“No. Who’s going to be the lucky rider?” he heard himself asking. It was a civil enough question. He was, after all, F’lar’s Wing-second and had a right to be curious about such matters. “You can ask for an open flight, you know,” he added defensively.

She turned pale and leaned back against Wirenth. As if for comfort.

As if for comfort, F’nor repeated the observation to himself, and remembered, with no relief, the way Brekke had looked at T’bor the day before. “It doesn’t matter if the rider’s already attached, you know, not in a first mating.” He blurted it out, then realized, like the greenest dolt that that was stupid. Brekke’d know exactly what Kylara’s reaction would be if T’bor’s Orth flew Wirenth. She’d know she would have no peace at all. He groaned at his ineptitude.

“Your arm is hurting?” she asked, solicitous.

“No. Not my arm,” and he stepped forward, gripping her shoulder with his good hand. “Look, it’d be better if you called for an open flight. There are plenty of good bronzes. N’ton of Benden Weyr, B’dor of Ista Weyr. Both are fine men with good beasts. Then you could leave Southern . . .”

Brekke’s eyes were closed and she seemed to go limp in his grasp.

“No! No!” The denial was so soft he barely heard it. “I belong here. Not – Benden.”

“N’ton could transfer.”

A shudder went through Brekke’s body and her eyes flew open. She slipped away from his grip.

“No, N’ton – shouldn’t come to Southern,” she said in a flat voice

“He’s got no use for Kylara, you know,” F’nor continued, determined to reassure her. “She doesn’t succeed with every man, you know. And you’re a very sweet person, you know.”

With a shift of mood as sudden as any of Lessa’s, Brekke smiled up at him.

“That’s nice to know.”

And somehow F’nor had to laugh with her, at his own blundering interference, at the notion of him, a brown rider giving advice to someone like Brekke, who had more sense in her smallest finger than he.

Well, he was going to get a message to N’ton and B’dor anyhow. Ramoth would help him.

“Have you named your lizard?” he asked.

“Berd. Wirenth and I decided. She likes him,” Brekke replied, smiling tenderly on the sleeping pair. “Although it’s very confusing. Why do I have a bronze, you a queen and Mirrim three?”

F’nor shrugged and grinned at her. “Why not? Of course, once we tell them that’s not how it’s done, they may conform to time-honored couplings.”

“What I meant was, if the fire lizards – who seem to be miniature dragons – can be Impressed by anyone who approaches them at the crucial moment, then fighting dragons – not just queens who don’t chew firestone anyhow – could be Impressed by women, too.”

“Fighting Thread is hard work. Leave it to men.”

“You think managing a Weyr isn’t hard work?” Brekke kept her voice even but her eyes darkened angrily. “Or plowing fields and hollowing cliffs for Holds? And . . .”

F’nor whistled. “Why, Brekke, such revolutionary thoughts from a craftbred girl? Where women know there’s only one place for them . . . Oh, you’ve got Mirrim in mind as a rider?”

“Yes. She’d be as good or better than some of the male weyrlings I know,” and there was such asperity in Brekke’s voice that F’nor wondered just which boys she found so lacking. “Her ability to Impress three fire lizards indicates . . .”

“Hey – backwing a bit, girl. We’ve enough trouble with the Oldtimers as it is without trying to get them to accept a girl riding a fighting dragon! C’mon, Brekke. I know your fondness for the child and she seems a good intelligent girl, but you must be realistic.”

“I am,” Brekke replied, so emphatically that F’nor looked at her in surprise. Some riders should have been crafters or farmers – or – nothing, but they were acceptable to dragons on Hatching. Others are real riders, heart and soul and mind. Dragons are the beginning and end of their ambition. Mirrim . . .”

A dragon broke into the air above the Weyr, trumpeting.

“F’lar!” With such a wingspan, it could be no other.

F’nor broke into a run, motioning Brekke to follow him to the Weyr landing field.

“No. You go. Wirenth’s waking. I’ll wait.”

F’nor was relieved that she preferred to stay. He didn’t want her to come out with that drastic theory in front of F’lar, particularly when he wanted his half-brother to shift N’ton and B’dor here for her sake. Anything to spare Brekke the kind of scene Kylara would throw if T’bor’s Orth flew Wirenth.

“Where is everyone?” was F’lar’s curt greeting as his brother joined him. “Where’s Kylara? Mnementh can’t find Prideth. She’s not to be haring off on her own.”

“Everyone’s out trying to trap fire lizards.”

“With Thread falling out of pattern? Of all the stupidities . . . This continent is by no means immune! Where in the image of all shells is T’bor? That’d be all we need – Threads ravaging the southern continent!”

The outburst was so uncharacteristic that F’nor stared at the Weyrleader. F’lar passed his hand over his eyes, rubbing his temples. The cold of between had started his headache again. The talk at the Crafthall had been unsettling. He gripped his half-brother’s arm in apology.

“That was inexcusable of me, F’nor. I beg your pardon.”

“Accepted, of course. That’s Orth wheeling in right now.” F’nor decided to wait before asking F’lar what was really bothering him. He could just imagine what Raid of Benden Hold or Sifer of Bitra Hold had had to say about new levies of manpower. Probably felt that the change of Threadfall was a personal insult, dreamed up by Benden Weyr to annoy the faithful Holds of Pern.

T’bor landed and strode toward the waiting men.

Perhaps Brekke was not so far off in her heretical doctrine, F’nor thought. T’bor had made Southern Weyr self-sufficient and productive, no small task. He’d obviously have made a good Holder.

“Orth said you were here, F’lar. What brings you to Southern? You heard our news about the fire lizards?” T’bor called, brushing the sand from his clothes as he walked.

“Yes, I did,” replied F’lar in so formal a tone that T’bor’s welcoming smile faded. “And I thought you’d heard ours, that Thread is dropping out of pattern.”

“There’s a rider along every inch of coastline, F’lar, so don’t accuse me of negligence,” T’bor said, his smile returning. “Dragons don’t need to be a-wing to spot Thread. Shells, man, you can hear it hissing across the water.”

“I assume you were looking for fire lizard eggs?” F’lar sounded testy and not completely reassured by T’bor’s report. “Have you found any?”

T’bor shook his head. “There’s evidence, far to the west, of another clutch, but there isn’t a sign of shell or corpse. The wherries can make fast work of anything edible.”

“Were I you, T’bor, I’d not release an entire Weyr to search for lizard eggs. There’s no guarantee Thread will move in on this continent from the ocean.”

“But it always has. What little we get.”

“Thread fell ten hours before schedule across Lemos north when it should have fallen on Lemos south and Telgar southeast,” F’lar told him in a hard voice. “I have since heard that Thread fell, unchecked,” and he paused to let that sink in to T’bor’s mind, “in Telgar Hold and Crom Hold, both times out of phase with the tables, though we do not yet know the time differential. We can’t rely on any previous performance.”

“I’ll mount guards immediately and send the wings to sweep as far south as we’ve penetrated,” T’bor said briskly and, shrugging into his riding jacket, trotted back to Orth. They were aloft in one great leap.

“Orth looks well,” F’lar said and then eyed his half-brother closely before he smiled, jabbing a fist affectionately at F’nor’s good shoulder. “You do, too. How’s the arm healing?”

“I’m at Southern,” F’nor replied in oblique explanation. “Are Threadfalls really that erratic?”