Foursome Fledgling Study Group
#2 of Fledgling Study Group
The study group returns for another session, and adds a new member.
Flapping his wings purposefully, Knaster flew through sector one, making his way across his clan's territory as he headed towards Caden's home. The winds were harsh today with crosswinds knocking the dragon fledgling from side to side and forcing him to tilt his wings to compensate. Whereas previously Knaster had only brought his mathematics notes to the study session, today he was also carrying studying material for several different classes--applied magic, chemistry, and statistics--and he wondered idly if all this additional paperwork was a help or a hindrance to his flight. More weight meant he had to flap his wings harder to maintain adequate lift, yet at the same time all that added mass also made him less easily blown about by suddenly changing wind currents. Knaster grinned to himself as he pondered that thought. Figuring out that question was a science topic (physics), and he had brought studying material for that too.
Knaster went into a glide as he approached the apartment tower where Caden lived. The vast majority of dragons in the City of Wings lived in apartment towers, as space was at such an extreme premium in a flying city. Since Caden's parents were wingleaders of the clan, they could afford comfortable housing and had a reasonably large apartment, especially given that Caden was an only child. However, size was just one single aspect affecting a residence's value. Location was just as important, and it was a mark of clan Taslin's sizable resources that they controlled a full housing zone within sector one--the city's beating heart.
Perhaps the most mundane quality that a home could have was its height. Within every apartment tower, living higher up provided a better view. More practically, it also meant that a dragon could simply step out onto a balcony and jump straight into flight, instead of having to flap hard to climb from a lower level. And since Caden's parents were both wingleaders for the clan, their apartment was the penthouse right on the highest level of the apartment tower, just below the flat rooftop.
Knaster could have glided down to the ground level and taken the elevator up, but instead he simply kept flapping his wings to maintain altitude and land on the publicly-accessible balcony landing strip of the apartment tower. Folding in his wings, the fledgling took a few seconds to catch his breath, and then he strolled over past the lift lobby and to the front door.
Knaster rang the doorbell, and this time he didn't have to ring it a second time. After a brief moment waiting, the front door latch was slid open and the door was opened up by a tall, elegant drakka with scales of smooth purple. Knaster had met some of the clan's wingleaders before (since his parents also happened to be Taslin wingleaders) and regardless, the familial resemblance was clear--this was Caden's mother.
"Another one? Just how many of you did Cadencial invite over today?" The drakka looked Knaster over, giving him the same slightly haughty, mildly disapproving look that he was well familiar with from Caden. She did seem to relax somewhat when she saw the wing pennants that Knaster was wearing, which were emblazoned by the insignia of their clan. "At least you're from Taslin too. And you do seem familiar. Hmm, yes! I think I remember you. You're Thave and Mikatun's child, aren't you?"
Knaster bowed his head deep, as was the appropriate greeting and a show of respect. "Yes, that's me. My name is Knaster, of clan Taslin, of the City of Wings. Good afternoon, drak."
The drakka dipped her head too, returning his greeting in a graceful motion. "And you know your manners! We are well met, Knaster. My name is Denacel, also of clan Taslin, and mate of Cato Hasilt." Denacel's eyes narrowed slightly, and she gave a Knaster a suspicious look that again strongly reminded him of Caden's glare. "Though I must assume you are here to join in for my daughter's adolescent, hooligan timewasting?"
Knaster hurriedly shook his head, and he didn't bother to keep the surprise of his face. "Uh... no? Or yes? I'm just here for a study session. Drak Izic arranged for me and Caden to revise some schoolwork together. Today we're going to be doing applied magic, science, and if there's time for it, statistics."
Denacel looked pleased, and she nodded approvingly at Knaster. "Ah, yes. I do remember Izic mentioning that he wanted extra tuition for Cadencial. Good on him for setting that up." Denacel stepped back from the door, and she smiled in a pleasant, practiced, friendly manner. "Come in, come in! Welcome to our home."
Knaster stepped into the penthouse apartment, and Denacel smoothly pushed the door shut behind the young drake. The apartment in which Caden and her parents lived was much as Knaster had remembered it--well-furnished and impeccably clean, decorated in a stylish but impersonal manner.
Denacel Taslin strolled forward, beckoning for him to follow her. "You flew here all by yourself? It feels like just yesterday when you children were fluttering your wings and learning how to fly. You must be thirsty--let me get you a drink." Every part about the drakka--from her physical appearance to even the way she stood or walked--seemed to exude a sense of elegant confidence. In that regard Knaster could sense the familial resemblance, though Caden hadn't quite achieved her mother's level of stylish self-assurance. It was ironic that despite how much Caden always grumbled about and tried to stand out from her parents, she clearly took after them heavily.
Knaster trailed after Denacel as she strolled into the kitchen, and he bowed his head again when she poured out a glass of water for him. "Oh, thank you." The jug had come out from the icebox and was chilly cold, and there seemed to be some slices of citrus fruit in it. Knaster didn't think that something as simple as _water_needed to be made fancy, but he wouldn't complain. "Thank you very much..."
Even as Knaster sipped the water, Denacel continued watching him. "Do make sure Cadencial studies properly--I've always told her that she could be doing so much better in school if she put in more effort."
"I'll try my best," Knaster assured her.
Denacel nodded. "I'm sure you will. I would much rather my daughter associate with a well-mannered young drake like you, instead of other... less desirable types. I'm sure you know how to behave yourself."
Knaster swallowed nervously. He put down the half-emptied glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his paw. "I'm just here to study and make friends."
Denacel smiled again. "Of course. But ensure you make the right sort of friends. Sometimes the sorts of people Cadencial associates with... It's all very well for her to build rapport with drakken from Hasilt, Mintaka, Dirak, or the other reputable clans, but now she also befriends the clanless and other... roguish or undesirable types. It does make me worry about her ever so much."
Clearly there were certain areas where Caden and her parents had wildly differing views. Recalling the last time he'd been here, Knaster would have described Glecion as friendly and optimistic, not as a roughish or undesirable type of person. It didn't seem right to look down on a blind, clanless fledgling, though he didn't argue with Caden's mother. Instead he just politely nodded.
In a smooth motion, Denacel turned around and strolled out of the kitchen. "Do let me know if there's anything else you need, Knaster. I hope you have a good studying session with my daughter today."
As Knaster went down the corridor towards Caden's room, one of the adjacent doors opened up and a familiar dark-scaled, green-stripped female fledgling backed out of a washroom, pausing only to wipe all four paws dry on the floor towel.
"Hello--ghuuh?" Knaster smiled and started to say hello to Glecion, only to immediately cut himself with a shocked exclamation. He recoiled backwards, leaning back on his haunches and raising his head. "Uuh...?"
The source of Knaster's great shock was simple--stepping out of the washroom, Glecion had turned around, except the blind fledgling wasn't wearing her blindfold. Instead her eyes were a dark greenish brown colour, and her gaze was bright and curious as she looked him over. "What?" asked the female fledgling.
"Whaa?!" went Knaster. His mouth opened and closed several times, but he wasn't sure what to say. Just a few days ago he'd spent a whole afternoon revising mathematics with Caden and Glecion, and all that time he had assumed Glecion was blind--why else would she be wearing a blindfold all the time? And why else would she have a textbook and notes filled entirely with special ink and paper that created raised text to be read by touch? Yet obviously this fledgling could see him now, as she frowned at Knaster and gave him a puzzled look. Her dark eyes were alert and attentive, and she easily made eye contact with him.
"Are you ok?" she asked him.
"You're not blind!?" Knaster blurted out.
The fledgling paused, and then she broke out into a short laugh. She glanced away, looking embarrassed. "Haha! I see you've met my sister. No, I'm not blind, since you ask."
Knaster had to take another moment to work this out. "Huh. Oh. Hmm! Sister? Oh. So you're not Glecion. Glecion's blind. But you're... not blind, and you're... not Glecion."
The fledgling nodded. "Yup. My name's Reylin. And you must be Knaster--the smart fledgling who's here to teach us."
Knaster shook his head automatically. "I'm not smart and I'm not here to teach," he modestly replied. "I'm just here to join in a study session where we all revise and learn together." He paused, and again he couldn't help but stare. "Hmh! Reylin. So you're... not Glecion. You're Glecion's sister, Reylin. Huh. Reylin," he muttered, repeating her name a few times.
Normally Knaster considered himself very good with remembering faces, names, and people. Reylin seemed, as far as he could tell, completely identical in appearance to Glecion. More than just sisters, they were probably nest sisters whose eggs had been conceived, laid, and then hatched together, or perhaps even full twins who had shared a single egg. Dragons usually laid eggs only one at a time, but sometimes they came in multiples. That might even explain why Glecion was blind, as hatchlings from a twin egg were at a far higher risk of congenital defects.
Just like Glecion, Reylin had a slender, almost scrawny physique that was often common among fledglings as they went through a rapid grow spurt and shed away any lingering hatchling pudginess. Reylin's scales had the dark, ashen grey colour of a thundercloud, though her underside did have a countershaded lighter tone, and she had stripes of pale green running vertically down her sides underneath her wings. Looking at Reylin's wings, Knaster spotted one discernible difference--a few days ago he had spent a whole afternoon revising with Glecion, and one thing that he had specifically noticed was that Glecion's wing muscles looked thin and weak. His assumption then was that Glecion didn't or couldn't do much flying, but here was a difference because Reylin had better-looking, stronger wings furled up neatly atop her back.
Instead of wearing a blindfold over her eyes to indicate that she was blind, Reylin's eyes were uncovered, sharp, and alert. She was even had a pair of dark googles raised above her eyes, strapped to her forehead--nocturnal dragons were a subspecies of drakken who were adapted for the night, with quieter wingbeats and sensitive eyes. Dark goggles were darkened lenses for protecting a nocturnal dragon's eyes when in bright sunlight, yet that was only necessary if you weren't blind.
And perhaps the most obvious and apparent difference was that Reylin had a gaze. When Knaster stared at her, she stared right back at him, something which Glecion obviously couldn't do. Reylin had a sharp, curious gaze, and Knaster got the immediate feeling that she was drawing in information and forming an opinion of him, just as he was for her. She glanced at his head (neck frill raised in surprise), his flight harness (well-fitted, and recently adjusted to fit a growing fledgling), his tail (tip twitching), his wing pennants (emblazoned with the Taslin logo), and...
Then the bedroom door flew open, banging against the wall noisily as Caden roughly shoved it with a headbutt. Loud, vaguely moody music immediately became audible from within the bedroom, and Caden glanced around. "Ah, Knaster, you're here. Welcome. I see you've also met Reylin. Glecion invited her to join us for your little study session today." The green-scaled fledgling looked between her two friends, still standing in the corridor. "Why are you two clowns staring at each other like that? Are you experiencing true love at first sight? How sweet."
Both fledglings hurriedly glanced away. Reylin shook her head, and she gave a dismissive look to Caden. "No, you silly! I was just... He was staring at me first, so I stared back. That's only fair."
"Sorry," Knaster said. "I thought you were Glecion, so it was a surprise when I saw that you... weren't Glecion." Glancing over Caden's shoulder and into the bedroom, Knaster could see the real Glecion lying on Caden's bed, wearing her blindfold as always. "Hello, Glecion."
"Hello!" Glecion happily replied, waving her wing in the general direction of the doorway and Knaster.
"Also, hello, Caden. And hello to you too, Reylin. Nice to meet you," Knaster said, going through the formalities and making a quick, courteous bow towards each of the fledglings in turn.
Reylin bowed her head back at him, but Caden rolled her eyes. "Whatever, Knaster. I thought you were going to be on time, but I guess you were distracted by making intense flirtatious eye contact with Reylin in the corridor."
"It's not like that... I didn't..." Knaster tried to say, but Reylin just chuckled and Caden didn't care to listen to his denials.
She turned around beckoned for the two fledglings to enter her bedroom. "Come on in. I'm not in any rush to get started with this whole studying nonsense, but the longer you two linger in the corridor, the more likely it is that my mother turns up to lecture me on something."
Knaster followed Caden into her bedroom, with Reylin trailing just behind him. Caden kicked the door shut with a hindleg, and then she went over to the bed and sprawled out onto top of it right beside Glecion.
"I did meet your mother at the front door. She reminds me of you, Caden," Knaster said.
Lying on her back on the bed, Caden stretched herself out and closed her eyes. "That's an insult to me. Also probably an insult to her too, if you asked her. I didn't know my mother would be back today--her business trip was supposed to last till the end of the week. If I'd known she was home, I'd have called off this whole study session, or at least we would be conducting it somewhere else."
Knaster glanced at Reylin again, then at Glecion. "Apparently your mother disapproves of you spending time in the company of, as she phrased it, clanless dragons, rogues, and other undesirables?"
Glecion tilted her head. "Hmm. Are we rogues?"
Reylin also tilted her head, and the two sisters really did look identical. "We're definitely rogues." She sat back on her haunches and made a flicking gesture with a forepaw, smoothly extending her claws in a quick motion. She looked down at her claws, and Knaster did too--Caden's claws looked trimmed and carefully groomed, but Reylin's claws looked unkept and sharp enough to properly cut and slash. Reylin glanced up, saw Knaster staring at her, and grinned at him mischievously. She waved her paw at him, flashing her claws. "I could be roguish! Rawr," she said, pretending to growl at Knaster.
Despite the joking of the twins, Caden didn't seem amused. "Bah. But of course my dear mother would say something like that to you. She thinks that just because Glecion and Reylin are clanless, they must be criminals or gang members. What an ignorant, elitist attitude. How typical... I must apologize on her behalf."
"Yeah, that's not a nice thing to say. I'm not a criminal," Reylin said. She frowned and looked thoughtful. "Although... I suppose there was that period many years ago when we had to steal food from the market square because the clanless shelter had its funding cut."
Glecion chuckled. "Hehehe. I remember that! I would walk into a wall or the side of a food cart and cry loudly to be a distraction, then Reylin or someone else would grab what they could from the cart when no one was looking."
Still lying on her back with eyes closed, Caden sighed. "Don't_confess_ to crimes in front of Knaster! He'll be honour-bound to report you for justice."
"Oh, I was just joking. Of course that was all a joke." Reylin grinned playfully at Knaster. "I'm not a criminal! After all, you need to have been caught to be a criminal, and I've never been caught yet."
Knaster blinked. He was genuinely unsure whether Reylin was joking--because surely that must have been a joke, yet then again she also sounded serious--and mentally he flipped-flopped between deciding whether she was being honest or facetious. It was probably a joke... or maybe it wasn't? Not that it was important. "You can be clanless, a rogue, a criminal gang member, or whatever you want. As long as you're here to study, we can be friends," Knaster decided.
Glecion laughed. "Haha. Clanless is true, rogue is debatable, criminal gang member is definitely untrue. And what was the last thing Caden's mother called us? Undesirable? Yes, I'm totally undesirable, but Reylin's not."
Reylin shook her head happily. "Oh, no. I'm totally undesirable too," she said with a grin.
"Apparently not," Caden muttered. "I'd say you're decently desirable, and I'm sure Knaster would agree from the way you two were staring at each other in the corridor."
Knaster felt a flash of embarrassment and he wanted to vehemently deny this, but that wouldn't dissuade Caden from making her needling remarks. Instead he decided to stick to the topic. "As I said, you can be whatever you want as long as you're here to study. So let's study." He went over to the table, then he changed course and first went over to the music player box sitting on a bookshelf and turned the volume all the way down.
Caden didn't open her eyes, but she did make an annoyed noise as the moody, repetitive music was quietened. "Hey."
"Loud music isn't conducive to studying," Knaster said. "Shall we get started? We do have quite a few topics to cover."
Caden and Glecion both didn't move, but Reylin nodded. Her playfulness dropped in an instant, replaced by a serious expression, and she went to go sit on one of the four cushions placed around the table. "Yes! Let's get started. I've been looking forward to this ever since Glecion told me that you guys were starting up a regular study session." Reaching into her flight harness, Reylin started removing document folders and arranging them first on the table and then on the floor too when she ran out of space on her side of the table.
Knaster used a wingtip to point at Reylin. "See? At least someone's got the right attitude."
Glecion giggled, while Caden just snorted. "Bah. Joking aside, how did I just know that you and Reylin would get along? You two workaholic clowns... There's more to life than studying nonstop."
"I didn't ask you to study nonstop. I just asked you to study during our studying session, which I think is reasonable," Knaster replied. He went over and sat down beside Reylin.
Caden let out a reluctant sigh, but she did roll out of bed. Her tail tip entwined with Glecion's and gave it a gentle tug, and then she strolled over, with Glecion also following. The four fledglings sat down around the square table and started taking out all their school notes.
Knaster nodded. "Alright! So let's start with... uh... science. We can go through the notes on the latest topic, and then afterwards we can look over our latest quiz sheets..."
As it had been previously, Knaster had a rewarding afternoon. Inherently it was useful to revise his schoolwork and brush up on his understanding of the school topics, and he also found it more beneficial to do this with three other fledglings. They could discuss the lessons, clarify their understanding with each other, and compare answers for their homework, quizzes, and example tutorial sheets.
Besides being more productive, it was simply more fun to spend time with other people instead of doing it alone. Knaster suspected that he might have been able to go through his studying faster if he'd been alone, but there were benefits to studying in a group. Aside from their discussions and crosschecking each other's work, it helped time to pass faster and Knaster enjoyed the studying session even more than the last one.
Across the afternoon, Knaster began to solidify his impressions of Caden, Glecion, and Reylin. The three female fledglings all had vastly different styles, mannerisms, and personalities, so certainly that came across in the way they studied and their general outlook on school and life.
Knaster didn't think that he was anywhere near the smartest or even most hardworking of all students in school, but he did decently well with his grades, almost always getting above average results. As they revised various topics, Knaster also got a chance to look over the recent homework and quiz results for the other three fledglings. It turned out that their grades were generally only average passes, and Knaster started to form quick suspicions about why exactly each of the three other fledglings was not doing as well as they could be.
Caden was unmotivated. Knaster would never have called her lazy for that would have been an insult, and regardless he didn't even think it was true. She wasn't lazy--she simply didn't seem to value school or take it seriously. For example, Knaster could see from Caden's lesson printouts that she never bothered to take notes or even try any of the example questions given. But she could do them! As a group, when the four fledglings all did questions before comparing their answers, Caden was fully capable of doing the questions. And though she wasn't always correct, that was still useful because her mistakes would become learning experiences.
Eventually Knaster decided to just ask her about it. As they were doing one more question, he glanced across the table at Caden and waited till she had also completed her working before bringing it up. "Caden, you don't... think very highly of school, do you?"
"Hahaha! Absolutely not." Jabbing her ink-stained tail tip down on her exercise book, Caden left a splotch of black liquid spread out across the page. "Do you really enjoy this, Knaster? You enjoy doing all these... science questions and statistical calculations?"
"It's not fun, but it is reasonable. We are students, so we have to study," Knaster replied.
Reylin was listening in to the conversation, and she nodded her head. "I like it and find it fun. It feels good to read all this information, take it in, understand it, and then apply it to questions."
Caden shook her head. "Maybe that's how you two see it, but I guess we just have different ways of looking at this. I find it absolutely, mind-numbingly, boring and... and pointless to have a whole bunch of equations and facts that I need to memorize. Then for quizzes and exams I regurgitate that onto a paper just to prove I can memorize. It's a waste of time."
"Ok, I do agree that memorizing things isn't fun, but learning isn't just about memorizing. It's about... uh... understanding?" Knaster tried, though he wasn't sure if he was explaining it properly.
Caden again used her tail tip to tap at her exercise book. "See this question here. Use the equation of state for magical conversion to calculate the maximum energetic efficiency for the use of stone magic in moving a rock from point A to point B? Whatever_._ Can't you just feel how useless this information is? I'm learning it now, and I'll use that knowledge to answer questions in my homework, quizzes, and the exams, but then afterwards I can just throw away that memory and I'll never ever have to think about that equation again."
Glecion piped up. "You might think it's useless, but if you end up being an engineer or tech specialist, I bet you would be using that calculation in your work," the blind fledgling pointed out.
Caden nodded slowly. "That's... true. But that's not what I want to do when I grow up. It's complicated--there are some topics I find interesting to learn, but there are many other topics I find difficult and pointless. That's why I think so much of school is a waste of time. It's a slog to memorize all this."
Glecion leaned over and affectionately bumped her snout against Caden's shoulder. "You still have to do it."
"Uggh, don't remind me," Caden replied, though she did grin and briefly nuzzled her own snout against Glecion's before returning to her exercise book. "Can we take a break now?"
"Let's finish this series of questions first, then we can take a short break," Knaster said.
And then there was Glecion. Knaster had quickly formed an opinion on Glecion, and after spending hours in this second studying session, he fully confirmed his thoughts. Glecion was held back in her studies simply because she was blind. She did try her best, but time after time as all four fledglings went through their notes together, Glecion would have obvious moments of realization where she suddenly understood a topic that had already been taught in class.
In school, Glecion could not see the board and therefore had to rely on the printed handouts made from special ink and paper as well as listening to the teachers, and to her credit she was doing modestly well in keeping up with her learning. Yet it was plainly obvious that with the other three fledglings revising with her, she was quickly filling in the gaps of her knowledge and understanding. Glecion was capable, but she wasn't learning optimally.
It just didn't seem fair, and perhaps worse, it didn't seem efficient. To succeed in school, Glecion only needed a bit more help or perhaps a different style of teaching that was more suited to her particular limitation. Thinking about his own clan, Knaster knew that Taslin leadership invested much time and resources into developing people. That was the simple reason why he and Caden were even having this study session--their clan wanted them to do well. It monitored their performance in school and intervened in their lives to ensure they learned and scored as well as they possibly could. And none of that was from altruism or generosity. Rational, coldly logical, calculative self-interest dictated that a clan which had properly-educated, well-trained members was able to give those same clan members better jobs, which in turn could produce more productivity and more taxes.
That was no grand secret. Knaster knew all of that, and Caden probably knew it too, because it simply made sense. Except that Glecion wasn't from their clan and in fact had no clan at all, so she and her sister lived off what the City of Wings provided in a sheltered home for the clanless. Instead of going to a specialized learning institute that would cater to her lack of vision, she had to make due with going to a normal school and keeping up by asking her sister what was written on the board.
Glecion didn't seem to mind. She seemed happy enough going to a normal school, and when Knaster asked her about it, she even seemed slightly indifferent. "If I went to Lighthouse Academy--which is that school for the blind--I would probably have an easier time studying, but then I'm doing fine in Eastwind already," Glecion said as they were chatting during a break in their study session. "Plus, Eastwind lets me meet up with way more people! It would be... strange if all my schoolmates and friends were also visually impaired. Or maybe it wouldn't? I don't know. I'm just happy with life as it is, and with the friends I have."
Glecion leaned against Caden, bumping their shoulders together affectionately. Caden had always seemed chilly and distant in school, but she didn't pull away and appeared slightly embarrassed when Knaster glanced at her.
"How do you two even know each other?" Knaster asked Caden. "Since Glecion and Reylin go to Eastwind Intermediate Educationary, while we're from District Central School?"
"I took an exchange program to Eastwind about a year ago, and we had a few classes together," Caden explained. "Those were fun times. It was a hassle to go all the way to sector forty instead of staying here in sector one, but I enjoyed it. And that exchange semester was where I met Glecion and Reylin."
Reylin had still been working on a statistics problem, but she glanced up from her writing. "I remember that. We all did a group project together on... what was it? Biology? We had to do a report and presentation on photosynthesis."
Glecion nodded. "Trees! And algae."
"Oh, yes. That was something indeed," Caden agreed. She let out a nostalgic sigh and turned to Knaster. "Good times... You know, Knaster, the reason why I choose to do an exchange program in Eastwind Intermediary was because I'd heard that schools in the city's outer sectors are less competitive and stressful all the time, especially compared to our school. And it was! Eastwind was pleasantly relaxing and friendly. Most of the students in the class were just looking to finish lessons and get to playing sports or games. Exam week still gets stressful, but during the rest of the semester it's all relaxed and calm. Mostly..." Caden drummed her claws against the table, then she pointed at Reylin with a grin. "Except for that fledgling. She just wouldn't stop studying. She practically did the entire report for our group and drafted out the whole presentation too. All that I, Glecion, and our last group member had to do was turn up on presentation day and read what she'd written for us."
Reylin shrugged, and then she went back to scribbling down answers to her homework. "You three didn't want to start work on our project till the semester was half over! And besides--of course I had to do it. If someone else had done it, they might have messed it up."
Knaster hid a smile. Reylin was unlike the other two female fledglings. Physically she was almost completely identical to Glecion, yet her personality was clearly different from her twin's. Glecion tried her best in school but kept up only with some difficulty because of her blindness--but Reylin didn't have limitation, and she applied herself with dedication.
Looking over all the notes Reylin had brought to the study session, Knaster wasn't sure how they'd even all fit into her flight harness, let alone how she'd flown over with all that much paper weighing her down. It wasn't that she had brought too many notes for a single subject, but rather that she took so many subjects.
As dictated by the city's Education Division, every fledgling of their age had a core set of topics that were compulsory, but there were also additional groups of topics where they could choose what to take--for example, between history, geography, literature, art, and music, the young dragons were obligated to choose at least one of those subjects. Knaster had chosen to do two out of these subjects (history and literature) which was already more ambitious than strictly necessary, but Reylin had gone further and taken three.
And that was just one area of studies where she was going above and beyond what was needed. There were the basics that every fledgling took, including mathematics, science, common language, applied magic, and so on. Then Reylin took all sorts of topics in addition, mixing several classes that were all optional and hadn't been intended to all be taken simultaneously--basic arcane engineering, writing and analysis, design philosophy (Knaster didn't even know what that one was), introduction to business studies, public speaking and debate, and the most exotic of all, something called griffin-speak.
Knaster had moved to sit right beside Reylin, and he glanced over her shoulder to look at all the notes, quizzes, and other paperwork she had spread around her. "Griffin-speak?" he asked.
Reylin was busy doing a geography assignment, but she nodded her head. "Tik. Fwee do swee, click si tick si zik," she went, making an odd series of whistling and clicking sounds. Reylin gestured to her throat. "It's the language of the griffins. Their vocal cords are different than dragons, and it's easier for them to make clicking and melodic whistling sounds. It's something about the beak."
"Wow," Knaster said, and he genuinely was impressed. "I've never even met a griffin before. I saw one at the library once, but that was all. Does a griffin teach the class?" he asked.
Reylin shook her head. "No, the class teacher is an old drakken trader who used to fly airships over the eastern mountain range to the griffin territories, to sell them expensive custom-made flight harnesses and sacks of sugar. The bird-cats have a sweet tooth--which is ironic, because they don't have teeth."
Knaster silently wondered why his school didn't teach griffin-speak. It sounded fascinating, even if it was probably a useless thing to learn given how few griffins there were in Avaeria, and how few dragons ever visited the griffin realms. "That's interesting. So... do you ever plan to do that? To visit the griffin territories? Is that why you're studying that subject?"
"I don't know. Maybe if I had enough time and money for a trip outside the city. But I just took this subject because it was an optional elective," Reylin explained.
"How do you take so many subjects? Is there even enough time in a school day to attend every lesson?" Knaster asked.
"I keep up," Reylin replied, and from the looks of her assignments and quiz results, she did.
In Knaster's personal opinion, Reylin was the best of the three other fledglings. She was clever, curious, but most of all just obstinately determined to do as many subjects in school as she possibly could, and to do as well as she possibly could for all of them. Yet at this point she had gone beyond her limit, where she simply had too many classes and topics to keep up and dedicate time to study each one. She wasn't doing badly, but her grades in each subject were only average because she spread out her time and effort so widely. Knaster admired her resolve, though he didn't openly admit that to anyone else.
Their study session progressed steadily through the afternoon. The four fledglings started with common topics, but eventually they had finished those by mid-afternoon. Caden and Glecion were satisfied with being done with studying for the day, and they went back to Caden's bed to laze around and chat leisurely. In contrast, Reylin blazed ahead with the rest of her schoolwork, and Knaster continued his revision with her. There were a couple of topics which they both took but which Caden and Glecion didn't, meaning that they could still study together. However for the topics which Reylin alone was learning, Knaster could only help quiz her with her notes.
"Uh..." Knaster frowned as she peered at Reylin's notes to read out an example question. "What is the distinction between product structure in design, sales, and manufacturing?"
Reylin replied instantly with no hesitation. "Differing stages of lifecycle. Product structure is the breakdown of elements used to create a system, which can differ based on whether you are considering it at the design stage, sales stage, or even after manufacture has begun." She paused for a moment, then a slight flash of hesitation crossed her face. "Is that the right answer?"
Knaster blinked. "Yes... I think? That sounds like what's written here in your textbook. But I'm honestly not fully sure because I have no idea what a... _product structure_even is."
Reylin grinned. "It's a fancy name for ingredients list, but for any sort of product. Let me elaborate." She tugged at the straps of the flight harness she was wearing. "For something like this flight harness, the designer would have a list of all the materials, parts, and subassemblies needed to create it. But what the designer plans isn't necessarily the same as what the factory workers end up needing to use, which could also be different from what the final buyer ends up purchasing if there are modifications or customizations at some other step along the business process."
"This is some _dense_stuff!" Knaster muttered, and his baffled expression made Reylin break out into giggles.
"Hehe. It's not my favourite topic," Reylin agreed. "Ask me the next question," she prompted.
Knaster flipped the textbook page, but he didn't read out the question and instead asked his own. "Ok, but then why? Why do you study this?" Knaster gestured around, to all the various stacks of notes Reylin had. "Why do you have so many different topics? I'm surprised your school even lets you take this amount of workload."
Reylin shrugged. "I have to."
"But why?" Knaster prompted.
Reylin was quiet for a moment. Her eyes darted around, and Knaster could just tell she was thinking. "Ask me the next question," she finally said.
Knaster didn't press things further. The point of this studying session was to study, not to probe into the life of his fellow fledglings, so he let Reylin keep her motivations to herself. Instead he looked down at the textbook and read out the next example question. "In planning a..."
By the time evening had come, the sun was low enough in the sky to cast rays of orange sunlight over the table, bed, and all of Caden's bedroom. Glecion and Caden had fallen asleep in a lazy nap basking in the sun, curled up together, while even Reylin and Knaster were too tired to keep studying any further.
Knaster was the one who finally decided that they were done. Reylin was still willing to study, but her concentration was visibly starting to waver after so many hours of learning. "That's enough. We've done enough studying for today."
Reylin had been slouching and staring blankly at another one of her textbooks, but that made her sit up straight. "What? But I've still got more things to study."
Knaster shook his head. "I'm tired out from studying, and so are you. There's a limit to how much you can learn at once."
"Mhm. I suppose that's true, and we did cover a lot already." Reylin stood up then bent from side to side, twisting her spine in a stretch.
Caden had been napping, but now she blinked her eyes open and turned her head to stare at Knaster and Reylin. "Are you two done? Finally! Listening to you two talk about... equation curves or supply chain whatevers is enough to put me to sleep." She yawned widely, then put her head down on the bed and closed her eyes again.
Knaster and Reylin spent the next few minutes packing up their notes, sorting them by subject before sliding them back into their respective flight harnesses. Glecion had already kept her notes when she'd finished studying an hour earlier, and Caden simply had tossed all her notes in a huge messy pile by the side of her desk.
"So, Reylin, why exactly do you study so many different subjects?" Knaster asked Reylin again.
The dark grey-scaled fledgling shrugged and kept sorting her notes. "I have to. Taking lots of subjects is the best way to stand out. It proves I'm adaptable and can learn, so it's the easiest way to prove myself."
"Prove yourself to... who?" Knaster asked, but before he could get a response, there came the sound of steps against the floor tiles outside, and Caden's mother pushed open the bedroom door.
The drakka glanced around at the fledglings. Her expression was mostly inscrutable, though she did give Knaster a slight nod of approval on seeing that he was still sitting at the table with his notes. Seeing Caden lying on her bed made her shake her head and click her tongue. "Cadencial. Hard at work studying, I hope?"
Caden could surely hear the faintly accusatory tone in her mother's voice. The fledgling made an irritated growl and sat up. "Grah. We studied for hours. I was just taking a break."
"If you say so, dear. Now, do remember that we have a dinner appointment with Terras and Jun, so get cleaned up and put on your flight harness. We're leaving in half an hour to meet your father at City Hall, then we'll have a displacer take us to the restaurant at sector three. Hurry up, now." Caden's mother turned to go, before pausing. "And do say goodbye to your friends."
Caden waited till her mother had gone and the door was shut again, then she let out a long sigh. "Huuuhhhh. I was going to ask if you three wanted to go out for dinner, but that'll have to wait for another day."
Spotting an opportunity, Knaster immediately took it. "Another day? Sure. We can schedule that to be right after our next study session. What about... second day of next week, after school again? We can meet up in the afternoon and do this again."
Reylin nodded. "That time works for me. And my sister."
Caden sighed again, but this time with more dramatic flair and less actual discontent. "Do we really have to make this a consistent thing, Knaster? Is studying at school not enough?
"You don't have to come if you don't want to," Knaster pointed out, but he was fairly certain Caden would, and he was right.
Caden grit her teeth and shook her head, but she agreed anyway. "This was supposed to be a one-off event to make Drak Izic happy that you listened to him and helped out a fellow clan member. Then somehow you and Glecion conspired to make it happen a second time, and you even brought in Reylin as if having one stubborn workaholic wasn't enough... Fine, fine. We can have another study session next week."
"I'm already looking forward to it. Hehe." Reylin chuckled, and she trotted over to the bed and nudged Glecion's shoulder with her snout. "Wake up, sis."
Glecion flicked her ears. "I'm not asleep. I've been awake for ten minutes listening to you talk. Though I do agree with Caden that listening to you and Knaster talk about business planning or vector fields was nearly enough to put me right back to sleep. But I am awake now."
"Ok good, because we're going home," Reylin said. She fiddled with her flight harness, pulling the straps tight against her body.
Glecion stepped off the bed, then she stretched out a wing to rest it on Reylin's back. They headed out the room, but Reylin paused and nodded once at Knaster. "Thanks for... for today. It was helpful."
"You're welcome. We can study more next week," Knaster replied.
"It was helpful!" Glecion cheerfully agreed.
Knaster nodded. He stood up as well. "Time for me to go too."
"Anyone want a drink or a snack before you go? No? Alright." Caden led the other three fledglings out from her bedroom and down the corridor, before opening up the front door and waving a wing in farewell. "Bye! See you all next week."
"See you, Caden. I'll call you later." As Glecion was walking by the doorway, she briefly leaned over and Caden bumped her snout against the blind fledgling's. It was a surprisingly affectionate gesture for Caden, who had always seemed chilly and indifferent even around her close friends at school. Caden noticed Knaster staring, and she gave him a glare, as if daring him to comment on it. He didn't.
"Goodbye, Caden." Stepping out from Caden's home, Knaster walked the short distance over to the elevator lobby and Knaster pressed the elevator call button to head up to the roof. Dragons flying somewhere usually started from as high an altitude as possible, since that gave them the height to glide downwards and save energy.
With Glecion's wing loosely draped over her back, Reylin also walked over to the elevator lobby and she used her tail tip to jab the elevator button to go down. Presumably since Glecion was blind and couldn't fly, they would have to take the city's public transportation--the displacer transit network, which was staffed by dragons with magic that let them bend space to teleport passengers around the city as needed. It was more convenient and less tiring to simply pay another dragon to use their magic to send you where you wanted to go, though flying had the obvious advantage of being free.
The three fledglings stood in the elevator lobby side by side, waiting for one of the elevator cars to slowly rise from below. As he was waiting, Knaster glanced to his side, towards the twin fledglings. Glecion was humming a cheery tune to herself, while Reylin was fidgeting with her dark goggles. She lowered those darkened lenses over her eyes--since as a nocturnal dragon she would need to protect her night-sensitive eyes when going outside into the afternoon sunlight--but then after a few seconds she changed her mind and lifted the goggles back to her forehead for now.
Knaster glanced away, looking instead to the elevator height indicator as it slowly incremented. Curiosity made him glance back at Reylin again, and this time she had been looking at him too, so their eye contact locked and held. It was an odd, impromptu game--Knaster and Reylin both stared at each other, waiting to see who would break first and look away. Knaster was only staring at Reylin because she was staring at him, and yet she was staring at him just because he was staring at her, and they both just stared at each other.
There was nothing at stake and nothing to be lost if one of them had simply looked away, which made this exchange all the more pointless. The longer it went on, the sillier and more immature this became, and yet it kept going. They both blinked, and Reylin even briefly glanced down to look at Knaster's flight harness, but then both young dragons kept staring. It was a mutual test of stubbornness, seeing who would be the first to realize (and then admit) that this was entirely a pointless thing to have been doing in the first place.
In his peripheral vision, Knaster could see Caden still standing at her doorstep, watching her friends. "Are you two idiots doing it again?" she asked. Caden's question was enough to make Reylin and Knaster falter and they both glanced away from each other.
"What? Doing what?" Glecion asked.
"Your sister and Knaster are staring at each other like idiots," Caden said.
"Are they really?" Glecion nudged Reylin's side. "Why, though? Is Knaster really that great to stare at?"
Reylin pawed at the ground. "No! He's just a normal dragon. It was... He was just staring at me first, so I stared back at him, and... uh..."
"That's not true. You were staring at me first, so I stared back," Knaster insisted.
Caden was grinning. "What are you two--hatchlings fresh out of the shell? A staring contest? It's like something out of preschool."
"I blame him!" Reylin muttered.
"That is also something you say in preschool," Caden pointed out.
Knaster had no response to that. Fortunately, right at that moment the elevator arrived and he was spared from having to explain his actions. With the ding of its bell, the elevator slid to a stop at their level and the doors opened up.
Reylin and Glecion stepped onto the elevator carriage, but before Knaster could step on as well, Caden gestured to him. "Knaster, can I speak with you for a moment? Before you go off?"
Knaster nodded, and he waved goodbye to Reylin and Glecion. Reylin smiled and waved back at him, then the elevator doors shut and they were gone. Knaster strolled back over to Caden. "Yes?"
Caden yawned, and she shook her head to clear any residual sleepiness from her nap. "What do you think of Glecion and Reylin?"
Knaster wasn't sure how to respond. "They seem... normal? At least Reylin is normal, while Glecion is blind but she's also normal other than that. Overall they both seem like nice, friendly people?"
"Good. Because they are_nice, friendly people," Caden said. "Speaking of that, I just want to clear things up. Earlier you asked Reylin why she takes so many subjects and... you _do know why that is, yes?"
"She said something about proving herself?" Knaster replied, which made Caden shake her head.
"Oh, Knaster. I was worried you were mocking her, but it turns out you just don't get it. Allow me to enlighten you." Caden pointed towards Knaster's back, and towards his furled up wings. "You see those wing pennants you're wearing?" Caden pointed towards her front door, where a banner was hanging. It had the exact same insignia that Knaster's wing pennants did. "And you see this banner?" Stepping out of her front door, Caden spread her wings and gestured all around. "And you see this apartment, and this whole tower full of apartments, and even this whole neighbourhood filled with apartment towers? They're all property of Taslin."
Knaster nodded his head. "Yes? We're in the territory of our clan."
Caden smiled, but there was no joy in her expression. "Exactly." She pointed in various directions. "The community centre in that direction is run by Taslin, and the swimming pool there is Taslin controlled, and more importantly that big cluster of commercial complexes and business towers is run by our clan. And not just in sector one, but sector two, thee, seven, nine, ten, and in all parts of the city. Taslin clan has strong influence everywhere."
Caden pointed again, in a slightly different direction. "And it's not just about our one big clan. You see that airship over there in the distance? The one taking off from the airship docks? It's built by Mintaka. In fact, the whole docks are run by Mintaka, as is the Central Logistics Depot. And they have their own neighbourhood district here in sector one, but also in sector four, five, sector fifteen, and a whole other load of places. Taslin, Hasilt, Mintaka, Dirak, Krin--there are five big clans, and they control this city. There are hundreds more smaller clans, but they all vie for power and operate in the influence of the big clans."
Knaster nodded hesitantly. "Ok? Sure! Yes, that's true. Why the impromptu social studies lesson, Caden? That's just how the city operates. How does this have anything to do with why Reylin is taking so many subjects?"
Caden let out a bark of laughter. "Bahaha. Reylin and Glecion are clanless, Knaster! Remember?"
Knaster blinked. He did remember that. "Oh. I... understand. Reylin's trying to get recruited into a clan."
"Yes! Now you get it," Caden said. "Glecion's a happy-go-lucky type. She's optimistic and cheerful and also humble enough to be happy with what she already has. But Reylin is not like that--she's determined to grab her own destiny by the horns and steer it as she wants. That is why she has so many subjects in school, because it gets the attention of clan recruitment officers. And as I'm sure you know from your own experience with Wingleader Izic, you know that they watch what happens in the schools. So that is why Reylin is working her tail off, hoping that she can score a scholarship from a clan, putting her on the pathway to a full recruitment offer."
"Oh." Looking out from the lift lobby corridor's windowed sides, Knaster could see a pair of grey-scaled fledglings walking out from the ground level and headed down the street together. "Oh," Knaster repeated.
"Knaster, I'm sure you've heard me grumble and complain about our clan before, but I am fully aware of the privileges and luxuries that are accorded to us as Taslin fledglings. Job opportunities in our workplaces, discounted housing in our districts, even admission to a better school. Not to mention all the friends and clanmates and the support networks and..."
"I know. I know all that. I don't take it for granted," Knaster said. After a moment, he sighed quietly. "Reylin would deserve it. She's smarter and more hardworking than you or me."
Caden laughed. "Hahaha. I fully agree. But unfortunately there's nothing you and I can do to help her with that process."
"Could we... could we ask Drak Izic about that? Since his department also does recruitment for our clan?" Knaster suggested.
Caden shook her head. "I've asked about submitting a referral, but the process is supposed to be impartial. Besides, our clan is just one among several, and I suspect Reylin will at least get into a smaller clan sooner or later. She works too hard _not_to get noticed."
"There are so, so many dragons in our clan, and so, so many clans in the whole city. It isn't even fair that dragons can be left clanless," Knaster said.
"You're right. It isn't fair." Caden sat down beside him, and the two young fledglings stared out over the city together.
Eventually Caden broke the silence by saying, "So Knaster, why exactly were you staring at Reylin earlier? Was it really love at first sight?"
"No. She was staring at me first, so I just..." Knaster's voice trailed off as he realized a denial would be pointless against Caden's teasing. Instead he took a few seconds to think of a comeback. "Why do you ask? Are you jealous?"
"Ha! You wish." With a grin, Caden stood up and strolled back into her home. "See you next week."
TO BE CONTINUED
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