Title: Side Effects

Author's notes: A random companion piece to "Rewriting History." In which Jaxom's extreme discretion in NOT discussing his forward-timing is lightly breached. Also, in case anyone was wondering why the usually music-respecting Pernese were chatting and joking DURING a musical performance, they're all completely hammered! So hammered. Even the performers.

"To old friends," Jaxom toasted quietly, in deference to the musicians currently performing the fifth encore of "The True Ballad of Moreta's Ride."

Piemur contentedly tapped against Jaxom's glass with his own goblet. "Old friends." Piemur studied the empty depths of his cup with a puzzled, drunken look, before adding a hearty splash from their second wineskin- a '16, in honor of MasterHarper Robinton, whose birthing day the raucous group was celebrating. "We're old, now," he said, philosophical in his inebriation. "Old and busy. Remember how long we lived here at Cove, when it was just sand and blankets and a campfire? Then Landing, and then the mad rush of the Aivas years. Now we hardly see one another."

"Except the ones we married," Jaxom pointed out, smiling a little foolishly.

"And what women we've married! Do you know Jancis is famous?" Piemur boasted proudly. "Famous!"

Jaxom's gaze wandered to their wives, seated at another table. The grown women were laughing uproariously at a story Sharra and Jancis were recounting, probably at their beloved Robinton's expense; Mirrim made several sharp stabbing motions at a tray of melon slices and the group burst into shrill cackles. Onstage as part of the chorus, Menolly expertly aimed a wadded up paper at her rather distinguished cluster of friends, and the noise immediately subsided.

"You," Piemur's finger wobbled a bit as he pointed to the Ruathan Lord Holder, "may have been born into this- this sphere, but I was a lowly herder's boy."

"Sphere?" Perhaps it was the wine, but Jaxom couldn't wrap his head around the word. "Like a ball?"

"What? No. Sphere. Class. Caste. Stratification." Piemur waved his hand around. "Lookit. There's Lessa, the living legend herself, and F'lar, who is probably going to go down in history as the greatest Weyrleader since Sean Connell. He's right over there, I'm watching him eat cheeses, not fifty yards away. Not to mention D'ram and Lytol, and half the Weyrleaders, and most of the important Craftmasters- you know which ones those actually are-"

"Don't let anyone hear you say that," Jaxom cut in.

Piemur rolled his eyes, but nonetheless lowered his voice. "Point is. Twenty, thirty turns ago, I was tending herdbeasts. And not even the prize animals, I always seemed to get the scrawny, expendable, flatulent ones. I never expected I'd be sitting here, surrounded by the elite, the ones who changed Pern and continue to do so day after day with boundless courage and heads and shoulders held high against the endless burden of-"

Jaxom laughed. "Piemur, you're drunk."

The harper shot him a harassed look. "I was just getting started," he complained. "It was going to be really eloquent." With a sigh, he subsided back into his seat, pensively fingering his wine goblet.

Jaxom leaned over to grip his old friend's arm. "You, Piemur, are discounting the service you've done for this entire planet," he said, suddenly serious. "Don't do yourself a disservice. You're a hero. Think of everything you've done."

"It didn't all feel heroic at the time," came the quiet reply. "It was scary and confusing, and sometimes even boring."

"Yeah," Jaxom said, at a loss for words. The ballad soared triumphantly as Moreta took to the skies on Weyrwoman Leri's Holth, filling the sudden silence between the two men.

"B'lerion's account of Moreta's ride was fantastic," Piemur said, changing the subject completely. "He should have been a harper. Accurate, funny and heartbreaking at the same time. D'you know," he added dreamily, "when they went forward to a time when Moreta had already died, she felt pleasantly disoriented? Euphoric, even. Rather different than other accounts of timing-related side effects. Not that anyone times forward, that would be insane."

"Euphoric?" Jaxom said dully, his mind fruitlessly battling against wine-stupor. "I've heard of confusion, dizziness. Most often Ruth and I don't feel anything at all when we time it. And we didn't feel anything. Why would anyone feel euphoric if their future counterpart was dead?"

"No sharding idea," Piemur replied idly, until he caught sight of his friend's pale face. "Jaxom?"

Ruth? Jaxom called to his dragon, attempting to quell his panic. Ruth!

The white dragon had been sleeping, and Jaxom hurriedly recounted Piemur's words. We didn't feel anything like that, Ruth replied groggily. It was only fifty turns. We will still be strong in fifty turns, if we take care.

Piemur was used to dragon exchanges, and impatiently waited for Jaxom's attention to return to the feast hall. "You went to the future," he guessed, very softly, but with real anger tingeing his clipped words. "Why would you risk that?"

"Aivas." The name held the same authority to Jaxom as it did to Piemur. "Ruth and I ... we went to the Yokohama and checked the trajectory of the Red Star. I had to know," Jaxom admitted, fresh guilt tearing at his heart as he glanced at his precious Sharra, once again reliving the risks he took with his life and Ruth's. He dropped his head to his knees, unable to look his friend in the eyes.

Minutes of silence passed before he heard Piemur's anguished whisper. "And did we succeed? Did we do it?"

Jaxom raised his head. "Yes," Jaxom and Ruth said simultaneously, and Piemur jumped at the draconic voice in his head. "Yes," Jaxom repeated with satisfaction, and as it always did, the triumph and relief filled his chest until he thought he would burst with joy.

Piemur buried his face in his hands for a moment, and when he emerged, Jaxom was not surprised to see the dampness in his friend's eyes. "It's one thing to know," Piemur said, wonderingly, "But to know. For certain."

Together, they finished the wineskin before the end of the ballad, with hands that only slightly trembled. "You mustn't tell anyone," Jaxom warned. "No one else knows."

"Not even Sharra?" Piemur said sharply. Jaxom shook his head, and Piemur let out a long, low exhalation before nodding his assent. "Then I swear I won't say a word. For all my life, I'll keep your secret."

"Not your whole life," Jaxom said as they shook hands solemnly. "Less than fifty turns now, or whenever the changes become glaringly apparent. Then we can celebrate with everyone. Well," he hedged, "actually, don't tell them I timed forward, if you please. I don't want to explain it to F'lar. Or Lessa. Oh, shards, Lytol would kill me, if Sharra hadn't already beat him to it."

"Deal."

"Do you think there will be a ballad about us someday?" Jaxom asked, trying to lighten the somber mood with some whimsical speculation.

Piemur smiled crookedly. "Menolly's already starting one, but she wants to get it right- or at least more accurate than the original Moreta's Ride. We're both in it, in case you're wondering."

"We are?"

"Yes, Lord Jaxom and his mighty Ruth, and the incredibly handsome traveling Harper Piemur."

"It doesn't really say that," Jaxom said, after he stopped choking on his wine.

"No," the irrepressible harper replied, tossing back another mouthful. "But it will, after I break into Menolly's workroom tonight and change all her drafts!"

Laughing, the two toasted one last time with the end of their wine. "To heroes," Piemur said, wryly, and Jaxom gladly returned the salute.