Part 17 (2/2)
”Dad?” Readis felt the first twinge of panic. Something terrible had happened. ”Dad?” Readis needed to be rea.s.sured.
”Readis, go tell Boskoney to come. Take Delky,' and he gestured toward the little runner, standing hipshotten in the shade at the corner of the house.
As Readis vaulted to her back, he looked over his shoulder and saw his father, sagging and motionless. He dug his heels into the willing little beast's ribs and she was away in a flash.
Readis really liked having Delky to ride on land but it wasn't a patch on swimming with Kib or Afo. For all she was patient and willing, Delky couldn't talk to him, not as the dolphins and the dragons did so he found her distinctly lacking. Even fire-lizards gave you some sort of reaction. Delky only did what she was asked to do. Still, she was useful. He sat back on her rump and, as she'd been trained, she came to a complete halt, showering sand into the harper's open doorway.
”What's the rush now, m'lad?” Boskoney asked, coming to the door.
”Dad wants you. Urgent. Fire-lizard brought a message and it's upset him.”
”It has?”
Readis gestured for Boskoney to mount behind him, though the harper's legs would catch any bushes on the way back.
Obedient and uncomplaining, Delky swivelled neatly on her hindquarters and cantered back as easily with her double burden as she had with only Readis' light body.
”What sort of message?” Boskoney demanded, reaching through Readis' arms to clutch Delky's mane.
”He didn't say. Just told me to get you.
”He hasn't moved a muscle since I left,' Readis muttered to Boskoney as the harper dismounted at the porch steps. Readis was really worried now. Bad news didn't often trouble Paradise River. When something did go wrong, his father was more apt to curse and pace and wave his arms about, but he was never silent and all drawn in on himself like now.
Hearing the harper's step, Jayge reached the message strip in his direction. In the act of stepping up, the harper halted, foot held midair a long moment before he sort of turned and sank to the top step, head in his hands and his shoulders shaking. That was too much for Readis. He kneed Delky around the house to the kitchen door where his mother was preparing their supper.
”Mother,' Readis said, edging into the house and touching her arm, ”I think you better go see what's wrong with Father.”
”What could be wrong with your father, dear?” she asked in a voice that suddenly seemed too loud to Readis.
”He got some bad news and sent me for Boskoney. Now he's sitting on the porch and . . . What would make a harper cry, mother?”
Aramina shot her son a startled look before she took the heavy pan off the fire and half ran to the front of the house. Readis moved after her in the touch-toe/step gait he had adopted to get him places almost as quickly as anyone else on two good feet.
Before he could reach the porch, he heard his mother crying.
not loudly as she had when she learned of Granddad's death but softly as if the pain inside her was unbearable. She had her arms about Jayge and was comforting him even as she wept.
The scene was too much for Readis and he retraced his steps, vaulted up on Delky's back again and raced her toward the cl.u.s.ter of cotholds down the river bank.
”I think you better get up to the hold, Aunt Temma, Uncle Nazer. You, too, Uncle Swacky,' he added when the burly figure of the grizzled old soldier appeared in the doorway. ”I don't know what's happened but it's made Dad, Mother and Boskoney cry.” He didn't wait to see if they followed but turned Delky around again and had her galloping past the tableau on his porch and on to Alemi's hold. He brought Alemi back with him on Delky, leaving Kitrin and the other fishmen to follow on foot.
When Alemi arrived, Temma, Nazer, Swacky, Parren and his wife and oldest daughter were standing about, weeping, too. The strip of paper was pa.s.sed to Alemi who began to breathe deeply and swallow while tears crept down his cheeks.
Seeing his chance, Readis turned Unclemi's hand toward him so he could read this awful message.
”Master Robinton and Zair have died. Aivas, too.” The stark words did not immediately make sense to him. Master Robinton couldn't die. Everyone needed him. Readis knew that. And how could a machine die? He knew that Aivas was a machine, a very intelligent machine, who knew a great deal but still a machine.
Machines didn't die, they just . . . just ran down? Wore out?
Suddenly the air was full of fire-lizards, all of them uttering the most incredible keening noise, sort of edgy and hurting the ears: sounds he'd never heard them make ever before in his life. They went diving about the air, swooping down to the roof of the hold, and then up again, unable to settle, all the time making that dreadful noise.
”What's the matter? My fire-lizard is terribly upset, cried Lur, one of the landsmen, who came running up to the main hold.
Behind him on the path, Readis could see other holders and crafters making their way here, attracted by the fire-lizards' unusual behavior. Alemi had slipped off Delky and joined those mourning on the porch so Readis kneed his runner to meet Lur, showing him the message. Lur's face went very pale under his tan and he collapsed against the nearest tree, bawling in great sobs. So Readis pointed Delky on down the path, showing everyone the message as he reached them. Soon everyone had congregated around the porch, weeping and immersed in this grief. Their children, not quite understanding the terrible loss, a.s.sembled a little away from the adults, confused by the atmosphere and the sight of their grieving parents.
It was the strangest evening Readis ever lived through. He watched as his father took a long time to coax Tork, his firelizard, to come to him so he could send off a message. Some of the women followed his mother into the house and they came back with wine. Another group went back to their houses and brought food, not that anyone other than the hungriest of the little kids ate much.
When the sun set, no-one seemed inclined to go home. The harper was still on the steps, turning a half-empty wine gla.s.s in his hands . . . Aramina or Jayge kept filling it. Readis noticed that tears kept dropping off his jaw and Boskoney made no move to dry them. Well, he was a harper and he would have been taught by Master Robinton so you could understand his grieving for the death of his Master. Readis thought it even sadder that the Master Harper's fire-lizard had died at the same time. That sort of loyalty brought a lump to his throat - even thinking that Delky, Kib or Afo might die along with him, should he die soon.
He nearly had the time he'd been so sick with the thorn poison in his foot. He knew that dragons died when their riders did but no-one who had a fire-lizard had died in Paradise River so he wasn't sure about their reaction. Then he realized that the grown-ups on the lawn were talking softly among themselves.
Kami thought they should get some glowbaskets. So Readis led her and Pardure who offered to help to where they kept them and set enough out so that this remarkable scene was lit.
Many Turns later, Readis remembered that night and the shadows cast on familiar faces all saddened by their loss. He remembered that, although there had been many skins of wine opened, and everyone was drinking, no-one got merry from the wine. There was no singing which was most unusual for any group with a harper in the center of it. Readis wondered as the night got later and later why no-one was chasing him and the other youngsters off to their beds. The littlest ones fell asleep where they were, on a parent's lap or on the ground beside them. Eventually he got up and collected covers for Aranya, Kami and her sisters and himself and Pardure and Anskono: his baby brother was sleeping in the hammock on the porch with their mother.
He tried to stay awake, to see what staying up all night was like, but the soft murmur of sad voices lulled him to sleep.
When he woke the next morning, he was in his own bed.
Checking outside, he saw that a fair number of people had slept the night on the gra.s.s. Boskoney occupied the hammock, Aramina's prized rug covering him. This was the day Readis was supposed to start school but he knew it wouldn't start today. The school had been Master Robinton's idea. Maybe it wouldn't happen now he was dead. Somehow Readis didn't like being deprived of that opportunity, especially when it mean he'd be going journeying to school a-dragonback.
His stomach was rumbling, since he hadn't eaten much last night out of deference to the occasion, so Readis went to the larder to see what he could find to eat. Evidently alerted by the small noises he was making, Aranya entered the kitchen, Almie tagging beside her.
”Hungry,' Almie said clearly, pouting. Although Aranya was in a clean coverall, Almie was still in the rumpled things she'd worn yesterday. ”I'm empty in my middle.”
”I'll feed you so be quiet,' Readis said in a low voice. He sort of figured his parents wouldn't want to be awakened. His baby brother would always sleep until someone, or some loud noise, woke him. Readis didn't want the loud noise to be Almie.
He set out bowls, filled them with the fruit which was always sliced and ready in the cooler and toasted bread for his sisters so they'd keep quiet. He spread Almie's bread with the sweetener she loved because he knew if he didn't, she'd demand it and loudly, too. Aranya was much easier to deal with than Almie.
Then he got the grain for the poultry and took care of them, and Delky who patiently waited out the back door for her morning handful of corn. The canines were just getting restless when he deposited their bowls in the run. They could howl loud enough to wake the dead, as his mother often said. Back in the kitchen, he heated water and ground more klah bark because the jar was empty. One thing for sure he knew would be needed was plenty of klah.
He got Aranya to take Almie into their room and wash her and dress her. Aranya loved playing ”mother' to their sister.
He was just sitting down to his own toast when Kami slipped in the back door, her blue eyes wide with the tidings and her expression solemn.
”It's awful, isn't it?” she whispered at him.
”They're still asleep,' Readis said, speaking low but not in a whisper. He gestured with the toasting fork and she shook her head. She did however look wistfully at the pitcher of fruit juice on the table so he filled her a gla.s.s of it.
”Father got messages this morning. We're all to sail to Monaco to escort the Harper to sea.
Readis felt his throat close over. Boskoney had sung a very moving song about an honorable sea burial, for another old harper, Aunt Menolly's master. It would be like that.
”All of us?” Readis asked after swallowing the lump. All of us in Paradise?” He meant children as well as grown-ups.
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