Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern 197
good thing, for at that season of the year it would be impossible to restock.
“Where is K’lon?” she asked Orlith.
He is at Igen.
“How is Sh’gall?” Moreta asked out of a sense of duty.
He sleeps deeply and Kadith says that he ate well. He recovers.
Moreta was amused at the indifference in Orlith’s voiceshe didn’t care, either, and that suited Moreta perfectly. When Orlith rose to mate again
HOLTH COMES! Falga and Tamianth are severely wounded!
Moreta paused long enough to take the simmering/e//B juice from the brazier before she hurried out. Holth emerged above the Star Stones and dove straight for her ledge. Moreta hurried up the stairs. With an agility that Moreta could not believe, Leri swung off her dragon, shedding the cumbersome agenothree tank so that it clanged hollowly on the stone, rolling to the wall.
“Tamianth has taken a terrible scoring, Moreta,” Leri said, her face gray with shock and anxiety. “The healers can manage Falga’s leg, but Tamianth’s wing …” Tears runneled the flight dirt on Leri’s face. “Here. Use my jacket! My helmet will fit and the goggles. Oh, go!”
“Orlith can’t!” Moreta felt anguish, sensing Leri’s distress through Holth.
“Orlith can’t, but Holth will!” Leri was shoving her jacket sleeve on Moreta’s outstretched arm. “You’re more use to Falga and Tamianth than anyone else could be. You’ve got to go! Holth won’t mind and neither will Orlith. This is an emergency!”
Both queen dragons were agitated, Orlith coming out to her ledge to croon and bellow, extending her neck up toward her rider, Leri, and Holth. Moreta pulled the jacket on. As Moreta was so much taller than Leri, it didn’t quite come to her waist, and Leri’s flying belt had to be cinched in to the last notch. Moreta crammed on the helmet and eyepieces and swung up on the fighting straps before she could reconsider.
Forgive me, Orlith! she cried, waving at her queen.
What is to forgive?
“Get going!” Leri bellowed.
Holth sprang, moving almost as heavily as egg-bloated Orlith. Moreta experienced confusion, linked for so many Turns to one
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Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern
Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern
199
dragon mind. How on earth was she going to understand Holth, when suddenly she did. Holth was there, with her, and Moreta could sense Oriith hovering protective. Jealously? No, she sensed nothing negative in her own dragon’s mind other than a concern that Moreta could not deal with her friend Holth. Holth was by then airborne, and the first intimate connection Moreta had with the old queen was of her weariness and her compulsion to help Tamianth.
Slow and easy does it, Moreta said to Holth with all the encouragement and understanding she could muster.
The watchdragon saluted them, wishing Holth and Leri well. As the watchdragon was a green weyriing, mistaking Holth’s rider could be forgiven but it stuck in Moreta’s mind as Holth gallantly plowed upward in the blustery wind.
Moreta envisioned the distinctive ridge of the High Reaches Weyr, a jagged comb with seven unequal spires.
I know where we must go. Trust in me, the old dragon said. Ida, Holth, Moreta replied, aware that Holth’s experience was far greater than Orlith’s for all the younger queen’s vigor. Take us to the High Reaches.
In place of her usual between litany, Moreta tried to analyze the difference between the two queen dragons. Holth’s mind-voice was old and tired, but it was firm, rich, and deep, many layers denser than Orlith’s. Perhaps, when Oriith had reached the fine age Holth enjoyed, she, too, would have the depth of Holth’s responsiveness.
Then they were in the warmer air over the High reaches, and Holth was skimming the jagged spindles and swooping in a deep left-hand bank so that Moreta had an unobstructed view of the ground and the injured dragons there. Moreta blinked at the small clusters attending the wounded. Tamianth rated the most assistance. As Holth descended, Moreta could see that Tamianth had lost the trailing edge of all three wingsails. And she was badly scored down her left side.
How did that happen? Moreta was appalled. Cross-over and too much to do. She wanted to help the wings, Holth said, and an echoing sadness welled in Moreta as Holth implanted the incident in her mind. Tamianth had risen at an angle so that Falga could bring the flamethrower into action but they had blun-dered into an updraft before they could correct. A great gout of