The Skies of Pern (19 page)

DISASTER (THROUGHOUT THE SAME DAY)

S
tepping out of the cothold, Sharra wrapped her cloak tightly around her. It was very cold, but the wind, which could cut like a knife down the broad avenue back to Ruatha Hold, had died out. She was tired from a long nursing, but relieved that the weaver would recover from his accident. She silently thanked Aivas once more for the medical information he had left. She had been able to repair the tendon in Possil’s hand—something she could not have done five Turns earlier—and to stitch shut the jagged wound. She could honestly tell him that he would have the use of his hand and be as skillful as ever in two months’ time.

A light caught her eye. To the east! Startled, because it was automatic to be fearful of anything coming from the east, she saw shooting stars, long straight slashes in the dark sky. She stopped in her tracks. These were not like the Ghosts of Turnover, for all they’d been bright this year. Ghosts lasted a second or two. These were visibly longer, almost ribbons in the night sky. One bright spot seemed to linger, then exploded.

She blinked. This could not be the result of fatigue after a delicate surgery. Certainly not Thread! She told herself firmly. Thread
isn’t due to fall anywhere tomorrow, and Thread came down silver-gray, like rain, in daylight, not like a streak of fire at midnight.

She didn’t realize she was running until she was halfway up Ruatha’s broad causeway and could hear the fretful whine of the watchwher.

“Mickulin!” she called, remembering from the duty roster who was on guard that night.

“I’m not seeing things, am I, Lady Sharra?” Mickulin’s hoarse whisper sounded scared as he leaned over the top of the smaller tower.

“If you’re seeing long white streamers, you’re seeing the same thing I am!” She raced up the stairs. “I’m calling Jaxom. Go rouse Brand. But it’s not Thread, Mickulin, and it’s not Turnover Ghosts either.”
Ruth! Ruth! Wake up
. She felt the very reassuring presence of the white dragon—a sleepy one—in her mind.
Wake Jaxom. Tell him to bring his binoculars. There’s something he must see. Hurry! And it’s cold
.

Mickulin rushed past her to open the great Hold door just wide enough to slip through it on his way to wake Steward Brand. Sharra stood with her back to the door, facing east, hoping that this amazing display would continue long enough for Jaxom to see it.

There! Another long streamer, shading to a yellow tinge in the trail—the Ghosts never had colors—and another! A long drop and then nothing.

“What’s the matter?” Jaxom hauled the door open, the sound echoed by the opening of a second door in the lower, inner courtyard as Ruth poked his head out of his quarters in the old kitchen. The white dragon’s eyes began to whirl as he stared at the splashings in the sky. “Shards!” his rider cried, and lifted his binoculars to focus on the display.

“What are they? What are they?”

“That isn’t Thread,” Jaxom said decisively, “and they’re too bright for Ghosts—besides which, according to Wansor and Erragon, that cometary shower is long past us. And they seem to be coming from one place in the sky. I think. Hard to focus.” He propped himself against the door frame and held his breath. “A
little better. Here! Brace yourself before you look!” He handed the binoculars to her.

It took her a moment to alter the focus of double-eye; they were a relatively new acquisition, an instrument that Jancis had recently developed.

“Oh, they are beautiful! And they are radiating from one spot.” She said the last in a fearful tone.

Jaxom pulled her toward him, moving oddly from one foot to another until she saw his feet were bare.

“I said it was cold!” she exclaimed.

“If you’re not going to look, I will,” he said, taking the binoculars she had lowered from her face. “Oh, Wansor and Erragon are going to want to know about this. How many sparks did you see?”

“I wasn’t counting,” she said tersely. She undid her scarf and put it down. “Stand on this. I’m not nursing you again.”

Without looking down, Jaxom stepped onto the scarf. “Eight, nine, ten.” He counted off another five rapidly, swinging round as he followed the path of whatever was burning so bright. “Possibly just another cometary tail.”

“Has Thread ever fallen at night?” Sharra asked in a whisper.

Jaxom shrugged. “Too bad there’s no way I can reach Tippel at Crom. He’s nearly as dedicated a sky-watcher as Master Idarolan, and he’s got binoculars, too. Maybe he did see it.” Jaxom took another long look. “Think I’d better have Ruth bespeak D’ram’s Tiroth. Cove Hold should be informed. It’s early morning dawn there.”

He was talking to Ruth when the door behind them opened and Brand came out. The steward saw the long streaks in the sky and stood as transfixed by the sight as everyone else.

“How beautiful!” he said.

“Is, isn’t it?” Mickulin said, looking up as five separate glowing spikes flared out at once. With a jaunty set to his shoulders, he moved past the three in the doorway and returned to his post.

“Yes, it is,” Sharra agreed, by now overcoming her initial concern. She eased against Jaxom, who tightened his affectionate hold as he offered the binoculars to Brand.

“Did you note the time, Brand?”

“In passing, Jaxom,” the steward said, his attention on the sky. “Whatever it is …”

“Meteors, I suspect, if I remember my astronomy lessons from Aivas,” Jaxom said.

“They seem to be flying from east to west but—” Brand swiveled to follow another shower. “—are they likely to strike the ground?”

“Probably burn up in the atmosphere,” Jaxom said, almost regretfully.

Pretty
, Ruth said from the courtyard.
I have told Tiroth. He will tell D’ram, who is running around and very excited
.

“Could be this is more widespread than it would seem,” Jaxom said. “Brand, keep an eye on it, will you? I think I’ll get dressed.”

“You can’t have been undressed,” Sharra said somewhat caustically, because she could see his legs encased in the same trousers that he had worn all day.

“Not completely.” He flicked his tunic away so she could see his bare chest. “I was waiting for you to get back. Were you able to repair Possil’s hand?”

“Thanks to Aivas, I was.”

“I may go on to Landing, love,” Jaxom said, “but you’d better get some sleep.”

“And you can do without?” she asked reproachfully as he guided her into the main Hall.

“You know me. I’ll rest when I find out what this is all about. If D’ram is running around at Cove Hold, then what we’re seeing is more than pretty shooting stars.”

H’nor and old brown Ranneth were on night duty on Telgar’s Rim when the rider saw the tiny sparkles of light low on the horizon in the southeast. He blinked and turned away. Couldn’t be the Red Star, he knew too well how that looked. Besides which, it couldn’t
be
in the east: it had been nor-nor-west when it had been skewed out of its old orbit. It wouldn’t be in a position to drop
sharding Thread on Pern ever again. No way that sharding thing could bounce back east.

He took up the binoculars—now required watchrider equipment—and focused carefully on the sparkles. They were like a shower; could they be coming from one place before disappearing? That wasn’t what the Turn’s End Ghosts looked like: they were pale and strung out across the sky. Furthermore, the Ghosts were much farther north, nearer the ice regions. He had an uneasy feeling.

H’nor rose from his comfortable position on the upper arm of his brown Ranneth, eyeglass still focused on the brilliant showers. There was another long one. Definitely not Ghosts. Burned too long.

What is it?
Ranneth demanded, coming out of his doze. A brown of many Turns, he slept when and where he could, but his rider’s alarm was palpable. He turned his head in the direction H’nor faced and was equally startled, rearing back on his haunches.
It is fire but what could stay alight so high above Pern?

H’nor gulped.
I don’t know
.

Sometimes metal fell from the sky, large enough to cause damage. Like the big hole at Circle Runner Station.

Knowing that the Dawn Sisters had been the ships that had brought the Ancients to Pern had not been easy for H’nor to assimilate. Learning about Aivas had also been unsettling. He was too old for such complications. He wanted no flaming things falling down before he and Ranneth could retire to a warm and comfortable weyr on the Southern continent.

As watchrider, he did have a duty to sound an alarm for any unusual occurrence and this ranked in that category.

Tell Willerth
, H’nor told Ranneth. The old brown rider was glad that the Weyrleadership of Telgar had changed recently, to a younger bronze rider, J’fery. Old R’mart had become quite difficult before he’d gone to the Southern Weyr for less onerous duties. Bedella and her queen, who hadn’t risen to mate in three Turns, had gone with him.
Tell Ramoth while you’re at it. Benden’s supposed to know
.

I will also tell Tiroth at Cove Hold
.

Yes, yes, tell them, too. They should know all about such things
.

The watchdragon reared back on his haunches and bugled a warning, as bright sparks appeared almost directly overhead in the sky.

Since it was nearly dawn in Benden, a good number of weyrfolk already breakfasting in the Lower Cavern were startled by the bugled alert. It coincided with Ramoth giving Lessa Willerth’s message from Telgar, so Lessa was on her feet, grabbing at F’lar’s tunic to drag him with her. Everyone else present scrambled to the Bowl after the Weyrleaders to see what was happening.

“Those aren’t Ghosts,” Lessa cried, coming to a stop so abruptly that F’lar had to sidestep. She could see what had alarmed the watchdragon: long flaring ribbons in the sky, almost directly above Benden. One large burst startled everyone, as if some smaller piece had broken off the bigger ball.

“No, they aren’t!” F’lar agreed, gazing up, his hands on his weyrmate’s arms, rubbing them to warm her.

Willerth didn’t say they were
, Ramoth reminded her rider. Then she added, surprised,
Ruth says there is something above Ruatha that Jaxom doesn’t think are Ghosts either
.

By now every dragon in the Weyr was peering up at the manifestation, their eyes beginning to whirl with agitation, creating the effect of rings of vivid color around Benden’s inner walls. F’nor and F’lessan joined their Weyrleaders, peering up at the phenomenon just as more flares burst from it.

“All the shooting arrows”—Lessa gestured with her hands—“seem to come from the same source.”

“I’d like to know
what
source,” F’lessan said, scrubbing at his thick hair, an uncharacteristic frown on his face.

“You’re the one who studied astronomy,” F’lar remarked, turning his head slightly toward his son but not taking his eyes off the sprays of brilliant lights.

“Not something like that,” F’lessan said. “Though it could be a meteor coming through the atmosphere. We do get them.”

“Yes, Circle Runner Station never lets us forget!” F’nor murmured wryly.

“Do we have to worry about it falling on us?” Brekke asked, curling her hand over F’nor’s arm.

“Shouldn’t it be moving?” Lessa said, becoming a little nervous. “It seems to be hanging right over us.”

“I’d say that’s an illusion,” F’lessan replied, trying to sound reassuring. He caught F’lar’s cocked eyebrow and shrugged. “It’ll probably disappear in a few moments. Though the Ghosts usually travel from west to east. Noticeably.”

“They’re also paler,” Lessa said. “This one is getting brighter!” She shivered.

F’lar dropped his arms across her to provide more warmth in the wintry early morning light.

It is very high above us
, Ramoth said,
and it is getting brighter
. She blinked the first protective lid across her eyes.

I agree. The winter Ghosts are higher still
, bronze Mnementh added.

“Would the
Yoko
see it, do you think?” Lessa asked. “Or is it too far north for the sensors?”

Tiroth says that he takes four to Landing to see
, Ramoth said, sounding surprised.

Lessa echoed that surprise when she repeated the message to the other riders grouped around her. “Well, Master Wansor certainly should be there, and that journeyman of his—what’s his name?”

“Erragon,” F’lessan said.

“Erragon, to see what the
Yoko
reports,” Lessa finished.

“I’ll go, too, for Benden’s sake,” F’lessan offered gallantly. “Sellie—” He caught the arm of his second son, Sellessan—technically he should call him S’lan, as the boy’d impressed a brown two Turns ago—who had sneaked out to see what was causing the commotion. The boy was as curious as F’lessan had been as a youngster. “Run get my flying gear. First table on the left.” The boy raced to obey.

“Erragon has that big telescope,” F’nor said.