“That would not signify if it suited the Lord of the High Reaches, but my guild protects me from persecution. I am safe enough in the craft. He is dependent on the proceeds of our industy.” He snorted, mocking. “I am the best weaver of battle scenes. To be sure,” he added, cocking one eyebrow waggishly, “dragons are no longer woven in the fabric as the comrades of heroes. You noticed, of course, the prevalence of growing greens?”

F’lar grimaced his distaste. “That is not all we have noted, either. But Fax keeps the other traditions. . . .”

Lytol waved this consideration aside. “He does that because it is basic military sense. His neighbors armed after he took Ruatha, for he did it by treachery, let me tell you. And let me warn you also”—Lytol jabbed a finger in the direction of the Hold—“he scoffs openly at tales of the Threads. He taunts the harpers for the stupid nonsense of the old ballads and has banned from their repertoire all dragonlore. The new generation will grow up totally ignorant of duty, tradition, and precaution.”

F’lar was not surprised to hear that on top of Lytol’s other disclosures, although it disturbed him more than anything else he had heard. Other men, too, denied the verbal transmissions of historic events, accounting them no more than the maunderings of harpers. Yet the Red Star pulsed in the sky, and the time was drawing near when they would hysterically re-avow the old allegiances in fear for their very lives.

“Have you been abroad in the early morning of late?” asked F’nor, grinning maliciously.

“I have,” Lytol breathed out in a hushed, choked whisper. “I have. . . .” A groan was wrenched from his guts, and he whirled away from the dragonmen, his head bowed between hunched shoulders. “Go,” he said, gritting his teeth. And, as they hesitated, he pleaded, “Go!”

F’lar walked quickly from the room, followed by F’nor. The bronze rider crossed the quiet dim Hall with long strides and exploded into the startling sunlight. His momentum took him into the center of the square. There he stopped so abruptly that F’nor, hard on his heels, nearly collided with him.

“We will spend exactly the same time within the other Halls,” he announced in a tight voice, his face averted from F’nor’s eyes. F’lar’s throat was constricted. It was difficult suddenly for him to speak. He swallowed hard, several times.

“To be dragonless . . .” murmured F’nor pityingly. The encounter with Lytol had roiled his depths in a mournful way to which he was unaccustomed. That F’lar appeared equally shaken went far to dispel F’nor’s private opinion that his half brother was incapable of emotion.

“There is no other way once First Impression has been made. You know that,” F’lar roused himself to say curtly. He strode off to the Hall bearing the leather-men’s device.

Honor those the dragons heed,