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Prologue

RUKBAT, IN THE Sagittarian Sector, was a golden G-type star It had five planets, two asteroid belts and a stray planet that it had attracted and held in recent millennia When men first settled on Rukbat’s third world and called it Pern, they had taken little notice of the strange planet swinging around its adopted prienerations, the colonists gave the bright Red Star little thought—until the path of the wanderer brought it close to its stepsister at perihelion When such aspects were harmonious and not distorted by conjunctions with other planets in the systeht to bridge the space gap between its home and the more temperate and hospitable planet At these ti anything they touched The initial losses the colonists suffered were staggering As a result, during the subsequent struggle to survive and combat this menace, Pern’s tenuous contact with the mother planet was broken

To control the incursions of the dreadful Threads—for the Pernese had cannibalized their transport ships early on and abandoned such technological sophistication as was irrelevant to this pastoral planet—the -terhly specialized variety of a life forh es and some innate telepathic ability were trained to use and preserve these unusual anions—named for the mythical Terran beast they reseet fro a phosphine-bearing rock, they would eons could fly, they were able to char Thread in es

It took generations to develop to the fullest the potential of these dragons The second phase of the proposed defense against the deadly incursions would take even longer For Thread, a space-traveling anic rounded, burrowed and proliferated with terrifying speed So a symbiote of the same strain was developed to counter this parasite, and the resulting grub was introduced into the soil of the southern continent The original plan was that the dragons would be a visible protection, charring Thread while it was still skyborne and protecting the dwellings and the livestock of the colonists The grub-sy any Thread that ons’ fire

The originators of the two-stage defense did not allow for change or for hard geological fact The southern continent, overtly more attractive than the harsher northern land, proved unstable and the entire colony was eventually forced to e from the Threads in the natural caves on the continental shield rock of the north

The original Fort, constructed in the eastern face of the Great West Mountain Range, soon grew too small to hold the colonists Another settlereat lake conveniently formed near a cave-filled cliff But Ruatha Hold, as the settleenerations

Since the Red Star rose in the east, the people of Pern decided to establish a holding in the eastern mountains, provided a suitable cavesite could be found Only solid rock and ly short supply on Pern, were i score of Thread

The winged, tailed, fire-breathing dragons had by then been bred to a size that required more spacious accommodations than the cliffside holds could provide But ancient cave-pocked cones of extinct volcanoes, one high above the first Fort, the other in the Benden mountains, proved to be adequate and required only a few improvements to be made habitable However, such projects took the last of the fuel for the great stonecutters, which had been progra operations, not for wholesale cliff excavations Subsequent holds and weyrs had to be hand-hewn

The dragons and their riders in their high places and the people in their cave holds went about their separate tasks, and each developed habits that became custom, which solidified into tradition as incontrovertible as law

Then came an interval of two hundred Turns of the planet Pern around its primary—when the Red Star was at the other end of its erratic orbit, a frozen, lonely captive No Thread fell on Pern The inhabitants erased the depredations of Thread and grew crops, planted orchards froht of reforestry for the slopes denuded by Thread They even er of extinction Then the Threads fell again when the wandering planet returned for another orbit around Pern, bringing fifty years of attack froain thanked their ancestors, now ons who seared the dropping Thread midair with their fiery breath

Dragonkind, too, had prospered during that interval and had settled in four other locations, following the master plan of interim defense

The significance of the southern hele to establish new settlements Recollections of Earth receded further froeneration until end or myth and passed into oblivion

By the Third Pass of the Red Star, a complicated socio-political-economic structure had been developed to deal with this recurrent evil The six Weyrs, as the old volcanic habitations of the dragonfolk were called, pledged theraphica

l section of the northern continent literally under its wing The rest of the population agreed to tithe to support the Weyrs since these fighters, these dragonmen, did not have arable land in their volcanic ho their dragons to learn other trades during peaceti the planet during Passes

Settlements, called Holds, developed wherever natural caves were found—soically placed than others It took a strongThread attacks; it took wise ad could be safely grown, and it took extraordinary measures to control population and keep it productive and healthy until such time as the menace passed

Men with special skills in , e Hold and looked to one Mastercrafthall where the precepts of their craft were taught and craft skills were preserved and guarded froeneration to another One Lord Holder could not deny the products of the Crafthall situated in his Hold to others, since the Crafts were deemed independent of a Hold affiliation Each Craftiance to the Master of that particular craft—an elected office based on proficiency in that craft and administrative ability The Mastercraftsman was responsible for the output of his halls and the distribution, fair and unprejudiced, of all craft products on a planetary rather than parochial basis