The Skies of Pern

by Anne McCaffrey

  “Good point,” Sebell said. “I’ll also find out what Tagetarl does with blurred or damaged pages.”

  “Unless Wide Bay healer hall is missing some of their medical texts,” Sharra added.

  “Yes, we must find out where and who issued that filth,” Crivellan urged.

  “I doubt we will,” Sebell said. “But, if you’ll pass the word of such things to your healers, we’ll have harpers keep their eyes open. Runners, too.” He glanced at Haligon, who nodded. Then he began to tick off more points on his fingers. “Right now we’ve enough to make some discreet inquiries in Keroon, trace the Crom runnerbeasts, see if anyone else saw them on the way here, or perhaps crossing Telgar and Keroon, find out where they got the fabric for their clothing, and pass around sketches of Batim, Scalp, and Itch.”

  “And suggest that all Halls keep guard at night,” F’lar said.

  “You’re within your rights, Groghe,” Jaxom said, pausing to smile ironically, “to keep them as long as they might be needed.”

  “Needed?” Groghe was offended. “I’ll have them out of my Hold as soon as possible.” Scowling, he glanced around the table, assessing all. “I know what I want to do with them. What I firmly believe should be done with all these dissenting Abominators.” He brought his fist down again on the table. “Exile ’em!”

  Crivellan jumped at the crack of fist on wood. “I thought that required a trial and jury,” he said, surprised.

  Groghe gestured to include those present. “Masters, Weyrleaders, and Lord Holders. Adequate judges. The vandals were caught in the act. Plenty of people saw what they did. Destroyed valuable property, depriving others of medicines and services. And not just in Fort.” He waved an encompassing arm. He focused narrowed eyes on the irresolute Healer. “Ordinarily, I’d send them to the mines. However, the notion of being exiled might make others think twice. I wouldn’t want anyone to think the healer halls can be attacked with impunity. Right, Master Crivellan?”

  “Yes,” the man admitted hesitantly. “It will be hard enough to replace what was spoiled and broken today. Though stopping that sort of travesty,” he added, pointing to the pamphlet, “is even more important!”

  “I thought you’d see it our way,” Groghe said. “We’ll proceed accordingly.”

  Sebell rose. “I shall have many messages for Kimi.”

  “Meer and Talla can help if you wish,” Sharra offered.

  “Tris, too,” N’ton said. He got to his feet, stretching stiffly.

  “You know, exile is a just punishment for them,” Lessa remarked. “They can’t escape it or each other. Don’t make it a large island, will you, N’ton.” She took F’lar’s hand to get to her feet and retrieved her heavy fur-lined riding jacket from the back of her chair. “We shall all keep our ears and eyes open during Fall two days from now.”

  “How soon can you get any information from the Runners, Haligon?” F’lar asked.

  Haligon shrugged. “They’ve first to spread the word. When I explained the matter to Torlo at the Fort Station, he wrote messages for every pouch being forwarded.”

  “Pern has relied on the Runners for much,” F’lar stated.

  “It always will,” Lessa added on her way to the door.

  Sharra wondered if she was the only one to see Haligon’s delighted reaction to Lessa’s reassurance. She was as eager to get home as Lessa. It had been a very long and trying day.

  “We’ll sort this out,” Groghe said at his heartiest. “Thank you one and all for assistance in this vexing matter. Let’s hope the new Turn improves from here on out!”

  “I’ll second that!” Jaxom replied fervently.

  Fort Hold Runner Station—1.2.31

  “We’ve no word from Crom yet,” Torlo said the moment Haligon walked into the Runner Station. Torlo had just finished dispatching the day’s runners, laden with Crafthall messages, resulting from a very busy Turnover. “Hard frost makes a hard trace.”

  “Weyr, Hold, and Hall are indebted to you, Torlo,” Haligon said courteously, wondering now why he had proffered services last night that he might not be able to secure. Runners had unassailable ethics.

  “No more than our duty to trace letters,” the old man replied with a careless flick of his hand, “especially after all that dirty business at the Healer Hall.” Then he cast a shrewd look at his early morning guest. “Too early, too, for you to be looking for Tenna, bearing in mind you should know by now how long it takes her to make a run back. You got to spend most of Turnover with her.”

  Haligon cleared his throat, not sure how to state his real business of the morning.

  “Oh? Something else, is it?” Torlo, who was a perceptive man under a brusque manner, pointed to the corner of the empty hall of the Runner Station. “Fresh klah, Lord Haligon?”

  Maybe this should have been done more informally, but Torlo had called the tone by using his title. Hiding his chagrin, Haligon accepted the hospitality and slid onto a settle seat at the end table while Torlo filled cups and brought a breadboard with some of the morning’s bake on it. Everyone would have known about the meeting in the Hold’s private dining room. That Batim had been questioned. Certainly the fire-lizard traffic out of the Harper Hall last night would have been noticed. The Runners had never objected—in so many words—to fire-lizards carrying messages. They appreciated that speed could be a critical factor that had not, yet, interfered with their craft. In the very early days, while clutches were still being found on the beaches of Boll, Ista, and Keroon, Runners had used fire-lizards, too.

  The young Lord sipped the klah—it was always excellent here—and deliberated exactly how to approach Torlo. He had several very good reasons for not antagonizing either the man or the Runners and for carrying out last night’s request, not the least of which was his firm regard, although his brother called it an obsession, for Tenna.

  “The Abominator who led the vandals let drop some information,” he began, choosing his words carefully.

  “He’s one of them?” Torlo’s contempt was deep. “Same as who abused Master Robinton?”

  “Similar but this time turning their spite on the Healer and Glass Halls.”

  “Glass Halls, too?” Torlo’s spiky brows shot up on his lined forehead, his deep-set eyes fast on Haligon’s face. He leaned forward slightly across the tables. “What about SmithCraftHalls?”

  Something in Torlo’s manner suggested to Haligon that they would have been legitimate targets. Haligon wondered why.

  “SmithCraftHalls set up tighter safeguards after the first raids on their Halls ten or more Turns ago,” he said.

  “Hmm. Yes. Recollect now.” Torlo rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “That Aivas guarded itself, didn’t it?”

  “A Hall shouldn’t have to protect itself,” Haligon said.

  “True.”

  “Especially Healers, the one Craft that’s benefited most from the knowledge Aivas left behind.”

  “Agreed.” Torlo motioned for Haligon to help himself to the sweet rolls on the board. He broke a piece off himself, pushing the crumbs into his mouth.

  Delaying, Haligon thought, so he continued.

  “Stationmaster, didn’t Master Oldive remove that growth from Grolly’s leg? Couldn’t have been able to do that before. I believe Grolly’s running again. And the cataract film from Tuvor’s eyes? He’s got clear sight now. I heard they can keep guts from popping out of a man’s belly. And they’re not niggardly with their help. Didn’t they show Beastmaster Frawly how to reduce the wobbles in that fine colt?”

  “Aye? So what’re you driving at, Lord Haligon?”

  “Some are spreading evil untruths about the Healers, with vile pamphlets …”

  “Runners burn the ones they’re given.”

  “They’ve seen some?” Haligon was jolted so badly he spilled klah on his hand.

  “Runners won’t spread filth like that.”

  “But where? When? Does it happen often?” So Crivellan was right to fret over the matter.
/>
  Torlo gave him a long stare. “Runner business. We take care of it.”

  “But where? We must stop it. Do Runners know where it comes from?”

  Torlo shrugged. “Runners stop it going further.”

  “Yes, but not all of it,” Haligon said, becoming more agitated. “The vandals had a particularly grisly copy. Master Crivellan was distraught.”

  “He’s not the only one.”

  Haligon stiffened at the satiric tone of Torlo’s voice. “What quarrel do Runners have with the Healer Hall?” he asked in a low voice though there was no one else in the dining room just then.

  “None.” Torlo was surprised by Haligon’s query.

  “With whom then?”

  Torlo paused, then a slight grin lifted the corner of his mouth and his eyes met Haligon’s squarely. “You’re not what you seem, Lord Haligon.”

  “Runners are as essential to us all as Healers, Stationmaster. What’s the problem?”

  Torlo considered that and then, making his decision, leaned forward.

  “We’ve no objection to Healer Hall improvements: they benefit all. When ‘improvements’ threaten an entire Craft, now that’s a different track altogether.”

  “Who would threaten Runners? Weyrwoman Lessa said last night that Runners would always be needed.”

  Torlo gave an ironic bark. “Did she? And who’ll be needing the dragons if the truth is told about the Red Star?”

  Haligon reassembled his thoughts. He’d never thought to step among so many verbal snakes.

  “Red Star? You don’t believe the Red Star was moved? But surely you saw it happen, here in the North?”

  “Saw the light in the sky, but what did that mean to someone ground-tied?”

  Haligon tried another tack.

  “All right, usually a Pass is fifty years. This time Aivas definitely said it would be less. We know from our own Records that that has happened several times before. So there’re sixteen more Turns to go till the end of this Pass. If it ends in sixteen Turns, then grant that Aivas knew more than we ever could: that when he gave a definite answer, it’ll be proved truth. He said the dragonriders accomplished what he set them out to do—alter the Red Star’s orbit so it can never come close enough to Pern to drop Thread on us again.”

  Haligon was rather surprised by his own intensity. He’d only been on the fringes of the massive effort that had occupied the planet for nearly five Turns. But, in his own heart, he’d believed in Aivas’s solution to Pern’s cyclical problem. He’d wanted—needed—to believe in it.

  “I may live another sixteen Turns to the end of this Pass,” Torlo replied. “So will you, but it’ll take another two hundred to be sure that Aivas was right.”

  “The point is, Stationmaster, there are so many smaller miracles available to us right now to give Aivas credibility.”

  Torlo’s cynical smile was lopsided. “Like making dragons—and Runners—unnecessary? If dragons won’t be needed against Thread, they’ll be looking for other things to do. Runners’ll be unnecessary!”

  “Runners unnecessary?” Haligon exclaimed, throwing up his hands in dismay. He knew the dragonriders were working hard on their own future but Runners had an assured one. “Why, your Craft started serving a need before the dragons had their first Weyr. Right now, Runners’re making traces and Stations in the south. Your Craft, like all the others, is expanding.”

  Torlo leaned forward across the table, his eyes sparking with anger. “Not when there are dragonriders taking messages and packing people and parcels.”

  Haligon countered quickly. “How many small halls and holds can afford to hire a dragon? Running a message costs only a thirty-second of a mark. There are currently six thousand two hundred and forty dragons, and half of them are brown, bronze, and gold who wouldn’t consider running messages. You’ve that many Runner families working all the hours of a Turn and using youngsters on the short runs to keep up with the demand, not to mention what’ll happen when the traces are laid in the south. The queens aren’t flying to mate as often or clutching as many, scaling down now that the end of this Pass is in sight, so I don’t really see greens and blues in competition with Runners. You’ve never been upset about fire-lizards.”

  Torlo snorted. “Only a few of them can be trusted to deliver messages.”

  “That’s true enough,” Haligon agreed, though his father’s queen, Merga, having been exceedingly well trained by Menolly, had always proven reliable. “And no Runner has ever failed to bring messages through.” His thought went to Tenna, out on the frozen traces at the moment.

  Torlo regarded him thoughtfully. “Nor will we ever.”

  “So what is really bothering you, Stationmaster?”

  “Those SmithCraftHall thingummies …” Torlo made a cradle of his fingers, scowling as he tried to find the exact word.

  “The comm units?”

  “Them! Seen one myself. People’ll be able to ‘talk’ to anyone. Won’t need Runners to take messages then.”

  Relief made Haligon laugh. “No, Torlo. Can’t happen.”

  “Why not?” Torlo’s sharp question was tinged with a belligerence he rarely displayed.

  “Too expensive,” Haligon blurted the words through his laughter. “Simple as that. Takes Master Bassage and his Hall months to make the things. Have to get the elements from several other Halls. And they have a short range here in the north because there isn’t a satellite relay.”

  “A what?”

  “Like the Yoko to relay the signal. Healer Hall has to put up the relay for this part of the west and one up at Tillek, possibly a third at Telgar. Two in the east, I heard. They’d work better on the southern continent because of the Yoko, but with so many starting out holds and halls down there, it’ll be a long time before they have marks for that sort of gadget. My father will use Runners for a long time. He trusts you. For all he’s forward looking on many issues, he trusts people more than machines. No, Stationmaster, Runners’ll be necessary for as long—as long as they’ve legs to run with. They were the first Craft Fort Hold supported. Turns before the first Weyr was established. We’ll never not need you, Master Torlo.”

  Torlo’s expression had cleared as Haligon enumerated the problems to be surmounted by the new technology.

  “Aivas is like that, isn’t it? Shows how to do things better and that takes time all in itself. Perhaps that’s the best way. No need to have things when we don’t know we really need ’em.” Torlo rose, tactfully bringing their dialogue to an end.

  As he got to his feet, Haligon wasn’t sure whether or not the Stationmaster had agreed to help the Hold.

  “We support healers road and trace, Haligon,” Torlo said with an emphatic nod of his head as he escorted the young Lord across the big long-ceilinged room. “Those as hears will give a word to the wise to them as is too badly informed to know what’s what!”

  “That’s what’s needed, Torlo.”

  “Myself, or Tenna, will tell you.” The Stationmaster tipped two fingers in a salute, leaving Haligon no option but to leave.

  How could the Runners think, for even a moment, Haligon wondered, as he made haste in the cold weather to tell his father of this conversation, that their services would ever be redundant? But the Weyrs would be. His step faltered as his eyes went instinctively toward the distant Weyr in the hills above Fort Hold. Weyrs, but not dragons! There would be a reason for dragons to remain in Pern’s skies. Doing something! Why, it was ludicrous to think of Pern without dragons!

  The air froze the hair in his nostrils. Was it warmer down near Boll where Tenna was running? He hoped so. His much-respected sire had been somewhat dubious about Haligon’s keen interest in Tenna, but it was proving a very useful connection. Haligon wished he could persuade Tenna to make it a lasting commitment. There were enough children of the Fort Bloodline to carry on, short of another plague. Maybe she’d like to go south, once he’d been released from his filial duties to Lord Groghe.

  He should a
lso tell Sebell about his interview with Torlo. The Masterharper should know about their fears. And so much to be done. So much! He had all those petitions to sort through, to find those that did merit his father’s particular attention. Well, today was a good one to stay inside and be warm. He took the steps to the Hold two at a time.

  Keroon Printer Hall—1.3.31

  Tagetarl squeezed tired eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his long nose, wondering at the same time why he thought that would restore his eyesight. Sleep would help, but he had to get through the corrections to the dictionary; some old harpers with too little to do were challenging definitions and deploring the new technological ones, which were vital if young students were to understand the language in which manuals were written. Being able to print many copies of the same material was a vast improvement on hand copying. Any Harper apprentice who had had to do his hours in the Archives Hall blessed the introduction of printing presses, but there must be a trick to finding all the mistakes that could creep into typeset lines. In his apprenticeship, if he made a mistake, he was able to scratch it out with a knife blade and rewrite, preferably before Master Arnor caught him at it.

  It wasn’t as easy to correct a mistake after several hundred copies had been printed. So many printing runs were technical and had to be accurate: explanations and instructions crystal clear. Rosheen was particularly good at this, and her fast fingers could set up a page quicker than he could. But they were both learning how to manage the complexities of this new Hall, and Tagetarl was particularly determined to honor Master Robinton’s faith in him by making this project the most successful of all that had been initiated by his Master and Aivas.

  The slight creak of the office door sounded overloud in the still night. He jumped to his feet. Night? A glance at his eastern-facing window told him that it was nearly morning.

  “It’s me!” a whisper announced.

  “The correct grammar is ‘It is I,’ or It’s I,’ ” Tagetarl told Pinch wearily. “How did you get in? The gate’s locked.”