All The Weyrs of Pern

15

"I've never seen so many fire-lizards!" Jancis exclaimed as she helped Piemur and Jaxom wash Ruth in Cove Hold's lagoon.

Lessa, F'lar, and D'ram were similarly occupied, assisted by other members of the Cove Hold research staff. Lytol and Robinton had gone to oversee the preparation of the evening meal. The atmosphere was tense with anticipation, and Jaxom hoped that the stress would not be communicated to the Hold people; fortunately it was not unusual for the Benden Weyrleaders and the Ruathan Holder to enjoy Cove's hospitality.

Ruth, have the fire-lizards twigged tomorrow's journey? Jaxom asked. He refused to think of it as an "attempt," which implied the possibility of failure.

They're excited because I am. Ramoth and Mnementh are, too. Look at their eyes! But the little ones don't know why they're excited.

Jaxom put some extra effort into scrubbing Ruth's left wing. There were hundreds of questions rattling about in his brain, but to settle on any one of them and find an answer was beyond him. This was not at all like the day that he and Ruth had gone hunting for Ramoth's queen egg. He had been a boy then, struggling to achieve manhood, to be both Lord Holder and dragonrider and to avert a major confrontation between the Southern Oldtimers and Benden Weyr. This also wasn't as spontaneous an acceptance of challenge as that morning's EVA had been. This was a planned expedition to be made in the company of two of the most important people on Pern.

And the three best dragons, Ruth added.

Aware that his roiling thoughts might also leak to the fire-lizards, Jaxom earnestly pulled soothing images to the fore in his mind. Just then a fire-lizard arrived from between with the faint pop of reentry. It was Meer-in all the excitement, Jaxom hadn't even noticed that he had disappeared.

So it did not exactly surprise him when Sharra strode into the Hold while they were finishing their dinner. Still, he had no idea what Meer might have conveyed to her, so he decided he would be best off playing innocent.

"Darling, what an unexpected surprise," he said, rising to greet her with an embrace. "There's nothing the matter at Ruatha, is there?" he added with a fair pretense of alarm. He ignored Piemur, who was rolling his eyes.

"No, nothing's wrong at Ruatha," Sharra said in the tone that always made him wary. But she smiled with genuine warmth at the others. "It's just that the biology team is starting the dissection tomorrow. Mirrim said shed convey me up. G'lanar pointblank refused. I hope I'm not interrupting..."

She was disabused of that notion by offers of klah from Lessa, wine from Robinton, and sweet breads from Jancis, while Piemur hastily drew another chair up to the table.

"G'lanar bring you?" D'ram asked.

As she nodded, Jaxom left Piemur to settle his wife and strode out to the porch to offer hospitality to the Oldtimer. But Lamoth and his rider were already airborne, circling to the east above the lagoon, disappearing into the night sky.

"I didn't catch him," Jaxom said. "He ought to have at least joined us for a cup."

D'ram brushed away Jaxom's discontent. "G'lanar was always a surly one. How does he happen-to be at Ruatha these days?"

Jaxom grinned. "The weyrling we had was judged old enough to fight and was sent to join K'van's wings. He asked us to accommodate G'lanar and Lamoth in their stead. The old bronze sleeps almost as much as G'lanar does."

"It does them both good to feel needed," Sharra said, her eyes glittering at Jaxom although her tone was social.

Jaxom wondered what on earth Meer had conveyed to her that had brought her to Cove Hold. His own message had been innocuous enough: the Egg knew staying over at Cove Hold was nothing out of the ordinary. But he was glad to see her.

It was also very like Sharra to say nothing to the point in company. But he began to worry about how to dissemble when they were alone in their sleeping quarters. As the dragonriders whiled away the after-dinner hours, no hint of their morning's plans was raised-partly because the young men and women of the Archive were present but especially because Sharra was there.

"I've a new song from Menolly," Master Robinton said, gesturing for Piemur to bring him his gitar and to get his own. He unrolled the score, passing a copy to Jancis to put on the rack for Piemur. "An odd tune, unusual for our Masterharper Menolly. She says the words were written by young Harper Elimona," he went on, plucking a string to tune the instrument. Piemur corrected the pitch of his and, reading the music, soundlessly fingered through the chords. "But a lovely haunting melody and words to lift hearts at this point in a Pass."

Then he nodded to Piemur and they began. Having sung and played so often together, they interwove and harmonized as if they had rehearsed the brand-new song a hundred times already.

A heart that's true in harper blue makes song from heart's own fire, and though betrayed, is not afraid: in danger, leaps up higher.

Jaxom suppressed the start of surprise the words gave him, and dared not look at either Lessa or F'lar.

No world is free of minstrelsy, nor noise, nor rage, nor sorrow. A harper must discharge his trust before he asks to borrow.

My Harper Hall is free to all who serve with song and playing. But you who'd hide your song inside are very sadly straying.

At those words, Jaxom wondered what cryptic message Menolly and Elimona were giving, and to whom. The next verse was even more germane to the problem of those who considered Aivas to be "the Abomination."

Will you withdraw beyond the law, lie safely in your slumber, while dangers shake your world awake and Death makes up his number?

Did harper here betray those dear he'd feel more than my tongue. If place you'll earn, you'd better learn more music than you've sung.

For if you die, while safe you lie halled in your selfish bone, no chant will come, no harper drum, and you'll lie long alone.

Jaxom, watching Robinton's face as he sang, wondered if the words could possibly have been prompted by Robinton or Sebell, who so often suggested themes to their harpers. But then, Menolly had such an uncanny knack of catching exactly the mood of the moment that this could have been merely serendipitous. The two harpers played a bridging passage; then their voices, which had been light and almost taunting, deepened for the final verse.

Get up, take heart-o, make a start, sing out the truth you came for. Then when you die, your heart may fly to halls we have no name for.

As the last chord died away there was a respectful silence before the audience burst into loud applause. Robinton and Piemur disclaimed humbly, Robinton saying that with such music any harper would find himself doing his very best.

"Who's next?" Piemur asked, strumming his gitar into a complicated alteration, minor to major.

The next hour was spent happily enough so that Jaxom relaxed, holding Sharra's hand and playing with her long fingers and trying to ignore the distance she had put between them. Talla was coiled up on her shoulder, but he saw nothing of Meer.

Ruth, did Meer tattle on us? he asked when Sharra was occupied in singing descant for one of her favorite songs.

He has curled up on the beach and pretends to be asleep. What could he tell her that would make sense?

Sharra's perceptive, Ruth. She could guess.

She knows you are always safe with me.

But she also doesn't want me risking my neck... more than I already do.

She will not refuse you, Ruth added encouragingly, though his tone held a nuance of doubt.

At last Lessa called an end to the evening's entertainment, murmuring something about never quite becoming accustomed to double-ended days. Robinton acted the perfect host, making certain, with Jancis's help, that all the guests were comfortably installed; his behavior was so calm and ordinary that when Sharra and Jaxom were alone in their usual corner room, she frowned in puzzlement.

"Why was Meer so agitated, Jaxom?"

"He was? Not much happened today." He began to pull his shirt off, which served to muffle his voice and hide his face lest his expression give him away. Sharra had become adept at reading him, a skill that usually smoothed matters between them, but this time he really didn't want to risk upsetting her unnecessarily. He had written notes for Brand and for her and given them to Piemur-not that he expected that Piemur would have to deliver them, but he had to plan for contingencies. "Anyone at Ruatha got a randy green or gold?" he continued as nonchalantly as possible.

He could see her considering that possibility. "I don't think so," she said finally. "Are you all going up to the Yokohama tomorrow?"

"Yes." Jaxom gave her his best grin, which he expanded into a yawn as he gestured for her to climb in first. When she was settled, he lay down and put his arm around her, cushioning her head on his shoulder as he so often did-only now he did it consciously, not merely in response to the habits of five Turns.

"What's the schedule?" she asked.

"More of the same. Getting accustomed to free-fall."

"Why?"

"Well, Aivas let us in on that today," Jaxom said, choosing his words carefully. "Seems like all the Weyrs of Pern are going to be needed to hoist the engine part of the ships to that big rift on the Red Star."

"What?"

He pushed her back down in the bed, grinning at her astonished expression, clearly visible in the moonlight flooding the room. "That's what I said. He's going to call our bluff that dragons can lift anything they think they can."

"But-but-why?"

"Those engines will be made to blow up, and the force of the explosion will nudge the Red Star into a new orbit."

"Oh my!"

Jaxom grinned. It took something as fantastic as that to reduce his beloved to an incredulous whisper. He pulled her close enough to lay a kiss on her forehead, meaning only to reassure her. But as his lips touched her soft skin and his nostrils inhaled the spicy fragrance she used, he felt desire well up inside of him. And, though at first her response was reflexive while she was still mulling over his news, he had no trouble in getting her complete attention.

Later, he was awakened by the scratch of a fire-lizard claw on his cheek. It was Meer, his sense of smell told him-and a Meer who was worried and puzzled.

Jaxom! Ruth's anxious tone reinforced Meer's warning. There is someone in the hall by your door. Meer senses danger. I'm coming!

For the love of the egg that hatched you, keep him quiet right now, Jaxom told Ruth. And be as quiet as you can.

You know how quietly I can move, Ruth replied, slightly aggrieved.

I want this one alive-and identifiable!

Carefully, so as not to disturb Sharra or alert the intruder, Jaxom rolled out of the bed and went for his belt and the knife sheathed there. In the darkness, Meer blinked orange-red eyes that were whirling in a gradually increasing speed, but the little bronze made no move.

An alteration in the shadows of the room told Jaxom that the door was being stealthily opened. He stayed where he was crouched, muscles relaxed but every fiber of him ready to move.

The door shadows separated into a crouching figure, knife holding hand raised in a strike position as the intruder crept toward the bed-then paused. Realizing that the man had discerned that only Sharra lay in the bed, Jaxom sprang, encircling the figure with his arms.

"Oh no you don't!" he cried in a hoarse whisper, still not wanting to wake Sharra. But there was no hope of that.

Meer, swooping at the man's face while Jaxom struggled to hold him, bugled with no regard for sleeping folk. Outside, Ruth bellowed, and half the fire-lizard population of the Cove tried to fly in through the open window.

Though the man struggled, breathing hoarsely in his desperation, Jaxom was the victor of far too many wrestling matches to have his hold broken easily. But he didn't quite avoid the slashing blade, which scored his bare shoulder. Cursing, Jaxom grabbed the dagger hand and, twisting it in a move F'lessan had taught him, broke the man's wrist. The attacker crumpled, crying aloud in pain just as F'lar, Piemur, Lytol, and D'ram came bursting into the room. Someone behind them was carrying an open glowbasket, and light spilled past the reinforcements to fall on the face of the man Jaxom had downed.

"G'lanar!" Jaxom fell back in surprise and shock.

The old bronze rider snarled up at him, batting at the shrieking fire-lizards who were still swooping at him, claws extended.

"G'lanar?" D'ram grabbed the man by the arm and, with F'lar's help, hauled him to his feet.

Jaxom told Ruth to call the fire-lizards off and, still screaming their challenge, the fair swooped back out the window.

Sharra stared from the bed as Jancis and Lessa crowded into the room, each holding a bright basket.

"What did you intend, G'lanar?" F'lar demanded, his voice coldly implacable.

"He's to blame..." G'lanar cried, spitting in his fury, cradling his broken wrist to his chest.

Jaxom stared down at the old rider. "Blame?"

"You! I know who it was now! It was you-and that white runt that ought to have died the moment it was born!" Outside, Ruth roared exception to the insult, then thrust his head through the window. "If it hadn't been for you, we 'd've had our own fertile queen! We'd've had a chance!"

Jaxom shook his head slightly, trying to understand the accusation. So few knew that he and Ruth had recovered the abducted queen egg from Benden Weyr. How had G'lanar learned?

"So it was you who cut the riding straps?" Jaxom demanded.

"Yes, yes, I did, and I'd've got you. I'd've kept trying till I did. Nor wept if your woman had died that morning. Save Pern from more like you and that abortion!"

"And you, a dragonrider, would seek the death of another?" D'ram's scorn and horror made G'lanar flinch-but only briefly.

"Yes, yes, yes!" His voice climbed in fury and frustration. "Yes! Unnatural man, unnatural dragon! Abominations as vile as that Aivas thing you worship." G'lanar's eyes glittered; his features were contorted.

"That's enough of that," F'lar said, stepping forward purposefully.

"It is! Enough!" Before either Jaxom, who had stepped back from the man, or F'lar, who was moving toward him, could act, G'lanar plunged his dagger into his own breast.

His action shocked everyone to immobility.

"Oh, no!" Jaxom breathed, dropping to the man's side and feeling for the throat pulse. With the rider dead, the dragon would suicide. Had G'lanar's thrust been true? His heart quailed, waiting for the keen all dragonriders dreaded to hear.

Ruth had pulled his head from the window, and Jaxom could see him, rearing back on his haunches and stretching to his full height, wings spread to balance him. The sound he uttered was muted, an oddly strangled noise. There were other sounds in the night, and then Ramoth and Mnementh landed outside the room, deepening the shadows.

Lamoth dies. In shame. Ruth sank back to the ground, wings limp against his back, his head low. They were mistaken to steal Ramoth's egg. We only set matters right. I am not an abomination or unnatural. And you are a very natural man, Jaxom. How can Aivas be wrong when he does everything to help us?

Lessa moved to Jaxom and lifted him up from the dead man; her eyes watered with tears and her expression was dreadful, but her hands were gentle. Sharra, wrapping the sheet around herself, ran to him and put her arms around him, draping a corner of the sheet over his nudity.

"I don't understand this," D'ram said, running trembling fingers through his thick, gray hair. "How could he so corrupt the truth? How could he seek the life of another dragonrider?"

"There have been moments," Lessa said in a broken voice, "when I wonder what good I did bringing the five Weyrs forward."

"No, Lessa." D'ram. recovered from regret to touch her shoulder supportively. "You did what was necessary. So did Jaxom, though I never realized it was he who saved that situation." He shot an approving look at the young Lord Holder.

"Why did no one realize that G'lanar harbored such a grievance?" F'lar demanded.

"I'm going to get to the bottom of this," Lessa said resolutely. "I'd thought the Weyrs were united in this project! Surely even Oldtimers are! They've fought two lives' worth of Thread..."

D'ram was scrubbing at his face, shaking his head, his shoulders hunched against the night's treachery. "Every Oldtimer I've spoken to-and there are few enough of us old ones now, and all the younger riders are definitely in accord with Benden. Everyone sees the help, the training, the promise Aivas holds out as the culmination of the Weyr objective since the first egg hatched. The project has given us all hope at this critical point in a Pass."

"Ramoth has started speaking to the other queens," Lessa said, her voice strained. "We'll know by morning if there are any other disaffected riders in any Weyr."

"I'll take care of this," F'lar said, gesturing to Piemur and Jaxom to help him with G'lanar's body.

"No, I will," D'ram said, stepping over the corpse to heave it over his shoulders. His face was devoid of expression, but his cheeks were tearstained. "He was a good rider before he went South with Mardra and T'ton."

The others stepped back so he could pass with his sad burden. Sharra handed Jaxom his long-tailed riding shirt, and as he slipped into it gratefully, she hurriedly pulled on a tunic. The night breeze was chilly. She went past Jaxom to the door.

"A cup of hot wine is indicated," she said, and Jancis followed her to the kitchen.

Sharra had added something to the wine, Jaxom decided when he woke and found morning well started. She was still asleep beside him, so he assumed that she had taken her own medicine. A boon for him, since he had no intention of delaying that day's plan. He eased out of the bed, scooped up his clothing, and went to dress in the head. When he entered the main room, he found Lessa cradling a cup of klah in her hands while F'lar, a set expression on his face, was spooning cereal into his mouth. Without a word, the Weyrwoman rose and filled a cup and a bowl for Jaxom.

"Is everyone else still asleep?"

Lessa shook her head. "Piemur and Jancis have gone to Landing with D'ram and Lytol. Robinton's to sleep himself out." She took another sip of klah. "Ramoth says the queens report no other traitors in our midst." Her tone was as bleak as her eyes. "She says that Southern's queen is inexperienced and Adrea too young to understand G'lanar's grievances. However, apparently old G'lanar had begun to get quite testy, going off a lot on his own after Tillek. When S'rond was due to join the fighting wings at Southern Weyr, G'lanar begged for the duty at Ruatha. That would have made me suspicious!"

"Why?" F'lar asked. "Ruatha's the duty everyone wants." He gave Jaxom an encouraging smile and spooned more sweetener over the remains of his porridge.

Noticing that, Lessa opened her mouth to scold and then shut it, looking away in her disgruntlement. F'lar winked at Jaxom, pretending relief.

"No, the Oldtimers who chose to go south with Mardra and T'ton were already antagonistic to Benden's aims," the Weyrleader said, "as much because Benden suggested them. G'lanar would've brooded long enough, ripe for any scheme to support his grievances. And we already know there's a fair number who see Aivas as an Abomination."

"There may be more after today," Lessa muttered.

F'lar dropped his spoon with a clatter. "No one's going to know about today..."

She shook her head, surprised at his remark. "I didn't mean what we plan to do," she said with some exasperation. "I meant, G'lanar's death. Well, the Weyrs know the old fellow died but certainly not why. We can at least keep the attack quiet."

F'lar shot an anxious look at Jaxom, who shrugged acquiescence. He certainly didn't wish to have the story bruited about.

"That's what D'ram's going to insure: that everyone thinks old G'lanar suffered a brainstorm."

"That's lame. The dragons'll know..."

"Ramoth says not. Lamoth had gone to sleep in the clearing, totally unaware of what G'lanar was doing here. Of course, he knew when G'lanar died, and he floundered between somehow. To be doubly cautious, D'ram means to speak to each of the remaining Oldtimers. Tiroth may not be a queen, but no dragon could hide his heart from that bronze."

"How," Jaxom asked, "did G'lanar realize that Ruth and I rescued Ramoth's egg?"

"Have you been timing it much lately?" Lessa asked bluntly.

Jaxom tried to shrug the question away. "Not often."

Lessa raised her eyebrows in resignation. "I keep telling you that timing it is dangerous. It was bloody sure dangerous for you. Lamoth would have known. He would have told G'lanar. G'lanar was misguided but not stupid. I know that all the Oldtimers at Southern have puzzled over who rescued the egg. In spite of our precautions, they all know Ruth's abilities and might have suspicions."

"G'lanar's the only bronze rider left from that group," Jaxom said, after a quick mental review.

"We have a more important task to perform today than to fret over this incident," F'lar said, rising to clear the table of his bowl and cup. "That is, if you feel up to it, Jaxom..."

Jaxom regarded F'lar scornfully. "I've been waiting on you. Let's do it."

"From here, or the Yokohama?" Lessa asked.

"The Yokohama," Jaxom said, grabbing his riding gear from the bench beside him. "We don't have the space suits down here."

"You're sure there's one to fit me?" Lessa asked, shrugging into her leather jacket.

Jaxom grinned. "There're two small ones. One ought to fit, even if we have to truss you up some." As he came out onto the porch, Meer chirped at him. "Lessa, to preserve my image in my wife's eyes, would you ask Ramoth to keep Meer from following me today? Ask her to tell him I'm safe with you two."

Lessa quirked her eyebrow, grinning up at him. "You're sure of that?"

Tucks had to be taken in the arms and legs and waist of the smallest of the suits, which caused some amusement to F'lar and Jaxom but none to Lessa. They contacted Aivas when they were ready to proceed. He brought up their objective, the immense long scar on the Red Star, on the screen in the cargo bay.

F'lar frowned at it again, not so much in order to imprint the scene firmly into his mind as to rationalize what he was seeing.

"When F'nor made his flight to the Red Star, he said there were roiling clouds..."

"There probably were," Aivas replied easily. "In orbiting so close to Rukbat, the planet's surface would have become heated, hot enough to melt rock and certainly causing steam from the ice that coats Thread ovoids. It can be posited that the planet itself is coated with the debris of the Oort Cloud. Steam or dust clouds of considerable density are entirely possible. That is undoubtedly what F'nor saw, not the actual surface. His memories of the event, even the abrasive injuries he and Canth sustained, bear out the supposition, At this point in its orbit, the surface has cooled, that phenomenon has subsided, and you see a sterile planet, its surface slowly freezing again."

"Well, let's do it!" F'lar vaulted to Mnementh's shoulder, grabbing the riding straps to swing himself to his customary position between neck ridges.

Despite free-fall, Lessa moved more clumsily.

"How anyone can be expected to move anywhere in this sort of gear..." she muttered, finally settling herself in place. She had a bit of trouble snapping the riding straps onto rings lost in the folds about her middle. "Can't see what I'm doing, trussed up like a wherry for the spit, and this helmet obscuring my sight..."

Jaxom grinned at her and looked toward F'lar. "Are you leading this expedition?"

Something like a growl came over Jaxom's helmet com and he chuckled.

"Do our dragons know where we're going?" Lessa asked. She held her suited arm up high above her head, looking first to the left at F'lar and then to the right at Jaxom; all three were concentrating on the image of that tremendous fault. "Very well, then, let's go!" And she dropped her arm.

Jaxom counted as Ruth shifted them between. He remembered to continue breathing, an exercise he frequently suspended on such trips. He didn't think of the blackness or the frightening cold of the familiar oblivion: he thought only of where they were going...

I know where we're going, Ruth assured him patiently .

...and how long it was taking them. Jaxom had counted twenty-seven slow seconds, seconds that seemed an eternity. He wondered if Lessa had counted when she had gone back four hundred Turns to-

And then the three dragons emerged simultaneously over a chasm that made Ruth extend his wings uselessly in an attempt to slow his entry in the light gravity and thin atmosphere.

"Aivas?" Jaxom cried, though in the next second he knew that they were too far from Aivas for any contact.

"Shards! Jaxom, we can handle this without his supervision!" F'lar roared. He moderated his tone as he went on. "There are times when I think we've gotten too dependent on Aivas. Slow your descent, Jaxom! We want to land on the edge, not in that bloody rift."

Just beyond Ruth, the rift widened into a crater more immense than the Ice Lake. Jaxom's body gave a massive shudder, and he had the most incredible feeling that he had expected to see that crater all along, though the detail had not been on the visuals. To center his wandering attention, he concentrated on the rim below him, and in the next breath, Ruth obediently glided to the hard-packed surface of the planet, his wings fully extended. Mnementh and Ramoth, necks stretched out and eyes whirling in a brilliant rainbow expressing their consternation, landed gracefully beside him.

"Quickly, now, mark those boulders..." F'lar pointed to the huge stone shafts that made a rim, like so many immense jagged teeth, across the mouth of the huge aperture.

"That crater's a fine landmark," Jaxom commented.

This place is strangely familiar, Ruth said, walking forward to peer over the edge.

Watch it! Jaxom warned his dragon as Ruth's feet sank into what appeared to be a mass of oval shapes. "Look, F'lar! Thread ovoids."

F'lar peered over Mnementh's shoulder while the big bronze dropped his head to examine the surface under his feet. He didn't appear particularly concerned.

"I don't like this place," Lessa commented. Ramoth seemed to share her distaste, placing her feet with extreme care as if she were walking through putrid mud.

"And watch that edge, too, Jaxom," F'lar added.

Ramoth was looking straight ahead, trying to see to the other side of the gorge. Jaxom could not see the far side in the dim light available. When he looked over his shoulder toward Rukbat, he had no trouble looking directly at the dim sun, but it did give sufficient light for him to pick out details of the terrain beyond the canyon. Not that there was much to see. The surface of the Red Star was pocked and slagged, minor fissures and fractures spreading out from the immense fault across what looked more like bare rock than sand. The black chasm stretched in both directions into the tenebrous distance. Jaxom looked behind him. There were some jagged projections, from small terraces to great sheets that would have taken up most of Benden's Bowl. An appallingly sterile landscape. Jaxom could almost feel sorry for the battered planet.

It's a long way across, isn't it? Ruth remarked.

You can see across it? Jaxom asked, squinting in the dismal gloom at the shadowy far edge.

There isn't much to see but more of the same.

"See how those levels are situated?" F'lar said, peering down. "We could settle the engines along them."

"Are they stable enough to hold that sort of weight?" Lessa asked.

F'lar shrugged. "I don't know why not. Don't you feel how much lighter we are here? The engines should weigh less, too. And look at the size of the slabs! Gigantic."

"Like teeth. You know, this looks as if some force broke the planet's surface as you or I would open a redfruit," Lessa said, her voice awed.

Ruth, can you drop down to that first level of rock? Take it easy now. We want to see how stable the protrusion actually is.

"Easy now, Jaxom!" F'lar cautioned, raising one hand as if to cancel the experiment.

There was plenty of wing space, and Ruth delicately lowered himself in the thin atmosphere past the lip of the canyon and down onto the first stone sheet. He dislodged a small boulder, which continued to fall. Jaxom listened for a long moment.

Have you got all your weight on this, Ruth? Jaxom asked.

Jaxom could feel Ruth grunting as he bent his knees and pressed downward.

It's not going anywhere. And I don't weigh so much here.

True. "We should have brought some lights," Jaxom told the others, peering along the stone protrusion. "But this shelf looks plenty long enough to hold even the Yokohama's engine. D'you want me and Ruth to see how far down we can go before the canyon closes up?"

"Shards! No!" F'lar said. "What you're doing is dangerous enough."

"How much time has elapsed?" Lessa asked. "The dragons have only so much air in their bodies."

"We're only seven minutes here," Jaxom said after glancing at the built-in suit chronometer. As a leader, he was wearing one of the original space suits, not one of those Hamian had so cleverly contrived.

"C'mon up out of there, Jaxom," F'lar said. "If the jaws of that canyon should snap shut..."

Jaxom, who had been thinking the same thing, was quite willing to comply. Beating his wings much faster than he'd need to on Pern, Ruth rose from the black chasm, facing the other two dragons.

"This would be one likely site then," F'lar said. "I'll go up, you go down. Lessa, see what the other rim is like. How much time, Jaxom?"

"Five minutes! No more!"

Jaxom found it somewhat unnerving to fly over this aperture, knowing that it likely extended to the depths of the planet. He kept his eye open for unusual extrusions to use as landmarks, but the sides had sheared clean for almost four minutes of flight. Then, a dragon-length below the lip, he saw another long, thick sheet of pale mottled rock. He asked Ruth to mark it in his mind.

Ramoth says we must return. They have found a third place, Ruth told Jaxom.

Then our mission is accomplished. Let's join 'em and go back.

Ramoth says to jump back from where we are.

Are you all right? Jaxom asked. Are they all right?

I'm all right. They're all right. But it would be good to get back to the Yokohama and breathe.

Let's go, then. And Jaxom thought with longing of his own for the safety of the cargo bay.

A fraction of a breath after Ruth and Jaxom arrived, the two big Benden dragons appeared. Even in the dim light of the cargo bay, Jaxom could see that their colors were grayed. Apprehensively, he looked down at Ruth, but no fading was visible. Then he saw that their journey had had an elapsed time of 12:30:20 minutes.

Are you all right? he asked, leaning forward on Ruth's neck, aware that the white dragon's mouth was wide open as he inhaled and exhaled, great deep breaths. Jaxom could feel him trembling.

"Jaxom? Lessa? F'lar?" Aivas's voice sounded very loud in the helmet.

"We're here," Jaxom replied. "We're all right. We've found three points for the engines. Well down in the chasm, wide ledges. Perfect." He looked at the chronometer. "Twelve minutes, Aivas. Twelve. Strange place," he added, recalling what he had seen of the lifeless surface and the jumbled, tortured terrain, with the vast canyon like a gaping wound that had killed the planet. Had anyone ever lived on it?

I am thirsty and I need a bath, Ruth said so plaintively that Jaxom laughed. Ramoth and Mnementh agree.

"I think we'll just let you get your full breath back, Ramoth dear," Lessa said, unsnapping the riding straps. "There wouldn't be any klah up here anywhere, would there, Jaxom?" she asked, almost as plaintively as Ruth had. "I'm thirsty, cold, and I feel as if I've been gone from Pern for a century."

"Water's all we've got up here," he told her. "But we're not that far from hot klah." He wouldn't mind a pitcherful or two himself. His guts felt cold from his navel to his backbone.

But the water cask proved to be empty, and Jaxom cursed under his breath. He would have a hard word or two for whatever dimwit hadn't had the consideration to refill the on-board cask.

Lessa was furious, too, but that made them quick to shed their suits and rack them carefully away. By then, all three dragons insisted that they were restored and wanted nothing more than a long drink and a longer swim.

"One thing," Lessa said as she remounted Ramoth. "This trip was much farther away, but it didn't take as long as I thought it would. I wonder...

"We've enough to wonder about, Lessa," F'lar said firmly, "and I want to get the details down as soon as possible before they fade."

"My impressions of that sterile place won't fade," Lessa replied emphatically. "I could almost feel sorry for it."

"It has been a dead planet for longer than Pern has been viable," Aivas said.

"That doesn't make me feel any better," Lessa replied.

Meer was waiting at Cove Hold, and he gave both Jaxom and Ruth such a scolding of agitated dives and fierce shrieking that Lessa and F'lar doubled up with laughter.

Ruth calmly reassured the little bronze and, ambling down toward the beach, invited him to help with the dragons' bath. You are not coming? he added plaintively when he saw Jaxom heading in the direction of the Hold.

"Can't, dear heart. Got to put down the details while they're fresh in my mind! Be with you soon enough," Jaxom called as he jogged up to the beach with Lessa and F'lar. Fairs of firelizards erupted into the air, diving for the dragons. "Not that you need us!"

The spacious living area of the Hold was empty, and calls for Robinton and Sharra went unanswered.

"I wonder where Sharra's gone," Jaxom said, remembering all too clearly how he had left her asleep and diverted Meer. She would be worried. Or angry! And with genuine cause, he thought, wincing.

Lessa grinned at him, understandingly. "You were with us."

"That'll be no excuse," Jaxom said glumly, wondering how he was going to restore himself in Sharra's eyes. Then he gave himself a mental shake and turned to immediate tasks.

As the Benden Weyrleaders collected drawing materials, Jaxom found a pitcher of cold fruit juice in the cooler; they all emptied the large jug while they recorded their visit. When they compared the images, there were few deviations. .

"That's done!" Lessa said, with a sigh of relief.

"You know," Jaxom said, propping his head on one hand and grinning at the other two, "I still don't believe we've been there and back!"

F'lar grinned wryly. "I don't know what I expected especially after F'nor's try-but it's incredible that something as dead as that has threatened us for so long."

"Well, it has!" Lessa said, planting both hands on the table and pushing herself to her feet. She picked up the sketches and thrust them at Jaxom. "Put them somewhere safe until you can show Aivas. Now, I'm going to swim!"

Though he wanted a swim as badly as the others did, Jaxom detoured through the room he had shared with Sharra, hoping that she had left him a message. There was none, and he felt more dejected than ever. He shucked off his clothes, thankful that he always kept a spare change at Cove Hold, and made his way down to the lagoon.

Meer and Talla separated themselves from those scrubbing Ruth and circled his head, chittering happily. Not entirely encouraged by their response, he waded out to Ruth.

Sharra's above. She wouldn't let Meer or Talla go with her. They'd get in the way, Ruth told him.

Jaxom slapped his forehead in dismay: she had told him, too, and he had forgotten about it, once again so immersed in his own business that her doings hadn't quite registered in his brain. He laughed in self-deprecation. At times he knew he didn't deserve a woman like Sharra, and this was one of them. How conceited he was! He missed her. Even if he couldn't have told her about the marvelous journey he had just taken, he missed her.

I'm here, Ruth said in subtle reproach.

Indeed you are, my dearest friend, as you always are! And Jaxom waded out in the warm water to help the fire-lizards give his lifemate a good scrubbing.