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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?

His yells attracted the attention of other miners, just coming up from the shafts, tired and dirty from a long day of digging iron ore. They, too, saw the light—coming straight at the hold. They scattered, yelling, diving for the nearest shelter under ore carts, behind the raw mounds of the day’s tips, the gantry, back into the shaft. There was a rushing noise of thunder rumbling from the sky—and not a cloud in sight. Some insisted that they heard a high-pitched shriek. Everyone agreed on the direction from which the object came: southwest.

Suddenly the high stone wall that surrounded the prison yard was breached, showering pieces of rock that rained down on the other sections of the minehold and causing miners to fall flat, covering their heads against the fragments. A second explosive noise followed the first, punctuated by screams of terror from those in the prison quarters. There was the stink of very hot metal, a familiar enough smell in a place where iron ore was smelted into ingots before being shipped to Smithcrafthalls—only this stink had an unusual acidity that no one could later accurately describe.

In fact, from the moment the journeyman shouted his warning, only one man of the several hundred in the minehold kept his head. Shankolin, imprisoned in the Crom mines for the past thirteen Turns, had waited for just such an opportunity: a chance to escape. He heard the wall shatter, of course, and saw a moment’s reflection of the blue-white light in the small window of the heavy door that was the only entrance to the building. He threw himself to the left, diving under a wooden bunk just as something large, hot, and reeking pierced the wall where his head would have been. It hissed as it plowed down the main aisle and buried itself in the far corner, dropping through the wood planks, smashing a corner pillar, buckling the wall, and causing part of the roof to collapse. Someone was screaming in pain, pleading for help. Everyone else was howling with fear.

Wriggling out from under the bunk, Shankolin took just one look at the opening made by the meteorite—for that was the only thing that could have caused the damage just done—and, realizing that he could see straight across the yard to the shattered wall, he reacted instantly. He dove out of his prison and sprinted to the broken wall. On his way, he made certain that there was no one on the guard walkway or in the end turrets. They must all have abandoned their posts as the meteor streaked toward the minehold.