Энн Маккефри - Dragon’s Kin

Tonight she was spelling Jori, who was taking extra long over her dinner. Renna didn’t really mind, though; she liked the late evening up on the watch-heights. Her ears were good and she could hear almost every word spoken as it rose up from the valley below, echoing off the hard cliff walls. She also had a great view of the lake under the night stars.

When two dragons popped out over the lake, she jumped with delight. They were huge, larger than anything Renna had ever seen—certainly larger than Kisk, Kindan’s growing watch-wher, and tar prettier. She watched in awe as they glided over the houses and landed on the hillside that led up to the mine entrance.

A man’s voice drifted up to her. “J’lantir, are you sure?”

She watched the two dragonriders dismount. The dragons rose again, flew toward the lake, and then plunged with frightening abandon into the water. Renna was afraid they’d drowned, until they popped back up again, bobbing like large wooden rafts on the water. She shivered. It was a cold night—dragons must have tough hides to like that water. Or maybe they’d just come from a hot place.

“Lolanth felt a strong presence,” the other dragonrider, J’lantir, replied. “J’trel would know for sure, M’tal, but my guess is that there is a young girl here who could ride gold ... only—”

“What?”

“Well, Lolanth tells me that this girl is in constant darkness,” J’lantir replied in a puzzled tone.

“Trapped? Is she in danger?” M’tal pressed.

“I don’t know. Lolanth seemed to think that the girl had been that way for some time,” J’lantir replied.

“You don’t suppose she’s blind?” M’tal wondered softly.

“Maybe that’s it,” J’lantir agreed. “What a pity, to be so gifted and not able to Impress.”

Their voices grew fainter as they headed down toward the watch-wher’s shed.

“This Camp looks to Telgar—and D’gan won’t Search,” M’tal said after a moment. “I think we shouldn’t mention this to anyone.”

“I think you’re right,” J’lantir agreed.

“Ah! We’re expected,” M’tal said with a laugh. “Gaminth tells me that Kisk is curious about your Lolanth and wants to come out.”

“Well, at least we know she can talk to dragons,” J’lantir replied with a chuckle. “I’ve told Lolanth to say ‘later’ to her.”

The two dragonriders ducked into the shed and their faint voices were cut off from Renna’s hearing. She ignored the sounds of the dragons splashing in the lake below as she recalled the conversation. For one thrilling moment, she’d hoped that perhaps they had been talking about her, and that she might be the one who could ride gold. Did they mean a gold dragon—a queen dragon? Wouldn’t that be marvelous, Renna mused. But then she’d heard M’tal saying that maybe the girl was blind. Renna ran through the list of girls in the Camp. She knew of no blind girl. Perhaps they were thinking of a baby or something. But if they were, she mused, wouldn’t their dragons be able to tell them? Maybe the girl was hidden someplace—but who would keep a person hidden away? Anyway, where could anyone hide someone here? In the mine? She shook her head. That would be too dangerous. But she couldn’t think of anywhere else, and she’d been everywhere in the Camp! She creased her brow in thought. Everywhere ... except the second floor of Natalon’s hold.

Renna spent the rest of her watch in thoughtful silence. She didn’t even grumble when Jori arrived back half an hour late.

“Nuella, this is Lord M’tal, Weyrleader of Benden Weyr,” Kindan said as the two dragonriders entered the shed. He looked at the other one. “My Lord—”

“J’lantir, rider of Lolanth, Wingleader at Ista Weyr,” the second dragonrider supplied deftly.

“You must be Kindan,” he went on jovially, holding out his hand. Kindan shook it quickly. J’lantir turned and held out his hand to Nuella. Kindan started to sidle unobtrusively over to her, to give her a nudge but stopped when he saw J’lantir and M’tal exchange a thoughtful look.

Before the silence grew too large, Nuella raised her hand. J’lantir quickly moved to grab it.

“I’m Nuella,” she said. She quirked an eyebrow at him and then her face fell. “You moved, didn’t you?”

“I did,” J’lantir admitted. “How did you know?”

“I can feel it in the angle of your hand,” she replied. She moved closer to him, letting go of his hand and raising her own. “Would you mind if I touched your face?” she asked very nervously. “That’s the way I get to know people.”

“Not at all,” J’lantir replied gallantly.

Nuella raised her hand up, hesitantly. Her fingertips touched his chin, then traced his jaw, his lips, his nose, eyebrows, and forehead.

“You’re sunburned,” she said with surprise. “Is it still warm at Ista, my Lord?”

“Sometimes the sun can burn worse on cloudy days,” J’lantir admitted. “However, in my case it comes from flying above the clouds, where the sun is still shining. At Ista the clouds sometimes gather very low.”

“You fly above the clouds?” Nuella repeated, awed.

“I do,” J’lantir affirmed.

M’tal stepped beside him. “I am M’tal,” he said to Nuella, reaching out to her. She found his hand and shook it and, with his permission, traced his face.

“Do you have a good Harper at Benden Weyr, my Lord?” she asked when she had finished.

“A good Harper?” M’tal mused. “Why yes, we do. Why do you ask?”

“It seems to me that your face laughs a lot,” Nuella answered. “I thought maybe that was because your Harper was funny.”

“He is,” M’tal replied with a laugh. “I’ll be sure to tell him you said so; I think he’ll be very pleased.”

Nuella dipped her head in acknowledgment, only partly hiding her blush.

“Nuella,” J’lantir said after a moment, “you had an interesting theory about how watch-whers see.”

“I think they see heat, my Lord,” Nuella responded.

M’tal said to Kindan, “J’lantir has been asked by his Weyrleader, C’rion, to learn all he can about watch-whers. I suggested that it might be a good idea if you and he pooled your knowledge.”

Kindan nodded, looking at the other dragonrider with increased interest.

“How could we test it?” J’lantir wondered aloud.

“I’ve been thinking about that, my Lord,” Nuella responded. “I thought maybe if we got a hot stone and a glow—”

“What a marvelous idea!” J’lantir exclaimed. “I think I would go with more than one glow, one dim and one bright, and maybe the same thing for the stones.” Very soon he and Nuella were engrossed in designing a complete test of the watch-wher’s sight.

“We could just ask her,” Kindan said to himself.

M’tal smiled at him. “But then it’d take away all their fun.”

“No, it wouldn’t,” Nuella said with her usual lack of deference. She put a hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry—I meant, my Lord.”

“She’s like that with everyone,” Kindan murmured.

“She’s got good hearing, too,” M’tal agreed, with a twinkle in his eyes. He turned to Nuella. “Nuella, I think that we all will be working together quite a great deal, so I think it best if we dispense with formalities and just get on with things—what do you say?”

Nuella’s eyes got very big. She nodded, speechless.

Kindan was no less amazed. “Do you mean you want me to call you by your name, my Lord?”

“It only seems fair,” J’lantir told them. “Besides, I’m not used to all this ‘my Lording.’”

“J’lantir is usually either flying upside down or is off somewhere reading,” M’tal said, clapping the other dragonrider on his shoulder. He leaned down to Nuella and whispered, “I heard once that he lost his whole wing for a week without noticing.”