“Best do it before you come to bed,” Fiona said. T’mar gave her another surprised look. She pushed back from her chair, having finished her meal a while back, and called out to the group, “Dragonriders, Thread falls tomorrow and I must rest!”

The riders all rose dutifully and nodded to her, eyeing the Weyrleader warily. T’mar rose, too, giving his half-eaten dessert a quick, rueful glance before adding, “A good night’s sleep would serve us all well!”

The others needed no more hints and slowly the dragonriders finished eating and, in small groups, made their way from the Dining Cavern to their weyrs, some accompanied by other riders, some by werymates and family.

Fiona was waiting for him in his quarters.

“Kindan is spending the night with Lorana,” Fiona told him. “Xhinna and the others know to call Talenth or Tolarth if they’ve need.”

“And you?” T’mar asked, gesturing to his room.

Fiona smiled and cocked her head up at him. “I’d like to stay with you tonight.”

T’mar smiled. “I’ve learned that it’s never good to disappoint the Weyrwoman.”

Later, much later, as Fiona rested her head on his shoulder, she asked, “What are we going to do?”

“Do?”

“Every Fall we lose two more,” Fiona said with a sigh. “Sometimes more, sometimes less but, on average, two. And with seventy-two fighting dragons, that gives us less than thirty-six Falls.”

“Much less,” T’mar said. “Really, we can’t hope to fight with less than a full Flight.”

“You could time it,” Fiona said, nuzzling deeper into his shoulder.

“The casualties would increase.”

“So we don’t have the time,” Fiona said.

T’mar was silent: He had no answer for her.

“It can’t be like this,” Fiona said. “Our children should grow up in the Weyr, strong, happy, and healthy—”

“And be dragonriders?”

“If they wish,” Fiona said. “But we shouldn’t have to face the end of everything, the last dragon, the last rider, the last Weyr.” She shook her head. “That shouldn’t happen.”

“No, it shouldn’t,” T’mar said. Which didn’t change the fact that it would. Thirty-six Falls would come in little more than four months—five at the most. It would take the weyrlings just hatched another twenty-three months at the least to mature and grow strong enough to join the Weyrs. “We could send them back in time.”

“The weyrlings?” Fiona guessed. “Where to? We can’t send them back to Igen, all the time there was used.”

“Southern?”

“We sent the fire-lizards there,” Fiona reminded him. “The dragons are cured now, but I don’t know if they couldn’t get sick again.” She paused in silent thought for a long while. When she moved again it was to prop herself up on one arm. She leaned forward and kissed T’mar gently on the lips.