He would make his Hold the place where all others would come to buy their burden beasts and racers. His most private dream was of founding a racehorse line to rival that which Earth had once possessed. There was no reason, once Thread had passed, that they couldn't revive the sport of kings. The practical could coexist with the exotic. Let Caesar Galliani develop meat animals if that was his passion, but Red would go for horses.

Now, astride his bay stallion, King, the best of the fine animals he had bred from the fertilized ova he had brought with him, Red ranged up and down the line, encouraging his people and rectifying small errors in the order.

He had positioned one of the heavier sleds to break trail, with teams of his strongest youths to widen the way whenever necessary. The way north through the main Fort valley was easy enough, but soon they would come to the less-traveled ground. Not that he didn't know the track like the back of his hand, he'd been up and down it so often, but a lot of it wasn't geared for wide traffic.

There were people waiting for them, too, at the new premises: the four fostered youngsters who were old enough to help; Egend Raghir and David Jacobsen, who were supervising the mechanical apparatus in the Hold; Madeleine Messurier, in charge of the domestic arrangements; and Maurice de Broglie, who, along with Ozzie and Cobber on loan from the specialists' work pool, was still checking rock formations and the tunnels. Soon they would move on to investigate other possible sites for holdings.

As soon as the wagon train was around the bend and Fort was out of sight, Red sent his fire-lizard, Snapper, to Maddie to announce that they were on their way. Useful creatures, the fire-lizards, though there seemed to be fewer of them about these days.

Sorka said it was because they were going back to their native sands in the South to lay their eggs. The little golden queens, being more responsible, remained to see them safely hatched before coming back to their humans. The green females laid their eggs and then forgot about the matter and, being shatter-witted, probably forgot that they had once had human friends. Sorka's Duke remained faithful, as did Sean's two browns and Snapper, another brown. Slowly, though, there were fewer and fewer of the winsome creatures in and out of Fort Hold.

"They may mind the cold and dreary winters more than we do," Sorka suggested. "We could go back to Landing and see if there're any clutches about to hatch."

Red had caught Sean's frown. The lad—and Red corrected himself with a private grin, because "lad" no longer applied to this confident adult—Sean, rider of bronze Carenath, was known as the Weyrleader. And, if he had certain traits of the martinet, they were needed to shape up his growing dragonrider contingent. In any case, his orders were strictly obeyed and, to Red's thinking, were sensibly formulated. There would be little spare time for the dragon-riders to go looking for fire-lizard nests. In fact, they had made only one return journey.

When Ezra Keroon had been fretful with the fever that racked him, Sean had very willingly gone back to Landing on Carenath. Sean had returned—almost as soon as he'd left, Sorka had remarked—to reassure the old captain that the Aivas building, which Ezra had so carefully shielded with shuttle tiles against Garben's eruption, remained intact and unscathed. Later Sean had reported more fully to Paul that the old settlement was just so many mounds under a thick carpet of gray volcanic ash. However, the knowledge that the interface with the Yokohama was still intact had soothed the querulous Ezra, and he'd gratefully subsided into a sleep from which he never woke: another victim of the undiagnosed fever.

The new place could quite easily be named after Ezra Keroon, Red thought. Certainly the man had been one of the heroes of the Evacuation—in fact, the last man to leave Landing, bar the admiral and Joel Lilienkamp. And even before the trip to Pern, he'd been a hero of the Nathi War, too. Yes, it wouldn't be a bad thing to name his Hold "Keroon." Or "Kerry." That was a good way to keep long-lost but well-loved places, or people, alive.

A request for his presence at the head of the caravan interrupted his ruminations. His mind back to the journey at hand, Red cantered King to see what the problem was.

They made camp the first night where Red had often done so, in a rocky clearing by one of the streams that fed into the bigger Fort River. All the stock was hungry enough to munch happily on the dried shredded seaweed that some of the fussier eaters tended to refuse.

A campfire is a cheerful affair, even when made of dried animal dung. Someone had contrived a solution that, when used to immerse the dung, replaced any lingering unpleasant odors with that of apple wood. The nutritious dinner stew was even seasoned appealingly so that, if you didn't think about the fact that it had been processed from offal, seaweed, and wild herbs and grains, you could relish the meal. Red was too hungry to be the least bit finicky, and let the hard travel bread soften in the leftover juices.

Snapper returned with a note from Maddie attached his leg.

The welkin will ring when we sight you. River's high with last week's rain. Don't let the sleds bog down. M.

Mairi had made their bed under one of the sleds. She had insisted that her bones required a certain amount of padding. Red wouldn't admit that his own did, too, and was grateful to lie down with only her and Snapper near him. He was thinking of the absolute wealth of three good-sized rooms at. . . Keroon Hold—naw, that didn't sound right—just for Mairi and himself.

The morning brought an unexpected delay. Some of the beasts, mainly those hauling sleds, had to be treated for harness galls. The harness had been new, but Red had thought it had been softened enough not to rub. Mairi dug about in their household belongings and brought out some well-cured sheep fleeces and some of the cotton that she had saved from the last crop at Landing. Red first applied the numbweed salve that was now in everyone's first-aid kit, then padded the abraded spots to prevent further friction. They also redistributed the lighter items from the sleds of the galled teams to ease their burden, and Red himself made certain that all harnesses were flexible enough and fitted perfectly. One thing sure, Red announced: He'd personally inspect every strap of harness that evening after it had been cleaned.

The delay cost them several hours, but when they finally moved out, it was in good heart, with smiles on faces that had grown unused to smiling. Almost, Red thought, as if the sheer joy of being out on their own, away from the burden of so much imprivacy—was that a word? he wondered, but it sounded exactly right—outweighed any minor snag. He was relieved and glad for many reasons to see this attitude adjustment. Considerable hard work would still be needed to complete the new place and make it livable, not to mention comfortable. For a while, there'd be other inconveniences and makeshifts. While they carved out their new habitation from the basic cavern system, everything would be covered with stone dust. He had brought as many masks as Joel would allow him, but there weren't enough for more than the people right at the work site. And rock dust had an insidious habit of permeating and clinging to objects well away from the actual excavation. Mairi had complained about the state of Red's clothing after his first long stay at the Hold cave.

He hoped that Max Schultz had managed to get his gang to finish the stud fencing. Red had paid his next-to-last credits to have the plastic extruded for enough posts and rails to provide paddocks. He wanted barn-sour animals to spend as much time as possible out-of-doors, even if it would be awhile before any grass could get started. There wouldn't be that much time to exercise horses at first, but they did have stables and byres inside the immense low cavern that would hold all the beasts. Turn-out paddocks were essential. He'd get Deccie Foley, who had a knack for teaching animals, to train the dogs with a certain call or whistle to round up the animals so that just one person would be needed to help the dogs get them all in under cover when Thread fell.