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  F’lar did not turn as a rush of air announced the arrival of the rest of the wing. He knew, however, when F’nor, the brown rider, his half-brother, took the customary position on his left, a dragon-length to the rear. F’lar caught a glimpse of F’nor’s boot-heel twisting to death the grass crowding up between the stones.

  An order, muffled to an intense whisper, issued from within the great court, beyond the open gates. Almost immediately a group of men marched into sight, led by a heavy-set man of medium height.

  Mnementh arched his neck, angling his head so that his chin rested on the ground. Mnementh’s many faceted eyes, on a level with F’lar’s head, fastened with disconcerting interest on the approaching party. The dragons could never understand why they generated such abject fear in common folk. At only one point in his life span would a dragon attack a human and that could be excused on the grounds of simple ignorance. F’lar could not explain to the dragon the politics behind the necessity of inspiring awe in the holders, lord and craftsman alike. He could only observe that the fear and apprehension showing in the faces of the advancing squad which troubled Mnementh was oddly pleasing to him, F’lar.

  * * *

  “Welcome, Bronze Rider, to the Hold of Fax, Lord of the High Reaches. He is at your service,” and the man made an adequately respectful salute.

  The use of the third person pronoun could be construed, by the meticulous, to be a veiled insult. This fit in with the information F’lar had on Fax; so he ignored it. His information was also correct in describing Fax as a greedy man. It showed in the restless eyes which flicked at every detail of F’lar’s clothing, at the slight frown when the intricately etched sword-hilt was noticed.

  F’lar noticed, in his own turn, the several rich rings which flashed on Fax’s left hand. The overlord’s right hand remained slightly cocked after the habit of the professional swordsman. His tunic, of rich fabric, was stained and none too fresh. The man’s feet, in heavy wher-hide boots, were solidly planted, weight balanced forward on his toes. A man to be treated cautiously, F’lar decided, as one should the conqueror of five neighboring Holds. Such greedy audacity was in itself a revelation. Fax had married into a sixth … and had legally inherited, however unusual the circumstances, the seventh. He was a lecherous man by reputation.

  Within these seven Holds, F’lar anticipated a profitable Search. Let R’gul go southerly to pursue Search among the indolent, if lovely, women there. The Weyr needed a strong woman this time; Jora had been worse than useless with Nemorth. Adversity, uncertainty: those were the conditions that bred the qualities F’lar wanted in a weyrwoman.

  “We ride in Search,” F’lar drawled softly, “and request the hospitality of your Hold, Lord Fax.”

  Fax’s eyes widened imperceptibly at mention of Search.

  “I had heard Jora was dead,” Fax replied, dropping the third person abruptly as if F’lar had passed some sort of test by ignoring it. “So Nemorth has a new queen, hm-m-m?” he continued, his eyes darting across the rank of the ring, noting the disciplined stance of the riders, the healthy color of the dragons.

  F’lar did not dignify the obvious with an answer.

  “And, my Lord—” Fax hesitated, expectantly inclining his head slightly toward the dragonman.

  For a pulse beat, F’lar wondered if the man were deliberately provoking him with such subtle insults. The name of bronze riders should be as well known throughout Pern as the name of the Dragonqueen and her Weyrwoman. F’lar kept his face composed, his eyes on Fax’s.

  Leisurely, with the proper touch of arrogance, F’nor stepped forward, stopping slightly behind Mnementh’s head, one hand negligently touching the jaw hinge of the huge beast.

  “The Bronze Rider of Mnementh, Lord F’lar, will require quarters for himself. I, F’nor, brown rider, prefer to be lodged with the wingmen. We are, in number, twelve.”

  F’lar liked that touch of F’nor’s, totting up the wing strength, as if Fax were incapable of counting. F’nor had phrased it so adroitly as to make it impossible for Fax to protest the insult.

  “Lord F’lar,” Fax said through teeth fixed in a smile, “the High Reaches are honored with your Search.”

  “It will be to the credit of the High Reaches,” F’lar replied smoothly, “if one of its own supplies the Weyr.”

  “To our everlasting credit,” Fax replied as suavely. “In the old days, many notable weyrwomen came from my Holds.”

  “Your Holds?” asked F’lar, politely smiling as he emphasized the plural. “Ah, yes, you are now overlord of Ruatha, are you not? There have been many from that Hold.”

  A strange tense look crossed Fax’s face. “Nothing good comes from Ruath Hold.” Then he stepped aside, gesturing F’lar to enter the Hold.

  Fax’s troop leader barked a hasty order and the men formed two lines, their metal-edged boots flicking sparks from the stones.

  At unspoken orders, all the dragons rose with a great churning of air and dust. F’lar strode nonchalantly past the welcoming files. The men were rolling their eyes in alarm as the beasts glided above to the inner courts. Someone on the high tower uttered a frightened yelp as Mnementh took his position on that vantage point. His great wings drove phosphoric-scented air across the inner court as he maneuvered his great frame onto the inadequate landing space.

  Outwardly oblivious to the consternation, fear and awe the dragons inspired, F’lar was secretly amused and rather pleased by the effect. Lords of the Holds needed this reminder that they must deal with dragons, not just with riders, who were men, mortal and murderable. The ancient respect for dragonmen as well as dragonkind must be rein-stilled in modern breasts.

  “The Hold has just risen from the table, Lord F’lar, if…” Fax suggested. His voice trailed off at F’lar’s smiling refusal.

  “Convey my duty to your lady, Lord Fax,” F’lar rejoined, noticing with inward satisfaction the tightening of Fax’s jaw muscles at the ceremonial request.

  “You would prefer to see your quarters first?” Fax countered.

  F’lar flicked an imaginary speck from his soft wher-hide sleeve and shook his head. Was the man buying time to sequester his ladies as the old time lords had?

  “Duty first,” he said with a rueful shrug.

  “Of course,” Fax all but snapped and strode smartly ahead, his heels pounding out the anger he could not express otherwise. F’lar decided he had guessed correctly.

  F’lar and F’nor followed at a slower pace through the double-doored entry with its massive metal panels, into the great hall, carved into the cliffside.

  “They eat not badly,” F’nor remarked casually to F’lar, appraising the remnants still on the table.

  “Better than the Weyr, it would seem,” F’lar replied dryly.

  “Young roasts and tender,” F’nor said in a bitter undertone, “while the stringy, barren beasts are delivered up to us.”

  “The change is overdue,” F’lar murmured, then raised his voice to conversational level. “A well-favored hall,” he was saying amiably as they reached Fax. Their reluctant host stood in the portal to the inner Hold, which, like all such Holds, burrowed deep into stone, traditional refuge of all in time of peril.

  Deliberately, F’lar turned back to the banner-hung Hall. “Tell me, Lord Fax, do you adhere to the old practices and mount a dawn guard?”

  Fax frowned, trying to grasp F’lar’s meaning.

  “There is always a guard at the Tower.”

  “An easterly guard?”

  Fax’s eyes jerked toward F’lar, then to F’nor.

  “There are always guards,” he answered sharply, “on all the approaches.”

  “Oh, just the approaches,” and F’lar nodded wisely to F’nor.

  “Where else?” demanded Fax, concerned, glancing from one dragonman to the other.

  “I must ask that of your harper. You do keep a trained harper in your Hold?”

  “Of course. I have several trained harpers,” and Fax jerked his shoulde
rs straighten

  F’lar affected not to understand.

  “Lord Fax is the overlord of six other Holds,” F’nor reminded his wingleader.

  “Of course,” F’lar assented, with exactly the same inflection Fax had used a moment before.

  The mimicry did not go unnoticed by Fax but as he was unable to construe deliberate insult out of an innocent affirmative, he stalked into the glow-lit corridors. The dragonmen followed.

  The women’s quarters in Fax’s Hold had been moved from the traditional innermost corridors to those at cliff-face. Sunlight poured down from three double-shuttered, deep-casement windows in the outside wall. F’lar noted that the bronze hinges were well oiled, and the sills regulation spearlength. Fax had not, at least, diminished the protective wall.

  The chamber was richly hung with appropriately gentle scenes of women occupied in all manner of feminine tasks. Doors gave off the main chamber on both sides into smaller sleeping alcoves and from these, at Fax’s bidding, his women hesitantly emerged. Fax sternly gestured to a blue-gowned woman, her hair white-streaked, her face lined with disappointments and bitterness, her body swollen with pregnancy. She advanced awkwardly, stopping several feet from her lord. From her attitude, F’lar deduced that she came no closer to Fax than was absolutely necessary.

  “The Lady of Crom, mother of my heirs,” Fax said without pride or cordiality.

  “My Lady—” F’lar hesitated, waiting for her name to be supplied.

  She glanced warily at her lord.

  “Gemma,” Fax snapped curtly.

  F’lar bowed deeply. “My Lady Gemma, the Weyr is on Search and requests the Hold’s hospitality.”

  “My Lord F’lar,” the Lady Gemma replied in a low voice, “you are most welcome.”

  F’lar did not miss the slight slur on the adverb nor the fact that Gemma had no trouble naming him. His smile was warmer than courtesy demanded, warm with gratitude and sympathy. Looking at the number of women in these quarters, F’lar thought there might be one or two Lady Gemma could bid farewell without regret.

  Fax preferred his women plump and small. There wasn’t a saucy one in the lot. If there once had been, the spirit had been beaten out of her. Fax, no doubt, was stud, not lover. Some of the covey had not all winter long made much use of water, judging by the amount of sweet oil gone rancid in their hair. Of them all, if these were all, the Lady Gemma was the only willful one; and she, too old.

  The amenities over, Fax ushered his unwelcome guests outside, and led the way to the quarters he had assigned the bronze rider.

  “A pleasant room,” F’lar acknowledged, stripping off gloves and wher-hide tunic, throwing them carelessly to the table. “I shall see to my men and the beasts. They have been fed recently,” he commented, pointing up Fax’s omission in inquiring. “I request liberty to wander through the crafthold.”

  Fax sourly granted what was a dragonman’s traditional privilege.

  “I shall not further disrupt your routine, Lord Fax, for you must have many demands on you, with seven Holds to supervise.” F’lar inclined his body slightly to the overlord, turning away as a gesture of dismissal. He could imagine the infuriated expression on Fax’s face from the stamping retreat.

  F’nor and the men had settled themselves in a hastily vacated barrackroom. The dragons were perched comfortably on the rocky ridges above the Hold. Each rider kept his dragon in light, but alert, charge. There were to be no incidents on a Search.

  As a group, the dragonmen rose at F’lar’s entrance.

  “No tricks, no troubles, but look around closely,” he said laconically. “Return by sundown with the names of any likely prospects.” He caught F’nor’s grin, remembering how Fax had slurred over some names. “Descriptions are in order and craft affiliation.”

  The men nodded, their eyes glinting with understanding. They were flatteringly confident of a successful Search even as F’lar’s doubts grew now that he had seen Fax’s women. By all logic, the pick of the High Reaches should be in Fax’s chief Hold—but they were not. Still, there were many large craftholds not to mention the six other High Holds to visit. All the same…

  In unspoken accord F’lar and F’nor left the barracks. The men would follow, unobtrusively, in pairs or singly, to reconnoiter the crafthold and the nearer farmholds. The men were as overtly eager to be abroad as F’lar was privately. There had been a time when dragonmen were frequent and favored guests in all the great Holds throughout Pern, from southern Fort to high north Igen. This pleasant custom, too, had died along with other observances, evidence of the low regard in which the Weyr was presently held. F’lar vowed to correct this.

  He forced himself to trace in memory the insidious changes. The Records, which each Weyrwoman kept, were proof of the gradual, but perceptible, decline, traceable through the past two hundred full Turns. Knowing the facts did not alleviate the condition. And F’lar was of that scant handful in the Weyr itself who did credit Records and Ballad alike. The situation might shortly reverse itself radically if the old tales were to be believed.

  There was a reason, an explanation, a purpose, F’lar felt, for every one of the Weyr laws from First Impression to the Firestone: from the grass-free heights to ridge-running gutters. For elements as minor as controlling the appetite of a dragon to limiting the inhabitants of the Weyr. Although why the other five Weyrs had been abandoned, F’lar did not know. Idly he wondered if there were records, dusty and crumbling, lodged in the disused Weyrs. He must contrive to check when next his wings flew patrol. Certainly there was no explanation in Benden Weyr.

  “There is industry but no enthusiasm,” F’nor was saying, drawing F’lar’s attention back to their tour of the crafthold.

  They had descended the guttered ramp from the Hold into the crafthold proper, the broad roadway lined with cottages up to the imposing stone crafthalls. Silently F’lar noted moss-clogged gutters on the roofs, the vines clasping the walls. It was painful for one of his calling to witness the flagrant disregard of simple safety precautions. Growing things were forbidden near the habitations of mankind.

  “News travels fast,” F’nor chuckled, nodding at a hurrying craftsman, in the smock of a baker, who gave them a mumbled good day. “Not a female in sight.”

  His observation was accurate. Women should be abroad at this hour, bringing in supplies from the storehouses, washing in the river on such a bright warm day, or going out to the farmholds to help with planting. Not a gowned figure in sight.

  “We used to be preferred mates,” F’nor remarked caustically.

  “We’ll visit the Clothmen’s Hall first. If my memory serves me right…”

  “As it always does…” F’nor interjected wryly. He took no advantage of their blood relationship but he was more at ease with the bronze rider than most of the dragonmen, the other bronze riders included. F’lar was reserved in a close-knit society of easy equality. He flew a tightly disciplined wing but men maneuvered to serve under him. His wing always excelled in the Games. None ever floundered in between to disappear forever and no beast in his wing sickened, leaving a man in dragonless exile from the Weyr, a part of him numb forever.

  “L’tol came this way and settled in one of the High Reaches,” F’lar continued.

  “L’tol?”

  “Yes, a green rider from S’lel’s wing. You remember.”

  An ill-timed swerve during the Spring Games had brought L’tol and his beast into the full blast of a phosphene emission from S’lel’s bronze Tuenth. L’tol had been thrown from his beast’s neck as the dragon tried to evade the blast. Another wingmate had swooped to catch the rider but the green dragon, his left wing crisped, his body scorched, had died of shock and phosphene poisoning.

  “L’tol would aid our Search,” F’nor agreed as the two dragonmen walked up to the bronze doors of the Clothmen’s Hall. They paused on the threshold, adjusting their eyes to the dimmer light within. Glows punctuated the wall recesses and hung in clusters above the larger looms w
here the finer tapestries and fabrics were woven by master craftsmen. The pervading mood was one of quiet, purposeful industry.

  Before their eyes had adapted, however, a figure glided to them, with a polite, if curt, request for them to follow him.

  They were led to the right of the entrance, to a small office, curtained from the main hall. Their guide turned to them, his face visible in the wallglows. There was that air about him that marked him indefinably as a dragonman. But his face was lined deeply, one side seamed with old burn marks. His eyes, sick with a hungry yearning, dominated his face. He blinked constantly.

  “I am now Lytol,” he said in a harsh voice.

  Flar nodded acknowledgment.

  “You would be F’lar,” Lytol said, “and you, F’nor. You’ve both the look of your sire.”

  F’lar nodded again.

  Lytol swallowed convulsively, the muscles in his face twitching as the presence of dragonmen revived his awareness of exile. He essayed a smile.

  “Dragons in the sky! The news spread faster than Threads.”

  “Nemorth has a new queen.”

  “Jora dead?” Lytol asked concernedly, his face cleared of its nervous movement for a second.

  F’lar nodded.

  Lytol grimaced bitterly. “R’gul again, huh.” He stared off in the middle distance, his eyelids quiet but the muscles along his jaw took up the constant movement. “You’ve the High Reaches? All of them?” Lytol asked, turning back to the dragonman, a slight emphasis on “all.”

  F’lar gave an affirmative nod again.

  “You’ve seen the women.” Lytol’s disgust showed through the words. It was a statement, not a question, for he hurried on. “Well, there are no better in all the High Reaches,” and his tone expressed utmost disdain.