The Impression

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To Felessan's speculative eye, the eggs hardening on the Hatching Ground looked different. Well, maybe not very different. Maybe not different at all. Perhaps it was just his knowledge that this time, this Hatching, was to be his first try at Impression, and that put the eggs in an entirely new light. The idea that he was considered worthy to Impress one of Pern's great dragons delighted and scared him.

The sunlight shone through the high openings to the Weyr Bowl outside, refracting gloriously off the mottled eggshells. Since F'lar had taken him arid two other boys in the Lower Caverns aside two nights earlier to tell them that they were eligible to be Candidates if they so chose — as if anybody with sense would turn down such a chance— Felessan had made several detours from his chores to pass through the great echoing cavern. Which egg held a bronze dragon, and which a blue? To Felessan's knowledge, no one had ever been able to work out a system to tell the smaller eggs apart. Of course, the queen egg was easy to pick out. It was mostly gold, like its occupant, it was bigger than all the rest, and it rested, lovingly protected, between the claws of its broody golden mother.

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