“Hallo there!” a male voice called. And he waved an arm at her. Moreta momentarily froze and then desperately wiped at her wet face. This was an impossible nightmare, and now she was hearing things as well as seeing—in between! “Wait for me!” the man called out.
Stunned, Moreta numbly waited while an unusually small, brown dragon halted neatly just a nose away from Holth. The old dragon put her nose forward and made the expected courtesy touch with a newcomer. Then Holth backed up with far more energy than she had previously shown.
Duluth? the gold dragon asked, surprised.
“What’s happening? Who are you? Why can I hear and see you?” Moreta cried. The panic was rising in her again. The old queen backed up a further step.
“I’m Marco Galliano,” the young rider said in a measured, calming tone. Or at least Moreta thought he was young. He had to be a new rider, for she didn’t know of a brown dragon named Duluth.
“Don’t worry, I can help you. Are you cold? You’re both shivering. ”
“Not from the cold,” Moreta said, trying to control the panic in her voice, but what else would one feel, stuck in between?
“Look, I know you’re new to all this, up here in the fold. Duluth and I do the rounds every day to look for strays. ”
“Do rounds? Look for strays?” Moreta echoed, incredulous. She felt as if the grayness was closing in around her and clutched at her riding harness, fearful that she was losing consciousness. If she fell off Holth now, she’d be falling into between. A whimper, unbidden, surged up her throat.
“C’mon, I’ll take you where it’s warm. ”
His dragon turned.
“Wait! Where are you going?” she yelled.
Just follow me. It’s easy, said the dragon.
“I don’t know why it works,” Marco said casually, “but I can always get back to Paradise. ”
Duluth took off on a good run and in a moment was so competently airborne that Moreta quickly urged Holth to follow. Holth took off at speed, as if she, like Moreta, wanted to get anywhere but here, no matter where that might be. Moreta’s vision blurred again as panic continued to exert its grip on her. She felt totally disoriented.
They flew straight for what seemed a long time, and then suddenly, unexpectedly, Marco and Duluth suddenly dropped, flattened out, and dived down through the dark floor of between. A hole appeared to engulf them, and Moreta urged Holth to follow.
They broke out over a very blue sea, facing a spit of white sand and tall frond-waving trees along a shore. The sound of the water washing onto the shore rushed into Moreta’s ears. Duluth landed on the beach, followed by Holth, who, sighing mightily as she instinctively kept her wings open to absorb the heat all dragons enjoyed, dug her feet down into the warm sand. The hot sun slapped Moreta in the face and she gasped with relief.
We’re safe! We can go home now, Holth! she cried with relief. Holth didn’t answer her. Quickly, Moreta tried to get her bearings, but the heat, combined with the complete exhaustion she felt, was too much to bear. She began to slide off Holth’s neck, but fell halfway down, landing on all fours on the hot sands.
“Look, you’re both awfully tired now. Your dragon has the right idea. C’mon,” Marco said, lifting her to her feet with great ease. Moreta wanted to correct him, tell him that Holth was not her dragon, but her mouth wouldn’t form the words. He put a hand gently under her elbow and started to propel her toward the shade. The heat was enervating, and she unconsciously opened her heavy flying jacket. Mute from shock and fatigue she followed Marco’s lead, looking over her shoulder to be sure that Holth was comfortable in the sand. The old queen snorted once, wriggled her shoulders, let her tail fall down on the sand, and exhaled noisily into a snore.
“Here, sit down for a while; you’ll feel better if you have a little rest.” Marco swept away some dry fronds from the tough grass that grew under the shading trees.
His hand changed position and practically forced her to the ground. She had no strength left. When he took her jacket from her limp hand and made a pillow of it on the grass, she lay down. Closing her eyes, Moreta hoped that when she opened them, she’d be back in her own Weyr and that this was all a terrible dream.
The strange young rider murmured a gentle reassurance she didn’t hear as she fell almost instantly into a deep sleep.
When Moreta roused, suddenly alert to the noise Holth made while changing position in the sand, Marco was still there. He placed a hand on her shoulder and spoke to her with all the calm assurance of a man five times his age. Strangely, the panic she had felt before she slept did not rise in her again. A calmness now pervaded her senses.
“It wasn’t a dream, much as you would like it to have been. This is real. You went between and didn’t come out. But I found you,” he said reassuringly.
Marco gestured for her to sit up and lean against a tree trunk. She noticed for the first time that he was clad in odd flying gear; but concern for Holth had her eyes swiveling to the dragon, who was resettling herself on the sand.
“She’s fine,” Marco said. “I think she needs to get the other side warm, too. This is the first she’s moved since she lay down, except to snore. Which she does loudly, as you must know. ”
Marco was an attractive young man—though nowhere near as handsome as Alessan, she thought to herself. But she put thoughts of her lover away. This frightening situation was hard enough to comprehend without being tortured by thoughts of being lost to him.
“Where are we, Marco?” she asked imploringly. “And, if we didn’t make it out of between, then what is all of this?” She gestured to the beach and the water lapping gently at the shore.
“Holth says your name is Moreta and that you’re the Fort Weyrwoman,” he said calmly, looking at her with respect. “Duluth is impressed. ”
“Which Weyr did you say you were from?”
“I didn’t, because Duluth and I were never in a Weyr. You don’t know your dragonrider history?” He looked disappointed.
Moreta, startled to be so accused, glared at him. “Of course I do. ”
“Then who,” he asked very quietly, “were the first riders?”
She was aware that her jaw dropped as she stared up at him. She knew who the first riders were and ... she tried to grasp the concept.
“You and Duluth. ..,” she said, dragging the facts from memory, “were the first pair to go between, to avoid a collision with an air sled at Paradise River Stake. ..” She paused, glancing around.
“Of course, the mechanics of going between safely were learned later,” Marco went on. “Duluth and I just acted out of instinct. ”
“And you’ve been in—between—ever since?” Moreta asked, a large knot clenched deep in her gut.
“More or less. It took me a while to realize that I could return to Paradise River whenever I wanted to. Of course, by the time I figured that out and got back here, everyone in Jim Tillek’s armada had moved on. I flew east in the direction I knew they were headed, but a fierce storm blew up and damned near knocked me off Duluth’s back, so I quit following. Duluth had strained a ligament in his right pinion. Fortunately I had enough numbweed left to ease the injury. By the time we could follow on, we figured they’d been hit pretty badly by the storm, too. There were even some pieces of wrecked ships among the debris washed ashore. No bodies—we looked. So we came back to Paradise and made it our headquarters. There are some buildings back there. At first I stored the things that washed up on the beach there, just in case anyone came back looking for them. No one ever did. And then, I sort of found others caught the same way. ”