“Good point, Robinton. N’ton,” and F’lar turned to the young bronze rider. “I want to know every remark that man makes, which aspects of the Red Star he views, what he could possibly see, what his reactions are. We’ve ignored that man too often to our regret. We might even be grateful to him.”

“I’d rather be grateful to grubs,” N’ton replied with some fervor. “Frankly, sir,” he added, hesitant for the first time about any assignment since he’d been included in the council, ‘ I’d rather hunt grubs or catch Thread.”

F’lar eyed the young rider thoughtfully for a moment.

“Think of this assignment then, N’ton, as the ultimate Thread catch.”

Brekke had insisted on taking over the care of the plants in the Rooms once she was stronger. She argued that she was farmcraftbred and capable of such duties. She preferred not to be present during the demonstrations. In fact she went out of her way to avoid seeing anyone but weyrfolk. She could abide their sympathy but the pity of outsiders was repugnant to her.

This did not affect her curiosity and she would get F’nor to tell her every detail of what she termed the best-known Craft secret on Pern. When F’nor narrated the Telgar Lord’s bitter repudiation of what the Weyrs were trying to accomplish, she was visibly disturbed.

“Larad’s wrong,’ she said in the slow deliberate way she’d adopted lately. “The grubs are the solution, the right one. But it’s true that the best solution is not always easy to accept. And an expedition to the Red Star is not a solution, even if it’s the one Pernese instinctively crave. It’s obvious. Just as two thousand dragons over Telgar Hold was rather obvious seven Turns ago.” She surprised F’nor with a little smile, the first since Wirenth’s death. “I myself, like Robinton, would prefer to rely on grubs. They present fewer problems. But then I’m craftbred.”

“You use that phrase a lot lately,” F’nor remarked, turning her face toward him, searching her green eyes. They were serious, as always, and clear in the candid gaze was the shadow of a sorrow that would never lift.

She locked her fingers in his and smiled gently, a smile which did not disperse the sorrow. “I was craftbred,” she corrected herself. “I’m weyrfolk now.” Berd crooned approvingly and Grall added a trill of her own.

“We could lose a few Holds this Turn around,” F’nor said bitterly.

“That would solve nothing,” she said. “I’m relieved that F’lar is going to watch that Nabolese. He has a warped mind.”

Suddenly she gasped, gripping F’nor’s fingers so tight that her fingernails broke the skin.

“What’s the matter?” He put both arms around her protectively.

“He has a warped mind,” Brekke said, staring at him with frightened eyes. “And he also has a fire lizard, a bronze, as old as Grall and Berd. Does anyone know if he’s been training it? Training it to go between?”

“All the Lords have been shown how – ” F’nor broke off as he realized the trend of her thought. Berd and Grall reacted to Brekke’s fright with nervous squeals and fanning wings. “No, no, Brekke. He can’t,” F’nor reassured her. “Asgenar has one a week or so younger and he was saying how difficult he found it to send his Rial about in his own hold.”

“But Meron’s had his longer. It could be further along . . .”

“Nabol?” F’nor was skeptical. “That man has no conception of how to handle a fire lizard.”

“Then why is he so fascinated with the Red Star? What else could he have in mind but to send his bronze lizard there?”

“But he knows that dragonmen won’t attempt to send dragons. How can he imagine that a fire lizard could go?”

“He doesn’t trust dragonmen,” Brekke pointed out, obviously obsessed with the idea. “Why should he trust that statement? You’ve got to tell F’lar!”

He agreed to because it was the only way to reassure her. She was still so pathetically thin. Her eyelids looked transparent though there was soft flush of color in her lips and cheeks.

“Promise you’ll tell F’lar.”

“I’ll tell him. I’ll tell him, but not in the middle of the night.”

With a wing of riders to direct between time for larval sacks the next day, his promise slipped F’nor’s mind until late that evening. Rather than distress her with his forgetfulness, he asked Canth to bespeak N’ton’s Lioth to pass the theory on to N’ton. If the Fort Weyr bronze rider saw anything that gave Brekke’s premise substance, then they’d tell F’lar.

He had a chance to speak to N’ton the following day as they met in the isolated valley field which Larad of Telgar Hold had picked to be seeded by grubs. The field, F’nor noticed with some jaundice, was planted with a new hybrid vegetable, much in demand as a table luxury and grown successfully only in some upland areas of Telgar and the High Reaches Hold.

“Brekke may have something, F’nor,” N’ton admitted. “The watchriders have mentioned that Nabol will stare for a long time into the distance-viewer and then suddenly stare into his fire lizard’s eyes until the creature becomes frantic and tries to rise. In fact, last night the poor thing went between screaming. Nabol stalked off in a bad mood, cursing all Dragonkind.”

“Did you check what he’d been looking at?”

N’ton shrugged. “Wasn’t too clear last night. Lots of clouds. Only thing visible was that one gray tail – the place that resembles Nerat but points east instead of west. It was visible only briefly.”

F’nor remembered that feature well. A mass of grayness formed like a thick dragon tail, pointing in the opposite direction from the planet’s rotation.

“Sometimes,” N’ton chuckled, “the clouds above the star are clearer than anything we can see below. The other night, for instance, there was a cloud drift that looked like a girl,” N’ton made passes with his hands to describe a head, and a few to one side of the air-drawn circle, “braiding her hair. I could see her head, tilted to the left, the half-finished braid and then the stream of free hair. Fascinating.”

F’nor did not dismiss that conversation entirely for he’d noticed the variety of recognizable patterns in the clouds around the Red Star and often had been more absorbed in that show than in what he was supposed to be watching for.

N’ton’s report of the fire lizard’s behavior was very interesting. The little creatures were not as dependent on their handlers as dragons. They were quite apt to disappear between when bored or asked to do something they didn’t feel like doing. They reappeared after an interlude, usually near dinnertime, evidently assuming people forgot quickly.

Grall and Berd had apparently matured beyond such behavior. Certainly they had a nice sense of responsibility toward Brekke. One was always near her. F’nor was willing to wager that Grall and Berd were the most reliable pair of fire lizards on Pern.

Nevertheless, Meron would be watched closely. It was just possible that he could dominate his fire lizard. His mind, as Brekke said, was warped.

As F’nor entered the passageway to his weyr that evening, he heard a spirited conversation going on although he couldn’t distinguish the words.

Lessa is worried, Canth told him, shaking his wings flat against his back as he followed his rider.

“When you’ve lived with a man for seven Turns, you know what’s on his mind,” Lessa was saying urgently as F’nor entered. She turned, an almost guilty expression on her face replaced by relief when she recognized F’nor.

He looked past her to Brekke whose expression was suspiciously blank. She didn’t summon even a welcoming smile for him.

“Know what’s on whose mind, Lessa? F’nor asked, unbelting his riding tunic. He tossed his gloves to the table and accepted the wine which Brekke poured him.

Lessa sank awkwardly into the chair beside her, her eyes darting everywhere but toward him.