Dragonsblood

by Todd McCaffrey

  “At least with the sick dragons,” K’tan said.

  “But you can’t say if a dragon that seems healthy hasn’t already got the sickness,” Tullea remarked.

  “No,” Lorana agreed. “We can’t.”

  “So we might end up with the whole Weyr up in high fields,” Tullea interjected sourly. “What a great idea.”

  “It’s the best we can come up with,” Kindan said with a shrug.

  Frowning, Tullea opened her mouth to retort, but B’nik raised an open hand, silencing her.

  “What about those rooms?” he asked. “Wouldn’t it be better to find them?”

  “What is supposed to be in these rooms, anyway?” Tullea demanded.

  “We don’t know,” Lorana told her. “But the Records specifically stated that they were built here at Benden.”

  “So you don’t know where they are or why they were built—and yet you want to spend precious time searching for them?” Tullea gestured to the rest of the Weyr. “And let our dragons die while you search?

  “Weyrleader, I think this is some old tale that will waste the time of our healer and harper,” Tullea said formally to B’nik. “As Weyrwoman, I can see no point in it. Why not have Lorana conduct the search on her own?”

  “But her dragon is sick,” Kindan protested.

  “All the more reason for her to be diligent, then.” Tullea pressed a hand to her head, as though to ease pain. “And Harper, you’ve been too long from your duties. I could use a good song, and I’m sure the weyrlings need more instruction.”

  “Lorana has been helping me tend the injured dragons as well as the sick,” K’tan protested.

  “Well, perhaps I can assist you,” Tullea replied sweetly. “It is one of my duties, after all.”

  “It’s settled then,” B’nik said, standing hastily. “Lorana will search for the missing rooms, and K’tan and Tullea will tend the sick and injured dragons, releasing Harper Kindan to his teaching duties.”

  “Well, Lorana, I’m sure you’ll want to feed your dragon before you begin your search,” Tullea said dismissively, grabbing Kindan’s arm and pulling him away. “Tell me, Harper, what new songs will you sing for us tonight? I’m sure the Weyr needs cheering.”

  “I was wondering how long it would be before she started in.”

  Lorana turned to see Salina standing beside her.

  “I’m sorry that I haven’t come to see you,” the ex-Weyrwoman apologized.

  “You’ve been busy,” Lorana excused her.

  “No, I’ve been afraid,” Salina corrected. She gave Lorana a frank look. “I’d heard about your Arith, and I . . .”

  “It’s all right,” Lorana said, patting Salina on the shoulder. “I understand.”

  “Well I don’t. You did everything you could when Breth was ill,” Salina said. She gestured with a hand. “Walk with me, please?”

  Lorana nodded and fell in beside Salina as they walked out into the Bowl. Salina turned to the entrance to the Hatching Grounds.

  “I’ve always loved this place,” she said. “Since I first Impressed—and before—I’ve been in love with Benden Weyr, its high walls, morning mists, brilliant sunsets, but most of all, I’ve loved the Hatching Grounds.”

  They were at the entrance, looking in.

  “There’s something marvelous about them,” Salina breathed. “Right now it’s so quiet in here, waiting, but soon, Minith will clutch and this cavern will be filled with her hissing and challenging anyone who comes near her eggs. And then—there’ll be the Hatching.”

  She gestured to the heights surrounding them. “Dragons—mostly bronzes—will stand up there, keening welcome to their newest offspring. And the Weyr, all of us, will be made alive again with each Impression, reliving all the joy”—her voice dropped—“and the pain of our bond with our own dragon.”

  She grabbed Lorana’s hand and patted it gently. “And one day, your Arith will be here, guarding her hatchlings.”

  Lorana shook her head. Salina cocked her head questioningly.

  “I don’t know,” Lorana said.

  “I heard Tullea’s set you a task,” Salina said, changing the topic with another pat of Lorana’s hand. “What is it?”

  Lorana explained about the Records they’d found at Fort Weyr.

  “Rooms?” Salina said musingly. “Special rooms, eh? And not mentioned in our own Records?

  “Perhaps the Records were lost—” Salina dropped Lorana’s hand and raised one of her own for silence, head bowed as she thought.

  “Perhaps they aren’t mentioned in our Records because they were considered obvious, like the Kitchen Cavern or the Bowl itself,” she said, looking up again. “If everyone knew about them, then there was no reason for special mention, was there?”

  Lorana gave her a dubious look.

  “And now no one can find the rooms,” Salina continued, musing out loud. “So if someone were to build rooms that everyone knew about and were obvious and they become lost—how would that happen?”

  “I don’t kn—”

  “A cave-in!” Salina exclaimed.

  Lorana’s look of doubt changed to one of excitement. “But where?”

  “I know where the rooms are,” Salina told her, starting down into the Hatching Grounds. “Follow me.”

  “Wait a minute,” Lorana called. “Shouldn’t we get glows?”

  “And probably some help, too,” Salina agreed, her enthusiasm only slightly quenched by her common sense. “If I’m right, the rooms are buried behind a rockslide.”

  “We should get Kindan,” M’tal said as soon as Salina outlined her theory to him that evening.

  Salina shook her head. “Tullea wants Kindan to sing tonight. I think she wants to separate Kindan and Lorana.”

  M’tal snorted, shaking his head. “Is she trying to make B’nik jealous, or Lorana angry?”

  “I can’t imagine Lorana getting angry,” Salina said. “Unless it was over something involving her dragon.”

  “Righteous anger, then,” M’tal agreed. “And perhaps not just for her dragon. She seems to have good priorities.”

  “She does,” Salina agreed emphatically. “It may help her survive—”

  M’tal cocked an eyebrow at her.

  “—if she loses her dragon,” Salina finished softly.

  “None who have gotten sick have recovered,” M’tal said softly by way of agreement. “But this can’t go on. Our ancestors were smart enough to make the dragons from fire-lizards; I can’t believe that they weren’t smart enough to anticipate a sickness like this.”

  “If they could predict it, and they could make dragons from fire-lizards, why didn’t they make it so the dragons wouldn’t get sick?” Salina asked.

  M’tal shook his head. “I don’t know. Perhaps we’ll find the answer when we get into those rooms.”

  “So why wait for Kindan?”

  “Kindan’s miner bred,” M’tal reminded her. “If there’s a cave-in, he’s the right one to handle it.”

  “And if he can’t?”

  “Then he’s the right one to get help,” M’tal replied, miming a miner holding a pick in two hands. Salina smiled and gestured toward the door of their new, lofty weyr.

  “It’s not such a bad idea of Tullea’s to have Kindan sing tonight,” Salina said as they started down the many flights of stairs to the Bowl.

  “Mmm?”

  “Well, he’s got quite a good voice, and we could use the cheering.”

  “Let’s hope, then, that Kindan’s in a cheering mood,” M’tal returned. Neither of them mentioned on the long descent from their weyr that M’tal’s Gaminth could have flown them to the Bowl in a moment: M’tal because he was sure that Salina was still quietly grieving her loss; and Salina because he was right.

  As they crossed the Bowl to the Kitchen Cavern, they could hear Kindan’s voice lead off in the opening chorus of “The Morning Dragon Song,” subtly altered:

  “Through early morning light I see,
>
  A distant dragon come to me.

  Her skin is gold, her eyes are green;

  She’s the loveliest queen I’ve ever seen.”

  “He must have changed that for Lorana,” Salina remarked. “That song normally refers to a bronze dragon.”

  “But I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Tullea thinks it’s for her,” M’tal said.

  Several big fires had been built in braziers outside of the Kitchen Cavern, and the long tables had been pulled out into the cold night air. Torches lined a way through the tables.

  The harper and his helpers were set up on one table placed against the wall of the Weyr Bowl itself. The sounds of Kindan’s guitar and voice echoed eerily off the walls of the Bowl. All around them, M’tal could see gleaming pairs of dragon eyes peering down from the heights above.

  By the time M’tal and Salina found seats, Kindan had finished his revised version of “The Morning Dragon Song.”

  “This is a different song, now,” Kindan said, his voice carrying over the murmurs and chatting of the dragonriders and weyrfolk.

  “Not all of it’s remembered, but perhaps its time has come.” He modulated his guitar chords into a dissonant, melancholy sound.

  “A thousand voices keen at night,

  A thousand voices wail,

  A thousand voices cry in fright,

  A thousand voices fail.”

  The murmuring of the crowd grew silent as Kindan continued:

  “You followed them, young healer lass,

  Till they could not be seen;

  A thousand dragons made their loss

  A bridge ’tween you and me.”

  M’tal and Salina exchanged worried glances and watched as B’nik and Tullea huddled together in an exchange that could almost be heard over Kindan’s voice as the harper continued:

  “And in the cold and darkest night,

  A single voice is heard,

  A single voice both clear and bright,

  It says a single word.”

  Salina bent to whisper something in M’tal’s ear, but he gripped her arm tightly and gestured at Kindan. The harper’s look was intent, as one who was desperately trying to remember something. His face brightened and he continued:

  “That word is what you now must say

  To—“

  Lorana suddenly leapt up from her seat and raced away across the Bowl. M’tal had a fleeting glimpse of her distraught look as she passed him, but before he could react to that, Tullea shouted out: “Enough! That’s quite enough! Harper Kindan, I do not want to hear that song ever again.”

  “But I do, Weyrwoman,” Kindan replied firmly. There was a gasp from the crowd. Everyone knew that Kindan could be outspoken, but speaking against the Weyrwoman was an affront to the honor of every dragonrider.

  “Tullea is right, Harper,” B’nik said loudly, rising beside his Weyrwoman. “That is not a song for this Weyr.”

  Kindan looked ready to argue the point. M’tal cleared his throat loudly, catching Kindan’s eyes and shook his head slowly. For a moment the young harper looked ready to pursue his rebellion. Slowly the color drained from his face and he calmed down.

  “Weyrleader, Weyrwoman,” he said with a half-bow from his chair, “my apologies. The song has me perplexed,” he explained. “But I will respect your orders”—he laid a slight emphasis on that word—“and return to more traditional lays.”

  “Very well then,” Tullea replied. She waved a hand at him imperiously. “Continue, Harper.”

  Kindan gave her another half-bow, signalled to his accompanists, and stood to sing in a strong, martial voice:

  “Drummer, beat, and piper, blow,

  Harper, strike, and soldier, go.

  Free the flame and sear the grasses

  Till the dawning Red Star passes.”

  “Go see to Lorana,” M’tal said to Salina as soon as he was sure that the situation was back under control.

  Salina found Lorana in Arith’s weyr, her arms wrapped around her dragon’s head.

  “He means me, doesn’t he?” Lorana asked as Salina entered. She didn’t look up at the ex-Weyrwoman. Her voice was choked with tears.

  “I don’t know,” Salina answered honestly. “But I hope he does.”

  “You hope?” Lorana asked incredulously, turning to face the Weyrwoman. “How can you?”

  “Because that song—if it has anything to do with what’s happening to us—”

  “How can it? When was it written?” Lorana demanded. “It’s probably just some old harper song written by someone who’d drunk too much.”

  “It could be,” Salina admitted honestly. “And, now that you mention it, that makes the most sense.”

  “So why did he sing it?” Lorana cried angrily.

  “You think it was about you?” Salina asked.

  “Don’t you?”

  “I don’t know,” Salina told her. “You’re not a healer, we know that.”

  Lorana shook her head angrily, fingering one of the silver pieces of brightwork on Arith’s harness.

  “Do you see this?” she asked, pulling the piece off and waving it at Salina. “Do you see how it’s marked? A healer’s mark.”

  Salina gasped, startled.

  “Exactly!” Lorana cried, turning back to replace the brightwork on Arith’s riding harness. “And everyone will know that, too. So what will they think, Salina?”

  “What do you imagine?”

  Lorana took a steadying breath and wiped the tears off her cheeks. “I think that the riders will believe that I brought this sickness here with me,” she said slowly.

  Salina felt as if she’d been struck in the stomach. She slumped down to her knees as the full impact of Lorana’s words struck home.

  If Lorana had brought the sickness, then it was her fault that Breth had died. For a moment Salina felt anger rise up in her and she knew that her face showed it, even without seeing Lorana’s stricken reaction. It would be so much easier, such a relief, if she could blame someone for her loss. But then her brain overcame her emotions, and Salina realized that Lorana stood to lose her own dragon, too, long before her time.

  “My fire-lizards,” Lorana continued, unable to control herself, “I think they got sick. And—” She stopped, eyes going wide with astonished fear. “J’trel and Talith—they went between forever.” She gulped down her tears. “I was so sure that it was me. I was going to leave, but then I Impressed Arith. I couldn’t leave her—I didn’t know what to do.”

  “You’re right,” Salina said, “you couldn’t leave her. And as your Weyrwoman, once you’d Impressed, I would never consider asking you to leave the Weyr. We will solve this problem together.”

  “Of all the stupid, ill-considered, blockheaded, unthinking—”

  “Don’t stop,” K’tan told Kindan as the harper poured out a litany of self-contempt. “You forgot fardling.”

  “—fardling, moronic, imbecilic—” Kindan paused, groping for more words.

  K’tan shook his head sadly. “A harper at a loss for words when they’re so desperately needed.”

  “Why did you do it?” M’tal asked, joining the other two.

  Kindan let out a deep sigh, shaking his head ruefully. “It just came to me,” he said. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!” He punctuated each word by banging his head with his hand.

  “How’s Lorana?” K’tan asked M’tal. “I noticed you sent Salina after her.”

  “I have no way of knowing,” M’tal answered with a grimace.

  “You could ask Arith,” Kindan suggested hopefully.

  “I don’t think so,” M’tal answered frostily. Kindan grimaced and dropped his head.

  “I suppose I could talk to Lorana,” he said.

  “No.” M’tal’s voice was firm.

  “You’ve caused enough trouble,” K’tan agreed.

  “I don’t know how I’ll make up for it,” Kindan said, giving M’tal a look that begged for advice.

  “I don’t know if you’ll b
e able,” M’tal told him grimly. “But there is one thing that would be a good start.” At Kindan’s hopeful look, he continued, “Salina says that she thinks the Oldtimer Rooms are hidden behind a rock fall near the Hatching Grounds.”

  “You mean? . . .” K’tan started, his eyes taking on a faraway look.

  M’tal nodded. “That rockslide back by the way we used to come to look at the eggs back when we were candidates.”

  “It seemed dangerous, even when I was young,” K’tan said. “I never went too close.”

  Kindan braced to the challenge. “Well, let’s grab some glows and have a look, shall we?”

  “Tonight?” K’tan asked, taken aback.

  “What better time?” Kindan replied. “While Tullea’s occupied.”

  “Should we wait for Salina?” K’tan asked.

  M’tal shook his head. “No, I think we might be in for a very long wait.”

  Kindan groaned.

  In the end, M’tal and K’tan talked him out of acting immediately, reasoning that the job was properly one for miners, and that Kindan would best be employed in engaging some. So with B’nik’s blessing, M’tal, K’tan, and Kindan left at first light the next morning.

  It took only moments after their arrival at Mine Natalon for Dalor to agree to come to Benden with miners. K’tan and Kindan returned to Benden to make preparations while M’tal arranged transport. Kindan had just finished alerting Mikkala that there would be extra mouths to feed when he heard a shout.

  “Kindan! Is it you?” the red-haired woman cried joyfully as she crossed the Bowl along with the other arrivals. “It’s been ages!”

  Kindan gave the woman a startled look and then recognition dawned: It was Renna. Memories of his youth at Camp Natalon came back to him. This woman was the youngster Kindan had set to keeping the watch when he’d been put in charge of his watch-wher, Kisk, over ten Turns ago. Renna had grown taller and broader, but she still bore the easygoing intelligence he had seen so long ago.

  Renna ran up to him and Kindan closed the remaining distance to be met by a tight hug and a peck on the cheek, both of which he returned fully.

  “You’re looking great,” Renna said, pushing him away to look him up and down. “Life at the Weyr agrees with you?”