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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?

Out of here. The man doesn’t need to be chasing his Runner. Then they were out of range of bloodsuckers and into cooler air. Zaranth circled, looking for Monarth and the rest of the dragons.

Monarth is aloft, and so is Path, Zaranth told her and headed in their direction. We are to swing wide behind the beasts, she added.

It’s not the first time we’ve herded, Tai said grumpily. She wished she had more in her belly than cold water; she’d had no lunch.

At this altitude, she had a good view of the bright-shirted herders, stringing out over the grassy plain, starting the beasts back the way they had stampeded.

It would be good to have a swim when the herd is turned.

It most certainly would. There were plenty of hospitable coves on the way back to Monaco Weyr, and trees full of ripe fruit.

Altogether, Tai thought, apart from the insects, the day had been profitable. It would take time to clean and stretch the pelts, but once word got around to the traders of today’s kill, she might even get to sell them raw. One day she might keep a particularly fine one—she fancied a clouded fur with ghost stripes—but in the meantime, northerners prized whatever was taken.

Part 2


DISASTER (THROUGHOUT THE SAME DAY)

Ruatha Hold—local time 12:04 in the morning—1.9.31

Stepping out of the cothold, Sharra wrapped her cloak tightly around her. It was very cold, but the wind, which could cut like a knife down the broad avenue back to Ruatha Hold, had died out. She was tired from a long nursing, but relieved that the weaver would recover from his accident. She silently thanked Aivas once more for the medical information he had left. She had been able to repair the tendon in Possil’s hand—something she could not have done five Turns earlier—and to stitch shut the jagged wound. She could honestly tell him that he would have the use of his hand and be as skillful as ever in two months’ time.

A light caught her eye. To the east! Startled, because it was automatic to be fearful of anything coming from the east, she saw shooting stars, long straight slashes in the dark sky. She stopped in her tracks. These were not like the Ghosts of Turnover, for all they’d been bright this year. Ghosts lasted a second or two. These were visibly longer, almost ribbons in the night sky. One bright spot seemed to linger, then exploded.

She blinked. This could not be the result of fatigue after a delicate surgery. Certainly not Thread! She told herself firmly. Thread isn’t due to fall anywhere tomorrow, and Thread came down silver-gray, like rain, in daylight, not like a streak of fire at midnight.

She didn’t realize she was running until she was halfway up Ruatha’s broad causeway and could hear the fretful whine of the watchwher.