Dragonheart

He waved at the weyrlings. “They weren’t disturbing you, were they, Weyrwoman?”

Fiona knew instantly that T’jen had heard her entire exchange with the weyrlings. She smiled at him, shaking her head. “They were just trying to help.”

“They could help themselves more by tending to their chores,” T’jen grumbled loudly enough that several weyrlings glanced worriedly in his direction and suddenly looked more energetic.

After the weyrlings were out of earshot, T’jen murmured to her, “I can understand the ones in your Hatching carrying on the way they do, but the older ones . . .” He shook his head.

“But — ” Fiona began, her thoughts all jumbled. “I mean, isn’t this normal?”

“What, Weyrwoman?” T’jen asked, turning to face her directly. “Tell me how you feel.”

“I’m all right,” Fiona said immediately. “Talenth’s fine — ”

“And you’d know, being a Weyrwoman for . . . ?” T’jen asked her, raising his brows in curiosity, a faint smile on his lips.

Fiona blushed in response. She thought back, her blush clearing into a smile as she remembered her amazing Impression of Talenth. How long ago had it been? It seemed forever. But how long? Her frown deepened as she realized she couldn’t quite remember.

“This is the twentieth day of the twelfth month,” T’jen supplied helpfully.

“Oh!” Fiona said. “Then it’s been — it’s been — ” Angrily she chided herself, This is simple! There are twenty-eight days — four sevendays — in each month, and she’d Impressed Talenth on the seventeenth of the month before so that meant that . . .

“Thirty-one days, Weyrwoman,” T’jen told her softly. Fiona looked up at him, chagrined. “You’re not the only one confused. All of my weyrlings, even the steadiest of them, are acting like you.”

“Is it the sickness?” Fiona asked with a feeling of dread knotting her stomach.

“I hope not,” T’jen said fervently. “And there’s no sign of distress among the dragonets — they’re merely a bit sleepier than I’d expect at this age.”

“I thought they always slept a lot when they’re this young,” Fiona said.

“They do, but not this  much,” T’jen told her. “It’s difficult enough to wake them to eat, much less anything else.”

“And that’s not normal?”

“No,” T’jen replied, shaking his head. “It’s not.”

“Have you told the Weyrwoman?”

“She pointed it out to me, actually,” he admitted.

It took Fiona a moment to follow his thought through to its conclusion. “Because of me?”

The weyrlingmaster smiled. “Well, you are  the newest Weyrwoman, she’s right to keep an eye on you,” he told her. “You never know . . .”

“Know what?” Fiona prompted.

“Know when you’ll become Weyrwoman,” T’jen said sadly. He met her eyes. “It happened quick enough for Cisca.”

“How?”

“You’d have to ask her,” he said. “It’s her story to tell or not.” Fiona yawned and T’jen laughed. “Not that you’d be awake long enough.”

“I’m sorry,” she apologized.

“Don’t be,” he told her. “Whatever it is, you need your rest, so go get it.” He turned to the massed weyrlings. “You lot, on the other hand, still have work to get done before you can take a break.”

A chorus of groans greeted his words.

“ . . .So i’d say that she’s the same as the rest,” t’jen concluded in his recounting to the Weyrleader and Weyrwoman over dinner that night. “Even the older weyrlings are acting odd.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you sooner,” K’lior said to the old Weyrlingmaster. “You’d said this last Turn when the others Impressed, but I thought . . .”

“You thought I was just moaning,” T’jen finished for him with a snort.

“I’ve never heard a Weyrlingmaster praise  his charges, after all,” K’lior said defensively.

“And by the First Egg, I hope you never do!” T’jen replied. Thoughtfully, he added, “And if you ever do, Weyrleader, you should let the man go. As you know: ‘There’s — ‘“

“ ‘ — always better from a weyrling,’ ” K’lior finished with T’jen.

“Exactly.”

“And what about now?” Cisca asked. “Does not ‘always better’ mean we should be pushing these weyrlings further? Particularly as the next Pass is nearly upon us.”

“Actually,” K’lior replied diffidently, “that’s a good reason to go slow.”

Cisca gave him a questioning look.

“The Weyrleader’s right, Weyrwoman,” T’jen told her. “With Thread coming, it’s more important to have these youngsters trained the best we can rather than put them and their young dragons against Thread too early.”

“We can expect the most losses in the first Turn of Threadfall,” K’lior said in agreement. In response to Cisca’s look, he explained, “It’s in the Records. I think it’s because it always takes time to adjust to the reality of fighting Thread.”

T’jen nodded. “Any mistake fighting Thread can be the last mistake a rider or dragon makes.”

“So we should go slow with these weyrlings?” Cisca asked.

“And keep an eye on them, as well,” T’jen said. “We don’t want them doing something foolish because they’re too drowsy to think clearly.”

“What does the harper say?” Cisca asked.

“He’s got no better idea than I,” T’jen said. “It could  be this sickness that affected the fire-lizards, but there’s been no sign of coughing from anyone.” He paused, his brow furrowed, then shook his head. “No, I don’t think they’re related — but I don’t know what is affecting the weyrlings so.” A moment later, he added, “They’ve got good days and bad days, some more than others.”

“Does anything help?” K’lior asked.

“Klah, ” T’jen said with a shrug. “The stronger, the better. For some, it’s klah  in the morning, at noon, and mid-evening. That’s for the worst of them, though.”

“So we just leave it at that?” Cisca asked, perturbed.

“I’d say it’s all we can do, for the moment,” T’jen replied.

“And I think Tannaz and I will keep a closer eye on our young Weyrwoman,” Cisca said.

The next morning Cisca found Fort’s second Weyrwoman in her quarters just as she finished her daily grooming of her queen, Kalsenth.

“Good morning,” Cisca called brightly to Tannaz and her dragon as she entered. “Kalsenth, if you can spare her, I’ve got a task for your rider.” And she repeated the conversation she’d had with K’lior the night before.

“I’d heard about the older weyrlings,” Tannaz said when she was done, “but not the younger ones.”

“And the new queen,” Cisca added.

The two queen riders were a study in contrasts: Cisca was tall, broad-shouldered and muscled without appearing so, with shoulder-length brown hair and eyes to match, while Tannaz was short, thin, wiry; her eyes, so dark they looked black, were set in a stark face of dusky skin surrounded by wavy black hair that announced her Igen origins to anyone looking at her.

Their personalities were even less matched than their forms, and for a time Cisca had been concerned that the older woman — for Tannaz had been three Turns older than Cisca when she Impressed — would cause problems. She had refused to return to Igen Weyr when she Impressed, which had perhaps been the final death blow for the desert Weyr. Having met D’gan, Igen’s Weyrleader — and heard K’lior’s recounting of their meeting — Cisca did not begrudge Tannaz her choice, even while she worried that she and the older woman would come to blows.

But it was not so, partly because they were both fundamentally too good and concerned for the Weyr’s well- being to allow any disagreements to exist between them for long. In fact, Cisca had come to value Tannaz’s fiery