She was at the edge now, looking down at the beach. She could see her ledge off to the right. There was the lip of the cliff that had broken off under her weight.
That was the quick way down, to be sure, but she couldn’t risk it again, and didn’t want to.
She glanced over her shoulder. The grayness was spreading across the horizon. Now she could see flashes against that gray, Flashes? Dragons! She was seeing dragons fighting Thread, their fiery breath charring the dreaded stuff midair. They were so far away that the winking lights were more like lost stars than dragons fighting for the life of Pern.
Maybe the leading edge wouldn’t reach this far? Maybe she was safe. “Maybes seldom are” as her mother would say.
In the stillness of the air, a new sound made itself heard: a soft rhythmic thrumming, something like the tuneless humming of small children. Only different. The noise seemed to come from the ground.
She dropped, pressing one ear to a patch of bare stone. The sound was coming from within. Of course! The bluff was hollow…that’s why the queen lizard…
On hands and knees, Menolly scooted to the cliff edge, looking for that halfway ledge of the queen’s.
Menolly had enlarged the entry once. There was every chance she could make it big enough to squirm through. The little queen would certainly be hospitable to someone who had saved her clutch!
And Menolly didn’t come empty-handed as a guest! She swung the heavy sack of spiderclaws around to her back. Grabbing handfuls of the grasses on the lip of the cliff, she began to let herself slowly down. Her feet fumbled for support; she found one toehold and dug half that foot in, the other foot prodding for another place.
She slithered badly once, but a rock protrusion caught her in the crotch before she’d slipped far. She laid her face against the cliff, gulping to get back her breath and courage. She could feel the thrumming through the stone, and oddly, that gave her heart.
There was something intensely exciting and stimulating about that sound.
Sheer luck guided her foot to the queen’s ledge. She’d risked only a few glances beneath her—the aspect was almost enough to make her lose her balance completely. She was trembling so much with her exertions that she had to rest then. Definitely the humming came from the queen’s cavern.
She could get her head into the original opening. No more. She began to tear at the sides with her bare hands until she thought of her belt knife. The blade loosened a whole section all at once, showering her with sand and bits of rock. She had to clean her eyes and mouth of grit before she could continue. Then she realized that she’d gotten to sheer rock.
She could get herself into the shelter only up to her shoulders. No matter how she turned and twisted, there was an outcropping that she could not pass. Once again she wished she were as small as a girl ought to be. Sella would have had no trouble crawling through that hole. Resolutely, Menolly began to chip at the rock with her knife, the blows jarring her hand to the shoulder, and making no impression at all on the rock.
She wondered frantically how long it had taken her to get down the cliff. How long did she have before Thread would be raining down on her unprotected body?
Body? She might not get past the bobble in the wall with her shoulders…but…She reversed her position, and feet, legs, hips, all right up to the shoulders passed into the safety of solid rock. Her head was covered, but only just, by the cliff overhang.
Did Thread see where it was going when it fell? Would it notice her, crowded into this hole as it flashed by? Then she saw the thong of the carry-sack where she’d looped it over the ledge to keep it handy but out of her way. If Thread got into the spiderclaws.
She pulled herself far enough out of the hole to cast an eye above. No silver yet! No sound but the steadily increasing thrumming. That wouldn’t have anything to do with Thread, would it?
The carry-sack thong had bitten into the ledge and she had a job freeing it, having to yank rather hard. The next thing she knew the sack came free, the force of her pull threw her backwards, cracking her head on the roof of her tunnel, and then the surface beneath her buttocks started to slide, out and down. Menolly clawed her way into the tunnel, as the ledge slowly de tached itself from the face of the cliff and tumbled down onto the beach.
Menolly scrambled back quickly, afraid more of the entrance would go, and suddenly she was in a cave, wide, high, deep, clutching the carry-sack and staring at the greatly widened mouth.
The thrumming was behind her and, startled at what she could only consider to be an additional threat, she whirled.
Fire lizards were perched around the walls, clinging to rock spur and ledge. Every eye glinted at the mound of eggs in the sandy center of the cave. The thrumming came from the throats of all the little fire lizards, and they were far too intent on what was happening to the eggs to give any heed to her abrupt appearance.
Just as Menolly realized that she was witnessing a Hatching, the first egg began to rock and cracks appeared in its shell.
It rocked itself off the mound of the clutch and, in hitting the ground, split. From the two parts emerged a tiny creature, not much bigger than Menolly’s hand, glistening brown and creeling with hunger, swaying its head back and forth and tottering forward a few awkward steps. The transparent brown wings unfolded, flapping weakly to dry, and the creature’s balance improved. The creel turned to a hiss of displeasure, and the little brown peered about defensively.
The other fire lizards crooned, encouraging it to some action. With a tiny shriek of anger, the little brown launched itself towards the cave opening, passing so close to Menolly she could have touched it.
The brown fire lizard lurched off the eroded lip of the cave, pumping its wings frantically to achieve flight. Menolly gasped as the creature dropped, and then sighed with relief as it came into sight briefly, airborne, and flew off, across the sea.
More creeling brought her attention back to the clutch. Other fire lizards had begun to hatch in that brief period, each one shaking its wings and then, encouraged by the weyrmates, flopping and weaving towards the cave mouth, defiantly independent and hungry.
Several greens and blues, a little bronze and two more browns hatched and passed Menolly. And then, as she watched a little blue launch itself, Menolly screamed. No sooner had the blue emerged from the safety of the cliff than she saw the thin, writhing silver of Thread descending. In a moment, the blue was covered with the deadly filaments. It uttered one hideous shriek and disappeared. Dead? Or between? Certainly badly scored.
Two more little fire lizards passed Menolly, and she reacted now. “No! No! You can’t! You’ll be killed.” She flung herself across their path.
The angry fire lizards pecked at her unprotected face and while she covered herself, made their escape. She cried aloud when she heard their screams.
“Don’t let them go!” She pleaded with the watching fire lizards. “You’re older. You know about Thread. Tell them to stop!” She half-crawled, half-ran to the rock where the golden queen was perched.
“Tell them not to go! There’s Thread out there! They’re being killed!”
The queen looked at her, the many-faceted eyes whirling violently. The queen chuckled and chirped at her, and then crooned as yet another fledgling spread its wings and began to totter towards sure death.
“Please, little queen! Do something! Stop them!”
The thrill of being the witness to a Hatching of fire lizards gave way to horror. Dragons had to be protected because they protected Pern. In Menolly’s fear and confusion, the little fire lizards were linked to their giant counterparts.
She turned to the other lizards now, begging them to do something. At least until the Threadfall was over. Desperately she plunged back to the cave mouth and tried to turn the little fire lizards back with her hands, blocking their progress with her body. She was overwhelmed with pangs of hunger, belly-knotting, gut-twisting hunger. It took her only a moment to realize that the driving force in these fire lizards was that sort of hunger: that was what was sending them senselessly forth. They had to eat. She remembered that dragons had to eat, too, when they first Hatched, fed by the boys they Impressed.