A Gift of Dragons

THE GIRL WHO HEARD DRAGONS

Aramina was roused by the urgency of her parents’ voices. Dowell’s fierce whisper of persuasion and her mother’s a fearful rejoinder. She lay still, at first thinking that her mother had had another of her “seeings,” but on such occasions Barla’s voice was totally devoid of emotion. Straining her ears to pick up only her parents’ words, Aramina ignored the myriad nocturnal noises of the enormous Igen cavern that sheltered some of the hundreds of holdless folk on Pern.

“It is pointless to assign blame at this juncture, Barla,” her father was whispering, “or to moan about our pride in Aramina’s ability. We must leave. Now. Tonight.”

“But winter comes,” Barla wailed. “How will we survive?”

“I can’t say that we survived all that well here last winter, with so many to share out what game was caught,” Dowell said as he rapidly stuffed oddments into the capacious pack. “I’ve heard tell of caves in Lemos. And Lemos …”

“Has wood!” There was bitterness in Barla’s voice. “And none in Igen to suit you.”

“We may be holdless, woman, but we have not lost honor and dignity. I will not be party to Lady Holdless Thella’s designs. I will not permit our daughter to be exploited in such a way. Gather your things. Now. I’ll wake the children.”

When Dowell touched Aramina’s shoulder, she swallowed against her fear. She hadn’t liked the self-styled Lady Holdless Thella when Thella had sought her out on the last few visits to the Igen caverns to recruit people to her roving bands. Aramina had been fascinated, and obliquely repelled by Giron, Thella’s second-in-command, the dragonless man who had scrutinized her so intently that Aramina had been hard put not to squirm under his cold and empty eyes. A man who had been a dragonrider and lost his dragon was only half a man, or so everyone said. Thella had hinted at concessions for Aramina’s family, perhaps even a hold, though Aramina was not so stupid as to contest that possibility, even as Thella offered the bait. Nor did Thella’s argument that the holdless had to band together, sharing whatever possessions they had, hold any weight with a child who had early learned that no gift was free.

“I’m sorry, Father,” she murmured in fearful contrition.

“Sorry? For what, child? Oh, you heard? You are not at fault, ’Mina. Can you manage your sister? We must leave now.”

Aramina nodded. She rose and deftly twisted her blanket about her shoulders to make a sling for Nexa. She had carried her thus often as the small family had wandered eastward. Indeed, Nexa merely draped herself sleepily across Aramina’s bony young shoulder and snuggled into the supporting blanket without rousing from her deep slumber.

Aramina glanced about, unconsciously checking to see that every one of their few belongings had been reclaimed.

“I’ve already packed the wagon with what we could take,” Dowell said.

“And Mother thought that that thieving Nerat family was pilfering things again.” Aramina was somewhat exasperated because she had been obliged to spend an entire day surreptitiously near that noisome camp, trying to spot any of their belongings.

Barla had already gathered up her precious cooking pots, wrapping them in old clothes to prevent their banging. Another shawl held the rest of the family’s portables, zealously guarded against the pilfering habits of the cavern’s population.

“Hush now! Come. We must make the most of the full moons.”

For the first time Aramina regretted that her father’s skill with woods had purchased for his family a partially secluded alcove toward the rear of the great Igen cavern. It had been much cooler during the blazing Igen summer, warmer and sheltered from the bitter winter winds, but now it seemed an interminable distance as they wended a cautious path among sleeping bodies to reach the entrance of the wind-sculpted sandstone cave.

Frequently Aramina had to shift Nexa in the journey down the sands to the river, sinking occasionally into old refuse holes and trying not to trip over debris. Having no hold to be proud of, the holdless residing in Igen cavern had no pride of place either, and any accommodation, transient or semipermanent, was marked by mute evidence of their occupancy.

The moons came out, bright Belior high and the smaller, dimmer Timor halfway down her arc, highlighting Igen River. Aramina wondered how long her father had planned this exodus, for not only did they have illumination but the river, dried by the summer’s sun, was low enough to make crossing to the Lemos side relatively easy and safe. Very soon, when the fall rains began in the high mountains, no one would be able to cross the torrent that rampaged around the bend, flooding the now shallow ford. Aramina also remembered that Thella and Giron had been in the cavern that very afternoon, unlikely to return for several days, thus giving the fleeing family some margin of escape. Neither had approached Aramina, for which she had been grateful, but perhaps Thella had alarmed Dowell. Whatever the reason, Aramina was grateful on many counts to be away from the brawling, odorous, overcrowded cavern. And she knew that Barla would be, too. Her brother Pell’s tendency to brag about his family would now be limited to hill and forest, wherry and tunnel snake.

The dray beasts were already hitched to the family’s wagon, a smallish one but adequate for four people. Since Aramina heard dragons and could give warning of the imminence of Threadfall, the family could travel with some impunity. It was this talent, until just recently considered the family’s most valuable asset, that the Lady Holdless Thella wished to pervert to her unlawful ends.

Aramina shifted her sleeping sister once more, for both shoulders ached, and Nexa, like other inanimate objects, appeared to grow heavier. Pell had awakened; his initial outburst muffled by Dowell’s large hand, he now trotted beside his father, burdened by the shawl bundle, and complained in a low undertone. Aramina came abreast of him.

“If you hadn’t blabbed to show off, we wouldn’t be running away,” she said to him in a tone for his ears only.

“We aren’t running,” Pell snapped back, grunting as the shawl bundle cracked him on the right shin. “We don’t run away. We change camps!” He was taunting her now with her own words, used on previous occasions to ease the stigma of their holdless-ness. “But where can we go,” and his voice became a frightened wail, “that Thella can’t find us?”

“It’s me she wants, and she won’t find me. You’ll be safe.”

“I don’t want to be safe,” Pell replied stoutly, “if you have to run because of me and my big mouth.”

“Hush!” said Dowell in a sharp voice. The children trudged the rest of the way in silence.

Their dray beasts, Nudge and Shove, turned their heads, lowing softly at the approach of familiar people; Dowell had left them with sufficient grain in their feed bags to content them. Barla climbed into the rear of the hide-covered wagon, took the sleeping Nexa from Aramina, the bundle from Pell, and gestured the children to the fore where Dowell was untying ring reins from the tether stone. Aramina and Pell reclaimed their goods from the wagon and took their positions, one on either side of the team, ready to encourage them into the river and up the bank on the far side. Dowell and Barla would walk behind to push should the wagon founder.

Despite the hour and the circumstances of their departure, Aramina felt a tremendous relief as they moved off. Two Turns ago she had been inexpressibly relieved not to have to plod at the pace of Nudge and Shove day after weary day. But now traveling was a far more palatable alternative to being part of Thella’s vindictive schemes.

“We are not holdless by choice, Aramina,” Barla had often abjured her daughter, “for your father held well under Lord Kale of Ruatha Hold. Oh,” and Barla would bow her head and press her hands to her mouth in anguish over terrible memories, “the perfidy, the treachery of that terrible, ruthless man! To murder all Ruatha blood in one pitiless hour!” Barla would gather herself then, lifting her head proudly. “Nor would your father serve Lord Fax of the High Reaches.” Barla was not an extravagant person in word or deed, retaining a quiet and unobtrusive dignity despite all the slights and pettiness that came the way of the holdless. Her acrimony was therefore the more memorable, and Aramina, as well as her surviving brother and sister, knew Fax as the villain, despoiler, and tyrant, possessed of no single redeeming virtue. “We had pride enough to leave when he made his unspeakable order …” Barla would often color and then pale when reciting this part of their exodus. “Your father had made this very wagon for us to attend Gathers.” Barla would sigh. “Attend Gathers as respected holders, not as wanderers, holdless and friendless. For other Lord Holders did not wish to antagonize Fax just then, and though your father had been so certain of a welcome elsewhere, there was none. But we are not like the others, children. We chose to retain our honor and would not submit to the incarnate evil of Fax.”

Although Barla would never be specific about that, of late Aramina was beginning to get glimmerings, now that she had become a woman. For Barla, despite the depredations of fourteen Turns of nomadic life and endless pregnancies as tokens of Dowell’s esteem, still retained a beautiful face and a slender figure. Aramina was old enough to realize that Barla was far more handsome than most holdless women and that, when they entered a new hold, Barla kept her lustrous hair hidden under a tattered head scarf and wore the many-layered garments of cold poverty.

Dowell had been a skilled wood joiner, holding a modest but profitable hold for Lord Kale in the forests of Ruatha. News of the treacherous massacre of the entire bloodline had reached the mountain fastness long after the event, when a contingent of Fax’s rough troops had thundered into the hold’s yard and informed the astounded Dowell of the change in Lord Holder. He had bowed his head—reluctantly but wisely—to that announcement and kept his resentment and horror masked, hoping that none of the troop realized that his wife, Barla, expecting her first child, also bore Ruathan blood in her veins.

If Dowell hoped that a meek acceptance and an isolated location would keep him from Fax’s notice, he erred. The leader of the troop had eyes in his head; if he couldn’t detect Barla’s bloodline at a glance, one look was enough to tell him that here was a woman of interest to Lord Fax. Nor had the man’s shrewd gleam escaped Dowell, and the wood-crafter had made contingency plans, which began with leaving the hold’s Gather wagon and two sturdy dray beasts in a blind valley on the Tillek side of the mountain. When half a Turn had passed with no further visitation, Dowell had begun to think his precautions foolish: that he had mistaken the man’s reaction to Barla’s beauty.

Then Lord Fax, followed by a score of his men, came galloping up the narrow trace to the woodland hold. His scowl had been frightening when he had seen Barla’s gravid state.

“Well, the pump will be primed and ready. She’ll whelp soon. Collect her in two months. See that she is waiting for her Lord Holder’s summons!”

Without a backward look, Fax had cruelly spun his runner about and, clouting the lathered creature with his rawhide whip, clattered back the way he had come.

Dowell and Barla had left their hold within the hour. Seven days later, a boy had been prematurely born, and died. Nor did Dowell and Barla find a ready sanctuary in Tillek’s hold.

“Not this close to Fax, man. Perhaps farther west,” their first host has suggested. “I don’t want him knocking on my hold door. Not that one!”

Dowell and Barla had traveled ever since, to the western reach of Tillek, where they had found brief respites in their journeyings while Dowell carved bowls and cups or joined cabinets, or crafted Gather wagons. A few weeks here, a half Turn there; and Aramina was born on their way through the mountains of Fort, the first of Barla’s children to survive birth. The news of Fax’s death caught up with them in the vast plains of Keroon, just after Nexa’s birth.

“Ruatha Hold brought Fax nothing but disease and trouble,” the harper told Dowell and Barla in Keroonbeasthold, where Dowell was building stables.

“Then we could return and claim our hold again.”

“If there’s anything to claim. But I’m told that Lytol is a fair man and he’ll need good workers,” the harper had said, eyeing the notched timbers that Dowell had fitted.

“We’ll return then,” Dowell had told Barla, “when I’ve finished my bond with the mastercraftsman.”

More than a full Turn later, they did begin the long journey up the Keroon peninsula, with a sturdy daughter, a small son, and a tiny baby.

Then Thread began to fall on the innocent green land, raining destruction on a population that had denied the existence of their ancient enemy. Once again dragons filled the skies with their fiery breath, charring the dread menace in midair, saving the rich land from the devouring Thread.

Travel became more hazardous than ever for the holdless; people clung to the safety of stone walls and stout doors, and to the traditional leadership of their Lord Holders. Within those sanctuaries there was little room for those without legitimate claim on leadership, supplies, and refuge. A new terror was visited on the unfortunate, deprived for any number of reasons of their right to hold or craft affiliation.

For Dowell and Barla, the terror was slightly abated by Aramina’s unexpected ability to hear dragons. When she first naively reported such conversations, she had been soundly spanked for telling lies. Then came the day when she persisted in warning them that her dragons said Threadfall was imminent. Threatened with a second thrashing and a supperless night, she had tearfully refused to retract her report. It was only when Dowell saw the leading edge of Thread, a silver smudging in the sky, dotted with the fiery blossoms of dragon breath, that he had apologized. As the family lay crouched under a rocky ledge just large enough to shelter them, they were grateful to her.

“The lords of Ruatha have always given dragonriders complete hospitality,” Barla had said, shielding the squalling Nexa against her shoulder. She had to stop to wipe grit from her lips. “No one in my immediate family was ever taken on Search, but then, there haven’t been that many Searches in my lifetime. Aramina comes by her talent as a right of blood.”

“And to think I ever complained that our firstborn was female,” Dowell had murmured, smiling at Aramina, tucked in the safest angle of the rock ledge. “I wonder if Nexa will be able to hear dragons.”

“I’ll bet I will when I’m older,” Pell had ventured, not wishing to let his sister take all the honors.

“It means we’ll be safe traveling across Telgar Plains to Ruatha, for Aramina can always warn us about Threadfall. We won’t need to be beholden to any lord for shelter!”

To be without restraint or obligation meant a great deal to Dowell’s pride. Since the advent of Threadfall, the holdless had suffered more than the usual indignities at the hands of holders, large and small. Having no right of affiliation, they could be cheated of the ordinary rights of hospitality; overcharged for any goods their infrequent marks could purchase; forced to work unnatural hours for the mere privilege of shelter from Thread; deprived of dignity and honor; and, above all else, required to express gratitude for even the least condescension shown by holders and crafters.

The elation of the small family was short-lived, for their dray beasts had run off in the panic of Threadfall. Dowell was forced to return to Keroonbeasthold on foot, hire his skill at a hard-bargained price for the next Turn, then trudge all the way back with the new team to where his family had waited, fearful of marauding holdless men and women and Threadfall.

The indenture over, Dowell had once again turned team and wagon westward. A miscarriage and fever had forced them to take refuge in the huge Igen cave, and expediency had kept them there when Dowell’s resolution had faltered under a series of misfortunes, all apparently designed to thwart his repatriation to Ruatha Hold.

Now they pushed on through the night, struggling to escape yet another threat to honor and resolve.

From somewhere Dowell had acquired a map of Lemos Hold, complete with road, track, and trace. Lemos had so many forests and mountains that rivers, Pern’s other roadways, were unusable. Dowell elected to follow the faintest of tracks and was careful to remove any droppings. When he finally allowed them to rest, it was noontime. During the brief respite he allowed his family and team, Dowell crushed leaves and stained the wagon’s leather cover with green to make it less visible to any searching eye.

“We’ll be safe in the forests of Lemos,” he said, reassuring himself as well as his family. “There are caves there in the mountains which no one could find …”

“If no one can find them, how will we?” asked Pell reasonably.

“Because we’ll be looking very hard, of course,” Aramina answered before her weary father’s short temper flared.

“Oh!”

“And we’ll live by ourselves and thrive on the provender that woods naturally provide us,” Aramina went on, “for we’ll have all the wood we need to be warm, and nuts and roots because we know where to look for them, and berries and roast wherry …”

“Roast wherry?” Pell’s eyes widened with delight at such a promise.

“Because you fashion such excellent snares …”

“I always caught more tunnel snakes than any one else at Igen,” Pell began. Then, remembering that this helter-skelter trip was due to his boastfulness, he covered his mouth with his hand and huddled into a tight ball of remorse.

“Any of the forest caves ought to have lots of snakes, shouldn’t they, Mother?” Aramina asked, wanting to lighten her mother’s sad face as well as her brother’s guilt.

“They should,” Barla agreed in the absent way of parents who have not really attended to their children’s conversation.

Dowell called them to order, and they continued on their way until Nudge refused to go farther and, when Dowell took the stick to him, sank resolutely to his knees. Unhitching the recalcitrant brute, they forced Shove to haul the wagon into the brush at the side of the trace.

“Nudge has got sense,” Pell muttered to his sister as the weary children gathered enough branches to screen the wagon.

“Father has, too. I certainly didn’t want to help Thella or,” and Aramina shivered with revulsion, “that dragonless man, Giron.”

“They’re as bad as Fax.”

“Worse.”

Although Barla roused herself sufficiently to hand out dry rations, she found that Aramina and Pell had fallen asleep.

Only when they had put four mountains between themselves and Igen River did Dowell let up on the pace he had set. On the narrow traces, more logging tracks than proper trails, there were none to witness their passage as they climbed higher into the vast Lemos range.

They were not quite alone, for dragons passed overhead on daily sweeps and Aramina reveled in their conversations. She made her reports amusing, to liven evening campfire—for Dowell had conceded that a careful, smokeless fire would not be easily seen in the thick woods.

“It was green Path again today, with Heth and Monarth,” Aramina said on the tenth day after their exodus from Igen Cave. “Lamanth, the queen, has clutched thirty fine eggs, but Monarth says that there are no queen eggs.”

“There aren’t always queen eggs,” Dowell reminded Aramina, who sounded unhappy.

“That’s what Path said. I don’t know why Monarth was upset.”

“I didn’t realize that dragons talked to each other,” Barla remarked, puzzled. “I thought they only talked to their riders.”

“Oh, they do,” Aramina assured her. “Heth talks constantly to K’van when they’re doing the sweep alone.”

“Why are there three today then?” Pell asked.

“Because Threadfall is imminent.”

“Why didn’t you say so?” Dowell wanted to know, exasperated with his daughter’s diffidence.

“I was going to. They think Threadfall will come over Lemos tomorrow late afternoon.”

“How can we survive Threadfall out in these woods?” Dowell demanded, angry with apprehension.

“You said there were lots of caves here in Lemos,” Pell said, grimacing his face into a tearful expression.

“We’ll need one!” Dowell said grimly. “We’ll start first light tomorrow. Aramina, you and Pell will search ahead. On the upper slope. For there is bare cliff above us and somewhere there must be a cave for shelter.”

“And we’ll need more roots and anything else you can find to eat,” Barla added, showing the empty stewpot as proof of the need. “There’s naught left of the dried meat and vegetables.”

“Why is it Thread always comes at times like these?” Pell asked, but expected no answer to his plaint.

He had occasion to repeat much the same expression the next morning when the off-rear wheel, sinking in a leaf-covered hole, cracked the cotter pin and lazily spun off. The team dragged the wagon on for several lengths, grinding the hub into the dirt before Dowell was able to halt them. Grimly he surveyed the damage. Then, with the sigh of long-suffering patience, he set to the job of repairing the wheel.

It was by no means the first time that wheels had come off, and Aramina and Pell needed no instructions to search out stout limbs, and to help roll a boulder into place for the lever. Indeed it was a well-drilled operation, and Aramina and Pell had wedged two blocks under the wagon bed as soon as Dowell and Barla had levered it up. They had the wheel back on the axle when Dowell discovered that there were no more cotter pins or kingpins in the wagon. He’d used the last on the journey to Igen Cave and had no reason to replace them in the long Turn.

“With the world and all of wood about us, Dowell?” Barla had remonstrated to cut short his flow of self-recriminations. “There’s a hardwood over there. It can’t take much time to whittle new pegs. The children can forage ahead for food and a cave. Come.” She handed him the hatchet. “I’ll help. Aramina, take a sack and one of the hide buckets. Pell, make one of your snares and set it if you cross snake spoor. Nexa, you may carry the small shovel, but don’t lose it in the woods.”

“If you hear more about Threadfall from the dragons, Aramina, you come back to me straightaway,” Dowell added as he made for the hardwood visible from the track. “Don’t dally.”

With a spirit of urgent adventure the three children ran up the track. For the first four switchbacks, there was nothing but forest on either side, though Pell insisted on inspecting several outcroppings of the gray rock that he felt looked promising.

Then the logging trace started a long, straight run, which finally disappeared around a rocky out-thrust. To their right, up a steep bank, the trees were sparser as the native rock intruded.

“I’ll go look up there, ’Mina!” Pell cried, and took off just as Nexa called Aramina’s attention to the unmistakable if withered tops of redroots growing on the downside.

Aramina saw Pell scrambling for footing on the steep and slippery bank, and elected to forage with Nexa. They had been digging for only a short while when Aramina heard Pell’s warbling, the family signal for an emergency. Fearful that he had injured himself climbing, Aramina raced back to the track.

“I found a cave, ’Mina! I found a cave.” Pell slithered back down the bank. “A good deep one. Room for Nudge and Shove, too.” His voice reflected the jouncing his body took as he half walked, half slid the remaining distance to his sister.

“And lost your gathering,” she said sternly, pointing to the cluster of broken bulge-nut twigs he still clutched in his left hand.

“Oh, them.” Pell tossed the useless bits aside, stood up, and brushed the wet leaves from his leathern pants. “There’re plenty more where they …” He broke off, an uncertain look on his face as his hand hesitated.

“Hmm, sprung the seams again, too,” Aramina said impatiently and, grabbing him, swung him about to see the damage the slide had done his trousers. She sighed, controlling her temper. Pell never considered risk and consequence.

“Only the seam. Not the leather. Mother can mend it! In the cave I just found. Plenty of space.” Grinning broadly to soothe the frown from his sister’s face, he made exaggerated gestures with his arms, outlining the splendor of his discovery.

“How far up the slope?” Aramina regarded the steep incline with a thoughtful eye. “I’m not sure Nudge and Shove could make it.”

“They’ll make it ’cause there’s grass and water …”

“The cave is damp?”

“Nah! Dry as far in as I went.” Pell cocked his head sideways. “And I didn’t go all the way in, just like you always warn me. Only far enough to see it was big and dry. And the tunnel snake signs. Good eating.” He rolled his eyes and smacked his lips at the prospect. “There’s even a stream and—a cascade, too.”

Aramina hesitated, eyeing the steep bank and wondering if Pell’s enthusiasm hadn’t clouded his judgment. Pell would go through life seeing only what he hoped he was seeing, not what really was. But the need to get under shelter was critical. No matter if Pell had exaggerated: he had found a cave. Her father could decide on its suitability.

“How far up the slope is it?”

“Straight to the top of the ridge”—Pell pointed—“down into the dip past the nut plantation. Turn to your right at the forked birch and you’ll stare right at the entrance. Only it’s to the left. A good overhang. C’mon, I’ll show you.”

“No, you wait here. Nexa’s down there digging roots”—Aramina pulled a face at her brother’s sour expression—“which we need nearly as much as the cave.” She hesitated once more. Maybe she ought to check the cave first, rather than raise false hopes.

“Ah, ’Mina, I wouldn’t lie about shelter.”

Aramina scrutinized her brother’s face, his features contorted into an expression of utter trustworthiness. No, Pell wouldn’t lie about something that important. A ray of sunlight broke through the clouds, lancing past the soughing tree branches, reminding her that there was little time left if they were to be under cover when Thread fell.

“Don’t wander off! You know how scared Nexa gets.” Aramina threw a deft twist of cord about the neck of her root sack and tossed it to the side of the logging track.

“I won’t stir from her side. But I expect I’d do better gathering kindling.” Thus avoiding his most hated chore of rooting, Pell diligently collected branches.

Aramina started off down the track in a lope, her long plaits bouncing off her shoulders and buttocks. She was light on her feet, moving with an economy of movement that would have been envied by a hold runner.

The sunlight seemed to follow her, illuminating her way on the overgrown trace, the springiness underfoot making the going a pleasure. She shortened her stride as the track switched back on itself, and listened intently, over the thud of her footfalls, for the sound of the wagon. Surely it hadn’t taken her father too long to whittle the necessary pins: Dowell and Barla should have made some distance up the logging road. Surely she ought to have heard the lumbering wagon, her father’s voice urging Nudge and Shove to their task.

Peering through the thickly planted trees, Aramina looked for some glimpse of the covered wagon. Apprehension lent her impetus and down the trace she sped, every nerve anxiously alert for any reassuring sight or sound. Faster she ran, positive now in her mind that something had happened. Could Lady Holdless Thella have possibly caught up with them?

Taking a more direct line, she bypassed the next turn and pushed through the underbrush, wiggling past trees. Then, as she discerned the bulk of the green-smeared wagon cover through the trees, she moved more circumspectly. The wagon had not shifted from the spot in which they had left it two hours past.

Trembling with fear, Aramina paused, listening now for the sound of voices, for the bass rumble of Giron or the crisp acid alto of Thella. Hearing nothing but the wind soughing through the leafless trees, she moved cautiously down until she was poised on the bank above where the wagon was still canted. Muffling a cry of fear, Aramina slid down the bank, recoiling in horror as she saw her father’s head and shoulders protruding from under the wagon. Somehow the blocks had slipped and the wheel lay once again on its side. Horrified, Aramina was certain that her father had been crushed to death until she saw that one block had fallen directly under the wagon bed, preventing the complete collapse of the heavy load onto her father’s chest.

Only then did Aramina hear the hoarse grunt and half sob, as she realized that her mother was attempting to lever the wagon bed off her stricken husband.

“Mother!”

“I cannot lift it, ’Mina!” Barla sobbed, leaning exhaustedly against the pole. “I’ve been trying and trying.”

Wasting no words, Aramina threw her weight onto the lever, and though Barla gave every remaining ounce of her strength, the two women could not summon enough mass between them to shift the wagon more than a finger’s breadth.

“Oh, ’Mina, what can we do? Even if we had Pell and Nexa, they couldn’t help enough …” Defeated, Barla slumped onto the ground, weeping.

“We lifted it enough. If Pell and Nexa were here, they could pull him free.…” Aramina swung ’round to her father, his tanned face pale with shock, the pulse in his neck beating slowly but reassuringly. “Pell’s found a cave. It’s not too far up the track. I’ll be right back.”

Giving Barla no chance to protest, Aramina started up the track again as fast as she could run. Pell and Nexa just had to be strong enough. She didn’t dare believe anything else. And they must hurry. The sun glancing into her eyes warned her that time was very short if they were to rescue Dowell and get the wagon up the trail to the cave. She couldn’t consider any other problems then, only the most immediate ones, and she almost ignored the sight of the dragon gliding overhead. She stopped so fast that she almost fell.

Dragon, dragon, hear me! Help me! HELP ME! Aramina had never attempted to communicate with the dragons, but a dragonrider would be strong enough to help her. Surely a dragonrider would not ignore her need.

Who calls a dragon?

She recognized the voice of Heth.

It is Aramina. Down on the logging trace, above the river in the forest. Please help me. My father is trapped beneath our wagon. And Thread will fall soon! She jumped up and down in the middle of the trace, waving frantically. Oh, please help me!

No need to shout. I heard you the first time. My rider wants to know who you are.

To her relief, Aramina saw the dragon change directions, circling down toward the track.

I told you, I’m Aramina.

May I tell him?

Such consideration rarely came Aramina’s way.

Yes, yes, of course. Are you Heth?

I am Heth. My rider is K’van.

How do you do?

I’d do better if we could see you.

But I’m right here. In the middle of the trace. And the wagon is large.… Oh, my father painted it green. If you’ll just fly lower …

I’m a dragon, not a wherry.… K’van sees the wagon.

Aramina crashed through the underbrush to reach the wagon at the same time as dragon and rider. Barla looked about to faint with shock at their sudden appearance.

“It’s all right, Mother. They’ll help us. They’re much stronger than Pell and Nexa would be.” Then Aramina realized that Shove and Nudge were taking great exception to the proximity of a dragon. She tied them tightly down by their nose rings to the tether stone, giving them more immediate pain to occupy their stupid brains.

Fortunately, the dragonrider directed Heth to land behind the wagon, out of the dray beasts’ immediate sight.

To her dismay, Aramina realized that both dragon and rider were young. She’d always thought that bronze dragons must be big, and, indeed, Heth had seemed enormous, outlined in the sky. But now she could see that he wasn’t fully grown and that his rider, K’van, was both undersized and younger than herself.

As if K’van sensed her disappointed appraisal, he straightened his shoulders and jerked his chin up. He walked forward, taking in the lever propped against the boulder and looking down at the prostrate Dowell.

“We may be weyrlings, but we can help you,” K’van said without ostentation. He turned to Heth. “What I want you to do is to put heave on this, Heth, with your forearms. C’mon, Aramina.”

Aramina stopped staring at the bronze dragon, who waddled forward to place his five-clawed paws about the lever.

“Not until I say go, Heth,” K’van cautioned, grinning a bit at Aramina as they knelt in the dust beside the unconscious Dowell, fastening their hands under the man’s armpits. “Heave, Heth! Heave!”

As quickly as they could, Aramina and K’van hauled Dowell’s body from under the wagon. With a cry of incredulous relief, Barla rushed to her husband’s side, opening his shirt to judge the extent of his injury. K’van had the presence of mind to replace the fallen block and prop the wagon up.

“You’ll need the wheel back on,” he said to Aramina. “That was fine, Heth.”

I am very strong, said the dragon with a trace of smugness, his great faceted eyes whirling bluey green as he maintained pressure on the lever.

“Oh, you are indeed, you beautiful, beautiful creature,” cried Aramina.

“All right, Heth, ease it down,” said K’van, holding the block in place. “Slowly now.”

The wagon settled, creaking as the block took its weight. K’van fumbled about in the grass and dust and triumphantly held up the pegs.

“Mother?” Aramina’s trembling voice held a question as she turned to look at her father.

“I can’t find anything broken,” Barla said in a low unsteady voice, “but look …” Her hand indicated the terrible line of bruising already discoloring the skin. Carefully she smoothed the hair back from Dowell’s brow, her expression of concerned tenderness causing the two young people to exchange embarrassed glances.

K’van touched Aramina’s arm. “Do you know how to set the wheel back on the axle?” He gave her a rueful glance as he proffered the pegs. “I don’t.”

“Whyever should you?” Aramina wanted to know as she took the pegs and noticed, with a pang, how carefully Dowell had made a cotter hole in the kingpin. “You’re a dragonrider.”

“Not all that long,” he said with a grin as he helped her lift the wheel and roll it into position. “And weyrlings are taught a little bit of every craft needed by the Weyr. You never know when something will come in handy. Like now!” He said this on the end of a grunt as the two young people tried to force the wheel onto the axle.

“It’s the dirt encrusted on the hub,” Aramina said as K’van paused uncertainly. With her belt knife, she scraped off the caked dirt, found a large rock, and, with a healthy knock, set the wheel firmly on. With another few taps of her rock, she rammed the kingpin through and then the cotter pin into its place.

“You’re deft at that,” K’van said admiringly.

“Practice.”

With Heth’s assistance, they removed the block from under the wagon.

“Have you far to go?” K’van asked then. “Thread falls soon and, as I recall, the foresters’ hold is a long ways up the track.”

Barla stifled a sound in her throat, but Aramina had an answer ready.

“I know,” Aramina lied calmly, “but this accident delayed us. However, there’s a cave not far up the track where we can wait out Threadfall.”

“Is it large?” asked K’van.

“Large enough. Why?” Aramina asked, suddenly wary.

“Well, just before you called us,” and K’van grinned ingenuously for her temerity, “Heth spotted a band of runners beyond the river. Are they part of your group?”

“No.” Barla groaned aloud, looking wildly up at Aramina.

“There shouldn’t be anyone else in this part of Lord Asgenar’s forests,” Aramina said with all the indignation she could muster. “We were warned that holdless raiders have been seen.”

“Holdless men?” K’van was instantly alert. “If they are, they’ll disperse once they’ve seen me. Look, let me help you get your father into the wagon and see you safely on your way to the cave. I’ll take care of the raiders. And warn Lord Asgenar, too.”

Aramina hadn’t expected that, but she said what was appropriate, determined to play out her part in this charade. She unfastened the tailgate so that they could slide Dowell in. Then, while K’van watched beside Heth, she and Barla took up their positions and prodded Nudge and Shove into a walk, and then into a shambling trot up the trace.

Barla and Aramina had to keep hard at the dray beasts to maintain their trot. Nudge resented the pace, twisting his horned head and lowing piteously, but Aramina had no mercy on him. Women and beasts were sweating when they finally reached the bank, Pell cheering lustily until Aramina shouted at him to stop being so foolish and come help.

In a few terse words, Aramina explained what had happened, and Pell began shaking his head slowly from side to side.

“I don’t know how we’ll get Father up that bank,” he said, appraising the difficulty. “You shouldn’t’ve sent the dragonrider away.”

“It’s not just Father being hurt, Pell. K’van saw a troop of riders on the other side of the river.…”

Pell quailed, and his distress communicated itself to Nexa, who had been standing there, wide-eyed and perplexed. Now she burst into tears.

“So we must also get the wagon out of sight. And hide Nudge and Shove.”

“But Thread’s coming. And we have to get Father up to the cave and …” Pell’s words tripped over themselves in his anxiety.

“Somehow we’ll do it,” Aramina said, peering up and down the trace to find a possible screen for the mass of the wagon. “Maybe, if K’van has frightened them with Threadfall, they’ll have to go back the way they came.… Maybe if we rig a stretcher, we can haul Father up the bank.…”

“Maybe, maybe, maybe!” Pell almost danced with frustration.

“I won’t have you children fighting at a time like this,” Barla said tartly, appearing in the back of the wagon. “We’ve got to rouse your father.… How long before Thread falls, Aramina? Or didn’t you ask the dragonrider?”

Aramina bowed her head at her mother’s rebuke. As she did so, her glance fell on a group of evergreens on the left-hand side of the roadway a few lengths farther up the track.

“There!” she cried dramatically, gesturing wildly. “There! We can drive the wagon in there, behind the evergreens. They’re just tall enough!”

With something constructive to do, even Nexa stopped her whingeing. Dowell was carefully lifted out of the wagon and covered by a sleeping fur. Then everyone concentrated on getting the wagon out of sight. Nexa was directed to brush away the tracks of the wagon as Aramina and Pell forced the dray beasts through the opening Barla parted into the copse. The artistic addition of extra branches completed the camouflage.

Then Barla sent Pell and Nexa on ahead to the cave with sleeping furs and Barla’s precious stewpot, while Aramina and her mother tried to rouse Dowell. The usual aromatic had no effect, and the two women exchanged anxious glances, when suddenly Nudge and Shove, tethered by the trace, began to moan fearfully and pull at their ring ropes.

“Thread?” gasped Barla, bending protectively over her husband.

“No,” cried Aramina, “Dragons! Big dragons!” Indeed it seemed to her as if the sky was filled with them, their great wings causing the saplings to bend to their backwind.

“Aramina, how did that dragonrider come to help us in the first place? You didn’t call him, did you?” When Aramina mutely nodded, Barla gave a despairing cry. “But the Weyrs will take you from us if they know you can hear and speak to dragons! And then what shall we do?”

“How else were we to save Father?” asked Aramina even as she, too, regretted her action.

I hear Aramina, said Heth’s unmistakable voice.

Oh, please go away, Heth. Say you can’t find me.

But I have! You must not fear. We won’t harm you. Before Aramina could speak again, three dragons skimmed neatly down onto the track, making Nudge and Shove buck and strain to be free of their tether. As one, Barla and Aramina dashed forward to prevent the escape of the dray beasts, twisting the nose rings until pain paralyzed the stupid animals.

We will move down the track, Aramina heard Heth say as she coped with the frantic Nudge. When the dragons were far enough away not to be an immediate threat, Aramina and Barla relaxed their hold.

“I am T’gellan, bronze rider of Monarth, and this is Mirrim, who rides green Path,” said the oldest of the three riders who approached them. “K’van wisely called for help to persuade those holdless raiders to absent themselves from this vicinity. So I thought we’d better make sure you had safely reached shelter before Threadfall.”

Barla hovered between her critical need for assistance and anxiety at the presence of dragonriders who might very easily depart with her daughter who could hear dragons.

Mirrim knelt beside Dowell and opened his shirt, then exhaled her breath on a long whistle.

“I can feel no broken bones, but he’s not regained consciousness,” Barla told Mirrim, sensibly making her husband’s needs her first priority.

“If he was under a wagon as K’van says, that doesn’t surprise me,” Mirrim remarked. “I’ve done considerable nursing at the Weyr. First let’s get him to this cave.”

“We don’t have much time to spare,” T’gellan added, squinting at the steep bank. “And I don’t fancy trying to haul an unconscious man up that!”

“Is there any sort of a clearing by your cave?” Mirrim asked Aramina.

“A small one,” she said, devoutly hoping that Pell’s description bore some resemblance to fact.

“Path? Would you oblige us?” Mirrim asked the green dragon.

I see no reason why not. In a maneuver that Aramina couldn’t believe she was seeing, the green dragon glided to the group without moving her wings or appearing to walk. Silly beasts, aren’t they? Path added as Nudge and Shove began their terrified lowing again.

Aramina was obliged to go calm them; their perturbation abruptly ceased as Mirrim, Path, her father, and her mother disappeared.

“Well, it seemed easier to send your mother along, too, Aramina,” T’gellan said with a laugh for her astonishment. “You’d best go the hard way. Thread will fall very shortly.”

“But I can’t … Nudge and Shove …”

K’van grinned. “Just get on one, get a good hold on the nose rein of the other. We’ll supply the impulsion.” And he jerked his thumb at the two dragons watching with their jewel eyes whirling mildly.

It was perhaps the wildest ride Aramina had ever had. In the first place, dray beasts were not designed for comfortable riding, having straight backs, wide withers, short necks and low-held heads. However, the flapping of dragon wings behind Nudge and Shove was more than enough to have sent them plunging through fire. They took the bank, cloven hooves slipping on the wet footing in no more than four bucking jumps. Momentum carried them over the top and down the dip, almost right into the cliff wall, where they fetched up to a dead stop that sent Aramina onto Nudge’s horns, and then to the ground with a force that jarred her from heel to headbones.

Pell appeared, eyes wide at her impetuous arrival.

“A girl on a green dragon brought Father and Mother. I didn’t think girls were allowed to ride fighting dragons.”

“Help me get these inside the cave before they stampede again,” Aramina said, though she had been equally surprised by Mirrim and Path.

“Oh, look, they’re going!” Pell’s disappointment was patent, as he saw the dragons hover briefly in the sky. “I’m forever missing the good parts,” he complained.

“Get Shove inside!” Aramina had no time to humor her brother, and she gave him such a hard prod that he sharply reminded her that he wasn’t any old dray beast.

He hauled on the nose rein and, lowing, Shove followed his painful muzzle—then bellowed as his hindquarters scraped along the right wall of the narrow entry. Aramina pushed at his dappled flanks and set him right. She was careful to line Nudge squarely in the opening, and to prevent any further recalcitrance she twisted his nose ring. With an injured bellow, he, too, made the passage into the cave, running into Aramina, who stopped, amazed at what lay before her.

“Isn’t this cave marvelous, ’Mina? Didn’t I find a good one? Couldn’t we get everything in here? Maybe we could even live here.” Pell dropped his voice to a hoarse whisper on the last sentence. “For it’s as big as a hold, isn’t it, ’Mina?” The boy was all but dancing at the end of Shove’s ring rein, momentarily oblivious of everything but his need for her approval.

In a sweeping glance, Aramina saw a solemn-faced Nexa cradling her father’s head where he lay on the pile of sleeping furs, and her mother busy lighting a small fire within a ring of stones before she allowed herself to examine the cave in more detail.

“Why, it is truly big enough to be a hold,” she said in a voice awed enough to delight her brother.

“It’s bigger than many holds we’ve been in, ’Mina,” Pell said with great satisfaction. “Much bigger. It’s nearly as big as any of the Igen caverns I ever was in.”

Aramina appraised the high ceiling, dry as far as she could see in the dim light filtering in from the entrance. She could sense rather than see clearly that the cave extended far beyond the immediate chamber in which they stood.

“There’s even a sort of stall place where we can tether Nudge and Shove,” he went on, babbling happily, and pulled on Shove to lead the way.

The beasts settled, Aramina and Pell came back to the front of the cavern, where Barla was coaxing the flames on the small hearth. Then a soft moan broke the silence as Dowell rolled his head from side to side in Nexa’s lap. She snatched her hands away from him, as if contact might somehow impede his recovery. With startled eyes she looked about for reassurance.

“There now, Nexa, I told you he’d come around,” said Barla, rising from the now healthy fire. “Aramina, we’ll need fresh water. As cold as you can draw it. We’ve nothing but cold compresses to ease the bruising. And hurry. Those dragonriders said that Threadfall was a matter of minutes away.”

“ ’Mina,” and Pell caught the other side of the bucket, accompanying his sister out of the cavern, “can you hear ’em yet?”

Aramina halted at the entrance, listening with every fiber in her ears, smiled at Pell, and walked quickly out.

“Show me where the water is,” she said, and Pell danced around in front of her and to their left.

“Right here! Right here!” he caroled, pointing and dancing about. “Just like I said. You won’t ever doubt me again, will you, ’Mina?”

“No, I won’t,” she said, smiling as she extended her hand into the little cascade that leaped and fell down the side of the mountain. The water was ice cold, numbing her fingers in seconds. She filled the bucket. She was just at the entrance to the cave when Pell let out an excited whoop. At the same time she heard a multitude of voices, excited and anticipatory.

“They’re here! I can see them! I saw them first!” His triumph found a lack in her talent.

“Well, I can hear them talking!”

“Can I watch the dragons fight Thread this time, ’Mina? This time can I watch?”

Aramina shushed him, examining the overhang of the cavern. Unless Thread should happen to fall at a tremendous velocity and at a slant, she couldn’t see how any of the dreaded menace could score them. Turns of familiarity with Thread had dampened her fear of it.

“Yes, I think it’s safe here for us to watch.” She placed a warning finger on her lips, and, slipping quickly inside to bring her mother the bucket of cold water, she rejoined him in the entrance.

To Pell’s keen disappointment, there wasn’t as much to watch as he’d anticipated. They could see the dragons in their ranks, suspended motionless in the clear mountain air, gleaming where wing and body reflected the sun briefly. Then the two watching children saw the sudden blurring of the sky, the silvery mist that was the leading edge of Thread.

Only then did the dragons break the temporary suspension, swooping up to meet the deadly rain, sending blossoms of fiery breath to char the parasitic Thread. Pell didn’t breathe with the wonder of the darting forays of the smaller dragons, exclaiming as he saw a long tongue of flame reach out to char a mass of Thread. Silver mist turned to black smoke and then dissipated lazily. Fire blooms traced the dragons’ progress after their ancient enemy until the hills and trees covered the distant sight from the watchers’ searching eyes.

“It didn’t last long enough,” Pell said dejectedly.

“It’ll last long enough for the dragonriders, I’m sure,” Aramina said with mild rebuke for his callousness. “Did you remember to bring the roots with you?”

“Ah, who wants to eat roots. There are acres of nuts out there.”

“Then you’ll have no trouble filling a sack, will you?” As Aramina turned back to the fire, she heard her father’s querulous voice.

“I don’t understand how you managed, with just Aramina.”

“Pell was a great help, too,” Barla said soothingly, wringing out another cold compress. She gave Aramina a quick stern glance.

“It was really very simple, Father. You keep telling us that if there was a lever long enough, we could even move Pern away from the Red Star,” Aramina said with a smile.

“This is no time for levity,” Barla said severely.

“Whyever not? Father’s conscious, we’ve got this huge big cave all to ourselves, and Pell’s gone out for more of these delicious nuts.” Expertly Aramina positioned two in her palm and cracked them. “See?” She held out the meats to Barla.

After a supper of boiled roots and crisp nut-meats, Aramina and Pell used the last of the daylight to gather fodder for Nudge and Shove, and sufficient boughs and fragrant bracken for bedding.

Tired as she was, Aramina found that sleep eluded her. She had been brought up to honor truth, and today that teaching had been disregarded for expediency. She had permitted K’van to think that they were proper holders, on their lord’s business. She had avoided truth with her father, although at Barla’s behest, so as not to worry him.

In each case the truth would confound her lies in very short order. But … K’van had chased off the Lady Holdless Thella and the band that had nearly caught up with her and her family. And … they had contrived to get Dowell safely into this cave refuge, hopefully without leaving an easy trail that Thella could follow. But … to achieve that end, she had revealed her ability to hear dragons to Benden Weyr riders. And … the dragonriders now knew exactly where she was even if Lady Holdless Thella did not. She could not imagine what punishment would be meted out to her for that daylong imprudence.

Nexa, curled close against her sister’s body, whimpered in a restless sleep. Aramina pulled the sleeping rug closely about her, stroking her arm, and Nexa subsided into sleep. For a while, she was distracted by Dowell’s breathing, a light snore because he had to sleep on his back, but its soft rhythm finally lulled Aramina to sleep.

It seemed all too short a time before Pell was urgently tugging at her shoulders and whispering excitedly in her ear.

“ ’Mina! ’Mina! K’van is here! And so is the Weyrleader! He wants to speak to you! And there are lots of strange men out there, too.”

“Here?” Frantically brushing sleep from her eyes, Aramina sat up, all too aware of yesterday’s bruises and scrapes and the dull ache across her shoulders from abused muscles.

“No, on the track. The men are armed with bows and arrows and spears and I think the dragons brought them.” Pell’s eyes were wide with excitement. K’van was just beyond him.

“It’s all right, Aramina, really it is,” said K’van, softly so as not to disturb the other sleepers. “It’s the raiders, you see.”

Careful not to rouse Nexa, Aramina slipped out from under the fur and pressed it gently down about her sister.

“The raiders are coming?” Pell’s voice slipped from whisper to harsh alarm, but Aramina quickly covered his mouth. Fear darkened his eyes as he stared at his sister.

The little one is suddenly afraid, said a surprised, richly mellow voice.

She has more to fear from the holdless. The second dragon voice was deep and dark, like a pool of the blackwater that Aramina had seen in Igen.

“I am not afraid of you.” Aramina spoke stoutly.

“Of me?” K’van asked in astonishment, his hand on his chest.

“Not you. Those dragons.” No, Aramina told herself, she was not afraid of the dragons, but of their riders and the impending justice that would be meted out for all the lies of yesterday. She hoped that K’van would not think too badly of her.

“I don’t think badly of you,” K’van protested as they stepped out into the sunlight. “Why should I? I think you were an absolute marvel yesterday, fixing that wheel and getting everyone safe inside the cave.…”

“Oh, you don’t understand,” said Aramina, trying to keep her voice from breaking.

“And neither does Heth but …”

It will come right, said Heth as if he meant it.

Then they were at the top of the bank and Aramina held on to a sapling to steady herself at the sight of masses of armed men, just as Pell had reported, and an incredible stream of dragons, taking off and landing in the track. Standing slightly apart with the enormous bronze dragon and a brown almost as big was the Weyrleader, F’lar, and his wing-leader, F’nor, talking earnestly with two men dressed in gleaming mail. A fur-trimmed cape was slung negligently over the shoulders of the younger man.

“Are those who I think they are?” asked Pell in an awed whisper. His hands clasped in his sister’s arm for reassurance. Then he stiffened, for F’nor had seen the three standing on the bank. He smiled and beckoned them down.

Aramina prayed earnestly that she wouldn’t lose her footing and arrive in an ignominious heap at the bottom of the slope. Then she felt K’van’s steadying hand. It was Pell who slipped, tumbling almost to the feet of the Weyrleader, who, with an easy laugh, gave him a hand to his feet. Then Aramina and K’van reached the group.

“How is your father today?” F’lar asked with a sympathetic smile.

“Badly bruised but sleeping, Lord F’lar,” Aramina managed to stammer. That was the correct form of address for the Weyrleader of Pern, wasn’t it? Aramina braced herself for the worst.

“We’ll hope not to disturb him, but those holdless marauders did not disperse after Threadfall.” F’lar’s slight frown indicated his annoyance with that intransigence.

“So,” F’nor took up the explanation, “Lord Asgenar plans to disperse them.” He grinned as he gestured to the tall man.

It was all Aramina could do to stand straight as she stared, appalled to be in the company of the Lord Holder whose land had been invaded by impudent holdless raiders in pursuit of a trespassing holdless family. In a daze she heard Lord Asgenar wondering why the raiders were pressing so far into his forestry. She saw that men were marching down the track, quietly but in good array.

“I’ve foresters in the top camp, although I cannot see what profit raiders could make of sawn logs,” Lord Asgenar was saying.

Now the truth must out, to save good men from Lady Holdless Thella’s brutal riders.

“It’s me.”

Aramina’s voice cracked so that her tentative admission was almost unheard. But the bronze dragon rumbled, and suddenly F’lar was regarding her with a sharp and penetrating gaze.

“You said that it was you, Aramina?”

The two men turned to gaze down at her. Pell’s fingers tightened about her arm.

You do not need to fear, child.

“Mnementh’s quite right, Aramina. Would you explain?”

“It’s me. Because I can hear dragons. And the Lady Holdless Thella …”

“Thella, is it?” exclaimed Lord Asgenar, slapping his hand onto his sword hilt. “By the first egg, I’ve been longing to meet that one.”

“Thella has been chasing you, child?”

It was such a relief to admit to the first truth that her confession was almost incoherent, except that between her words Aramina kept hearing the reassurances of three dragon voices in her head, calming her, bidding her speak more slowly and above all not to be worried about a thing.

“So, Thella thinks to Search for what is the Weyr’s by right?” F’lar’s amber eyes flashed with a fire no less frightening than dragon breath. “And you and your family left Igen Cave only ten days ago? You have traveled hard to escape that woman. Where did you come from?”

“Last Turn my father bonded himself to Keroonbeastmaster.…”

“Then you are Keronese?”

“No, Lord F’lar. My father and mother had a small forest hold in Ruatha …”

Aramina stopped in midsentence, startled by the play of surprise and comprehension that flashed across the faces of the dragonriders.

“Lessa should have come, after all, F’lar,” F’nor said, grinning with some private amusement at the Weyrleader.

“So Fax made your family holdless, Aramina.” F’lar’s voice was kind, though his eyes still sparkled.

Unable to speak, Aramina nodded.

“And your father was a forester?” Lord Asgenar’s question was eager.

Again Aramina could only nod.

“He’s the best wood joiner and carver in all Pern,” Pell spoke up, sensing a sympathy in their audience that Aramina, immersed in guilt, could not appreciate.

“Is he now? I thought as much.” F’lar took up the conversation, giving Aramina a chance to regain her poise. “That’s a very well made Gather wagon you hide so neatly. We almost didn’t spot it, did we, Asgenar?”

“Well hidden indeed. But I must go on, F’lar, F’nor. My men are assembled. I’m leaving men to guard your cave, Aramina, so you will have absolutely nothing to fear from our Lady Holdless Thella. Not now or again. We’ll see to that.”

And, at his signal, two men ranged behind Aramina, K’van, and Pell. As Aramina watched the tall young Lord Holder stride down the track to join his men, she began to feel secure for the first time since her first encounter with Thella and Giron.

“We must leave, too,” F’lar said to F’nor. “Can’t let them sight dragons in the sky near this mountain. Aramina. K’van brings some medicines for your father from our healer.”

“We do not like to be beholden to anyone,” Aramina replied, as her parents had drilled her to say to any such well-meant offers. “We have all we need with us.” She caught her lip to be telling yet another untruth.

“But we,”—and F’lar bowed slightly toward her—“are beholden to you for luring that hellion Thella near enough to grab her.”

“Oh!”

“Take the medicines, child. Ease your father’s injuries,” said F’nor, clasping Aramina’s shoulders in his warm, gentle hands. He gave her a kindly little squeeze. “And don’t be afraid.”

“I’m not afraid,” Aramina replied, for she wasn’t. Not of the weyrmen. But what would her proud father say of her actions over the past two days?

Then both dragonriders quickly vaulted to their waiting dragons, swinging nimbly up onto the neck ridges. With mighty leaps that sent dust, pebbles, and bruised leaves flying, the two beasts launched themselves upward. Suddenly the trace was empty of dragons and men, and only the two soldiers and the youngsters remained to hear the morning breeze sighing through the forest.

“I wonder if they’d have taken me along to see Thella get trounced,” Pell said, cocking his head around and beaming at the soldiers.

“Well now, lad, you should have asked, shouldn’t you?” said the older guard. “Now, young lady, if you’ll just lead the way to this cave of yours …”

“K’van, where’s Heth got to? You’re here. Where’s he?” Pell wanted to know, looking all about him as if the bronze dragon might be roosting in a nearby tree.

“He’s up at the cave, Pell. Probably asleep in that small clearing … if it’s big enough. Dragons like the sun and we had a very busy day yesterday.”

“And a busy one so far today, too,” Pell said amiably, digging his toes into the damp mulch of the bank.

“You could do with some steps cut in this bank,” said the younger soldier, who had just slipped as far as he had come.

“Oh, we couldn’t do that,” Pell replied, horrified. “We don’t really live in that cave. Though I’d sure like to,” he added with such ingenuousness that the older guard chuckled. “Can you make a good snare?” he asked him. “ ’Cause that cave is just crawling with tunnel snakes. They’d make mighty good eating after months and months of nothing but roots and fish.”

“I tie a pretty good snare,” K’van said, grabbing a sapling to pull himself onto the top of the ridge.

“You? But you’re a dragonrider.”

“I wasn’t always,” K’van admitted, grinning over Pell’s head at Aramina. “Before I was a dragonrider I was a very lowly weyrboy, and small. Just the right size to set snares for tunnel snakes. My foster mother used to give an eighth of a mark for every fifty snakes we caught.”

“Really?” Pell was awed by the thought of riches beyond the eating. “Well,” and Pell recovered from his awe, “I’m bloody good at snake-snaring, too, aren’t I, Aramina?”

“Not if you use the word ‘bloody’ you aren’t,” she said in reproof, not wishing the soldiers to think that the holdless were also mannerless.

They had reached the clearing—and there was Heth, curled in a tight ball that just fit in the available space. The soldiers grinned as Pell, eyes wide, carefully circled the sleeping bronze dragon.

“The cave is where, young lady?” asked the guard leader.

Aramina pointed. “There!”

“There’s water just to the right,” Pell said hospitably, “and there’s a whole grove of nuts just beyond the copse if you’re hungry.”

“Thank’ee, lad, we’ve rations with us.” The guard patted a bulging pouch. “Though a drink of cold water would be welcome. Traveling between sort of dries a man’s mouth of spit. You go on in, tell your folks not to worry. We’ll be out here on guard.”

“I’d rather stay with you,” Pell said confidentially.

Aramina caught the guard’s expression and hastily vetoed that option.

“Aw, Aramina, you had all the fun yesterday.”

“Fun?” Aramina got a firm grip on his arm and pulled him ruthlessly toward the cave entrance.

“Later, perhaps, Pell,” K’van said in the role of conciliator, “after you’ve eaten your breakfast, for I know I woke you out of a sound sleep. I’ve got enough klah here to serve everyone, and some bread, because Mende knew you wouldn’t have had a chance to bake yesterday.” K’van’s engaging grin dared Aramina to reject the treats.

“Bread? Klah? What else do you have in that sack, K’van?” Pell, displaying the manners of the worst Igen holdless riffraff, tried to pull open the neck of the sack for a glimpse of its contents.

“Pell!” Aramina’s shocked whisper reminded her brother of their sleeping parents as well as his manners.

“But, ’Mina, do you know how long it is since we had klah?”

“I’ve promised to make it for the guards, ’Mina,” K’van said in a voice that had brought many around to indulge his whimsies. “Surely a cup between friends …”

She relented, though she was sure to receive a scolding on that account as well as for her other errors. But a cup of klah would do much to ease the trembling in her stomach and knees, and give her the energy to bear whatever other shocks this day might hold for her.

The aroma, as it steeped, roused the sleepers, though Barla’s first conscious act was to peer in her husband’s face, reassured by the soft snores that emanated from his slightly open mouth. Only then did Barla react to the fragrance of the brewing klah.

“We had no klah,” she said, frowning at Aramina before she recognized K’van beside the little hearth.

“My foster mother, Mende, sent it along with fellis and numbweed salve to ease your husband’s injury,” said K’van, rising to bring her a cup of the fresh brew. He smiled with a shy charm to which Barla was scarcely impervious.

Aramina regarded the young bronze rider with astonishment.

“My Weyrleaders insisted that I return to see if he is recovering from the accident.”

“That is kind of you, young K’van, but unnecessary. We do not care to be beholden to anyone.” Barla pretended not to see the cup he offered, but Aramina saw her mother’s nostrils twitch in appreciation of the aromatic steam.

K’van gave her another of his charming smiles. “I’m weyr-bred, you know,” he said, undaunted, “so I know how you feel about being under obligation.” When he saw Barla’s incredulous expression, he went on. “Before the Pass began, Benden Weyr was begrudged every jot and tittle … because”—and now his voice became querulous and his eyes took on a merry twinkle for his impersonation—“everyone knows that Thread won’t fall on Pern again!” He grinned impishly at Barla’s astonishment and her sudden realization that Benden had indeed once been relegated to a state not much different from that of the holdless: tolerated when unavoidable, ignored when possible, and condemned on every occasion for uselessness. “Drink, good lady, and enjoy it. Mende also sent along bread, knowing you’d’ve had no chance to bake yesterday.”

“Mother, could we not send Mende one of the wooden spoons Father carved at Igen?” Aramina ventured to suggest to salve her mother’s sensibility.

“Yes, an exchange is always permissible,” Barla replied and, inclining her head graciously, finally accepted the cup of klah.

Relieved by her mother’s capitulation, Aramina carefully cut a thick slice of the round loaf, spreading it generously with the jam that K’van had also extracted from his sack of surprises. She bent a stern glance on Pell when he started to devour the treat ravenously.

Only when she had served the others did Aramina eat, savoring the klah and the thick, crunchy bread spread with the berry jam. Daintily she even rescued the crumbs from her lap with a moistened fingertip. When K’van and Pell went outside to serve the guards, Barla summoned Aramina to the sleeping furs, where she was delicately smearing numbweed salve on the livid bruises on Dowell’s chest.

“Why is that rider still here?”

“He came back this morning, Mother.” Then Aramina took a deep breath, realizing that only the truth would serve. Evasion was as dishonest as lying, whatever her motive. The presence of the dragonriders and Lord Asgenar would ensure the safety of everyone. With complete candor she accounted for her part in the events of the past day and this morning. “And the Benden Weyrleader was just here with Lord Asgenar and his men because Lady Holdless Thella has followed us. Lord Asgenar is using this opportunity to ambush her and that horrid band of hers. So we’ll be safe now because Lord Asgenar and Lord F’lar think father built a fine Gather wagon. And truly, they did call it a Gather wagon just as if that’s all it ever has been.”

“That’s what it was made for,” said Dowell in a sad voice, slightly shaken by the pain of the shallow breaths he took to speak.

“Here, Dowell. Drink this fellis,” Barla said, raising the carved wooden cup to his lips.

“Fellis? We had no fellis!”

“We have it now, Dowell. Don’t be so proud it hurts!” Barla said, suspending pride in the interests of healing her husband.

Thus abjured, Dowell swallowed the dose, closing his eyes at the pain even that minor movement caused his swollen flesh.

Barla saw Aramina’s tender concern. “The numbweed will be taking effect soon. I am truly grateful to this Mende. I think a spoon and one of the sandstone bowls. A woman can never have too many of them.” She sighed. “I am truly grateful to her. And …” She turned to Dowell, who had closed his eyes in tacit accord. “I think that we must be grateful to you, daughter … in spite of the fact that you seem to have forgotten all we have tried to instill in you of manners and conduct.”

Aramina bowed her head, assuming a contrite pose. Then she realized that although her mother’s voice was sharp, there was no bite to her words. Discipline required a scolding, but this time it was only the form that was obeyed, not the spirit. Aramina looked up and tried not to smile at this unexpected absolution.

“ ’Mina, if Lord Asgenar …,” Dowell began in a voice no stronger than a whisper, speaking in short phrases between the shallow breaths he took, “… favors us … with his presence again … we must request … formal permission to stay … in this cave … until I am able … to continue our journey.”

“I’ll tell him. And I’ll mention it to the guard as well.”

Dowell nodded again, closing his eyes, his mouth beginning to relax a little as fellis and numbweed gave him surcease. Barla rose and, motioning Aramina to follow her, left his side.

“It is a good dry cave, ’Mina,” she said, as if this were the first chance she had had to inspect it. “There are guards? We must not fail in hospitality.”

“Pell remembered to offer, Mother, and they say they have their own rations.”

“That is not to the point, ’Mina, and you know it. Would there be more roots in the patch Nexa found yesterday? And nuts, too? For they make a tasty flat bread.”

Aramina schooled her features not to betray her dismay, for it took a great many nuts to make a decent quantity of nut flour, and the grinding took hours.

“I’ll get nuts, and there may be some wild onions, too,” she said, aware of her narrow escape from punishment and determined to be dutiful today.

“Where’s Pell? He ought to accompany you.”

“He’s with K’van, Mother.” Aramina picked up her sack, cleaned her belt knife, and sheathed it. She glanced about in the habit of someone used to thinking ahead on chores before she left.

Pell was not with the guards, nor was K’van, although Heth’s bronze hide was visible through the trees.

“The boys have gone off to set a wherry snare,” the older guard told Aramina with a grin for such youthful pastimes. “There’s roosts there.” He pointed over the rocky saddle leading to a farther dell.

“A roast wherry would be a real treat for all of us,” Aramina said, smiling to include both guards.

“Oh, aye, that it would, young lady.” When Aramina started toward the nut plantation, he caught her by the arm. “It’s you we’re guarding. Where are you going?”

“Only over that ridge”—Aramina pointed to the south—“for nuts.”

“I’ll just have a look-see.” The guard strode along with her, past the sleeping Heth, and up the long slope.

He halted, catching her arm again, as he looked down into the peaceful grove. The nut trees, well grown, were so thick-branched that they had inhibited any undergrowth that the acid of the nut mast had not killed. The approach of humans had sent the wood snakes scurrying, and only the last vestiges of the summer’s insects flitted about. Nuts were visible in plenty.

“I’ll give you a hand,” the guard said, seeing that it was a matter of scooping up the fallen tree fruits.

With two willing pairs of hands, Aramina’s sack was filled in short order.

“How much do you need?” the man asked when Aramina began to make a carryall of her jerkin.

“Mother has a mind for nut bread.”

The man raised his eyes skyward. “It do be tasty, and you might just need enough”—he winked broadly at her—“to stuff that wherry your brother plans to snare. I’ll just fetch these to your mother. Don’t stray now.”

Aramina didn’t stray, but in gathering she headed toward the far edge of the grove, wondering what other edibles might be found. She filled her jerkin as she moved, and had it stuffed to overflowing when she reached the boundary. There the land fell away into broken boulders. She looked up to the top of the mountain on whose flank she stood. She could see down to a twist of the river rushing through a gorge, just visible through the wintry forest. To be alone, after so many Turns of overcrowding, was a rare treat for Aramina. Maybe Lord Asgenar’s gratitude would indeed extend to a longer stay for her family in the cave. It could be made quite tenable, she was sure, even in the coldest weather. Why, they could make stalls for Nudge and Shove, and if Lord Asgenar didn’t object, maybe cut steps up the bank. From the fallen trees, they could fashion furniture. Her father could even season wood in the dry rear of the cave and have his own workshop. Her imagination embellished the dazzling possibilities. And then, being a practical girl, she sighed at her folly. She would be content enough to have a secure and private dwelling for as long as it took her father’s chest to heal. She mustn’t be greedy.

She listened then, as the breeze caressed her face, to what other sounds might be carried up from the river. She wondered if the ambush had been sprung and if she’d hear the sounds of battle. She shivered. Much as she feared Lady Holdless Thella and Giron, she wished only an end to their threat, not their lives.

She heard the faint sound of someone treading close and, thinking it was the guard returning, was taken completely by surprise as a rough hand covered her mouth and strong ones pinned her arms to her sides.

“It falls out well, after all, Giron,” said a harsh voice, and Aramina’s head was pulled cruelly back by her hair so that she looked up into the stained, sweaty face of Lady Holdless Thella. “We have snared the wild wherry after all, and the trap she laid is bare for Asgenar.”

Heth! Heth! Help me! Thella! Even if Giron’s heavy hand had not covered her mouth, Aramina was completely paralyzed by fear. Her mind idiotically repeated the one syllable that meant rescue. Heth! Heth! Heth!

Giron growled at Aramina as he began to manhandle her across the grove. “Don’t struggle, girl, or I’ll knock you senseless. Maybe I ought to, Thella,” he added, cocking his big fist in preparation. “If she can hear dragons, they can hear her.”

“She’s never been near a Weyr!” Thella’s reply was contemptuous, but the notion, now Giron had planted it, gave her a moment’s pause. Her face contorted with anger, she gave Aramina’s hair another savage jerk. “Don’t even think of calling for a dragon.”

Aramina couldn’t have stopped her mind’s chant, but she frantically rolled her eyes as if complying with Thella’s order. Anything to relieve the pain of her scalp.

“Too late!” Giron threw Aramina from him, a heave that left a hunk of her hair and scalp in Thella’s hand and Aramina teetering on the brink of a drop. A drop that was blocked by Heth, his eyes whirling red and orange in anger. He bellowed, sinuously weaving in among the trees, chasing Thella and Giron. From the other side of the grove came the two guards, Pell, and K’van, shouting imprecations. Aramina saw Giron and Thella disappear into the woods. The guards ran past in full pelt, but Heth had to stop at the edge of the grove, the forest being too dense for him to penetrate. He continued to bellow in fury, even after K’van reached him.

Shaking with reaction to her frightening experience, Aramina slumped against the nearest bulge-nut tree, clasping it for support and trying not to weep so childishly.

“ ’Mina! What happened to you?” Pell knelt beside her, his hand hovering over the bleeding scalp wound. “It was really Thella? Who else was with her?”

K’van was beside her, patting her shoulders.

“You did the right thing, ’Mina. Heth heard you and told me. We were setting snares. Heth’s called for reinforcements. They won’t get away. If there hadn’t been so many trees, Heth would’ve caught ’em already!”

“Dragons,” she said in gasps, “aren’t built … to run in forests.” Sniffing, she pointed to Heth, who was retracing his way, weaving in and out of the trees, snarling as one wing caught on a protruding branch. He looked so funny; she oughtn’t to laugh at the dear dragon who had saved her from Thella and Giron, but it was funny, and she began to giggle and then couldn’t stop her laughing.

“What’s so funny!” demanded Pell, outraged by his sister’s laughter.

“I expect she’s a bit hysterical. Not that I blame her. You take her other arm, Pell. We’ve got to get her back to the cave.”

“What about Heth?”

Heth rejoined them, his roars now reduced to belly rumbles.

I told her I was coming! I told her I heard her! Didn’t you hear me, ’Mina? Heth curled his neck around K’van to peer anxiously up at Aramina.

Hiccuping somewhere between laughter and tears, Aramina speechlessly patted Heth’s muzzle.

I was so scared … even her thought hiccuped … I couldn’t even hear myself.

“Shards!” said K’van as a whoosh of wind signaled the arrival of a wing of dragons. Heth swiveled his head toward the display.

The guards chase them through the woods!

As the three youngsters watched, Aramina marveling at the snippets of conversations she caught in the confusion of orders given and received, the dragons began to peel off from the wing formation, going in all directions in a search for the renegades.

“T’gellan’s leading the wing,” K’van informed them, deftly picking out of the stream the information that escaped Aramina. “They’ll search. We’re to get back to the cave.”

“Oh, my sackful of nuts!” cried Aramina.

“Nuts, she worries about! At a time like this!” Pell was disgusted.

Aramina started to cry again, unable to stop the tears. “Mother needs them for bread flour.…”

“I’ll come back for ’em,” exclaimed Pell at the top of his voice in frustration. “I’ll come back!”

Not completely reassured, since she knew her brother so well, Aramina was nonetheless willing to be helped back to the cave. Her mother, after her first startlement, bathed and salved Aramina’s scalp and the other scratches she had received from the rough handling. If Barla did so with compressed lips and a decidedly pale face, she did not scold Aramina. Pell, under K’van’s stern eye, had gone back for the nuts and Aramina’s jerkin. K’van brewed more klah, a very welcome cup that infused Aramina’s cold stomach with welcome heat.

Aramina, Lessa waits without, said Heth. For your mother, too.

“Mother, we’re wanted outside,” Aramina said.

“By whom?”

“By Lessa, the Weyrwoman of Pern,” said K’van. “Heth just relayed the message.”

Barla looked at her daughter as if she had never really seen her clearly before.

“You don’t just hear dragons,” she said in a puzzled voice, “they hear you, and they talk to you, and you can answer them?”

“A very useful knack,” K’van said with a grin; then he added, “Lessa’s waiting.”

“Is she angry with me?” Aramina asked timorously.

“Why would she be angry with you?” K’van asked, puzzled.

We could not be angry with you, Aramina, said the most beautiful dragon voice that Aramina had yet heard.

“C’mon.” K’van took Aramina firmly by the arm to haul her out of the cave. “You don’t keep Lessa waiting.”

Aramina’s first impression of the slender figure standing in the clearing was surprise. The Weyrwoman of Benden was so small in stature: a full head shorter than Aramina. But, once Aramina confronted Lessa, the vivid eyes and the forceful personality made her forget about such a trivial detail as height. Nor had Heth mentioned that F’lar and Lord Asgenar also waited.

“My dear child, are you quite all right?” Lessa’s expression turned anxious as her hand hovered over the ugly bare patch on Aramina’s head.

“I don’t know how that villian Thella eluded us,” said Asgenar, his teeth clenched with frustration. “We have captured the rest of her band. Fewer to trouble you, and us. I am most chagrined, Aramina, that despite our precautions you were put at risk.”

“I’m fine, really, Lord Asgenar. Heth saved me. And Mother had the fellis and numbweed.”

“We are extremely grateful to you,” Barla put in, “for those generous gifts.”

“Generous!” Lessa made a scathing remark. “I would be a lot more generous, Lady Barla, if your stiff Ruathan pride would permit.”

Nothing could have startled Barla more, but, though she permitted a slight smile to curve her lips, to Aramina she seemed to be more prideful than ever.

“We Ruathans have reason to be proud, Lady Lessa.”

“But not stupid in that pride, Lady Barla. Lytol tells me that Dowell’s hold is still vacant. Deserted, needing repairs, for no one under Fax’s holding prospered. Would you prefer to return there? Lord Asgenar”—Asgenar bowed at his name—“is also interested in anyone with wood mastery.”

Barla looked from one to the other. “Ruatha is ours by right.”

“So be it, Lady Barla,” Lessa said, and, from the way her mouth twitched, Aramina was certain that she applauded the answer.

“However, Lord Asgenar, I am certain that my husband would be glad to build you a Gather wagon … to acquit our lodging here.”

“Only if he also accepts the marks his Craft allots for the labor,” said Asgenar with a wide grin.

“Of course, Aramina is for Benden Weyr,” Lessa went on, her eyes now fixed on Barla’s face.

“But I want to go home, to Ruatha!” cried Aramina, clinging to her mother now; clinging, too, to the dream on which she had been nourished from childhood, the return to the place of her birth, where her family belonged.

“A girl who hears dragons belongs to the Weyr,” said Barla, firmly taking Aramina’s hands and pressing them hard.

“It’s not as if you can’t visit any time you want to,” Lessa said lightly. “I do. Though we of Ruatha serve our Weyrs whenever we are called to.”

Please, ’Mina. Heth’s tremulous whisper invaded her conflicting thoughts. Please come to Benden with me and K’van. We’d love to have you.

You will be most welcome in Benden Weyr, said the dark, black, rich voice of Mnementh.

“There are eggs hardening on Benden Hatching Ground right now,” Lessa went on, her voice persuasive. “Benden needs a girl who can hear dragons.”

“More than my family needs me?” asked Aramina perversely.

“Far more, as you’ll discover,” said Lessa, holding her hand out to Aramina. “Coming?”

“I don’t have a choice, do I?” But Aramina smiled.

“Not when Lessa, and Benden’s dragons, have made up your mind for you,” said F’lar with a laugh.

From the track, dragons bellowed an emphatic agreement.