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Chapters (64)
  1. Other titles by Anne McCaffreyPublished by Ballantine Books:
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Contents
  6. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  7. INTRODUCTION
  8. PROLOGUE
  9. At a Gather—6.15.30
  10. Part 1
  11. Turnover at Landing—1.1.31 Present Pass Aivas—Aivas Adjusted Turn 2553
  12. Benden Weyr—1.1.31
  13. Southern Hold—1.1.31
  14. Healer Hall—1.1.31
  15. Back at Landing—1.2.31
  16. Fort Hold—late night—1.1.31
  17. Fort Hold Runner Station—1.2.31
  18. Keroon Printer Hall—1.3.31
  19. Benden Weyr—midday—1.3.31
  20. Monaco Bay Weyr—five days later—1.8.31
  21. Part 2
  22. Ruatha Hold—local time 12:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  23. Telgar Weyr—local time 4:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  24. Benden Weyr—local time 6:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  25. Harper Hall—local time 1:00 in the morning—1.9.31
  26. Landing—local time 10:12 mid-morning—1.9.31
  27. In the Conference Room at Landing—1.9.31
  28. Monaco Weyr—10:22 in the morning—Timing it
  29. In the Conference Room at Landing—local time 1:10–1.9.31
  30. Sunrise Cliff Seahold—timed-back
  31. In the Conference Room—local time 2:12 at Landing—1.9.31
  32. Back at Landing—local time—3:40
  33. Harper Hall—5:00 in the morning, and Southern Hold—2:00 in the morning–1.9.31
  34. Landing—late afternoon—1.9.31
  35. Same time at Keroon Printer Hall—local time 11:15—1.9.31
  36. Later, on an unusually bright evening at Landing, Sunrise Cliff, and Honshu Hold—1.9.31
  37. Part 3
  38. Honshu—1.10.31
  39. Circle Runner Station—1.18.31
  40. Harper Hall
  41. Benden Weyr—
  42. Benini Hold—east Monaco and Honshu—1.20.31
  43. Harper Hall—1.28.31
  44. Honshu Hold—2.1.31
  45. Fort Hold—2.13.31
  46. Printer Hall at Wide Bay—same night
  47. Honshu Hold—2.9.31
  48. Night at Wide Bay—2.9.31
  49. Ruatha Hold—late evening—2.9.31
  50. Core Hold—two days before Council Meeting—2.26.31
  51. Part 4
  52. Honshu Weyrhold—2.26–27.31
  53. Council Meeting at Telgar Hold—3.1.31
  54. Honshu Weyrhold—3.01.31
  55. Interim at Benden and elsewhere
  56. Honshu Weyrhold—time passing slowly
  57. Landing—3.21.31
  58. Honshu Weyrhold—3.21.31
  59. Southern Hold—3.23.31
  60. Honshu Weyrhold—3.27.31
  61. Benden Weyr—3.27.31
  62. Cove Hold—same day, same approximate time
  63. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  64. What’s next onyour reading list?

Chesmic couldn’t quite place the man’s accent. He was certainly not from Keroon; Keroonians drawled—that is, when they spoke at all. Nor was he from the eastern coast. Runners bred there spoke in crisp tones. West coasters did, too, though they accented some words differently. That was it. The man had no accent, no tone to his words: he just spoke them and sometimes blurred the t’s and d’s and n’s.

“Naw, sold it to the Smithcrafthall for more marks than the mines’ve earned in Turns.” Chesmic did not wholly approve of that sale but it had been their meteorite. Not that he couldn’t have sold his to the Smithcrafthall, if he felt like it, but you couldn’t sell something that had been in his family so long. Wouldn’t be right!

“I heard that they think it’s part of the Red Star,” the young man said, a sly gleam in his eyes.

“That’s a bundle of snake wallop,” Chesmic replied contemptuously. He pointed skyward. “Iffen the Red Star had broke up—which Masters Erragon and Stinar and Wansor has seen through Cove Hold that it hasn’t—we’d have rocks falling down all over the planet. And we don’t.”

“That Fireball made enough trouble for us,” one of the Runners said.

“It was wrong to move the Red Star,” the older man said, his face somber and his voice forbidding. “It has circled Pern for centuries and to alter its course is a bad deed.”

“Oh, it’s still to circle Pern,” Chesmic agreed. “Just not close enough to drop Thread on us again.”

“Thread, and the dragonriders flaming it out of our skies, is tradition. So many have been broken. So much has Aivas corrupted our way of life, our traditions.”

There was something about the man’s toneless voice that caught you up in his words but Chesmic knew about traditions. Runners followed ones that belonged to the first Crafthall to be formed at Fort Hold.

“There isn’t a Runner on any trace on Pern, north or south, that does not follow tradition. And since you’ve both finished eating, you’d best make use of the beds that tradition—” Chesmic paused to be sure these strangers understood what he meant. “—requires us to offer travelers during winter.” He rose and gestured toward the loft steps.

The older one rose and bowed. So did the younger man, but his expression was sullen as they both made their way to the sleeping loft.