“Sir?” Menolly stared at him, startled as much by the abrupt change of subject as the sense of what he said.
“I wish we hadn’t changed so in this last long Interval.”
“But, sir, you’ve been supporting all the changes F’lar and Lessa have advocated. And Benden’s been right to make those changes. They’ve united Hall and Hold behind the Weyrs. Furthermore,” and Menolly took a deep breath, “Sebell told me not so long ago that before this Pass of the Red Star began, harpers were nearly as discredited as dragon riders. You’ve made this Hall into the most prestigious craft on Pern. Everyone respects Masterharper Robinton. Even Piemur,” she added with a laugh trembling in her voice as she struggled to relieve her master’s melancholy.
“Ah, now, there’s the real accomplishment!”
“Indeed it is,” she said, ignoring his facetiousness. “For he’s very hard to impress, I assure you. Believe me, too, that he won’t be in the least distressed to do for you what he does naturally for himself. He’s always heard the gossip at Gathers and told me, knowing I’d tell you. ‘What a harper hears is for the Harper’s ears.’” She laughed to find Piemur’s saucy quip so applicable.
“It was easier during the Interval . . . .” Robinton said, with another long sigh. Zair, who’d been cleaning himself, chirped in a querying way, tilting his head and peering with earnestly whirling eyes at his friend. The Harper smiled as he stroked the little creature. “Boring, too, to be completely candid. Still, it won’t be that long an assignment for Piemur, will it? His voice ought to settle within the Turn, and he can resume his place as a soloist. If his adult voice is half as good as his treble, he’ll be a better singer than Tagetarl.”
Seeing that that prospect cheered her Master, Menolly smiled.
“The dream message was from Ista Hold. Sebell’s on his way back with those herbal medicines Master Oldive wanted. He’ll be at Fort Sea Hold by late afternoon tomorrow if the wind holds.”
“Indeed? I’ll be very interested to hear what our good Sebell has for his Harper’s ears.”
CHAPTER TWO
THE TRAY PIEMUR was carrying was all that restrained him from jumping into the air and kicking his heels together in his jubilation. Working for Master Robinton, no matter how indirectly, and being apprenticed to Master Olodkey, was no loss of prestige and much more than he had dared contemplate. Not, Piemur admitted to himself, that he’d given much thought to his future.
Of course, one never saw much of Master Olodkey about the Hall. He kept to the drumheights, a lean, slightly stooped figure of a man with a big head and coarse bristling brown hair that seemed to stand out from his skull to give him the appearance, the irreverent said, of one of his own bass drumsticks. Others insisted that he was deaf from years of pounding the great message-drums for the Harper Hall. Except for drumbeats, they hastily amended, which he didn’t need to hear: he felt the vibrations in the air.
Piemur considered his new apprenticeship and found it good: there were only four other apprentices, seniors all, and five journeymen serving Master Olodkey. Granted that Piemur had been Master Shonagar’s special, but Master Shonagar was responsible for every singer in the Hall, whereas Master Olodkey rarely had more than ten harpers looking to him. Piemur again was in a select group. Even more select if he’d been permitted to announce the full truth.
He skittered down the steps, balancing the tray deftly. Maybe, once he’d proved to the Masterharper that he could keep his mouth sealed . . . And Master Robinton was wrong to think that any could extract information from Piemur that Piemur didn’t care to divulge. Nothing pleased Piemur more than “knowing.” He didn’t necessarily have to show off to other people how much he “knew.” The fact that he, Piemur, an insignificant herdsman’s son from Crom, knew, was sufficient.
He wished he hadn’t been so brash, mentioning the Southern Continent, but the reactions had proved that his guess was accurate. They had been down to the south: at least Sebell had, and probably Menolly. If they’d gone, then the Harper needn’t risk the trip with such eyes and ears to do the hardwork.
Piemur hadn’t had much to do with the Oldtimers before F’lar had ordered them exiled to the Southern Continent. For this he was fervently grateful as he’d heard enough about their arrogance and greed. But if he, Piemur, had been exiled, he wouldn’t have just stayed put. He couldn’t understand why the Oldtimers had quietly accepted their humiliating dismissal. Piemur calculated that some two hundred and forty-eight Oldtimers and their women had gone to the Southern Continent, including the two dissatisfied Weyrleaders, T’ron of Fort and Tkul of the High Reaches. Seventeen Oldtimers had returned north, accepting Benden as their leader or so Piemur had heard. Most of the exiled men and dragons had been well on in Turns, so they were no real loss to the dragon strength of Pern. Old age and sickness had claimed almost forty dragons in the first Turn, and almost as many had gone between this Turn. Somehow that struck Piemur as being rather careless of dragons, even Oldtimer ones.
He stopped abruptly, aware of a tantalizing aroma wafting from the kitchens. Bubbly berry pies? And just when he needed a real treat! His mouth began to water in anticipation. The pies must be just out of the bake oven or surely he would have discerned that fragrance before.
He heard Silvina’s voice rising above the working noises and grimaced. He could’ve gotten a few pies out of Abuna with no trouble. But Silvina wasn’t often taken in by his starts and schemes. Still . . .
He let his shoulders sag, dropped his head and began to shuffle down the last few steps into the kitchen level.
“Piemur? What are you doing here at this hour? Why do you have the Harper’s tray? You should be rehearsing . . .” Silvina took the tray from his hands and stared at him accusingly.
“You didn’t hear?” Piemur asked in a low, dejected voice.
“Hear? Hear what? How could anyone hear anything in this babble? I’ll . . .” She slipped the tray onto the nearest work surface and, putting her finger under his chin, forced his head up.
Piemur was rather pleased to be able to squeeze moisture from the corners of his eyes. He narrowed them quickly for Silvina wasn’t easily fooled. Though, he told himself hastily, he was very sorry he wouldn’t be singing Domick’s music. And he was sorrier that Tilgin was!
“Your voice? Your voice is changing?”
Piemur heard the regret and dismay in Silvina’s hushed tone. It occurred to him that women’s voices never did change, and that she couldn’t possibly imagine his feelings of total loss and crushing disappointment. More tears followed the first.
“There, lad. The world’s not lost. In a half-Turn or less your range’ll settle again.”
“Master Domick’s music was just right for me . . .” Piemur did not need to fake the ragged tones.
“To be sure, since he wrote it with you in mind, scamp. Well, wouldn’t you know? Though I can’t for the life of me believe you could contrive to change your voice to spite Domick—”
“Spite Master Domick?” Piemur widened his eyes with indignation. “I wouldn’t do such a thing, Silvina.”
“Only because you couldn’t, rascal. I know how you hate singing female parts.” Her voice was acerbic, but her hand under his chin was gentle. She took a clean corner of her apron and blotted the tears on his cheeks. “As luck would have it, I seem to be prepared with an easement for your tragedy.” She propelled him before her, motioning toward the trays of cooling pies. Piemur rapidly wondered if he ought to dissemble. “You can have two, one for each hand, and then away with you! Have you seen Master Shonagar yet? Watch those pies! They’re just out of the oven.”
“Hmmmm,” he replied, biting into the first pie despite her admonition. “It’s the only way to eat ’em,” he mumbled through a mouthful so hot that he had to suck in cool air to ease the burning of his gums. “But . . . I’m to get wherhide clothes.”
“You? In wherhide? Why would you need wherhide?” She frowned suspiciously at him now.
“I’
m to study drum with Master Olodkey, and Menolly asked me could I ride runners, and Master Robinton said I was to ask you for wherhide.”
“All three of them in it? Hmmm. And you’d be apprenticed to Master Olodkey?” Silvina considered the matter and then eyed him shrewdly. He wondered should he tell Menolly that Silvina hadn’t been taken in by their stratagem of making him a drummer. “Well, I suppose you’ll be kept out of mischief. Though I, for one, doubt it’s possible. Come on then. I do have a wherhide jacket that might fit.” She cast him a calculating look as they moved toward the storage section of the kitchen level. “Let’s hope it’ll fit for a while because sure as eggs hatch, I shan’t be able to pass it on to anyone else the way you mangle your clothes.”
Piemur loved the storerooms, redolent with the smell of well-cured hides and the eye-smarting acridity of newly dyed fabrics. He liked the glowing colors of the cloth bales, the jumble of boots, belts, packs hanging from hooks about the walls, the boxes with their odd treasures. Silvina rapped his knuckles with her keys several times for opening lids to investigate.
The jacket fit, the stiff new leather bucking against his thighs as he pranced about, swinging his arms to make the shoulders settle. It was long in the body, but Silvina was pleased: he’d need the length. Fitting him with new boots showed her how ragged his trousers were, so she found him two new pairs, one in harper blue and the other in a deep gray leather. Two shirts with sleeves too long, but which no doubt would fit him perfectly by midwinter, a hat to keep his ears warm and his eyes shaded, and heavy riding gloves with down-lined fingers.
He left the stores, his arms piled high with new clothes, boots dangling from their laces over his shoulder and bumping him front and back, his ears ringing with Silvina’s promise of dire things happening to him if he snagged, tore, or scuffed his new finery before he’d had it on his back a sevenday.
He happily employed the rest of the morning by dressing in his new gear, examining himself from all angles in the one mirrored surface of the apprentice dormitory.
He heard the burst of shouts as the chorus was released and peered cautiously over the sill. Most of the boys and young men swarmed across the Court to the Hall. But Master Domick, music rolled in one fist, strode purposefully toward Master Shonagar’s hall. The last to exit was Tilgin, head bowed, shoulders slumped, weary from what must have been an exhausting rehearsal. Piemur grinned; he had warned Tilgin to study the part. One never knew when Master Domick might call on the understudy. There was always the chance of a bad throat or a hacking cough for a soloist. Not that Piemur had ever been sick for performance . . . until this one. Piemur gave a sour note. He really had wanted to sing Lessa in Domick’s ballad. He’d sort of counted on coming to the Benden Weyrwoman’s notice that way. It was always wise to be known to the two Benden Weyrleaders, and this would have been the perfect opportunity.
Ah well, there were more ways of skinning a herdbeast than shaving him with a table-knife.
He folded his new clothing carefully in his bedpress, giving the fur a smoothing twitch. Then quickly glanced out the window again. Now, while Master Domick was busy with Master Shonagar, would be the time for him to slip into the dining hall. Keep out of sight, and soon enough he’d be out of Domick’s mind. Not that Piemur was at fault. This time.
A shame really. Lessa’s melody was the loveliest Domick had ever written. It had so suited his range. Once again a lump pushed up in his throat at the sadness of the lost opportunity. And probably a Turn before he could try to sing again. Nor was there a guarantee that he’d have anywhere near as good a singing voice as an adult as he’d had as a boy. None at all. He’d miss being able to astonish people with the pure tone he could produce, the marvelous flexibility, the perfect sense of pitch and timing, not to mention his particularly acute skill at note-reading.
His reflections caused him sufficient pangs of regret so that, when he drifted past the first group of apprentices in the court, they paused in their play and watched his slow progress with awed silence.
He trudged up the steps, past apprentices and journeymen, eyes down, hands flopping at his sides, the picture of dejection. Scorch it, would he have to pretend to have lost his appetite? He could smell roast wherry, succulent, and dripping with juices. And then, berry pies.
However, if he managed his tablemates adroitly . . . Hunger warred with greed, and there was nothing feigned about his expression of sad reflection when the dining room began to fill.
Piemur, deep in his plans, was aware of being flanked by silent boys. But the chubby fist visible on the left was Brolly’s. The stained, dirty, calloused, nail-bitten hand on the right was Timiny’s. His good friends were standing by him in this moment of loss. He let out a long, draggling sigh, heard Brolly shift his feet uncomfortably, saw Timiny extend his hand tentatively to draw it back slowly, uncertain how a gesture of sympathy would be received. Well, Timiny might just give him both pies, Piemur thought.
Suddenly everyone moved, and a quick glance at the round table told Piemur that Master Robinton had taken his place. A flash of blue and gray past his lowered eyes was probably Menolly moving to take her place at a journeyman’s table.
Ranly and Bonz sat directly opposite Piemur, regarding him with wide and worried eyes. He gave them a sad half-smile. When the platter of roast wherry slices came to him, he heaved another sigh and fumbled for a slice. He stared at it on his plate instead of attacking it immediately. But then, generally, he’d have taken as many slices as he could knife onto his plate without raising uproars from his mates. He did like roast tubers, but restrainedly took only a small one. He ate slowly so that his stomach would think it was getting more. A rumbling belly would ruin his ploy for bubbly pies.
None of his friends spoke, either to him or to each other. At their end of the table, gloomy silence prevailed. Until the bubbly pies were served. Piemur maintained his air of tragic indifference as the first ripple of delighted surprise sighed down from the kitchen end of the table. He could hear the rise of happy voices, the quick interest of his friends as they saw the burden of the sweet tray.
“Piemur, it’s bubbly pies,” said Timiny, pulling at his sleeve.
“Bubbly pies?” Piemur kept a querulous note in his voice, as if even bubbly pies had no magic to revive him.
“Yes, bubbly pies,” said Brolly, determined to rouse him.
“Your very first favorite, Piemur,” said Bonz. “Here, have one of mine,” he added and, with only an infinitesimal show of reluctance, pushed the coveted pie across to Piemur.
“Oh, bubbly pies,” repeated Piemur on the end of a quavering semi-interested sigh and picked up one of the offerings as though he was forcing himself to exhibit interest.
“It’s an awfully good bake, Piemur.” Ranly bit into his with exaggerated relish. “Just take a bite, Piemur. You’ll see. Get a bubbly or two inside you, and you’ll feel more like yourself. Imagine! Piemur not wanting all the bubblies he can eat.!” Ranly glanced at the others, urging them to second him.
Bravely Piemur ate slowly of the first bubbly pie, wishing they were still hot.
“That did taste good,” he said with a trifle brighter tone and was promptly encouraged to eat another.
By the time he had consumed eight because three more were donated from the other end of the table, Piemur affected to lose the edge of his gloom. After all, ten bubbly pies when he might only have had two was a good day’s scrounge.
The journeyman rose to deliver announcements and assignments. Piemur toyed with the notion of several different reactions to the news of his change in status. Shock, yes! Delight? Well, some because it was an honor, but not too much, otherwise they might doubt the performance that had won so many pies.
“Sherris, report to Master Shonagar . . .”
“Sherris?” Surprise, shock, and consternation, totally unrehearsed or anticipated brought Piemur straight up off the bench and prompted his neighbors to seize him by the shoulders and push him down. “Sherris? That lit
tle snip, that wet-eared, wet-bottomed, wet-bedded—”
Timiny clamped his hand firmly over Piemur’s mouth, and the next few announcements were lost to that section of the apprentice tables. Indignation revitalized Piemur, but he was no match for the concerted efforts of Timiny and Brolly, determined that their friend should not suffer the extra humiliation of a public reprimand for interrupting the journeyman.
“Did you hear, Piemur?” Bonz was saying, leaning across the table. “Did you not hear?”
“I heard that Sherris is to be Master . . .” Piemur was sputtering with rage. There were a few truths Master Shonagar ought to know about Sherris.
“No, no, about you!”
“Me?” Piemur ceased his struggles, abruptly horrified by the sudden thought that maybe Master Robinton had changed his mind, that some further investigation had led him to believe Piemur was unsuitable, that all the morning’s bright prospect would be wrenched from his grasp.
“You! You’re to report to . . .” and Bonz paused to give additional weight to his final words, “Master Olodkey!”
“To Master Olodkey?” Relief gave Piemur’s reaction genuine force. Then he looked wildly around for the Drummaster.
Bonz’s elbow suddenly digging into his ribs alerted him, and there was Dirzan, Master Olodkey’s senior journeyman, staring down at them, fists against his belt, a wary and disapproving expression on his weathered face.
“So we get saddled with you, eh, Piemur? I’ll tell you this, you watch your step with our Master. Quickest man in the world with a drumstick, and he doesn’t always use it on the drums!” He eyed Piemur significantly and then, with a sharp gesture, indicated that Piemur should follow him.
CHAPTER THREE
THE REST OF that day was not quite as joyful for Piemur. At Dirzan’s order, he moved his gear from the senior apprentice dormitory to the Drummers’ quarters, four rooms adjacent to the height, separate from the rest of the Hall. The apprentices’ room was cramped and would be more so when the spare cot for Piemur was added. The journeymen’s quarters were hardly more spacious, nor Master Olodkey’s, though he had his small room to himself. The largest room was both for the instruction and living. Beyond, separated by a small hallway, was the drum room, with the great metal message-drums shining in the afternoon sun. There were several stools for the watch-drummer, a small workable to write down the messages, and a press, which became the bane of Piemur’s mornings. It contained the polish and cloths required to keep that eye-blinding shine on the drums. Dirzan took evident relish in telling Piemur that, by custom, the newest apprentice was required to maintain their brilliance.
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