I updated! I realised how long I'd left this to rot, and I know it's just not right, especially when you've all been so patient. Hopefully, this tale should be coming to a close pretty quickly now, and I hope it'll be finished in the next two weeks/month or so. Please leave a review to say how you liked it!

Chapter Six

She was four. Kiroth had reached normal growth two Turns back when she first rose to mate, glorying in the welding of bodies and minds, still delighted that Hasath had caught her. But like a foolish wherry, she had been forced to cringe and hide from dragonkin and their humans, sliding on her belly like a tunnel snake to remain undiscovered. Most of her first children had hatched from the Shell with the same ferocity that she recalled vividly from her own birth. Some creeled piteously, seeking someone to lead them, to master them. Kiroth wouldn't allow that to happen. They were dispatched without mercy, for those who were weak would never survive this cruel world.

That first generation of her womb were named Lort, Dreet, Yult, Kast, Birst… She had forgotten the rest, whose hides were blue and green and brown. She wanted bronzes – and gold. Her first daughter was as bloodthirsty as her mother, keening for revenge on those who harried them so mercilessly. In her brief life, they knew her as Fort, whose tough hide failed her when the humans first used lances. They had stabbed her in the belly and hacked off her graceful head, parading it as some grisly trophy. Now, Kiroth's hatred burned as hotly as it had those few Turns ago on the Sands, but it was blacker. Fort had risen to mate barely a sevenday before, and the eggs in her womb had been ready to be laid on one of Southern's hot dry beaches. Her killers had ripped the soft shells apart and let the hatchlings suffocate.

Kiroth thought of the young dragonets secreted on the Southern continent and felt a swelling of motherly pride. Her third clutch, Hatching only hours before news of her beloved daughter's murder, were already being taught to obey their instincts by the junior queen, Trist. It seemed that all her own hatchlings had some tenuous link to the humans' meddling; their names still followed a uniform pattern. Kiroth hoped that when Trist was caught in the next year, her young would be further from the possibility of slavery to humans. A gusty breath of air escaped her jaws, and she hung her head slightly. Why didn't the humans leave them alone?

Kiroth! Dreet bugled a warning, and Kiroth danced away only just in time, the lance grazing her tail. Fury raced into her belly and pooled there. If only there were some way to char the wooden beams as they flew in the Up! The Up was for dragonkin alone, and such things did not belong there. Her jaws closed around the slender weapon and it splintered, but it was merely the herald for a greater foe. Dragons blinked from between, their number outstripping her own egg-brothers and sisters by at least twoscore more. Kiroth shrieked in anger. So, they presumed to try and fight her with dragons, did they? She snapped her orders.

Hasath, take the younger flight of bronzes and engage Igen-kin. Gorth, lead our brothers against Fort and High Reaches. Her eyes bled crimson. Senth, bring the flitters about and kill the rest! She trembled in her anger, her wings glittering as she continued to soar towards the last queen of Benden, and the large brown dived neatly towards the weyrs she had indicated, his entourage strong in blues and greens. The browns flew under their bronze brothers, and the bronzes marshalled the Queen, their deep-chested roars echoing Kiroth's screams. Before the two lines crashed, Kiroth met the senior queen of Benden's bloody gaze, and snarled: the oldster is mine.

The battle began. Naranth bugled her fierce challenge and her rider leant forward in anticipation, her features set in grim anger. The two gleaming bodies crashed together, their necks snaking as they struggled to find purchase beneath the jaw. A savage bite in that soft hide would sever the artery and the dragon would die almost immediately. Their claws raked the other's unprotected belly, and Kiroth found herself becoming frustrated. Naranth was squirming like quicksilver, twisting in her grasp to protect the pathetic human on her back.

Her teeth grazed Kiroth's throat, and the younger queen felt a battlefury fall like a mist on her eyes. Anger lent her strength, and she leapt from her dam's grasp and with one swipe unseated the rider. The injured human fell with shock etched onto her face, and with a desperate bellow, Naranth streaked after the falling figure. Kiroth spied her chance. She, too, was diving after the human, but with a different intent. If the senior queen was so strenuously protecting the human, then perhaps to kill it would be enough.

The young dragon's talons rent the frail body apart as so much soft earth, and Naranth shrieked, her eyes rolling back in her head. She sagged, and then ripped into between with a vigour that was frightening. Kiroth felt her dam's despair just before she became not. And then, she was turning back to the battle, but there were so many dying, so many hurting-

A bloodbath.

They didn't stop for two days. The corpses of the fallen rotted where they had not been able to enter between in time, and death bled its bloodthirsty, hungry way across Pern. By the end, only four of those who had battled remained. They entered wearily into between, glad to follow her coordinates, glad that they were still alive. Pern was scarred, but the dragonmother rose to mate barely eight moons later. The clutch was larger, and stronger, than any previous. The dragons made their home in the mountains, where humans could not breathe the thin air, and grew in number. And Kiroth, humming at her daughter's clutch Hatching, felt triumphant. They had won the right to live.

They would survive.

"You are sure?" the voice breathed hoarsely. His companion smirked, but it held no humour, and the glint in his eyes was malicious.

"I am sure," he drawled. "I have spent too many years to fail now, where it matters most." He held out the crate, and watched the broken man before him take it in his hands. Coarse, weathered fingers clasped its metal sides, and its cargo clinked softly. The other hissed in wrathful warning.

"Fool! Break those and you will release something far worse before its time!" He stroked his creation lovingly, and his eyes flickered back to his accomplice's face. "Take care that you feed them to the beasts slowly. Introduce it in small amounts during this sevenday, and then increase it." His eyelids hooded, and the thin mouth curled unpleasantly. "That sharding queen won't know what hit her."

Chira paced smugly into the antechamber, pausing just enough before greeting the weyrleader that the action was studiously insulting. The new weyrwoman was glowing almost as much as her queen, who was due to rise within the next sevenday. The weyr's bronzes were on tenterhooks, snappish and unusually rough with one another as each lusted after gold. Naranth was young, but her hide was a curious sun-drenched hue, and her sinuous body was almost as long as Ramoth had been.

F'lar didn't seem to register her insult, although his tired grey eyes studied her for a moment before turning back to his companions. The man's erect figure had suddenly drooped after his weyrmate fell to the ravages of Fever, and her shivering, unutterable agony had ended only with eternal sleep. Ramoth had gone between the moment her lifemate ceased to struggle in rasping breaths for air, and the piercing wail could almost be heard echoing around the weyr even though the dragons had long since stopped their lament. Mnementh had tried to follow his mate into between, and only his fear that his own lifemate would succumb to insanity caused his return back into the warmth of life.

"Weyrleader," Chira said coolly. He nodded briefly at her, and turned back to the Mastercraftsman. F'lar said something in a low voice to the small man, and the other nodded, his anxious expression relaxing slightly. Gersan directed a cursory bow at the young woman, muttering "Weyrwoman" as he left. She acknowledged him with pursed lips, and then transferred her attention to the weyrleader. "I want D'kran to head up K'net's old wing," she began. Evidently, of all the things he had prepared himself for, this wasn't one of them. F'lar's glance at the young queenrider was surprised. When he said nothing, she added, slightly belligerently, "Since Piyanth was scored so badly in the last Threadfall to hit Pern, the Games will need fresh blood." Chira crossed her arms, and cocked her head, waiting for an answer. When it didn't come, she gave a sigh, and F'lar gestured for her to remain silent.

"Since this queen dragon appeared from the future, we have no way of knowing what could happen, Chira." His reproach was not direct, but it stung her. "Until I - we - discover her purpose, and a little more of why she was so badly injured, the Games do not seem to be most important." He paused. "D'kran is yet young, Chira, as are you. There is time -" and here his voice choked a little at the irony "- for you and D'kran to learn the burdens of leadership soon enough." The young woman's eyes blazed, but she bit her lip to keep from uttering the retort that sprang so readily to her lips. Naranth sent a soothing shaft of love towards her, and Chira took a deep breath. Her shoulders sagged slightly.

"You're right," she said blankly. Nodding stiffly, she turned on her heel and strode from the room, missing the faint look of regret that passed over the other man's face. She was young, he reminded himself. He was old enough to be her grandsire, and she had Turned fifteen only that season. She was nervous about the mating flight, as well, though she tried to hide it behind a facade of brashness. He suspected it would be her first, but D'kran was a good man, and his bronze Dranth was clever and surprisingly agile, for his colour. The young man needed only seasoning, as did that impetuous young weyrwoman. He quirked a sad smile, recalling another weyrwoman who had had the tendency to think later, and speak first. Mnementh crooned softly in longing, but his reply echoed the same as always.

Not yet.

I know that we haven't seen any of Ronan this chapter. There's still quite a portion to go for this story, so he'll be coming back, don't worry! Please leave a review, and I'll update as quickly as possible. =)

Rue