Dragon's Kin Read online

  Jofri was a journeyman Harper. He was due to return soon to the Harper Hall to complete his Mastery. When he did, he’d probably be too senior to return to a small Camp like this one. Instead, Zenor was sure that he’d be posted to a great Hold—perhaps even Crom—there to supervise not just the major Hold’s children but all the journeyman Harpers dispatched to the small cots and Camps that spread out from the large Hold as its inhabitants expanded their territory.

  Of course, maybe a new Harper would know more about Healing than Jofri, who had come to accept that in matters of Healing, Kindan’s eldest sister, Silstra, was the Master and not he. Zenor swallowed when he remembered that the caravan approaching bore Silstra’s future husband. And that, as a wife of a Smith, Silstra would leave Camp Natalon forever.

  “Time or not,” Tarik replied with a sneer, “you won’t be here.”

  “Uncle,” Natalon said, breaking up what he feared would be another nasty exchange of words, “whatever the result, it was my decision.”

  Natalon turned his attention back to Zenor. “Run down to the women at the cookfires and inform them that our guests are approaching.”

  Zenor nodded and took off gladly, not wanting to listen to more of Tarik’s snippery. As he left, he heard Danil’s voice above the others, “Do you suppose your replacement is also in the caravan, Jofri?”

  Oh, no! Zenor wailed to himself. Not a replacement for Harper Jofri so soon!

  Back up in the watch-heights, Kindan followed Zenor’s movements until he was lost in the crowd of elders. Nervously he waited until his friend exited the crowd and then he heaved a sigh of relief—Zenor wasn’t in trouble and neither was he. He watched Zenor head down from the plateau toward the buildings and fields below and guessed that he had been ordered to let the rest of the Camp know that the caravan had been sighted. Tonight there would be a welcoming feast.

  Kindan saw Zenor slow down as he approached the Harper’s cottage. He was surprised to see Zenor stop and then dart around to the front of the cottage—out of Kindan’s sight—and, presumably, inside. What was Zenor doing? Kindan guessed that he had stopped because someone inside the cottage had called to him. Kindan made a mental note to find out.

  Then the first sounds of the arriving caravan distracted him and he turned his attention to it.

  The faint smell of pine sap came into the Harper’s cottage on the breeze. Pine sap and something else, some subtle smells that made Nuella think instantly of—“Zenor, is that you?” she hissed.

  The sounds of a runner stopping suddenly and skidding came through the window, followed by Zenor’s voice in a whisper, “What are you doing here?”

  Nuella frowned, irritated at his tone. “Come inside and I’ll tell you,” she answered testily.

  “Oh, all right,” Zenor grumbled. “But I can’t be long, I’m Running.” Nuella heard the capital “R” in his voice and knew that he was using kid-shorthand for “I’ve got the job of runner.”

  She held her next question until she heard his feet on the front steps. She made her way from the kitchen in the back down the hallway to the front door. A breeze, scented with the lake’s moisture, wafted in as Zenor entered.

  “I thought Kindan was the runner and you had watch,” Nuella said.

  Zenor sighed. “We switched,” he said. Then, his tone brightening, he added in a rush, “He’s going to let me help wash the watch-wher!”

  “When?”

  “Tonight,” Zenor answered. “The caravan’s arrived—”

  “I heard,” Nuella said with a frown. “Do you know if the new Harper’s come? I wanted to meet him.”

  “Meet him? What will your father say?” Zenor demanded.

  “I don’t care,” Nuella answered frankly. “If I’ve got to be cooped up all the time, at least I can learn something from the Harper. Work on my pipes some more—”

  “But what if people find out?”

  “The caravan’s coming, right? There’ll be a feast tonight, won’t there? You’re going down to tell them at the square, right?” Nuella asked, and then continued immediately, “So tonight, I’ll dress up in bright and dark colors—trader clothes—and no one will know.”

  “The traders will,” Zenor protested.

  “No, they won’t,” Nuella said. “They’ll think I’m just a miner dressing up to flatter them.”

  “What about your parents, or Dalor?”

  Nuella shrugged. “You’ll have to keep me away from them, that shouldn’t be hard. Especially as they won’t be expecting me.”

  “But—”

  Nuella reached out, caught his arm, turned him around, and pushed him toward the door. “Go on now, or someone will be asking why you’re so slow.”

  By the time Kindan’s relief arrived hours later, he had forgotten about Zenor’s detour, his stomach rumbling with anticipation at the great smells of spice-roasted wherry rising up from the huge outdoor cooking fires below.

  Usually, every family at Camp Natalon ate in their own quarters. Tonight, there were huge fires burning in the pits placed at the center of the square, and long wooden tables with benches had been drawn around them to provide seating for everyone, camper and caravanner alike.

  Harper Jofri and several other musicians were playing lively music while the crowd ate happily.

  Kindan managed to find food and a quiet seat far away from any further chores. Munching happily on the spiced wherry meat—his favorite of his sister’s excellent recipes—and drinking fresh berry juice, Kindan nevertheless kept his eyes and ears roaming, both to avoid any interruptions, like work, and to strain for any interesting gossip.

  At the head table, in the center of all the tables, Kindan spied the head of the caravan and his lady but his eyes fixed most on his own sister and her fiancé, Terregar. The smith was of medium height but well-muscled. He wore a short, close-trimmed, dark beard that always seemed to be split by a smile made all the brighter by his twinkling blue eyes. Kindan had liked him from the first moment he’d met him.

  Terregar and Silstra—their names had a good ring to them. But to him, and indeed all of Camp Natalon, his sister would always be Sis. Kindan wondered if there was a “Sis” in the Telgar Smithcrafthall already. Perhaps she was marrying someone from out of the Smithcraft and they were looking for a replacement. He wondered if Camp Natalon would ever find a replacement for his Sis.

  Kindan found his eyes watering and decided that the wind must have changed and blown some of the ash from the fire toward him. He ignored the lump in his heart. He knew how happy Sis would be; he’d heard her say it so many times. And he couldn’t deny that Terregar was a nice man. Still . . . it would be a lonelier place without his big sister, the sister who’d watched over all the family since their mother had died.

  The wind changed, and the freshening breeze brought a new smell—bubbly pies! Kindan’s stomach rumbled as he sought the source of the smell. He started to get up, but a hand pushed him down.

  “Don’t think about it,” a voice growled in his ear. It belonged to the youngest of his older brothers, Kaylek. “Dad sent me to find you. You’re to wash Dask now.”

  “Now?”

  “Of course!”

  “But all the pies’ll be eaten!” Kindan protested.

  Kaylek was unimpressed. “You’ll get some tomorrow at the wedding,” he said with a shrug. “Mind you clean him properly, or Dad’ll have your hide.”

  “But it’s not dark yet!” Kindan protested. Dask, like all watch-whers, had been born with huge eyes that found the light of day hideously painful. Dask’s eyes worked best at night. At night, there wasn’t anything a watch-wher couldn’t see. Many were the miners who owed their lives to the ability of a watch-wher to see a human body under the rocks and rubble of a cave-in.

  A larger figure loomed over the both of them. Kindan could tell immediately who it was by the way that Kaylek shied away; Kaylek was always more frightened of their father than Kindan.

  “You two are disturbing the meal,”
Danil said in a deep voice roughened by an age in the mines. He laid one large hand on Kaylek’s shoulder.

  “I told him to go wash Dask,” Kaylek said.

  Kindan looked up and met his father’s eyes squarely. Danil returned the look with a slight nod.

  “Well, it can wait until after the bubbly pies,” he said. He shook a huge finger at Kindan. “I’m trusting that you’ll do us all proud and make my watch-wher the envy of Crom Hold tomorrow.”

  “Yes, sir!” Kindan responded enthusiastically. The dreaded chore suddenly seemed a mark of great trust and respect. “I will.”

  Danil kept his hand on Kaylek, saying, “Come along, son, there’s a craft girl you might like to meet.”

  Even in the failing light, Kindan could see Kaylek turn beet red. Kaylek, just Turned fourteen and still very wary of his new-found voice and manhood, was quite shy around girls his own age. Kindan managed not to laugh out loud, but Kaylek caught the look in his eyes and glared at his younger brother. Immediately Kindan sobered—for the look threatened retribution.

  The smell of bubbly pies teased Kindan’s nose, and he turned to hunt them out. Kaylek’s retribution was sometime in the future—the bubbly pies were right now.

  The evening meal in the Camp’s square was still going strong when Kindan started up toward the shed that was Dask’s home. As he walked slowly and deliberately away from the bonfire and the crowd, a small shadow detached itself and followed him.

  “Are you going to wash the watch-wher now?” Zenor whispered, panting as he struggled to catch up.

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you get me, then?” Zenor asked, his voice full of perceived betrayal.

  “You’re here, aren’t you?” Kindan replied. “If I went through the crowd looking for you, Kaylek would have noticed and done something to stop us.”

  “Oh.” Zenor didn’t have any older brothers and was completely unused to using guile to get his own way. But because he wanted an older brother just as much as Kindan wanted a younger brother they got along famously—even if there was no more than two months’ difference in their ages.

  They were about halfway there when Kindan noticed another shadow trailing beside them.

  “What’s that?” he asked, stopping and pointing.

  “What?” Zenor answered promptly. “I don’t see anything.”

  One of the things that Kindan really appreciated in Zenor was that his friend was a truly terrible liar.

  “Maybe it was a trick of the moons,” Zenor suggested, gesturing up to Pern’s two moons, Timor and Belior.

  Kindan shrugged and continued onward. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that the shadow was still following. He thought for a moment and came up with an interesting notion.

  “Who did you talk to, today, at the Harper’s?” he asked Zenor.

  Zenor stopped dead in his tracks. So, Kindan noticed with satisfaction, did the shadow. “When?” Zenor asked, his eyes wide.

  “When you went from Natalon down to the square,” Kindan said. “I saw you stop and talk to someone—and I’d already seen Jofri in the group when you talked to Natalon, so it couldn’t have been him.”

  “Me? When?” Zenor repeated.

  Kindan waited silently for him to answer.

  “Oh!” Zenor said suddenly as though actually remembering and not rapidly concocting a lie. “That was Dalor.”

  Dalor was Natalon’s son, nearly the same age as Zenor and Kindan. Kindan didn’t like the way Dalor took on airs about being the son of the Camp’s founder, but he couldn’t fault the boy otherwise. Dalor was often honest and had stood up for Kindan more than once when Kaylek had been picking on him. Kindan, for his part, had stuck up for Dalor when Cristov, Tarik’s only son, picked fights.

  Kindan gave Zenor a measuring look, but before he could ask his next question, Zenor said, “Won’t your Dad be mad if he finds out that I helped wash Dask?”

  “So we’d better make sure he doesn’t find out,” Kindan said.

  Zenor gestured for Kindan to get moving again. “In that case, we’d better get done before my parents start wondering where I am.”

  Kindan considered teasing Zenor more about their shadow, but the look on his friend’s face made him reconsider.

  “Okay,” was all Kindan said, starting up the slope toward the shed where Dask was quartered, next to the cothold his father had built.

  Dask’s shed was large enough for the watch-wher to lie on his side with plenty of distance from the walls. Straw was piled on the floor. Kindan opened the double doors carefully and chirped a quick note.

  “Dask?” Kindan called softly. “It’s me, Kindan. Dad asked me to get you washed for the wedding tomorrow.”

  The watch-wher uncoiled from his sleeping position, his head emerging from underneath his small wings and his bright eyes, like huge jeweled lanterns, reflecting the last of the twilight brightly back at the two boys.

  “Mrmph?” the watch-wher muttered. Kindan crossed the distance between them quickly but cautiously, murmuring softly, reaching out slowly to scratch the ugly watch-wher on the ridge just above his eye.

  “Mrmph,” Dask murmured with growing pleasure. Kindan blew a breath toward the watch-wher’s nose so that Dask would get a good smell of him and recognize him. Dask snorted and blew back. Kindan reached above the eyes for Dask’s ears and stroked them.

  “Good boy!” he said. Dask arched his neck and pulled his head out of Kindan’s grasp to look down haughtily at the boy.

  “We’re here to wash you,” Kindan repeated. Dask leaned down toward Kindan and blew another breath at him, then raised his head up and looked out past the curtain that had been hung inside the double doors. Kindan realized that Dask had seen Zenor. “That’s right, me and Zenor,” he said soothingly. “Come on in, Zenor.”

  “It’s awfully dark in there,” Zenor said, still standing outside the doors.

  “ ’Course it is,” Kindan replied. “Dask likes the dark, don’t you, big fellow?”

  Dask blew an agreeing breath over Kindan’s head and then swiveled his neck to peer curiously toward Zenor.

  “The sun’s down now,” Kindan said to the watch-wher, pointing toward the lake. “Why don’t you go for a quick dip and Zenor and I will freshen up your bed?”

  Dask nodded and started out of the shed. Wide-eyed, Zenor backed out of the way as the watch-wher pushed by him. Then Dask gave a little happy chirp, flapped his wings once, and vanished. A cold breeze blew over Zenor from where Dask had been.

  “Kindan, he vanished!”

  “He went between,” Kindan corrected. “Come on and help me tidy his bed. There should be some fresh straw near you.”

  “Between? You mean just like dragons?” Zenor looked from the spot where the watch-wher had been to the lake.

  Kindan glanced consideringly at his friend and shrugged. “I suppose so. I’ve never seen a dragon go between. I heard their riders tell them where to go—but Dask does it on his own. He doesn’t like all the bright fires in the square, so he’s always going the faster way.

  “Come on,” he continued. “Give me a hand. He’ll be back soon and then the work really starts.”

  Kindan was serious. They had just gotten fresh straw spread about in a satisfactory bed when another blast of chill air announced Dask’s return. The watch-wher’s brown skin was glistening with drops of water, and, with a happy noise, he shook himself.

  “No!” Kindan bellowed. “Don’t shake! We’ve got to get the dirt off you first.”

  Grabbing a long-handled brush and a bar of hard soap, Kindan directed Zenor to a bucket of scrubsand. Between them, they scrubbed the watch-wher from top to bottom, snout to tail. Both boys were wet and sweating by the time the watch-wher was clean and dry.

  “There you are, Dask,” Kindan said, pleased. “All clean and handsome. Just don’t roll before the ceremony tomorrow.”

  Even in the low light, Kindan could see Dask’s multifaceted eyes whirling with the green and
blue of happiness.

  “Whew!” Zenor breathed, sinking down to the floor by the doors. “Washing watch-whers is hard work! I wonder what it’s like with dragons?”

  “Harder,” Kindan said. At Zenor’s questioning look, he explained, “Well, dragons are bigger, aren’t they? And their skin flakes and has to be oiled, too.”

  Kindan rose to his feet and gave Dask a hug and a pat on the neck. “Dask here doesn’t need to worry about such things. He’s tough!”

  “I’m tired,” Zenor said. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to wash him all by yourself.”

  “We’d’ve been faster if your friend had helped,” Kindan said.

  Zenor jumped up. “I don’t know what you’re talking about! There’s no one here but us.”

  “Who are you talking to?” a voice called loudly from outside the shed. It was Kaylek. “Kindan, if you’ve got someone helping you, Dad’ll skin you alive!”

  Zenor vanished into the shadows as Kaylek entered, looking suspicious.

  “What are you talking about, Kaylek?” Kindan demanded coyly. “Can’t you see I’m just finishing?”

  “In about half the time I’d’ve expected of you,” Kaylek muttered, peering into the corners of the shed. Behind him, Kindan could see Zenor carefully move the brush he had been using out of sight.

  “I’m a fast worker,” Kindan said.

  “Since when?” Kaylek retorted. “I’m sure you had help. Dad’ll lynch you—you know how he feels about people spooking his watch-wher.” Kindan noticed that Kaylek never called Dask by his name.

  “Whoever it is has to be nearby,” Kaylek said, eyes darting this way and that in the dark shed. “I’ll find him and then—”

  A loud rattle of stones outside interrupted him.

  “Aha!” Kaylek yelled and charged off in the direction of the sound.

  Kindan waited until Kaylek’s steps had faded into the distance before speaking again. “I think it’s all right now,” he said to Zenor at last. “But you’d better leave.”