Her hands oiled, she took the fine-pointed needle from the weyrling's hand, willing A'dan to fortitude. Orlith?

I can only speak to his green, T'grath. Orlith said a bit tartly. Dilenth needs all my concentration and none of the other queens has returned to help.

In the next second, however, A'dan shook himself, finished washing his hands, and turned resolutely to Moreta. His complexion was better and his eyes steady though he swallowed convulsively.

"Good! Let's begin. Remember! We're mending!"

Moreta jumped up on the sturdy table, beckoned him to follow, and then reached for the first length of cloth. As Moreta made her first neat tacks along the dorsal, Dilenth and A'dan twitched almost in unison. With Orlith's control and all the numbweed on the bone, Dilenth could not be experiencing any pain. A'dan had to be anticipating the dragon's reaction. So Moreta talked to him as she stitched, occasionally asking him to stretch or relax the fine cloth.

"Now I'll just fasten this to the underside. Pull to your left. The leading edge of the wing will be thick-no help for it-but if we can just save enough of the mainsail . . . There! Now, A'dan, take the numbweed paddle and smear the cloth. We'll lay on it what wingsail fragments remain. This is a very fragile summer tunic. Gently does it. M'barak, cut me another length. That tendon's been badly stretched but luckily it's still attached to the elbow. Orlith, do stop him flicking his tail. Any movement makes this operation more difficult.

Moreta was grateful when Dilenth's exertions abruptly ceased. Probably another queen had arrived to support Orlith. She thought she saw Sh'gall but he didn't stop. He wasn't attracted to this aspect of Threadfall.

"Retaining that tendon is a boon," she said, realizing that her verbal encouragement to A'dan had faltered. "I'll have those reeds now, B'greal. The longest one. You see, A'dan, we can brace the trailing edge this way, using gauze as support. And I think there're enough fragments of membrane. Yes. Ah, yes, he'll fly again, Dilenth will! Slowly now, very gently, let's lay the tatters on the gauze. M'barak, can I have the thinner salve? We'll just float the pieces . . . so ..."

As she and A'dan patiently restored the main wingsail, she could see exactly how the clump of Thread had struck Dilenth. Had F'duril and the blue dragon emerged from between a breath earlier, F'duril would have been bowled off Dilenth by the searing mass. She must remember to point out to F'duril that good fortune had attended their reentry.

They retrieved more sail fragments than she'd initially dared believe. Moreta began to feel more confident as she stitched a reed to the tendon. In time the whole would mend although the new growth, overlapping the old, would be thicker and unsightly for seasons to come, until windblown sand had abraded the heavier tissue. Dilenth would learn to compensate for the alteration on the sail surface. Most dragons readily adapted to such inequalities once they were airborne again.

Dilenth will fly again, Orlith said placidly as Moreta stepped back from the repaired wing. You've done as much as you can here.

"Orlith says we've done a good job, A'dan," she told the greenrider with a weary smile. "You were marvelous assistants, M'barak, D'ltan, B'greal!" She nodded gratefully to the three weyrlings. "Now, we'll just get Dilenth over to the ground weyrs-and you can all collapse."

She jumped down from the table and would have sprawled had A'dan's hand not steadied her. His wry grin heartened her. She propped herself against the table edge for a moment. Nesso appeared, dispensing wine to Moreta first and then the others.

Dilenth, released from Orlith's rigid control, began to sag on his legs, tilting dangerously to his right. Orlith reasserted her domination while Moreta looked around for F'duril.

"He'll be no help to anyone," Nesso observed sourly as they all watched the blue rider sinking slowly to the ground in a faint.

"It was the strain and his wound," A'dan said as he rushed to his weyrmate.

Dilenth moaned and lowered his muzzle toward his rider.

"He's all right, Dilenth," A'dan said, gently turning F'duril over. "A little sandy-"

"And a lot drunk!" M'barak murmured as he signaled the other two lads to aid A'dan with F'duril. '

"The worst is over now!" A'dan said with brisk cheer.

"He doesn't know what worst is," Nesso muttered gloomily at Moreta's side as the blue dragon lurched away, supported on one side by A'dan's Tigrath and K'lon and blue Rogeth on the other.

It took Moreta a few moments to realize that K'lon and Rogeth should not be about. "K'lon? . . ."

"He volunteered." Nesso sounded peeved. "He said that he was fine and he couldn't stand being idle when he was so badly needed. And he the only one!"

"The only one?"

Nesso averted her face from the Weyrwoman. "It was a command the Weyr could not ignore. An emergency, after all. He and F'neldril decided that he must respond to the drum message."

"What drum message are you talking about, Nesso?" Abruptly Moreta understood Nesso's averted gaze. She'd been overstepping her authority as Headwoman again.

"Fort Hold required a dragonrider to convey Lord Tolocamp from Ruatha to Fort Hold. Urgently. There is illness at Ruatha and more at Fort Hold, which cannot be deprived of its Lord Holder during such a disaster." Nesso blurted out the explanation in spurts, peering anxiously up at Moreta to gauge her reaction. "Master Capiam is sick-he must be, for it is Fortine who replies to messages, not the Masterhealer." Nesso grimaced and began to wring her hands, bringing them by degrees to her mouth as if to mask her words. "And there are sick riders at Igen, Ista, and many at Telgar. There's Fall in two days in the south ... I ask you, who will fly against Thread if three Weyrs have no riders to send?"

Moreta forced herself to breathe slowly and deeply, absorbing the sense of Nesso's babbling. The woman began to weep now, whether from the relief of confession or from remorse Moreta couldn't ascertain.

"When did this drum message come?"

"There were two. The first one, calling for a conveyance for Lord Tolocamp, just after the wings left for Fall!" Nesso mopped at her eyes, appealing mutely to Moreta for forgiveness. "Curmir said we had to respond!"

"So you did!" Nesso's blubbering irritated Moreta. "I see that you could not delay until we had returned from Fall. Surely Curmir responded that the Weyr was at Fall?"

"Well, they knew that. But F'neldril and K'lon were here-no, there"-Nesso had to find the exact spot near the Cavern-"so we all heard the drum message. K'lon said immediately that he could go. He said, and we had to agree with him, that since he had been ill of the fever, he was unlikely to contract it. He wouldn't let F'neldril or one of the weyrlings or the disabled take the risk." Nesso's eyes pleaded for reassurance. "We tried to ask Berchar about the danger of infection, but S'gor would not let anyone see him and could not answer for him. And we had to respond to Lord Tolocamp's request! It is only right that a Lord Holder be in his Hold during such a crisis. Curmir reasoned that, in such an unusual instance, we were constrained by duty to assist the Lord Holder even if it meant disobeying the Weyrleader!"

"Not to mention the Masterhealer and a general quarantine."

"But Master Capiam is at Fort Hold," Nesso protested as if that sanctioned all. "And what will be happening at Fort Hold in Lord Tolocamp's absence I cannot imagine!"

It was the happenings at Ruatha Hold that concerned Moreta more vitally, and the second drum message.

"What is this of sick riders? Did it come in on open code?"

"No, indeed! Curmir had to look it up in his Record. We did nothing about that. Not even forward it for it didn't have the pass-on cadence. F'neldril and K'lon said you should know. There are forty-five riders ill at Telgar alone!" Nesso placed one hand on her chest in a dramatic gesture. "Nine are very ill! Twenty-two are ill at Igen and fourteen at Ista." Nesso seemed obscurely pleased by the numbers.