“By the First Egg, there is!” Fiona exclaimed. She hadn’t meant to yell, but she heard her voice echoing off the Bowl walls. From on high, Talenth cried in loud agreement.

“Who says so?” Norik demanded, sweeping a hand around the empty Weyr. “Who will fly the Thread that falls even now at Upper Crom?”

“I say so,” Fiona roared back, turning to stare down the weary man. “I, Fiona of Igen, Talenth’s rider, say that there is a Telgar Weyr and that we will fight Thread whenever and wherever it falls!”

As if in answer, Talenth bugled once more, this time in challenge.

Fiona only had a moment to marvel at her actions: How much of her outburst had been her and how much her dragon? She didn’t know if what she was doing was right; to her knowledge, no one had ever done it before. But, just as she felt Talenth’s stalwart declaration, she felt that it was the right thing to tell those who survived at Telgar that there was a queen dragon who was theirs—and a Weyrwoman who would stand for them.

Her call was answered loudly by bronze Zirenth, bronze Ladirth, bronze Ginirth, and more than twenty browns, greens, and blues.

“Igen?” Norik repeated numbly, his gaze stuck on the approaching wing of dragons like a dying man offered a final glimmer of hope. “You come from Igen?”

“I was there, Turns back,” Fiona said, surprised by her own words. She raised her voice as she continued, “High Reaches flies for Telgar today, and Fort has sent its wings.”

“That is good,” Norik said, shaking his head. “But there is still no Telgar.”

“There will always be a Telgar,” Fiona said firmly.

Norik looked doubtful as he glanced toward the Bowl and the dragons and riders dispersing within it. “This is a sad day.”

“You were right: We will need a ballad,” Fiona told him, nodding consolingly. “And I would like you to write it, if you can.” She held his eyes. “Honor is due this day.”

“For the living or the dead?” Norik wondered.

“Both,” T’mar said as he approached. “You are Norik, the harper.”

The harper looked at him, straining as he examined T’mar, his eyes going wider as he recognized him. “You look like T’mar, but you seem older.”

“Three Turns at Igen,” T’mar agreed calmly. Norik mouthed the word “Igen” with something like hope. T’mar held out his hands to the anguished man, saying, “I grieve for your loss.”

“What’s he doing here?” Fiona asked, pointing toward H’nez, as they settled themselves at the nearest table in the Kitchen Cavern and she had a chance to survey the riders K’lior had dispatched.

“He claimed the right,” T’mar told her quietly. “He’d argued for the first available transfer and this was it.”