"After the flight as well as before?" Robinton asked, amusement warring with his unprofessional desire to gamble.
"I'm a dragonrider, Master Robinton," D'fio said gruffly, "not one of those faithless Southerners."
"And I'm Master Harper of Pern," said Robinton. But he leaned into the man's back, pressing a two-mark piece into his hand. "Barnath, of course, and please let none be the wiser."
"As you wish. Master Robinton," D'fio sounded pleased.
They rose above the black shadow of the Fort Hold cliffs, the lighter darkness of night sky, moonless at this hour and season, just barely discernible. He felt the tension in D'fio's back, drew his own breath in sharply as they transferred between, and abruptly emerged with Drenth calling out his name to the Ista Weyr watchdragon.
Robinton shielded his eyes from the brilliance of the sun slanting off the water. As he glanced below, he saw the dramatic half-peak of Ista Weyr, the black stone like giant jagged fingers pointing to the bright blue skies. Ista was the smallest of the Weyrs, some of its complement of dragons making weyrs in the forest that surrounded the base. But the broad plateau beyond the cone was crowded with bronze beasts, their riders forming a cluster close to the golden queen who was crouched over her kill, sucking the blood from its body. At a farther and safe distance from this spectacle a large group of people looked on.
Toward this area, Drenth glided.
Zair took wing from Robinton's shoulder, to join other fire-lizards in an aerial display of excitement. Robinton noticed that the little creatures kept a distance from the dragons. At least the fire-lizards were appearing at Weyrs again.
D'fio dismounted, too, and sent his brown for a swim in the warm waters of the bay below the Weyr plateau. Other dragons, uninvolved in this flight, were already taking advantage of the bathing at Ista Island.
Caylith vaulted from the ground toward the herd of beasts in the Weyr's corral. Cosira half-followed, keeping a firm control on her young queen so that she wouldn't gorge the meat and be too heavy for this all-important mating flight. Robinton counted twenty-six bronzes ringing the killing ground, gleaming in the harsh sunlight, their eyes wheeling red in rut agitation, their wings halt-furled, their bodies at a crouch that would send them skyward the instant the queen ascended. They were all young, as F'lar had recommended, almost equal in size as they waited, never taking their glistening eyes from the object of their interest.
Caylith growled deep in her throat as she sucked the blood from the buck carcass. She raised her head to snarl contemptuously back at the bronze ring.
Suddenly the watch dragon roared a challenge and even Caylith turned to look. Arrowing in from the south, over the sea, came two bronzes.
Just as Robinton realized that the beasts must have flown in at sea level to get this close to the Weyr undetected, he also realized that these were older beasts, muzzles graying, necks thickened. Southerners. Two of the Oldtmers' bronzes. That had to be T'kul with Salth, and probably B'zon with Ranilth. Robinton began to run toward the killing ground, toward the queen's prospective mates, for that was the obvious goal of the two bronzes sweeping in from the south.
Their timing had been perfect, Robinton thought then saw two others making for the landing bronzes-the stocky figure of D'ram and F'lar's lean body. T'kul and B'zon jumped off their beasts. The dragons took one final leap to range themselves with the other bronzes who hissed and growled at the newcomers. Robinton prayed under his breath that none of the bronze riders would act first, think later. Most of them were so young they'd not recognize T'kul or B'zon. But D'ram and F'lar certainly had.
Robinton felt his heart pounding in his chest and a totally unfamiliar ache that caused him to grimace and slow his trot momentarily. B'zon was facing him, a set smile on his face. The Oldtimer touched T'kul's arm and the former High Reaches Weyrleader spared the Harper a quick glance. T'kul considered him no threat and turned back toward the two Weyrleaders.
D'ram reached T'kul first. "You fool, this is for young beasts. You'll kill Salth."
"What option have you left us?" B'zon demanded just as F'lar and Robinton skidded to either side of the two Southerners. There was a hysterical note in the man's voice. "Our queens are too old to rise: there are no greens to give the males relief. We must…"
Caylith bugled as she left the blood-sucked corpse of the buck and half-flew, half-ran to scatter the herd, one sweeping forepaw impaling another victim on its flank and dragging it back to her.
"D'ram, you declared this flight open, didn't you?"
T'kul asked in a harsh voice, his features fine-drawn despite the tan of Southern suns. He looked from D'ram to F'lar.
"I did, but your bronzes are too old, T'kul." He gestured toward the eager young dragons. The difference between them and the two older ones was pathetically obvious.
"Salth's dying anyway. Let him go out flying. I made that choice, D'ram, when I brought him here." T'kul stared hard at F'lar, the bitterness and hatred so vivid that Robinton sucked in his breath. "Why did you take back the egg? How did you find it?" Desperation broke briefly through T'kul's cold pride and arrogance.
"Had you come to us, we would have helped you," F'lar said quietly.
"Or I," D'ram said, miserable before the plight of his one-time acquaintance.
Ignoring F'lar altogether, Tkul gave the Istan Weyrleader a long scornful glance then, straightening his shoulders, jerked his head at B'zon to move forward. F'lar was in his direct path to the other bronze riders. The Benden Weyrleader opened his mouth to speak, shook his head in regret and stepped to one side. The Southern riders moved the few paces forward just in time. Caylith, raising her bloody muzzle, seemed to pulse more golden than ever. Her eyes were whirling opalescence. With a fierce scream, she launched herself upward. Barnath was the first dragon off the ground after her, and, to Robinton's surprise, T'kul's Salth was not far behind the Istan bronze.
T'kul swung back to F'lar, the triumph on his face an insult. Then he strode to Cosira's side. The Weyrwoman was swaying with the effort of staying in mental contact with her queen. She didn't notice that it was G'dened and T'kul who were leading her back to her quarters to await the outcome of the flight.
"He'll kill Salth," D'ram was muttering, his face stricken.
That odd pressure against his chest kept Robinton from reassuring the worried man.
"And B'zon,, too!" D'ram grabbed F'lar's arm. "Is there nothing we can do to stop it? Two dragons?"
"If they had come to us…" F'lar began, placing his hand consolingly on D'ram's. "But those Oldtimer riders always took! That was they error at the outset!" His face hardened.
"They're still taking," Robinton said, wanting to ease D'ram's distress. "They've taken what they wanted from the north all along. Here, there. What pleased them. Young girls, material, stone, iron, jewels. They looted with quiet system ever since they were exiled. I've had the reports. I've given them to F'lar."
"If only they had asked!" F'lar looked upward at the fast-dwindling specks of dragons in flight.
"What was that all about?" Lord Warbret of Ista Hold hurried up to them. "Those last two were old or I don't know dragons as well as I thought I did."
"The mating flight was open," F'lar replied, but Warbret was looking at D'ram's anxious face.
"To old dragons? I thought you stipulated young ones that hadn't had a chance at a queen before! I don't see the point myself, in having another older Weyrleader. No offense intended, D'ram. Change upsets holders." He gazed at the sky. "How'll they keep up with the younger ones? That's a gruelling pace."
"They have the right to try," F'lar said. "While we await the outcome, some wine, D'ram?"
"Yes, yes, wine. Lord Warbret…" D'ram recovered his composure sufficiently to gesture the Lord Holder to accompany him toward the living cavern. He beckoned to the other guests to follow, but his step was heavy and slow.