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A queen dragon’s first mating flight was a momentous occasion. It was supposed to be a time of joy and excitement for the Weyr, and a heady mix of lust and physical sensation for riders and dragons alike.
But as Wirenth flew, Brekke raged. She had always been calm and unflappable, never one to lose her head to anger. Now, tangled up in her bond with Wirenth until she could not tell where the human ended and the dragon began, anger was all Brekke knew. Anger, that another queen would dare to challenge her during this, her first mating flight.
Even if she had thought to look for it, she would have found no trace of her own reticence toward this event, so subsumed was she in her dragon’s powerful emotions. Indeed, she would later realize that at the core of her rage was an ice-cold blade of fear, for none if it was supposed to happen like this. A fight between queens could not end well and she was powerless to stop it.
Wirenth screamed and dove toward Prideth, the interloper. Brekke felt that scream to her very core.
It took everything she had just to stay with Wirenth in that moment. There was nothing left with which to control the dragon.
“Wirenth, stop!”
Eyes darting, she had one last look at what was happening around her, and then she was torn out of her own body and became wholly Wirenth. Pan wracked her as Wirenth and Prideth grappled, claws and teeth rending flesh, dripping with blood.
She screamed as her wing tore, delicate membrane giving way, sending her plummeting toward the mountains and death.
Only she did not fall.
Ramoth was there beneath her, an enormous golden bulk to buoy her up. And Canth was above her, holding her steady. Wirenth’s rage was undimmed, but injured as she was, and pinned between two dragons that were a match for her in size and strength, there was nothing she could do but thrash—and scream.
Brekke was screaming too when she came back to awareness in her own body. She was only dimly aware of Mirrim, stationed in front of her and armed with a large frying pan, apparently ready to fend off any overly-zealous bronze riders. The pain she felt through her bond with Wirenth overwhelmed everything else. Physical, emotional, mental… the pain consumed everything, chasing thought away.
She barely realized she was in motion until Mirrim tried to stop her. Her limbs moved jerkily, almost beyond her control. But she must get to Wirenth!
“Stop! Stop!” Mirrim cried. “Brekke, what happened?”
Brekke heard the words, and some deep part of her stirred in response to them, but Mirrim was not Wirenth. Pushing her way free of Mirrim, Brekke threw herself out of the weyr. By the time she reached the hall outside she was running at full speed.
The dragons still beat her to the ground. Wirenth was staggering free from Ramoth with the careful assistance of two bronze dragons.
Brekke was not aware of Canth’s sudden reappearance high above the Weyr, nor of his plunging descent.
She was aware of F’nor pelting headlong toward her moments later, if only because she was in his arms the instant he reached her. Berd and Grall chose that moment to reappear, echoing the humans’ fear and anguish in their own cries.
“Will Wirenth survive?” F’nor demanded.
Brekke already knew the answer, both through her connection to Wirenth and because every dragon involved had been attempting to reassure her since the moment they had subdued Wirenth. She had been in no state to hear them then, but she heard them now, and wilted a little in relief even as the Weyr healer confirmed it.
By now shock was truly beginning to set in. She recognized the signs in a distant way, as if she were observing them in someone else. She was cold, so cold. It seemed almost as if she were slowing down while everything around her was happening faster and faster.
The sheer number of people who had responded to the emergency, all of them jostling to reach her or Wirenth, or just to see what had happened. The growing cacophony of outraged dragon voices, a deafening mix of furious bugles and words in Brekke’s mind. Ramoth heaving herself into the air and blinking away to between almost the moment she was airborne. The sense of growing rage within the Weyr—directed at Kylara, not at Brekke and Wirenth, or even Prideth. A woman arriving at a run, bearing fellis juice and a sedative.
Brekke refused both, felt vaguely as if she were watching herself do this. Not until Wirenth has been treated. Not until I know she will recover. Yet the woman pressed her again until F’nor waved her away.
And then Lessa arrived. The Weyr simultaneously erupted into chaos and at last cohered into order as Pern’s leading Weyrwoman demanded answers and action.
It was this that snapped Brekke out of her daze, at least a little. Only at this point did she realize that F’nor and Lessa, and she noted now that F’lar was here too, had arrived after the initial appearance of their dragons. And others from Benden were arriving, too. And Fort, and…
She must have said something aloud, though she was not aware of speaking, or else she looked so perplexed that F’nor felt compelled to explain.
“Once Berd raised the alarm, the dragons acted on their own,” he told her. “To save Wirenth.”
He did not say it aloud, but she could feel it in the fierceness of his embrace: to save you.
She was no one special, only a junior weyrwoman, and one whose queen had never risen at that. Compared to Kylara she was nothing, subservient to a fault.
Yet here they all were.
She allowed herself to slump a little, in despair or relief, she could not say, and realized too late that there was no going back. She had been pulled so tight since even before the move to High Reaches Weyr, bearing up under a mountain of responsibilities that should not have been hers alone, that once she let some of the pressure go, she could not regain her grip.
But F’nor was there to catch her and, when her legs would not support her any longer, to carry her to Wirenth.
Brekke could hardly sleep in the days after that disastrous mating flight. It seemed that she would just barely close her eyes only to jolt awake in stark terror of having lost Wirenth, as if the worst had actually happened, rather than being averted at the last moment.
Wirenth was never far, resting in the weyr as her injuries slowly healed. Yet when night fell and Brekke had nothing else to serve as a distraction, Wirenth was never close enough.
She gave up on sleep again and slipped out of the warm furs of her bed. Cold from the stone floor seeped into her feet, the same cold that pervaded everything here at High Reaches. Brekke noticed only distantly, her attention almost entirely focused on her beloved dragon.
Wirenth slept easily, pain kept at bay by generous doses of numbweed. She was a beautiful dragon in spite of the grievous injuries that marred her golden hide. Brekke watched for a moment and wished that her own pain could be numbed away so easily.
There had been plenty of encouragement for the liberal use of sedatives or wine, of course, but she had turned all of it down for fear that deep sleep would bring only nightmares from which she could not escape. She would rather wake and have the option to reassure herself in her dragon’s presence.
Linked as always to her moods, even in sleep, Wirenth stirred and blinked open churning eyes.
You are upset, the dragon observed.
“Oh, Wirenth,” Brekke murmured. She was beyond grateful that Wirenth had survived, that Canth and Ramoth and the other dragons had been able to tear the dueling queens apart before either could kill the other, that her dragon was still alive and at her side. And yet there was a doubt in her heart now that only Wirenth, in her warm and steady surety, could soothe.
I am alive, Wirenth told her. I will heal. I will rise again.
Careful to shield her thoughts from Wirenth, Brekke felt a chill that had nothing to do with the weather as she considered that possibility. That inevitability. Wirenth would rise again. Even before the aborted flight, Brekke had feared that her own inhibitions would limit her dragon. Now the very thought of another mating flight filled her with terror she could barely hide.
“You are alive,” she affirmed, leaning slightly to let her head rest against Wirenth’s powerful forelimb.
For the first time since the flight, Brekke wondered what had happened to Prideth and Kylara. No one was willing to talk about it, and she had seen no sign of either of them. She had not asked Wirenth for fear of reigniting the dragon’s rage.
Prideth lives, too, Wirenth said, soothing, slights seemingly forgotten now that her mating lust had subsided.
Somehow that brought Brekke no comfort. Nor did the knowledge that the Benden Weyrleaders might intend some sort of punishment for Kylara. Nothing would change what happened.
She wanted only for Wirenth to live and thrive. It was certain now that Wirenth would survive her injuries. It remained to be seen how she would fly. Once more she inspected the wounds and was relieved to see no signs of infection. But it was not enough to reassure her.
Brekke cursed the chill of the High Reaches and wished she could take Wirenth to Southern with its moderate climate and vast stretches of ocean beaches. Her dragon would heal better and more quickly there, she was sure. But there was no way Wirenth could fly there straight in her condition.
I will heal here, too, Wirenth said, huffing a little as if she were indignant at the mere thought that Brekke’s care might be insufficient. You tend me and you are a skilled healer.
Brekke nodded. She leaned closer, relishing the supple-soft feel of dragonhide against her cheek. But truly, she had not been able to help at all in the initial treatment of Wirenth’s wounds, and she felt a pang at having failed her dragon. She had been beyond desperate at the thought of losing Wirenth, unable to calm herself until shock set in. She had never felt such fear before in her life, and hoped to never experience it again.
Do not fear, Wirenth told her, as if it could be so easy. Maybe for dragons it was.
“I’ll try,” Brekke promised.
She wished there was somewhere they could go where it would be just the two of them. Where there was no Thread and no pressure to meet anyone else’s expectations… by that point she had to laugh at herself, however gently. Such dreams were foolish, and Wirenth was Wirenth. There was no escaping the pressures of her very nature and the nature of Brekke’s bond with her.
Wirenth was a dragon. Sooner or later, she would be ready to rise again. Brekke could do nothing to stop it. All she could do was prepare.
But how could she prepare for something like that? She was only human. And although she had tried, she could not change her nature. She did not desire any of the bronze riders at High Reaches any more than she had before, and she could not force herself into a change of preference.
Days passed as if nothing had happened. Wirenth healed and began to fly again. Brekke returned to her ordinary duties under a cloud of despair. Of Kylara and Prideth, there was still no sign, the two having been transferred in disgrace to another Weyr—though no one would yet tell Brekke where.
Each day Brekke felt as if she crept a little closer to her doom. She hated that her beloved Wirenth would be the cause of this doom even as she resolved to would do anything that was necessary for Wirenth and the Weyr. Her own desires must come last, no matter how much it hurt her.
The hardest part was hiding it from Wirenth, and from F’nor and Canth during their regular visits.
She wanted nothing more than to confess to one of them, or all of them, just how much she was struggling, how very afraid she was. But this was another part of her Farmhold upbringing she found difficult to overcome: at the Farmhold one did not complain about what needed doing, one simply endured.
For Wirenth, Brekke chose to endure.
Days went by, turning into one sevenday and another, then another. Life in High Reaches Weyr returned to what now passed as normal. Brekke was able to push her feelings of dread to the side and return her focus to the daily operations of the Weyr, which were now officially, if temporarily, hers. Duty was a welcome distraction.
With Kylara formally removed from her position as Weyrwoman, the next queen to rise here would determine the new Weyrleaders for High Reaches Weyr, a reality that Brekke did her utmost not to think about. She was terrified that Wirenth might rise again any day now, since her initial flight had been interrupted. Wirenth’s injuries still showed, but she was getting around more easily by the day and had already taken a few test flights, all of which had proved successful.
It was only a matter of time before she was well enough to rise.
Everyone else knew it, too. The whole Weyr seemed to be holding its collective breath, waiting to see what would happen. And it wasn’t just High Reaches Weyr. It was all the Weyrs, perhaps all of Pern. But it was also those she cared most about who were watching.
Canth bespoke her a few times to see how she was doing, at F’nor’s request and of his own volition. Once she even caught Grall peeking around a corner, though the fire lizard let out an alarmed peep and vanished between the moment she realized she had been caught. Brekke drew comfort from the fact that they cared, but with Thread falling almost constantly, a visit seemed too much to ask.
Besides, she knew full well how close she had come to losing Wirenth, and the part of herself that was bound to her dragon. Had Canth and the others arrived even a moment later, things might have turned out very differently. When she thought about that, everything else seemed too much to ask. She was already so very, very lucky.
But she was also so very, very tired. Between her duties to the Weyr and the nightmares that took her nightly back to the mating flight, and her certainty that another such flight was just around the corner, Brekke was beginning to feel as if everything that was Brekke was being leached away. If she emptied herself out much more, she was not sure what would be left.
She needed something, something she could not name and did not know how to ask for. Wirenth’s injuries meant she had already been given more of a break than any other queenrider would receive during a Pass. But it wasn’t enough. With each frigid day that passed, Brekke yearned even more for warm sun and hot sands, the salt-soothing feel of ocean water on her skin.
We could go there, Wirenth suggested one particularly cold morning when the fantasy of Southern weather was the only thing that got Brekke out of her warm bed.
“The Oldtimers are based there now,” Brekke protested. “If they see us, it could mean trouble.” And the very last thing she wanted now was to be the source of more conflict for the Weyrs.
A pause, as if Wirenth were deep in thought. Then: We could go when no one will know.
It was true, Brekke realized. She knew all of the doings of Southern in great detail, at least for the period of time she had been assigned there. Surely she could think of a time and place where no one would catch them. Where it really could be just the two of them, no worries, no fear.
Brekke had never really tried to sneak away from the Weyr in secret before, but now she realized there was a certain thrill to it. Responsibility had always bound her in its fierce grip before. There had always been something else to think about and to take precedence over her own silly whims. But now, when she had no duties except to help Wirenth recover, when doom seemed to hang eternally over her head, the risk suddenly seemed worth it.
She still took the time to make sure Mirrim had plenty to keep her occupied, and that everything else would be in order during her absence, before donning her flight gear. Berd joined them as she was climbing into place on Wirenth’s back, clinging to Brekke’s shoulder. Wirenth gave her no time for second thoughts. They were between almost the instant they were airborne.
Between was even colder than High Reaches, but not by much. And then the warm air of the Southern Continent surrounded them, a welcome change from the never-ending chill of the far north. Brekke felt suddenly as if she could breathe again after holding her breath for an age.
Wirenth took her time gliding down to the warm water. Brekke’s only warning was a flicker of glee from Wirenth before the dragon plunged into the warm sea with Brekke still perched on her back.
Brekke slipped off Wirenth’s back in the water and came up sputtering and laughing, having never expected such treachery from her dragon.
It is good to see you laugh again, Wirenth commented.
“And it’s good to see you healing so well,” Brekke told her, kicking her way closer. Indeed, Wirenth’s hide shone a brilliant, healthy gold under the Southern sun. If not for the still-healing scars, she would have seemed perfectly healthy, the very ideal of a maturing queen dragon.
The sight was such a relief that Brekke did not even mind the surprise dunking, or that she would have to wait some time for her clothes to dry before they could risk going between back to High Reaches.
She made her way to shore, leaving Berd to help Wirenth with her bath, and left her clothes on the sand to dry. There were several large fruit trees near the edge of the forest here, and the fruit looked to be at the peak of ripeness. She would not go hungry while she waited. Indeed, the fruits she sampled were sweetly delicious, a welcome change from the dregs that had been left for them at High Reaches when the Oldtimers departed.
Though they had arrived at midmorning, the day passed all too quickly. Brekke took care not to spend so much time in the sun that she would tan, but she let Wirenth sun herself to her heart’s content. It would do her nothing but good to soak up all this warmth, Brekke thought.
It was hard to keep her thoughts from slipping back to the Weyr, and from worrying about what might go wrong there in her absence. For Wirenth, she was determined to manage it.
But as the sun began to sink toward the horizon, practicality crept back in. This day had been a much needed break and a part of her wished it did not have to end. But the greater part of her was all too aware of all the duties and obligations waiting for them back at the Weyr. So she did not give voice to the petulant question she wanted to ask—do we have to go back?—and got on with it.
There really was no reason to put it off any longer. Her clothes had long-since dried in the warm sun, and so would pose no risk when going between.
Wirenth stood up and stretched her wings so luxuriously that Brekke stopped to watch her. It really was good to see her recovering so well. Shaking off the feeling of awe that Wirenth always inspired in her, Brekke climbed into place. Berd alit once more on her shoulder, chirping his readiness to return to their new home.
It seemed a shame to not take any of the wonderful Southern fruit back to High Reaches, but that would give away where she had been—and that she had been timing it. So they left it all behind as Wirenth launched them skyward and between to High Reaches.
Wirenth brought them back several hours after their departure that morning and, to Brekke’s dismay, the Weyr was in near-chaos when they reappeared in the air above. Riders and weyrfolk clustered outside Brekke’s weyr as Wirenth landed, Mirrim and F’nor foremost among them; Brekke wanted to wilt under the weight of their concern but knew she had no choice but to face them. She had no idea how she would explain the selfishness that had led her to shirk her duties and flee the Weyr.
They were only worried about you, Wirenth assured her. Canth says no one is angry with you.
Somehow that did not make her feel any better.
Lessa is on her way.
Brekke was midway through rebandaging a blue rider’s injured arm when Wirenth reached her with the news. Ordinarily Wirenth kept silent when she was working, so as not to disrupt what was often a delicate process. Today her interjection sounded more like a warning than an announcement.
Wondering what Lessa might be doing at High Reaches Weyr, much less searching for her, Brekke finished what she was doing and sent the rider on his way. She had just enough time to finish what she was doing, wash up, and retreat to her weyr before Lessa arrived.
She knew Lessa, had trained under her for the first months of Wirenth’s life. She was still unaccountably nervous at finding the Benden Weyrwoman at her door. It seemed there could be no good reason for Lessa’s presence at High Reaches today.
Nevertheless, if there was one thing Brekke knew how to do, it was be hospitable.
Do not be afraid, Wirenth told her. Lessa is here to help.
It was hard not to be intimidated by the Benden Weyrwoman. Lessa was famously tiny, but she nevertheless dominated the room as soon as she set foot inside. Brekke felt insignificant in comparison, despite Wirenth’s reassurances.
But once they had dispensed with the usual pleasantries, what Lessa had to say shocked her.
“You aren’t the only one,” she began.
Confused, Brekke could only manage to say, “I don’t know what you mean.”
Lessa’s expression softened slightly. “F’nor finally worked up the courage to bring up your concerns about Wirenth’s mating flight to F’lar, who told me,” she explained.
Brekke went cold, but it seemed Lessa did not expect her to respond.
“When Ramoth rose for the first time, I had no idea what was going to happen,” Lessa admitted. The look in her eyes was very far away. “It took me by surprise—no one told me anything. And so it hurt me deeply, though I know now that F’lar did not mean it to. It… took me a long time to move past it.” She was clearly struggling but managed to master herself. “This is not a story I tell to others.”
Indeed, in all her time at Benden, Brekke had not heard even a suggestion that any of Ramoth’s—or any gold’s—mating flights had been anything less than enjoyable for her rider. She had felt surrounded by women who eagerly embraced this aspect of weyr life, alienated by her Craftbred values. Kylara, for sure, had had a number of cruel things to say about Brekke’s “prudish” ways during the time they had both been assigned to Southern.
Brekke waited for Lessa to go on, feeling as if her heart had lodged in her throat. Lessa was not one to be pitied, so Brekke would never dare to pity her, but she did feel a gut-wrenching empathy and an unexpected kinship with this indomitable woman now. She could scarcely imagine the pressure Lessa had been under in those days, when Ramoth was the only living queen dragon and the future of all of Pern rested on her shoulders.
“It will be a while yet before Wirenth rises again,” Lessa went on. “But she will rise again.”
“I know,” Brekke said, her voice so quiet even she could barely hear it. Wirenth knew too. She could feel it through their bond. And she wanted that for Wirenth. She did. She only wished…
“You are not the only one who has struggled with this,” Lessa repeated. “I wanted to make sure you know that, at least.”
Brekke thanked her, feeling numb, not knowing what else to do or say. It did help to know she was not the first to find herself in this sort of situation, but it was not a solution either.
“If F’nor is acceptable to you, we can arrange for him to visit High Reaches when Wirenth is near her time,” Lessa told her. Brekke could hardly believe what she was hearing.
F’nor had told her, before everything went so very, very wrong, that he would approach his Weyrleaders about her plight. She had never imagined he might be successful in arguing for a reprieve.
“You’ll let Canth fly Wirenth?” Brekke blurted out, hardly daring to hope.
Lessa’s expression sent her hopes crashing down as soon as she dared to voice them.
“We can’t,” Lessa explained. “Not during a Pass, when we need every dragon. There is no record of a brown ever mating with a gold, at least not any that has survived this long, so we have no idea what would happen to the eggs, or if there would even be eggs. And believe me, F’nor and I checked every record.”
Disappointment gripped her heart like a dragon’s claws, squeezing. It was oddly soothing to realize that not all of the disappointment she was feeling was her own. Some came from Wirenth, too.
I like Canth, she reminded Brekke. I would let him fly me, if he could catch me.
I like him too, Brekke assured her. Too bad Lessa had just crushed any hope of that happening.
“I can’t simply decree that Canth, or any brown, be allowed to try for Wirenth,” Lessa went on, “but I can insist that you be provided with an acceptable partner for your part of the mating flight, rather than being forced. We can find others to partner the rider of whichever bronze flies Wirenth. Would that set your mind at ease?”
Brekke could have wept from sheer relief at the very idea. She managed a small nod, and to keep her tears from showing.
Lessa, looking the gentlest Brekke had ever seen her, smiled. “I’ll take that as a yes,” she said. To Wirenth, who was watching them with avid attention, she added, “I understand that you have no objection to Canth. Perhaps someday, at the end of the Pass, we might be able to argue for it.”
Wirenth’s eyes gleamed such an avid blue-green that there could be no doubting her interest.
The Benden Weyrwoman did not linger much longer after that, but by the time she departed Brekke’s mood was markedly improved.
You are much happier now than you were before, Wirenth observed.
Brekke went to her, running her hands over the supple gold hide, feeling the scars where Wirenth had been so terribly wounded. She would bear those scars the rest of her life, but she would live. She would fly. And she would rise again to mate. For the first time, Brekke faced that possibility without fear in her heart.
“I am very happy now, my love,” she confessed, and she did not need to hide her true feelings because it was true. What lay ahead was perhaps not the perfect ending she might have wanted, but it was one she could accept, and even enjoy. Her own scars might be mental rather than physical, but they would heal, just like Wirenth’s.