Dragonsinger (dragon riders of pern)

by Anne McCaffrey

  She held the tray for him so he could feed Zair as they crossed the room. She slid the tray onto the middle the sandtable and, anticipating the Harper’s own requirements, offered Zair his next few pieces of meat while Master Robinton gratefully gulped down steaming klah. He grabbed a piece of bread, dipped it into the sweeting, had another sip of klah and then, his mouth full, waved at Menolly to leave.

  “You’ve got your own to feed, too. Don’t forget to work on your song. I’ll require a finished copy later this morning.”

  She nodded and left him, wondering if she ought to check and see if Sebell was managing with Kimi. He was, seated at one of the journeymen’s tables, with more than enough willing assistants.

  Her fire lizards waited patiently at the kitchen steps with Piemur and Camo. Once her friends had been fed, she was enjoying a second cup of klah when Domick came striding across the court toward her.

  “Menolly,” and he was frowning with irritation, “I know Robinton wants you to finish that song for him, but will it take all morning? I wanted you to go through that quartet music with Sebell, Talmor and myself. Morshal has the girls for theory on firstday so Talmor’s free. I’ll never get that quartet ready for performance unless we have a few more good rehearsals.”

  “I’ll start the copy right now, only…”

  “Only what?”

  “I don’t have any copying tools.”

  “Is that all? Finish your klah quickly. I’ll show you Arnor’s den. Just as well I’m taking you,” Domick said, guiding her toward the door in the opposite corner of the court. “Robinton wants the song done on those sheets of pulped wood, and Arnor won’t hand them out to apprentices.”

  Master Arnor, the Hall’s archivist, occupied the large room behind the Main Hall. It was brilliantly lit with glow baskets in each corner, in the center of the room, and smaller ones depending above the tilted worktables where apprentices and journeymen bent to tasks of copying faded record hides and newer songs. Master Arnor was a fusser: he wanted to know why Menolly was to have sheets; apprentices had to learn how to copy properly on old hide before they could be entrusted with the precious sheets; what was all the hurry about? And why hadn’t Master Robinton told him himself if it was all this important? And a girl? Yes, yes, he’d heard of Menolly. He’d seen her in the dining hall, same as he saw all the other nuisancy apprentices and holder girls and, oh, well, all right, here was tool and ink, but she wasn’t to waste it now, or he’d have to make more and that was a lengthy process and apprentices never paid close attention to the simmering and if the solution boiled, it would be ruined and fade too soon and oh, he didn’t know what the world was coming to!

  A journeyman had been unobtrusively assembling the various items, and he handed them to Menolly, giving her an amused wink for his master’s querulousness. His smile also conveyed to Menolly the tip that the next time she should come directly to him rather than approach his cranky master.

  Domick got her away from the old archivist after the barest of courtesies. As they walked back to the Hall entrance, he again directed her not to be all morning at the copying or he’d never get the new quartet sufficiently rehearsed before the Festival. As he opened the door to the Main Hall, she heard the Masterharper’s voice and sped up the stairs.

  As she worked in her room, her concentration was penetrated now and then by voices raised in discussion in the Hall below. Absently she identified the various masters: Domick, Morshal, Jerint, the Masterharper and, to her surprise, Silvina, and others whose voices she couldn’t recognize as readily. As the conversations apparently had to do with posting journeymen to various positions about the country, she paid scant heed.

  She was, in fact, just finishing the third and looser interpretation of the song when a brisk tapping at the door startled her so much she almost smeared the sheet. At her answer, Domick strode in.

  “Haven’t you finished yet?”

  She nodded to the sheets, spread out to dry. Scowling with exasperation, he strode across the room and picked up the nearest sheet. Before she could warn him about damp ink, she noticed that he took the sheet carefully by the edges.

  “Hmmm. Yes. You copy neatly enough to please even old Arnor. Yes, now…” he was scanning the other sheets. “Traditional forms all duly observed… Not a bad tune, at all.” He gave her an approving nod. “Bit bare of chord, but the subject doesn’t need musical embellishment. Come, come, finish that sheet, too.” He pointed to the one before her. “Oh, you have! Fair enough.” He blew gently across the sheet to dry the last line of still glistening ink. “Yes, that’ll do. I’ll just be off with these. Take your gitar across to my quarters, Menolly, and study the music on the rack. You’re to play second gitar. Pay special attention to the dynamic qualities of the second variation.”

  With that he left her. Her right hand ached from the cramped position of copying, and she massaged it, then shook her fingers vigorously from the wrist to relieve the strain.

  “Now,” she heard the Masterharper’s voice from the room below, “the point is that all but one of the formalities has been observed. Admittedly, there’s not been much time spent in the Hall, but an apprenticeship served elsewhere under a competent journeyman has always been admissible. Does anyone wish to register any reservations about the competence of that journeyman?” There was a short pause. “So that’s settled. Ah, yes, thank you, Domick. Now, Master Arnor…” and Menolly lost the sound of his voice as he evidently moved away from the window.

  She was uncomfortably aware that she was not only an inadvertent eavesdropper on Craft matters not her business, but disobedient to Master Domick’s orders. Not that she didn’t wish to follow them. She picked up her gitar. Playing with Talmor, Sebell and Domick was a pure delight. Had Master Domick meant to intimate that she’d be part of that quartet in a performance? Well, if yesterday was any sample of being a harper, yes, she probably would be performing in that quartet, new as she was to the Harper Hall. That was part of being a harper, after all.

  When Menolly entered Domick’s quarters, Talmor and Sebell, Kimi disposed on his shoulder and not looking too pleased to be shifted from the crook of his arm, were already discussing the music. They greeted her cheerfully and asked if she’d enjoyed her first go in a gather at Fort Hold. They both laughed at her enthusiastic replies.

  “Everyone’s the better for a good gather,” said Talmor.

  “Except Morshal,” said Sebell, and, glancing sideways at Talmor as if they shared some secret, rubbed the side of his nose.

  “Let us play, Journeyman Sebell.” Menolly thought that Talmor sounded reproving.

  “By all means, Journeyman Talmor,” said Sebell, not the least bit perturbed.

  “If you will join us, Apprentice Menolly.” The brown man gestured elaborately for Menolly to take the stool beside him.

  As Menolly checked the tuning of her gitar, Talmor turned the sheets of music on the rack. “Where does he want us to start?”

  “Master Domick told me to study the dynamics of the second variation,” said Menolly with helpful deference.

  “That’s right, that’s where,” said Talmor, snapping his fingers before he flipped the correct sheets to the front. “At the beat then…sweet shells, he’s changing the time in every third measure…what does he expect of us?”

  “Are the dynamics difficult?” asked Menolly, feeling apprehensive.

  “Not difficult, just Domick all over,” said Talmor with the sigh of the long-suffering. But he tapped the appropriate beat on the wood of his gitar and gave a more emphatic fifth beat for them to start.

  They’d had a chance to go through the second variation once before Domick entered the room. Nodding courteously to them, he took his place. “Let’s start at the beginning of the second variation, now that you’ve had a chance to play through it.” They worked steadily, going straight through the music once. The second time they paused frequently to perfect the more difficult passages and balance the parts. The dinner bell punctuated
the brisk notes of the finale. Talmor and Sebell put down their instruments with small sighs of relief, but Menolly refingered the final three chords softly before she laid her instrument down.

  “Does your hand hurt?” asked Domick with unexpected solicitude.

  “No, I was just wondering if the string was true.”

  “If you heard a sour sound, it was my stomach,” said Talmor.

  “Too much gathering?” asked Sebell with little sympathy,

  “No, not enough breakfast, thank you!” replied Talmor with the brusqueness of someone being teased. He rose and left the room, followed closely by the silently laughing Sebell.

  “Master Shonagar has you this afternoon, Menolly?” asked Domick, motioning for Menolly to come with him.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, then you’d have to continue that voice instruction anyway,” he said in a cryptic fashion. Menolly decided he must be wishing to have her practice with him more steadily, but Master Robinton had been specific: her mornings were scheduled to Master Domick; afternoons she was to go to Master Shonagar.

  When they entered the dining hall, the room was already well filled. Domick turned to the right toward the masters’ table. Menolly caught one glimpse of Master Morshal, already seated, his face set in the sourest lines she had yet seen on the bad-tempered old man, so she looked quickly away.

  “Pona’s gone!” Piemur pounced on her from the left, his face wreathed with smug satisfaction. “So I can sit with you, near the girls, now. Audiva said I could ’cause it was Pona who got snotty. Audiva says will you please sit with her.”

  “Pona’s gone?” Menolly, both surprised and nervous, permitted Piemur to pull her toward the hearthside table. There were two empty places, one on either side of Audiva, who smiled hesitantly as she saw Menolly approaching. She beckoned to the seat on her right, away from the other girls.

  “See, Pona is gone! She got taken away a-dragonback,” Piemur added, his pleasure in her departure somewhat allayed by the prestigious manner of her going.

  “Because of yesterday?” The thin knot of worry in her middle grew larger and colder. Pona in the cot, contained by the discipline of the Harper Hall, was bad enough; but, in her grandfather’s Hold, pouring out acid vengeance, she was much more dangerous for Harper apprentice, Menolly.

  “Naw, not just yesterday,” Piemur said firmly. “So don’t you go feeling guilty about it. But yesterday was the final crack, the way I heard it, bearing false witness against you. And Dunca’s been raked over by Silvina! That pleased her no end; she’s just been itching to take Dunca down.”

  Timiny was straddling three seats across from Audiva, and gesturing urgently to Menolly and Piemur to take them.

  “You sit with Timiny, Piemur. I’m going to sit next to Audiva. Looks like she’s being put on by Briala with that empty seat and all.”

  As she stepped to the place, she caught Briala’s startled, antagonistic glance. The dark girl nudged her neighbor, who also turned to glare at Menolly. But Menolly smiled at Audiva and, as she stood by the tall craft-girl, she felt Audiva’s hand fumble for hers and the grateful pressure of her fingers. Stealing a sideways glance, she noticed that Audiva’s eyes looked red and her cheeks showed the puffiness of recent and prolonged weeping.

  The signal to be seated was given, and the meal began. If Menolly felt too self-conscious and Audiva too upset to talk, Piemur suffered no inhibitions and babbled on about how he’d made his marks count.

  “I got nine more bubbly pies, Menolly,” he told her gaily, “ ’cause the baker thought they were for you, me and Camo. I did share with Timiny, didn’t I, Tim? And then I won a wager on the runners. Anyone with half an eye could tell the one with the sore hoof would run faster…so he wouldn’t have to run so long.”

  “So, how many marks did you come back with?”

  “Ha!” Piemur’s eyes flashed with his triumph. “More’n I went to the gather with, and I’m not saying how much that is.”

  “You’re not keeping it in the dorm, are you?” asked Timiny, worried.

  “Haw! I gave it to Silvina to keep safe for me. I’m no fool. And I told the entire dorm where my marks are, so they know it’s no good putting on me to find out where I’ve hid ’em. I may be small, but my glow’s not dim!”

  Briala, who was pretending to ignore them all, made a disagreeable sound. Piemur was about to take umbrage when Menolly kicked his shin to warn him to be silent.

  “You know what, Menolly,” and now Piemur leaned across the table, exuding mystery as he glanced from her to Audiva and Timiny, “they’re posting journeymen.”

  “Are they?” asked Menolly, mystified.

  “You ought to know. Couldn’t you hear anything in your room? I saw the windows of the Main Hall open, and you’re right over ’em.”

  “I was busy,” Menolly said sternly to Piemur. “And I was brought up not to listen to other people’s private conversations!”

  Piemur rolled his eyes in exasperation for such niceties. “You’ll never survive in a Harper Hall then, Menolly! You’ve got to be one jump ahead of the masters…and the Lord Holders…A harper’s supposed to learn as much as he can…”

  “Learn, yes; overhear, no,” replied Menolly.

  “And you’re an apprentice,” added Audiva.

  “An apprentice learns to be a harper by overhearing his master, doesn’t he?” demanded Piemur. “Besides, I gotta think ahead. I gotta be good at something besides singing. My voice won’t last forever. Do you realize that only one out of hundreds,” and he waved his arms in such an expansive gesture that Timiny had to duck, “of boy sopranos have any voice when they hit the change? So, if I’m not lucky, but if I’m good at digging things out, maybe I’ll get posted like Sebell and have a fire lizard to take important messages from hold to hall…” Then Piemur froze, and cautiously turned to look at Menolly, his eyes wide with consternation.

  She laughed; she couldn’t help it. Timiny, who had obviously heard Piemur’s long-range plan before, gulped so fiercely that his neck cartilage bobbed up and down his throat like a net floating in a fast current.

  “I really do like the fire lizards, Menolly, I really do,” said Piemur, trying to undo the indiscretion and reinstate himself in Menolly’s good graces.

  She couldn’t resist a pretense of disdain, and ignored him, but his expression was so genuinely panic-stricken that she relented sooner than she intended.

  “Piemur, you’ve been my best and first friend in the Hall. And I really do think my fire lizards like you. Mimic, Rocky and Lazy let you feed them. I may not be able to help, but if I do ever have any say in the matter, you’ll get an egg from one of Beauty’s clutches.”

  Piemur’s exaggerated sigh of relief attracted attention from the other girls, who were still pretending that that end of the table didn’t exist. Platters of stewed meats and vegetables were now being served, and Menolly took advantage of the general noise to ask Audiva how things were with her.

  “All right, once the furor died down. I rank the rest them, even if rank is not supposed to be a consideration while we’re at the Harper Hall.”

  “You’re also the best musician of the lot,” said Menolly, trying to cheer Audiva. She sounded very depressed, and she must have been crying a lot to have such puffy cheeks.

  “Do you really think I can play?” asked Audiva, surprised and pleased.

  “From what I heard that morning, yes. The others are hopeless. If there’s no reason you have to stay at Dunca’s when you have free time, maybe you’d like to come to my room. We could practice together if that would help.”

  “Me? Practice with you? Oh, Menolly, could I please? I really do want to learn, but all the others want to do is talk about the fosterlings at the Hold, and their clothes, and who their fathers are likely to choose as husbands for them, and I want to learn how to play well.”

  Menolly extended her hand, palm up, and Audiva gratefully seized it, her eyes sparkling, all traces of her unhappiness e
rased.

  “Just wait till I tell you what happened in the cot,” she said in a confidential tone that reached only Menolly’s ears. She saw Piemur cocking his head to try and hear, and waved him away. “It was a treat! A rare treat! What Silvina said to Dunca!” Audiva giggled.

  “But won’t there be trouble about Pona being sent back? She is the granddaughter of the Lord Holder of Boll.”

  Audiva’s face clouded briefly. “The Harper has the right to say who stays in his own Hall,” replied Audiva quickly. “He has equal rank with a Lord Holder, who can dismiss any fosterling he chooses. Besides, you’re a holder’s daughter.”

  “Holder’s, not Lord Holder’s. Only I’m an apprentice now!” Menolly touched her shoulder badge, which meant more to her than being her father’s daughter.

  “You’re the Masterharper’s apprentice,” said Piemur who indeed had sharp ears if he’d heard their whispers. “And that makes you special.” He glanced toward Briala, who had also been trying to overhear what Menolly and Audiva were saying. “And you’d better remember that, Briala,” he said, making a fierce grimace at the dark girl.

  “You may think you’re special, Menolly,” said Briala in a haughty voice, “but you’re only an apprentice, after all’s said and sifted. And Pona’s her grandfather’s favorite. When she tells him all that’s been going on here, you may not be that anymore!” And she snapped her fingers in a derisive gesture.

  “Close your mouth, Briala! You talk nothing but nonsense,” said Audiva, but Menolly caught the note of uncertainty in her voice.

  “Nonsense? Just wait’ll you hear what Benis plans for that Viderian of yours!” They were all distracted by a sudden groan from Piemur.

  “Shells, Pona has gone! That means that I’m stuck with singing her part! What a ruddy bore!” His dismay was comic, but it turned the talk to a discussion of the upcoming Spring Festival.

  Piemur told Menolly that if she thought a gather was fun, she should just wait for the Festival. Everyone in the Hold cliff doubled up so that the entire western half of Pern could be under shelter there for the two days of the Festival. Dragonmen came from all over, and harpers and craftmasters and holders, large and small. That’s when any new craftmasters were made, and new apprentices tapped, and it was great fun, even if he would have to sing Pona’s role, and there’d be dancing all night long instead of just until sundown.