Disclaimer: Pern and its inhabitants are the property of the late, great Ann McCaffrey. Most of these characters in this story are the creation of Ann McCaffrey.

This was originally a five chapter treatment of T'gellan and Mirrim long before they were at Eastern. Now It's now expanded to bring them to Eastern and right before the start of "All The Weyrs of Pern".

Chapter One

T'gellan couldn't believe his luck, double-edged as always. Young Mirrim was here, at Benden, but under the most devastating circumstances. Only that morning, Brekke's Wirenth rose to mate and Kylara's Pridith rose to fight. The moment both queens had gone between, every dragon and rider had known. His bronze Monarth had keened until the bones behind his ears throbbed. The pain of this loss was more intense than a shock of threadscore. Two queens, gone. His immediate thought was of kind Brekke and her gentle, healing hands. Could she survive losing her queen?

F'nor had brought Brekke back to his weyr in Benden and her foster-daughter, Mirrim, came with them. He hadn't seen her yet; he wasn't sure when he would but she was back in his presence. What luck? That evening, after his sweep ride, T'gellan stationed himself at one of the outer tables that commanded a broad view of the entire dining hall, the bowl and part of the kitchen. He was shocked when he realized that the tall, grim figure was her. She had run the steps between F'nor's weyr to the kitchen, then the infirmary across the bowl repeatedly. Mirrim looked pale with red-rimmed eyes and unkempt hair. Nothing like the first time he saw her . . .

It wasn't threadscore that had taken him back to Southern Weyr but a shoulder wound during a rescue operation. When he burst from between with great Monarth bugling distress, he at first thought it was for their passengers; one badly injured brown named Keth and his unconscious rider, B'tarth. Monarth landed his hind legs.

"Put your hind feet on the ground, Keth. They come with numbweed. You are strong. Your rider is strong."

T'gellan felt the weight lift from his back but something tugged at his shoulder. Keth's fore claw had penetrated his wherhide jacket and into his shoulder. Funny, it didn't hurt, then. Monarth eased forward so that Keth could lie down. Healers were already swarming the four of them. They spun in his fading vision and bodies climbed behind him, voices calling out. His last memory before unconsciousness was "Brekke, Brekke, we're hurt..."

# # #

Deft fingers fixed the outer bandages to his arm and neck as T'gellan regained his senses. He heard Monarth first. "Brekke and the dark one say you will heal well. I am going for a swim." Abruptly, the cold gulf of between cut off his dragon's thoughts.

" …easier patient than threadscored. He's yours to tend," a woman's voice above him said.

An acerbic voice responded from beside his numb left side. "Then let me tend and you return to B'tarth. Goren said he was thrashing and it will wake Keth again."

"Manners are not just for the bedside, Love," the calming voice that he now recognized as Brekke's was fading as it walked away.

"Yes ma'am," sighed the other voice. She began humming the Duty song as he felt her move pillows behind his head and tuck a light blanket about his body. T'gellan opened his eyes to flat grey. He realized a compress was over his eyes and he groaned when he lifted his left hand to remove it. A firm palm pushed down on his forehead as the voice chided, "Now, now, Rider. We have gone through much toil to dress you out, the least you can do is to lie still. Those are your orders."

T'gellan used his right hand to press over the hand on his forehead. Firmly he moved the hand and compress from his eyes. It was late afternoon. He became aware of birdsong and droning bugs as he gazed into depthless green eyes from a child's face. "You're but a girl!" he blurted.

"And you're but a boy on a bronze," she rejoined. "You are in Southern and you are my patient. Now cooperate. You don't need the compress and we can leave it off. I do need my hand, so let it go."

It was the first time since he impressed his magnificent bronze Monarth that T'gellan had felt like a child. "Yes ma'am," he replied as he gave her hand a slight squeeze before letting it go. Her brows arched over those sea green eyes but she smirked then moved back. "You must be hungry, I'll warrant. Would you like some bread and broth?" He nodded as she moved away. He became aware of his room which was actually a long hall with a succession of beds along the wall. He was not the only patient. To his right was a grizzled rider, grinning widely.

"She's a competent healer's apprentice, young Mirrim," said he. "G'nareth, Blue Bleth's rider of Telgar." He crossed his right arm with his fist over his heart in the deferential salute owed to bronze riders.

"Mirrim," said T'gellan, lost in thought for a moment before he remembered his rank and duty. "T'gellan, Bronze Monarth's rider of Benden". He nodded, releasing the older man's salute. As he lay back, G'nareth chuckled. T'gellan felt like an eight turner.

"I like Brekke's dark one." came Monarth's thought, unbidden. T'gellan grinned. Dragons rarely named humans let alone assign feeling towards them so quickly. His stomach grumbled and he realized that he was looking forward to seeing the server more than he was the food she would bring.

# # #

A sevenday into his convalescence at Southern, T'gellan was allowed to move to an open weyr. Monarth had already created a wallow in the gritty dirt. He rumbled with contentment as T'gellan ambled into view. Both lids on his great eyes lowered as he huffed a breath that blew across the clearing unsettling a few fellis blossoms off the largest sample of that kind T'gellan had ever seen. As the petals wafted to the ground, T'gellan gaze drew to his immense bronze companion's exposed abdomen. Up North, his dragon would have curled up to conserve warmth but here, winter chills were unknown. It was comical to see his dragon on his back sunning his immense belly.

With his unbound hand, he picked up the gritty dirt and rubbed it on a patch of dry skin. He noticed another patch further up so attacked that spot by scaling the belly. Once on top, he realized how quickly he tired. Monarth's rangy odor was always strongest on his belly. It was T'gellan's favorite fragrance. Although his bandaged arm and shoulder hindered him he found a way to lie on his back and face the declining sun as well.

While drowsing, he thought of his first experience with a woman. It had been soon after his and Monarth's first flight between. Willa of the lower caverns in Benden had wooed him. Her favorite location for her particular brand of initiation was an inaccessible stretch of beach on an island off of Ista. Well, inaccessible to all but a dragon rider. Aside from Lessa, Willa was the only woman that Monarth had listened to. Once he knew her plan, he had no hesitation in taking them to the beach that she had imaged.

That had been two turns ago. Soon another batch of dragons and riders were paired and as T'gellan's prowess increased, Willa's interest waned. As she was fifteen turns his senior, it should not have stung as much. Since he was given leave to visit Gathers he found plenty of women ready to bed him. He guessed he could have been hare-lipped and gimped legged, his allure was the great beast he lay upon.

"Odd," he mused, "It must be the heady smell of fellis and sea that makes me remember her." Simultaneously he and Monarth sighed. Monarth still turned his great head when Willa was in view. Many bronzes did. He felt his dragon shift, then cradle him in a forepaw and roll. Once he was under his dragon, he was laid on the dirt and Monarth backed away.

"You are as silly as a wherrie, Rider, to let the sun burn you red," said a familiar voice. Mirrim was over him, slathering a cooling salve on his face and arms. "You did your bandages no service either. Why there must be as much dirt in there as there is on Monarth's hide."

The image of Willa was still fresh in his mind as he opened his eyes. Instead of strawberry waves caressing a heart-shaped face with wide set blue eyes and languid smile, there were green pebble eyes and a sardonic smirk. He was beginning to like those eyes.

"Can you stand?" she asked, already pushing him to a sitting position.

"Leave off, child," he gruffed. He scrambled to his knees and realized at once that his exposed legs had burned too. He stifled a groan. Mirrim was under his good shoulder, expertly holding him steady as she directed him to the hut at the edge of the clearing.

"Tell your dragon to go for an evening swim." she ordered. Before T'gellan could bespeak Monarth, the dragon had turned away and leapt to the sky, the current of air from his down-sweep driving grit into their backs. By then she had guided him to a bench inside the hut. He relaxed as she uncovered a glow.

"Well, it's not my fault if your face peels. It's a pretty good sunburn," she remarked. Deftly she untied the various knots holding his arm to his chest. He looked down to the padding over the puncture that Keth's leading wing claw had dug into the fleshy part beside his armpit. He had already seen the scar and listen to Brekke, Healer Goren and Mirrim's discussions. Dragon claw wounds tended to fester. They were pleased to remark on its health.

He couldn't fault Keth. The dragon had popped between when thread had raked him and his rider in an updraft caused by dragon wings rather than gravity. T'gellan had relied on Monarth's senses to be directly under the pair when they reappeared. The blast of cold between had saved him from the initial shock of the claw. A dragon who curled a wing under himself like that surely couldn't fly. Monarth had quickly assessed and popped between to medical attention.

To his credit, Keth would fly again, but not until the thin wing membrane regrew. He and his rider were in Southern for at least a turn. T'gellan would be able to fly between within three sevenday. He'd be back on duty in another two. Both he and B'tarth had stoically absorbed wingleader N'ton's admonitions two days later. "Don't get used to this" was N'ton's last instructions to T'gellan.

Mirrim had taken the affected arm by the elbow and placed it carefully on a block of wood that served as an arm rest. "I'll let you air for a moment." She stepped away and shook out the outer bandage flinging grit out the door. "There now, we might be able to get another day of use out of this if you promise to stop playing in the dirt."

"What I'd really like is a soak," T'gellan said, thinking of the hot pool in his Benden weyr.

"Absolutely not," she imposed. "You cannot think of swimming yet.

"I was thinking more of the hot baths in Benden," he replied. "There are thermals in Benden Range that warm all the weyrs. They bubble up steaming water from underground to each weyr."

She considered him for a moment, a slight scowl on her forehead. "Each weyr has a thermal pool?"

"Yes," he replied. "Every weyr has a bathing room that annexes the bedchambers and dragon couches. The ancients built them. They work exactly the same as they did to this day." T'gellan was aware that the thermals actually required regular maintenance of which he knew little but he was proud to be of Benden and fond of his bathing pool.

Her lips curled in a quirky half grin. "A whole pool of water you didn't have to heat. I'd bath daily." She gave a little sigh and returned to her task.

He knew to keep his arm still. He had tried to feed himself that first day only to find that his dominant hand was useless until the wound healed enough. Using the other hand proved messy. She had spooned the broth into his mouth like he was a child except that she kept up a lively banter for him, G'nareth, and the other convalescing riders whose attempts to tease her evoked sharp retorts that kept T'gellan in light spirits. He had tried to gauge her age that first day. She was too mature and adept to be a child and yet she was not near full grown. Now, as she moved about his room, fluffing the thick rush bag on the narrow cot, pulling the curtains over the windows and moving the spindly table to his side, she moved like a woman, her shift was meant to hide the soft curves of her body. She returned to his side to smooth more cooling salve on his arm and chest where the outer bandage had not protected.

"I'm a bit thirsty," he replied. "Is there a wineskin about?" Shrewd green eyes observed him.

"I will bring you some juice and food." She replied. "You're in no condition to go to the mess hall. Not with that red face. Brekke will flay me."

T'gellan chuckled. The Brekke he knew was incapable of it. "Your foster mother would do no such thing."

Mirrim grinned sheepishly, "No, she wouldn't. But her disappointment in me would feel like a whip."

He gripped her hand where it had lingered on his arm. "I promise to stay low until the burn fades. Will you bring me something to eat?"

Her genuine smile in return gave him his answer. That evening the two of them sparred over the first of several meals. Each morning, Mirrim sponged him clean then spread salve over his face, arms, chest and legs and each evening before he drifted to sleep she repeated the ministrations. Daily, he endured the manipulation of his arm as she made him exercise it, another exquisite torture. Her quick wit and sharp tongue matched his jesting humor. Often, Monarth's rumble would follow her rejoinders. One morning, he'd spied her caressing Monarth's eye ridges before she scratched at the door to his hut.

After a sevenday or so, Brekke came in Mirrim's stead. By then his burn had faded into a ruddy tan. She spoke pleasantly as she examined the wound and manipulated his arm. She quietly told him that he was free to fly to the beaches for the day and occupy his time with other endeavors. He thought it best to leave the girl alone. Brekke had intimated as much. After a few days frolicking with his dragon in the warm salt waters and drowsing under the trees at beach line he felt restless to return to Benden. T'gellan didn't see Mirrim again until the day he left. She was not cold to him, exactly, but obviously aware that she had been reproached for the attachment. Healers did not fraternize with patients, especially Bronze Dragon Riders. And yet …

And yet he hadn't let those green eyes go, not even when he and Monarth were back at Benden.