Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern 155
impossible to like everyone. Capiam didn’t like Ratoshigan but he shouldn’t be glad the man was suffering along with his lowliest beasthandler.
Capiam vowed, yet again, that he would have far more tolerance for the ill when he recovered. When! When! Not if. If was defeatist. How had the many thousands of patients he tended over his Turns as a healer endured those hours of unrelieved thought and self-examina- tion? Capiam sighed, tears forming at the comers of his eyes: a further manifestation of his terrible inertia. Whenyes, whenwould he have the strength to resume constructive thought and research?
There had to be an answer, a solution, a cure, a therapy, a restorative, a remedy! Something existed somewhere. If the Ancients had been able to cross unimaginable distances to breed animals from a frozen stew, to create dragons from the template of the legendary fire-lizards, they surely would have been able to overcome bacterium or virus that threatened themselves and those beasts. It could only be a matter of time, Capiam assured his weary self, before those references were discovered. Fortine had been searching the Records piled in the Library Caves. When he had had to dispatch journeymen and apprentice healers to reinforce their overworked craftsmen in the worst plague areas, Tirone had magnanimously placed his craftspeo-ple at Fortine’s disposal. But if one of those untutored readers passed over the relevant paragraphs in ignorance of the significance … Surely, though, something as critical as an epidemic would merit more than a single reference.
When would Desdra come with her soup to break the monotony of his anxious self-castigation? “Stop fretting,” he told himself, his voice a hoarse croak that startled him. “You’re peevish. You’re also alive. What must be endured cannot be cured. No. What cannot be cured must be inuredendured.”
Tears for his debilitation dripped down his cheekbones, falling in time to the latest urgent drum code. Capiam wanted to stop his ears against the news. It was sure to be bad. How could it possibly be anything else until they had some sort of specific treatment and some means of arresting the swift spread of this plague?
Keroon Runnerhold sent the message. They needed medicines. Healer Gorby reported dwindling stocks of borrago and aconite, and needed tussilago in quantity for pulmonary and bronchial cases, ilex for pneumonia.
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Moretw Dragonlady of Pern
A new fear enveloped Capiam. With such unprecedented demands on stillroom supplies, would there be enough of even the simple medicaments? Keroon Runnerhold, dealing as it did with many ani-mal health problems, ought to be able to supply all its needs. Capiam despaired afresh as he thought of smaller holds. They would have on hand only a limited amount of general remedies. Most holds traded the plants and barks indigenous in their area for those they lacked. What lady holder, no matter how diligent and capable, would have laid in sufficient to deal with an epidemic?
To compound demand, the disease had struck during the cold season. Most medicinal plants were picked in flower, when their curative properties were strongest; roots and bulbs gathered in the fall. Spring and flowering, autumn and earthy harvest were too distant, the need was now!
Capiam writhed in his furs. Where was Desdra? How much longer did he have to endure before the wretched lethargy abated?
“Capiam?” Desdra’s quiet voice broke into his self-pitying rumi-nations. “More soup?”
“Desdra? That message from Keroon Runnerhold” “As if we had only one febrifuge in our pharmacopia! Fortine has compiled a list of alternatives.” Desdra was impatient with Gorby. “There’s ash bark, box, ezob, and thymus as well as borrago and featherfem. Who’s to say one of them might not prove to be specific for this? In fact, Semment of Great Reach Hold believes that thymus is more effective for the pulmonary infections he’s been treating. Master Fortine holds out for featherfem, being one of the few indigenous plants. How are you feeling?”
“Like nothing! I cannot even raise my hands.” He tried to demonstrate this inability. “The lassitude is part of the illness. You wrote that symptom often
enough. What can’t be cured”
Summoning strength from a sudden spurt of irrational anger, Capiam flung a pillow at her. It had neither the mass nor the impetus to reach its target, and she laughed as she collected the missile and