Anne McCaffrey: Dragonsinger

“Why not Sebell? He’s got his egg to check, too, doesn’t he? And with Menolly here in the Hall…” Silvina was saying as Master Oldive, ushering Menolly out of the room before him, closed the door.

“I’m to see to your feet as well, Silvina tells me,” was the man’s comment as he indicated Menolly should lead the way to her room. The Master’s voice was unexpectedly deep. And while he might be shorter than herself in the torso, he’d as long a leg and arm and matched her stride down the corridor. As he pushed wider her door, she realized that his stature was due to a terrible malformation of his spine.

“By my life!” Oldive exclaimed, stopping abruptly as Menolly preceded him into the room. “I thought for a moment you were as blighted as myself. It is a fire lizard on your shoulder, isn’t it?” He chuckled. “Now, there’s one on me, so it is. Is the creature friendly?” He peered up at Beauty, who chirruped back, since Oldive was patently addressing her. “As long as I’m friendly to your Menolly, I take it? You’ll have to write another verse to your fire lizard song, proving the rewards of kindness,” he added, gesturing her to sit on the window side of the bed as he pulled up the stool.

“Oh, that’s not my song…” she said, removing her slippers.

Master Oldive frowned. “Not your song? But Master Robinton assigns it to you—constantly.”

“He rewrote it…he told me so.”

“That’s not unusual,” and Master Oldive dismissed her protest. “Proper mess you made of your feet,” he said, his voice taking on a distant, thoughtful quality as he looked at first one, then the other foot. “Running, I believe…”

Menolly felt reproved. “I was caught out during Threadfall, you see, far from my cave and had to run…oooh!”

“Sorry, did I hurt? The flesh is very tender. And will remain that way awhile longer.”

He began to smooth on a pungent-smelling substance, and she couldn’t keep her foot still. He grabbed her ankle firmly to complete the medication, countering her embarrassed apology by remarking that her twitching proved that she’d done the nerves no harm with the pounding she’d given her feet.

“You’re to keep off them as much as possible. I’ll tell Silvina so. And use this salve morning and night. Aids healing and keeps the skin from itching.” He replaced Menolly’s slippers. “Now, this hand of yours.”

She hesitated, knowing that his opinion of the bungled wound was likely to echo Manora’s and Silvina’s. Perversely she was afflicted by an obscure loyalty to her mother.

Oldive regarded her steadily, as if divining some mea sure of her reluctance, and extended his own hand. Compelled by the very neutrality of his gaze, she gave him her injured hand. To her surprise, there was no change of expression on his face, no condemnation or pity, merely interest in the problem the thick-scarred palm posed for a man of his skill. He prodded the scar tissue, murmuring thoughtfully in his throat.

“Make a fist.”

She could just about do that but, when he asked her to extend her fingers, the scar pulled as she tried to stretch the palm.

“Not as bad as I was led to believe. An infection, I suppose…”

“Packtail slime…”

“Hmm, yes. Insidious stuff.” He gave her hand another twist. “But the scar is not long healed, and the tissue can still be stretched. A few more months and we might not have been able to do anything to flex the hand. Now, you will do exercises, tightening your fingers about a small hard ball, which I will provide you, and extending the hand.” He demonstrated, forcing her fingers upward and apart so that she cried out involuntarily. “If you can discipline yourself to the point of actual discomfort, you are doing the exercise properly. We must stretch the tightened skin, the webbing between your fingers, and the stiffened tendons. I shall also provide a salve, which you are to rub well into the scar tissue to make it softer and more pliable. Conscientious effort on your part will determine the rate of progress. I suspect that you will be sufficiently motivated.”

Before Menolly could stammer her thanks, the astonishing man was out of the room and closing the door behind him. Beauty made a sound—half quizzical chirp, half approving burble. She’d come loose from Menolly’s neck during the examination, watching the proceedings from a depression in the sleeping furs. Now she walked over to Menolly and stroked her head against Menolly’s arm.

From the apprentices’ hall across the courtyard, the singing was renewed, with vigor and volume. Beauty cocked her head, humming with delight and then, when Menolly shushed her, looked wistfully up at the girl.

“I don’t think we should sing again just now, but they do sound grand, don’t they?”

She sat there, caressing Beauty, delighting in the music. Very close harmony, she realized approvingly, the sort only trained voices and well-rehearsed singers can achieve.

“Well,” said Silvina, entering the room briskly, “you have stirred them up. It’s good to hear that old rooter sung with some spirit.”

Menolly had no time to register astonishment at Silvina’s comment, for the headwoman poked at Menolly’s bundle of things on the table, and twitched the sleeping rug into neat folds.

“We might just as well get you settled in Dunca’s cottage now,” Silvina continued. “Fortunately, there’s an outside room unoccupied…” The headwoman wrinkled her nose in a slightly disparaging grimace. “Those holder girls are impossible about being outside, but it oughtn’t to worry you.” She smiled at Menolly. “Oldive says you’re to keep off your feet, but some walking’s got to be done. Still, you won’t be in a chore section…another good reason to keep you at Dunca’s, I suppose…” Silvina frowned and then looked back at Menolly’s small bundle.

“This is all you brought with you?”

“And nine fire lizards.”

Silvina laughed. “An embarrassment of riches.” She glanced out the window, peering across the courtyard to the far roof where the fire lizards were still sunning themselves. “They do stay where they’re told, don’t they?”

“Generally. But I’m not sure how good they are with too many people about or unusual noise.”

“Or fascinating diversions…” Silvina smiled again at Menolly as she nodded toward the windows and the music issuing from the apprentices’ hall.

“They always sang along with me…I didn’t realize we shouldn’t—”

“How should you? Not to worry, Menolly. You’ll fit in here just fine. Now, let’s wrap up your bundle and show you the way to Dunca’s. Then Robinton wants you to borrow a gitar, Master Jerint is sure to have a spare usable one in the workshop. You’ll have to make your own, you know. Unless you made one for Petiron at the Sea Hold?”

“I had none of my own.” Menolly was relieved that she could keep her voice steady.

“But Petiron took his with him. Surely you…”

“I had the use of it, yes.” Menolly managed to keep her tone even as she rigidly suppressed the memory of how she had lost the use, of the beating her father had given her for forbidden tuning, playing her own songs. “I made myself pipes…” she added, diverting Silvina from further questions. Rummaging in her bundle, she brought out the multiple pipes she had made in her cave by the sea.

“Reeds? And done with a belt knife by the look of them,” said Silvina, walking to the window for more light as she turned the pipes in a critical examination. “Well done for just a belt knife.” She returned the pipes to Menolly with an approving expression. “Petiron was a good teacher.”

“Did you know him well?” Menolly felt a wave of grief at her loss of the only person in her home hold who had been interested in her.