If the grubs did live to eat Thread, and if F’lar could maneuver the scared Lords and Craftsmen into accepting this solution, what then? They weren’t fools, those men. They’d see that Pern would no longer be dependent on dragonriders. Of course, that’s what they wanted. And what under the sun did out-of-work dragonriders do? The Lords Holder Groghe, Sangel, Nessel, Meron and Vincet would immediately dispense with tithes. F’nor wouldn’t object to learning another trade, but F’lar had relinquished their tentative hold on the southern continent to the Oldtimers, so where would dragonmen farm? What commodity would they barter for the products of the Crafthalls?

F’lar couldn’t be under the impression that he could mend that breach with T’kul, could he? Or maybe—well, they didn’t know how large the southern continent was. Past the deserts to the west or the unexplored sea to the east, maybe there were other, hospitable lands. Did F’lar know more than he said?

Grall chirruped piteously in his ear. She was clinging to the fur rug by his shoulder, her supple hide gleaming golden from her bath. He stroked her, wondering if she needed oil. She was growing, but not at the tremendous rate dragons did in the first few weeks after Hatching.

Well, his thoughts were disturbing her as well as himself.

“Canth?”

The dragon was asleep. The fact was oddly consoling.

F’nor found a comfortable position and closed his eyes, determined to rest. Grall’s soft stirrings ended and he felt her body resting against his neck, in the curve of his shoulder. He wondered how Brekke was doing at the High Reaches. And if her small bronze was as unsettled by weyrlife in a cliff as Grall. A memory of Brekke’s face crossed his mind. Not as he had last seen her, anxious, worried, rapidly mobilizing her wits to cope with moving so precipitously after T’kul had swooped down on the unsuspecting settlement. But as loving had made her, soft, gentled. He’d have her soon to himself, all to himself, for he’d see that she didn’t overextend herself, fighting everyone’s battles except her own. She’d be asleep now, he realized, for it was still night at High Reaches…

—

Brekke was not asleep. She had awakened suddenly, as she was accustomed to doing in the morning, except that the dark stillness around her was not simply that of an inner room in the weyr cliff, but was full of the soft solitude of night. The fire-lizard, Berd, roused too, his brilliant eyes the only light in the room. He crooned apprehensively. Brekke stroked him, listening for Wirenth, but the queen was sound asleep in her stony couch.