Phaidan
"Phaidan! Phaidan! Shard it, wake up!" someone called. Phaidan stumbled over to the door and opened it, still half asleep. Narga, one of the Hold's healers was standing there, looking very worried as usual. "Thank Faranth!" she gasped. "Come!" she grabbed Phaidan's arm and pulled him from the room.
"Where are we going?" he asked Narga as he struggled to keep up with her. "And can't we slow down? I'm still asleep!"
"We can't slow down because we're going to the infirmary where Larielle is because she collapsed!" Narga explained. "Wake up!"
Phaidan had been awake from the moment he'd heard the words infirmary and Larielle in the same sentence. "She what?" he exclaimed. "Why?"
"Don't know. She was sitting there in the dining hall, talking with the tailor and then she just collapsed," Narga told him. "When I left to get you, they were trying to revive her."
Phaidan increased his pace, all but running down the halls. He reached the infirmary far before Narga did. The sight of Larielle laying there, chest barely rising and falling with shallow breaths, made Phaidan hesitate before dashing to her side. One of the healers was checking her pulse. "Still there," he said, more to himself than Phaidan. "She's barely hanging on."
"Is she going to make it?" Phaidan asked, gazing nervously at Larielle. He could barely detect her breaths now. "Can't you do anything for her?"
"Can't do much until she stop's breathing," the healer replied, his tone saying that it really annoyed him to be so useless. "Everything I can think of would be too strong when she's so fragile right now."
So Phaidan sat there, doing nothing but watching Larielle, hoping that she'd wake up and everything would be alright. He couldn't tell how long it was after he arrived at the infirmary that the healer announced that her pulse was getting stronger. "Will she live?" Phaidan asked again.
"She's got a pretty good chance. She hasn't gone into cardiac arrest, it was just a mild heart attack. Tarnu!" he called to one of the apprentices, "what would you need to strengthen a heart recovering from a heart attack?"
The apprentice hesitantly replied with an herb Phaidan had never heard of before and, upon recieving an approving nod from the healer, dashed off, presumably to get the herb. "Will that help?" Phaidan couldn't help but ask, knowing that he was making a pest of himself.
"It should," the healer replied tolerantly. "She'll be a bit dizzy when she regains conciousness, but she should be fine after an hour or so."
Before the apprentice returned, however, something went horribly wrong. Narga bent almost mechanically to take Larielle's pulse. "No pulse!" she reported to the healer attenting Larielle, who swore loudly. The next few minutes were a whirl of activity for Phaidan. He saw it all as if he were in a dream. The apprentice returning with the herbs a minute too late, the healers trying to revive Larielle, the last effort before Narga shook her head sadly and stood back.
"I'm sorry Phaidan," Narga apologised in a soft voice. "She went into cardiac arrest and we couldn't bring her back."
Phaidan just sat there, too stunned to speak. It couldn't happen. Not so quickly. This must be a dream, and he'd wake up to find Larielle nestled beside him, safe and alive. Why wasn't he waking up. "No," he breathed.
"Do you need some time with her?" Narga asked, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. "We have enough space for her to take up a bed."
"No," Phaidan managed, wondering why he wasn't crying. "I... I think I'd like to be alone." Without another word, he got up and walked away, still plagued by that surreal feeling that this was all a dream. He didn't stop to see them pull the sheet over Larielle's body, he could see it happening in his mind as he walked down the halls back to his quarters.
He sat down on the bed, wondering if it was possible that he had shared this bed with Larielle not even a day ago, and she had been healthy as ever, no hint of what the day would bring. Finally the tears came. Phaidan just sat their, sobbing until he was sure he couldn't cry anymore. He finally fell back onto his bed just lay there, afraid that if he went back to sleep his world would change again.
He didn't know how much later it was when someone knocked on his door. He must have fallen asleep at some point, for when he opened his eyes he found himself staring up at the ceiling. "Come in," he called, not bothering to get the door. Nothing good ever seemed to follow that.
It was Narga who opened the door, quietly closing it behind her. "I just wanted to see how you were holding up and if you needed anything," she told him.
"I'm fine, I don't need anything," Phaidan replied, sitting up. "Did you think I'd need something?"
"I thought you might need someone to talk to, or a transport or something like that," Narga replied with a shrug. "Or if you just need to be alone, I'll leave."
"Why would I need a transport?" Phaidan asked. The possibility of leaving hadn't occured to him. He hadn't thought ahead to what it would be like tommorow, waking up without Larielle there.
"Many people who've lost a husband or wife don't stay for long," Narga answered. "I have a dragonrider friend who'd be happy to take you somewhere else."
Phaidan stared uncomprehendingly at Narga for a few moments. True, he couldn't bare to stay here, but how could he just leave the hold that'd been his home all his life? His father had been a steward here since before his oldest sister Anapai was born. But without Larielle... "I think I would like that," Phaidan answered.
During the evening meal that night, a drudge ran into the dining hall with a message that there was a dragonrider waiting for him in the courtyard. Phaidan hastily excused himself from where a few friends were trying to cheer him up and dashed outside.
Sure enough, a bluerider was waiting patiently for him, leaning up against his blue's massive side. "You must be Phaidan," the bluerider guessed as Phaidan neared. "I'm K'var, rider of blue Merrenth from Dark Moon Weyr."
"Merry meet, K'var," Phaidan replied, extending a hand in greeting, though he didn't feel very merry about anything at the moment.
"Nagra told me about Larielle," K'var began in the same sympathetic manner Phaidan was getting quite tired of by now. "I'm sorry."
Phaidan managed a wry grin. "Me too. We were going to be espoused next turn."
"So, where you headed?" K'var hastily changed the subject. "Feel like going somewhere warm or cold or just feel like going?"
"Don't much care," Phaidan replied with a shrug. "Where would you go if the woman you were planning to spend the rest of your life with died?"
"If I were a holder, I'd probably go somewhere I'd never been before, so that I couldn't find anything to remind me of her," K'var replied after a moment.
"That doesn't eliminate many places," Phaidan admitted.
"Ever wanted to go to a Weyr?" K'var suggested.
"Not really, but I wouldn't say no to visiting one," Phaidan replied with a shrug of indifference. "Why?"
"My Merrenth seems to think that you'd make a good Candidate if you'd like to Stand," K'var replied. "Might help you get over Larielle too."
"I don't think I ever will get over her," Phaidan sighed. "But I'm not going to turn down an oppourtunity to Impress. I might as well go to a Weyr instead of a hold."
Phaidan quickly packed the few things that would be essential for about a sevenday and told the most trustworthy drudge, Lifru, to have the rest shipped later.
He ran back out into the courtyard to find his family there. His mother was crying, his father looked as though he had cried, his two sisters also had red eyes; Larielle had been their friend. His brother ran up to him, wrapping his arms around Phaidan's legs. "Do you havta' go, 'Aidan?" the five turn old begged. "Do you havta'?"
Phaidan pried Apridin's arms from around his legs. "I have to go," he said, picking Apridan up and walking towards his family. He put Apriden down, gave his mother a quick hug and told them not to worry. Then he hosited his bags onto the dragon's back, secured them with K'var's help, and climbed up to sit behind K'var.
He could feel the muscles in Merrenth's legs bunch as the blue prepared to launch himself into the air. His stomach lurched as Merrenth lept from the ground and flew a little ways up into the crisp night air. The last thing he saw before Merrenth went Between was the lighted window of what used to be his quarters in the hold, and he couldn't help thinking that at this time last night, he and Larielle were in there. Then all was black.