The Dolphins of Pern (25 page)

Dolphins could do quite a few things only they could do, being water creatures. Dragons were of the air. There
had
to be something that only dragons could do.

Readis’s distraction had not gone unnoticed. Master Samvel found him staring at a screen displaying the earliest flight of dragons: dragons as small as large runnerbeasts.

“I’ve been meaning to have a word with you, Readis,” Samvel said, sitting down on the next chair. “You’ve not been paying as close attention in class as you usually do. Are you troubled about something?”

Readis took a deep breath. “Master Samvel, what’s going to happen to the dragons?”

Samvel blinked in surprise, and then he smiled
and, in a rare gesture, patted Readis on the head. “You are not the only one pondering that question, young Readis.”

“Yes, but what can they do when Thread is all gone?

“This is a huge planet, Readis, and there is much work to be done to settle all the land available to us. Right now the dragonriders are carefully overflying this vast Southern Continent, making as detailed a map as possible. We know only a small part of it, and much of it would be impassable to people on foot or uninhabitable until the Pass ends. Don’t you worry about the dragons. Their riders will take care of them, as they’ve always done. But your concern does you credit. We must never, on Pern, forget what the dragons have done for us for twenty-five hundred Turns.”

“How could we forget?” Readis asked, appalled at the very notion of such ingratitude.

Samvel’s smile was sad. “We’ve done it often enough in long Intervals. You concentrate on your studies now, lad, and
let
the Weyrs worry about themselves. You have your own future to worry about.”

That put Readis in mind of F’lessan’s advice to him: to learn more about the dolphins. So once again he accessed that information, even though he knew most of it by heart already and had become quite fluent in using the underwater hand signals.

“Underwater” was the relevant word. Though Readis had learned how to hold his breath so he could follow the dolphins on some of their shallower dives, the Ancients had had special breathing equipment that had allowed them to stay underwater for
long periods of time. Tanks, smaller but similar in design to those used with flamethrowers, had been strapped to swimmers’ backs. They’d had face masks to cover nose and mouth and had breathed proper air from a tube to the tank. The device seemed simple enough to Readis, although how he would acquire one was beyond him. He had a small hoard of marks since his father had paid him the last two seasons for helping with the harvesting, but he doubted that would be sufficient. However, since the tremendous effort from all crafthalls to implement Aivas’s plan was a glorious page of history now, some craftsmen might be willing to take such a commission. They might even know how to construct one since they, too, had access to many of Aivas’s more specialized files.

So Readis sought Uncle Alemi the next time he was back at Paradise River. He’d brought a diagram of the apparatus with him. In the evening, he turned Delky to the shortcut to the head and, as he’d suspected, he found Alemi and his son Aleki on their way to the pier for their daily talk with the pod.

Readis got through the courtesies as fast as possible and then shoved the drawing at Alemi. “If we had something like this, which the dolphineers used, we’d be able to function better in the dolphins’ own environment.”

Alemi gave him a startled look and then laughed outright. “You have learned a lot in that school, haven’t you, Readis? Kami’s nearly as bad with all the terms she throws out to confuse her poor parents. Now, let’s see what you have here to perplex an old sailor.” He glanced at the drawing as he walked.

“You’re not old, Unclemi, and I don’t think you’ll be the least bit perplexed about an aqua-lung.”

“Hmmm. Is that what this contraption is called?”

“That’s how I read it.”

Alemi wasn’t as condescending as many Masters were, but he still liked to tease, and Readis was not in a receptive mood. He was in deadly earnest about this project.

“I looked back over all the tapes showing dolphins and dolphineers. When the partners had to do underwater work, or long-distance swimming, the humans always wore this sort of equipment. And special clothing called wet suits.”

“One would need special gear to keep skin from softening too much during long immersions.” Alemi examined the drawing closely. “The Ancients had special gear for just about everything, didn’t they?”

“More than we’ll ever have,” Readis replied. “More than we’d ever need. The Charter Preamble states that they formed the Pern Colony to avoid the intense specialization that had stratified Earth culture. They intended to achieve a good standard of living using the lowest possible form of technology needed to supply essential services and a good, rounded lifestyle.”

Alemi grinned at Readis. “You’re much worse than Kami. Does the Charter really say that?”

Readis nodded, grinning back. At least Alemi wasn’t peremptorily dismissing the notion.

“And since this equipment is not beyond our current capabilities—oh, yes, I see the similarities and I know we have this much technology,” Alemi added, tapping the mask and the tank with one finger. “It’s
only a matter of re-creating the elements displayed here. And, since such an order would come better from a Masterfishman, you’ve come to me to make the request.”

Readis nodded enthusiastically now, immensely relieved that Alemi had grasped what Readis hesitated to voice.

Alemi handed the sheet back and sighed deeply. “You know your mother’s opinion about dolphins and you; Readis. It wouldn’t be right for me to deliberately assist you to further your association with them.”

“Oh!” Readis sank into Delky’s back and, as she’d been trained to do, she halted. “But you know she’s wrong …”

“She’s your mother, Readis, and my Hold Lady. I’m well aware of the loyalty I owe her. I’ve not been all that easy in my mind about allowing you to swim with the pod here. Oh, I know you’ve been doing it, and as long as I didn’t actually see you in the water with them, I could pretend I didn’t know.” Alemi gave a wry grin. “The dolphins don’t at all understand your mother’s attitude, since Afo warned you about the thorn.”

Readis groaned. “But it was
my
fault, not Afo’s, or any of the dolphins.”

“True. Look, lad, I’m on your side in this even if I can’t sail on a dangerous tack. You could”—Alemi paused—“see what your father says.”

“He won’t upset Mother.”

Alemi lifted his hands in a gesture of impotence. “Try him, Readis. He’s really easy to approach on matters that improve the Hold, you know. And he
never accused the dolphins.” Alemi shot the boy a glance. “He knew where the fault lay,” he added in a kindly voice. “Afo and Kib are always asking for you. Will you join us?”

Seeing the pod improved Readis’s spirits, especially after Kib and Afo did an enthusiastic tail walk when he gave them some of the hand signals he’d learned from the old tapes.

“’Member! ’Member!” Kib cried, squeeing and blowing with pleasure. “You do good. Very good. Better best. You come under soon?”

“Not today, Kib. But I will, someday,” Readis assured the happy dolphin.

“Old old times come back,” Afo said, her jaw dropping low as she squeed and chirped.

Readis could not resist giving Alemi an accusing look for failing to fall in with his plan to obtain an underwater breathing device.

It was full dark before the three of them made their way back to the hold proper. When his mother asked him where he’d been so long, he could quite honestly reply that he’d gone to visit Alemi and stayed to play with young Aleki.

Sometime during the night another solution presented itself to Readis. He had experienced a keen sense of betrayal when Alemi refused to help him get an aqua-lung. The device would only make his swimming with the dolphins that much safer. He’d’ve thought that Alemi would see that, too. However, he had another, stauncher ally in T’lion. When he got back to Landing after this break, he’d leave word that he’d like to speak to T’lion. In addition to his responsibilities
as a member of a fighting wing, the bronze rider’s duties often brought him to Landing. They hadn’t seen that much of each other lately, but theirs was a friendship that could be resumed at any point with no sense of time lapse.

T’lion sought him out one afternoon a sevenday later. “Sorry to be so long getting to you, Readis, but what with Fall and all …” The bronze rider let his sentence dangle.

“That’s all right,” Readis said, pawing through the sheets that littered the deck in his quarters to find the diagram. “I found this.” He shoved it at his friend.

“Ooooh. This is great,” T’lion said, his eyes widening as he scanned the sheet. “An aqua-lung? Hey, we could use one of these. No trouble at all. Are you getting one?”

“I’m only a student, T’lion.” Then in a rush, he added, “I tried to get Alemi to help but he wouldn’t on account of my mother not liking me associating with dolphins and all.”

T’lion made a sound in his throat and smiled wryly. “They just won’t let you live that down, will they?”

“Evidently not!” Readis couldn’t suppress the bitterness. “It’d cost a lot of marks, wouldn’t it?”

“Hmmmm. Could. But we’re not the only ones who’re swimming with dolphins whenever we get the chance. Can I have this?” When Readis eagerly agreed, T’lion folded it carefully and put it in his inside pocket. “D’you have time to come see my pod?”

“Your pod?” Readis said, raising his eyebrows in surprise at the possessive pronoun.

“Well, the pod that answers my bell,” T’lion said with a grin. “Coming?”

Readis’s answer was to grab up the lined jacket and a swimming clout. He paused only long enough to scrawl a note on the message board at the entrance to his dormitory that he had gone with T’lion. He was old enough now that he didn’t have to ask special permission for short absences.

Once on the strand near Eastern Weyr, Readis helped T’lion divest Gadareth of his riding harness. T’lion rang the bell in the Come-in sequence that was less urgent than the Report and gave the dolphins the opportunity to ignore the summons if they chose. They rarely did, but sometimes only one or two answered. By the time the boys had changed into their swimming clouts, the waters of the cove showed half a dozen dolphins leaping and speeding toward shore. Raising himself up on his hind legs, Gadareth opened his wings and threw back his head for a welcoming bugle. The air was immediately full of wild fire-lizards, for they loved nothing better than to play with their large cousins in the water. Flattening his wings right to his back, he walked into the water and began to swim out to meet the dolphins with the fair display above him.

As one of the games dolphins liked best was scrubbing a dragon, they proceeded to “help” the humans wash Gadareth. The boys nearly drowned half a dozen times trying to emulate dolphin acrobatics. The fire-lizards left halfway through the bath to go about their own business.

“We really do … need that … breathing device,” T’lion gasped out to Readis when they took a rest,
hanging on to the wing Gadareth had extended for washing. “But you can sure hold your breath a long time when you want to.”

“Can’t … do it … too often. Head starts … to spin,” Readis said. “Other thing … we need … is a decent … ball for them … to play with!”

“So they can steal it?” T’lion demanded. “That’s what they’ve done with all the ones I get made for em.

“New game? New game?” Boojie asked, head high in the water so all of his smiling face was visible.

“Not today, Booj,” T’lion said. “You’ve worn us out. C’mon, Gadareth, let’s go ashore.”

Booj swam backward, clapping his flippers and squeeing with delight. “Worn out! Worn out! We play more better.”

T’lion and Readis let Gadareth tow them ashore, grasping his tail until they felt the slope of the beach under their feet.

Gadareth found himself a spot on the sand, and a number of fire-lizards returned to find resting places on him while they murmured sleepily to their living perch. T’lion carefully extracted the diagram from his inner pocket and looked at it.

“We’ve got glass,” he said, tapping the face mask, “and we’ve got material for the straps, and the tanks shouldn’t be a problem, nor the hose. Valves look the same as the ones Smithcraft put on flamethrower tanks. It’s the rest of the face mask that might be difficult. You got any free marks?”

Readis rolled over on his stomach and propped himself up on his elbows. He grimaced. “If I’d known, I wouldn’t have spent so much at the last
Landing Gather But I’ve maybe three whole Smithcraft marks and some quarters. Now I’m nearly fifteen, Dad pays me for harvesting.” He said that with a bit of pride: he’d sweated for those marks.

“Hmmm, well, yes. I’ve some, too, from a bit of trading I’ve done.”

“Trading?” Readis perked up. Over the Turns he’d heard enough from Temma, Nazer, and his father about trading to be familiar with the Lilcamp family traditions. “What with?”

“Ohh …” T’lion shrugged his reluctance to continue. Then, making a quick decision, he went on. “Well, it’s like this. Most dragonriders are kind of looking about this continent to see where they’d like to live when the Pass is over. I mean, during Threadfall and all, the Holds and crafthalls tithe to the Weyrs, so we don’t have to worry about that. Honestly, we’d rather not be beholden to anyone …”

“But Holds and Halls have always tithed to Weyrs …” Readis protested, being well versed in Tradition.

T’lion grinned. “Not when there isn’t going to
be
more Thread.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, so we’re looking for our own places.”

“What F’lessan calls a weyrhold?”

T’lion nodded.

“And you’ve found one?” Readis asked, excited to learn that the dragonriders were looking so far ahead.

“Oh, I’ve found several sites I’d like, but we have to put in a bid and then, when it’s time, the Weyrleaders will decide who gets what. Right now, we’re charting the land to make divisions easier.
That’s why I’ve been up at Landing so much, registering what Gaddie and I have overflown.”