Much relieved by such husbandry, I was about to quit the storeroom when I saw the shelves on which the Hold's medicinal Records were kept,the recipes for compound mixtures and preparations as well as the notations of whichever person dispensed herb, drug, and tonic.
I opened the glowbasket above the reading table and wrestled with the stack to remove the oldest of the Records from the bottom shelf. Perhaps this illness had occurred before in the many long Turns since the Crossing. It was dusty, and pieces of the cover flaked away in my hand. If Mother's assiduous housekeeping had not required it to be dusted off, it was unlikely she would notice the damage. The tome stank with antiquity as I opened it, carefully, not wishing to desecrate it any more than absolutely necessary. I ought to have saved myself the trouble, the ink had faded, leaving only linear splotches on the hide that looked like freckles. I wondered why we bothered to store them anymore. But I could just imagine Mother's reaction if I suggested disposing of these ancestral artifacts.
I compromised by going back to the tome still legibly labeled Fifth Pass.
What boring diarists were my ancestors! I was heartily relieved when Sim came to tell me that the head cook earnestly desired my presence. Well, with Mother away, he was likely to apply to me. I held Sim, who was, in any case, not at all eager to return to his labors in the scullery, and quickly penned a note to Joumeywoman Desdra, suggesting that Fort Hold 's apothecary supplies were at her disposal. I would follow that up as soon as I could, for I doubted that I would be permitted such generosity once Mother had returned to take over the storeroom keys.
I think that was the first moment in which it occurred to me that Lady Pendra would be as vulnerable to this disease as anyone else. A pang of fear or anxiety paralyzed my hand over the script until Sim's throat clearing roused me. I smiled reassuringly at him. Sim didn't need to be burdened with my silly fears.
"Take this to the Healer Hall. Give it into the hand of Joumeywoman Desdra only! Understand? Do not just hand it over to the nearest body in healer colors."
Sim bobbed his head up and down, smiling his vapid smile and murmuring reassurances.
I dealt with the cook, who had just been informed by my brother to prepare for an unspecified quantity of guests. He was at a loss to know what to do, as the evening meal was already being prepared.
"Soup, of course- one of your excellent hearty meat soups, Felim, and a dozen or so of the wherries from the last hunt. They will have hung long enough to be used. Excellent as cold meat, the way you have with seasoning them. More roots, for they, too, can be reheated tastefully. And cheese. We've plenty of cheese."
"For how many?" Felim was too conscientious far his own good. He had been so often chastised by my mother for "wastefulness" that his only defense was showing her the records of how many ate at which meal and what was served them.
"I'll discover that, Felim."
Campen, it appeared, was certain that every nearby holder would be coming to ask his advice about the present emergency, and thus Fort Hold must be prepared to feast the multitude. But the drum message had unequivocally specified a quarantine situation, and I pointed out that the holders, no matter how worried, would be unlikely to disobey that stricture. Those in the home farms might come, since, in effect; they considered themselves part of the main Hold. I forbore to mention that most of these knew a good deal more about managing themselves than did Campen. Still I did not wish to depress him.
I returned to Felim and advised him to increase the portions only by a quarter but to make up additional klah, get a new cheese and more biscuits. Checking the wine stores, I saw there was sufficient in the tons already broached.
I then went up to the dayroom on the second story, the aunts and other dependents were already aware of the drum reports and highly agitated. I organized them to ready what empty rooms remained into infirmaries. Stuffing clean cases with straw for makeshift pallets would not be too arduous, and they'd feel better for doing something. I caught Uncle Munchaun's eye and we managed to get out into the corridor without being followed.
Munchaun was the oldest of my father's living brothers and my favorite among the pensioners.
Until he had been injured in a climbing fall, he had led all hunting parties. He had such great understanding of human frailties, such humor, such humility that I always wondered how my father could have been chosen to Hold, when Munchaun was so much the better human being.
"I saw you coming from the Hall. What's the verdict?"
"Capiam is now a victim of the disease and Desdra tells the healers to treat the symptoms."
He raised his finely curved eyebrows, a wry grin on his face. "So they don't know what they're dealing with, eh?" When I shook my head, he nodded. "I'll start looking through the Records.
They must be good for something besides keeping us elderly supernumeraries occupied."
I wanted to deny his self-deprecation, but he smiled knowingly at me and my protestation would have fallen on deaf ears.
That evening, more of the minor holders came than I had anticipated, as well as all the Crafthall
Masters, excepting the Harper and Healer Halls, of course. We had ample for them, and they talked well into the night, discussing contingencies and how to shift supplies from hold to hold without breaking the quarantine.
I poured a last round of klah, though I think only Campen drank any, and retired to my room, where I read the old Record as long as I could keep my eyes open.
Chapter III
When I heard the drums, I jumped out of my bed and ran into the corridor where I could distinguish their pulse. The message was terrifying. Before its echoes had died, another came in from the south: Ratoshigan demanding assistance from the Healer Hall. It was very early indeed for the drums to be speaking. I left my door open as I hastily donned a work tunic and trousers and belted on the heavy ring of Hold keys. I put on boots, too, for the soft house shoes were no protection against the cold stone floors of the lower level, or the roads without.
The drums banged on with more casualties reported at Telgar, Ista, Igen, and South Boll, and more requests for reassurance from distant Holds and Healer Halls. There were volunteers, which were heartening, and offers of assistance from Benden, Lemos, Bitra, Tiliek, and High Reaches, places so far untouched by the catastrophe. I found that encouraging, and worthy of the spirit of Pern.
I was halfway across the Field when the first of the coded reports came in from Telgar Weyr: there were dead riders and, because of their deaths, dragon suicides. Passing field workers on their way to the beastholds, I carefully controlled my agitation, nodding and smiling but hastening so that no one would be brash enough to stop me. Or perhaps they did not wish to learn more bad news on top of yesterday's. Hard on the echoes of Telgar's grim news, Ista began citing its report.
Why I had thought that dragonriders would be immune from this disease, I do not know, except that they seemed so Invulnerable astride their great beasts, seemingly untouched by the ravages of Thread, though I knew well enough that dragons and riders were often badly scored, and impervious to other minor ailments and anxieties that were visited on lesser folk. Then I recalled that dragonriders often flitted from one Gather to another, and there had been two Gathers on the same day, Ista as well as Ruatha, to lure them from their mountain homes. Two-and plague well advanced in both! Yet Ista was halfway east. How could the disease spring up so quickly in two so distant places?
I hurried on and entered the Harper Hall Court. Everyone here was already up, half of them holding runnerbeasts, saddled and burdened for long trips, their tack in healer colors. Above us the drums continued their grim beatings. From Healer Hall to Hold and Weyr, the messages were sent by Master Fortine. Where then was Master Capiam?