[[This is dated back when Dehka and Kahbrohm were probably going on about 5 turns. The writing of Tiny!Dehka has been approved by Tsu]]

Those who had weyrs near the bronzerider may have found mornings to be particularly tedious. N’ori’s weyr was always full of noise first thing in the morning, and that one was no different. Squeals of laughter tore through the room on tiny legs, leaving trail of water from the tub behind them. The very uncoordinated effort only added a layer of difficulty to gathering the boys up, the man throwing a towel over each of his sons before scooping them up and heaving back towards the bathroom. “There will be no more escape attempts until we’re dry, hmm?”

There were at least 3 more escape attempts from Kahbrohm alone.

He’d been told that one boy was going to be a handful for him alone, and many had stated their disapproval of him going stag on raising two sons after that. But he’d fought tooth and nail to keep them both - and had backed it up with proof. It was in the moments where he was out in the weyrbowl with them, running away from them at almost agonizingly slow speed and they both howled with laughter; It was in the stories told as he sat on the bed with them both as each boy relayed their adventures of the day; It was in sleepy smiles, and laughter. He’d found what made the hard work of being their father worth it in so many places.

It hadn’t been a particularly hard day for N’ori, but he could tell when he retrieved his two sons from the creche after drills that they’d both played hard. He was personally informed that Kahbrohm had played extra hard and made several of the other boys cry - more so when he told them that they needed to suck it up and get stronger. Dehka had apparently disapproved and the two had gotten into yet another fight. He apologized once again for their behaviour, but it had mostly been forgiven. Kahbrohm had been a rough boy before N’ori had taken him in, after all, and the crecheworker hadn’t expected N’ori to miraculously mold him into something else overnight.

Dehka had initially asked to be carried, but when his brother had expressed he was too tough to need to be carried like a baby, the boy had suddenly wanted to show Kahbrohm that he too was tough. N’ori had ended up scooping up both boys to rest against his shoulders. At least when Kahbrohm had looked at the stairs and suddenly seemed overwhelmed with the amount of leg movement scaling them would have taken. Both had fallen asleep by the time N’ori had gotten back to their weyr.

They certainly had a busy day, now didn’t they? Meigth greeted from his ledge, offering sweet waves of affection over the dreams of the two sleeping boys. They certainly did. I am told they’re both quite tough. he thought back to his lifemate, if only to keep from waking the two as he carefully laid them out on the bed. How much older until he’d have to get them both their own? Another turn? Less? It seemed like they were sprouting like weeds - at least they’d been compared to them at least once. N’ori couldn’t help but linger to watch them for a few minutes.

After those few minutes, however, he went to join Meigth on the ledge, laying out flat on his back with a deep sigh. It felt good to lay down. The bronze moved to lay around his rider, resting his head next to the man’s chest with a content rumble. He was rewarded with the idle stroking of an eye ridge. The sun filtering across the ledge made the stone nice and warm, and had it not still been a fairly early evening, perhaps he would have let himself fall asleep. But the evenings were for him, on most days, to catch up on tasks one just couldn’t quite get done with little ones underfoot - and really, they were much more fun than any chore was.

But laid out there with Meigth, it was easy to instead ruminate about a past that was getting farther and farther away. I remember it, if you don’t. Meigth reassured. The memory of a dragon helped keep it alive, after all, and as if to help the bronze offered the determined look on Nahna’s face when she’d shoved her son into N’ori’s arms and made her plea. Sometimes, N’ori wondered if he could have loved her - no, if she could have loved him. Perhaps the thought had preoccupied his mind longer than he meant it to, and the sudden weight of little hands on his chest made him startle slightly.

Meigth simply laughed at his surprise. It was only Dehka, who had carefully fumbled around the bronze to find N’ori. “Go back to bed, son,” N’ori said as the little boy rubbed sleepily at his eyes, and then settled onto the man’s chest with a tired sigh. It took only moments for him to doze off again, and N’ori chuckled to himself in defeat. It wouldn’t be long after that when Kahbrohm found himself alone in the bed and also came fumbling out to find N’ori. The boy spent a long moment leering at his brother, before climbing up higher on their father’s chest, almost determined to be as close to the man’s face as he could before he settled again.

Unlike his brother, however, he was full of muttered stories about his day in the creche which slowly slurred off into the soft snores of a child.

Both would shift and roll into new positions, leaving him trapped on the ledge. It wasn’t a hard decision to make, however. He’d let the two get their sleep, and while his back would likely hate it come morning, N’ori didn’t much mind being part of the family nap pile out on the ledge.