyne. A large chunk of the night was spent telling the 'rider everything. As he related his story, he was surprised at the amount of pain he still felt; it seemed have doubled since that night he ran away. Now he just had the maturity to handle it. The young man who never seemed able to show emotion found himself wiping a few tears away -but only a few-, which Lyne pretended not to notice. He vowed that very night to become a Harper in honor of his late father.

Less than a sevenday later, he was interviewed and apprenticed into the Harper craft. He used his music as an outlet for the grief that still rested heavily and sharply on his heart and mind. He could never show emotion in casual conversation, but put a gitar in his hands and everything inside of him came out in the songs produced. It worked, too- for a couple sevendays, he was happier than he had been in a long time.

            This happiness, however, came to an abrupt end- far too fast for the young man to compensate. In a bout of long, hard playing that started spontaneously with a journeyman, Sorcen tore up the skin of his fingers on the strings, and, as they didn't hurt, didn't take care of them. They became infected, and a healer told him if he didn't stop playing for a few days, he risked his entire career. Unwilling to take that risk, he took the advice, but the advice took a serious toll on the apprentice.

            The grief he still held inside could no longer be released through  the music, and it threatened to overtake him. Unable to express it, and not  having the capacity to handle it, he went into a depression. His friends tried vainly to pull him out of it, but it only seemed to get worse. One finally had the sense to contact Lyne via firelizard, knowing that the 'rider was his closest friend, and the one most likely to be able to help him. Lyne arrived and brought him back to her weyr - the chill of ::between:: going unfelt by the young man. When they arrived, she  tried to make him comfortable without forcing him to talk, but making him aware that she was willing to listen. The little-known fact that his depression was  caused by his parents' deaths was eased out of him as the proud teen  struggled to hold the pain inside. Lyne, realizing that his pride was the problem, told him gently to let it go, that she wouldn't think less of him for it. With this encouragement, all of the grief that had remained bottle up for so long was released with many tears and a few anguished cries.

                This display of emotion was rare for the young man- he normally keeps his feelings to himself. Plagued by a short temper when he was younger, his many Turns of traveling taught him to keep that in check, and made him more sensitive and accepting to others' personalities. Though he smiles often, his deep laugh is heard only on very rare occasions. He's always respectful to those of upper rank, but won't hesitate to let his opinion be known if he thinks he's right. Though outwardly confident, he is inwardly filled with self-doubt, particularly when he is asked or required to look into the future. Having spent the previous 5 Turns in search of the past, he finds the future daunting and prefers to live in the moment.