"If you want something done right, do it yourself."
BASICS
RETIRE INFO: Adopt
NAME: Jaelyn, nickname Jae
GENDER: Female
PRONOUNS: She/her/hers
ORIENTATION: Homosexual
BIRTHDATE: Late winter 2747
AGE: 23 as of Spring 2770
LOCATION: High Reaches Weyr
OCCUPATION: Wingrider, Worrier, Zappath herder
WING: Moonshot
APPEARANCE
EYES: Brown
HAIR: Dark brown, wavy
HEIGHT AND BUILD: 5'6, curvy
PLAY-BY: Gina Rodriguez
FULL APPEARANCE: With her dusky brown skin, slightly plump build, warm brown eyes and bright smile, Jaelyn is the sort of woman who shows to her best advantage under a blue sky. She walks briskly and efficiently, but has a smile and a nod for everyone. Her clothing is traditional and feminine, but mostly practical. She doesn't wear makeup or jewelry and her clothes and skin are usually clean. She frequently wears her hair in a neat braid or bun.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY: At first glance, Jaelyn seems like a man's ideal of what a woman should be. She's sweet and caring. She knows how to sew and cook and clean and genuinely enjoys taking care of others, children and adults alike. But beneath those stereotypes lies a backbone of steel. Jaelyn is demanding and precise and as ambitious as any want-to-be bronze rider. If something is not done well enough, she expects it to be done again. And just because she asks with a smile, doesn't mean she's willing to bend. She's a leader through and through. But because she's so nice about it, it's easy to miss.
Jaelyn loves the lower caverns. She considers them the heart of the weyr and enjoys being in them, doing the behind the scenes work it takes to make the weyr run. While she won't neglect her duties as a rider, she'd rather spend her freedom managing a scuffle in the kitchens or a delay in the arrival of tithes. She doesn't much care for rider politics. Let the ambitious fight among themselves for who gets to wear the shiny knots. The weyr will still be there either way. That said, she is well tuned to the gossip of the weyr and enjoys knowing little things about each of the weyr's residents. Who's sleeping with who, who takes too much milk with their klah, who has a child on the way. If the lower caverns are the heart of the weyr, gossip is its pulse. And she wants to know every beat of it.
Jae is helpful and overbearing and often meddling. Thoroughly convinced she knows best, she will push and push until she gets her way. She doesn't do well with leisure time and needs to always have a job to do or she'll find somebody else's life to manage.
HISTORY
FAMILY:
Mother: Caralyn, dragonless
Father: Unknown
Lots and lots of foster siblings
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: Kemma of Green Steampith
BIRTHPLACE: High Reaches Weyr
HISTORY: Jaelyn never really knew her mother. The woman's heart and soul had died turns before she was born. She doesn't know why the woman chose to have her, although she's heard rumors. She doesn't believe them. Her mother hasn't told anyone what's on her mind in turns.
So with a father she'd never met and a mother who had long since lost all interest in this world, Jaelyn became a child of the weyr. And she thrived. She loved the creche, loved watching the cooks and drudges do the work the riders took for granted, loved being surrounded by the constant bustle. For as long as she could remember, she knew exactly what she wanted to be when she grew up. She wanted to be headwoman, directing and steering it all.
When she turned fifteen, she opted out of candidacy, choosing instead to continue working in the lower caverns. She helped keep the storerooms and do the laundry and make sure the food made it to its table on time and all the feasts were properly planned. And she could imagine no better life. She was diligent, she was ambitious and she was fully sure she'd make headwoman by the time she turned forty.
But then one of her foster siblings aged out of candidacy and when she tried to console him, he lashed out at her. Saying she couldn't understand, because she'd never tried. That she had no right to speak to him like she knew when she didn't. And Jaelyn realized her strategy had had a major blindspot. She lived at the weyr. Most children stood. And so long as she didn't, some would always see her as odd and different, an outsider. If she wanted to be headwoman, she needed to truly be one of them.
So she signed up for candidacy. How hard could it be to stand for a few turns, pretend to be sad to be left standing and then go back to exactly what she'd been doing before? And with so many genuinely eager candidates, she was fully confident no dragon would be desperate enough to choose her.
UPDATES
- Late Winter 2765- Jae Impresses Blue Zappath and is less than thrilled about this development.
- Early Fall, 2767- Jae and Zappath fly more of the Fall than they would ordinarily, and when exhaustion sets in a mistake is made: Zappath attempts to flame Thread when completely out of firestone. He almost manages to avoid the clump, but Jae's left leg is still scored along her calf (Moderate). Kemma is also injured. Her and Jae realize they both like each other and should court/date while they're in the infirmary with a little less than welcome help from Zappath.
