"One thing sure," Betrice said wryly as she wrapped the squalling, wriggling baby tightly into the fine cotton sheet his mother had woven forjust this moment, "he's got your lungs, Petiron. Here! I've got to make Merelan more comfortable now."

The howling baby, his face brickred with his exertions, tiny fists clenched, was deposited into his alarmed father's arms.

Jiggling the babe as he had seen other fathers do, Petiron carried him to the window to get a good look at his firstborn.

He didn't see the looks passing between the midwife and her assistant, nor did he see the younger woman leave quietly to summon a healer. Merelan's bleeding was not tapering off. The midwife suspected that something had been torn; the baby had been breech, and was large-headed, as well. She packed ice in towels around Merelan's slim hips. It had been a long labor. Merelan lay limp in the bed, exhausted, her face white and lined. She seemed bloodless, and that worried Betrice more. There was such a risk in a transfusion: despite the similarity in color, blood differed from person to person. Once, long ago, healers had known how to tell the difference and match the blood. Or so she'd heard.

Betrice had suspected that Merelan would have trouble delivering, for she could feel the size of the child in the womb, and so she had asked the Healer Hall to stand by. There was a solution of special salts that in extreme cases could help a patient overcome the loss of blood.

Betrice glanced over to the window and managed a little grin at the father's inexperienced handling. Harper Petiron might be a brilliant musician, and play for hours at a Gather, but he'd a lot to learn about fathering. For that matter, he was lucky enough to have a son at all, considering Merelan had lost three in the early stages of pregnancy. Some women were born to bear many, but Merelan was not one of them.

Merelan's eyes flickered open and then widened with joy as she heard the lusty cries of her newborn.

"There now, he's here and all the parts in the right place, so you may rest easy, Singer," Betrice said, stroking Merelan's cheek.

"My son..." Merelan whispered, her usually magical voice raspy with exhaustion. Her head turned in the direction of the noise her baby was making, and her fingers twitched on the stained sheet.

"Soon, Singer. Let me clean you up..."

"I must hold him." Merelan's voice was feeble, but her need was fierce.

"Now, you'll have plenty of time to hold him, Merelan," Betrice said, a hint of sternness in her soothing tone. "I promise you that." And hope I'm not lying through my teeth, she added to herself.

Just then Sirrie and the healer arrived. Betrice breathed in relief when she saw Ginia and the bottle of clear liquid she carried that might mean the difference between life and death for the new mother.

"Petiron, go take that yowling child of yours and show him off," Ginia said in a peremptory tone, scowling at the nervously jiggling father. "They've all been waiting in the Hall to see him in person, not that anyone doubts he's here with that set of lungs. Off with you!"

Petiron was only too willing to go. He'd been as much help as he could be, rubbing Merelan's back and sponging her sweaty forehead during the long labor, and he desperately needed a drink to soothe his nerves. He'd been so afraid for Merelan toward the end, especially right after the birth when she seemed to shrink into nothing in the bloodied bed. They wouldn't have told him to leave if it weren't all right, he was sure of that! He was also sure that he'd never put Merelan in such danger again. He hadn't known just how difficult childbirth was.

"The lungs on him!" Ginia said with a mirthless smile. She bent to examine Merelan. "She's torn all right. You can give her some fellis, now, Betrice. Sirrie, strap her arm to that splint board. She needs fluid. How I wish we understood more about whole blood transferences. That's what she really needs, with all she seems to have lost. You know how to find a vein with the needle thorn, Sirrie, but if you've trouble, let me know."

Sirrie nodded and began her ministration, while Ginia did what she could to mend the torn flesh. The baby's protests were still audible despite the distance between this room and the main Hall.

"She's fighting the fellis, Ginia," Betrice said anxiously.

"What's she saying?"

"She wants her baby." Then Betrice mouthed words that Ginia could easily read: "She thinks she's dying."

"Not while I'm here, she isn't," Ginia said vehemently. "Get the babe back. It won't hurt her to have it suckling, and that would help contract the womb. Either way, it'll calm her, and I want her as calm as possible right now."

Betrice went herself and brought the now outraged infant back, grinning broadly at his ferocity and grip on life.

"He'll put fight back into her with his own, so he will," she said, smiling as she laid the baby beside Merelan, whose right arm instinctively curled about her child. He found her breast with no help from anyone. And Merelan sighed with relief.

"I swear he's doing the trick," Betrice said, amazed at the sudden flush of color in the singer's cheeks.

"I've seen stranger things happen," Ginia replied, glancing up. "There. That's all I can do... except caution Petiron that she's not to get pregnant again. I doubt she can, but he'll have to restrain himself."

The three women grinned at each other, for the entire Hold knew how devoted the couple were to each other: enough so that thinly disguised love ballads about their adoration circulated Pern.

"With all the talent available on this continent, it isn't as if Petiron had to breed a choir," Ginia said, rising.

Briskly the women changed the bedding for fresh, Merelan barely stirring as they did so, the baby clinging tightly to her. When Ginia and Betrice felt they could leave her safely in Sirrie's care, she was asleep, but looking far less pallid.

"Tell you one thing," Betrice confided in the healer, "she won't be all that pleased having just one baby."

"Then we'll see that she fosters others. It's far better for a child to have siblings than not, especially the way Merelan's going to dote on that boy. Keep that in mind next year. That is, if she continues to pick up strength."

Betrice gave a snort. "She'd better. I've a reputation to keep." "Don't we all!"

It was Petiron who objected to his spouse fostering the children of others. He found it hard enough to share her with their son, and he didn't believe other fathers and mothers when they informed him that young Robinton, for that was what they named him, in memory of Merelan's father Roblyn, was a good child and very undemanding.

"I always thought Petiron a generous man," Betrice told her spouse, MasterHarper Gennell.

"Why have you changed your mind?" Gennell asked with mild surprise.

She paused, pursing her lips -- she was not much of a tattler. "I'd say he was jealous of the time Merelan spends with Robie."

"Really?"

"Not that it's much, for I think she's aware of his resentment and does her best to ease it all. But young Mardy's had another child for all I warned her not to, with her third not yet a full Turn old--" Betrice sighed with exasperation. "-- and Merelan could help... if Petiron weren't so set against it."

"Young Robinton's what?"

"A full Turn next Third Day and already walking, stout as you please. Tending one in a cradle during the day to give Mardy a hand wouldn't be troublesome. Robie's no trouble and as sweet as his mother." Betrice beamed with an almost maternal pride.

"Leave it for now, Betrice," Gennell said. "There's all this excitement over Petiron's new Moreta Cantata at Turnover with Merelan as the major soloist."

"I can't say I like her working so hard at it, though, Gen, and that's the truth, for she isn't fully recovered from such a difficult birth..."

Gennell patted his spouse's capable hand. "Petiron wrote the music for her, and there isn't another soprano with her range in all Pern. I can quite understand how he'd be jealous of anyone taking up too much of her time."

"Unless it's himself doing it, you mean."

"There's more than one way to accomplish the same purpose, you know." He caught and held her eyes and smiled.

"At it again, are you?" Betrice said with no heat and some affection. Gennell was not MasterHarper of Pern just for his expertise on every instrument in the Hall.

"No," he replied cheerfully, "but I'll get at it on this matter now that you've been good enough to point it out to me. Petiron's a good sort, you know. And he really does love the boy."

Betrice firmed her lips together. "Loves him, does he?"

"You doubt it?"

She regarded her spouse critically. "I do." She curled her hand around his arm. "But then I have you as an example. You were as eager to tend the first of our five as the last, and they have certainly turned out well. Oh, Petiron looks in the cot now and then, or at the child when he's toddling in the yard, but only if you remind him that he's fathered a son."

Gennell picked at his lower lip and began to nod. "Yes, I believe I see what you mean. But I don't think loading Merelan with Mardy's latest is going to remedy a fatherly absentmindedness -- especially as Petiron's so involved in the Turnover rehearsals."

"Them! Well, let's hope he doesn't wear Merelan out beforehand."

"That I can oversee," Gennell said briskly, "and will. Now, off with you." As she turned away, he managed an affectionate slap on her backside as he resumed his task of assigning newly promoted journeymen to the many holds and halls which required such services.

Merelan sang the difficult role of Moreta in the Turnover cantata that her spouse had written for her, dealing with the cadenzas as easily as if they had been mere vocalizes. The warmth of her voice and the effortlessness of her performance held the audience -- and Petiron -- enthralled. Even those resident in the Hall who had heard her practicing and were well aware of her vocal abilities were on their feet, awed by her skill. Merelan not only had the superb breath control to support her coloratura voice, she could also imbue such emotion in her tone that there were many with tears in their eyes when her voice trailed off as Moreta and her dragon jumped between on their last, fatal transfer. Fort's Lord and Lady Holder were so enthusiastic that they started the rush up to the stage, to be sure she heard their compliments.

Petiron beamed as she modestly accepted praise, subtly reminding people that the music her spouse had written was ajoy to perform. He didn't seem to notice how pale she was. But Betrice did, and she gave the singer a potent restorative drink in the brief interval during which those in the chorus not required for the next part of the program filed out of the stands. Merelan would be singing -- less demandingly -- in the second part of the evening's entertainment, but she was offstage during the male chorus that came next.

Betrice watched the singer all through that and saw her color gradually return. And when she rose to sing a descant to the final selection, she did not appear as faint as she had earlier.

When the evening's program was over and the Hall cleared for the dancing, Fort's Lady, Winalla, sought out Betrice.

"Is Mastersinger Merelan all right, Betrice? She was trembling so much when Grogellan and I were speaking to her that I feared to let go of her hand."

"I had a restorative drink ready for her," Betrice said at her most noncommittal. It was kind of Lady Winalla to be concerned, but this was a Harper Hall affair, not the business of the Hold. "She puts so much into her singing, doesn't she?"

"Hmmm, yes, she certainly does," Winalla said, tacitly accepting the rebuff and moving on to speak to other guests.

If it surprised Petiron when Merelan caught a chill and developed a feverish cough, he was the only one.

"Sometimes I think that man is only interested in her for her voice," Betrice said waspishly to Gennell as she returned to their apartment after a shift of nursing the singer.

"That may well be a good deal of her importance to our resident composer," Gennell said. "No one else could manage either the range or the difficulty of the vocal scores he creates, but that isn't all he sees in her." He cleared his throat. "He was besotted with her beauty from the moment she came to us from South Boll for training. In fact, well before we realized what a superb natural voice she had." He looked off into the darkness beyond the glowbasket by the bed, remembering the first time he had heard her effortless scales. The entire Hall had stopped all work just to listen.

Betrice chuckled as she slid under the new furs, a gift from all the journeymen of the Hall this Turnover. The pelts had been sewn together in the most beautiful pattern. She let her hand linger on the soft fur of the edging. "Never seen a man more smitten in my life. He just stared. And she couldn't take her eyes off him. Mind you, he's attractive enough even if he isn't often a merry person. Just as well Agust was her vocal teacher, or she'd never have progressed past vocalizes."

"So remember how Petiron would hang about in the courtyard just listening to them as if he'd nothing better to do with his time," Gennell said, reaching out to close over the glowbasket. Absently he patted Betrice's shoulder and then punched the pillow for a spot to lay his head.

Just when Gennell thought he'd settled the question of which journeyman should take which assignment, more holders applied for trained personnel he did not have. With a hard winter, it was impossible to ask journeymen to tour from one hold to another, spreading their services by spending four sevendays in one place and then moving on. Every family had the right to learning, to be instructed in the Teaching Ballads so there was no misunderstanding about what was due whom and when.

He thought longingly of the times, now several hundred Turns back, when the six Weyrs of Pern had assisted the major Halls with dragon transport. Those on the east coast still had Benden Weyr, so Lord Maidir could boast of dragon rides to distant Holds and Gathers whenever he needed them. But Fort Weyr had been empty over four centuries, and no one really knew why.

Gennell had once looked at the Records kept in the Archives of both the Harper Hall and Fort Hold and there was only the one entry, shortly after the end of the last Pass.

"The MasterHarper was asked to Fort Weyr this fifth day of the seventh month, first Turn after Pass End."

That was it: short and cryptic. In other similar instances when the MasterHarper was called to the Weyr, a fuller explanation was given.

The next entry was by the then-MasterHarper, Creline, dated a full two months later when Fort Hold's tithe train duly arrived with supplies and found the Weyr abandoned, and nothing but broken pottery on the top of the midden heap. Other Holders had noticed that their flags requesting dragon assistance had gone unanswered and, while annoyed by the discourtesy, people were far too involved in relaxing after fifty Turns of ground-crew duty to wonder much about the absence of dragons from the skies. It was enough that Thread was gone.

A Conclave had been convened when it became all too apparent that five of the six Weyrs were empty. Benden's two Weyrleaders were mystified as well, truly surprised by the abandonment, and by Benden's being the only remaining Weyr.

Many theories had been put forth. A favorite claimed that a mysterious disease had spread through the five Weyrs, killing both dragons and riders. But that didn't account for the missing weyrfolk or the absence of every stick and stitch belonging to them. Benden Weyr had even sent a wing, with reliable Hold and Hall passengers, to scan the Southern Continent in case all five Weyrs had -- for some unknown reason -- decided to resettle south, despite the hazards of that country.

The matter was under discussion, often heated, for Turns afterward and no one the wiser for all the talk.

Then Creline performed a new work, which he called the Question Song, and which was to be included in the compulsory Teaching Ballads. Gennell had made a mental note to return the song to that category since someone -- he wouldn't like to point a finger -- had let it drop out some time before he became MasterHarper. Such things happened: but they shouldn't, considering the importance with which Creline had treated the work. Odd song. Haunting melody. Yes, worth reviving.

Another fifty-five Turns remained before Threadfall was due again. That is, Gennell amended to himself, if it was going to Fall again. Many believed Thread was gone forever. Acommon theory claimed that the Weyrs had been bound by some bizarre suicide pact, leaving only Benden to carry on the draconic traditions. That made no sense whatever to a thinking man. But at least he was unlikely to have to contend with that in his term as MasterHarper. With a sigh of relief, he firmly turned his mind toward sleep.

Merelan's cough developed into a chest cold shortly after Turnover. Sniffles and coughs were prevalent during the beginning of any new Turn when the weather remained cold and snowy, and young Robinton and Petiron both suffered from colds, but they threw off the worst of the infection quickly. But Merelan's cough seemed determined to linger, and she could rarely get through a vocal exercise without having to break off in a spasm. For the first time, Petiron became seriously worried about her health.

So did Betrice and Ginia, for the singer had quickly lost what weight she had gained after the baby's birth -- and more.

"You've really nothing big coming up in the way of rehearsals, have you?" Ginia asked Petiron privately after delivering another bottle of cough mixture for Merelan. With a certain degree of reluctance, he shook his head; had he not been sick, he most assuredly would have started composing something extravagant for the Spring Gathers.

"Well, then," Ginia continued, "I happen to know the MasterHarper is looking for someone to provide basic instruction at a hold in South Boll. Not far from where Merelan was born. So why don't you ask him to allow you to take the post? I believe the accommodations would be adequate for a small family like yours. The Ritecamp traders just arrived here, and their route takes you close by Pierie Hold."

Before Petiron could produce a good reason why he couldn't leave the Harper Hall at that time, he and his small family were on their way south, their baggage loaded on pack animals that Master Gennell ordered. He sent along two good Ruathan-bred mounts, as well. Master Sev Ritecamp was only too happy to oblige the Harper Hall and had agreed to take them to the very door of Pierie Hold.

"If Master Petiron wouldn't mind taking some time of an evening to learn some of our youngsters their Teaching Ballads. They're in dire need of some educating," Sev had suggested very politely. "And maybe give us a new song or two in the evening around our fire."

"That would be only fair," Merelan said when Petiron was not as prompt as he could have been in agreeing. Then she winked at her spouse, knowing very well that he hated doing "basics" with beginners, while she enjoyed teaching the very young. So long as the children were taught, it really didn't matter who did the teaching. As Mastersinger, she knew her Teaching Ballads and Songs as well as Petiron did.

The young daughter of the Ritecamps' leader had a toddler the same age as Robie, though not, Merelan privately thought, as sturdy as her lad, but she doubted that Dalma would mind watching two who could amuse each other while Merelan taught.

MasterHarper Gennell was delighted to have a master to assign for however short a term. Betrice had a word with the Rite-camp healer about Merelan's condition and waved farewell with the rest of the Hall.

Although the Ruathan runnerbeasts provided were well trained and easy riding, Merelan at first rode in Dalma's efficient house-wagon, since she knew herself incapable of managing the antics of a mount right then. Petiron, less familiar with riding beasts, was more often on the lead wagon seat, talking to Sev Ritecamp or his father or his uncle or whoever was the day's guide. Despite his forebodings and initial dismay, Petiron soon began to relax and enjoy the trip. Having overheard the favorable comments about the Ruathan breed, he offered Sev's eldest son the chance to ride his mount, and consequently he found all the Ritecamp men more genial toward him. He even enjoyed the nightly music sessions, for almost everyone in the thirty wagons of the train played some instrument and could carry intricate parts. Many had good voices, and he found himself conducting four-and five-part harmonies to some of their favorite ballads and airs, as well as teaching them the newer songs.

"They're nearly as good as fourth-year apprentices," he said with some surprise to Merelan at the end of the third evening's session.

"They do it for fun," she said gently.

"There's no reason they cannot do it better and have fun, too," he said, not at all pleased at her subtle rebuke over his attempt to improve the harmonies.

"Now, hold still, while I put the salve on your face," she went on, holding his chin firmly while she pasted his cheeks and nose with the remedy for the windburn he'd acquired.

With her that close to him, he could see she had more color in her pale cheeks, though she still coughed so hard it made him wince to think what damage she might be doing her vocal cords. But she didn't seem quite as strained about the eyes and mouth as she had been.

"Are you all right, Mere?" he asked, holding her by the arms.

"Of course, I'm all right. Why, it's an answer to one of my childhood dreams: going adventuring in a trader's van."

She favored him with the wide smile that put dimples in both cheeks, and she was more his Merelan than she had been since before her pregnancy. He folded her into his arms, hugging her -- remembering to be gentle, as he felt how thin she still was in his embrace. That reminded him what he might not have, and he was about to put her firmly away from him when she clung tightly.

"It's safe enough," she murmured and he clasped her with a passion that he had been aching to express but had sternly repressed. He didn't even have to worry about an inopportune interruption from the baby sleeping in the spare crib in Dalma's wagon. So he loved Merelan with a single-minded urgency that had been denied him far too long. Nor was there any reluctance in her response to him.

The slow trip south was really a very good idea.

At some point during that ambling three-week journey to the southern tip of South Boll, Petiron realized that he had been nearly as strung out, emotionally and physically, as Merelan. Being in the Harper Hall, with music, musicians, and instruments constantly heard, caused one to think only of music to write for instruments and voices to perform. On the road, he was not compelled by the tacit competition rampant in the Harper Hall to produce yet more complex and glorious sounds. He had an opportunity for the first time since he had started his apprentice years to realize the richness -- as well as the simplicity -- of life all around him.

He'd come from Telgar Hold, one of the largest, so he had never really been short of the necessities of day-to-day existence. Living in the Harper Hall had been a continuation of his childhood's conditions. He took so many things for granted that it was a lesson to him to be denied easy access to, say, the well-tanned hides for musical compositions that he was accustomed to covering with quick, large notations. Now he learned to write economically, using small marks that allowed him to fit more than one work on a single hide.

Eating was another thing he had never given much thought to. Food arrived in the Hall with no indication to those who dined of its acquisition or preparation. Now he learned to hunt and fish with the other men of the caravan, even as the women gathered firewood and nuts and, as they continued to the warmer areas, early greens, fruits, and berries.

Petiron could stride along with the other traders all day long now, and Merelan, too, put on weight and became weather-tanned, and fit. She walked part of each day with Dalma and the other young mothers, at a pace slow enough for the youngest toddler to keep up. Her cough disappeared and she was once again vivid with the beauty that had stopped Petiron's heart five Turns earlier. And he began to realize just how restrictive he had been in the Harper Hall; so immersed had he become in composition and practice that he had forgotten that other things existed in life: a normal life.

The caravan camped for three days by one of the Runner Stations, and, as usual, the Station Master sent his runners out in all directions to alert those who lived far off the southern road.

"Some of these people are very shy," the Station Master told his guests. "You might even find them... well, a bit... odd."

"You mean, from living off in the hills?" Merelan asked.

Sev scratched his head. "They got odd notions, you might say."

Merelan knew there was something that he was not saying, and she couldn't understand his sudden reticence.

"Ah, d'you have something that isn't Harper blue?" he blurted.

"I do," Merelan said, "but I don't think Petiron does. You mean, he might aggravate someone?" She smiled to show that she perfectly understood.

"Ah, yes, that's about the size of it."

"I'll see what I can do about keeping him occupied," she said, smiling sympathetically.

Everything went very well the first two days. The morning of the third, Merelan was entertaining all the children with game songs and teaching them the gestures that went with them, when a very tattered girl, eyes wide with delight, moved with surreptitious stealth closer and closer. When she was near enough, Merelan smiled at her.

"Do you want to join us?" she asked in a carefully soft voice.

The girl shook her head, her eyes wide now with a mixture of longing and fear.

"Oh, please, everyone else is here," Merelan said, doing her best to reassure the timid child. "Rob, open the circle and let her in, will you, dear?"

The child took another step and then suddenly squealed when she saw a man charging from the trader's wagon, right at Merelan's circle.

"You there... you stop that, you harlot. You evil creature, luring children away from their parents..."

Merelan didn't realize at first that he meant her. The child raced into the shelter of the heavy plantationjust beyond the clearing, but that didn't seem to cool the man's fury, for he charged right up to Merelan, his arm raised to strike her.

Robinton ran to clutch his mother's skirts, frightened by the wild threats and crazed behavior. Sev, the Station Master, two of the male runners, and three other traders charged to her rescue, Sev just in time to push the attacker off balance and away from Merelan. The children were by then all weeping and running away.

"Easy, Rochers, she's a mother, singing baby songs," Sev said, holding the man away.

"She's singing, ent she? Singing comes first, don't it? Singing to lure kids away! She's evil. Just like all harperfolk. Teachin' things no one needs to know to live proper."

"Rochers, leave be," the Station Master said, exercising considerable force to pull the man away, shooting embarrassed and apologetic glances at Merelan.

"Come, Rochers, we need to finish dealing," said one of the traders. "Come on, we'd nearly shook hands..."

"Harper harlot!" Rochers shouted, trying to free a fist to wave at Merelan, who was clinging to Robinton as much as he was clinging to her.

"She's not a harper, Rochers. She's a mother, amusing the kids," the Station Master said, loudly enough to try to drown out what the man was saying.

"She had 'em dancing!" Spittle was beginning to form in the corners of his mouth as the men pulled him back to the wagons.

"Get into Dalma's wagon, Merelan," Sev said quickly. "We'll clear him out."

Merelan complied, picking Robie up in her arms and trying to calm his frightened sobs. She slipped behind a tree and through the wooded verge until she could duck into Dalma's wagon, one of the last in the Station clearing. She was shaking when she got inside it, and she nearly shrieked with fear when someone pushed open the little door. But it was only Dalma, her face white with anxiety. She embraced Merelan and tried to soothe Robinton all at the same time.

"Crazy, woods crazy," she murmured reassuringly. "Who'd've thought he'd even notice you over there, playing so nicely."