Joust dj-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  So Haraket was going to give him some hints! He wouldn't have guessed that from the Overseer's stony expression. He relaxed a little, and continued his task with more confidence.

  With a few more such hints, Vetch got the harness fastened, then without further prompting, went over all the straps again, cinching them down as he recalled his father harnessing the donkey for carrying a load to market. When he glanced again at Haraket, the overseer wasn't frowning at all; in fact, there was no mistaking his look of satisfaction.

  When Vetch finished, Haraket came over and double-checked the fit of each strap. Some he tightened further, but the ones across the neck, he loosened.

  "Here, the neckband—it's more to carry the breastband than anything else," Haraket told him. "You want it loose enough to slip two fingers under it. But here—" he moved down to two of the straps that passed in front of Kashet's legs. " —these need to be as tight as you can pull them. This one here, too—" Vetch watched him closely, making mental notes. What he wanted was to be free of masters, but—short of a miracle—that wasn't going to happen. Failing that, this was the best place he'd ever been in, and he did not want to be sent away.

  Especially not back to Khefti, for he was fairly certain that if Khefti was ever presented with the opportunity to get his hands on Vetch again, what he would contrive for the remainder of Vetch's life did not bear thinking about. It would be so bad, in fact, that Vetch's previous existence as Khefti's serf would seem pleasant in comparison.

  So I will serve Kashet, and my Jouster, and they will never want another dragon boy, he vowed to himself, watching how Haraket slid two fingers between the harness and Kashet's neck to check the fit.

  Jouster Ari reappeared at that point, and Haraket stepped back abruptly. Vetch scrambled back out of the way, certain that the Jouster would find something wrong. All of this would come tumbling down, and with a word the Jouster would send him back to Khefti, or at least order Haraket to beat him.

  But after an inspection of the harness, Ari gave a brief nod to Haraket, handed the Overseer his lance, and slapped Kashet on the shoulder. Without a command, Kashet extended his foreleg to the Jouster; Ari used it as a step, and with its aid, vaulted into the saddle. Haraket handed the lance back to Ari, and the Jouster set the lance into the socket at his belt, and took a firm grip on the handhold at the front of the saddle.

  Warned now by his own experience, Vetch shielded his eyes;

  Kashet spread his wings and leaped upward, and in a storm of sand and hot wind that buffeted Vetch and made him shelter his face in the crook of his elbow, the dragon vaulted into the clear blue of the heavens. The dragon and rider wheeled above the pen for a moment as Kashet gained height, looking like a jewel-bright painting against the cloudless blue of the heavens.

  Then, abruptly, they side-slipped to the north and were gone.

  "Don't just stand there gawking, get that shovel!" Haraket barked, and Vetch hastily looked back down and saw where the overseer was pointing. "Once Kashet's out of the pen, you clean it, clean it thoroughly, and immediately!"

  At Haraket's direction, Vetch got the shovel and the barrow he'd used to bring the meat, and began the cleaning. Kashet used a second pit cut into the earth and rock to one side of the huge wallow, smaller than the wallow and not nearly as hot, for a privy. Like a cat, perhaps, for the droppings were neatly buried and the smell minimal. Not unpleasant either; they smelled a bit acrid, but not fetid. The droppings themselves, black, hard as stones and round, were about the size and weight of a melon.

  "Don't touch those with your bare hands," Haraket warned, as he carried one in the shovel to the barrow. "Something about them burns the skin."

  He took Haraket's word for it, though he was surprised, and couldn't imagine what could do the burning. The droppings were actually cooler than the nesting sand, so it evidently wasn't heat that would burn the skin. Perhaps it was something like natron, only stronger.

  "This stuff is worth its weight in silver," Haraket said warningly, as Vetch pushed the barrow at his direction. "You account for every dropping to me, and I account for it to the priests; whatever they use it for, it's important to them. There's a tally board where you'll be taking it."

  So there was; Vetch unloaded his barrow, and put a mark on the board for every dropping before he went back for a second load. There weren't nearly enough droppings piled in the court-yard where he upended his barrow, given all of the dragons that were here; someone must come and take the stuff away pretty promptly.

  Vetch didn't ask what dragon dung was good for; if it was priestly business, it was just as well not to know, and that was doubly true when the priests were Tian. They were likely to take an innocent question poorly if it came from someone like him.

  The sun, which had been directly overhead when he began the task of cleaning out the pen, had traveled westward, and the corridors were now shadowed by the high walls. That certainly made his job a little easier, although the kamiseen managed to drop down and began to scour its way through the complex, bringing the fire of the desert with it. Still, he was not looking forward to nightfall, for it was as cold at night during the dry season as it was hot during the day. Once the sun god left for his nightly journey through the underworld, he took all of the warmth with him.

  I wonder where I'm to sleep? he thought, suddenly, when it occurred to him that the day was more than half spent. He hadn't seen anything that looked like a sleeping pallet since he'd arrived here. He really didn't want to sleep where the rest of the dragon boys slept; he'd lie awake all night waiting for them to do something to him. But he probably wasn't going to get a choice about it either. Unless—they might have other serfs here, or they might have him sleep with the slaves. That wouldn't be bad. At least they wouldn't have a reason to plague him.

  When he tipped out the last of the droppings on the pile, Haraket signed to him to leave the barrow over to one side of the room. "Someone else will clean the barrow. Now you have lessons that go along with tending your dragon. You'll be seeing to Kashet's harness and saddle, so now it's time for you to begin to learn to clean and mend harness," said Haraket, and led him off again into the maze of corridors.

  At the very edge of the area of the pens, just past the butchery, where pens and open courtyards gave way to real buildings with roofs and doors, was his next destination. Now that the noon meal was over, there was more activity here, and along the corridor marked by the sign of Teleth, the wise god of scribes and engravers, it now appeared that the doors there marked a series of workshops. This was where Haraket led Vetch, who was certain now that he could at least find his way back to Kashet's pen from where he was.

  "Hu, Shobek," Haraket called, pushing open a door to a dim room, full of shadows, that smelled of leather and leather oil. It was also full of dragon boys, presided over by a dour old man.

  "Hu, Haraket," replied the old man, a thin and wiry individual with a leather cap fitted over his shaven skull. "The new one?"

  "The same," Haraket replied, and before Vetch could ask anything, turned on his heel and strode away, leaving Vetch standing just inside the doorway.

  This time, it appeared, his work was to be accomplished under someone else's supervision besides Haraket. The old man examined Vetch for a moment; the other dragon boys here were ranged in neat rows all down the room, each sitting cross-legged on a brown reed mat, each one with his hands full of some piece of harness or other leather work, head bent in concentration. Clearly this man Shobek had charge over them all, and enforced discipline completely. The other boys might glance up at Vetch, but it was a brief glance, and each one quickly returned his gaze to the work in his hands, lest the Overseer of this workshop catch him staring too long. The air was redolent with the pleasant smell of new leather, of leather oil, and of some spice he couldn't identify.

  "Ever worked leather?" the old man growled. And when Vetch shook his head, he just sighed, as if he had not expected any other answer. "You are the newest and most ignoran
t of everyone here, boy," the man said roughly. "You have a lot to learn, and you'd better make up your mind to learn it quickly. I'll have no idlers in my workshop. Show me your hands."

  Quickly, Vetch stretched out both his hands, grateful that he'd gotten that bath. His nails might be broken, his palms callused hard, but at least both were clean. The old man grunted.

  "Good. You're no stranger to work. And you've got clever, small hands. I can make some use of you now, so mind what you're told, for I won't tell you twice."

  Within moments, Vetch was sitting cross-legged on a reed mat of his own, discharging the dirtiest job of all, that of cleaning the saddles.

  Old saddles, actually, with the leather cracking and going dry; evidently he wasn't to be trusted yet with saddles that weren't all but ruined.

  "No one is using these at the moment," Shobek said, as he piled four of them beside Vetch's mat. "Clean and get these fit to repair, and then I'll put you on Kashet's spare harnesses."

  As Shobek instructed him, he was relieved to find that there was not much that was going to be difficult about this job. His first job was to clean the saddles, using some concoction in a pottery jar, his second, to oil, and try and revive the elderly leather by rubbing in a compound of wax and tallow, with precious myrrh added to give it fragrance.

  And it was myrrh that his nose had detected, though he hadn't recognized what it was at first, for its signature aroma had been mingled with the honey scent of wax and the heavy scent of the oil.

  It wasn't the hardest task he had ever had, by any stretch of the imagination. And although at this point, the hottest part of the day, anyone who wasn't a servant was lying down in a cool room or trying to cool off by bathing in a pool, this wasn't a bad job. He was sitting down; he was in a cool, dim room. The thick mud-brick walls kept the heat out, and the stone floor cooled things further. There was a certain sensuous pleasure in working with the leather, watching it slowly revive under his attentions, the fragrant myrrh soothing his senses. He knew what myrrh was, of course; on feast days even Khefti would get a cone of perfume scented with it or some other fragrance and wear it all day on top of his coarse, braided horsehair wig. The Tians loved perfumes and unguents, and someone who did not bathe at least twice daily and who smelled of grease and sweat as Khefti did was regarded with unconcealed disdain. So on festival days, in the hopes of mingling with his betters, Khefti would bathe like a concubine and lavish as much myrrh on himself as he could afford. Not that it did much good. Not all the perfume cones in the world could cover up the rancid scent of Khefti-the-Fat…

  There were other spices in the wax as well, though none as strong as the myrrh. Perhaps this was what gave the dragons their pleasant scent.

  The saddles were not large or heavy, as Vetch already knew; nothing like the kind of bulky chair he would have envisioned for riding a dragon. Instead, they were a kind of thick pad of kapok-stuffed leather molded by time and use to the shape of a particular dragon's shoulders, with straps and braces, handholds, carry pads and harness straps firmly sewn onto them. The ones in his charge were very old and much abused; stiff and dried out, the pale brown leather cut up here and there, the harnesses snapped, the sinew stitching torn loose, the stuffing coming out in places. The other boys were doing the skilled work, that of replacing harness straps and restitching and patching. All he had to do was to untangle straps, which were generally stiff and dried hard, then remove as many of the broken ones as he could, and get the leather clean and supple again.

  It wasn't easy work, cleaning these filthy saddles and harnesses, but compared to hauling water in the full sun and the kamiseen wind to nourish the tola, it was practically like having a holiday. For once, he wasn't concentrating on the curse on Khefti, nor on not spilling a bucket. He found himself half entranced while he worked, thinking of nothing at all, merely listening to the other dragon boys chatter softly to one another. Evidently, so long as they got their quota of mending done and didn't talk too loudly, their Overseer didn't care if they gabbled away.

  But then, they were all freeborn. Freeborn boys obviously had fewer constraints on their behavior, even when working at a task, than serfs. There were limits on how much they could be punished, and for what infractions; freeborn boys could leave an apprenticeship if their parents agreed, so a Master had better not beat them more often than their fathers did if he wanted to keep them. The more difficult the job they were apprenticed to, the more freedom they tended to have, so given how difficult the dragons were to work with, the dragon boys probably got away with a great deal.

  Of Khefti's apprentices, two were learning the skilled trade of the potter, the other four, the far-less-skilled task of the brick maker. The pottery apprentices lorded it over the other four, who got no relief even when Khefti took his daily nap. They had a canopy to work under; Khefti deemed that sufficient for their needs.

  Vetch wondered, though, whether dragon boy counted as being an apprentice, or being a real job. Or were there degrees within the task—that you were the equivalent of an apprentice until you became an Overseer, or even a Jouster? There certainly weren't any dragon boys over the age of fifteen or sixteen, not if he was any judge of ages.

  This lot ignored his presence altogether, which suited him. They spoke of other boys, of their families, of what they planned to do this evening when the dragons slept and their duties were over. !t astonished him, a little, to hear how very much they were allowed to do in their free time, for Khefti's apprentices were permitted to leave their Master's home only to go straight back to their own.

  But the dragons didn't fly by night. Perhaps they couldn't. When the sun-god descended, and it grew cold, perhaps they slept. That would mean that there wasn't much in the way of duties for a dragon-boy after sundown.

  Certainly all of them had plans to enjoy themselves. Some of them planned to bathe in certain pools in the complex, some to fish by moonlight, and a favored few, older, and who actually had real money to spend, intended to visit a wine house outside the complex.

  Then some of the talk turned to certain dragons and Jousters, and the nobles of the King's court who had an interest in them.

  "The next time Lord Seftu invites Kest-eman for a feast, I'm to come along," boasted one, to the apparent envy of his peers.

  "Lord Seftu!" exclaimed a boy with who should not have adopted the shaved-head style, for it made his exceedingly round head look like a grape on a slender stem. "They say he has acrobats and dancers and musicians at all of his feasts! And river horse, and bustard and sturgeon and honeyed dates stuffed with nuts—

  "And boating on his pleasure lake by moonlight," chimed in another, enviously. "And every guest has a serving maid of his own."

  "He's been to every practice," the first boy said smugly. "And he's won a great deal of money on Besere, thanks to what I told him. He told Besere that he wants to reward both of us."

  "On top of what he's given you already?" exclaimed the round-headed boy. "Shekabis, when we're done, can I touch you? Maybe some of that luck will rub off!"

  Vetch learned massive amounts about the Jousters and their lives just by listening. The nobles, it seemed—some of them, anyway—found it entertaining to watch the jousting practices. They would wager on the Jousters as they practiced the skills that made them what they were, sometimes tipping the dragon boys for information on the health and temper of dragons and their riders. Now Vetch had at least one minor question answered. So that was where boys were getting their money!

  And—as he stretched his ears shamelessly to listen—he soon found that wasn't the only way they got money to spend.

  "Lady Heetah's getting desperate. She gave me a whole silver piece to carry a message to Ari this morning," one of the older boys said, with a sly grin for the others. Even Vetch knew what that meant. Ladies didn't ask boys to carry messages to men unless they were in the midst of (or wanted to instigate) a love affair. It sounded as if this Lady Heetah was in the latter position.

  "And
did you?" asked the round-headed boy, with a lift of his lip that suggested that Lady Heetah was throwing away good money on a hopeless cause.

  "I left it in his rooms, when I went to clean Abat-nam's." The first boy shrugged. "Who's to say if he even looked at it? Or cared, if he saw it. She should have learned better by now; she sent me on a fool's errand, that one. But she pays well."

  "Besotted." The second shook his head. "Stupid women. As well court the image of Ta-Roketh in the Temple of Kernak as Ari. Actually, you'd be better off courting the statue. You might get a miracle and the image might fill with the god and respond to your invitation."

  "That's what Lesoth says," another of the older boys nodded wisely. "Ari's never paid attention to court ladies. Oh, he likes his women, well enough—he's never even looked at a pretty boy— but the court ladies haven't a chance with him. Paid night blossoms, yes; Ari is like any other man with them."

  One who had been silent until then rolled his eyes. "Like any other man? Like a Bull of Hamun, you mean! Lesoth says that Ari's got a mighty reputation in Seles-teri's wine shop! The dancing girls there all know him well!"