Thank you for all the reviews. I hope this chapter makes up for making the Weyrwoman cry!
20.12.199
"Chandra! I'd hoped you'd get here in time!"
H'ric smiled broadly as the trader came through the entrance to the Weyr bowl.
"Weyrleader! We made good time after we picked up your drum message. I left the most part of the wagons to carry on, but brought the immediate family here."
"You could have messaged me? I'd have sent a dragon or two?"
Chandra shook his head, his smile fading.
"We're not in good enough ranking with the Holders for them to allow that, I'm afraid. I'd have had to pay out a lot of marks for such a message, and I knew I could make it in time, once I had the date."
"Pay for a drum message? Is that usual?"
Chandra shrugged as he gestured to the rest of his immediate family, his wife and sons and daughters, and H'ric hurried to greet them.
"There's a lot of things changing in this world," Chandra's wife said bluntly. "Traders are mostly always welcome, but not if they try and send messages. The Lord Holders wouldn't trust us not to send a coded message that would set them up for a higher price."
"That sounds like the sort of world this is turning into," H'ric agreed bitterly, as he led them to the caverns to claim their rooms and to get washed and changed.
He marked off his list; Dawan was standing at this Hatching, and he had sent in good time for the boy's family. He had high hopes the boy would fix on a bronze, because the way he had soaked up the learning had been little short of astonishing. Together with Cosin, C'lin's son by his weyrmate Sisla, they had formed the apex of their class. The beginnings of a new Wing, H'ric thought contentedly as he hurried to greet others coming to this late Hatching just before Turn's End. The mating had been satisfactory, Galanath had outflown Fineth by a clear margin, and if only ten eggs had resulted, the Weyr still considered the two dominant dragons to be a remarkably well matched pair.
H'ric huffed out his breath, seeing it dissipate on the cold wind skirling around the Bowl. The winter tithe had come in from Benden, Bitra and Lemos, and there had been some welcome additions from a couple of the other Lord Holders, fruit that had been bottled and preserved, vegetables turned into Sisla's particularly fine chutney.
"Grance! Do you have some new songs for us tonight?" H'ric called to the harper, and he turned and waved.
"Yes, I've a couple, and some new dance tunes as well. Let's hope we don't get snowed in, Weyrleader, those clouds look menacing."
H'ric looked up into the north east, and shivered at the size of the storm clouds on the horizon.
"They might not reach us for a day or two, and maybe even dissipate in the further mountains," he said. "But there's snow on the way, no doubt of it."
He knew both of them had automatically thought of L'rens and his love of the far northern valleys with their endless eternal snows, but neither of them mentioned it. After his illness, and recovery, H'ric had tried to shake off the constant feeling of oppression about the future, and planned the Weyr on a more day to day spontaneous basis. Sending the Wings out to their designated places had helped, because the dragons had hunted their own food for the most part, allowing more meat to be salted and cured for the winter in the Weyr.
"More people! Oh, it's the Lady Irilia and Lavand's family - I'll do the honours, Weyrleader!"
H'ric watched with some amusement as the harper hurried across to the daughter of Bitra's Lord Holder. Grance had filled out in the months he had been at the Weyr, doing as much exercise as the weyrlings and the riders, helping with the hay harvest in the valleys north of Telgar, but not neglecting his teaching and composing duties. H'ric knew he had visited the Lady Irilia a few times, and they certainly seemed to have plenty to talk about. Perhaps the lady would be returning to the Weyr in the near future, H'ric thought, and turned to greet more guests.
When he slipped into his place beside Jiverny, H'ric was smiling, and she took his hand and smiled back.
"Where were you?" she asked in a low voice, although there was plenty of conversation in the ground to mask her question.
"Oh, just calming Jerenic with a story and a little game. He's been restless - he seems to be able to pick up on feelings much more than a lot of the other children. He's calm enough now, playing a complicated counting game with Booty."
Jiverny laughed. Her mother had made a cloth toy in the shape of a bronze dragon, and the much-loved, much-bedraggled toy accompanied Jerenic most of the time. He had insisted on a thank you letter, which Jiverny had written, and Jerenic had put a lot of wobbly crosses on the bottom of it.
"We'll have to watch that sensitivity, make sure it isn't crushed," she murmured, and then they turned their attention to the Hatching Ground where the dragons had begun their bone-aching hum as the first of the eggs began to rock wildly. There were twenty boys grouped near them, ranging from Dawan as the youngest to Cosin as the eldest, but all of them had responded well to teaching, and getting to know the Hatching Grounds, paying their respects to Haveneth as she had guarded the eggs.
"Look there! A brown - oh yes - Limol has him!"
"His name is Slendith!" the boy shouted, and the riders cheered as the newly pairing was helped away from the mayhem on the ground as the other eggs began to crack, and the dragonets spilled from them, damp and new, soft skinned, unsteady on their feet, a couple tripping themselves up.
"Who has that bronze? Is it Dawan?"
"No, there's another bronze - Fafnel has him - there's Dawan - there's an egg breaking near him - "
H'ric joined the cheer from Chandra and his family as Dawan Impressed, shouting his bronze dragon's name as Marath.
"There's a dragonet facing the wrong way!" Jiverny said tensely. "Look - that brown - it's turned itself completely around - someone go and help it - "
"Grance is there," H'ric replied. "What's he doing on the lower levels? Oh yes, he was sitting with Irilia - good man - oh! Oh - L'rens - you clever, clever man - "
He sat back, aware of his voice choking on sobs, because Grance had lifted a face radiant with love and awe.
"His name is Soromoth!"
H'ric walked the tables that night at the feast, naming the new dragonriders.
"G'ance, rider of brown Soromoth, Weyrharper of Benden."
People cheered, and H'ric gave the harper the sign of equals.
"I hope you can still manage to play and sing," H'ric said with a grin, and G'ance smiled back.
"Oh, I think I can do that, Weyrleader!"
He was sitting with D'wan and C'sin, the pair having taken him in with them, despite the huge disparity of ages between all three.
"My pa would have been proudest," C'sin said. "Although your pa looks ready to burst with pride, D'wan."
"Yep. Will you write to your folks, G'ance?"
"Yes, I'll do that soon. Looks like I have to sing for my supper first!"
He took his gitar to the small stage and acknowledged the good wishes, his glance going to Irilia who was smiling proudly at him.
"I wrote a few songs for the new riders," G'ance said, plucking a chord. "And a couple of new dance tunes, because Weyr folk are insatiable dancers!"
He paused at the burst of laughter and applause, and struck another chord.
"But first - those who are not Weyr-bred might not understand the absolute depth, the absolutely insoluble bond of a dragon and its rider. So this is for them - and for me - and for L'rens who told me I could do anything if I faced it and refused to give in to my fear."
The room fell silent as G'ance played an opening sequence, and then began to sing.
"You are my heartfriend, O soul of my soul,
Nowhere is fine to me, save where you are.
You my first thought in the day and the night,
Waking and sleeping, you are my delight.
You are my wisdom, you are my true soul,
You ever with me, and I with you always.
You are my great treasure, and I your true friend,
Both of one mind now, our barriers transcend.
Riches I need not, nor men's earthly praise,
You are my soul's birthright, now and always.
You, and you only, the first in my heart,
O heartfriend of dragonkind, my treasure you are.
You are my bright charger, my weapon of force,
You are my whole armour, my trust and my hope.
The path we have chosen, the battles we fight,
O raise us to greatness, ever onwards to right .
Skies we will cleave through, to fight to the end,
O grant us great joys after victory is won!
Great heart of my own heart, whatever become,
You are my true heartfriend, and we will be one."