The Shattered Cothold

Writers: Avery
Date Posted: 28th March 2016

Characters: Riveenata, R'kehr
Description: Two sweepriders find a grisly sight
Location: Citrus Bay Hold
Date: month 4, day 15 of Turn 8
Notes: Mentioned: Lanniya

She had seen the impact of hurricanes on River Bluff Weyr before, but for as long as Riveenata could remember, she had never seen anything this bad. The Weyr had been hit during her life, but those had frequently been glances, and they'd had enough warnings from dragons and dolphins to be able to batten down what they could. And after all, the Weyr was made of solid stone and carved into the cliff. Outlying buildings could be hit, as they'd been this time, but weyrfolk were an industrious lot and so they'd been able to rebuild and go about their way reasonably quickly.

But she'd never seen what a hurricane could do outside of a Weyr. It was because she had not been a rider, and the rest of the South generally frowned on women crafters, so she wouldn't have been able to provide the direct aid she was trained for as a Healer. So why would she have been assigned to the assistance rosters? She'd always imagined it would be like what happened to the Weyr - some damage but quickly picked back up.

When she'd flown Thread over the Weyr's territories, she was always too busy to consider anything but that. And when doing sweeps, she was usually too busy focusing on that to truly spend time examining the composition of the buildings, since she was looking for problems. So she hadn't really realized how fragile they were compared to the Weyr itself. Oh they were
built out of Thread-resistant materials, or at least the roofs were. But the freestanding buildings like smaller holds and especially all of the cots weren't nearly as sturdy.

The first sweepride they'd done over Sunstone had been hard for her to stomach. She'd seen buildings that had had sides ripped off, but other parts were successfully standing. She'd seen others that were completely collapsed, shattered into brick or stone chunks. Trees had been splintered and their limbs fallen over to flatten more plants, and it was apparent the orchards had taken a significant blow.

It had been a grim ride that had taught her some lessons about life outside of the Weyr. Thread they could fight, and if they did their job right, they'd prevent the holders from dealing with infestations. But this kind of weather damage? There was nothing the dragons could have done to prevent it. All they could do was step in now to do what they could to provide relief.

By the time she'd gotten back to the Weyr Riveenata had wanted nothing more than a soak and to collapse. Lanniya had seemed pale and drawn afterwards. The greenrider had agreed with that feeling - what they'd seen had been sobering. That hadn't stopped her from being among the first in line to volunteer to do additional sweeps.

The regular wings had the bulk of the emergency sweep roster, since they were all hale and hearty, while the queen's wing was full of pregnant and recovering riders, with a few able-bodied wingriders like herself. That hadn't stopped her from signing her name to the list, reasoning she was healthy and could take a shift; if it was a problem she was sure she'd be removed. But either no one had had a problem, or no one had noticed.

Riveenata had been assigned to fly out with R'kehr. He'd Impressed in the weyrling class that had just graduated, which meant they were both relatively junior riders. He was normally lively and cheerful, and so he'd been good company as they'd gotten ready with supplies and maps, and then headed to Citrus Bay Seahold to begin. Over the course of their three-candlemark sweep, though, they'd both lost any sense of humor they'd had.

Right near the end of their sweep, when they'd been farthest away from their starting point, they had found one cot that was more inland, that had had all its occupants dead inside, crushed under the weight of their roof falling in. That had been a particularly nightmarish moment. She'd seen crush damage before as a Healer, when there had been accidents at the Weyr's docks, or once when a man had been trampled under panicked
herdbeasts. But this was another thing entirely.

R'kehr had gone to see if anything else was recordable. Riveenata was sitting on a convenient outcropping of rock, unfolding he map of the territory they had, and using the oiled marker to mark out the cothold with a large X. On the sheets of explanatory hide where they could make more detailed notes, she recorded that the cothold had been found with the buildings in a destroyed state, that the human casualties were total. The
last part of the page she left empty for anything R'kehr found.

While she waited for the young bronzerider to come back, she found she couldn't stop thinking about the reasons why the inhabitants of the cot had stayed. It hadn't seemed that far of an overland distance to a shelter not if they'd had a few candlemarks of notice and access to runners. There was Citrus Bay nearby, where there were strong shelters to guard against
the storm. Why had they stayed in their cot? Had they only had enough warning to batten down their own home, and not enough to risk traveling on the roads in case the storm's fury had caught them unprepared? Had they assumed the roof that saved them from Thread every sevenday would be enough?

Riveenata knew she'd never really know why the cot holders had done what they done. They must have had their reasons when they'd made their choice to shelter in place, and it was a choice that had gone poorly for them. She knew she'd continue to see the shattered building and the mangled bodies for days to come.

"The runners are dead, but their draft beasts are alive," R'kehr said from behind her.

The greenrider started, the marker slipping and dragging a bit more mark on the map. She scowled at herself for her inattention and licked her sleeve to wet it to try to rub the mark off.

"What beasts? How?" she asked.

R'kehr reported what he'd seen. "They had a big stable. Almost the size of the cot. I found two of big draft herd beasts alive in the stables."

"Those were intact?" she asked.

"Not entirely. Looks like they had spent a lot of effort reinforcing the stables. I guess they relied on their draft beasts, so that part had a good solid stone siding and roof. The runners must have been newer, because that was a wooden addition. Oh, they had the solid roof over that part too - that broke through and squished the runners." The bronzerider
shuddered.

"Eugh," she said, wrinkling her nose. "I'll mark that there are surviving beasts down. Did you do anything with them?"

"No, should I? I wasn't sure what'd happen to them."

"We'll report it when we get back to Citrus Bay. Maybe the hold will find that information useful come out here to take them to replace any of their own animals that died."

"The roads are pretty badly off, not sure they'd want to come out here," R'kehr said.

"Then maybe the holder will say we can come back here and slaughter them for the Weyr. Think they'd be worth eating?"

"Thadath says he'd eat them. He's pretty hungry after this."

"I know what you mean. Savith is starving," she said, shaking her head.

"How many more after this place?"

"Two more cot holds to check on, then we can go back to the weyr," she said after checking the map.

"Thank Faranth. I need a soak, a skin of wine, and a tumble to get my mind off this," R'kehr said.

"Me too," Riveenata said. But her heart wasn't in the words. She had a feeling she'd be seeing this destroyed cot in her mind for quite some time.

Last updated on the April 4th 2016

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The Shattered Cothold