It had felt great to tell Sythwyr that they had a lead, for someone who actually needed them. The rest had only found one of the blood, distantly removed and perfectly well-adjusted, with no genetic, magical, or even personal issues any of them could identify. But Ssubyrsyn, Ssothrysaa, and Rythrys had done so much better. They'd found someone who was confused, miserable, and alone-- someone who needed to know of his heritage, because it was obviously endangering him and those around him-- somehow, they weren't quite sure how. But still, Rysaa even had a name: Lant'ien.

The bonding was a bit of a surprise, of course, but not in a bad way. They'd already had one experience with bonding, though it wasn't exactly in everyone's faces. The worst thing was that no one was quite sure what to do with Neve, except Rysaa himself, who refused to let her out of his sight. It hadn't taken him long at all to adjust to her presence and be won over by her personality, which was odd and a little amusing, given how long it usually took him to do things. Thrys was a little disturbed, but Ssubyr was just happy they were happy-- not to mention happy that this meant he was due a bond, soon!

However, even better than having been successful, at least in the first step of locating blood-kin, and almost better than the anticipation of bond-hunting, was the moment when Sythwyr asked him to find their troubled kin for them. It was a scrying of the present, after all, and the space station-city above the planet, where Rysaa had determined the boy lived, was entirely self-contained, so the air would surely be able to find him. It was the first time he'd been actually asked by the leader of the Search team to do something important, something only he could do, and he was thrilled.

... and then, somehow, he couldn't do it.

It wasn't the air. Though there wasn't much of a breeze on Star City, it was such a contained atmosphere that the air was so tame it was easy to search through even without a wind to stir it up. Ssubyr had no trouble at all finding anything else he tried to find-- and he learned quite a few intriguing things that, while unimportant to finding this "Lant'ien" boy, were still fascinating enough to pay attention to for a few seconds before moving on-- but for some reason, he couldn't get it to show him anything about the one person he wanted to find. It was like the air ignored him completely-- or didn't even know he was there.

But he had to be there. Rysaa's scrying was clear on that: Lant'ien lived on this station, and he rarely ever left. Being down on the planet Atu was a rarity, itself.

Ssubyr didn't want to give up... but he didn't see any other choice, not unless he wanted to stand there all day, night, or whatever. At least it was just his brothers and Neve to stare at him when he suddenly fell backwards onto the couch, which he'd made sure was behind him before he started working, with a frustrated huff.

"No luck?" Thrys said.

"Obviously," Ssubyr agreed sulkily. "I don't know what the problem is!"

"Do you think he isn't here?" Thrys asked.

"He hates to leave where he lives, though," Neve protested. "That was obvious with what we saw: he was so uncomfortable on Atu."

"But then why can't I find him?" Ssubur exclaimed unhappily. "The air sees everything. There are only a couple pockets of 'clean' places, where the air gets circulated just through them, but they're not anywhere near the living places, and they're all sciency and stuff. He wasn't a scientist-- right?"

"More like a tinkerer," Rysaa agreed.

"So he wouldn't be there. But he's not anywhere else, either...."

"Didn't you have a hard time finding him, too, Rysaa?" Thrys asked.

"Well, yes," Rysaa admitted reluctantly, sullen at having to admit a failure. That was the only real sore spot between him and Neve: her way had worked better than his way, in finding the scene he'd wanted. She nuzzled his hand in silent apology, yet again, and he scratched around her horn in silent acceptance. 

"So try what he tried?" Thrys suggested, distracting Ssubyr from watching the little interaction.

"That doesn't work as well with air," he sighed, rolling his head back to stare up at the ceiling. "Not this air-- it's tame and doesn't move much. I actually have to hunt if I want it to show me anyting except this room and the ventilation around it."

"What if you tried what else he tried?" Neve's soft voice suggested.

"What else was that?" Ssubyr asked absently.

"Getting help," Neve replied. "Bonding."

Ssubyr sat up so quickly he made his head spin. Rysaa laughed at his expression, and even Neve giggled, but Thrys frowned. "Bonding isn't a solution," he said. "It was as much Neve wanting to try something different as because they were bonded. You know that."

"Oh, but Thrys, I want to!" Ssubyr protested excitedly.

"Ssubyr, you want to do something new every couple days!"

Well, all right, that was true, but this was different! "You said yourself, we do things together," Ssubyr said, trying a different tack. "Rysaa bonded, right? Now it's our turn!"

"Do you really think Sythwyr will wait around for you to bond, because you say it's what will help your magic work? You don't even know that it will help!"

"More power might help," Rysaa spoke up reluctantly. "Especially since it seems like it's something about him, Lant'ien, that makes him hard to find. And... you know, a different perspective on what he can see," he added, half under his breath as if that way he could avoid their noticing of him admitting, again, to his failure. "Neither of us are any good with wind, you know. Maybe a bond would be better."

"And Sythwyr doesn't have to know," Ssubyr said. "We'll just tell him I'm tired from earlier today, and remind him how hard Rysaa had to work to find any information, and how fickle and finicky the air is. All we need is a couple days--"

Thrys gave him a startled look. "A couple days? Why only a couple days?"

Ssubyr couldn't help but look a little guilty. "Well, there's something here that looked interesting, and it's hatching in a couple days...."

Rysaa rolled his eyes. "Maybe it wasn't that finding anything was hard," he said, "maybe you were just distracted." 

"I was not!" Ssubyr pouted, a little stung. "I just saw it in passing, that's all. It's not as if I can help it, when the air's just throwing it in my face. Anyway, the clutch is more like her." He pointed at Neve, who blinked calmly at him. "Avengaeans, right?"

"Asandae, from Avengaea," Neve agreed. "There are more, here?"

"At this place called Abstract Destiny," Ssubyr said smugly. "More crossbreeds, like you. I thought-- well, it'd be a neat parallel, right?"

"I... maybe," Thrys admitted weakly.

"Why are you so reluctant all of a sudden?" Rysaa asked. "You were more interested than either of us, before."

Thrys shook his head. "I'm not. I just don't want you to think that bonding will solve all your problems."

"Of course not," Ssubyr said airily, waving a hand at his brother and grinning. "It'll just make new ones. But they'll be fun, I bet! I'm gonna go sign up!"

And before either brother could stop him, Ssubyr hopped off the couch and darted out the door. All he had to do was find one of those computer-things, figure out how to use it, and find the right place to send his sign-up.

Piece of cake!

The Hatching

Chapter Eleven

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