Chapters (64)
- Other titles by Anne McCaffreyPublished by Ballantine Books:
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- INTRODUCTION
- PROLOGUE
- At a Gather—6.15.30
- Part 1
- Turnover at Landing—1.1.31 Present Pass Aivas—Aivas Adjusted Turn 2553
- Benden Weyr—1.1.31
- Southern Hold—1.1.31
- Healer Hall—1.1.31
- Back at Landing—1.2.31
- Fort Hold—late night—1.1.31
- Fort Hold Runner Station—1.2.31
- Keroon Printer Hall—1.3.31
- Benden Weyr—midday—1.3.31
- Monaco Bay Weyr—five days later—1.8.31
- Part 2
- Ruatha Hold—local time 12:04 in the morning—1.9.31
- Telgar Weyr—local time 4:04 in the morning—1.9.31
- Benden Weyr—local time 6:04 in the morning—1.9.31
- Harper Hall—local time 1:00 in the morning—1.9.31
- Landing—local time 10:12 mid-morning—1.9.31
- In the Conference Room at Landing—1.9.31
- Monaco Weyr—10:22 in the morning—Timing it
- In the Conference Room at Landing—local time 1:10–1.9.31
- Sunrise Cliff Seahold—timed-back
- In the Conference Room—local time 2:12 at Landing—1.9.31
- Back at Landing—local time—3:40
- Harper Hall—5:00 in the morning, and Southern Hold—2:00 in the morning–1.9.31
- Landing—late afternoon—1.9.31
- Same time at Keroon Printer Hall—local time 11:15—1.9.31
- Later, on an unusually bright evening at Landing, Sunrise Cliff, and Honshu Hold—1.9.31
- Part 3
- Honshu—1.10.31
- Circle Runner Station—1.18.31
- Harper Hall
- Benden Weyr—
- Benini Hold—east Monaco and Honshu—1.20.31
- Harper Hall—1.28.31
- Honshu Hold—2.1.31
- Fort Hold—2.13.31
- Printer Hall at Wide Bay—same night
- Honshu Hold—2.9.31
- Night at Wide Bay—2.9.31
- Ruatha Hold—late evening—2.9.31
- Core Hold—two days before Council Meeting—2.26.31
- Part 4
- Honshu Weyrhold—2.26–27.31
- Council Meeting at Telgar Hold—3.1.31
- Honshu Weyrhold—3.01.31
- Interim at Benden and elsewhere
- Honshu Weyrhold—time passing slowly
- Landing—3.21.31
- Honshu Weyrhold—3.21.31
- Southern Hold—3.23.31
- Honshu Weyrhold—3.27.31
- Benden Weyr—3.27.31
- Cove Hold—same day, same approximate time
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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Taking down an old glass, Tagetarl unstoppered the skin and poured a sample. Pinch carefully tapped a few grains of the powder into the glass. The wine slowly began to froth.
“You’d have been dead asleep—or maybe even dead,” Pinch said. He replaced the bung in the wineskin. “Definitely a malicious attempt to render you incapable of defending your Hall. Where can we hide it?” He looked around the room.
“Underneath the sink, behind the laundry soaps,” Tagetarl suggested and helped Pinch bestow it, with a final glance to be sure the bung was in tight. “And we were supposed to drink a whole skin tonight?”
“You usually drink with your evening meal.”
“Cider,” Tagetarl said in protest. “Wine only on special occasions. And how do they know we drink at dinner?”
“Probably watching. Your kitchen faces the road. You don’t close the shutters until you go to bed.” Pinch shrugged. “Then, too, most people’ll drink freely of free wine, you know. And you did say you’d drink the Lord Holder’s health.”
“It couldn’t possibly be Lord Kashman he meant?” Tagetarl asked.
Pinch twisted his chin sideways and shrugged. “He wasn’t specific, was he? Or do they intend to impugn Lord Toronas since it’s a Benden wine? Or implicate Lord Kashman? Interesting.” Then he gave a delicate sniff of the savory odors drifting down from the kitchen level. “When did you say dinner is? I mean to join you. All that free wine!”
Rosheen came into the cellar. “I thought I saw someone strange. Pinch?” she added, staring at the Harper as he discarded the outer layer of rags. “What are you doing here?”
“I perceive you haven’t told her,” Pinch said with a long-suffering sigh.
“Told me what?” She glared at both of them.
“You were right, Rosheen,” Tagetarl said with a sad grimace. “There is trouble coming our way.”
“Abominators?” she exclaimed when, between them, Tagetarl and Pinch disclosed all they knew.
As ever, Rosheen did not react the way Tagetarl thought she would.
“You mean, you didn’t tell me to cook enough to feed your friends a decent supper, Pinch? You left them waiting up there in that awful loft all day long?”
“They brought food and they’ve slept most of the day,” Pinch added as if that was occupation enough. “Couldn’t let anyone know they were here.”
Abruptly she sat down on the stairs, her face suddenly white as she absorbed the danger the Hall was in.
“You mean,” and now her white skin was flushed with angry spots on her cheeks, “you let me go through the entire day oblivious to all this?”
“Now, now, Rosheen, one of us had to act natural,” Tagetarl said.
“Well, now, I’ve a thing or two to say to that, MasterPrinter Tagetarl—”
“Later, Rosheen,” Pinch said. “You can say anything you want to him when we’ve got all this behind us.”