Free Nerilka's Story by Anne McCaffrey

now making sure that Master Capiam went back where he belonged. I took the opportunity and walked quickly down the slope to the waiting people.
    “Nah, then, Master Capiam,” Theng was saying as I made good my escape, “you know I can’t allow you close contact with any of your craftsmen.”
    I was immensely relieved that Theng intervened at that point. It was presumptuous of me, perhaps, but I felt that Master Capiam ought to remain where he was accessible to drum messages and councils with other Masters, particularly when he and the Masterharper had just pulled their Craftsmen from Fort Hold. As devoted a Craftsman as he was, it was not right that Master Capiam put himself at risk in this wretched camp. Perhaps now that the vaccine was being processed, the internment camp would be dispersed in only a matter of days. It would be a long time, however, before Hold, Hall, and Weyr could pick up the skein of routine and unravel the tangle in which the plague had left us.
    I had a very selfish reason for being glad that Master Capiam had elected to stay above. I wished to change my identity as well as my Hold. One or two harpers or healers might recognize me from their attendance at the Hold, but they wouldn’t be looking for Lady Nerilka here in the internment camp, surrounded by infection and vulnerable to discomfort as well as death.
    Although she had not said so, Desdra undoubtedly had refused my offers of assistance because she knew that young ladies of Hold Blood did not engage in such activities on a public basis. She probably considered me a feckless, trivial person and perhaps I was: Some of my recent thoughts and decisions could have been considered petty. But I did not consider that I was sacrificing my high rank and position. I thought, rather, that I was putting myself in the way of being useful, instead of immured in a Hold, protected and unproductive, wasting my energy on trivia like sewing for my stepmother. Such a “suitable occupation” for a girl of my rank could so easily be undertaken by the least drudge from the linen rooms.
    These thoughts fleeted through my head as I kept up the awkward gait I had assumed—ironic, as Hold girls were taught to take such tiny steps that they appeared to float across the floor. I had never quite mastered that skill. I followed the men and women who had brought the baskets to the perimeter. Now I could see that most of them wore harper knots. One man wore the colors of the River Hold, and another of the Sea Hold. Travelers trapped on their way to seek help from Tolocamp? The path turned off into the copse, where I could now see that rude shelters had been erected. We had been indeed fortunate that the weather had been so clement, for the third month was generally blustery, often blizzardy, and freezing cold. Each open fire in its ring of stones wore either spit or kettle iron. Was this where my restorative soups had gone? Then I realized that those huddled in blankets or hides about each fire had the gray complexions and lackluster expressions of convalescents.
    One larger shelter, its sides made of an odd assortment of materials, was set to one edge of the copse, and from it issued a chorus of rasping coughs and groans that labeled it the main infirmary. It was toward this that the demijohn of fellis was being taken. Those carrying the baskets of food were beginning to distribute bread to those at the fires. Three women began to sort the vegetables and meat scraps into kettles. The silence was the worst of the scene.
    I hastened to the infirmary and was met at the door by a tall, unshaven healer. “Fellis, herbs—what have you?” he asked eagerly.
    “Tussilago. Lady Nerilka made it fresh last night.”
    He grimaced and took the demijohn from me. “It’s heartening to know not everyone there agrees with the Lord Holder.”
    “He’s a hypocritical coward.”
    The healer raised eyebrows in surprise. “Young woman, it is unwise to speak of your Lord Holder in that