Dragondrums Read online

  The drumheights were always manned save for the “dead” time, four hours in the depth of night, when the eastern half of the continent was still sleeping and the western half just retiring. Piemur wanted to know what happened if an emergency occurred in the dead time and was crisply informed that most drummers were so attuned to an incoming message that even in the shielded quarters the vibrations had been known to alert them.

  As part of his apprentice training, Piemur had dutifully learned the identifying beats of each of the major holds and crafthalls, and the emergency signals, like “threadfall,” “fire,” “death,” “answer,” “question,” “help,” “affirmative,” “negative,” and a few useful phrases. When Dirzan first showed him the mass of drum messages that he would be expected to memorize and perform, he began to wish fervently that his voice would settle before winter came. Dirzan ruthlessly loaded him down with a column of frequently used beat measures to learn by the next day, telling him to practice quietly, using sticks on the practice block, and left him.

  In the morning, writing under. Dirzan’s full attention Piemur struggled through the lesson. He almost cried out with relief when Menolly appeared. She ignored him.

  “I need a messenger. Can I steal Piemur?”

  “Certainly,” Dirzan said without surprise, since that task was also a function of drum apprentices. “He can practice his lesson on his way, I expect. I expect he’d better.”

  Piemur groaned to himself at this partial reprieve, but kept a carefully contrite expression on his face for Dirzan’s benefit.

  “Did you get riding gear yesterday from Silvina?” Menolly asked him, her face unrevealing. “Get it on,” she said when he nodded, gesturing him to be quick about changing.

  She was laughing with Dirzan when he reappeared, but broke off her conversation, motioning Piemur to follow her. She took the steps from the drumheights at a clip.

  “You said you’d ridden runners?” she asked.

  “Sure. I’m herder bred, you know.” He was a bit miffed.

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve ridden runners.”

  “Well, I have.”

  “You’ll have a chance to prove it,” she said, awarding him a curious smile.

  Piemur stared hard at her profile as they made their way out of the arch entrance and across the broad Gather meadow in front of the Harper Hall. To their left towered the cliff that housed Fort Hold, and the rows of cots that huddled in the bosom of the sturdy precipice. On the fire heights of the Hold, the brown dragon stood, looking more massive silhouetted against the bright sky, one wing extended, which his rider was grooming.

  Piemur felt a surge of reverence for dragons and their riders, reinforced by the sight of Beauty, Menolly’s queen fire lizard, alighting on her friend’s padded shoulder, while the rest of Menolly’s fair cavorted in the air above them.

  Her head raised, Menolly smiled at her playful friends and told them they were going for a ride. Did they care to come along? Chirruping and excited aerial displays greeted her question, and Piemur watched, as ever envious, while Beauty stroked Menolly’s cheek with her wedge-shaped head and crooned into her ear, the jewel-faceted eyes bright blue with pleasure. Grimly, Piemur forebore to ask the questions that seethed in his mind as they walked in silence toward the great caverns carved into the Fort cliff to house the herdbeasts, wherry flocks and runners. Inside the cavern, the head stockman approached with a smile for Menolly. Her fire lizards whirled into the cavern and sought perches on the curious beams that supported the ceiling, beams that had been fashioned by long-lost skill of the ancients. No one even knew from what substance they had been contrived.

  “Off again, Menolly?”

  “Again,” she said with a slight grimace. “Banak, have you gear for a beast for Piemur, too? As easy for me to have the second runner ridden as led.”

  “A’ course,” and the man led the way to the enclosure where the backpads and headgear were hung on racks. After a close look at Piemur, he selected pad and gear, handed Menolly hers. They followed him down the aisle of open-ended stalls. “Your usual is third down, Menolly.”

  “See if Piemur remembers how to go on,” she said to Banak.

  The man smiled and handed Piemur the gear. With a degree of assurance he didn’t feel, Piemur made the clucking sound it was wise to use to announce human presence to a runner beast. They weren’t intelligent creatures, responding to a narrow set of noises and nudges, but, within that limited scope, quite useful. They weren’t even pretty, being thin necked, heavy headed, long backed, lean bodied, with spindly legs. Their hide was covered in a coarse fur and ranged in color from a dirty white to a dark brown. They were more graceful than herdbeasts but by no stretch of the imagination as beautiful as dragons or fire lizards.

  The creature Piemur was to ride was a dirty brown. He threw the mouth rope over its neck, and by pinching its nose holes, forced it to open its mouth to receive the metal mouthpiece. Quickly grabbing its ear, Piemur managed to get the headstall in place. It snorted as if mildly surprised. Not half as surprised as Piemur that he’d remembered that little trick. He heard Banak grunt. He slapped the pad in place and tightened the midstrap, wondering if this thing would give him any trouble once he was astride it.

  Untying its halter, he backed it out and found Menolly at the aisle, holding her larger beast. She examined the gear on his.

  “Oh, he did it right,” said Banak, nodding approval and waving them to go on as he turned to the rear of the cavern on his own affairs.

  It had been a long time since Piemur had been bestride a runner. Fortunately, this creature was docile, and its pacing stride smooth as Menolly set off briskly down the eastern roadway.

  There was a knack of easing yourself on a runner’s pad. Piemur found himself almost unconsciously assuming the position; sitting on one buttock, extending his left leg as far as the toe-hold strap would go, while cocking the knee of his right leg firmly against the runner’s side. A rider would change sides often in trip. For a girl seahold bred, Menolly rode with the ease of much practice, Piemur noted.

  All the way down to the sea hold, Piemur kept his mouth shut. He’d be scorched if he’d ask her why they were going there. He doubted that the sole purpose of this excursion was to see if he could ride runners or keep his mouth shut. And what had she meant by easier to have a second runner ridden than led? This reticent, assured Menolly on Harper business was quite different from the girl who let him feed her fire lizards, and a long stride from his recollections of the shy and self-effacing newcomer to the Harper Hall three Turns back.

  Once they reached Fort Sea Hold, Menolly tossed him her beast’s mouth rope, told him to take them to the hold’s beastmaster, ease the backpads, water them and see if they could have some feed. As Piemur led the creatures away, he noticed that she went to the harbor wall, shading one hand as she peered at the eastern horizon. Why was she waiting for a ship? Or had that something to do with the drum message from Ista Hold the other morning?

  The beastmaster greeted him cheerfully enough and helped him attend the runners.

  “You’ll be likely heading back to the Hall as soon as the ship docks,” said the man. “I’ll pad up Sebell’s beast, so he’s ready. Soon’s we got these comfortable, you just pop into my hold there, and my woman’ll fix you a bite to eat. Boy your age could always do with a bit, I’m sure. One thing about seaholding, you’ve always the extra to feed, even in Threadfall.”

  His hospitality included Menolly when she came in; after Piemur too had seen the speck far out on the sea. He knew that he’d have a chance to rest his weary bones as well as exercise his jaw.

  Sebell had a runner stabled here, huh? Sebell borne by a westbound ship. Which suggested that Sebell had also sailed from this seahold. Piemur tried to remember how long it had been since he’d seen Sebell about the Hall, and couldn’t.

  Fort Sea Hold possessed a natural deep harbor so that the incoming ship sailed right up to the stone-lined side.
Seamen on shore as well as on the ship neatly tied her thick lines to the bollards on the wall. Sebell was not immediately visible, though as Menolly’s fire lizards did a welcoming display above the ship’s rigging, the westering sun glinted off two golden bodies, Sebell’s queen, Kimi, as well as Menolly’s Beauty. Piemur didn’t spot Sebell in the bustle of people unloading the ship until suddenly he appeared right in front of them, heavy bags draped across his shoulders and arms. A seaman carefully laid two more filled sacks at his feet. Enough to load down a runner beast, all right.

  “Good trip, Sebell?” asked Menolly, picking up one of the sacks and slinging it with a deft twist of her wrist to her back. “Give Piemur at least one yoke of those,” she added, and Piemur sprang quickly to relieve Sebell of some of his burden, fingering the bulges to see if he could identify the contents. “And don’t maul it, Piemur. The herbs will be crushed soon enough!”

  Herbs?

  “Piemur? What’re you doing here? Shouldn’t you be rehearsing?” began Sebell. His smile was pleasant and the whiteness of his teeth stood out against dark tanned skin.

  Herbs and a tan? Piemur would bet every mark he had that Sebell had just returned from the Southern Continent.

  “Piemur’s voice has broken.”

  “It has?” There was no doubting Sebell’s pleasure at the news. “And Master Robinton’s agreeable?”

  Menolly grinned. “With a slight variation, according to the wisdom of our good Master!”

  “Oh?” Sebell glanced first at Piemur and then back to Menolly for explanation.

  “He’s been told off as apprentice to Master Olodkey.”

  Sebell began to chuckle then. “Shrewd of Master Robinton, very shrewd! Right, Piemur?”

  “I guess so.”

  At such a sour rejoinder, Sebell threw his head back and laughed, startling his queen who’d been about to land on his shoulder. She flew about his head, scolding, joined by Beauty and the two bronzes. Sebell threw an arm across Piemur’s shoulders, telling him to cheer up, and draped his other arm about Menolly. Then he guided them toward the holdstables.

  There was a look on Sebell’s face that suggested to Piemur that the companionable arm about his shoulders had been an excuse for the one about Menolly’s. The observation cheered Piemur for he knew something no other apprentice did. Maybe not even Master Robinton. Or did he?

  Variations on that notion contented Piemur on the initial leg of their hall ward trip. The last three hours were spent in increasing physical discomfort. For one thing, he had sacks strapped front and back of his pad and another slung over his shoulder. It was difficult to adjust his rear end and find a spot not already beaten to a pulp by the runner beast’s action. Rather unfair of Menolly, Piemur thought with some rancor, to include him on an eight-hour ride his first time on a runner in Turns.

  He was immensely relieved that he wasn’t expected to tend the mounts, too, as they handed mouth ropes to Banak. Then, Piemur wished he’d been able to dismount in the Harper Hall courtyard, for his stiff and seemingly reshaped legs made the short walk from beasthold to Hall an unexpected torture. Sourly he listened to Menolly and Sebell chatting as they preceded him. They talked of inconsequentialities so that Piemur couldn’t even ignore his aches by concentrating on their comments.

  “Well, Piemur,” said Menolly as they climbed the steps to the Hall, “you haven’t forgotten how to pace a beast. Shells, what’s the matter with you?”

  “It’s been five bloody Turns since I’ve ridden one,” he said, trying to straighten his sorely afflicted back.

  “Menolly! That’s plain cruel,” cried Sebell, trying to keep a straight face. “Into the hot baths with you, lad, before you harden in that posture.”

  Menolly was instantly contrite, with protests of dismay and apology. Sebell guided him to the bathing room, and when Menolly brought a tray of hot food for them all, she served Piemur as he floated in the soothing water. To Piemur’s utter embarrassment, Silvina appeared as he was patting his sore spots dry. She proceeded to slather him with numbweed salve and, making him lie down, massaged his back and legs. Just when he thought he’d never move again, Silvina made him get to his feet. Strangely enough, he could walk more normally. At least the numbweed deadened the muscular aches enough for him to make his own way across the court and up the three flights to the drumheights.

  He slept through three drum messages the next morning, the fire lizards’ feeding and half the chorus rehearsal with instruments. When he woke, Dirzan gave him time for a cup of klah and a meatroll, then quizzed him on the drum measures assigned him the day before.

  To Dirzan’s amazement, Piemur beat them out time-perfect. He’d had plenty of hours in which to memorize them on that runner ride. As a reward, Dirzan gave him another column of measures to learn.

  The numbweed salve had worn off, and Piemur found sitting on the stool during his lesson agonizing. He had rubbed his seat bones raw, a combination of the stiffness of his new trousers and the riding. This affliction provided him with an opportunity to visit Master Oldive after lunch. Although Sebell’s sacks were in evidence in Master Oldive’s quarters, even to some herbs piled on the worktable, Piemur pried no new snippets of information from the Master Healer. Not even if this had been the first shipment of such medicines. He did learn that galls hurt more when treated than when sat on. Then the numbweed took over. Master Oldive said he was to use a cushion for sitting for a few days, wear older, softened pants, and ask Silvina for a conditioner to soften his wherhide.

  No sooner had he returned to the drumheights, than he was sent with a message for Lord Groghe to Fort Hold, and when he came back, set to stand a listening watch.

  He saw Menolly and Sebell the next morning when he fed his trio of fire lizards but, apart from solicitous inquiry about his stiffness, the two harpers were not talkative. The next day Sebell was gone, and Piemur didn’t know when or how. He was able, however, to observe, from the drumheights, the comings and goings, in and out of Fort Hold, of riders on runners, of two dragons and an incredible number of fire lizards. It occurred to him that while he had been congratulating himself on knowing most of what went on in the Harper Hall, the drumheights let him observe the larger world which, up till that day, had been unremarked by himself.

  Several messages came in that afternoon, two from the north and one from the south. Three went out; one in answer to Tillek’s question from the north; an originating message to Igen Tanner Hall; and the third to Master Briaret, the Masterherdsman. To tantalize him, all the messages were too quickly delivered for him to recognize more than a few phrases. Infuriated to be in a position to know more and unable to exercise the advantage to the full, Piemur memorized two columns of drum measures. If his zeal surprised Dirzan, it irritated his fellow apprentices. They presented him with several all too forceful arguments against too much application on his part. Piemur had always relied on being able to outrun any would-be adversaries, but he discovered that there was no place to run to in the drumheights. While nursing his bruises, he stubbornly learned off three more columns, though he kept this private, tempering his recitations to Dirzan. Discretion, he was learning, is required on many different levels.

  He was not sorry six days later to be told to take a message to a minehold situated on an awkward ridge in the Fort Hold Range. With a signed, Harper-sealed tube of record hide, he mounted the same stolid runner beast Banak had given him for the previous trip.

  Gingerly settling the seat of his now well-softened wherhide pants onto the pad, Piemur was relieved to feel no discomfort from his tail bones as the creature moved off. The journey should take him two to three hours, Banak said, as he’d pointed out to him the correct south-western track. Three hours was probably correct, Piemur thought as his efforts to increase the pace of his runner failed. By the time the wide track had narrowed to a thinner trace, winding against a stony hillside, with deep gorges on the outside, Piemur was quite willing to let his runner go at that steady, careful pace. As he f
igured it would have taken the Fort Hold watchdragon only a few moments to make the trip, and the watchdragon’s rider was quite willing to oblige the Masterharper of Pern, he wondered why he’d been sent. Until he delivered his message tube to the taciturn mineholder.

  “You’re from the Harper Hall?” The man scowled at him dubiously.

  “Apprentice to Master Olodkey, the Drummaster!” This could be some sort of test of his prudence.

  “Wouldn’t have thought they’d send a boy on this errand,” he said with a skeptical grunt.

  “I’ve fourteen Turns, sir,” Piemur replied, trying to deepen his tone without notable success.

  “No offense meant, lad.”

  “None taken.” Piemur was pleased that his voice. remained steady.

  The Miner paused, his gaze drawn upward. Not, Piemur noticed, in the direction of the sun. When the Miner began to scowl, Piemur also looked up. Though why the Miner should register displeasure at the sight of three dragons in the sky, Piemur couldn’t guess. True, Thread had fallen only three days before, but you’d think dragons would be a reassuring sight at any time.

  “There’s feed and water in the shed,” said the Miner, still watching the dragons. He gestured absently over his left shoulder.

  Obediently Piemur started to lead the runner around, hoping that there would be something for himself as well when he’d tended the beast. Suddenly, the Miner let out a startled oath and retreated into his holdcot. Piemur had only reached the shed when the Miner came striding after him, thrusting a small bulging sack at him.