Энн Маккефри - Beyond Between

“It is something I have thought often about,” Sh’gall said quietly. “When our lives as dragonriders are over, do we go on with our dragons to something else, or is this all we are?”

“I like to think that there is more for us, somewhere else,” Leri said wistfully, through her unchecked tears. “Another part to this life. But I am just a foolish old woman, hoping I’ll find my belovedbetween.”

“As to that,” Master Tirone cleared his throat, rocking back on his heels as he assumed an academic stance, “we know only that it is an area of nothingness separating here from there. But there is—” He paused dramatically. “—more to it than we will ever know. Another dimension, perhaps, through which only the dragons may travel.”

“Another dimension?” Lidora looked startled.

“As height and width and depth are dimensions.Between may be another such.”

“But we don’t know, do we?” Levalla, the Benden Weyrwoman, said in a puzzled tone.

“No, we don’t and I’m not sure how that applies to this. situation,” said Sh’gall.

“Has Orlith heard Moreta?” Tirone asked hopefully, whipping his head around to stare in the direction of the Hatching Ground.

“She says not,” Leri replied. “I asked her first,” she added in a tone that suggested Tirone shouldn’t have intimated that Orlith hadn’t been asked. “She is devastated.” Then Leri drew a deep breath. “Orlith and I shall gobetween as soon as the eggs are ready to hatch.”

There was a furious dispute from everyone in the room.

“And why should I stay?” Leri demanded when Sh’gall had waved for silence. “I had planned to leave anyway. Without my own dragon, I have no reason to stay, and much more for going.”

“Dear Leri, if your pain has worsened, I can increase the dose of fellis juice in your cup,” Desdra said, but Leri met her eyes.

“You haven’t a palliative strong enough to ease my loss of Holth,” she said, almost angrily. “It is no time to mourn,” she added, glancing at Lidora, who was weeping openly. “There is a queen egg to hatch, and twenty-four others. They are our future and deserve all our care and devotion. Your care and devotion.” She stared hard at Kamiana, whose eyes were dimmed by the tears she did not shed. The younger Weyrwoman gently folded sympathetic arms about the old woman, careful not to squeeze her sore body.

“You have more courage than the rest of us, dear Leri.”

The second night Moreta and Holth returned to Waterhole, she tried a new tactic. Dismounting, she made her way directly to Rusty’s paddock, where he was standing, front legs splayed, as he trumpeted his usual announcement about the proximity of a dragon.

“Boo!” Moreta shouted, leaning over the fence toward the runner.

Letting out a piercing squeal that made Moreta grab tightly to the top rail, Rusty kicked away from her, shooting pieces of dirt in all directions in his haste to flee.

Hearing the commotion, Thaniel appeared in the doorway. Rusty was rearing on his hind legs and striking out at some menace only he could see.

Now that Moreta had an audience, she took several steps backward and then stood very still, waiting for Rusty to calm down. Then, aware that Thaniel might go back inside the house, she ran forward again until she was right under Rusty’s nose.

“Boo!” she shouted again. He screeched, backing up as fast as he could move his feet. Then Moreta stepped back, which so confused the trembling old runner that he just watched her intently, evidently afraid of what she might do next.

He pawed the ground in front of him, as if daring her to come closer. But it was Thaniel who came closer, and he beckoned the mount over.

“G’wan. Rusty, do your stuff!” Moreta shouted loudly. “Can’t you see Holth over there? You always shriek when there are dragons about. Let’s hear it for old Holth!”

Quite willing to oblige, Holth moved from where she was standing. That did it. Rusty almost sat on his hindquarters in an effort to put distance between him and what his instincts told him was the bane of his existence. He cut some very fancy shapes on the ground and above it as he protested the dragon’s presence.

Moreta saw Thaniel’s incredulous expression.

But with that, he turned and walked back into his hold.

Moreta believed that Rusty had felt her presence and had lookedat her, not through her. So there had to be some way to get Thaniel to understand what she wanted.

This time Marco wasn’t waiting for herbetween. She took a few deep breaths to stifle her concern, but a twinge of fear added to the cold she was already feeling.

Holth, do you sense Duluth anywhere near?

Holth’s concern doubled Moreta’s. What would happen to them if they were forced to remainbetween? Where was Marco?

Holth, can you get us back to Paradise River?Moreta asked, already knowing the answer.

No,was the glum reply.If I could go betweenas I used to do with no trouble, I could take us there by flying straight, but it’s a long way from Waterhole.

Moreta began to shiver, earnestly wanting the warmth at Paradise River to revive her. What would she and Holth do if Marco didn’t come?

Then abruptly, she sensed movement in the air to her right, and a dark shape loomed toward them.

“Sorry. You didn’t take as long as I thought you would,” Marco said.

“Where were you?” she demanded. Then, contritely, she added: “I was scared.”

“Ah, now, Moreta, you know I wouldn’t leave you here.” Marco gestured expansively at the darkness around them. “I went to check on some movement I saw.” He pointed over his shoulder in the direction from which he had come. “Nothing.” He shrugged. “I’m sorry for giving you and Holth a fright.”

With a nod, she accepted his apology.

“So how’d your haunting go today?” Marco asked when they had landed back at Paradise River Cove.

“Haunting?”

“That’s a word we used on my homeworld to describe what you’re trying to do.”

“Oh, I see,” she replied, and proceeded to fill him in. He was highly amused by her tale of saying “boo” to Rusty and chided her for being so mean to a poor old runnerbeast.

“Right now, I’m glad that anything sees me.” She rubbed at her face. “If only I could just give Thaniel a message.”

They were both watching their dragons sprawling in the hot white sands. He gestured for her to sit on the rocks surrounding the fire pit, where, he told her, he lit a fire every night because it was comforting.

“If I could just get him to see me once, Marco, I might get him to see me as a message of some sort,” she said as she jabbed aimlessly at the sand with a charred, broken stick.

“I wonder what will work.”

“Something has to. I can’t keep ‘haunting’ him forever. Thaniel is supposed to be smarter than Rusty.”

Marco leaned across and took the stick from her hand. With the end of it, he wrote a large M in the sand. “I’ve never experienced anything like this before. No rider has ever been stuckbetween with the wrong dragon.” He rubbed his eyes, and continued. “I really don’t know if it’ll work, but youcould try writing a message for Thaniel in the dirt. What do you want to tell him?”

“Get Leri. Moreta.”

“That’s short, sweet, and to the point. Let’s hope he sees it,” Marco said.

And so Moreta returned again and again, every evening at the same time, until it became such a routine that Thaniel came out of his hold to stand by Rusty’s enclosure as if he were waiting for her. And each evening Moreta performed the same scare tactics with Rusty and then scratched her message in the ground. It was obvious to Moreta that the runnerbeast saw her, stared straight at her, while she gouged her message in the dirt, but Thaniel still looked through her, oblivious to the message she wanted him to see.