Энн Маккефри - Dragon’s Kin

“You didn’t think, you mean,” the old man roared back irritably.

Kindan hung his head. “Yes, sir.” If there was one thing Kindan was good at, it was at being bawled out—he’d had lots of practice.

“You seem to have a knack for that, don’t you?” the Harper noted tetchily.

“Yes, sir,” Kindan agreed, his head on his chest and his answer going to the floor.

The new Harper eyed Kindan. “You’re not related to that oaf I just sent out of here this morning, are you?”

Kindan glanced up at that, his lists clenched. It was enough to be in the wrong and caught out twice by the stranger, but only a family member had the right to call Kaylek an oaf!

“Hmm,” the old man murmured. “You say nothing, but your body shows its support for your clan.”

He stood up and strode over to Kindan. Putting a hand under Kindan’s chin, he lifted the boy’s head until Kindan was looking in the Harper’s eyes. Kindan could not keep the anger off his face, and he refused to utter an apology. He matched looks with the Harper for as long as the Harper stared at him.

Finally, the Harper stood back. “Stubborn. But I’ve managed worse.”

Kindan’s nostrils flared.

The Harper ignored him, flicking his gaze to Zenor. “Well, come in, lad, I won’t bite you!”

Zenor looked as though he were completely torn between the obvious fallacy of the Harper’s statement and the blasphemy that a Harper could lie. He gave Kindan an inquiring look and, receiving no hints from his friend, stood dazed like a smallbeast stalked by a wherry until the Harper cleared his throat warningly. Zenor jumped into the room as though stung.

“Harper Jofri tells me that you sing well,” the Harper said to them, dividing his gaze between the two boys. “But Harper Jofri is a journeyman who specializes in ballads and drums.

“I”—and here the Harper deepened his voice and increased his volume, so that his words echoed resoundingly through the room—“am a Master and specialize in the voice. So, naturally, I have been asked to oversee the evening’s vocal arrangements.”

Kindan looked up at that, amazed. Harper Jofri had often admonished the boys and girls of Camp Natalon that it they didn’t behave he’d use the tricks that had been used on him by the Harper Hall’s vocal master. “Be good, or I’ll treat you like Master Zist treated me,” Jofri would warn them.

And here, standing in front of them, true to life and full of horrors, was that very same Master Zist.

Zenor’s jaw dropped. Out of the corner of his eye, Kindan could see Zenor trying to get words out of his mouth, but it was obvious that all the air in him had gone into his eyes, for they looked ready to pop straight out of his face.

“You’re—” Kindan realized that he was not immune from terror, either. “You’re Master Zist?”

Beside him, Zenor had managed to close his mouth.

“Ah,” Master Zist replied in satisfied tones, “you’ve heard of me. I am pleased to learn that Harper Jofri remembered my lessons.

“It remains to be seen how much he has taught you,” he continued, raising a finger warningly. “I will not let my first day here—and this Camp’s very first wedding—be marred by voices that are not in proper form.”

Master Zist opened his hand and waved the two boys closer to him. “When you are ready, I shall hear a scale from middle C in harmony.”

Kindan and Zenor glanced at each other; Harper Jofri had had them doing scales in harmony since they could first walk. Their eyes gleamed and they turned back to the Master, opened their mouths, and—

“No, no, no!” Master Zist roared. The boys caught their breath and rocked back on their heels in fright. “Stand up straight. Shoulders back. Take a deep breath and—”

Following his orders, the two boys started to sing the scales.

“Who told you to sing?” Master Zist yelled at them. After they shut their mouths in horror, he continued, “I do not recall asking you to sing.” He sighed. “It is obvious that you two must first learn how to breathe.”

Zenor and Kindan exchanged looks. Didn’t they already know how to breathe?

By lunchtime, Kindan was exhausted. He hadn’t realized how much work it could be just to sing. Rather than letting them go, Master Zist sent Zenor to get their lunch and tell Jenella that the two boys would sing at the wedding. Zenor’s eyes lit when Master Zist told them, but Kindan was too tired and still wary of the new Harper.

“You,” Master Zist intoned after Zenor had left, “will practice the wedding chorale Harper Jofri had selected for your brother.”

Kindan gulped. Kaylek would kill him for sure when he found out, and that song was a really hard one to learn.

By the time Zenor returned with lunch—it seemed to take forever—Kindan was sweating with effort and Master Zist was nearly shaking with rage.

“Leave the food here,” Master Zist told him, “and take yourself away.”

Instead of breaking for lunch, Master Zist insisted that Kindan continue his singing. No matter how hard he tried, Kindan could not master the song.

In the end, red-faced and bellowing, Master Zist threw up his hands. “You are not listening to me! You do not pay the slightest attention. You can master this song, you just choose not to. Oh, you are such a waste! To think your mother died giving birth to you! You’re not worth it at all.”

Kindan’s fists clenched and his eyes flared with rage. He turned on his heel and ran out of the cottage. He got only a few feet before he was stopped by his sister.

“Kindan, how is it going?” she asked, too excited to notice his expression. “Isn’t it great that Master Zist is here? Did you know that mother said he taught her our favorite song?”

Kindan took one look at her cheerful face as her words registered in his brain—and inspiration struck.

“Excuse me, Sis, I’ve got to get back to practicing,” he said before he turned back to the cottage. Over his shoulder he added, “Everything’s going great.”

He barged back into the cottage where Master Zist still sat, waiting. Kindan pulled himself up to a proper singing posture, drew in a breath, and began to sing:

“In early morning light I see,

A distant dragon come to me.

Its skin is bronze, its eyes are green;

It’s the loveliest dragon I’ve ever seen.”

Encouraged by the Harper’s silence, Kindan continued through the whole song. In the end, he looked truculently at the Master and said, “I can, too, sing. My sister says that I can sing as well as my mother. My sister says that I am worth it. And my father, too. And they should know—they were there when I was born.” Tears streaked down his face, but he didn’t care. “My sister said that my mother’s last words were that I wouldn’t need much caring but I’d be worth it.”

Master Zist was in shock. “That voice,” he muttered to himself. “You have her voice.” He looked up at Kindan and there were tears in his eyes, too. “Lad, I’m sorry. I should never have said ... I had no right ... Could you sing it again, please? You have the same lyric quality she had.”

Kindan wiped his tears and drew breath, but his throat was still choked up with grief and anger. Master Zist raised a hand to stop him and went into the cottage’s kitchen. He returned with a cup of warm tea.

“Drink this, it’ll ease your throat,” he said in a much kindlier and more subdued voice. While Kindan was drinking, Master Zist said, “I drove you too hard, lad. I have never driven a student so hard. I shouldn’t have done it to you, either. It’s just that—that I want this to be the best day for your sister and your father. I want to give them that.”

“So do I,” Kindan said.