Defective
A/N
This story is dedicated to all the people we know who are a little bit different, and who struggle to find their place in the world. This novelette-length tale is set early in the "All the Weyrs of Pern" time line. Rated T for a bit of lime flavor in the middle; most of the story is K-plus, and the language is all K.
"What do you think of this one, Canth?"
No, not that one. Keep looking.
F'nor was slowly making his way down a line of young men from Lemos Hold, looking for good candidates for the Hatching Sands. Ramoth had laid yet another enormous clutch, and Benden Weyr was almost completely out of suitable boys to pair off with them.
The boys themselves were somewhat nervous. They had all heard stories of what life in the Weyr was like, and many of those stories had been exaggerated to the point of becoming horror tales. But at the same time, they all had seen the dragons and their riders protecting their world by burning Thread out of the sky, and no one could question that the Weyr provided a vital service. Their parents were ambivalent. Becoming a dragonrider would bring no disgrace on anyone's family, the way it might have done a generation ago. But losing a young, strong worker to the Weyr could definitely harm a Hold's productivity, especially if the boy was the firstborn and the heir to the Hold.
F'nor and Canth had picked out two promising boys already, Tazadi and Chet. That pair was standing apart, watching the brown rider and his huge beast as they worked their way down the line. One of the girls among the spectators was visibly distressed. Had she set her heart on one of the chosen candidates, and was she now realizing that she might never see him again? These things happened from time to time, and there was nothing that anyone could do about it. No doubt her father would wave his hand and mutter something like, "You'll find another one." Maybe that would become true someday, but it was no consolation to the girl today.
Canth rejected the next boy, then another one. They were getting close to the end of the line. Two candidates wasn't a bad day's work, but F'nor liked to bring in candidates in groups of three, just because he could do it – Canth could carry four people without any strain at all.
No, not that one. But the next one...
Canth paused. That was unusual; normally, the brown had no doubts or confusion when considering possible candidates. The big dragon looked at the second-to-last boy from several angles, while F'nor waited patiently. The boy looked to be 13 or 14 Turns; he was of average height and build, reasonably good-looking but otherwise unexceptional. He looked increasingly nervous as the huge brown dragon scrutinized him ever more closely. At last, he found his voice.
"Excuse me, sir, but... is your dragon going to eat me?"
F'nor laughed. "Never! Dragons can't hurt people. He's just trying to figure something out." To Canth, he thought, "What is it that you're trying to figure out?"
There is something unusual about this boy. I cannot put a name to it. I think he will Impress if given the chance; he is compassionate and sensitive, and he has no preconceived notions about dragons. There may be issues in the future, but I think we should take him.
"All right, then!" F'nor burst out. "Young man, what's your name?"
"Gorray," the boy answered hesitantly.
"In that case, Gorray, today is your lucky day! Canth has chosen you. You're going to be put to the egg!"
"Thank you, sir, I think," Gorray said. "Can I say goodbye to my parents?"
"Of course you can, but this isn't a forever goodbye. They can visit you anytime, and once you and your dragon learn to fly between, you can visit them, too." Gorray ran over to hug his parents and exchange some words with them, Canth rejected the last boy in the row, and it was time for them to go.
"Tazadi, Chet, Gorray, it's time. Let me show you how to ride a dragon." He gave each of them a hand as they climbed onto Canth's foreleg, then encouraged them to work their way back to make room for the next boy. Gorray was the last to climb aboard, so he was right behind F'nor.
"Okay, all of you, wrap your arms around the midsection of the one in front of you and hold on tight. Canth won't snap your necks back when he takes off, like a lot of green dragons will do, but he still gets into the air quickly. I don't want to lose any of you on your very first flight. Hold on – here we go!" Canth crouched, then sprang into the air with a powerful downflap. Gorray tightened his grip on F'nor as they quickly passed the heights of the roofs. Then his grip became an absolute death hold.
"We're going between now," F'nor warned them.
"Please put me d–" Gorray was pleading at the moment Canth took them between. Then none of them could see, hear, or feel anything for a few seconds. When they emerged over Benden Weyr, Gorray had not relaxed one iota.
"What do you think of our Weyr?" he asked the boys.
"Wow," Chet sighed.
"It's bigger than I thought," Tazadi nodded.
"Please put me down!" Gorray begged. "Please! Now!"
"We'll land in a minute or two," F'nor tried to reassure him, but something was very wrong. "Canth, what's going on here?"
He is afraid of heights! Canth sounded shocked. To a dragon's way of thinking, such a thing was unimaginable.
"Now you tell me!" F'nor mentally burst out. "Why didn't he tell us that before?"
He did not know. He is a Holder's son who has spent his entire life learning about farming. He has never been off the ground before.
F'nor shook his head. "A boy who's afraid of heights can't be a dragonrider. He has no business on the sands. We'll have to send him back."
I think that is what he wants as well.
Gorray was close to tears. His eyes were shut tightly, he was shaking, and F'nor was beginning to have problems breathing because the boy was clinging to him so tightly. He encouraged Canth to spiral down and land more quickly than usual. He preferred to stretch out this part of the flight, so the new candidates could better appreciate the sight of their future home for the first time, but this time, one of his candidates had no interest in the view at all.
As soon as Canth thudded to the ground, F'nor was looking around for help. He couldn't dismount until Gorray let go of him, and Gorray wasn't budging. He spotted R'esh, blue Ayinth's rider, walking toward the Weyr tanner's shop. "R'esh! Come here for a moment!" The blue rider looked to see who was calling him, then trotted over to Canth's side.
"How can I help you, F'nor?"
"Help me disengage myself from this hatching candidate's death-grip so I can dismount." It took both of them to get Gorray to let go. F'nor handed the traumatized boy down, then helped the other two candidates dismount. They stared at Gorray curiously. He was kneeling on the ground, his arms wrapped around himself, rocking back and forth. He still hadn't opened his eyes.
"What's wrong with him?" Tazadi wondered.
"That's not your worry," F'nor told them firmly. "Both of you, head over to the cave on your left with the green marks on it. That's the office of K'lune, the Weyrlingmaster. He'll take care of you and tell you what happens next." The two boys headed off in that direction, trying to hide their nervousness from each other. F'nor crouched down beside the trembling Gorray.
"We're on the ground now. You're safe."
Gorray opened his eyes, but wouldn't look at the brown rider. "I feel so stupid! I'll bet nobody else ever panicked like that."
F'nor rested a hand on the boy's shoulder. "We've seen a few other people who were afraid of heights. Most of them already knew it and didn't try to become Hatching candidates. As for you... you shouldn't try to Impress a dragon, so I suppose I'll have to bring you back home."
"On dragonback?" Gorray looked up at him, his eyes wide.
"No, I guess that won't work," F'nor nodded. "Hmm. We can't let you try to walk that far. I guess you'll have to wait for the next tithe train to arrive from Lemos Hold. You can ride with them on their return trip."
"When will that happen?" the boy asked.
"I'll have to ask Manora, our headwoman. I think we just got a train from them less than a sevenday ago, so you may have to wait a month or more. In the meantime, we'll find something for you to do. Everyone in the Weyr earns their bread." He decided to let Manora put the boy to work.
As the son of a Holder, Gorray had no skills that might benefit the Weyr. But he was a quick learner and a hard worker; he did well at all of the basic tasks Manora put him to, from peeling tubers to assisting the Weyr Smith. He did particularly well in his four-day stint helping the Weyr tanner, mending worn riding straps.
"Did you ever consider an apprenticeship in the Tannercrafthall?" the tanner asked him.
"I've considered lots of things, sir," Gorray answered politely. "But Father wouldn't approve any of them. I'm not the firstborn in my family, but I work harder than my older brother does, and Father says he needs me in the fields. If he could, I think he'd let my brother go to the trades, and let me inherit the Hold. But things don't work that way."
"More's the pity," the tanner shrugged. "You've got a good eye and a steady hand. You'd make a fine tanner if you had the chance." Gorray heard similar encouragements from the cooks, the wood-smith, the tailor, and the Weyr Harper, who put him to work copying old Records for a few days.
Then came the day when the dragons began to hum, and the Weyr exploded into activity. Ramoth's eggs were going to hatch! Everyone had their work to do, from the Weyrleader to the lowliest kitchen drudge. Tazadi and Chet joined the other candidates in their white smocks on the Hatching Sands, hoping that today would be best day of their lives so far. Gorray was invited to watch, but he missed the hatching of the first few eggs because he was on meat-chopping duty in the kitchens; those new dragons would be ravenously hungry as soon as they hatched. As soon as he finished his work, he ran up the ramp (being careful to not look over the edge) to the Hatching Sands and looked for the young men from the Lower Caverns. He would stand and watch the Hatching with them.
"A moment of your time, young man?" someone said. It was K'lune, the Weyrlingmaster.
"Yes, sir?"
"We know about your... your special issue," K'lune said, trying not to sound harsh or cruel about it. "We can't run the risk of you Impressing a dragon, even though you aren't a candidate. At least two Benden dragons have recently chosen people who weren't on the list. It would be very unfortunate if you joined them. I have to ask a special favor of you, Gorray. You're welcome to watch the Hatching, but please, be very careful to not look any of the dragons in the eye. Will you do this?"
"I will," Gorray nodded, "but will that do any good? Tazadi and Chet have been telling me some of the things that you're teaching them. One thing they said is that, if the dragon wants you, then he wants you, and there's nothing you can do about it. Isn't that true?"
"Yes, that's quite true," K'lune nodded. "This request is more a formality than anything else. If the Weyrwoman asks me, I can tell her I took precautions and no one will get in trouble. Not that I'm expecting any trouble."
"Wouldn't it make more sense to just tell me to stay away from the Hatching?"
"It would," the Weyrlingmaster nodded slowly, "but I don't have the heart to do that. You'll be going home soon to resume your life as a farmer, and we all want you to take a good memory of the Weyr with you when you go. Oh, look – a bronze just hatched! Hurry up now; go find your friends and enjoy the Hatching! And please be careful where you look." Gorray fast-walked past the crowds of riders and their partners until he found where the Lower Caverns boys were standing.
He watched the Hatching from near its beginning to the end. None of the new dragons so much as glanced in his direction, so he didn't have to avert his gaze or otherwise avoid looking them in the eye. There was no queen egg this time, but there was one bronze, which helped to make up for it in the eyes of the spectators. He watched Tazadi Impress a brown named Sinth. Other browns, blues, and greens hatched and quickly chose their lifetime partners. Then there was only one egg left. It was rocking energetically, but its occupant wasn't rushing to chip his way out of the shell. At last, the shell broke into multiple pieces and its green occupant stepped out to face the world.
The twenty remaining candidates, including Chet, started to close in. Then they stopped and, with one mind, took a step back. Something was very wrong. This green was well-proportioned, her color was normal, and she seemed alert. But when she fanned her wings... they were barely the length of Gorray's foot! What horrible defect was this? She flapped her diminutive pinions twice, then began looking around at the candidates, who drew away as her gaze fell on them.
"Shards!" exclaimed the boy on Gorray's right. "Those wings! She's Hatched defective!"
"She'll never fly with wings like those," said the one on the left. "A dragon who can't fly is useless."
"What will they do with her?" Gorray wondered.
"I don't know," said the one on the right. "The Weyr has no use for slackers – they tell me that in the kitchens all the time – so I guess they can't use a dragon who can't fly or fight Thread, either."
"Maybe it would be best if she can't Impress anybody," a boy behind them said softly. "It's sad when a dragon dies, but it would be over quickly, and she wouldn't leave behind a broken-hearted rider."
It seemed that this might be the way things would play out. The little green walked around the circle of candidates, and then walked the circle again, unable to find her chosen rider. She was showing signs of distress. The muted rumble of conversation in the seats was growing louder as the guests speculated on what might happen next.
"I guess we're all done here," said the one on the left. "Whatever that dragon does, it's no concern of ours, and if she dies, I don't want to be here to see it."
"Let's go get some of that food," said the one behind them. They all nodded sullenly. They were hungry enough, but this unfortunate green hatchling had cast a pall over the entire event. They filed past the circle of candidates, wondering if one of them was about to become the partner of a landbound dragon. As they passed, Gorray took one more glance at the little green. He felt bad for her, even though he knew that the other boys were right – a flightless dragon had no future. He didn't try to avert his gaze because he knew that she wouldn't look at him. Why would she? He wasn't a Hatching candidate, just a farm boy who, through terribly bad luck, had wound up in a place that held no future for him. She was completely focused on the circle of candidates as she circled them a third time.
Then she glanced back at him –
There you are! I am Ashreth!
Gorray was stunned, both mentally and physically. Impression was always a dramatic event, and this impression was totally unexpected. He stopped in his tracks; the boy behind him walked right into him. "Hey, keep it moving!" the boy snapped. The boys in front of them heard the commotion, stopped, and looked back. One of them realized the meaning of the expression on Gorray's face and groaned, "You got the defective dragon?"
"Ashreth... I'm Gorray," he said out loud as he stepped through the circle to face the tiny dragon who was fixated on him. "But I think you picked the wrong boy."
I certainly did not! You are the one for me. You are smart, talented, kind-hearted and unselfish. You are not like all these other boys. You are also wise, clever, and handsome. We will do great things together, G'ray.
"If... if you say so." Gorray tried thinking toward the dragon, the same way she was thinking into his mind. The other candidates realized that the dragon had made her choice and turned away with a mixture of sadness and relief. Gorray knelt so he could look the little dragon in the eyes. Those eyes were blue and whirling with delight. Then some red flecks appeared.
I am very hungry, you know.
Gorray looked around for someone who might know something about feeding a hungry young dragon. Because he wasn't part of the weyrlings' class, he hadn't learned anything about newly-hatched dragons, and he had no idea what was supposed to happen next. Fortunately, one of the blue riders whose job it was to guide the new dragon/human pairs down to the Bowl saw this pair and strode over to them.
"I don't know how this is going to work out," R'esh said, "but for now, congratulations. What's your name and your dragon's name?"
"This is Ashreth," the boy answered, "and I'm Gorray... or maybe I'm not. My dragon just called me G'ray. Can she change my name like that? I have no idea what's going on here."
"Join the club," R'esh said firmly. "You've got an unusual beast, G'ray, but some things never change. The first thing every dragon wants is food, and the second thing is oil for her itchy skin. I'll take you to the food and the oil, and there's food for you, too. Follow me, please." They rose and followed him, grateful for some firm directions that they could follow. All newly-hatched dragons had to walk, so there was no immediate difference between Ashreth and the other hatchlings as they made their way down the ramp to the Bowl, where food, oil, and countless people waited.
As they left, F'lar and Lessa watched them, perplexed. "Isn't that the boy who's afraid of heights?" he asked.
"That's him, all right," Lessa nodded. "He wasn't supposed to be on the sands at all! How did this happen?"
"Probably the same way Lord Jaxom and Ruth happened, or the way Mirrim and Path happened," F'lar answered. "Ramoth's offspring have minds of their own. They must get it from their dam's rider." He smiled and gave Lessa a side-hug. Then he looked serious again. "The Oldtimers are going to complain bitterly about this breach of tradition."
"We should be used to that by now," Lessa said bitterly. "I guess the two of them make a good team, though. She can't fly, and he doesn't want to fly."
"But what are we going to do with them?" F'lar wondered. Lessa had no ready answer.
All the other new dragonriders couldn't wait to show off their dragons to their families. None of G'ray's family had come for the Hatching; they had no reason to come when he wasn't supposed to be a candidate. The people he knew best were Tazadi and Chet from his village. Tazadi – correction, T'zadi – was busy showing off his new dragon to his own family, and Chet was busy being consoled by his relatives, and by the rather comely daughter of a Benden laundress whom he'd recently befriended. Everyone gave the dragon with the stunted wings a wide berth, as though afraid that her condition might rub off on them somehow. G'ray felt very alone.
But you are not alone. I am with you. I will always be with you.
Wordlessly, G'ray knelt and hugged his dragon. Maybe Ashreth didn't measure up to the Weyr's standards, but she was his dragon! He had no idea at all what the future held for them, but if they could face it together, he would somehow get through. Undistracted by friends or family, he had few problems keeping her belly full and her skin well-oiled. They were among the first of the dragons and riders to fall asleep together.
The next morning, G'ray and Ashreth joined the class of weyrlings. The others had been working with Weyrlingmaster K'lune for several sevendays already, and friendships had begun to form among them. G'ray was a newcomer who needed remedial instruction in the care and feeding of new dragons. That, and his dragon's "defective" wings (as the others described her in whispers), made them outsiders in the group. Fortunately, G'ray's ability to learn quickly served him well in this new endeavor, and he soon caught up with his classmates, in terms of learning the basics.
Ashreth's vestigial wings were no handicap at this stage of their training, because none of the dragons was ready to fly yet. The young dragons worked on strengthening their muscles, building endurance, and perfecting their communication with their humans. The riders did teamwork exercises and trust falls, learned the history and hierarchy of the Weyrs, and began learning the in-flight commands and hand signals that a Wingleader would use. All of the exercises were meant to build camaraderie and mutual trust among all the riders and dragons. But no exercises could hide Ashreth's tiny wings, or conceal the fact that she would be left behind when everyone else learned to fly. She and her rider remained outcasts.
No one was cruel to them; no one deliberately shunned them or said anything to them that K'lune had to correct. But G'ray was always picked last in team sports, and Ashreth always wound up in the outermost positions when they practiced formations on the ground. K'lune didn't know how to intervene. G'ray would have been miserable had he gone through such treatment alone, but with his green friend by his side, he remained cheerful. He knew it was nothing personal.
One day, the Weyrlingmaster pulled G'ray aside. "I've been thinking," he began. "We all know that Ashreth is never going to fly... and I hope I'm not being unkind by coming right out and saying that."
"It's not something I haven't heard twenty times already," G'ray replied, "and I know it's true. It doesn't hurt me to hear it again."
"I'm glad for that," K'lune nodded. "What I'm wondering is, will it be possible for her to go between?"
"Why couldn't she?" G'ray asked. "Dragons don't actually fly when they're between, so her disability won't hold her back, will it?"
"My concern is her re-entry," the Weyrlingmaster replied. "If the mental pictures that you give her are all at ground level, then that's where she'll reappear. There's always a little bit of variation in the re-entry location, no matter how precise the picture may be. If she comes out a little too low, her feet will become embedded in the ground. That's no hardship in the soil of your father's Hold or in the sands of Igen, but if she embeds her feet in solid stone, she'll probably need help from the Minercraft to get out again. It might be very painful to her as well."
"Then I'll give her a picture and mentally raise the point of view by a few feet," G'ray decided. "I can do that, can't I?"
"You can," K'lune answered. "But that means she'll come out of between a few feet off the ground, and then fall. A two-foot drop won't be too serious, but what if she's off by twenty feet? I can easily see her breaking a leg that way. It would be a jarring landing for you, too." He took a deep breath. "I'm not sure I should teach you how to go between if it's probably going to result in injury to your dragon."
"Sir," the young man answered, "in my short time in this Weyr, one thing I've learned is that 'Dragonmen must fly / When Threads are in the sky.' I know we're never going to fly, but I'm just as much a dragonman as any of the others, and Ashreth is going to want to burn Thread when she sees it, no matter how high or low she is. If you don't teach us what we need to know, then what do you think will happen the first time Thread falls near the Weyr?"
K'lune sighed. "You'll make it up as you go along, and either you'll get badly Threadscored, or you'll get lost between. You're right, G'ray; I have to teach you and your dragon the same things that the others will learn. Adapting that to your own special situation is going to be your job. I cannot help you there; I've never dealt with a dragon like Ashreth before. Please be aware that you can't take everything I teach literally, like the other riders do. You'll have to make adjustments to my lessons to make them work for you and your dragon." He looked around the Weyr. "Also, I'll have to teach you and Ashreth about going between on your own time. You can't take part in the usual lessons because those lessons are taught in the air."
"We can do that," G'ray said. Ashreth woke from her nap and ambled over to where they were talking. She rested her head on his lap; he absently rubbed her eye ridge. K'lune had to smile. Their obvious love for each other made her deformity seem irrelevant for a few moments.
"There's one more thing we need to talk about," the Weyrlingmaster said. "That's your future with Ashreth. You'll never be assigned to a fighting wing, of course, and that's what all dragons do... up until now. What kind of work do you see yourselves doing in five Turns?"
G'ray shrugged. "I really don't know. I haven't thought that far ahead yet. Maybe we can be a watchdragon on the heights."
K'lune shook his head. "Even if you can master getting up to the heights by going between, that isn't a likely outcome. Benden has plenty of old and injured dragons who can't do anything except be watchdragons. I don't think F'lar will demoralize those veterans by taking their jobs away and giving the work to you. Try to think of something else."
Before G'ray could answer, K'lune gasped as he spotted one of the blue riders trying to hang from his dragon's wing. Those wings weren't anywhere near strong enough for that yet; the dragon could seriously strain a muscle. "Excuse me, G'ray. I need to intervene over there." The Weyrlingmaster ran over to correct the erring rider, leaving G'ray and Ashreth to their thoughts.
The first day of flying lessons might have been the saddest day of young G'ray's life. He watched forlornly as all the other dragons and riders trooped up the ramp to the Hatching Sands, and launched themselves into the air from the mouth of the cave there. Riders whooped for joy; dragons shrilled and bellowed their delight in finally flying with their humans; and G'ray and Ashreth remained on the bottom of the Bowl, watching.
You can come up with the rest of us if you want to. That was Numath, K'lune's brown dragon, speaking to Ashreth.
What would that accomplish? Ashreth answered. I would be just as land-bound in the cave as I am down here.
G'ray leaned against his green friend. "Are you sure we're going to do great things together?"
I would never lie to you, my friend.
"But could you be mistaken?"
Trust your dragon. That thought hadn't come from Ashreth! G'ray looked around and noticed Ramoth on a ledge high above them, watching her children's first flights. She glanced down at him for a moment. Had the senior queen of Benden Weyr sent him that message? If that thought was hers, then he would do well to heed it.
"Let's go for a walk," he suggested. "We'll talk about everything that dragons have ever done, and we'll think about which of those things you can do. We'll start making plans for our future together." Ashreth was more than willing. They slowly walked around the Bowl, circling it twice before it was lunch time. They considered everything from the obvious (fighting Thread) to the mundane (catching wild game, lifting logs to help build Cove Hold) to the stories of the ancient past (moving equipment in an emergency, delivering medicine to remote Holds). Very few of those actions held any promise for a dragon without wings.
When the other weyrlings arrived for lunch, they were bubbling over with excitement. D'alet, the only bronze rider in this Turn's group, was especially exuberant. "That was incredible! It was beyond belief! G'ray, you don't know what you're missing!"
G'ray just folded his arms and glared at him. Before he could think of anything worth saying, K'lune stepped in. "Well, I know what you're missing, D'alet. Tact and kindness! Think twice before you open your mouth with comments like that."
"Oh. Sorry." D'alet went off with the brown riders to compare notes about their first flights.
Za'yin, one of the other green riders, came alongside G'ray. "You know, if D'alet's dragon gets to be Mnementh's size, maybe he could take you and your dragon for a ride. It wouldn't be the same as really flying, but at least you could get up into the air and feel what it's like."
"Thanks for the thought, Za'yin," G'ray answered, "but it wouldn't make anything any better. We'll find ourselves a destiny that doesn't depend on wings."
G'ray couldn't sleep that night. Images of himself and his dragon soaring through the sky kept intruding into his thoughts, and then erasing themselves like bursting bubbles as he realized how frightened he would be. He finally gave up trying to sleep and sat up.
Can I do anything to help?
"I don't think so, Ashreth. Well, maybe you can. Let's go up to the Hatching Sands. We can look down on the Bowl and pretend that we're about to take off."
Will that make things better?
"Probably not. But we really missed out on the action up there today, and I just feel like doing something." They padded up the ramp, being careful not to look down, and approached the lip of the cave. Arwith, one of Benden's junior queens, had laid her first clutch about three sevendays ago, and she was almost as jealous over her eggs as Ramoth, so the green and her rider stayed far away from those eggs. The Sands were dark and quiet; no one was there except the two of them. He stepped to the edge of the cave, looked down at the Bowl below them... and quickly backed away several steps and waited for his heart to slow down. They were up a lot higher than he had realized! Ashreth looked longingly out the entrance, then turned and lay down next to her friend.
G'ray took a deep breath. "Ashreth, there are times when I wish we could just jump off this cliff, and your wings would magically grow to full size, and we'd fly circles around everybody! Wouldn't that be amazing?" He sighed. "But if that happened, then I'd be scared to death and I'd ask you to land immediately. We can't win."
We will find a way to win.
He threw his arms around his dragon's neck. "I know we will, Ashreth! I just want to know all the answers, and I want to know them now!"
Then he heard something like soft rustling and muted voices. The sounds weren't coming from the Bowl below them; he could never hear a voice from that far away. "Ashreth, do you hear something?"
I hear sounds from the back of the cave, near Arwith's eggs.
"Let's take a look. Quietly." They walked as softly as they could. The cave was completely dark; they could see nothing, until a spot of light appeared. Someone had opened a glowbasket. G'ray took a few more steps until he could see four men and two brown dragons clustered around Arwith's queen egg. It was hard to be sure in the darkness, but they all looked old.
"I don't recognize any of them, Ashreth."
They should not be here. The green began to growl.
"Don't alert them – they outnumber us! We need help! Call Arwith! Tell her to time it!" Ashreth sent out a quick mental summons, and she called in Ramoth and Mnementh as well. In moments, two huge gold dragons glided into the cave at nearly full speed, trumpeting a terrifying warning at the tops of their lungs.
"Shards!" one of the men yelled. "Let's get out of here!" They jumped onto the dragons, which hopped into the air and vanished between just before Arwith got to them. She and her rider, Talina, fell to examining all the eggs, while Lessa slid off Ramoth's back and stormed over to G'ray and Ashreth. He quickly told her what he'd seen and heard. Her face hardened.
"It must have been a renegade group of Oldtimers, trying to steal another queen egg! Won't they ever learn?"
"We don't know that for sure, Lessa," F'lar said as Mnementh arrived.
"Yes, we do," Talina said bitterly. She held up a web of padded wherhide straps that the men had left behind. "Here's the proof. They left this right next to Arwith's queen egg. They meant to steal it, and no Weyr except Southern has any reason to do such a thing. How did they get in here?"
"They probably came straight between from Southern to here," F'lar suggested. "Our Hatching Sands are well-known to all the Weyrs, so getting a good mental picture of the place would be easy."
"They tried that once before with Ramoth's egg," Lessa told Talina. "They were thwarted by... forces outside our control. We've thwarted them again tonight, and we have to thank G'ray and Ashreth this time."
"Yes, thank you," Talina said. "I don't know what you were doing up here tonight, but I'm very glad you were here. Now, how are we going to stop them if they try again?"
"We need to post a guard at night," Lessa decided. "What we really need is a watch-wher."
"You still have fond memories of that wher from Ruatha, don't you?" F'lar observed.
"Not so much, not since Ramoth came into my life," she replied. "But I do recall how well that wher guarded me when I was young and helpless. We need that same kind of guardian over these eggs."
F'lar looked across the dark sands. "It could take a month or more to find a wher that isn't already guarding something."
"Sir, may we volunteer?" G'ray said hesitantly. "Ashreth and I don't have to be awake in the daytime because we can't take the same flying lessons as the other weyrlings. We can go on a night schedule and guard the Hatching Sands until the eggs hatch. It would give us something useful to do for the Weyr."
"That's not work for a dragonrider," Lessa said disapprovingly.
"It's work for a dragonrider who can't fly," he answered politely.
F'lar considered the matter for a few seconds, then nodded. "You've got yourself a job, G'ray. You've already shown that you know what to do in case of intruders. I'll make the arrangements with the Weyrlingmaster."
For the next few months, G'ray and Ashreth spent their nights awake in the great cave, keeping an eye on the dragons' eggs. After a few sevendays, Ramoth added a clutch of her own to the Sands. Her jealousy over her eggs was legendary, and G'ray wasn't sure if the huge gold dragon would allow him to get near the new clutch. But she had full confidence in Ashreth (who was her daughter, after all), and she gave the night guardians no trouble.
There were no further attempts at egg-stealing. Night after night, G'ray had nothing to report. But night after night, Arwith and Talina slept soundly, which might not have been the case if they hadn't had a trustworthy guard on duty. When the eggs hatched, everyone relaxed, and G'ray and Ashreth went back to their weyrling lessons. It had felt good to be useful, but that was over now.
Besides, they had a new task ahead of them. It was time for them to learn how to go between.
K'lune explained the process to them in detail. "The most important part is giving your dragon a clear mental picture of where you want to go. She'll go to that exact spot, give or take a few feet, so if you wind up in the wrong place, it's no good blaming your dragon."
"What if I give her a clear picture, and then something distracts me and I think about someplace else?" G'ray wanted to know.
"The bronzes and browns can sort through multiple confused images and figure out what you really want," the Weyrlingmaster told him. "With greens, and to a lesser extent with blues, they'll follow your exact instructions, so you need to be disciplined and not get distracted. I don't think you'll have a problem with that, G'ray.
"Now, here's what we're going to do. Usually, I have the young dragons and riders fly up next to the Star Stones and memorize that image. You can't do that, so I'll give you the mental picture that Numath and I use."
"And how high off the ground are you when you use that image?" G'ray asked.
K'lune grimaced. "About a hundred feet above the Stones. That won't work – I can't let you two fall that far. We'll have to think of something else."
"How about if Numath flies up to the Star Stones, lands, and gives Ashreth the picture he can see from there?" G'ray wondered.
The Weyrlingmaster nodded. "That will be about right. Numath is a bigger dragon than your Ashreth, so his point of view will add a few feet of height to the mental image as a safety factor. Numath, would you do what G'ray just suggested, please?" The aging brown flapped up to the Star Stones, landed neatly, folded his wings, and focused on the stones themselves.
I have the picture, Ashreth said confidently.
"Are you ready for this, Ashreth?" G'ray asked nervously.
We can do this.
"Then let's do it!" he exclaimed. A moment later, the two of them disappeared. Numath stepped aside so he wouldn't be in the same space as the incoming green. K'lune counted "1, 2, 3..." and just before he reached 4, Ashreth appeared at the Star Stones, about ten feet off the ground. She fell to earth and landed so hard, her legs buckled and she wound up on her belly.
"Ashreth!" K'lune gasped. "Numath, is she all right?"
Ashreth answered before Numath could respond. Watch out for that first step, G'ray. It is a lulu.
She is all right. The relief in Numath's mind was palpable. G'ray wants to know if they did it right.
"Tell them they did it perfectly. Now it's time for them to jump back down here." Five seconds later, the green dragon and rider disappeared. They reappeared three seconds after that, right where they had started, but four feet off the ground. Ashreth braced herself and the fall didn't faze her.
"I think there's an art to this," G'ray commented as he checked his straps for signs of stretching.
"True," K'lune nodded. "You two are going to need more practice than the other weyrlings because the third dimension is more critical to you than it is to them. But I'm encouraged that you did as well as you did on your first jump. I was worried that Ashreth's... unusual conformation... might have affected other parts of her as well, like her ability to go between. I'm glad I was worrying over nothing. Now, try it again!"
After half an hour's practice, G'ray had learned how to mentally adjust the point-of-view of another dragon's mental picture so he could bring Ashreth in at a relative altitude of two to four feet. A four-foot drop posed no problems to a dragon of her size, as long as she was ready for it, and it was far better than coming in too low and getting her feet stuck in the ground. The practice was called off after half an hour because G'ray was shivering from the cold of between. Ashreth could have kept going for hours, and she freely said so. The joy of finally doing what all the other dragons did was overwhelming, second only to her concern for her rider's well-being.
Two sevendays later, that joy was repeated with another accomplishment: chewing firestone. The Weyrlingmaster included Ashreth in this exercise, more for the sake of her own peace of mind than for any realistic hope that she might need to breathe fire someday. Once all the weyrling dragons had chomped a few pieces and built up some gas inside themselves, they were set in a line, two dragonlengths apart. Ashreth was given a place in the line, no different from any other dragon.
"One of the fighting wings is going to fly overhead," K'lune told them, "and the riders will drop lengths of twine that have been dyed to look like Thread. Your dragon's job is to flame them before they touch the ground. Your job is to rein in their instinctive hatred of Thread and make them observe fire discipline."
"May I ask a question?" D'alet asked. "Why do they tie up a fighting wing to do this? Wouldn't it be better for the second-Turn or third-Turn weyrlings to drop the fake Thread for us?"
"Good question," K'lune answered. "We've tried that, and it doesn't work because the young dragons aren't experienced enough. They've been told that it's fake Thread, and their riders know that it's fake Thread, but they see it and respond to it as though it was real Thread. But they haven't chewed any firestone, so they can't flame, and it distresses them badly. The dragons in a fighting wing have seen enough real Thread that the fake stuff doesn't fool them. Okay, here they come! Get ready!"
G'ray felt his dragon quivering all over. "Is there anything I can do to help you, Ashreth?"
I know how to do this. Her eyes began to turn red. I will breathe fire to protect you!
On the first pass, none of the fake Thread fell close enough for Ashreth to flame it. On the second pass, one piece fell very close to them; the green had to point her head nearly straight up to get it, and the smoldering ashes landed on her flank. G'ray leaned back to brush them off. The fighting wing made five more passes until all of the young dragons had used up all their fire, then returned to their usual drills. K'lune called his charges together.
"You all did well for your first try," he began, "but I saw a few safety violations. D'alet, your dragon poached your neighbor's Thread on the third pass."
"He was looking the wrong way and he wasn't paying attention," D'alet protested.
"That doesn't matter, D'alet. You have to observe fire discipline at all times. Your dragon is still young and learning how to flame. If he was an adult dragon and he flamed that far to his side, his fire would have reached your neighbor and you would have burned him badly. I'd rather correct you now than let something like that happen again.
"Also, G'ray, your dragon flamed almost straight up. Again, that's a violation of fire discipline."
"What should we have done, Weyrlingmaster?" G'ray asked.
"You should have let it fall," K'lune answered firmly. "The next row of dragons could get it, or the queens could get it. At normal flying speeds, if the Thread was right over you at that range, you would fly right out from underneath it and it wouldn't do you any..." Then he remembered that "normal flying speeds" didn't apply to this dragon. "Uhh... never mind. See me afterwards." He corrected a few other minor errors, then dismissed his charges for lunch.
The Weyrlingmaster sat down next to G'ray as he ate. "G'ray, for any other dragon, what you did today was a mistake. But for you and Ashreth, I think it was the best thing you could have done. I have no idea if you're ever going to fight Thread for real, but if you do, it will be at ground level and there shouldn't be any dragons right above you. Flaming straight up isn't the mistake for you that it would be for the others."
"Are you saying that we have to make up our own rules for flaming, just like we make up our own rules for going between?" G'ray asked.
"Exactly," K'lune nodded. "Normally, all the dragons follow the established precedents; this Turn's greens act like last Turn's greens, this Turn's blues act like last Turn's blues, and so on. It's easy to teach when your students are mostly predictable. But that's not the case with you."
"I'm sorry for the problems we've caused you," G'ray began, but K'lune cut him off firmly.
"Don't you dare apologize! Any teacher, whether he's a Harper training small children or a Weyrlingmaster working with young dragonriders, will tell you that the non-traditional students are his biggest challenge, but they can also be the most rewarding ones. I've learned things about dragons and their riders that I'd never thought about before, thanks to you and your special green friend. Yes, my life would be easier if Ashreth was a conventional dragon... but my life is a lot richer because she isn't." He clapped G'ray on the shoulder as he rose. "Just keep being yourself, and don't worry about what all the 'normal' riders are doing." He left G'ray eating by himself, as usual.
As he returned his dirty plate and cutlery to the kitchens for washing, G'ray noticed one of the teen-aged drudges staring at him again. She had been watching him for several days now; he had noticed her freckled face and flaming-red hair nearby every time he sat down to eat. He decided to find out what, if anything, was going on. "Did you want something?" he asked.
She flushed. "Can we talk for a minute, somewhere else?"
"Sure," he nodded. They stepped outside the kitchens and walked toward the herdbeast pens. "What's on your mind? For starters, my name is G'ray."
"I know. I'm Alepha," she said shyly. "You're a green rider, right?"
"Yes, I am," he answered, and let it go at that.
She looked away at the herdbeasts in their pen. "Green dragons cause problems for us kitchen workers, especially the girls."
That was an odd thing to say. "How so?"
Her face hardened. "They go on mating flights all the time. They make all the boys want to... well, you know what they want to do. It's what they always want to do, but during a mating flight, they can't stop themselves."
Now he understood. "And that's not so good for pretty girls like you, right?"
She flushed again. "I'm not that pretty... but when a green dragon is in the air, nobody cares about that. They just grab the first girl they see. And they're rough! Some of them are actually cruel. I've been through a couple of mating flights, and I hate them! Yes, I feel the passion too, but I hate what the boys do to me! I hate how I feel afterwards!" A tear ran down her cheek.
He reached out and wiped it off her cheek with his fingertip; it left a streak down her dirty face. "Is there anything I can do?"
She turned to face him and took a deep breath. "Some of the girls... well, they, uhh, they make a... an arrangement with a rider if they think he's nice. When a green goes on a mating flight, the riders know about it before any of us in the kitchen find out about it. The rider seeks out that girl before anybody else can grab her, and she seeks him out. He tries to be gentle with her, and he saves her from the rough ones, and from four or five boys in a row." She took a deep breath. "I've overheard the kinds of things that the Weyrlingmaster says to you, so I know you're not a troublemaker. I think you're nice, and you're kind of cute. Will you... will you seek me out next time a green dragon goes on a mating flight?"
He was not expecting that!
"Are you, uhh... Alepha, are you asking me to be your boyfriend?"
"Sometimes, when riders and girls make an arrangement like that, they wind up being weyrmates," she admitted. "I don't know if I'm ready for that. I just don't want to be..." She broke off and looked away.
He hesitantly rested his hands on her shoulders, and was relieved that she didn't flinch. "When you put it that way, it's hard for me to refuse. Are there any drawbacks to an... arrangement like this?"
"Sometimes the boys in the kitchen get mad if a rider takes a girl away and leaves them with nobody," she admitted. "They don't start fights or anything, but they give that rider the cold shoulder for a sevenday or two."
That wouldn't be so different from the way the other riders treated him now. "Okay, I accept. I'll be your... uhh, your special rider the next time a green goes on a flight."
"Thank you," she whispered. Then she faced toward him but didn't look him in the eye. "Has your green dragon been on her mating flight this Turn?"
"No, she hasn't. In fact, she probably never will. My Ashreth is the dragon with tiny wings. She can't fly. I don't know how it's going to work when she comes into season."
"Oh." She said nothing for a few seconds. "Well, I guess I'll see you later, G'ray."
"Yeah, I'll see you later." She walked back to the kitchens with something that might have been a bounce in her step. He stood watching her until she turned the corner. The implications of the deal he'd just made were starting to sink into his mind. Until very recently, he'd been too young to be affected by a mating green's radiated passion. He was beginning to notice things like that, but Ashreth's steady presence helped to stabilize his mind, and he hadn't given in to the feeling. When it was Ashreth's turn, that would probably change... but how was that going to work? He sought out K'lune again.
"I'll be honest," the Weyrlingmaster said heavily. "I've been thinking about that, and I have absolutely no idea. Your dragon can't fly, and a flying dragon is always faster than a dragon on foot, so she'll probably be caught right away. The problem is that the males have never mated on the ground before. All their instincts tell them that it's done in the air. Do they know how to catch a dragon on the ground? Will they even try? I really don't know what is going to happen."
"So, once again, I'm making it up as I go along?" G'ray asked.
"Yes, that seems to be your destiny, but this time, it will be different. This time, there will be other dragons involved. Has Ashreth been acting proddy?"
"I don't think so," G'ray answered. "But one of the other greens took her first flight a sevenday ago, so I know she's old enough. I just want to be ready when it happens."
K'lune slowly stood up. "G'ray, green Ashreth's rider, you are starting to think like an adult. All of my weyrlings should have as much concern for the future as you have. I wish I had a few more dragon/rider pairs like you... wings or no wings." G'ray flushed, in very much the same way that Alepha had flushed a few minutes ago.
It was about ten days later that Ashreth began acting strange. She was forgetting things that G'ray had told her just a day ago, and her obedience to commands wasn't instantaneous anymore, as if she was thinking it over before deciding to obey. K'lune pulled G'ray aside and said, "Probably tomorrow," and winked.
His prediction was spot-on. The next morning, Ashreth's color was unusually vibrant, and she wanted no other dragons near her while she shredded and devoured a wherry. She was soon surrounded by all the male dragons in her weyrling class – thirteen blues, six browns, and one bronze. Their eyes were whirling as they silently watched her eat, waiting for the moment when she would launch herself skyward and the mating flight would begin. At least, that was the plan as they understood it. Their instincts and reflexes in these matters had never steered them wrong before.
To their shock, she ignored all their instincts by staying on the ground. As she ran away from them, they froze for a few seconds. Then they took flight in a chaotic mob and rose up about five hundred feet, where they milled about in confusion. There was no precedent for this situation. How were they supposed to catch a dragon who didn't come up to be caught? The ones who were nearly overcome with mating passion followed her from the air, but did nothing else, because they didn't know what else to do. The ones who were still listening to their riders soon got some advice, which they tried to put into practice.
One of the blues swooped down, hoping to twine necks with Ashreth on the way by. That was when they realized that, although Ashreth could not match the speed of a flying dragon, it was far from a one-sided competition. With her feet firmly on the ground, she could change speeds and directions far faster than any airborne dragon could match. She simply ducked under the first blue that dived at her, then reversed directions so the second one missed her by a dragonlength. She swerved and made the third one miss, then did a head-fake and went left when the fourth blue went right. She trumpeted her triumph and stuck her tongue out at the bewildered males, then began a string of evasive maneuvers unlike any mating flight in Pern's history.
The confused cloud of male dragons sorted itself into a slow-flying line, with each dragon taking a turn to dive on the elusive ground-bound green. Each time a dragon tried and missed her, he went to the back of the line. The big browns and the bronze had no chance of success at all; their great strength and endurance meant little in an agility contest like this. When the first brown swooped at her, she stopped in her tracks and the brown thudded into the ground in front of her. She shrilled her low opinion of him, then ran right up next to him, which made the next blue veer off for fear of hitting the brown. Then she ran in circles around him, just out of reach. He got back into the air, but it cost him precious energy, and the other dragons couldn't dive on Ashreth until he got out of the way. This wasn't nearly as easy as K'lune had thought it would be.
G'ray felt the passion beginning to rise inside him and looked around intently for a partner. Then he remembered his arrangement with Alepha and ran for the kitchens, calling her name.
"Over here!" she screamed. He followed the sound of her voice and found her in an alcove with a frenzied boy who was trying to undress her. He hadn't gotten far; the knot of her kitchen apron had gotten tangled, and he was trying to pull the apron off over her head, without success. She saw G'ray and turned toward him, but couldn't go far because the other boy was holding onto her clothes.
He reached for her and she kissed him desperately. "Hey!" the other boy protested. "I was here first!"
G'ray pulled away from Alepha enough to gasp, "She's made her choice. Let her go." The boy tried once more to pull off her apron, but her attention was clearly fixed on G'ray. The boy gave up in disgust and left to find some other object for his lust. G'ray and Alepha ran out of the kitchens hand-in-hand and toward the herdbeast pens, like they'd done the first time they met.
"Around that corner," he panted, pointing at a small rocky alcove. "That's all the privacy we're going to get." He didn't remember much after that, because one of the blues finally got lucky and knocked Ashreth off balance with his tail, then turned on a wingtip and pounced on her before she could scramble away. The green dragon's passion overflowed, as did G'ray's... but he remembered to try to be gentle.
When the wave of dragon-induced passion had crested and passed over them, he found himself lying with a sweaty, disheveled girl who was clinging to him as though her life depended on it. Her tangled red hair was darkened with dust. He felt just as dusty, sweaty, and disheveled, but also utterly relaxed. Their clothes were scattered around them; her apron knot had remained stubborn, so he had sliced through the sash with his belt knife. Alepha's breathing was slowly returning to normal.
"Are you okay?" he asked softly.
"That wasn't so bad," she whispered. "I was right. You are nice."
"I think I owe you an apron, though."
She glanced at the cut-up apron and half-smiled. "Considering what you just saved me from, we're even."
He considered what they'd just done. "So this was a good arrangement?"
"It was a wonderful arrangement," she nodded. "Now that you've seen me at my least glamorous, do you still want to keep the arrangement going?"
He thought about that. She was kind of cute, she worked hard, she had standards, he liked her hair, and the idea of leaving her to be ravaged by some other boy... "Next Turn, my dragon will be old enough to get her own weyr. When that happens, would you be willing to join me there?"
"Deal," she sighed. She hadn't thought it over for even half a second. Had she been angling for more than just safety when she suggested this "arrangement?" Either way, he doubted that he'd have any regrets. Their arrangement remained in force as the months went by. Eventually, the boys in the kitchen learned to leave Alepha alone when the greens took their mating flights.
The weyrlings' lessons continued. Their dragons were approaching their full size; Ashreth was just below average size for a green, except that her wings were barely the length of her rider's legs. It was a big day when the young dragons got their first chance to help the fighting wings attack Thread. They didn't flame any Thread themselves, of course. Their role was limited to bringing sacks of firestone up to the fighting dragons. It was vitally important work, and they all did well... except for Ashreth. She stayed in the Weyr and listened forlornly to the mental messages of the fighting dragons and their weyrling helpers. Her human friend was riding her neck to reassure her, but it didn't seem to do her much good.
Thread is falling, and I am helpless to destroy it.
G'ray leaned forward and hugged her neck. "It's like you said, Ashreth. We'll find our way to succeed. We just haven't found it yet."
But when?
"I think it might be soon." He wasn't at all sure about that, but he didn't want to discourage Ashreth.
You are not being perfectly honest with me.
Had he seriously thought he could fool his own dragon? "I just want you to be happy, Ashreth. I want to be useful, too. I don't want to wait five or six Turns any more than you do."
Two sevendays later, a tithe train arrived from Benden Hold. "Can we stay here for a few days, once we've unloaded?" the head carter asked Manora. "There's a fever that started running around Benden Hold as we were leaving, and we don't want to catch it."
Manora considered. "Well, we've got plenty of food here, thanks to your cargo. You'll have to sleep in tents, and you may want to tie your runners outside the main gate, so the dragons don't terrify them every five minutes. But yes, you can stay here until the fever has run its course."
She took that news to F'lar and Lessa, who considered it. "Will that affect anything?" she asked them.
"Our next Threadfall will be over Benden," he noted. "Lord Toronas will be in a bad mood anyway because his business dealings will be disrupted by the fever. If any Thread gets through and injures his land, he'll be doubly angry. We'll have to be more careful than usual."
"You don't have to worry about me," Lessa replied. "The queens' wing always does its job."
"And you do it well," he nodded, wrapping an arm around her shoulder. "Just spread the word – everybody needs to be extra-diligent this time."
When the day came, every dragon and rider in Benden Weyr prepared to do battle with their hated enemy. G'ray had nothing to do except to shovel firestone into sacks, long after the other weyrlings had put down their shovels and prepared to fly. When he finally stopped, the other dragons had all taken off and gone between, and his arms ached.
I wish there was a way to save you from this kind of work.
"It's okay, Ashreth," he said as he rubbed her neck. "Somebody has to do it, and I'm somebody. It's better than doing nothing while the rest of the riders are risking their lives."
Like me?
He hated that forlorn tone in her thoughts. On a whim, he picked up a chunk of firestone and offered it to her.
What am I supposed to do with this?
"You're supposed to chew it, you silly fire lizard! Once my hands stop hurting, I'll find some pieces of rope to throw in the air, and you can flame them. It'll help you feel better."
If you say so, she said dubiously. And do not call me a fire lizard. I am a dragon!
"Yes, you certainly are," he nodded. Her attention was soon on the mechanics of chewing up a rock without biting her tongue.
She could "hear" the other dragons as they spoke to each other in the sky. She passed their messages on to G'ray so he could know what was going on. One message from Mnementh stood out from all the others:
Tell the riders that, due to the fever, Benden's ground crews are few and far between. We must not let any Thread get through.
"That sounds bad," G'ray said out loud.
"What sounds bad?" Alepha was on a short break from kitchen duty, and she had seen G'ray and walked over to join him.
"Benden Hold doesn't have enough ground crews because of the fever," he told her.
"Oh," she said. "What will happen if Thread gets past the dragons?"
"I don't know," he admitted. Then he saw Ashreth's head jerk upright, and guessed her meaning. "I think they see the leading edge of Threadfall! They're going in!"
The two of them stood alertly next to the flightless green dragon. Ashreth passed the dragons' thoughts to G'ray, who spoke them out loud for Alepha. This Threadfall was unusually dense near the leading edge. It sounded like a tough fight, and then it got worse.
"Mareth, watch out for that big clump! That was Mnementh talking. It is going to... oh, no! It got Mareth's wing! She is out and headed back home. Uinath and Brith, do the best you can with it. Ramoth, tell the other queens that a really big clump is headed their way. Ramoth doesn't think their agenothree sprayers can take it out fast enough. Some of it is going to reach the ground."
"Is there a ground crew nearby?" Alepha wondered anxiously.
"I don't think so." G'ray looked distracted. "A fighting dragon could make a few flaming passes and kill the Thread in the ground, but they don't dare break formation while Thread is still falling. One of the weyrlings might be able to do it, but they haven't been chewing firestone, and it would take them too long to build up a fire inside." Then his face lit up as his heart soared. "Ashreth, that's it! Ask the queens to give you the picture of where the Thread will land! We can fight it!"
Ashreth looked startled, but she relayed the message. "Ramoth wants to know how we can do that."
"Tell her you don't need wings to kill Thread on the ground. You've been chewing firestone, so you've got your fire ready. We just need to know where to go. Ask one of the queens to swoop as low over the impact zone as she can, and give you a low-altitude picture. We'll take care of it from there. We can do this, you and me!"
Alepha ran over to the piles of firestone and grabbed one of the bags he'd just filled. She put it in his hand, then kissed him hard. "That's for good luck," she whispered. "Be careful!"
"We will," he answered as he climbed onto Ashreth's back. Luck was something he would need today, and plenty of it. He wasn't dressed for Threadfighting and his dragon didn't even have any riding straps on. He was breaking several ironclad rules, and he was running a huge risk on multiple levels. But there wasn't any time to run and get Ashreth's flying gear if Thread was on the verge of touching down. A veteran dragon might have timed it, but he and Ashreth had never tried that before, and he was running enough risks as it was.
Ramoth says the clump of Thread has landed. Arwith is flying low to give me the picture. There! G'ray "saw" a field of grass with an ugly blackened hole in the middle. The point of view was much too high; he and his dragon would hurt themselves if they fell that far. He tried to mentally bring down the height so the point of view was just above ground level, gave the adjusted picture back to Ashreth, and shouted, "Go!"
Between was always cold and dark beyond description. Then they were there. In spite of his efforts, they came in too high, and Ashreth landed hard. Unrestrained by riding straps, G'ray was thrown to the ground. It knocked the wind out of him for a moment.
G'ray! Are you all right?
"I'm okay," he gasped as he got to his knees.
You are lying. You are hurt! Give me the picture so I can take you back to the Weyr.
She was right on both counts; judging by the pain in his right forearm, he had probably broken something when he hit the ground. But this wasn't the time to put his own needs first. "Don't worry about me! Get the Thread!" With his left hand, he pointed at the hideous dark hole in the ground, whose edges were visibly swaying. Ashreth took one look, and then her instincts took over. Her eyes turned red with primal rage. She stepped right to the edge and blasted the entire hole with her fire. Tendrils writhed, blackened, and died under her assault. She waited a few seconds, shifted positions to the right, then flamed it again. When she was done, nothing was moving in the hole except wisps of smoke. The green dragon sighed.
That felt good. Now let me take you home.
"Thread is still falling, Ashreth! What if another clump gets through? We shouldn't go home while the other dragons are still fighting."
When you put it that way, I suppose... Then she looked skyward. Ramoth says, "Well done, and can we do it again if we have to?"
"Tell Ramoth that we've got some firestone and we know how to use it," G'ray responded. "Tell her, 'Dragonmen must toil / When Threads are in the soil.'" He offered Ashreth another chunk of firestone, who took it eagerly.
The queens' wing called for G'ray and Ashreth three more times during that Fall. One was a precaution and a false alarm; no Thread had gotten through in that location. The other two times, Ashreth did what all dragons do, and she did it well. Once the queens realized that "a mental picture from low altitude" meant "a mental picture where the grass is tickling your belly," they adjusted their height to the absolute minimum, and they brought the wingless green in low enough that neither she nor her rider suffered any further injury. When the "all clear" signal was given, Ashreth got the welcome picture of Benden Weyr from her rider, and they flashed between to home.
Once the fighting dragons had landed and been cleaned up, most of the riders headed for their personal weyrs for a much-needed bath. Lessa, however, wanted to find the flightless dragon and rider who had saved Benden Hold. "Where is your rider?" she asked Ashreth.
He is with the Weyr Healer. He broke his arm from a rough landing. I feel very bad about that. There must have been something I could have done to prevent it.
She sought out the Healer, and found him facing a line of riders, treating one minor injury after another. It was G'ray's turn, and the Healer was having trouble trying to numb, set, and splint the broken arm. It was hard because the patient kept turning away to face a crowd of green riders. They were peppering him with questions about what he'd done, how he'd done it, and what he was thinking and feeling while he did it. It sometimes happened that a bronze, or more rarely a brown, received extra glory and attention after an unusually effective flight; the green riders weren't accustomed to such honors for one of their own. G'ray, for his part, was unaccustomed to any of the dragonriders wanting to hear what he had to say.
"G'ray!" Lessa called. "Take a break from answering questions! Let the Healer do his work. Once you've been patched up, meet with me, the Weyrlingmaster, and the Weyrleader in the conference room."
"All right," G'ray nodded. Then he looked up, up, up to the conference room set into the cliff above them. "How shall I get there?"
Lessa grunted. "I forgot about that! Can you ride with K'lune? No, never mind. We'll meet with you down here in K'lune's office." He allowed the Healer to do what he had to do. Then he waited until three of the most important people in the Weyr joined him and sat down with him.
"I suppose I should start, seeing how we're in my office," the Weyrlingmaster said. "How did you break that arm, G'ray?"
"I flew without straps," G'ray admitted.
"I thought as much," K'lune said. "After all the lessons I've taught about flying safety, you took your first serious flight today, and you did it wrong. How long should I ground you for breaking one of the most important rules in the book?"
G'ray looked puzzled. "Ground me, sir? How will you do that?" K'lune realized what he'd said and did a facepalm.
F'lar managed a half-smile. "That threat doesn't carry much weight with this man and his dragon, Weyrlingmaster. You'll have to threaten him with something else."
"And I will," K'lune said firmly, "once I think of something. Don't get the idea that you're going to get away with anything, G'ray! I can't let you serve as a bad example." His face softened. "But you also need to know that I'm exceptionally proud of you and Ashreth, and what you did today. You took initiative, you rose to the occasion, you overcame some adversity, and you did more than anyone ever asked or expected of you. I may wind up using you and your dragon as good examples for future classes of weyrlings."
"Hear, hear," F'lar nodded. "You also created your own job, which you'll perform from now on, whenever Thread falls. The Lord Holders always complain when their ground crews have to clean up our mess, rare though that is. You and your dragon are going to seriously cut down on that mess. The queens used to be the final level of the dragons' protection of Pern; from now on, that honor will be yours. By going between, your dragon can get to a trouble spot faster than any ground crew, without depleting any of the fighting wings. We'll call you in whenever Thread gets near ground level, and by the time the ground crews get there, they'll have nothing to do except confirm that you did your job. You will reduce the threat to Pern, and you'll also reduce the complaints that we receive from Lords like Toronas. You'll make things better for everyone."
Lessa agreed. "And this is all the more exceptional because you're still second-Turn weyrlings! Normally, we don't let weyrlings even try to fight Thread because you're too inexperienced. But the Threadfighting you'll do will be in two dimensions, not three, so you can focus on your job without worries. Young man, you and Ashreth have just become front-line Thread-fighting dragons."
"...while your peers will still be shoveling firestone and delivering it to the fighting wings," K'lune added. "At least you learned what matters the most about being a dragonrider, even if you missed the part about the riding straps. Seeing how you keep making up your own destiny, let me ask you: can you make any suggestions about your next move?"
"My next move?" G'ray hadn't considered that possibility. "Well, this isn't the very next thing that I should be worrying about, but sometime either this Turn or early next Turn, Ashreth and I are supposed to get our own weyr. But all the weyrs are halfway up the cliff face. How will we...?"
"I think," Lessa said, "that I'll work with Manora to turn one of our ground-level storage caves into a weyr for a special green dragon. It will be a lot bigger than most greens' weyrs, simply because our storage caves aren't small; it's no reflection on your importance, even though you have made yourself quite important. You'll have your weyr, green rider. Occupy it with honor!"
"I will, Weyrwoman," G'ray said humbly.
"And keep showing proper honor to your weyrmate as well," K'lune added mischievously. G'ray turned crimson.
That was the last day that G'ray was treated like an outsider by the other weyrlings. He was welcomed in any group of dragonriders he might approach (but especially the green riders). Even the older riders who might have written off his feat as a lucky fluke had to respect the injury he'd taken while fighting Thread. In the kitchens, Alepha got some extra respect for having paired off with a boy who became a hero. Ashreth never worried about the future again, and she began to take on the carefree attitude that was more typical of green dragons.
It was also the last time that anyone worried about saying the wrong thing about her wings. No one tried to make up new euphemisms, or shied away from describing them at all. From that day on, the people of Benden Weyr talked about Ashreth's vestigial wings in the same way that they might talk about Ramoth's size or Ruth's color. She wasn't seen as deformed or defective. She was accepted and loved for who she was.
Three days later, they got a messenger from Telgar Weyr. F'lar, F'nor, and Lessa gathered to hear his message. "That fever from Benden Hold has spread west," the blue rider told them, "and half of my Weyr is out of commission. We have to fly Thread over Igen in two days. Can you supply a small wing to help us out?"
"A small wing," F'lar said thoughtfully. "I suppose we could loan you R'gul's wing. They're understrength after the casualties they took last time, so they qualify as 'small.'"
Then F'nor gestured toward Ashreth, who was feeding in the Bowl far below them. "Or, if we really wanted to help Telgar out, we could send them the smallest wings of all!"
The messenger didn't understand why they thought this was so funny.
The End
A/N
This is another story where I broke all the rules while writing it. I had nothing but the concept of a flightless dragon when I started. Every character, every plot point was made up as I went along; I didn't have an ending in mind until the story was done and needed to be wrapped up. Some parts were happy accidents, like writing the part about K'lune threatening to ground Ashreth and then realizing that he couldn't "ground" a flightless dragon. Since F'nor spoke the first words in the story, it seemed fitting to let him speak the last line of dialog as well.
To some extent, my characters were inspired by a very similar dragon/rider pair in one of my "How to Train Your Dragon" fanfics, "Snart's Saga." In that story, Tarburn the acrophobic Viking and Stormann the wingless dragon didn't get the happy ending that Ashreth and G'ray got. Unless you count being celebrated in a Viking saga as a happy ending. I'm sure the Vikings saw it that way.
I started writing this story in late November 2023. Christmas music was starting to play in all the stores. Could I have been inspired by "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" when I came up with this tale? I guess it's possible. I did the editing during the Hanukkah season, so I named most of my minor characters after letters in the Hebrew alphabet.
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