so many changes . . . which might be one of the reasons that we had so
many infertile watch-wher eggs.”
Sorka’s eyes gleamed. “
One
reason.”
Wind Blossom returned her stare with a blank look.
“I am curious about the other reasons,” Sorka said. “I am now convinced
that some of those failures were planned to make you look less skilled than
you are.”
Wind Blossom said nothing.
“Your mother was trained by the Eridani,” Sorka said. “You were trained by
her, weren’t you?”
Wind Blossom shook her head. “There are some questions I should not
answer even for you, Sorka.”
A wheezing cough shook Sorka’s body and M’hall glanced inside, Torene
hovering worriedly behind him.
Sorka waved them back out as the cough passed.
“If you cannot answer my questions, I won’t hinder you with them,” she said
after taking a sip of water from the glass Wind Blossom proffered her.
Wind Blossom winced. “I do not want to burden you.”
Sorka smiled. “And I was trying to lighten your load. A burden shared, as it
were.”
Wind Blossom spent a moment in thought. “I do not know everything. I was
not told myself.”
“But you made guesses,” Sorka observed. “I have made guesses, too. Let
me share some with you.
“I think it odd that such heroic figures as Admiral Benden and Governor Boll
should willingly take themselves into oblivion just after the Nathi War when
their skills were still very clearly needed.”
Wind Blossom nodded. “Yes, I had wondered about that.”
“And the Eridani?”
“When the Eridani agree to husband a new ecosystem they assign three
bloodlines,” Wind Blossom said. “It is a major undertaking. There has only
been one time that I know of where the Eridani have been willing to make
such an assignment without having thorough knowledge of the ecosystem
in question.”
“Here?” Sorka asked.
Wind Blossom nodded.
“Three bloodlines?”
“To avoid mistakes and provide redundancy,” Wind Blossom said. Sorka’s
face paled and Wind Blossom reached for her hand, placing her finger over
her wrist to take the Weyrwoman’s pulse. “Your pulse is failing, Sorka. Let
me call the others.”
“Wait!” Sorka’s voice was nearly a whisper. “What can I do to help you?”
Wind Blossom was silent for a moment. “Go quietly and peacefully, dear
friend.”
Sorka smiled. “What can I do to help Pern? Do you want to perform an
autopsy?”
Wind Blossom’s eyes widened in horror. “No.”
“But I heard that you need cadavers.”
Wind Blossom shook her head. “Not yours.”
She turned to the doorway and gestured to M’hall and the others to enter.
Sorka glared at her but was so quickly surrounded by her offspring and
relatives that she could do no more.
“Her pulse is dropping,” Wind Blossom explained to Torene. “I do not know
how much longer she has.”
“Nice of you to let us in,” Torene returned tartly.
“My request, Torene,” Sorka said. “I had to talk with my friend.”
Torene looked chagrined but did not apologize.
Tall men surrounded the Weyrwoman and she greeted each with a smile.
“M’hall. L’can. Seamus. P’drig.”
The men gave way to the women, Sorka’s daughters. “Orla. Wee Sorka.”
The last was an elegant woman in her early thirties. Sean had insisted on
naming their last-born Sorka because, as he’d said, “She looks just like you,
love.”
“Wee” Sorka leaned over from the far side of the bed to give her
namesake a strong hug. Sorka hugged her back.
“I’ll miss you most of all, I think, my wee one,” she told her youngest.
“I’ll miss you too, Ma,” the younger Sorka replied, tears streaming
unchecked down her face.
Sorka turned from her to grasp M’hall’s hand. “My strong one.” M’hall gave
her hand a gentle squeeze.
Sorka looked at Torene. “Take good care of him for me.”
Torene ducked her head, her cheeks wet with tears. “I will, Ma, you may
depend upon it.”
Sorka let go of M’hall’s hand and sought out L’can’s. “My silent one,” she
said. L’can squeezed her hand, rubbing the tears from his face with the
other.
“We could bring you down to the Cavern, to Faranth, Ma,” P’drig said.
Sorka smiled, letting go of L’can’s hand and grabbing his. “No. She knows
my heart in this. I will leave my body behind here, in your company and
Wind Blossom’s keeping.”
There was a concerted gasp and heads swiveled toward Wind Blossom.
“Your father and I have given everything we can for you and Pern,” Sorka
told them. “This poor body is but the least I can leave.”
“You don’t need to do this,” Wind Blossom said.
Sorka waved her objections aside. “I have heard about the pressing needs
for cadavers—”
“And I have told you that I do not want yours, Sorka,” Wind Blossom
interrupted, her face wrought with emotion.
“We must do what is best for Pern,” Sorka said. “It is my last request, Wind
Blossom, that you perform an autopsy to investigate the early dementia
you’ve recently noticed. Use my body for whatever medical purposes you
see fit. I’d heard that you had wanted to practice for Tieran’s surgery—”
“Mother!” The word was torn from M’hall’s throat.
Wind Blossom shook her head. “I do not want to do this.”
“The boy deserves a new face,” Sorka said. “I have thought about this for a
fortnight now. In my bedside table you will find my will, with specific
references on these matters.”
Sorka looked around the room, catching the eyes of everyone in turn. “My
loved ones, I will not deny you every protection I can think of. Soon I will no
longer need my body. Let the people of Pern find a last use for it. Please,
follow my will on this.” She turned her gaze to her eldest. “M’hall, in this I
appoint you my executor.”
“Mother . . . Ma . . .” M’hall broke down.
Torene wrapped comforting arms around Sorka. She gave Wind Blossom
a sour look, then looked at Sorka. “My lady, it shall be as you wish. I pledge
my word as your daughter-in-law, and as Benden’s Weyrwoman. It shall
be.”
“Thank you,” Sorka said softly. She gave a deep sigh and turned back to
the others. “Now, let me look at you all. Tell me how you are.”
The conversation wandered on from son to daughter and back again. Sorka
managed to get them to laugh once, and someone brought up
refreshments. Gradually the talk wore down and Sorka ordered them to
leave her, all but M’hall and Wind Blossom.
“I want you to stay with me, Wind Blossom,” Sorka said, feebly patting her
bed. “You and M’hall, here.”
It was late. The two sat silently beside Sorka’s bed while the first queen
rider of Pern sank slowly into sleep. M’hall went around the room covering
all the glows save one. Every now and then Wind Blossom would check
Sorka’s pulse by pressing gently on her wrist.
As dawn neared and its gray light began to fill the room, Sorka gave a faint
gasp. Wind Blossom looked up just as Faranth’s despairing wail broke the
silence, amplified by Duke’s higher but equally piteous wail, and was
immediately silenced itself as the first Impressed fire-lizard of Pern and the
first queen dragon of Pern went
between.
Their stilled voices were
replaced by the keening of all the dragons at Fort Weyr.
M’hall rushed to Sorka’s side, but Wind Blossom already knew from the
lack of a pulse that the first Weyrwoman had joined her husband. Wind
Blossom stirred herself, ignoring the complaints of her joints, and knelt
beside M’hall.
“Let me tend to her for a moment, and then you may come back,” she
offered.
M’hall looked at her through tear-soaked eyes and nodded slowly.
She guided the bereft rider out of the room and into the arms of his wife
and weyrmate.
“Just give me a few minutes,” she said to Torene.
Fort’s Headwoman had delivered clean bedsheets and toiletries earlier in
the evening. Wind Blossom, ignoring the tears rolling down her face, made
one final inspection of Sorka’s body, and then gently made the body
presentable, as she had done for Emily Boll and her own mother before
her.
Satisfied that she had done all she could to make things easier on Sorka’s
children, Wind Blossom left the room and let them enter.
M’hall was the first to his mother’s side. L’can, P’drig, and Seamus stood at
the end of her bed, while her daughters, Orla and Sorka, closed in on the
side.
D’mal and Nara, Fort’s Weyrleader and Weyrwoman, arrived to pay their
respects, but Wind Blossom asked them to wait for Sorka’s family to
complete theirs.
“Please ask Torene to let us know when there is a good time,” Nara said.
Wind Blossom nodded. A while later one of the weyrfolk came with a chair
and a basket of fruit for Wind Blossom, courtesy of the Weyrwoman.
Gratefully, Wind Blossom sat down before the door and ate daintily from
the selection.
Sorka’s children drifted out in ones and twos over the next half hour.
When Torene came out, Wind Blossom relayed Nara’s request. Torene
glanced back into the room at M’hall.
“I’ll give him a few more minutes,” she said. “I’m going down to the caverns
for some lunch—” She glanced at the early morning light and remembered
that Benden was six time zones ahead of Fort. “—er, breakfast.”
Wind Blossom waited outside until she heard M’hall’s voice from in the
room. Thinking, in her wearied state, that he might be asking for her, she
stepped through into the room—and stopped.
M’hall stood beside his mother’s bed, holding her dead hand in his. Tears
streamed down his face and onto the bed.
“What will I do now, Ma?” M’hall repeated.
Wind Blossom could see the small boy inside the grown man struggle with
the awful loss of his mother and last parent.
She knew that M’hall was groping with the awful realization that he no longer
had some higher authority to turn to, no one to confide in, no one to seek
praise from, or to ask, “Do you love me?” without fearing the answer.
M’hall turned at the sound of her footsteps and Wind Blossom cast her
eyes to the ground, not wanting to meet his.
“What—” M’hall swallowed, and continued more strongly, “What did you
do?” He did not need to say “when your mother died.”
Wind Blossom reflected on the question. Then she looked up and
answered him honestly: “My mother never loved me. When she died it was
my obligation to assume her dishonor, and she savored passing it on to
me.”
Wind Blossom gestured to Sorka. “She showed me some of her love. I felt
like the desert in a cloudburst,” she continued softly. Her voice hardened.
“For my mother, I could never be good enough.”
M’hall nodded and wiped his eyes. “She was a great lady.”
“Yes.”
“She gave everything for this planet,” M’hall said. He looked down at the
still, lifeless body. “I think I understand her last request now.”
“I don’t,” Wind Blossom said. “I would prefer to leave her undisturbed and
keep the memory of her body as it was alive, not as it is dead.”
M’hall shot her a penetrating look. “I had not thought of it that way. Wind
Blossom, will you honor my mother Sorka’s last request?”
“M’hall, I do not want to.”
“My father always taught me that I had to honor a lady, particularly my
mother.” He shook his head. “I cannot gainsay her.”
Outside the room they heard the sound of footsteps and Torene’s voice:
“M’hall, are you all right?”
“In here,” M’hall answered. “Yes.”
Torene, D’mal, and Nara entered. Wind Blossom moved closer to M’hall to
make room.
“We wanted to pay our respects,” D’mal told M’hall.
“I learned so much from her,” Nara added. “She was like a mother to me.”
Beside her, Wind Blossom felt M’hall flinch as her words reinforced his
sense of loss. He said nothing.
With an inquiring glance at M’hall, Nara approached the side of the bed,
bent over, and gave Sorka’s cheek one last kiss. D’mal gently drew his
Weyrwoman out of the room, their grief and sympathy evident on their
faces.
M’hall leaned forward and gently stroked Sorka’s cheek one last time. Then
he straightened, his features showing his grief being subdued by his
self-mastery. He looked at Wind Blossom, his face a leader’s mask.
“I must honor my mother’s last request. Is there anything more you need to
do before we can depart?”
“Yes.”
“Then we will wait outside until you are done,” M’hall answered, gesturing
for Torene to precede him.
Gingerly, Wind Blossom completed shrouding Sorka’s body. When M’hall
returned, he started at the sight of the body all covered in white cloth.
Recovering his composure, he gently lifted it cradled between his arms.
“Brianth awaits us outside,” he said to Wind Blossom, gesturing that she
precede him.
Outside Sorka’s quarters, a group of Fort riders gathered to pay their
respects. Once M’hall had wearily hauled himself up on Brianth’s neck, two
of the riders lifted Sorka’s shrouded body up to him. He placed it before
him on his dragon’s neck. Then the riders helped Wind Blossom up behind
M’hall.
“Are you ready?” M’hall called over his shoulder as Brianth beat effortlessly