Levalla laughed. “As if I had time for any dallying these days. You’re looking exceedingly well, Moreta. Any injuries in your Weyr from yesterday’s Fall?”
“A few Threadscores and another dislocated shoulder. I’d say that this consolidation puts each wing on its mettle.”
“My thoughts, too,” K’dren said, “but I shall be eternally grateful when we can resume our traditional regions. It isn’t Sh’gall, I’ll have you know—he’s a bloody fine leader; it’s that sour excrescence from Telgar—”
“K’dren . . .” Levalla spoke in firm remonstrance.
“Moreta’s discreet, but that man . . .” K’dren balled his fists, setting his jaw as his eyes flashed with antipathy for the Telgar Leader. “He won’t assist in either of your requests, you know, Moreta!”
“He might not.” Moreta took out the lists. K’dren exclaimed in surprise at seeing them.
“So they will serve a purpose after all. Let me have a glance.” He flipped the sheets till he came to the angular backhanded scrawl of M’tani’s. “T’grel would be the man to contact at Telgar. Even if he weren’t a responsible rider, he’d do it in reprisal for some of M’tani’s tricks. And you must have riders from each Weyr, ones who know how to find the hole-in-the-hill cots that aren’t well marked. Well, you can be sure of Benden support. I wondered why our healer was bloodletting again!” He rubbed his arm with a rueful smile.
“And Capiam’s sure about this vaccination of his?” Levalla asked. Her fingers betrayed her anxiety by the speed with which-she flipped her worry-wood.
“He likens it to Thread. If it can’t get a grip, it can’t last.”
“About your Hatching, now. We do have a very keen young man from a Lemos highlands minehold whom we found on Search two Turns ago,” Levalla said, reverting to Moreta’s ostensible errand. “I don’t know why he didn’t take, but we’ll have him back if he doesn’t find a mate on your Ground. Dannell’s his name, and he’s eager to keep up with his mining craft if he can.”
“Are you Searching more among the crafts than the holds these days?”
“With the end of Pass in sight, it’s best to have men who can occupy their spare time profitably for the Weyr.”
“We receive the tithe whether there’s Pass or not,” Moreta said with a frown.
K’dren looked up from his perusal of the names. “To be sure, but once a Pass is over, the Lords may not be quite so generous.” K’dren’s expression indicated that his Lords had better sustain the quality of their tithes. “I’ve underlined the riders who I suspect do time.” His grin was raffish. “It’s not something anyone admits to but T’grel must have to use it to cope with M’tani. Don’t bother with L’bol at Igen. He’s useless. Go directly to Dalova, Allaneth’s rider. She lost a lot of bloodkin at Igen Sea Hold. She’d know who among her riders time it. And Igen has all those little cotholds stashed in the desert and on the riverbanks. Surely you’ve got a few good friends left at Ista. You were there ten Turns. Have you heard that F’gal’s bad with kidney chill?”
“Yes, I’d planned to speak to Wimmia out of courtesy. Or D’say, Kritith’s rider.”
“You have a son by him, don’t you?” Levalla said with a tolerant smile. “Such ties seem to help at the most unexpected times, don’t they?”
“D’say is a steady man and the boy Impressed a brown from Torenth’s last clutch,” Moreta said with quiet pride. She rose. She would have liked to stay longer with the Benden Leaders but she had a long day ahead of her.
“We’ll give Dannell time to pack up and send him on to you at Fort tomorrow, with M’gent. You can use the opportunity to go over any details with him. Shall I have a discreet word with my Lords?”
“Master Tirone is supposed to be sweetening them but your endorsement would be a boon.”
As K’dren escorted Moreta to the stairs, Levalla waved an idolent farewell, still worrying the wood in her left hand.
The encouragement that Moreta received from the Benden Weyrleaders did much to sustain her during her next three visits. At Ista, F’gal and Wimmia were in her weyr, bronze Timenth on the ledge, the tacit signal for privacy. So Moreta directed M’barak to land Arith at D’say’s weyr, where Kritith greeted Moreta with shining blue spinning eyes, rearing to his hindquarters and extending his wings. He peered out to the ledge, patently disappointed that Moreta had arrived on a blue instead of with her queen. Then D’say emerged from his sleeping quarters. To her chagrin she had obviously awakened him from a much-needed sleep. He was one of the few who had not succumbed to the first wave of illness, and he had ridden Fall continuously, nursed other sick riders, and tried to bolster F’gal’s leadership during the latter’s kidney ailment.
As she argued with D’say on the necessity of once again cooperating with the Healer Hall, she wished that he had had the plague; then he would not be so slow to comply. D’say resisted her presentation in such a glum silence that she was becoming depressed when their son M’ray suddenly charged up the steps.
“I beg your pardon, D’say, but my Quoarth told me that Moreta is here.” The boy—in his height he was more manly than boyish—paused just long enough in the threshold to receive permission to enter. Then he rushed to Moreta, embracing her with a charming enthusiasm. He peered anxiously into her face with eyes the color of her own, set in a head with the same deep sockets and arching brows. Yet he was far more D’say’s child in build and coloring. “I knew you were ill. It’s very good to see you well.”
“Orlith has clutched. I’ve had little to do except repair scored riders and dragons.”
M’ray opened his arms, looking from sire to dam, hopeful of answers to his unspoken questions.
“Moreta needs help, which I don’t think she’ll get from F’gal in his state of health,” D’say replied noncommittally. He refilled Moreta’s cup with klah, tacitly giving her permission to tell their son.
She did, and the boy’s eyes widened with apprehension and a growing eagerness that answered the challenge.
“Wimmia would agree, D’say—you know she would. We only have to present the urgency to her. She’s not a passive person, like F’gal. He’s—he’s changed a lot recently.” As M’ray blurted out his opinion, he eyed D’say to see if the bronze rider would try to refute him. D’say shrugged. “Anyway, I’d like to help and my wingleader, T’lonneg, is hold-bred. If there’s anyone who’d know the rainforest holds, it’s him. He caught the plague, too, and lost family. He should know about this, D’say, really he should. This isn’t the sort of request you can deny, is it? No more than we can stop rising to Fall.” M’ray faced his sire, shoulders back, jaw forward, a pose she remembered striking when she had acted on her own initiative in treating a runner in her family’s hold. “I rose with Ista’s wings at every Fall. Haven’t got so much as char in my face.”
“Keep it that way,” D’say remarked in a flat voice that masked the pride he had for his lad. “T’lonneg says they fly well, M’ray and Quoarth.”
“What we’d expect,” Moreta said fondly, smiling all the more warmly at the lad. It was a pity that she hadn’t been able to give him more time but she’d had to go on to Fort Weyr, and D’say had remained at Ista. “K’dnen thought that six or seven riders would be needed from each Weyr.”
D’say rose to stand beside his son; there wasn’t a hair’s difference in height between them. Moreta had never been motherly toward her children; as a queen rider, she’d had to foster them immediately. She could be proud of M’ray, though, of his eager enthusiasm. Though he was committed to the Weyr, it suddenly occurred to her that she had other children and her bloodline could be sustained in Keroon.
“We will recruit riders who are adequate to the task and will discharge this duty to the Hall,” D’say assured her. “I’ll speak to Wimmia as soon as she’s free. She’ll review the fosterlings for your queen’s clutch, though I must remind you that we had heavy losses among the weyr and hold folk. Everyone wanted to see that peculiar beast when it p
assed through here on its way to the Gather.”
“I grieved to know you had such heavy losses.” Moreta looked up at the fine lad, grateful he had been spared. “When you’ve arranged the matter, send a messenger to Master Capiam. He has all the details worked out.”
“I’ll see you at the Hatching?” M’ray winked impudently at her.
“Of course!” Moreta laughed, and he embraced her again, a little more certain of where his arms should go and not quite so fierce with his strong arms.
Both riders walked her to the weyr entrance.
“You’re off to Igen now?” D’say asked. “See Dalova. She’ll agree.” D’say’s smile showed some of the charm that had once attracted her. The bronze rider had always been slow to make up his mind, but his loyalty never faltered after he had. “Don’t try to talk to M’tani at Telgar. Ask for T’grel. He’s sensible.”
Then the bronze and brown rider locked fingers to give Moreta a lift to Arith’s back, warning M’barak in a jocular fashion that he’d better be careful with that conveyance. M’barak replied solemnly that it was his sworn obligation.
Then they were above Igen Weyn, the brilliance of the sun glancing off the distant lake painful to eyes between blinded; but the heat, the dry intense desert heat, was welcome to chilled bodies as Arith bugled his request to the watchrider.
Dalova was at her weyr ledge to greet Moreta, her tanned face wreathed in delighted smiles for her visitor.
“You come in Search?” she cried, embracing Moreta and drawing her into the cool of her quarters. Dalova had a demonstrative and affectionate nature, though the strains of the recent past were apparent in her nervous gestures and grimaces, the way she constantly shifted her position by hen queen, often tapping her fingers on Allaneth’s forearm as she listened to Moreta’s explanation of her double Search.
“There’s no question of my refusing help, Moreta. Silga, Empie, and Namurra won’t refuse either. Six, you say Capiam’ll need? I’d wager any amount”—she laughed, a high nervous laugh—“that P’leen times it. You do get to know, you know. As I’m sure you do.” She grimaced, causing the sun-lines around her sad brown eyes to crease. “If only L’bol were not so terribly depressed. He feels that if he hadn’t let our riders convey that dreadful beast about—” She broke off and threw her arms out as if she could scatter all the unpleasantness and misery. Absently she patted her dragon’s face, and Allaneth regarded her fondly. “I can help you distribute the vaccines but I cannot, in conscience, give you any candidates. We have so few young people to present to hatchlings, much less a queen. Besides, Allaneth should rise soon; I’m counting on it.” A flash of desperation crossed Dalova’s mobile face.
“There’s nothing like a good mating flight to buoy the spirits of the entire Weyr,” Moreta said, thinking ahead to Orlith’s next flight with increasing anticipation.
“Oh, my, not you, too?” Dalova asked with a shaky little laugh. Tears formed in her expressive brown eyes, and now her queen licked her hand.
Without hesitation, Moreta took Dalova in her arms and the woman wept, in the quiet forlorn way of someone who has cried often without relief.
“So many, Moreta, so many. So suddenly. The shock of it when Ch’mon and Helith went. Then . . .” She could not continue for sobbing. “And L’bol is sunk in apathy. P’leen has risen with the Igen wings. That’s not out of order, but when we’re no longer consolidated, if he cannot lead . . . So I’m counting on Allaneth’s rising, and me! Once there’s been a good mating flight, everyone’s spirits will improve. And once the fear of this hideous plague is over, everyone will be restored.”
Dalova raised her head from Moreta’s shoulder, drying her eyes. “You know how firestone makes me sneeze, and I nearly burst myself to keep from doing it because a sneeze frightens people so! Ridiculous, but it is the truth.” Dalova sniffled, found her kerchief, and blew her nose lustily. “I must say, I do feel better because you know what it’s like. Now, let me have a look at our Weyr maps. Yes, I see what Master Capiam means and he’s worked so much of the detail out, it’ll be no trouble. I’ll organize Igen. Have you been to Telgar yet? Well, ask for T’grel. Then you’ll go to High Reaches? Is Falga improving? Will Tamianth really fly again? Oh, that is good news. Look, much as I’d love you to stay, you’d better go or I’ll drip tears all over you again. I try not to for L’bol’s sake because Timenth tattles on me and that depresses L’bol even more. You can’t imagine what a relief it is to weep all over you. Look, I’ll send Empie when we’ve decided, and I might not ask more than the queens or P’leen. I can trust them but L’bol never approves of timing it, for any reason, and now is not the moment to upset him on minor matters.” Dalova had been ushering Moreta to the weyr entrance, holding tightly to her arm as they walked. She smiled warmly up at M’barak, stroked Arith’s nose, and gave Moreta a leg up.
At Telgar the brown watchdnagon bugled threateningly to Arith, ordering the blue to land on the Rim instead of proceeding down to the Bowl.
“My orders, Weyrwoman,” C’ver said with no apology. “M’tani wants no strangers in the Weyr.”
“Since when are dragonriders strangers to each other?” Moreta demanded, offended by the order and insolence with which it was delivered. Arith trilled with concern over their reception and he could sense Moreta’s fury. “I’ve come in Search—”
“And left your queen alone?” C’ver was openly contemptuous.
“The eggs harden. I call M’tani to honor his promise to S’peren to send us candidates for Impression. I have vaccine with me if it is needed for the weyrfolk I seek.”
“We have all of that we need for those who deserve it.”
“If I were on Orlith, C’ver—”
“Even if you were on your queen, Moreta of Fort, you wouldn’t be welcome here! Take your Search into your own Holds. If there’re any holders left, of course!”
“If those are your sentiments, C’ver—”
“They are.”
“Then have a care, C’ver, when this Pass is over. Have a care!”
C’ver laughed and his brown reared to his hind legs, trumpeting derisively. Arith trembled from muzzle to tail tip.
“Get out of here, M’barak.” Moreta spoke through clenched teeth. Telgar could burn in fever and she’d never answer them. They could be down to the last sack of firestone and she’d not send them a sliver. The Weyr could be full of Thread and she—“Take us to the High Reaches.”
A Rim landing indeed! The cold of between did not dampen Moreta’s fury, but Arith stopped trembling only when the High Reaches watchdragon caroled a welcome.
“Ask Arith to request permission to land in the Bowl near Tamianth’s quarters. Say we come in Search.”
“I already did, Moreta,” M’barak said, his eyes still shadowed by Telgar’s rejection. “We are twice and twice times twice welcome at the High Reaches. Arith says Tamianth is warbling.”
As Arith glided past the Seven Spindles and the waving watchrider, they could indeed hear Tamianth’s intricate vocalization. B’lerion’s Nabeth answered then charged out of his weyr to its ledge. S’ligar’s Gianarth emerged as if catapulted, flapping his wings and uttering high crackling tnills as Arith made his landing.
M’barak turned to grin at Moreta, his shattered confidence restored by the spontaneous greetings and goodwill. Then Moreta saw B’lerion standing in the wide aperture to the weyrling quarters that accommodated the wounded Tamianth. He waved his right arm vigorously and then trotted out to meet her.
“Just a quick word alone,” he said, folding his good arm around her shoulders with careless ease. “I took Desdra and Oklina to the Nerat plantations late last night. We’ve all the needlethorn we could possibly require. I’ve not mentioned either of your Searches to Falga and S’ligar and there have been no awkward questions from any other source.” He raised his voice, chatting casually. “Tamianth’s wing is dripping ichor, and she’s got a tub for diving; S’ligar’s improving, the sun is shining, the W
eyr is righted, and Pressan and I were just giving Falga a little walk. Pressen thinks very highly of you, my dear Moreta. Cr’not may tell me that Diona did it, but we know Diona, don’t we? Pressen attended the dragon injuries from yesterday’s Fall. Spends his free time badgering Falga about dragon cures, which keeps her from feeling useless. Ah, here we are, Falga, your waterbearer!”
The first thing Moreta noticed was the enormous water butt conveniently placed at Tamianth’s left, full to its brim. Then she saw the neat stack of buckets.
B’lerion chuckled. “My idea. Everyone who wants to visit Falga goes by way of the lake and brings in a full bucket. Every hour a weyrling returns the empties to the lake. If you count the current buckets, you’ll realize that Falga’s been having entirely too much company. Or Tamianth’s thirst has finally been slaked.”
Falga was propped against cushions on a wide couch that had been made of several weyrling beds tied together. Moreta was delighted to see the good color in Falga’s face and returned her embrace, almost embarrassed by the woman’s profuse thanks for saving hen queen’s life. Then, out of deference to Falga’s fervent request, Moreta checked the progress of Tamianth’s wing with Pressen while Tamianth hummed softly, watching Moreta with softly glowing eyes.
Holth says Orlith sleeps. It was Tamianth who spoke.
Startled, Moreta glanced at Falga, who was equally surprised but smiled warmly at her.
“You’ve come on Search,” Falga began. “Surely it’s early, and even a shade unwise to assemble candidates.” Falga indicated that Moreta should sit on one end of the couch, B’lerion on the other.
Moreta hesitated, glancing at Pressen, but he was busy in the far end of the large room.
“I’ve two reasons for coming.”
“But there’s only one queen egg.” Then Falga slumped back against her pillows, resigned. “What else has gone wrong then?”
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