“Really?”
“Yes,” R’ney said, grinning. “I remember when Sevra, the youngest and prettiest—and she knew it—decided she could get away with baiting Nerena, who was the shyest and meekest.”
“And?” Xhinna asked. “What did your parents do?”
“Nothing,” R’ney said with a smirk. “They knew Nerena pretty well. One day, when Sevra had been at her worst for over a sevenday, Nerena blew her top and cut off all Sevra’s hair while she slept.” R’ney shook his head. “She thought she had the best hair.”
“And what did you parents do then?”
“They said, ‘Sevra, maybe now you’ll not taunt your sister so much,’ ” he replied, shaking his head and grinning at the memory. “You’ve never seen such outrage. Sevra learned two lessons from that.”
“Two?”
“Maybe four, now that I think on it,” R’ney said, lifting a hand and ticking off fingers as he said, “She learned that if you push someone too far, no matter who, they’ll fight back. She learned that no one will support her when she’s wrong, no matter how pretty and demanding she is. She learned what it was like to be the ugly duckling in our smithhall; it took months for her hair to get back to its old length. And,” he finished, ticking off the fourth finger, “she learned that there’s no point in demanding justice when you’re being unjust yourself.”
“A lot of lessons,” Xhinna said, feeling a pang for sisters and brothers she never had.
“I learned a lesson, too,” R’ney said.
Xhinna raised an eyebrow.
“Just because she’s shy and modest, doesn’t mean a person won’t stand up for herself.” He paused just a moment before adding, “Did you know that Jepara has taken to calling Meeya ‘Meeyu’?”
“Oh,” Xhinna said, rolling the notion around in her mind as an evil grin spread across R’ney’s face. Then she smiled, too. “You’d think she’d be smart enough to realize that those baby Meeyus will be Mrreows one day.”
“You’d think,” R’ney agreed. Xhinna raised a hand and laid it on his shoulder. “You know, brown rider,” she said, “it’s worth repeating. I really couldn’t think of a better father for Taria’s child—if that’s to be.”
R’ney turned red and placed his hand gently on top of hers. “I would like to take credit for having planned it in advance, but in all honesty I can’t,” he told her. “In other circumstances, the same thing might have happened with anyone nearby.”
Xhinna shook her head at him. “Which of your sisters does Taria most remind you of?”
“Nerena,” R’ney said without a moment’s thought. He raised his hands and shook his head, saying, “But you can’t think—”
“No,” Xhinna told him soothingly. “But if someone like, say, Sevra were there, or someone even like V’lex …”
“It would have been much easier to control my emotions—theirs being such less pleasant personalities,” R’ney admitted. He cocked his head at her, looking down into her deep blue eyes. “And how do you know this?”
“I’ve been dealing with children for Turns now,” Xhinna said, smiling up at him. “Adults are only grown-up children, after all.”
“And we all mature at different rates,” R’ney said thoughtfully, glancing again in the direction of Jepara. “Is that why you tolerate her?”
“That and to honor a dead man who taught those I respect,” Xhinna said, her eyes going distant.
“Mikal of the Harper Hall?” R’ney guessed. Xhinna shook her head. “Weyrleader M’tal of Benden?” Again, Xhinna shook her head. R’ney spread his hands in surrender.
“No one important,” Xhinna said, thinking back to her conversation with Fiona. “Just a man who made a mistake and was never allowed to recover from it.”
“D’gan of Telgar?” R’ney asked, then shook his head. “But they say he’s still alive, so he’s got a chance.”
“Not him, either,” Xhinna told him. She could see he was perplexed, so she continued, “I was thinking of Vaxoram. He was the bully Kindan—K’dan—bested back at Harper Hall just before the Plague.”
“ ‘Step by step,’ ” R’ney quoted, showing that he was familiar with the tale.
“Exactly,” Xhinna said. A breeze wafted by and she smelled the scent of food being prepared nearby; her stomach reminded her that she should eat soon, her conscience reminded her that she needed to be certain that Taria had eaten, too. “I’m hoping we’ll give her the chance Vaxoram never had.”
“And how are you planning on doing that?” R’ney asked skeptically.
Xhinna pulled him close and whispered into his ear. When she was finished, he straightened, his eyes twinkling. “Oh, you’ll teach her a lesson Nerena would have loved!”
“Would have?” Xhinna caught the bittersweet tone in his voice.
R’ney dismissed his pain with a shrug. “She died in the Plague, keeping the rest of us alive.”
“Nerena is a pretty name,” Xhinna said into the silence that followed. R’ney cocked his head at her. “I think that Tarena wouldn’t be bad, don’t you?”
“You mean—for—” He cut a hand toward the Hatching sands and Taria. “—if it’s a girl?”
“I’ve a thing for girls,” Xhinna admitted with a small smile. “They’re more biddable, to my way of thinking.”
“Biddable!” R’ney snorted, shaking his head. “Blue rider, you need to acquire a mirror for when you next say that.”
“Okay,” Xhinna said, patting him on the shoulder. “Perhaps not more biddable, but it would be a good name for a girl.”
“Girls, as you may have noticed, are dangerous,” R’ney said. Xhinna looked at him, brow raised. “At least for me,” he allowed. “They find it incredibly easy to wrap me around their thumb.”
“So, a girl it is, then,” Xhinna declared.
The brown rider nodded in satisfaction, savoring the name: “Tarena.”
“And, perhaps, Tareny if it’s a boy?” Xhinna suggested, enjoying the brilliant expression that spread across the brown rider’s face.
“No, I’ve no objection,” X’lerin said when Xhinna found the time to approach him several days later with her request. “R’ney’s a good man and this will help him.” He smiled. “Besides, it will heal any ruffled emotions about the hatching sands.”
“True,” Xhinna agreed, deciding not to be ruffled with the bronze rider for broaching the subject; as she’d said to R’ney, there were secrets that were kept in the Weyr or Hold, and there were those that were openly acknowledged. This was one of the latter.
“What do you think of W’vin?” X’lerin asked.
“He’s a steady, good man,” Xhinna said.
“And J’keran?”
Xhinna paused a long time before answering. “He does his work, he’s a good trainer, he’s—”
“Tired, bitter, scared, worn out,” X’lerin broke in, saying the words she was trying to avoid.
Xhinna took a breath to protest on the brown rider’s behalf but let it out again, nodding her head once in curt agreement.
“You wouldn’t believe how often I’ve found him drunk,” the young bronze rider said mournfully.
“But after all he’s done—all they’ve done—isn’t it our job to give him and all those with him new hope, new encouragement, and the rest they so desperately need?” Xhinna asked. She continued, “I’ve seen him fighting, I’ve seen him come back Fall after Fall when his friends and fellow riders haven’t, I’ve seen the light go out of his eyes, the fear come into them.”
“Are we all going to be like that?” X’lerin asked, allowing just the slightest of his dread to leak into his voice.
“No,” Xhinna declared passionately. “That’s what we’re here for, we’re here to see to it that we live, that Pern lives, or that if we have to die, it’s for only the best reasons.”