You walk into a weyr, and immediately there are almost half a dozen flitters chirping at you. The noise is unbearable! Rushing inside, you call out, "is there anyone here?"

"Of course there is," says a woman's voice, and you try to see through the flapping wings. "Come down from them!" She says and immediately the flits disperse into the rafters of the room. Finally you can breathe more easily! You straighten out your shirt and try to smooth down your hair, while she scolds the flitters.

"Are all those flits yours?" You ask. She nods while she's still looking up at the group. "They're ... colorful," you tell her. Looking around her weyr you spot a lot of writing equipment and travel gear. "You're used to traveling a lot, aren't you?"

The woman turns and looks at you, finally. "Yes, I am... well, I used to be a traveling judge. I was trained at the Harper hall, but they don't usually let women get too high in the rankings. So I left after a while. I'm a Journeyman harper. I was on my way to one of the local Cotholds to make sure everything was fine with them, but they had a Search rider with the children - and he Searched me!" She laughs, "I never thought I'd even get this far." She pulls at the knots on her shoulder, similar to yours, but with a distinct additional yellow cord wrapping through the black.

"That's quite an achievement, though," you say. "So is having five flits!"

"Oh, they're just my friends..." She gazes at them and lists off their names as they cheep at one another in the dim area above the room. "The blue one is the first I found, his name is Birdie. Bronze Gleam and Green Ivy were from another nest I found while I was traveling, and brown Roanie was guarding the last egg of the third nest. Gold Shimmer came from that egg."

"Well that's interesting, but how in the world do you feed them all?" You ask, unsure how anyone could live with all the noise up there.

"Oh, I just tell them to hunt for themselves, but when they need something nice, I always give it to them." She laughs, "I heard Birdie calling from his egg, you know. There are a lot of flits in this Weyr, they all talk to one another all the time."

"Yeah, they're pretty noisy," you comment, but then realize she's not talking about their voices. "Wait, you can hear the flits?"

"Yes," she says, "they aren't very smart, but they are so cute! Don't you think?" She coos at one of them and they all respond. "I can't really control them very well as a group, but one on one they do respond very well indeed."

"Oh I bet that helped you a lot as a judge, then!"

"Sending messages, yes indeed," she nods. She is a tall, healthy looking woman. Not entirely beautiful, but she's pretty and seems very sure of herself. "I would like to continue to be a Judge, I've arranged it with the Weyrwoman that I do, she said that once things are settled and I've a dragon," she leans closer and whispers as though no one else should hear, "she seems to have a lot of confidence that I'll Impress, so I trust I will soon," then moves back into her seat and says more loudly, "that I should become the Weyr's resident Judge. That's quite a lot of work, but I'd love to try and do it."

"You seem like you know what you're doing, what kind of things have you passed judgements about?"

"Oh that's ... well, there were many private disputes. Things about whose lamb it was, or what runner could be traded for which goods. There was one, though," she shudders, "well I'll never forget it. A girl came to the local Harper with bruises, and we had to investigate her foster father. It was terrible, what the man would do to his wife and children."

"Normally people don't get involved," you say. She nods gravely.

"Indeed. But this was at the cost of two children dying from his beatings, and his wife nearly so. It was when he threatened me because I'm a woman - that was all I needed to make sure he was arrested. What a horrible life, to be moved from a Weyr or Hold only to be placed with a man like that! We made sure that the other children were provided for. It was hard, he was so smooth when he spoke. He hardly thought he'd done a thing wrong even when we showed him the evidence."

"That does sound rough. Well you've pulled through that, I don't think there will be anything like that around here. We do take that kind of thing seriously here at Dragonhope." You assure her, and she looks visibly relieved. You notice that in the background while you were talking to her, the flitters would make small noises - almost like they were echoing sentiments. So when her tale of woe was at its peak, they were hissing, snarling. Now, they're sedate and grooming.

"One last thing," you say, still writing notes about her in the Weyr journal. "Do you think that your ability to speak with flitters will carry over to dragons?"

"Well," she says, looking into the distance. It looks a lot like the way that riders would talk to their dragons. "I suppose it does - it... It never really occured to me, but you can't hear them at all, can you? With your mind I mean?"

You shake your head, "no, hearing dragons and probably especially hearing flitters, that's an ability that very few people have. I've heard it has been dangerous to do so, too, at least in the wrong person."

"Oh I can imagine! I can think of being in a Hold, unable to leave, perhaps - and you know they're out there. Or even being around people who didn't think it was appropriate, they'd think you're insane!" She fans herself, "I'm lucky to have been Searched then! I had really no idea, but now that I think about it, ... no one's ever really gotten it when I tell them what I know."

"Well dragons cut right to the truth," you tell her. "If you Impress you'll have a dragon whose mind might enhance your ability, but certainly," you chuckle, "you'll be able to talk directly to one, and they talk to each other."

"Oh you aren't kidding!" She exclaims, laughing and causing a ruckus with the flitters. "They're so chatty! They almost never stop. But I can stop listening, it's always there, but I just don't listen. Like a brook always being nearby, you only hear the sound it makes when you're really paying attention to it. It's like that."

"Well that's very good to know. I'm sure that someone around here will ask you more about it at some point, there are plenty of Mediciners and even the Scribes like myself who are curious about things like that!"

"I'll be sure to oblige them, thank you for coming."