continuously, nursed other sick riders, and tried to bolster F’gal’s leadership during the latter’s kidney ailment.
As she argued with D’say on the necessity of once again cooperat-ing with the Healer Hall, she wished that he had had the plague;
then he would not be so slow to comply. D’say resisted her presenta-tion in such a glum silence that she was becoming depressed when their son M’ray suddenly charged up the steps.
“I beg your pardon, D’say, but my Quoarth told me that Moreta is here.” The boyin his height he was more manly than boyish paused just long enough in the threshold to receive permission to enter. Then he rushed to Moreta, embracing her with a charming enthusiasm. He peered anxiously into her face with eyes the color of her own, set in a head with the same deep sockets and arching brows. Yet he was far more D’say’s child in build and coloring. “I knew you were ill. It’s very good to see you well.”
“Orlith has clutched. I’ve had little to do except repair scored nders and dragons.”
M’ray opened his arms, looking from sire to dam, hopeful of answers to his outspoken questions.
“Moreta needs help, which I don’t think she’ll get from F’gal in his state of health.” D’say replied noncommittally. He refilled Moreta’s cup with klah, tacitly giving her permission to tell their son.
She did, and the boy’s eyes widened with apprehension and a growing eagerness that answered the challenge.
“Wimmia would agree, D’sayyou know she would. We only have to present the urgency to her. She’s not a passive person, like F’gal. He’she’s changed a lot recently.” As M’ray blurted out his opinion, he eyed D’say to see if the bronze rider would try to refute him. D’say shrugged. “Anyway, I’d like to help and my wingleader, T’lonneg, is hold-bred. If there’s anyone who’d know the rainforest holds, it’s him. He caught the plague, too, and lost family. He should know about this, D’say, really he should. This isn’t the sort of request you can deny, is it? No more than we can stop rising to Fall.” M’ray faced his sire, shoulders back, jaw forward, a pose she remembered striking when she had acted on her own initiative in treating a “unner in her family’s hold. “I rose with Ista’s wings at every Fall. Haven’t got so much as char in my face.”
‘Keep it that way,” D’say remarked in a flat voice that masked
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the pride he had for his lad. “T’lonneg says they fly well, M’ray and
Quoarth.”
“What we’d expect,” Moreta said fondly, smiling all the more warmly at the lad. It was a pity that she hadn’t been able to give him more time but she’d had to go on to Fort Weyr, and D’say had remained at Ista. “K’dren thought that six or seven riders would be needed from each Weyr.”
D’say rose to stand beside his son; there wasn’t a hair’s difference in height between them. Moreta had never been motherly toward her children; as a queen rider, she’d had to foster them immediately. She could be proud of M’ray, though, of his eager enthusiasm. Though he was committed to the Weyr, it suddenly occurred to her that she had other children and her bloodline could be sustained in Keroon.
“We will recruit riders who are adequate to the task and will discharge this duty to the Hall,” D’say assured her. “I’ll speak to Wimmia as soon as she’s free. She’ll review the fosterlings for your queen’s clutch, though I must remind you that we had heavy losses among the weyr and hold folk. Everyone wanted to see that peculiar beast when it passed through here on its way to the Gather.”
“I grieved to know you had such heavy losses.” Moreta looked up at the fine lad, grateful he had been spared. “When you’ve arranged the matter, send a messenger to Master Capiam. He has all the details worked out.”
“I’ll see you at the Hatching?” M’ray winked impudently at her. “Of course!” Moreta laughed, and he embraced her again, a little more certain of where his arms should go and not quite so fierce with his strong arms.