“Slowly,” Salina told him. M’tal nodded affably and, with great exaggeration, ponderously chewed his meal.
Salina ignored the over-response. “Better.”
“Klah, my lady?” W’ren repeated his offer. Salina accepted with a grateful nod.
“And some soup, to start,” she said. Kindan and Lorana found themselves colliding in their haste to fill the Weyrwoman’s bowl. With a graceful gesture, Kindan let Lorana have the honor.
“Please join me,” Salina said after she’d been served, “if you’re still hungry.”
“I don’t think K’tan has yet eaten, my lady,” Kindan said before the Weyr healer could make any objections.
Salina glared at him balefully until K’tan filled his own soup bowl, then she turned her attention to W’ren, who reddened and filled his plate with the still-hot spiced wherry.
Satisfied, Salina filled her spoon again and brought it toward her lips. Before she sipped the soup, she said to Lorana, “How bad was it?”
“Forty-five dragons went between,” Lorana told her.
The Weyrwoman shuddered, forced herself to finish her mouthful. With her other hand, she gestured for Lorana to tell her the rest.
“Twenty-three with serious injuries, and thirty-seven with minor injuries that will heal in two sevendays or less.”
Salina nodded, placing her spoon back in her bowl. “How many were left dragonless?”
“Four,” K’tan told her, his face tight with pain.
“And they’re being tended?”
“They are in the care of weyrmates or weyrfolk,” K’tan assured her. “With their loved ones whenever possible.”
“Good,” Salina said. She looked at Lorana. “The dragons that went between-did you feel it?”
“Yes,” Lorana replied, her throat tight with pain.
Salina reached out and grabbed Lorana’s hand. “I’m sorry, that’s quite a load to bear,” she said.
“We’re tough, my lady,” Lorana said, “Arith and I.”
“That’s good, for these are tough times,” Salina responded. She looked at the Weyr healer. “What are we going to do about it?”
“I’ll go back to the Records Room. There has to be something there,” K’tan replied, rising from the table.
“Sit, sit,” Salina ordered, gesturing him back into his chair. “You’ve fought Thread, tended the ill… you must be exhausted.”
K’tan met her eyes and nodded frankly.
“You’d miss more than you’d see,” the Weyrwoman continued. She looked at M’tal. “When is the next Threadfall?”
“For our Weyr?” M’tal asked.
Salina nodded.
“Not for another three days. But I don’t know how the other Weyrs will do. Telgar Weyr fought Thread over Igen Weyr today, as well. I wonder how they fared.”
“I-” Lorana began. The others glanced at her. “I think they did badly,” she said. Her eyes gleamed with tears. “There were many dragons who went between.”
“And you felt them all?” Salina asked in a voice filled with awe. Lorana nodded.
“My poor dear,” the Weyrwoman replied, reaching for Lorana’s hand once again. “And to think I grieved for one.”
“I-I don’t think I feel their loss as strongly as I would the loss of my own dragon,” Lorana protested.
“And I hope that never happens,” K’tan told her fervently. All the others nodded.
“But even so, the loss of so many dragons,” Salina said, then stopped. “How many dragons, do you know?”
“I don’t,” Lorana confessed. “Maybe a hundred.”
“A hundred,” W’ren exclaimed.
“Maybe more,” Lorana added.
“At the beginning of this Pass, to lose a hundred dragons,” K’tan murmured, shaking his head.
“There were less than three thousand dragons on all Pern,” M’tal said, speaking for the first time. “If a hundred are lost every Threadfall…”
With a roar of anger, D’gan slammed his hand against the table in the Council Room. “How many did you say?”
“Fifty-four are severely wounded and will take six months or more to heal, eighty-three are lightly wounded and may be able to fly in the next three months,” V’gin repeated.
“And we lost seventy,” D’gan added, his anger spent in that one loud outburst. It had been a rotten Fall. The Weyr had been arrayed perfectly, but the air currents over old Igen Weyr had always been difficult and they roiled the Thread up and down unpredictably. Once the wings had taken their first losses, D’gan’s brilliant array of dragons had flown apart and things had only gotten worse.
This was supposed to be his triumph, his first Threadfall, his chance to show everyone who had doubted, after all the success in the Games, after all his tireless efforts, that he, D’gan of Igen Weyr, was the proper Weyrleader of Telgar.
He remembered the sad day when Morene had died and the last queen of Igen had gone between. He remembered how V’lon had grown old, his face seamed with age, practically overnight. How Telgar, Benden, Ista, and Fort had begged off providing Igen with a replacement queen. How in the end, D’gan’s suggestion that Igen ride with Telgar was grudgingly accepted. But on that day, over twenty Turns ago, D’gan had vowed that he’d show them all, that he’d prove to the doubters that Igen riders were the best. He’d vowed to become Telgar’s Weyrleader, to fly their queen and show the rest of Pern his mettle.
And he had. He’d worked tirelessly, still was working tirelessly. But on the way, perhaps after the first mating flight, or even before, D’gan had found that his aspirations had changed. He was more than just a displaced rider finding a home in a new Weyr, he was a Telgar rider and he was a Weyrleader. He would show them-M’tal, C’rion, that young boy, K’lior, all of them-what a true Weyrleader was like.
It had been his Weyr that had won all the Games. His Weyr had the most dragons, his Weyr had the most queens, and his Weyr was responsible for the most territory on Pern.
And now this. He turned to V’gin. “How many dragons will I have to fight the next Fall?” he asked, knowing the answer.
“There are fifteen more dragons showing signs of the fever-”
“They’ll fly the Fall,” D’gan interjected.
V’gin grimaced. “We don’t know how much the sickness contributed to our losses, D’gan.”
“Exactly,” D’gan said, “we don’t know. So they’ll fly. ‘Dragonmen must fly, when Thread is in the sky.’ So, Weyr healer, how many dragons will fly with me over Telgar Weyr and Hold in six days’ time?”
V’gin sighed. “If you include the fifteen sick dragons-”
“And any others that get sick in the meantime,” D’gan said pointedly.
V’gin accepted the correction with a shrug. “Counting them, you’ll have three hundred and thirty-eight fighting dragons and two queens.”
“The queens will stay behind,” D’gan said. “A proper queen’s wing is three or more.” His tone failed to hide how much it galled him that Garoth had not been able to provide the Weyr with another queen dragon. Well, perhaps on the next mating flight, he thought to himself.
“I think you’re right,” Lina, Telgar’s Weyrwoman, agreed. She was older than D’gan, and he often wondered how much of her affections were for him, D’gan, and how much for Telgar’s Weyrleader, even though they had sired a child between them.
“D’lin did well today,” D’gan commented. The youngster was really too young to be hauling firestone, but he had insisted and T’rin, the Weyrlingmaster, had allowed him. Still, it had been a surprise to recognize his own son throwing him a sack of firestone as Thread fell all around them.