As if for comfort, F’nor repeated the observation to himself, and remembered, with no relief, the way Brekke had looked at T’bor the day before. “It doesn’t matter if the rider’s already attached, you know, not in a first mating.” He blurted it out, then realized like the greenest dolt that that was stupid. Brekke’d know exactly what Kylara’s reaction would be if T’bor’s Orth flew Wirenth. She’d know she would have no peace at all. He groaned at his ineptitude.

“Your arm is hurting?” she asked, solicitous.

“No. Not my arm,” and he stepped forward, gripping her shoulder with his good hand. “Look, it’d be better if you called for an open flight. There are plenty of good bronzes. N’ton of Benden Weyr, B’dor of Ista Weyr. Both are fine men with good beasts. Then you could leave Southern…”

Brekke’s eyes were closed and she seemed to go limp in his grasp.

“No! No!” The denial was so soft he barely heard it. “I belong here. Not—Benden.”

“N’ton could transfer.”

A shudder went through Brekke’s body and her eyes flew open. She slipped away from his grip.

“No, N’ton—shouldn’t come to Southern,” she said in a flat voice.

“He’s got no use for Kylara, you know,” F’nor continued, determined to reassure her. “She doesn’t succeed with every man, you know. And you’re a very sweet person, you know.”

With a shift of mood as sudden as any of Lessa’s, Brekke smiled up at him.

“That’s nice to know.”

And somehow F’nor had to laugh with her, at his own blundering interference, at the notion of him, a brown rider, giving advice to someone like Brekke, who had more sense in her smallest finger than he.

Well, he was going to get a message to N’ton and B’dor anyhow. Ramoth would help him.

“Have you named your lizard?” he asked.

“Berd. Wirenth and I decided. She likes him,” Brekke replied, smiling tenderly on the sleeping pair. “Although it’s very confusing. Why do I have a bronze, you a queen and Mirrim three?”

F’nor shrugged and grinned at her. “Why not? Of course, once we tell them that’s not how it’s done, they may conform to time-honored couplings.”

“What I meant was, if the fire-lizards—who seem to be miniature dragons—can be Impressed by anyone who approaches them at the crucial moment, then fighting dragons—not just queens who don’t chew firestone anyhow—could be Impressed by women, too.”

“Fighting Thread is hard work. Leave it to men.”

“You think managing a Weyr isn’t hard work?” Brekke kept her voice even but her eyes darkened angrily. “Or plowing fields and hollowing cliffs for Holds? And…”