BooksBarbecue
Back The Dragonriders of Pern
Chapters (55)
  1. Title Page
  2. Map
  3. Prologue
  4. VOLUME I: DRAGONFLIGHT
  5. Dedicatory Note
  6. PART I Weyr Search
  7. PART II Dragonflight
  8. PART III Dust Fall
  9. PART IV The Cold Between
  10. VOLUME II: DRAGONQUEST
  11. Dedication
  12. I Morning at Mastercrafthall, Fort Hold / Several Afternoons Later at Benden Weyr / Midmorning (Telgar Time) at Mastersmithcrafthall, Telgar Hold
  13. II Evening (Fort Weyr Time). Meeting of the Weyrleaders at Fort Weyr
  14. III Morning over Lemos Hold
  15. IV Midday at Southern Weyr
  16. V Midmorning at Ruatha Hold / Early Evening at Benden Weyr
  17. VI Midmorning at Southern Weyr / Early Morning at Nabol Hold: Next Day
  18. VII Midmorning at Benden Weyr / Early Morning at the Mastersmithcrafthall, Telgar Hold
  19. VIII Midmorning at Southern Weyr
  20. IX Afternoon at Southern Weyr: Same Day
  21. X Early Morning in Harpercrafthall at Fort Hold / Afternoon at Telgar Hold
  22. XI Early Morning at Benden Weyr
  23. XII Morning at Benden Weyr / Predawn at High Reaches Weyr
  24. XIII Night at Fort Weyr: Six Days Later
  25. XIV Early Morning at Ruatha Hold / Midday at Benden Weyr
  26. XV Evening at Benden Weyr: Impression Banquet
  27. XVI Evening at Benden Weyr / Later Evening at Fort Weyr
  28. VOLUME III: THE WHITE DRAGON
  29. Dedication
  30. I At Ruatha Hold, Present Pass, 12th Turn
  31. II Benden Weyr, Present Pass, 13th Turn
  32. III Morning at Ruatha Hold, and Smithcrafthall at Telgar Hold, Present Pass, 15.5.9
  33. IV Ruatha Hold, Fidello’s Hold, and Various Points Between, 15.5.10-15.5.16
  34. V Morning in Harpercraft Hall, Fort Hold, Afternoon in Benden Weyr, Late Afternoon in Harpercraft Hall, 15.5.26
  35. VI Ruatha Hold and Southern Hold, 15.5.27-15.6.2
  36. VII Morning at Ruatha Hold, 15.6.2
  37. VIII Ruatha Hold, Fort Weyr, Fidello’s Hold, 15.6.3-15.6.17
  38. IX Early Summer, Harpercraft Hall and Ruatha Hold, 15.7.3
  39. X From Harpercraft Hall to the Southern Continent, Evening at Benden Weyr, 15.7.4
  40. XI Late Morning at Benden Weyr, Early Morning at Harpercraft Hall, Midday at Fidello’s Hold, 15.7.5
  41. XII Ruatha Hold, Fidello’s Hold, Threadfall, 15.7.6
  42. XIII A Cove in the Southern Continent, 15.7.7-15.8.7
  43. XIV Early Morning at Harpercraft Hall, Midmorning at Ista Weyr, Midafternoon at Jaxom’s Cove, 15.8.28
  44. XV Evening at Jaxom’s Cove and Late Evening at Ista Weyr, 15.8.28
  45. XVI At the Cove Hold, 15.8.28-15.9.7
  46. XVII Fort Hold, Benden Weyr, at Cove Hold, and at Sea aboard the Dawn Sister, 15.10.1-15.10.2
  47. XVIII At the Cove Hold the Day of Master Robinton’s Arrival, 15.10.14
  48. XIX Morning at the Cove Hold, Star-gazing in Late Evening, Next Morning, Discovery at the Mountain, 15.10.15-15.10.16
  49. XX At the Mountain and at Ruatha Hold, 15.10.18-15.10.20
  50. XXI Next Day at the Mountain, Cove Hold, and the Southern Hatching Ground, 15.10.21
  51. Afterword
  52. Dragondex
  53. Other Books by Anne McCaffrey
  54. To learn more about other great titles from Ballantine Books . . .
  55. Copyright
Document

“Oh, that one,” Martha laughed with amused dismay. “She’ll eat us out of the weyr, and even my Loranth has had to call the other queens to restrain her.”

“She perches on the Star Stones as if she owned them and keens constantly,” T’ton added, less charitably. He cocked an ear. “Ha. She’s stopped.”

“You can come, can’t you?” Lessa blurted out.

“Come? Come where, my dear?” Mardra asked, confused. “You’ve been going on and on about our ‘coming,’ and Threads approaching, and the Red Star bracketed in the Eye Rock, and... my dear, don’t you realize the Red Star has been past Pern these two months?”

“No, no, they’ve started. That’s why I came back between times...”

“Back? Between times?” T’ton exclaimed, striding over to the bed, eyeing Lessa intently.

“Could I have some klah? I know I’m not making much sense, and I’m not really awake yet. But I’m not mad or still sick, and this is rather complicated.”

“Yes, it is,” T’ton remarked with deceptive mildness. But he did call down the service shaft for klah. And he did drag a chair over to her bedside, settling himself to listen to her.

“Of course you’re not mad,” Mardra soothed her, glaring at her weyrmate. “Or she wouldn’t ride a queen.”

T’ton had to agree to that. Lessa waited for the klah to come; when it did, she sipped gratefully at its stimulating warmth.

Then she took a deep breath and began, telling them of the Long Interval between the dangerous passes of the Red Star: how the sole Weyr had fallen into disfavor and contempt, how Jora had deteriorated and lost control over her queen, Nemorth, so that, as the Red Star neared, there was no sudden increase in the size of clutches. How she had Impressed Ramoth to become Benden’s Weyrwoman. How F’lar had outwitted the dissenting Hold Lords the day after Ramoth’s first mating flight and taken firm command of Weyr and Pern, preparing for the Threads he knew were coming. She told her by now rapt audience of her own first attempts to fly Ramoth and how she had inadvertently gone back between time to the day Fax had invaded Ruath Hold.

“Invade... my family’s Hold?” Mardra cried, aghast.

“Ruatha has given the Weyrs many famous Weyrwomen,” Lessa said with a sly smile at which T’ton burst out laughing.

“She’s Ruathan, no question,” he assured Mardra.

She told them of the situation in which Dragonmen now found themselves, with an insufficient force to meet the Thread attacks. Of the Question Song and the great tapestry.

“A tapestry?” Mardra cried, her hand going to her cheek in alarm. “Describe it to me!”

And when Lessa did, she saw—at last—belief in both their faces.

“My father has just commissioned a tapestry with such a scene. He told me of it the other day because the last battle with the Threads was held over Ruatha.” Incredulous, Mardra turned to T’ton, who no longer looked amused. “She must have done what she has said she’d done. How could she possibly know about the tapestry?”