“They’ve stirred up the fires, and soon there’ll be some restorative
soup. Desdra concocted it. She tended Master Capiam, and he says the soup worked miracles for him.”
“We shall hope it does for us as well.” As they both heard the sound of coughing, Alessan turned his head sharply toward the door of his bedroom, inhaling apprehensively.
“Your sister? Well, you’ll see,” K’lon said with conviction. “The vaccine will effect a great improvement in her condition.”
“I sincerely hope so. She’s all the family I have left.”
Though Alessan spoke in a light, almost diffident voice, K’lon felt his throat close tightly with compassion.
“Oh, that serum will moderate the effects of the virus for her, I assure you. I’ve seen amazing recoveries after its administration. In fact, the serum Follen gave her is probably derived from the blood I donated.” K’lon rattled on mendaciously. Others had taken consolation from that fact so he held it out as comfort to this sadly bereaved man.
Alessan regarded him with a slightly surprised expression and his lips twitched in wry humor. “Ruatha has always been proud of its dragonrider bloodties though they’ve never been so direct.”
K’lon responded to Alessan’s retort with a thin laugh. “You haven’t lost your wits.”
“They’re about all I have left.”
“Indeed, Lord Alessan, you have much more,” K’lon said stoutly. “And you shall have all the help Weyr, Hold, and Hall can supply.”
“As long as what you have already brought is effective.” Once more Alessan’s head turned toward the room where his sister lay. “It is more than we had hoped for.”
“I shall have a look at your stores and see what is most needful,” K’lon began, vowing to himself that one of his first tasks would be to remove the Gather banners. If their presence had affronted him as a hideous reminder of that unfortunate occurrence, how cruelly would they affect Lord Alessan.
The Lord Holder stood far more quickly than he ought to have for he had to steady himself against the chair. “I know exactly what we need… .” He walked shakily to the desk at the window, absently stacking dirty dishes as he looked. He found the sheet of hide he wanted with a minimum of search. “Medicines, first of all. We have no aconite, not a gram of febrifuge left, only an ineffective syrup for that wretched cough, no thymus, hyssop, ezob, no flour, no salt.
186 Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern
Blackstone is almost depleted, and there have been no vegetables or meat for three days.” He handed the sheet to K’lon, a wry smile on his lips. “See how timely your arrival is? Tuero sent the last drum message this morning before he collapsed. I doubt I should have had the strength to climb to the drum tower.”
K’lon took the sheet with a hand that shook only slightly less than the hand that offered it. He bowed to hide his face, but when he looked up, he saw that Alessan was gazing out the window, his expression unreadable.
“Pollen told me that scenes like this are repeated throughout the continent,”
“Not like this,” K’lon said, his voice cracking.
“Follen didn’t go into detailhow badly are the Weyrs affected?”
“Well, we have had our casualties, it’s true, but dragonriders have met every Fall.”
Alessan gave him a long puzzled look, then he turned away again to gaze out the window. “Yes, I suppose they would, if they could. You’re from Fort Weyr?”
As K’lon knew that Alessan was aware of his affiliation, he sensed that the man was trying to discover something else. Then he remembered what Nesso had said, about Moreta dancing in a scandalous monopoly of the young Lord.
“Lady Moreta is recovering and so is the Weyrleader. We have had only one death at Fort, an elderly brown rider and his dragon, Koth. The toll was fifteen at Igen, eight at Telgar, and two at Ista but, because of the vaccine, we are hopeful.”
“Yes, there is hope.”
Why Alessan should glance from the fields to the mountains, K’lon did not know, but the action seemed to hearten the man.
“Did you know that we had over a hundred and twenty of the best western racers here a few short days ago, and seven hundred Gatherers to enjoy the dancing, the wine, the feast, the plague …”