Moreta - Dragonlady of Pern

CHAPTER XII

«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 nicked 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 melee 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 guards 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.»

Theng made a conciliatory noise between his teeth and then his attention was taken by the spacing of his guards. Slowly Capiam turned in the direction of the halls.

As he walked, he realized that he could not walk out of his Hall as Nerilka could leave her Hold. Withdrawing his healers from the Hold was quite within his right as Masterhealer, but he must remain in his Hall, available to those who need him throughout Pern. However, he felt the better for his brief flirtation with the idea. And the camp had gained not only supplies but a valuable assistant. He must ask for volunteers to take the remainder of Nerilka's purloined supplies to Ruatha with all possible haste.

«The ichor can be extracted from one queen and applied to the joints of another,» Moreta told Leri. «And you shouldn't be coming all this way for a message someone else could have brought.»

They were standing at the entrance to the Hatching Ground and talking in quiet tones, although it was doubtful that the sleeping Orlith would have paid them any attention had they bellowed. She was still exhausted from the laying of twenty-five eggs. Orlith had curled herself about the leathery eggs, the queen egg within the circle of her forearms, her head laid at an awkward angle. Her belly skin was beginning to shrink and her color was good, so Moreta had no more anxieties about her queen and time to worry about Falga's Tamianth.

«No one there is capable of doing that,» Leri said with a fine scorn, «or so Holth was informed by Kilanath. Holth says she sounds very worried.»

«She has reason to be if Tamianth is not producing any ichor on that damaged wing.» Moreta paced up and down. «Is Falga conscious?»

«Delirious.»

«Not the plague?»

«No, wound fever. Under control.»

«Shards! Falga knows how to draw ichor. It would have to be Kilanath and Diona …» Moreta looked back at the slumbering Orlith.

«She'll be out a long while,» Leri murmured, stepping inside the Hatching Ground and gripping Moreta's hands tightly in hers. «It doesn't take long to draw ichor and spread it.»

«That's abusing Oriith's trust in me!»

«She trusts me as well. Every moment you delay …»

«I know! I know!» Moreta thought wretchedly of Falga and Tamianth, of all that Weyr had done the last few days.

«If Orlith should rouse, Holth will know and, considering the emergency, Orlith will understand. The clutching's over!» Leri pressed urgently on Moreta's hands.

Unusual circumstances, of which there were far too many recently in Moreta's opinion, warranted unusual actions.

«Holth's willing. I asked her first, as soon as she told me about Tamianth.»

Obviously Leri felt that no one at Fort realized that Moreta had been absent two days before to treat the injured High Reaches' queen. Moreta cast a distraught look toward her sleeping queen, returned Leri's clasp with an answering pressure, and walked hurriedly from the sheltering arch of the Hatching Ground, quickly leaving Leri behind.

«Don't stride so! I can't,» Leri whispered after her. Moreta adjusted her pace. Anyone really observant would have noticed the difference in height between the woman who had entered the Ground and the one who left, but it was the gray hour before dawn and no one was about. Thread would Fall later that day at Nerat and the dragonriders rested whenever possible with so difficult a schedule.

Moreta delayed long enough on her way to Holth to change into her own riding gear. Leri's had left a broad exposed band across her back and she couldn't risk kidney chill. Holth greeted her at the entrance to her weyr and Moreta stepped aside for the queen to reach the edge. Then she mounted, conscious once again of the difference between dragons. She wished fervently that she did not feel that she was somehow betraying Orlith.

«Take us to the High Reaches, please, Holth,» she asked in a subdued voice.

«The watchrider sleeps and the blue will not note our departure,» Holth said impassively and, despite her dark reflections, Moreta smiled. So Leri and Holth had considered that detail.

Then Holth propelled herself from her ledge and was barely airborne before she went between. Moreta gasped at the audacity and hadn't time to think of her verse before the darkness around them was relieved by the glows surrounding the High Reaches Bowl.

«Tamianth is below but it is easier for me to take off from a ledge,» said Holth, neatly landing on one. «Tamianth will not object to my tenancy. Then she added gently,» Orlith sleeps. «And so does Leri.»

«The pair of you!» Moreta's exasperation was good natured.

Holth turned gleaming eyes toward her and huffed softly.

«Is that you? Moreta?» a quavering voice asked.

«It's Moreta.»

«Oh, bless you, bless you. I'm so sorry to drag you here but I simply can't do it. I'm afraid of hurting Kilanath. Hitting a nerve or something. They tried to explain to me how simple it all is but I can't believe them. Oh, do wake up, Kilanath. Moreta's come.»

A pair of dragon eyes lit the darkness below the ledge. Moreta put her hand on the wall, her left foot seeking for the top step. Light spilled from the weyrling quarters now occupied by Tamianth but the stairs were still in confusing shadow.

«Oh, do hurry, please, Moreta!» Diona's plea was more wail.

«I would if I could see where I'm going.» Moreta spoke sharply, irritated by Diona's ineffectuality.

«Oh, yes, of course. I didn't think. You don't know where anything is in this Weyr.» Dutifully Diona opened a glowbasket but, before she held it up, she turned its illumination away from Moreta. «Yes, Pressen, she's here. Oh, do hurry, Moreta. Oh, yes, sorry.» Then she remembered to hold the basket high enough to show Moreta the steps.

Moreta skipped down them as fast as she could before something else could distract Diona. Kilanath dipped her head close to Moreta and sniffed, as if testing the quality of the visitor.

«Now, don't fret, Kilanath,» Diona crooned in a saccharine voice that Moreta thought ought to irritate a queen. «You know she came here just to help.» Diona turned apologetically to Moreta. «She really will behave because she's terribly worried about Tamianth.»

As Moreta entered the weyrling quarters, she could see why. Tamianth looked more green than gold except for the gray wing and grayspread score on her side. The wing had been propped at the shoulder and put in a sling so that the queen could relax, but her hide twitched constantly from stress. Tamianth opened one lid of her eyes, which were gray with pain.

«Water! Water, please, water!» Falga's voice rose in feverish complaint.

«That's all she says.» Diona was wringing her hands. Pressen, the bright-eyed healer, ran to Falga's side and offered her water, but she pushed it away before falling back into her restless tossing.

Muttering an oath, Moreta strode to the queen, picked up a fold of hide on the neck, and cursed. The dragon was dehydrated, her skin parched.

«Water. Of course, it's Tamianth who needs the water! Has no one offered the queen water?» Moreta looked about for a water tank, for anything resembling a container.

«Oh, I never thought of that!» Diona snatched her hands to her mouth, her eyes wide with dismay. «Kilanath kept telling me about water but we all thought Falga …» She waved feebly at the fevered woman.

«Then, by the Egg of Faranth, get some!»

«Please, water. Water!» Falga moaned, restlessly trying to rise.

«Don't stand there, Diona. Are there weyrlings in the next building? Well, rout them out! Use a cauldron from the kitchen but get water for this poor beast. It's a wonder she's not dead! Of all the irresponsible, ineffectual, dithering idiots I have ever encountered.» Moreta saw the startled expression on Pressen's face as he rose from Falga's side. She pulled herself together, breathing deeply to dispel the impotent anger and dismay that boiled within her. «I can't keep coming here for oversights!»

«No, no, of course not!» Pressen's reply was conciliatory, anxious. The poor beast was too weak to reach farther than her rider who had, even in her pain-wracked daze, tried to communicate! Fuming at Diona's ineptitude, Moreta snatched down the nearest glowbasket to examine Tamianth's wing. Two days without any lubrication and the wing fragments might not reconstruct. The glowlight glistened ominously on a stain on the floor, under Tamianth's injured side. With a muffled cry of despair, Moreta dropped to one knee, dipped her fingers in the moisture, sniffing it.

«Pressen! Bring me your kit, redwort and oil! This dragon's bleeding to death!»

«What?»

Pressen stumbled toward her and she held the basket high, at Tamianth's side. Grimly she recalled the instructions she had given Pressen, unused to dragon injuries. Keep the side wound covered with numbweed. Why hadn't she checked it? How could she have assumed, given the chaotic conditions at High Reaches, the inexperienced healers, and the tired riders, that the wound had been properly attended? Instead she had blithely flitted off, smugly pleased with her wing repair.

«The fault is mine, Pressen. I ought to have seen to the side as well. What has happened is that Threadscore ruptured veins along the side and shoulders. Numbweed covered the ooze. Ichor isn't reaching the wing. We'll need to repair the veins. The surgery is much the same sort you'd do on a human. Color is the main difference.»

«Surgery is not my speciality, Lady, but,» he added, seeing her desperate expression, «I have assisted and can do so now.»

«I'll need surgical clamps, oil, redwort, threaded needle …» Pressen was pouring oil and redwort into bowls. «I have all the instruments we'd need. Barly's effects were handed over to me when I arrived.»

Dreading what she might find, Moreta examined the injured wing. Some ichor beaded the joints but far less than was required. Tamianth would have to be very lucky; stupidity had already worked against the poor beast. Possibly, with application of Kilanath's ichor at crucial points, the damage could still be reversed. Liberal and frequent dressings of numbweed had, at least, kept the fragments moist. Once Tamianth's veins had been mended and water brought the poor thirsty beast …

Moreta scrubbed her hands in the redwort, hissing at the sting in half-healed scratches. Then she oiled her hands thoroughly while Pressen made the same preparation.

«First we must clean the numbweed away from the wound. I'd say the stoppage is here … and here, and perhaps, even down here near the hearts.» She lightly indicated the areas, then with oil-soaked pads, she and Pressen cleaned away the numbweed. Tamianth shuddered. «With all this numbweed, she can't feel any pain. Here! See where the ichor is oozing …» Her father had always talked as he worked on injured runners. Much of what she had heard from her earliest years she had been able to apply to dragons. She oughtn't to think of her father at a time like this, but his habit would help her teach Pressen. Someone in the Weyr had to know. «Ah, here's the first one. Just below your left hand, Pressen, should be another. Yes, and a third, a major vein leading to the hearts, and the belly vein.» Moreta reached for the fine needle and the treated thread Pressen had made ready.

«Yes, the colors are different!» Pressen saw the greenish flesh and the darker green ichor that was dragon blood, the curious shining fiber that was dragon muscle. He was absorbed. «Has she had any supply to the wing at all?» His nimble fingers were suturing the first severed vein.

«Not really enough.»

«Thirsty! Thirsty. Water, please, water!» Falga raved.

«Can't that idiotic woman do anything? There's a lake full of water out there!»

There was suddenly a great amount of noise, the hollow sound of metal banging against another object, the sleepy complaints of young voices. The smell of desperately desired water roused the dragon from her stupor.

Hidden from sight behind the droop of the wing, Moreta could not see what was happening but she heard the bong of the kettle being dropped and the plash of buckets of water being poured. She heard the greedy slurping of Tamianth as the dragon sucked water down a parched throat.

«By the Egg, she'd drink barrels!» said the bemused voice of an older man. «She mustn't have too much at once, boys, so take your time with the refills. Anything else I can do,» The Weyrlingmaster ducked carefully under the wing and stared in surprise at Moreta. «I thought your queen had clutched, Moreta.»

«She has, but this one would have died …»

When Moreta pointed to the ichor-stained puddle on the floor, the disapproval in the Weyrlingmaster's face turned to shock.

«S'ligar's down with a touch of the plague, despite the vaccine,» Cr'not said. «But,» he gestured impotently toward Pressen, at the sound of Diona's voice thanking the weyrlings, «I could hear Falga calling for water …»

«It's no one's fault, Cr'not. Everyone's tired, pushed beyond their strength or trying to take on unfamiliar tasks. I should have examined this wound two days ago!»

«Sometimes I think it's only the momentum of routine that keeps any of us going,» Cr'not said, rubbing at his face and eyes.

«You could be right. There. That's the last! Thank you, Pressen. You've the makings of a good Weyr healer!»

«Once I get accustomed to such large patients!» Pressen smiled back at Moreta.

«And you're about to learn another invaluable technique for healing dragons,» Moreta said, beckoning to Pressen to follow her. She took the largest syringe from Barly's kit, fitted a needlethorn to its opening, soaked a pad quickly in redwort and then ducked under Tamianth's wing. «Diona.»

«Oh, no,» Diona moaned timorously, spreading her arms to protect her queen. «Tamianth's looking ever so much better. Her color's improved enormously.»

«I should hope so, but, if we don't get some ichor on her joints, she may never fly again. Holth, tell Kilanath!»

Cr'not moved toward the weyrwoman, his expression ferocious, and Diona moaned again.

«It doesn't take long, and it won't hurt Kilanath.»

The queen was a good deal more cooperative than her rider, dipping her wing as she knelt for Moreta's ministration.

«Pressen, see? Here, where the vein crosses the bone?» As Pressen nodded, Moreta rubbed on some redwort, turning the golden skin brown. The fine sharp needlethorn entered hide and vein so smoothly that the dragon never felt the prick. Moreta deftly drew ichor into the tube. It glistened green and healthy in the glowlight.

«Most interesting,» Pressen said, his expression intent. Neither of them paid any attention to Diona's moaning or Cr'not's exclamation of disgust.

«Now we will apply this,» Moreta returned to Tamianth, Pressen right beside her, «to the joints and the cartilage. See how dry the cartilage is? Soaks the ichor right up. Well, ah, here, nearest the shoulder, see how the beads are forming? Tamianth's beginning to function again. We'll save that wing yet!» She grinned at the little man whose face beamed back at her. «And color's returning to Tamianth's eyes, too.»

«Why, so there is! Is she winking at me?»

Moreta chuckled. The gray had certainly receded from Tamianth's huge eyes and the 'winking' was just the sparkle returning to the facets as the dragon improved. «I believe so. She knows who's helped her.»

«And Falga is sleeping.» Pressen hurried to the cot, feeling the pulse along Falga's neck. He sighed with relief. «She's much quieter now.»

«Holth?» Moreta asked, aware of other obligations.

«They sleep!» Holth was unperturbed.

«I must get back to Fort. Cr'not, will you keep checking on the wing for me? Pressen knows how to draw ichor and where to put it but not when. You would.»

«I will!» Cr'not nodded solemnly. «Now, you ought not to leave your queen,» he added, shaking his head worriedly.

«There is a point at which ought has little to do with actions, Cr'not. I was sent for. I came! Now I'm going!» She gave him a curt nod. Weyrlingmasters were a breed of their own and felt they could criticize with impunity anyone in a Weyr. As she collected her riding gear, she gave Pressen a saucy wink and then strode out of the building.

She ran to the stairs and took the steps two at a time.

«They sleep,» Holth repeated, her eyes whirling serenely.

«And so shall we once we're back home,» Moreta said, swinging up onto Holth's lean back. «Take us to Fort Weyr, please, Holth.»

Obligingly, Holth sprang from the ledge and, once again, went between as soon as there was free air about her. As the chill of nothingness wrapped them, Moreta wondered if she should mention Holth's curious trick to Leri. Was it just that the queen was old and could not jump as forcefully? Did it not seem an impertinence on Moreta's part to criticize?

Then they were back in the dawn, skimming low above the lake in Fort Weyr. That was the explanation: Holth was practicing stealth. The watchrider was unlikely to notice a dragon leaving so low in darkness.

Holth glided to her own ledge and accepted Moreta's effusive thanks before lurching wearily into her weyr. Moreta ran down the stairs and into the Hatching Ground. To the Weyrwoman's relief, Orlith hadn't so much as changed the angle of her head during her rider's absence. And Leri slept soundly on Moreta's cot.