Doll by Dolldivine

Name: Ferrilee

Gender: Female

Age: 17

Origin: Craft Bred (trapping, senior apprentice)

Height: 5'7"

Build: slender and muscular, with sturdy legs from walking great distances

Skin: brown, some scars from animal fights

Hair: platinum blond, cut short, left dirty most often

Eyes: brownish-green, narrow, always looking for details

Personality: Ferrilee is an exercise in contraditctions. She is confident on her own, and when she's asked to perform in her chosen field she is quite secure. However, out of her element she's usually a bit of a wallflower until she feels more comfortable. Thus, she is leadership material in ways: she can train anyone how to build and check a simple trap. But she's also never been too sure of herself as a "girl" - girls don't run around in the mud and forest, do they? Well she does, and she's proud of it. Most of her closer friends are boys for this reason. They've largely accepted her as one of the gang, and she would expect this to extend into the Weyr.

History: Born to a Craft House full of trappers, traders, hunters and tanners, with a nebulous idea at best of who her parents were. Ferrilee was allowed to choose her own path, find her own strengths, and take advice from anyone who would give it to her. She was skilled with knots, box traps and even complicated spring traps which were geared toward hidden tunnel snakes and scarce prey. As she got older, into her tween years, and she began more or less developing as a normal girl, she was mortified to learn what kind of 'changes' she'd have to endure. She did manage to keep her gender issues (if you could call them that) off her mind for at least a year as she concentrated on learning a bit of animal husbandry to flesh out her knowledge. That much work prevented her from really worrying about whether she would have to bind her chest down (it would never be really necessary). The practical way she looked at things grew into a routine.

Ferrilee enjoyed that routine until she was Searched, and even then learned quickly to apply her existing knowledge to her current surroundings. Life in the Weyr was at least as rigid as she'd expected - with chores, expectations, and a command structure which she appreciated.

When anyone might have noticed her rather disconcerting behavior toward pet animals such as canines or felines, an amount of digging would reveal an experience during her training with various animals. She regarded dogs as little more than smelly interruptions to her tasks - a pack of the creatures had ruined one of her best laid traps and therefore her chances at Journeyman-hood. As far as felines go, she thought they were merely thieves, or worse, distractions.

One thing she did like far more in a Weyr than wandering around the countryside or being put up in a cothold, was that women were expected to do many of the same things as their male counterparts, at least as far as riding duties were concerned. Should she Impress, she hoped to get a male dragon. The education regarding greens going into heat, or horror of horrors a queen rising, was enough to wish she'd brought those chest-binding supplies and pass herself off even to a dragon as a boy.

She would hardly notice the passage of time if not for the seasons changing, so Ferrilee was simply happy to explore Sedona Weyr until the hatching.

***

The clutch was one surprise after another! Ferrilee hadn't guessed that blue dragons came in female, nor that there were twin dragons born even once in a while! But this smallish bunch of largish eggs had both! Ferrilee stood in awe as a female brown impressed first, and twin greens and a couple bronzes and...

While the two surprising bronzes were impressing, another egg was trying to hatch, and now a skinny blue hatchling was wandering the sands. The hatchling glanced at several of the male candidates, but seemed reluctant to approach them, and the blue eventually wound up by the girls instead. Convinced by now that this was another cross-gender, the male candidates lost interest, as did a few of the girls. This seemed to upset the blue, with one candidate in particular. Why are you ignoring me, Ferrilee? Wait...I'm not a girl! I just want one for a rider. He gave a snort, and Ferrilee was soon leaving to feed her Froyneth.

Froyneth grew quickly, average in size for his shade, but very quick and still more sleek than the others in his clutch. He was among the first into the air, with or without his rider. They were also among the first to join up with Albion's wing riders, and shortly Ferrilee headed back to her wilderness home - mostly to show off. In the two years since she'd been gone, very little had changed, though a few of those boys who had been part of her 'gang' before were now Journeymen and wandering the lands. That gave her a bit of a pout, because she knew she was just as good as they were, even now - maybe even especially now.

So she challenged the Master of the trapper hall: give her an afternoon to prove her worth, and she'd walk away from the craft either a perpetual Senior Appy, or a Journeyman in her own right. He took her up on it, assigning a number of tasks which she could easily do herself, and a few that she could only have finished with her dragon. Perhaps he knew... And sure enough when he did pin her Journeyman knots on her rider's jacket, he told her that his brother had been a rider, and enjoyed challenging those in his peer group to such activities.

Ferrilee and Froyneth would continue to hunt, trap, and scout for Albion, in addition to being a steadfast pair during Threadfall.

***

--Questions!--

1. What color do you particularly want to Impress?
Blue

2. Any colors you do NOT want to get?
Gold

3. Extrovert or Introvert?
I like being part of a crowd, but not the center of attention.

4. Nervous about the Hatching?
I don't care, I probably won't Impress anyway.

5. Are you a leader, or a follower?
I'd be a great leader!

6. Someone played a mean-spirited prank on another candidate. What do you do?
Any of the above, I just can't decide!

7. Some of your friends dare you to go somewhere dangerous. What do you do?
I'd dare them right back. All or none!

8. You find someone's stray pet canine. What do you do?
Get away from me, you mangy mutt!