“Any proposal that smacks of change right now,” (especially now, F’lar added to himself, thinking of this Threadfall.) “is going to alarm certain Weyrleaders and Lord Holders. Sometimes I think that only the Crafts constantly look for change, are interested and flexible enough to judge what is improvement or progressive. The Lord Holders and the – ” F’lar broke off.

Fortunately another runner was approaching from the north, his legs pumping strongly. He came straight past the green dragon, right up to his Lord.

“Sir, the northern section is clear. Three burrows have been burned out. All is secure.”

“Good man. Well run.”

The man, flushed with praise and effort, saluted the Weyrleader and his Lord. Then, breathing deeply but without labor, he strode over to the prone messenger and began massaging his legs.

Asgenar smiled at F’lar. “There’s no point in our rehearsing arguments. We are basically in agreement. If we could just make those others see!”

Mnementh rumbled that the wings were reporting an all-clear. He so pointedly extended his foreleg that Asgenar laughed.

“That does it,” he said. “Any idea how soon before we have another Fall?”

F’lar shook his head. “F’rad is here. You ought to have seven days free. You’ll hear from me as soon as we’ve definite news.”

“You’ll be at Telgar in six days, won’t you?”

“Or Lessa will have my ears!”

“My regards to your lady.”

Mnementh bore him upward in an elliptical course that allowed them to make one final check of the forest lands. Wisps of smoke curled to the north and farther to the east, but Mnementh seemed unconcerned. F’lar told him to go between. The utter cold of that dimension painfully irritated the Thread scores on his face. Then they were above Benden Weyr. Mnementh trumpeted his return and hung, all but motionless, until he heard the booming response of Ramoth. At that instant, Lessa appeared on the ledge of the weyr, her slight stature diminished still further by distance. As Mnementh glided in, she descended the long flight of stairs in much the same headlong fashion for which they criticized their weyrling son, Felessan.

Reprimands were not likely to break Lessa of that habit either, thought F’lar. Then he noticed what Lessa had in her hands and rounded angrily on Mnementh. “I’m barely touched and you babble on me like a weyrling!”

Mnementh was not the least bit abashed as he backwinged to land lightly by the Feeding Ground. Thread hurts.

“I don’t want Lessa upset over nothing!”

I don’t want Ramoth angry over anything!

F’lar slid from the bronze’s neck, concealing the twinges he felt as the gritty wind from the Feeding Grounds aggravated the cold-seared lacerations. This was one of those times when the double bond between riders and dragons became a serious disadvantage. Particularly when Mnementh took the initiative, not generally a draconic characteristic.

Mnementh gave an awkward half jump upward, clearing the way for Lessa. She hadn’t changed from wher-hide riding clothes and looked younger than any Weyrwoman ought as she ran towards them, her plaited hair bouncing behind her. Although neither motherhood nor seven turns of security had added flesh to her small-boned body, there was a subtle roundness to breast and hip, and that certain look in her great gray eyes that F’lar knew was for him alone.

“And you complain about the timing of other riders,” she said, gasping, as she came to an abrupt stop at his side. Before he could protest the insignificance of his injuries, she was smearing numbweed on the burns. “I’ll have to wash them once the feeling’s gone. Can’t you duck ash yet? Virianth will be all right but Sorenth and Relth took awful lacings. I do wish that glass craftsman of Fandarel’s – Wansor’s his name, isn’t it? – would complete those eyeguards he’s been blathering about. Manora thinks she can save P’ratan’s good looks but we’ll have to wait and see about his eye.” She paused to take a deep breath. “Which is just as well because if he doesn’t stop raiding Holds for new lovers, we won’t be able to foster all the babies. Those holdbred girls are convinced it’s evil to abort.” She stopped short, set her lips in the thin line which F’lar had finally catalogued as Lessa veering away from a painful subject.

“Lessa! No, don’t look away.” He forced her head up so she had to meet his eyes. She who couldn’t conceive must find it hard, too, to help terminate unwanted pregnancies. Would she never stop yearning for another child? How could she forget she had nearly died with Felessan? He’d been relieved that she had never quickened again. The thought of losing Lessa was not even to be thought. “Riding between so much makes it impossible for a Weyrwoman to carry to term.”

“It doesn’t seem to affect Kylara,” Lessa said with bitter resentment. She had turned away, watching Mnementh rend a fat buck with such an intense expression in her eyes that F’lar had no difficulty guessing that she’d prefer Kylara thus rendered.

“That one!” F’lar said with a sharp laugh. “Dear heart, if you must model yourself after Kylara to bear children Weyrwoman, I prefer you barren!”

“We’ve more important things to discuss than her,” Lessa said, turning to him in a complete change of mood. “What did Lord Asgenar say about the Threadfall? I’d have joined you in the meadow, but Ramoth’s got the notion she can’t leave her clutch without someone spying on them. Oh, I sent messengers out to the other Weyrs to tell them what’s happened here. They ought to know and be on their guard.”

“It would’ve been courteous of them to have apprised us first,” F’lar said so angrily that Lessa glanced up at him startled. He told her then what the Lemos Lord Holder had said on the mountain meadow.

“And Asgenar assumed that we all knew? That it was simply a matter of changing the timetables?” Shock faded from her face and her eyes narrowed, flashing with indignation. “I would I had never gone back to get those Old-timers. You’d have figured out a way for us to cope.”

“You give me entirely too much credit, love.” He hugged her for her loyalty. “However, the Oldtimers are here and we’ve got to deal with them.”

“Indeed we will. We’ll bring them up to date if . . .”

“Lessa,” and F’lar gave her a little shake, his pessimism dispersed by the vehemence of her response and the transparency of her rapid calculations on how to bring about such changes. “You can’t change a watch-wher into a dragon, my love . . .”

Who’d want to? demanded Mnementh from the Feeding Ground, his appetite sated.

The bronze dragon’s tart observation elicited a giggle from Lessa. F’lar hugged her gratefully.

“Well, it’s nothing we can’t cope with,” she said firmly, allowing him to tuck her under his shoulder as they walked back to the weyr. “And it’s nothing I don’t expect from that T’kul of the ever-so-superior High Reaches. But R’mart of Telgar Weyr?”

“How long have the messengers been gone?”

Lessa frowned up at the bright midmorning sky. “Only just. I wanted to get any last details from the Sweepriders.”

“I’m as hungry as Mnementh. Feed me, woman.”

The bronze dragon had glided up to the ledge to settle in his accustomed spot just as a commotion started in the tunnel. He extended his wings to flight position, neck craned toward the one land entrance to the dragonweyr.

“It’s the wine train from Benden, silly,” Lessa told him, chuckling as Mnementh gave voice to a loud brassy grumble and began to arrange himself again, completely disinterested in wine trains “Now don’t tell Robinton the new wine’s in, F’lar. It has to settle first, you know.”

“And why would I be telling Robinton anything?” F’lar demanded, wondering how Lessa knew that he had only just started to think of the Masterharper himself.

“There has never been a crisis before us when you haven’t sent for the Masterharper and the Mastersmith.” She sighed deeply. “If we only had such cooperation from our own kind.” Her body went rigid under his arm. “Here comes Fidranth and he says that T’ron’s very agitated.”