K’vin pretended wide-eyed shock at such a notion. M’shall glanced around. “I didn’t hear that, Paulin,” the Benden Weyrleader said with stiff dignity.
“As if we would…” K’vin remarked to M’shall as they strode out of Fort Hold.
“I’d like to,” said M’shall, in a taut voice, “that’s the problem. But then, I’ve known Chalkin longer than you.”
Craigath and Charanth were already on the court, awaiting their riders.
“You’ll take the western and northern crossings, K’vin?” M’shall asked as they separated to reach their bronzes.
“Have you been checking on numbers for transport?”
“Yes, and had sweep riders checking in ever since Chalkin closed the borders. Zulaya will warn Tashvi and Salda that we’re proceeding. We’ll take all to the Weyr first. The entire Weyr is organized to help.”
“You’re a good man, K’vin,” and M’shall grinned at his colleague.
“So let’s do it!” The Benden Weyrleader launched himself up his dragon’s shoulder and swung neatly between the end ridges.
We go to help? Charanth asked K’vin.
“Indeed we do. Tell Meranath to have Zulaya put our plan into operation. I’ll meet my wing at the Falls road. And I think we’d better ask Iantine to come along.”
When K’vin returned to Telgar, the first rescue wave was ready to take off at his signal. He paused long enough to haul Iantine behind him on Charanth.
“Get as much down in black and white as you can, Iantine. I want Chalkin nailed by the evidence.”
Iantine was all too happy to comply with the request. It would be one way of paying back the arrogant Lord Holder for his snaking ways and meanness. But, no sooner had Iantine dropped to the hard-packed snow of the border point than his attitude changed to horrified disgust. Using an economy of line, he sketched the pen” - ropes looped around trees and the shivering knots of people forced to stand for there was not enough room to sit down - in the churned mud of an inadequate space. He drew the haggard faces, the chilled bodies bent inward from cold, or those clumped together to share what warmth they had. Some had been stripped of all but what covered private parts, and they had been surrounded by their fellows in an attempt to keep them from freezing.
Some were standing barefoot on the rough rags and boots of their neighbors, feet blue and dangerously white from frostbite. Children wandered weeping with hunger and fatigue, or slumped in unconscious bundles in the mud at the feet of the adults. Three elder lies were stiff in death. Bloodied faces and bruised eyes were more common than the unmarked.
The guards, however, were warm with many layers of clothing, good fires with cooking spits turning to roast the meat of such animals as the refugees had brought with them.
Others were tied or penned up for future use. Such belongings as the refugees had brought with them were now piled at the side of the guard house or in the barrows or carts lined up behind. Iantine faithfully recorded rings and bracelets, even earrings, inappropriately adorning the guards.
They had been alarmed at the arrival of the dragon riders as many as could retreating into the shelter of the stone border facility.
That had made it considerably easier to move the refugees. Of course, many of them were in such a state of shock and fear that they were as frightened of the dragons and the riders as of the brutal guards.
Zulaya had brought weyrfolk with her, and their presence reassured many. So did the blankets and the warm jackets. And the soup: the first sustenance many had had since they had left their holds.
What Iantine couldn’t put down on paper were the sounds and the smells of that scene. And yet he did… in the open mouths of the terrified folk, their haunted eyes, the contortions of their abused bodies, their ragged coverings, and the piles of human ordure because the guards had made no provision for that human requirement, and the abandoned belongings and carts.
Now that he had seen real privation, Iantine realized how lucky he had been in his brief encounter with the Lord Holder of Bitra.
Iantine returned with the last group, letting his hand rest only in between, sketching as they flew, propping his pad against P’tero’s back.
“You haven’t stopped a moment,” P’tero shouted over his shoulder.
“You’ll freeze your hand up here, you know.” Iantine waved it to prove its flexibility and continued to sketch. He was adding details to the men who had been hung by their heels and used in target practice. The men had been cut down - one of the first things the rescuers had done.
Iantine had only had time enough to do an outline but the details - despite all the other sketches he had made that day - were vivid in his mind’s eye, and he had to get every one down on paper or he would feel he had betrayed them.
When the young blue rider deposited him in front of the Lower Cavern, Iantine, still filling in substance, managed to get himself to a table near enough the fire to get the good of the warmth - and increase the fluidity of his drawing. His fingers gradually thawed and his pencil raced faster.
A touch on his shoulder startled him half out of his chair.
“It’s Debera,” and the green rider placed klah and a bowl of stew in front of him. “Everyone else has eaten. You’d better,” she said severely, wrenching the pencil out of one hand and taking the pad from the other. “You look awful,” she added, “peering closely at his face.”
He reached for his pad but she slapped at his hand, swinging it out of his reach.
“No, you eat first. You’ll draw better for it. Oh, my word!” Her eye was caught by the scene and her free hand went to her mouth, her eyes widening in shock. “Oh, they couldn’t have.”
“I sketched what I saw,” he said, exhaling in a remorse that came from his guts and then inhaling the tantalizing odor emanating from the stew. He looked down at it, thick with vegetables and chunks of meat. They really could do miracles with wherry here. He picked up the spoon and began to eat, only then realizing how empty his stomach was. It almost hurt receiving food, and that nearly made him stop eating altogether. Chalkin’s prisoners had been without food for three or four days.
“They’re all fed now,” Debera murmured.
Iantine gave her a startled glance and she patted his shoulder reassuringly, as she often patted her Morath.
“I felt the same way when I ate earlier on.” She sat down across from him. “We’d been going flat out to feed them when Tisha made us all stop to get something to eat, too.” She started turning the pages of his book, the look on her face becoming more and more distressed at each new scene of the tragedy.
“How could he?” Iantine reached over and gently pulled the sketch-pad from her, setting it down, closed, between them.
“He gave the orders.” Iantine began, “And knew just what would happen when he did, I know.”
“I’ve met some of his… ‘guards’. Even my father wouldn’t have one about the hold.” She tapped the pad. “No-one can ignore that sort of evidence.” Iantine gave a snort. “Not with dragon riders verifying what’s in here!”
He finished the last of the stew and stretched out his legs under the table, scrubbing at his face, still tingling with his long hours in the unremitting cold of the border crossing. “Go to bed, why don’t you, Iantine?” Debera said, rising.
She glanced around the cavern, which was occupied by only a few riders and folk finishing their evening meal. “They’ve all been sorted out and you’ll be lucky if you have your room to yourself. But I’d better get some sleep, too. That Morath of mine! She wakes positively starved, no matter how much I give her.”