Dragon’s Time: Dragonriders of Pern

by Anne; Todd J. Mccaffrey Mccaffrey

  “You’ve got Jeila!” Shaneese reminded her.

  “And—” Terin cut herself off abruptly. She’d been about to say “Lorana” and they all knew it. The redhead went bright red and lowered her eyes, toying with her breakfast.

  “She’ll be back,” Fiona said firmly.

  There was silence with Terin eating slowly to avoid speech and Shaneese eyeing her worriedly, groping for words.

  “Well, I’ve said my news,” Shaneese said, pulling her hand out from Fiona’s again. “You need to eat, Weyrwoman.”

  “So do you!” Fiona reminded her, pointing to the food in front of them. “Oh, this will work out perfectly! With you to keep me eating and Jeriz—”

  “And how is he working out?”

  “Better, with a good night’s sleep,” Fiona said. “Did you know, he’d been too proud to admit he was freezing sleeping by himself?”

  “Traders trade on their pride,” Shaneese said.

  “And what is the profit on freezing to death?” Fiona asked, brows raised archly. “Anyway, as soon as I realized where the chattering was coming from, I insisted he get in with me—”

  “Kindan didn’t object?” Shaneese asked.

  “Kindan wasn’t there,” Fiona said, moving on quickly. “Anyway, as soon as I got him in with me he was out like a new-hatched dragon with a full stomach.” Terin giggled at the image. Fiona’s eyes narrowed as she observed Shaneese’s body language.

  “What is there between you and this child?” Fiona asked her, her tone serious and authoritative.

  “I’ve nothing against the lad,” Shaneese protested quickly.

  “I never asked you, how was it you came to be here, a trader in the Weyr?” Fiona pressed.

  “L’rat found me,” Shaneese said. “I wanted to go. I was young.”

  “Do you miss him much?” Terin asked softly.

  Shaneese frowned before responding, “He was a good man.”

  “But—”

  “I don’t think I ever really knew him,” Shaneese said honestly.

  “Not the way you know T’mar,” Fiona guessed.

  “You have the advantage of me,” Shaneese said, her eyes dim, reserved. “You are younger, prettier—”

  “Oh, please!” Fiona broke in. “This is not a competition, Shaneese. I told you that before.”

  Shaneese nodded, her eyes wet with unshed tears, and she bowed her head.

  “I left because I was shamed,” Shaneese said. “Tenniz shamed me.”

  “How?” Fiona asked, eyes wide with surprise, prepared to hear the worst.

  “No,” Shaneese said quickly, “he did nothing like that.” She sighed. “In fact, I think he told the truth. And, perhaps if I’d been older, I would have understood the gift he gave me.” She snorted at a memory and looked up to meet Fiona’s eyes. “Instead, I spit in his soup.”

  “Shaneese!” Terin exclaimed.

  “I had sixteen Turns at the time,” Shaneese said. “I had a lot of pride, too.” She added, frankly, “I was beautiful in my youth.”

  “Still are!” Fiona said, just a moment before Terin joined in agreement.

  Shaneese waved their compliments aside. “Traders value the profit and the trade.”

  “We know,” Terin said, with all the feeling of old Igen Weyr’s principal negotiator.

  “For a woman, a man must be worthy,” Shaneese continued. “And so, when Tenniz said what he said …”

  “What horrible thing did he say?” Fiona asked. “That you were ugly?”

  “He said that I would be second wife and enjoy it,” Shaneese said, looking directly at Fiona. “That I would gain great honor and much happiness after a time of sorrow.”

  “Yeah, he always seemed to speak in riddles,” Terin agreed.

  “Among the traders, being second wife is considered a great shame,” Shaneese said with a sigh. “Rarely do we even consider such things and almost always in times of great hardship.” She sighed again. “And then, the first wife is always the one considered the better, the superior.”

  She shook her head. “I could not believe that he had seen the future and he would not take back his words.” Her lips turned down in a frown as she added, “I think he was truly hurt that I didn’t find joy in his seeing.”

  “So you spat in his soup?” Fiona asked.

  Shaneese nodded, her dark skin brightening with an underlying blush.

  “I suppose that beats tunnel snakes in the bed,” Terin said, glancing meaningfully at Fiona.

  “It was only one!” Fiona protested. “And you said you wouldn’t tell anyone!”

  “Seems to me,” Terin replied, taking another roll and buttering it, “that if you two are wives to the same man, you ought to share such exploits.”

  Fiona thought on that and nodded, telling Shaneese, “It was Kindan, Turns back when I was a child and he’d been ignoring me.”

  “A tunnel snake?” Shaneese repeated.

  “It was only little,” Fiona said in her own defense. “And I screamed a warning before he got in the bed, so he wasn’t bitten.”

  “Tunnel snakes are rare in the desert,” Shaneese said. “But they are very deadly. You’re lucky you weren’t caught.”

  “Oh, believe me,” Fiona said, rising from her chair and rubbing her behind in painful memory, “I was caught!”

  Shaneese and Terin shared a laugh at her expense. Fiona joined them, then said to Terin, “We should get going if we don’t want Kindan to send the weyrlings after us.” She turned and hugged Shaneese. “I can’t say what the future will hold,” she told the older woman. “But I would like to see it with you—and our children.”

  “I cannot say that it will always be easy, Weyrwoman,” Shaneese told her somberly. “I am not the easiest of persons and I may find it difficult to share.”

  “I know what you mean!” Terin agreed feelingly.

  “This close, this near to the same man, things may not always be easy,” Fiona agreed, hugging her again. “We can only do our best.”

  Shaneese nodded solemnly. “And we’ll do our best for our children.”

  “Always! That’s what weyrfolk do!”

  Fiona and Terin found the weyrlings and Kindan already arrayed outside the weyrling barracks. Kindan noted their approach and worked them carefully into his speech.

  “And here are the Weyrwoman and weyrwoman Terin to show us how it’s done,” Kindan said, his eyes darting with laughter as he saw how he’d caught Fiona unprepared and how quickly she’d recovered from the sudden introduction.

  Fiona eyed the cluster of weyrlings. Forty-two. If only they were old enough and mature enough to fight Thread. Telgar would have a full Flight with reserves and … they just might make it. She forced the thought away, concentrating on maintaining a cheerful appearance. “The Weyrwoman is the heart of the Weyr.”

  “Weyrlingmaster, what is it you want us to do?”

  “I was thinking, to warm up, some dismounted drill,” Kindan said.

  Fiona smiled and nodded, moving closer to Kindan to speak to his ears alone, “May I make a suggestion?”

  “Of course,” Kindan said out of the corner of his mouth, even as he waved for the weyrlings to spread out. “You know I’m just winging this.”

  Terin giggled at the choice of words.

  “After they’ve stretched, have them bring out their weyrlings to watch the drill,” Fiona said. “And before that, it might make sense if Talenth and I make a demonstration flight.”

  “It’ll be Turns before they can fly,” Kindan reminded her.

  “True, but we found at Igen that drilling and practicing made their muscles stronger when they could fly.”

  Kindan nodded at the sense in that. Fiona recalled that not too long ago—just after the weyrlings had Impressed—she had made a note to spend more time with them. It seemed such a long time ago, but it was only a month; the events of Lorana’s disappearance and the ever-present dread hanging over the Weyr seemed to make events distant, me
mories fading.

  “And when they got older, they were allowed to practice gliding off the queens’ ledge,” Terin put in hopefully.

  “Well, if Jeila won’t mind, I’ve no objection,” Fiona said, grinning. “After all, I could hardly imagine Talenth objecting. Turnabout is fair play.”

  “You’ll say that if you find a tunnel snake in your bed, won’t you?” Kindan teased.

  “No, I won’t,” Fiona told him firmly, her hand moving down to her belly. “I have no need of a sudden fright.”

  Kindan acknowledged her point with a nod, but Fiona suspected that sometime in the future, after the birth, she might find herself the recipient of a tunnel snake shock.

  Kindan split the weyrlings into three teams, with X’lerin leading one, W’vin leading another, and Taria in charge of the third. The green rider gave him a startled look when her name was called, but Kindan explained that every weyrling should expect to lead the drill.

  “Jeriz here is going with W’vin’s group,” Kindan said, nodding to the youngster. Some of the weyrlings exchanged surprised looks, but Kindan continued, “For this exercise, he’ll be a rider from another Weyr.”

  Kindan started the weyrlings on simple stretching exercises, going from group to group to provide corrections and examples. Fiona decided to follow along.

  “Don’t stretch too much,” Kindan warned her.

  “Bekka would have told me if I couldn’t.”

  “I don’t recall you asking her,” Terin remarked.

  Fiona gave her a mulish look, then thought better of it. Talenth, could you ask Bekka if I can exercise with the weyrlings?

  A moment later, a thin voice bellowed from a weyr several levels up, “Of course! Just take it slow!”

  Fiona smiled and waved up at the small blob of blond hair and the larger form of Birentir behind her. Bekka waved idly back and returned to her rounds. Fiona noticed the shadow of a third person behind them.

  “Where’s Jeila?” Fiona asked.

  “With Bekka,” Terin told her, sounding surprised. “Didn’t you know? She’s been doing it for nearly a sevenday, Shaneese asked her.”

  “Makes sense,” Fiona said. “I imagine Bekka’s keeping an eye on her.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “You go with Xhinna and I’ll go with X’lerin,” Fiona said. “We can be extra riders, too.” With a wave she headed off, leaving Terin to tromp over to her assigned group, feeling a bit awkward.

  Fortunately, Xhinna and Taria greeted her cheerfully and Xhinna worked her into their stretch exercises quickly.

  After stretches, Kindan had them run. Fiona joined in, but ran slower than the others. She hated running and Kindan knew it; she planned to plead her pregnancy if he gave her any trouble.

  “Come on, Fiona, you can do better!” Kindan called to her as he urged the others on. “You don’t want to show the weyrlings that they’re faster than you.”

  Well, naturally, all the weyrlings immediately set about to prove that they were faster than their Weyrwoman. Fiona kept up gamely, glowering at Kindan while arranging to be slow enough that even the slowest of the weyrlings beat her.

  “They’ll be talking about that for days,” Kindan murmured to her as she made it past the final mark.

  Fiona smiled at him. Kindan gave her a wary look: he’d seen that look on her shortly before he’d found that tunnel snake.

  “You know,” Fiona said, “we should have them run to the queens’ ledge and back.”

  Kindan cocked his head at her questioningly.

  “After a while, tell them that the first one back will be the first to have their dragon glide from the ledge.”

  Kindan’s brows rose approvingly. “A very good idea.”

  “And I’ll be able to run to the queens’ ledge and sit out the run back,” Fiona added.

  Kindan laughed. “Another good idea.”

  He turned his attention back to the weyrlings as Fiona rejoined X’lerin’s group and received their good-natured and high-spirited commiserations with aplomb. He had them space out and started them on calisthenics. It was not long at all before all of them were sweating, hot, and tired, Fiona and Terin among them.

  Kindan had them cool down with some simple formation drills: having them form wings and wheel left, right, and form to line ahead. He had them practice “flying” between each other, taking care to avoid touching their outstretched fingers—“wings”—while making the maneuvers progressively more complicated.

  The drill lasted less than an hour before Kindan set them loose to look after their hatchlings.

  Kurinth came scuttling out of her weyr then, looking for Terin, who raced off to feed her. Fiona and Jeriz, however, joined the hatchlings as they went into their quarters.

  “Feed them, then check their skin,” Kindan ordered as he looked around for the runner assigned to coordinate getting the raw meat sent over from the Kitchen. He frowned, and nodded toward Jeriz. “Do you think you could run over and tell Shaneese that the hatchlings need their meal?”

  Jeriz gave him a slightly troubled look, but nodded anyway, taking off across the Weyr Bowl with his arms slightly outstretched, trying to disguise his self-conscious imitation of their earlier drill.

  Fiona followed X’lerin and the werylings she’d drilled with to their dragonets, praising each one and giving advice on feeding when the buckets of scraps arrived.

  “You’re doing great with the oiling,” Fiona told X’lerin as she examined Kivith’s skin and stroked the small bronze’s eye ridges.

  “Thank you, Weyrwoman.”

  “Could you look at my dragon, please?” a worried weyrling asked and Fiona shortly found herself going from weyrling to weyrling offering advice or encouragement as needed. She was not surprised that Xhinna’s Tazith and Taria’s Coranth were perfectly groomed: the older girl had spent enough time helping Fiona oil young Talenth when they were together back in Fort Weyr.

  “It’ll seem like all you do is feed, oil, and—occasionally—sleep,” Fiona assured the weyrlings with a grin. “But, ask any dragonrider and they’ll tell you that it gets better over time.”

  “How long?” W’vin asked.

  “It depends on the dragonet,” Fiona said. “Some start sleeping longer in their third or fourth month, others sooner, others later.” She smiled at the chorus of half-smothered groans rising around her. “You get used to it so quickly that when they start sleeping longer or needing less oiling, you’ll wonder where you found all the extra time.”

  That thought cheered them up. She caught several stifling yawns and saw at least one that had to be caught by the others when he stumbled, sleep-weary.

  As soon as she could, Fiona caught up with Jeriz and suggested that they tend to Talenth.

  “Are we going to have to oil her?” Jeriz asked, his eyes wide in fear of the monumental task.

  “Of course!” Fiona agreed impishly, starting her way briskly across the Bowl and smiling at the pounding of the boy’s feet behind her as he strove to catch up.

  “She’s bigger, but not so patchy,” an oily Jeriz declared with relief an hour later when they’d finished going over every bit of Talenth’s gold hide. He wiped his oily fingers on the rag and, with a disappointed frown when he realized that he hadn’t made them any drier, wiped them surreptitiously on the back of his trousers.

  Talenth rustled her wings and carefully folded herself into a comfortable ball, placed her head under her wing, ready for a nap.

  The air smelled of hot rock, cool oil, and the very special, pungent smell of dragon.

  “Be glad she’s not Tolarth,” Fiona said, patting her queen affectionately. “We’d still be here.”

  “Tolarth is Jeila’s queen,” Jeriz said sounding both questioning and proud at the same time.

  “She’s the biggest queen on Pern, for the moment,” Fiona said. “She’s the first queen born with the cure for the sickness.”

  “And that makes her bigger?”

  “We’ll s
ee,” Fiona said. “If the other queens—like Terin’s Kurinth—get as big, then probably. If not, well, Minith is maybe better at producing big dragons.”

  They will all get bigger, Talenth assured her.

  I’m sure yours will, love, Fiona thought back affectionately.

  “We should clean up and then get lunch,” Fiona said to Jeriz.

  “And after that?”

  “Reading Records,” Fiona pronounced. Jeriz couldn’t stifle groaning his opinion of that.

  The afternoon was, as Fiona had said, spent reading Records. But some of it was spent with the boy perched in her lap as she traced out the letters and read to him. He was small enough that his weight didn’t crush her and cute enough that cuddling him was a joy; Fiona hoped that her sons would be as cuddly at his age. Jeriz at first resisted the treatment, but relented when it became clear that it was the easiest way to work on reading.

  After an hour of working on letters, Fiona switched to reading Records. Not long after she started, she felt the boy’s body relax into slumber. She smiled fondly as she heard the slow, steady sound of his breathing and, greatly daring, kissed the top of his head, finding the jet black hair as soft as she’d imagined. How could anyone not love this child, Fiona thought to herself. She bent to kiss his hair once more, but her movement must have startled him, for Jeriz woke and struggled in her lap.

  “Get off!” he said, erupting from the chair. He turned back and glared at her. “I’m not your son.”

  “No,” Fiona agreed. “You fell asleep.”

  “I was tired,” Jeriz said, lowering his eyes from hers. “And you were droning on.”

  Fiona got the impression that Jeriz felt his pride had been assaulted.

  “Sorry,” she said, nodding toward the nearby chair. “You can sit there, if you’d prefer.”

  Jeriz idled toward the chair but seemed reluctant to take it. He sat in it for a moment, then got it. “It’s hard and cold.”

  Fiona hid a smile. “I’m sorry,” she told him. “You can have your choice of chairs, but they’re all pretty much hard and cold.”