“And no answers to the troubles which beset us,” Fandarel added, gesturing skyward with his thumb.
“We’ve had to take time to copy these Records,” Terry continued solemnly, “because they are all but illegible now . . .”
“I contend that we lost more than was saved and useful. Some skins were worn out with handling and their message obliterated.”
The two smiths seemed to be exchanging portions of a well-rehearsed complaint.
“Did it never occur to you to ask the Masterharper for help in transcribing your Records?” asked F’lar.
Fandarel and Terry exchanged startled glances.
“I can see it didn’t. It’s not the Weyrs alone who are autonomous. Don’t you Craftmasters speak to each other?” F’lar’s grin was echoed by the big Smith, recalling Robinton’s words of the previous evening. “However, the Harperhall is usually overflowing with apprentices, set to copying whatever Robinton can find for them. They could as well take that burden from you.”
“Aye, that would be a great help,” Terry agreed, seeing that the Smith did not object.
“You sound doubtful—or hesitant? Are any Crafts secret?”
“Oh, no. Neither the Craftmaster nor I hold with cabalistic, inviolable sanctities, passed at deathbed from father to son . . .”
The Smith snorted with such powerful scorn that a skin on the top of the pile slithered to the floor. “No sons!”
“That’s all very well when one can count on dying in bed and at a given time, but I—and the Craftmaster—would like to see all knowledge available to all who need it,” Terry said.
F’lar gazed with increased respect at the stoop-shouldered Craft-second. He’d known that Fandarel relied heavily on Terry’s executive ability and tactfulness. The man could always be counted on to fill in the gaps in Fandarel’s terse explanations or instructions, but it was obvious now that Terry had a mind of his own, whether it concurred with his Craftmaster’s or not.
“Knowledge has less danger of being lost, then,” Terry went on less passionately but just as fervently. “We knew so much more once. And all we have are tantalizing bits and fragments that do almost more harm than good because they only get in the way of independent development.”
“We will contrive,” Fandarel said, his ineffable optimism complementing Terry’s volatility.
“Do you have men enough, and wire enough, to install one of those things at Telgar Hold in two days?” asked F’lar, feeling a change of subject might help.
“We could take men off flame throwers and hardware. And I can call in the apprentices from the Smithhalls at Igen, Telgar and Lemos,” the Smith said and then glanced slyly at F’lar. “They’d come faster dragonback!”
“You’ll have them,” F’lar promised.
Terry’s face lit up with relief. “You don’t know what a difference it is to work with Benden Weyr. You see so clearly what needs to be done, without any hedging and hemming.”
“You’ve had problems with R’mart?” asked F’lar with quick concern.
“It’s not that, Weyrleader,” Terry said, leaning forward earnestly. “You still care what happens, what’s happening.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
The Smith rumbled something but there seemed to be no interrupting Terry.
“I see it this way, and I’ve seen riders from every Weyr by now. The Oldtimers have been fighting Thread since their birth. That’s all they’ve known. They’re tired and not just from skipping forward in time four hundred Turns. They’re heart-tired, bone-tired. They’ve had too much rising to alarms, seen too many friends and dragons die, Threadscored. They rest on custom, because that’s safest and takes the least energy. And they feel entitled to anything they want. Their minds may be numb with too much time between, though they think fast enough to talk you out of anything. As far as they’re concerned, there’s always been Thread. There’s nothing else to look forward to. They don’t remember, they can’t really conceive of a time, of four hundred Turns without Thread. We can. Our fathers could and their fathers. We live at a different rhythm because Hold and Craft alike threw off that ancient fear and grew in other ways, in other paths, which we can’t give up now. We exist only because the Oldtimers lived in their Time and in ours. And fought in both Times. We can see a way out, a life without Thread. They knew only one thing and they’ve taught us that. How to fight Thread. They simply can’t see that we, that anyone, could take it just one step further and destroy Thread forever.”
F’lar returned Terry’s earnest stare.
“I hadn’t seen the Oldtimers in just that light,” he said slowly.
“Terry’s absolutely right, F’lar,” said Lessa. She’d evidently paused on the threshold, but moved now briskly into the room, filling the Smith’s empty mug from the pitcher of klah she’d brewed. “And it’s a judgment we ought to consider in our dealings with them.” She smiled warmly at Terry as she filled his cup. “You’re as eloquent as the Harper. Are you sure you’re a smith?”
“That is klah!” announced Fandarel, having drunk it all.
“Are you sure you’re a Weyrwoman?” retorted F’lar, extending his cup with a sly smile. To Terry he said, “I wonder none of us realized it before, particularly in view of recent events. A man can’t fight day after day, Turn after Turn—though the Weyrs were eager to come forward—” He looked questioningly at Lessa.
“Ah, but that was something new, exciting,” she replied. “And it was new here, too, for the Oldtimers. What isn’t new is that they have another forty-some Turns to fight Thread in our time. Some of them have had fifteen and twenty Turns of fighting Thread. We have barely seven.”
The Smith put both hands on the table and pushed himself to his feet.
“Talk makes no miracles. To effect an end to Thread we must get the dragons to the source. Terry, pour a cup of that excellent klah for Wansor and let us attack the problem with good heart.”
As F’lar rose with Lessa, F’nor’s message rustled at his belt.
“Let me take a look at F’nor’s message, Lessa, before we go.”
He opened the closely written pages, his eye catching the repetition of “fire lizard” before his mind grasped the sense of what he was reading.
“Impressing? A fire lizard?” he exclaimed, holding the letter so that Lessa could verify it.
“No one’s ever managed to catch a fire lizard,” Fandarel said.
“F’nor has,” F’lar told him, “and Brekke, and Mirrim. Who’s Mirrim?”
“Brekke’s fosterling,” the Weyrwoman replied absently, her eyes scanning the message as rapidly as possible. “One of L’trel’s by some woman or other of his. No, Kylara wouldn’t have liked that!”
F’lar shushed her, passing the sheets over to Fandarel who was curious now.
“Are fire lizards related to dragons?” asked the Craft-second.
“Judging by what F’nor says, more than we realized.” F’lar handed Terry the last page, looking up at Fandarel. “What do you think?”
The Smith began to realign his features into a frown but stopped, grinning broadly instead.
“Ask the Masterherder. He breeds animals. I breed machines.”
He saluted Lessa wi
th his mug and strode to the wall he had been contemplating when they entered, immediately lost in thought.
“A good point,” F’lar said with a laugh to his remaining audience.
“F’lar? Remember that flawed piece of metal, with that garble of words? The one with the scribble like last night’s. It mentioned fire lizards, too. That was one of the few words that made sense.”
“So?”
“I wish we hadn’t given that plate back to Fort Weyr. It was more important than we realized.”
“There may be more at Fort Weyr that’s important,” F’lar said, gloomily. “It was the first Weyr. Who knows what we might find if we could search there!”
Lessa made a face, thinking of Mardra and T’ron.
“T’ron’s not hard to manage,” she mused.
“Lessa, no nonsense now.”
“If fire lizards are so much like dragons, could they be trained to go between, as dragons can, and be messengers?” asked Terry.
“How long would that take?” asked the Smith, less unaware of his surroundings than he looked. “How much time have we got this Turn?”
CHAPTER VIII
Midmorning at Southern Weyr
“NO, RANNELLY, I’ve not seen Kylara all morning,” Brekke told the old woman patiently, for the fourth time that morning.
“And you’ve not taken a good look at your own poor queen, either, I’ll warrant, fooling around with these—these nuisancy flitterbys,” Rannelly retorted, grumbling as she limped out of the Weyrhall.
Brekke had finally found time to see to Mirrim’s wounded brown. He was so stuffed with juicy tidbits from the hand of his overzealous nurse that he barely opened one lid when Brekke inspected him. Numbweed worked as well on lizard as on dragon and human.
“He’s doing just fine, dear,” Brekke told the anxious girl, the greens fluttering on the child’s shoulders in response to her exaggerated sigh of relief. “Now, don’t overfeed them. They’ll split their hides.”