Moreta

by Anne McCaffrey

  “Something’s happened to Orlith?” Moreta skipped down the stone steps as fast as she could, her heart pounding. She raced around the corner into her weyr, knocking her shoulder as she bounced into the turn.

  Orlith had her head angled to catch the first possible glimpse of her rider. As Moreta barreled into the weyr, Orlith bugled repeatedly.

  As she threw her arms around her dragon’s head, Moreta noticed Leri standing to one side, wrapped up in sleeping furs, looking excessively pleased.

  “We managed just fine,” she explained between Orlith’s effusions, “but the sooner you get her to the Hatching Ground the better. I don’t think she could have held out much longer, but you were needed badly at High Reaches, weren’t you?”

  Between apologies and encouragements to her dragon, Moreta agreed.

  “No one even knew you were gone,” Leri said, “but I doubt I could have sustained the deception getting Orlith to the Hatching Ground.”

  I really need to go, Orlith said plaintively.

  CHAPTER XII

  Fort Hold, Fort and High Reaches Weyrs, Present Pass, 3.18.43

  “I, FOR ONE, am heartily glad to hear a piece of good news,” Capiam said when the echoes of the drum message had faded.

  They had all heard the sound of the drums but, closeted in the thick stone walls of Lord Tolocamp’s apartment in Fort Hold, they had not been able to distinguish the cadences until the Harper Hall began to relay the tidings onward.

  “Twenty-five eggs is not a generous clutch,” Lord Tolocamp said in exaggeratedly mournful voice.

  Capiam wondered if the Lord Holder’s dose of vaccine had held some curious contaminant. The man’s whole personality had altered. The charitable would say that he grieved for his wife and four daughters, but Capiam knew that Tolocamp had consoled himself rather quickly by taking a new wife, so his sorrow was suspect. Tolocamp had also made his losses the excuse for a variety of shortcomings, short temper, and dithering.

  “Twenty-five with a queen egg is a superb clutch this late in a Pass,” Capiam replied firmly.

  Lord Tolocamp pulled at his lower lip, then he sighed heavily.

  “Moreta really must not permit Kadith to fly Orlith again. Sh’gall was so ill.”

  “That is not our business,” Tirone remarked, entering the discussion for the first time. “Not that the illness of the rider has any effect on the performance of the dragon. Anyway, Sh’gall is flying Fall at Nerat so he’s evidently fully recovered.”

  “I wish they would inform us of the status of each Weyr,” Lord Tolocamp said with another heavy sigh. “I worry so.”

  “The Weyrs”—Tirone spoke with a firm emphasis and a sideways look of irritation at the Lord Holder—“have been discharging their traditional duties to their Holds!”

  “Did I bring the illness to the Weyrs? Or the Holds? If the dragonriders were not too quick to fly here and there—”

  “And Lords Holder not so eager to fill every nook and cranny of their—”

  “This is not the time for recriminations!” Tirone shot a warning glance at Capiam. “You know as well, if not better than most people, Tolocamp, that seamen introduced that abomination onto the continent!” The deep rumbling voice of the Masterharper was acid. “Let us resume the discussion interrupted by such good news.” Tirone’s expression told Capiam that he must control his antipathy for Tolocamp. “I have men seriously ill in that camp of yours.” Tirone caught the Lord Holder’s gaze, stabbing his finger toward the windows. “There is not enough vaccine to mitigate the disease, but they could at least have the benefit of decent quarters and practical nursing.”

  “Healers are among them,” Tolocamp countered sullenly. “Or so you tell me!”

  “Healers are not immune to the viral influence and they cannot work without medicines.” Capiam leaned urgently across the table to Tolocamp, who drew back, another habit that irritated the healer. “You have a great storeroom of medicinal supplies—”

  “Garnered and prepared by my lost Lady—”

  Capiam ruthlessly suppressed his irritation. “Lord Tolocamp, we need those supplies—”

  A mean look narrowed Tolocamp’s eyes. “For Ruatha, eh?”

  “Other holds besides Ruatha have needs!” Capiam spoke quickly to allay Tolocamp’s suspicions.

  “Supplies are the responsibility of the individual holder. Not mine. I cannot further deplete resources that might be needed by my own people.”

  “If the Weyrs, stricken as they are, can extend their responsibilities in the magnificent way they have, beyond the areas beholden to them, then how can you refuse?” Tirone’s deep voice rang with feeling.

  “Very easily.” Tolocamp pushed his lips out. “By saying no. No one may pass the perimeter into the Hold from any outlying area. If they don’t have the plague, they have other, equally infectious, diseases. I shall not risk more of my people. I shall make no further contributions from my stores.”

  “Then I withdraw my healers from your Hold,” Capiam said. He rose quickly.

  “But—but—you can’t do that!”

  “Indeed he can! We can,” Tirone replied. He got to his feet and came round the table to stand by Capiam. “Craftsmen are under the jurisdiction of their Hall. You’d forgotten that, hadn’t you?”

  Capiam swung out of the room, so angry at Tolocamp’s pettiness that bile rose sourly in his throat. Tirone was only a step behind him.

  “I’ll call them out! Then I’ll join you in the camp.”

  “I didn’t think it would come to this!” Capiam seized Tirone by the shoulder in an effort to express his appreciation at the Harper’s swift reinforcement.

  “Tolocamp has presumed once too often on the generosity of the Halls!” Tirone’s usually smooth, persuasive voice had a hard edge. “I hope this example reminds others of our prerogatives.”

  “Call our Craftspeople out, but don’t come to the camp with me, Tirone. You must stay in the hall with your people, and guide mine.”

  “My people”—Tirone gave a forced laugh—“with very few exceptions, are languishing in that blighted camp of his. You are the one who must bide at the halls.”

  “Master Capiam—”

  The men whirled toward the woman’s voice. The speaker emerged from the shadow of a doorway. She was one of the three remaining Fort daughters, a big-boned girl with large brown eyes well-spaced in an intelligent but plain face. Her thick black hair was pulled severely back from her face.

  “I have the storeroom keys.” She held them up.

  “How did you? . . .” Tirone was uncharacteristically at a loss for words.

  “Lord Tolocamp made plain his position when he received the request for medicines. I helped harvest and preserve them.”

  “Lady? . . .” Capiam could not recall her name.

  “Nerilka.” She supplied it quickly with the faint smile of a someone who does not expect to be remembered. “I have the right to offer you the products of my own labor.” She gave Tirone an intense, challenging stare. Then she returned her direct gaze to Capiam. “There is just one condition.”

  “If it is within my giving.” Capiam would give a lot for medicines.

  “That I may leave this Hold in your company and work with the sick in that horrid camp. I’ve been vaccinated.” A wry smile lifted one side of her mouth. “Lord Tolocamp was expansive that day. Be that as it may, I will not stay in a Hold to be abused by a girl younger than myself. Tolocamp permitted her and her family to enter this hallowed Hold from the fire-heights yet he leaves healers and harpers to die out there!”

  And he left my mother and sisters to die at Ruatha. Her unspoken words were palpable in the brief silence.

  “This way, quickly,” she said, taking the initiative and pulling at Capiam’s sleeve.

  “I’ll remove our Craftspeople from this Hold on my way out,” Tirone said. He walked quickly toward the hall.

  “Young woman, you do realize that once you leave the Hold without your father’s
knowledge, particularly in his present frame of mind—”

  “Master Capiam, I doubt he’ll notice I’m gone.” She spoke with a light disregard for the matter, obviously more bitter about her sire’s new wife. “These steps are very steep,” she added and flicked open a handglow.

  Steep, circular, and narrow, Capiam realized as his foot slipped on the first short step. He disliked blind stairways, of which Fort had more than its fair share. The Ancients had been fond of them in the construction of the first holds as auxiliary access between the levels of what were, essentially, natural caves. He was grateful for Nerilka’s guidance and the soft glowlight but the descent seemed to take ages. Then the darkness lightened and they emerged on to a landing, with narrow high halls branching in three directions. Beside the circular stair they had just left was a second one that he hoped they would not need to use.

  Nerilka led him to the right, then down a short broad flight and to the left. He was completely disoriented. Nerilka made a second left turn. Three drudges who had been lounging on long benches by a heavy wooden door got to their feet, their faces impassive.

  “You are prompt, I see,” Nerilka said, nodding approval to them. “Father appreciates promptness,” she said to Capiam as she was separating the keys. Unlocking the door took three of the larger ones. Opening required the effort of one of the drudges and then Capiam could smell the mingled stillroom aromas, astringent, bitter, fragrant, and oddly musty.

  Nerilka pulled open the glowbasket inside the door to illuminate sinks, braziers, tables, high stools, measuring apparatus and implements, gleaming basins and glass bottles. Capiam had been in the room often and when he had, he’d approached it from the other direction in the company of Lady Pendra. Now Nerilka was unlocking the storeroom and beckoning him to follow her. She smiled when she heard his surprised gasp.

  Capiam had known that Fort Hold’s storage rooms were ample, but he had not been beyond the dispensary. They were standing on a wide tier, balustraded from the vast, dark interior, with steps leading down to the main floor. He could hear the slither and rustle of tunnel snakes fleeing the sudden light. Capiam saw shelves, reaching, it seemed, to the high vaulted ceiling. Barrels and crates and drying racks, were ranged in rows and dusty ranks. He had the impression of staggering resources and doubly condemned Tolocamp’s parsimony.

  “Behold, Master Capiam, the produce of my labors since I was old enough to snip leaf and blossom or dig root and bulb.” Nerilka’s sarcastic voice was intended for his ears only. “I won’t say I have filled every shelf, but my sisters who have predeceased me would not deny me their portions. Would that all of these hoarded supplies were usable, but even herbs and roots lose their potency in time. Waste, that’s the bulk of what you see, fattening tunnel snakes. Carry-yokes are in the corner there, Sim. You and the others, take up the bales.” She spoke in a pleasant authoritative tone, gesturing to the drudges. “Master Capiam, if you do not mind—that’s the fellis juice.” She pointed to a withy-covered demijohn. “I’ll take this.” She lifted the bulky container by its girth strap. In her other hand, she swung a pack over one shoulder. “I mixed fresh tussilago last night, Master Capiam. That’s right, Sim. On your way now. We’ll use the kitchen exit. Lord Tolocamp has been complaining again about the wear on the main hall carpets. It’s as well to comply with his instructions even if it does mean extra lengths for the rest of us.” She covered the glowbaskets.

  She set down the demijohn to lock the storeroom, ignoring Capiam’s expression, for it was apparent to him that she had gone to some pains to organize the unauthorized distribution. Her eyes met his once as she swept the chamber with one last long glance. The drudges were already halfway down the corridor with their burdens.

  “I would like to take more, but four drudges added to the noon parade to the perimeter are not going to be noticed by the guard.”

  Only then did Capiam realize that Nerilka was dressed in the coarse fabric allotted the general worker, a plainly belted tunic over dark-gray trousers and felted winter boots.

  “No one will care in the least if one of the drudges continues on to the camp.” She shrugged. “Nor will anyone at the kitchen exit think it odd for the Masterhealer to leave with supplies. Indeed, they would wonder if you left empty-handed.”

  She had locked the outer door and now looked speculatively at the bunch of keys. “One never knows, does one?” she said to herself in the habit of one used to solitary tasks. She stuffed the keys in her belt pouch and then, noticing Capiam’s look, gave him that little half smile. “My stepmother has another set. She thinks it is the only one. But my mother thought the stillroom a very good occupation for me. This way, Master Capiam.”

  Capiam followed. The docility of the Fort daughters had been the source of ribaldry at the Halls whenever Lady Pendra had invited unmarried men of rank to the Hold. Nerilka, Capiam was chagrined to remember, was one of the oldest of the eleven daughters, though she had two full elder brothers, Campen and Mostar, and four younger. Lady Pendra had been constantly pregnant, another source of indelicate comment among the apprentice healers. It had never occurred to Capiam—and certainly not to his shameless juniors—that the Fort Horde had any wits or opinions of their own. In Nerilka, rebellion was full blown.

  “Lady Nerilka, if you leave now—”

  “I am leaving,” she said in a firm low voice as they entered the kitchen’s back corridor.

  “—and in this fashion, Lord Tolocamp—”

  She halted and faced Capiam at the archway into the busy, noisy kitchen. “—will miss neither me nor my dower.” She lifted the demijohn. She sighed with exasperation, glancing at the door through which the drudges had exited. “I can be of real use in the internment camp for I know about mixing medicines and decocting and infusing herbs. I shall be doing something constructive that is needed rather than sitting comfortably in a corner somewhere. I know your craftsmen are overworked. Every hand is needed.

  “Besides,”—she gave him a sideways glance that was almost coquettish—“I can slip back in whenever it’s necessary.” She patted the keys in her pouch. “Don’t look surprised. The drudges do it all the time. Why shouldn’t I?”

  Then she moved on and he followed her quickly, unable to think of any counterargument. The moment she passed the arch from the kitchen, her posture changed, her stride altered, and she was no longer the proud daughter of the Hold but a gawky woman, head down, shuffling, awkwardly overburdened and resentful.

  Once out in the great roadway, Capiam looked, trying not to appear furtive, to his left, to the main forecourt and stairs. Tirone and the dozens of harpers and healers regularly in attendance at Fort Hold were moving down the ramp.

  “He’ll be watching them! Not us,” Nerilka said. She chuckled. “Try to walk less proudly, Master Capiam. You are, for the moment, merely a drudge, burdened and reluctantly heading for the perimeter, terrified of coming down sick to die like everyone in the camp.”

  “Everyone in the camp is not dying.”

  “Of course not, but Lord Tolocamp thinks so. He has so informed us constantly. Ah, a belated attempt on his part to prevent the exodus! Don’t pause!” she added, again in that authoritative voice.

  Capiam would have halted in consternation but for her warning. He saw four guards hurrying after Tirone’s group.

  “You can walk as slowly as you want, that’s in character, but don’t stop,” she advised.

  She watched, too, and if her eyes sparkled and she grinned at the discomfiture of her father’s guards, there was no one but Capiam to observe her unfilial delight. At that distance, Capiam couldn’t tell whether the guards were halfhearted in their efforts or not. There was a brief mêlée from which Tirone and his companions continued unhurriedly down the roadway to the Harper Hall. Nerilka and Capiam continued toward the perimeter.

  The internment camp had been established to the left of the massive Fort Hold cliff, in a small valley out of the direct view of the Hold. The guard lines had been set
above it, in full view of Lord Tolocamp’s windows. A rough timbered shack had been erected as a guard shelter from which temporary fencing had been built in both directions. Guards constantly patrolled the fence.

  Nerilka’s three drudges deposited their burdens at the guardhouse where others were leaving baskets of food. Then the men had begun to retrace their steps to the Hold, empty yokes balanced on their shoulders.

  “If you go past the perimeter, Master Capiam, you will not be permitted back,” Nerilka reminded him.

  “If there is more than one way into the Hold, is there only one past the perimeter?” Capiam asked flippantly. “I’ll see you later, Lady Nerilka.”

  As they approached the shack, guards were being assigned to carry certain of the baskets and bales into the prohibited area where a group of men and women waited patiently for the exchange to be made.

  “Here now, Master Capiam.” The guardleader came striding up, his expression alarmed. “You can’t go in there without staying—”

  “I don’t want this medicine heaved about, Theng. Make sure they understand it’s fragile.”

  “I can do that much for you,” Theng replied, and he strode diffidently to add the demijohn to one side of the bales. “This is to be handled carefully and preferably by a healer. Master Capiam says it’s medicine.”

  The internees moved forward to collect the supplies, and Theng backed up. Nerilka was right behind him and as he turned to come back to the guardhouse, she slipped past him and joined those picking up the baskets as if she were one of them.

  Capiam waited for an outcry, for surely the other guards had noticed her. Nerilka was already trudging down the slope toward the tents of the internment camp when Theng took him by the arm to escort him back.

  “Nah, then, Master Capiam, you know I can’t allow you close contact with any of your craftsmen,” Theng said as Capiam cast one more glance after Nerilka’s retreating figure.

  “I know, Leader Theng. The medicine was my concern. So little of its ingredients remain.”