The Old Time (2/3)

Writers: Estelle
Date Posted: 8th December 2024
Series: The Missing Wingleader

Characters: M'gan, Nirzhaya
Description: Nirzhaya and M'gan visit the Gather in the past
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr, Elsewhere on Pern
Date: month 2, day 20 of Turn 12
Notes: Notes: M'gan's past timing is council approved.

Afterwards, that evening would seem dream-like to M'gan, but in the moment it had been just like any other Gather night. They wandered into a row of canopied stalls heaped with different kinds of goods, manned by eager traders and craftfolk. At first there were rolls of rich cloth, embroidered blouses and tunics, gleaming leather boots and the glitter of jewels in delicate silver settings. Then, as they followed their noses, they came to brightly glazed plates, trays and cooking pots, and beyond those to sugared fruits, elaborate whirls of pastry, skewers of meat sizzling over a brazier and spicy-scented wine.

Someone tapped M'gan on the shoulder and he jumped, turning to look into the face of a smiling man with round, flushed cheeks. He raised an eyebrow at their knots, but there was no hostility in his manner, only surprise. "Welcome, dragonriders! It's not often we get visitors from the Weyr at our little hold."

"Ah..." He hardly knew what to say, or whether he was talking to a man or a long-gone ghost. By their standards, the hold was hardly little - this gather wouldn't have discredited a Lord's Hold - but it would have been different then. Now. "Thank you?"

"We were out for a night ride and saw the lights," Nirzhaya said with an easy smile. "And I persuaded my friend to go a-gathering."

"We're honoured you chose to join us. Can I interest you in a glass of wine - or a bottle for future enjoyment, perhaps?" The man gestured towards his stall, and M'gan recognised a journeyman vintner's knots. "This red is all the way from Amethyst Cliff. Master Jefirant's eleventh pressing, from 1153. We think it's going to do very well."

Nirzhaya glanced at him, raising an eyebrow slightly. He was lost for a moment in the strangeness of hearing a wine of twenty-five Turns' repute - in their own time - offered as a new vintage at a Gather, that he almost forgot to answer. "Oh - yes. But perhaps a couple of glasses of the ordinary red for now..."

He fumbled in his pocket for a mark piece, with no time to worry about whether the vintner would accept it or what the consequences might be of leaving something from his time behind him, and accepted the glasses. The wine tasted smooth and fruit-rich on his tongue, and as they wandered on, it took the edge off the unreal sense that he really shouldn't be here.

"You should have bought the bottle," Nirzhaya commented, her eyes glinting in the lamplight. "It'd be worth a lot more back home."

"I didn't come prepared for shopping." M'gan rattled the few loose marks in his pocket. Soon, he'd relaxed enough to hand over a thirty-second mark for a handful of hot bubbly pies.

"Let's see if we can find some Healers. If they're not sniffy about my knots then we'll know for certain we're pre-plague." She bit into her pie and licked the sugar from her lips.

"Oh - right." Even through his distraction and the softening glow of the wine, he felt a twinge of alarm. "We should be careful."

"Yes, I know. Don't mention the plague."

"Or the Weyrhealer. He'd be, what, a little junior journeyman in this time. Do you remember who came before him?"

"I have prepared for this, you know. There should be a stall somewhere with herbs and cough remedies and the like. I'll just ask them how business is, and if there's any news from the Hall." The greenrider wove her way through the crowd, trailing her companion in her wake.

True to her word, she didn't mention anything to the journeyman manning the stall that suggested she had any knowledge of the future. M'gan hung back while they discussed the latest developments in the craft, much of which was incomprehensible to him, wishing she hadn't taken such a risk. They'd seen in a moment that there was no need for confirming the date: the healer on duty was a woman.

"We definitely did it!" Nirzhaya was grinning as she returned to him, barely able to suppress her excitement. "Unless you've gone to truly legendary lengths to play a joke on me, we're before 1160. The name of the Healer Hallmaster checks out, and when I asked if any new infectious diseases had been reported..."

"You did what?"

"Relax! It's a perfectly ordinary question for a healer to ask. They said there'd been some fever cases reported in Emerald Falls but it wasn't serious." She linked her arm with his. "Next, we need to get an idea of how many people are here, and how far they've come. We know that Holinbridge was a bigger hold in the past than now...I mean, then. Where we came from. There are people here from all over the South. That wine from Amethyst Cliff, and look at all those riverboats - they'll have come south from the trading ports."

They'd come to to the dancing square, which bordered on the river and the wide stone bridge. Across the water, there were indeed trader boats moored at the quay, sometimes two deep, no doubt attracted by the opportunity to sell their wares at the Gather.

"I don't know. We shouldn't stay long."

"But we went to so much effort to get here. Preparing the star chart, researching the names of Masterhealers and the like, an hour's straight flying. We can't just stay ten minutes."

"It's been more than a half-hour..."

His objection was interrupted by a roll of drums and a chord from the stage that had been set up for the harpers. Nirzhaya laughed and tugged at his arm. "Don't you at least want to dance?"

Last updated on the December 16th 2024

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