The Dragonriders of Pern

by Anne McCaffrey

  As he approached the entrance of the Lower Caverns, the aroma of boiling numbweed made his eyes smart. He’d grab some klah, bread and fruit and go listen to the Weyrlingmaster. They were upwind. As Wing-second, F’nor liked to take every opportunity to measure up the new riders, particularly those who were not weyrbred. Life in a Weyr required certain adjustments for the craft and holdbred. The freedom and privileges sometimes went to a boy’s head, particularly after he was able to take his dragon between—anywhere on Pern—in the space it takes to count to three. Again, F’nor agreed with F’lar’s preference in presenting older lads at Impression though the Oldtimers deplored that practice at Benden Weyr, too. But, by the Shell, a lad in his late teens recognized the responsibility of his position (even if he were holdbred) as a dragonrider. He was more emotionally mature and, while there was no lessening of the impact of Impression with his dragon, he could absorb and understand the implications of a lifelong link, of an in-the-soul contact, the total empathy between himself and his dragon. An older boy didn’t get carried away. He knew enough to compensate until his dragonet’s instinctive sensibility unfolded. A baby dragon had precious little sense and, if some silly weyrling let his beast eat too much, the whole Weyr suffered through its torment. Even an older beast lived for the here and now, with little thought for the future and not all that much recollection—except on the instinctive level—for the past. That was just as well, F’nor thought. For dragons bore the brunt of Thread-score. Perhaps if their memories were more acute or associative, they’d refuse to fight.

  F’nor took a deep breath and, blinking furiously against the fumes, entered the huge kitchen Cavern. It was seething with activity. Half the female population of the Weyr must be involved in this operation, F’nor thought, for great cauldrons monopolized all the large hearths set in the outside wall of the Cavern. Women were seated at the broad tables, washing and cutting the roots from which the salve was extracted. Some were ladling the boiling product into great earthenware pots. Those who stirred the concoction with long-handled paddles wore masks over nose and mouth and bent frequently to blot eyes watering from the acrid fumes. Older children were fetching and carrying, fuelrock from the store caves for the fires, pots to the cooling caves. Everyone was busy.

  Fortunately the nighthearth, nearest the entrance, was operating for normal use, the huge klah pot and stew kettle swinging from their hooks, keeping warm over the coals. Just as F’nor had filled his cup, he heard his name called. Glancing around, he saw his blood mother, Manora, beckon to him. Her usually serene face wore a look of puzzled concern.

  Obediently F’nor crossed to the hearth where she, Lessa, and another young woman who looked familiar though F’nor couldn’t place her, were examining a small kettle.

  “My duty to you, Lessa, Manora—” and he paused, groping for the third name.

  “You ought to remember Brekke, F’nor,” Lessa said, raising her eyebrows at his lapse.

  “How can you expect anyone to see in a place dense with fumes?” F’nor demanded, making much of blotting his eyes on his sleeve. “I haven’t seen much of you, Brekke, since the day Canth and I brought you from your crafthold to Impress young Wirenth.”

  “F’nor, you’re as bad as F’lar,” Lessa exclaimed, somewhat testily. “You never forget a dragon’s name, but his rider’s?”

  “How fares Wirenth, Brekke?” F’nor asked, ignoring Lessa’s interruption.

  The girl looked startled but managed a hesitant smile, then pointedly looked towards Manora, trying to turn attention from herself. She was a shade too thin for F’nor’s tastes, not much taller than Lessa whose diminutive size in no way lessened the authority and respect she commanded. There was, however, a sweetness about Brekke’s solemn face, unexpectedly framed with dark curly hair, that F’nor did find appealing. And he liked her self-effacing modesty. He was wondering how she got along with Kylara, the tempestuous and irresponsible senior Weyrwoman at Southern Weyr, when Lessa tapped the empty pot before her.

  “Look at this, F’nor. The lining has cracked and the entire kettle of numbweed salve is discolored.”

  F’nor whistled appreciatively.

  “Would you know what it is the Smith uses to coat the metal?” Manora asked. “I wouldn’t dare use tainted salve, and yet I hate to discard so much if there’s no reason.”

  F’nor tipped the pot to the light. The dull tan lining was seamed by fine cracks along one side.

  “See what it does to the salve?” and Lessa thrust a small bowl at him.

  The anesthetic ointment, normally a creamy, pale yellow, had turned a reddish tan. Rather a threatening color, F’nor thought. He smelled it, dipped his finger in and felt the skin immediately deaden.

  “It works,” he said with a shrug.

  “Yes, but what would happen to an open Threadscore with that foreign substance cooked into the salve?” asked Manora.

  “Good point. What does F’lar say?”

  “Oh, him.” Lessa screwed her fine delicate features into a grimace. “He’s off to Lemos Hold to see how that woodcraftsman of Lord Asgenar’s is doing with the wood pulp leaves.”

  F’nor grinned. “Never around when you want him, huh, Lessa?”

  She opened her mouth for a stinging reply, her gray eyes snapping, and then realized that F’nor was teasing.

  “You’re as bad as he is,” she said, grinning up at the tall Wing-second who resembled her Weyrmate so closely. Yet the two men, though the stamp of their mutual sire was apparent in the thick shocks of black hair, the strong features, the lean rangy bodies (F’nor had a squarer, broader frame with not enough flesh on his bones so that he appeared unfinished), the two men were different in temperament and personality. F’nor was less introspective and more easygoing than his half brother, F’lar, the elder by three Turns. The Weyrwoman sometimes found herself treating F’nor as if he were an extension of his half brother and, perhaps for this reason, could joke and tease with him. She was not on easy terms with many people.

  F’nor returned her smile and gave her a mocking little bow for the compliment.

  “Well, I’ve no objections to running your errand to the Mastersmithhall. I’m supposed to be Searching and I can Search in Telgar Hold as well as anywhere else. R’mart’s nowhere near as sticky as some of the other Oldtimer Weyrleaders.” He took the pot off the hook, peering into it once more, then glanced around the busy room, shaking his head. “I’ll take your pot to Fandarel but it looks to me as though you’ve already got enough numbweed to coat every dragon in all six—excuse me—seven Weyrs.” He grinned at Brekke for the girl seemed curiously ill at ease. Lessa could be snap-tempered when she was preoccupied and Ramoth was fussing over her latest clutch like a novice—which would tend to make Lessa more irritable. Strange for a junior Weyrwoman from Southern Weyr to be involved in any brewing at Benden.

  “A Weyr can’t have too much numbweed,” Manora said briskly.

  “That isn’t the only pot that’s showing cracks, either,” Lessa cut in, testily. “And if we’ve got to gather more numbweed to make up what we’ve lost . . .”

  “There’s the second crop at the Southern Weyr,” Brekke suggested, then looked flustered for speaking up.

  But the look Lessa turned on Brekke was grateful. “I’ve no intention of shorting you, Brekke, when Southern Weyr does the nursing of every fool who can’t dodge Thread.”

  “I’ll take the pot. I’ll take the pot,” F’nor cried with humorous assurance. “But first, I’ve got to have more in me than a cup of klah.”

  Lessa blinked at him, her glance going to the entrance and the late afternoon sun slanting in on the floor.

  “It’s only just past noon in Telgar Hold,” he said, patiently. “Yesterday I was all day Searching at Southern Boll so I’m hours behind myself.” He stifled a yawn.

  “I’d forgotten. Any luck?”

  “Canth didn’t twitch an ear. Now let me eat and get away from the stink. Don’t know how you stand it.”
<
br />   Lessa snorted. “Because I can’t stand the groans when you riders don’t have numbweed.”

  F’nor grinned down at his Weyrwoman, aware that Brekke’s eyes were wide in amazement at their good-natured banter. He was sincerely fond of Lessa as a person, not just as Weyrwoman of Benden’s senior queen. He heartily approved of F’lar’s permanent attachment of Lessa, not that there seemed much chance that Ramoth would ever permit any dragon but Mnementh to fly her. As Lessa was a superb Weyrwoman for Benden Weyr, so F’lar was the logical bronze rider. They were well matched as Weyrwoman and Weyrleader, and Benden Weyr—and Pern—profited. So did the three Holds bound to Benden for protection. Then F’nor remembered the hostility of the people at Southern Boll yesterday until they learned that he was a Benden rider. He started to mention this to Lessa when Manora broke his train of thought.

  “I am very disturbed by this discoloration, F’nor,” she said. “Here. Show Mastersmith Fandarel these,” and she put two small pots into the larger vessel. “He can see exactly the change that occurs. Brekke, would you be kind enough to serve F’nor?”

  “No need,” F’nor said hastily and backed away, pot swinging from his hand. He used to be annoyed that Manora, who was only his mother, could never rid herself of the notion that he was incapable of doing for himself. She was certainly quick enough to make her fosterlings fend for themselves, as his foster mother had made him.

  “Don’t drop the pot when you go between, F’nor,” was her parting admonition.

  F’nor chuckled to himself. Once a mother, always a mother, he guessed, for Lessa was as broody about Felessan, the only child she’d borne. Just as well the Weyrs practiced fostering. Felessan—as likely a lad to Impress a bronze dragon as F’nor had seen in all his Turns at Searching—got along far better with his placid foster mother than he would have with Lessa had she had the rearing of him.

  As he ladled out a bowl of stew, F’nor wondered at the perversity of women. Girls were constantly pleading to come to Benden Weyr. They’d not be expected to bear child after child till they were worn-out and old. Women in the Weyrs remained active and appealing. Manora had seen twice the Turns that, for instance, Lord Sifer of Bitra’s latest wife had, yet Manora looked younger. Well, a rider preferred to seek his own loves, not have them foisted on him. There were enough spare women in the Lower Caverns right now.

  The klah might as well be medicine. He couldn’t drink it. He quickly ate the stew, trying not to taste his food. Perhaps he could pick something up at Smithcrafthall at Telgar Hold.

  “Canth! Manora’s got an errand for us,” he warned the brown dragon as he strode from the Lower Cavern. He wondered how the women stood the smell.

  Canth did, too, for the fumes had kept him from napping on the warm ledge. He was just as glad of an excuse to get away from Benden Weyr.

  F’nor broke out into the early morning sunshine above Telgar Hold, then directed brown Canth up the long valley to the sprawling complex of buildings on the left of the Falls.

  Sun flashed off the water wheels which were turned endlessly by the powerful waters of the three-pronged Falls and operated the forges of the Smithy. Judging by the thin black smoke from the stone buildings, the smelting and refining smithies were going at full capacity.

  As Canth swooped lower, F’nor could see the distant clouds of dust that meant another ore train coming from the last portage of Telgar’s major river. Fandarel’s notion of putting wheels on the barges had halved the time it took to get raw ore downriver and across land from the deep mines of Crom and Telgar to the crafthalls throughout Pern.

  Canth gave a bugle cry of greeting which was instantly answered by the two dragons, green and brown, perched on a small ledge above the main Crafthall.

  Beth and Seventh from Fort Weyr, Canth told his rider, but the names were not familiar to F’nor.

  Time was when a man knew every dragon and rider in Pern.

  “Are you joining them?” he asked the big brown.

  They are together Canth replied so pragmatically that F’nor chuckled to himself.

  The green Beth, then, had agreed to brown Seventh’s advances. Looking at her brilliant color, F’nor thought their riders shouldn’t have brought that pair away from their home Weyr at this phase. As F’nor watched, the brown dragon extended his wing and covered the green possessively.

  F’nor stroked Canth’s downy neck at the first ridge but the dragon didn’t seem to need any consolation. He’d no lack of partners after all, thought F’nor with little conceit. Greens would prefer a brown who was as big as most bronzes on Pern.

  Canth landed and F’nor jumped off quickly. The dust made by his dragon’s wings set up twin whirls, through which F’nor had to walk. In the open sheds which F’nor passed on his way to the Crafthall, men were busy at a number of tasks, most of them familiar to the brown rider. But at one shed he stopped, trying to fathom why the sweating men were winding a coil of metal through a plate, until he realized that the material was extruded as a fine wire. He was about to ask questions when he saw the sullen, closed expressions of the crafters. He nodded pleasantly and continued on his way, uneasy at the indifference—no, the distaste—exhibited at his presence. He was beginning to wish that he hadn’t agreed to do Manora’s errand.

  But Smithcraftmaster Fandarel was the obvious authority on metal and could tell why the big kettle had suddenly discolored the vital anesthetic salve. F’nor swung the kettle to make sure the two sample pots were within, and grinned at the selfconscious gesture; for an instant he had a resurgence of his boyhood apprehension of losing something entrusted to him.

  The entrance to the main Smithcrafthall was imposing: four landbeasts could be driven abreast through that massive portal and not scrape their sides. Did Pern breed Smithcraftmasters in proportion to that door? F’nor wondered as its maw swallowed him, for the immense metal wings stood wide. What had been the original Smithy was now converted to the artificers’ use. At lathes and benches, men were polishing, engraving, adding the final touches to otherwise completed work. Sunlight streamed in from the windows set high in the building’s wall, the eastern shutters were burnished with the morning sun which reflected also from the samples of weaponry and metalwork in the open shelves in the center of the big Hall.

  At first, F’nor thought it was his entrance which had halted all activity, but then he made out two dragonriders who were menacing Terry. Surprised as he was to feel the tension in the Hall, F’nor was more disturbed that Terry was its brunt, for the man was Fandarel’s second and his major innovator. Without a thought, F’nor strode across the floor, his bootheels striking sparks from the flagstone

  “And a good day to you, Terry, and you, sirs,” F’nor said, saluting the two riders with airy amiability. “F’nor, Canth’s rider, of Benden.”

  “B’naj, Seventh’s rider of Fort,” said the taller, grayer of the two riders. He obviously resented the interruption and kept slapping an elaborately jeweled belt knife into the palm of his hand.

  “T’reb, Beth’s rider, also of Fort. And if Canth’s a bronze, warn him off Beth.”

  “Canth’s no poacher,” F’nor replied, grinning outwardly but marking T’reb for a rider whose green’s amours affected his own temper.

  “One never knows just what is taught at Benden Weyr,” T’reb said with thinly veiled contempt.

  “Manners, among other things, when addressing Wing-seconds,” F’nor replied, still pleasant. But T’reb gave him a sharp look, aware of a subtle difference in his manner. “Good Master Terry, may I have a word with Fandarel?”

  “He’s in his study . . .”

  “And you told us he was not about,” T’reb interrupted, grabbing Terry by the front of his heavy wher-hide apron.

  F’nor reacted instantly. His brown hand snapped about T’reb’s wrist, his fingers digging into the tendons so painfully that the green rider’s hand was temporarily numbed.

  Released, Terry stood back, his eyes blazing, his jaw set.

>   “Fort Weyr manners leave much to be desired,” F’nor said, his teeth showing in a smile as hard as the grip with which he held T’reb. But now the other Fort Weyr rider intervened.

  “T’reb! F’nor!” B’naj thrust the two apart. “His green’s proddy, F’nor. He can’t help it.”

  “Then he should stay weyrbound.”

  “Benden doesn’t advise Fort,” T’reb cried, trying to step past his Weyrmate, his hand on his belt knife.

  F’nor stepped back, forcing himself to cool down. The whole episode was ridiculous. Dragonriders did not quarrel in public. No one should use a Craftmaster’s second in such a fashion. Outside, dragons bellowed.

  Ignoring T’reb, F’nor said to B’naj, “You’d better get out of here. She’s too close to mating.”

  But the truculent T’reb would not be silenced.

  “Don’t tell me how to manage my dragon, you . . .”

  The insult was lost in a second volley from the dragons to which Canth now added his warble.

  “Don’t be a fool, T’reb,” B’naj said. “Come! Now!”

  “I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t wanted that knife. Get it and come.”

  The knife B’naj had been handling lay on the floor by Terry’s foot. The Craftsman retrieved it in such a way that F’nor suddenly realized why there had been such tension in the Hall. The dragonriders had been about to confiscate the knife, an action his entrance had forestalled. He’d heard too much lately of such extortions.

  “You’d better go,” he told the dragonriders, stepping in front of Terry.

  “We came for the knife. We’ll leave with it,” T’reb shouted and, feinting with unexpected speed, ducked past F’nor, grabbing the knife from Terry’s hand, slicing the smith’s thumb as he drew the blade.

  Again F’nor caught T’reb’s hand and twisted it, forcing him to drop the knife.

  T’reb gave a gurgling cry of rage and, before F’nor could duck or B’naj could intervene, the infuriated green rider had plunged his own belt knife into F’nor’s shoulder, viciously slicing downward until the point hit the shoulder bone.