The Dolphins of Pern (37 page)

“Bell long lost,” Cal said. “Long, long, long.”

Readis grinned at the delphinic repetitions. He really must teach them “good, better, best,” though Cal’s pod spoke very well: much better than even the Paradise River ones.

“Did you find it on the sea bottom?”

“We find. We bring. You fix. You ring.” Loki said. He identified her by the splotch on the side of her melon.

“Loki! You’re a poet! Did you know that?” Readis exclaimed.

“Yes. I poet, I know it. See?”

Readis howled so with laughter that he lost his balance and sprawled on the ledge, repeating her words while dolphins faces regarded him in their constant amusement and clicked and squee’ed.

“You have bell now. Need long-feet, mask, tank so you can swim far with pod!”

That sobered Readis almost instantly. “That would cost more marks than I have …” And Readis suddenly realized that such marks as he did have were back in his dormitory room. Or, if Master Samvel had taken his long absence as a withdrawal from the school, maybe his belongings had been returned home. Either way, the marks were out of his reach, as
was the aqua-lung. “And I don’t have any to buy an aqua-lung, even if one could be made.”

“No thing left over?” Cal asked.

“If you mean diving stuff from the Ancients’ time, no, they didn’t last the way the bell did. Where did you find it?”

“Where storm sink Dunkirk ships,” Cal said as if the event had taken place recently and not nearly twenty-five hundred Turns before.

“And you know where that was?”

“Still find man things when bad storm turn over,” Cal said, and Readis was astonished.

“How
could
you remember something that happened so long, long, long ago?” he asked, absently scratching her chin again.

“The Tillek. She holds history in her head.”

“Now, don’t tell me there’s a dolphin who’s twenty-five hundred Turns old.”

“No, not tell what isn’t true. But she knows from
her
Tillek.”

“Oh, you’ve sort of a Harper Hall?”

“We have the Tillek,” Cal repeated firmly. “You must have lung to go see the Tillek. You must go see the Tillek.”

“I’d love to. When I’m able.” Readis sighed. “If I ever am.”

“If you be dolphineer, you meet the Tillek.” Once again Cal spoke so definitively that Readis gave a wistful chuckle.

“I be dolphineer, already. I have bell, I have cave, I have you! Did you eat well yesterday on Thread?”

“Eat good, good, good,” squee’ed some of the
other pod members. “Too bad, bad, bad, men don’t eat.”

“Well, that’s the way it is, fellas,” Readis said. “And I’d better eat,” he added as his stomach rumbled.

A large rainbow fish was flipped to the ledge, and instinctively he grabbed it by the gills before it could wriggle off. A second one followed the first, and then a large leaf, two beautiful shell fragments, and a barnacle-encrusted object.

“You eat, then we swim. Much to show you.”

“I’ve no long-feet, no lung. And my …” He had started to mention the abrasions the vest had made and how loath he was to put it back on and risk opening those barely healed scrapes.

“You dolphineer. Your pod swim you safe,” Tursi said with such authority that Readis could only laugh.

He took care of Delky while the rainbow cooked. After his breakfast, he collected more wood for his fire, and banked the coals with wet seaweed. He also lavished scratches and pattings on the waiting pod. Occasionally one of them would pull the bell, just to hear it ring. Finally, Delky had become so accustomed to the sound that she didn’t so much as twitch an ear when it rang.

The “much” the dolphins had to show him had to do with the coastline up to the mouth of the deep gorge of what the Ancients had called the Rubicon River. It required him to swim with the pod long but thrilling hours. When he needed to drink they seemed to know where little brooks and freshettes drained into the sea. They provided him with fish whenever
he needed, they also kept up their gifts of items that attracted them. Almost every morning there were offerings. He’d removed only four bloodfish, so he felt he hadn’t earned any special gifts, but he remained grateful for anything. Once they brought him a “man thing,” a plastic crate with one side knocked in, but the color was as bright, when he cleaned off the clinging mud, as the day it had been made. They told him there were more where that came from. Over the next few weeks, he acquired seven, three of which were filled now with “treasures.”

Winter storms had set in, so he also had days when it was inadvisable for him to swim with the pod. The sea would lash waves into floods over the ledge and he’d have to bring Delky inside with him. The wind found all kinds of crevices to howl into, so that he often had to stuff his ears with plugs he made from fibrous plants. Invariably, if he went to the ledge at low tide, there’d be a fish left high and relatively dry, for him to eat. Occasionally branches with the tougher-stemmed fruits clinging to them would be added as special treats. It amazed him that the dolphins knew what humans could eat.

During the first of those storms, he padded the rough spots of the vest. He wore it as a “man thing”—his excuse to them—but there were many occasions when the vest kept him from being half drowned by the enthusiastic aquabatics of his companions. They began to learn how to swim with him, not over or under or impeding his movements. They could not quite understand why he had to spend time out of the water because his skin began to shrivel and slough off. He learned to qualify such matters as
“man” things as opposed to “dolphin” or “sea and marine” things. He also tried experimenting with wood to carve the best approximation of “long-feet” he could; he tied these to his feet with a mixed grass and tail-hair rope. But the devices were too cumbrous and either twisted off—as he couldn’t carve a “pocket” for his feet without breaking off a piece of wood—or banged into dolphin bodies. They never complained, but he could see the darker marks on their skin, which he knew he had caused with his wooden water shoes.

His days were so full now of sea work that he almost considered turning Delky loose. It wasn’t fair to keep her standing in the cave. Declining to go with the pod one day, he used all the rope he had made to cordon off a pen for her, not far from the cave but with enough grass and shelter from the sun for her old hide and by one of the many brooks so she’d have water. As he kept a calendar on his cave wall to mark off Thread days, he could always keep her in when she might be in danger from Fall. That way, he didn’t feel as bad about confining her. With no other runners to lure her away, Delky was content with these arrangements.

He was therefore horrified to return late one evening to find evidence of a bloody struggle, bushes knocked over and trees scarred with kick-marks and no sign whatever of Delky. Searching the little paddock to discover what had attacked her, he finally found clear paw prints and knew his old friend had fallen victim to one of the huge cats. He blamed himself, and was disconsolate for days after Delky’s removal. The size of the paw prints dissuaded him
from going after the beast with only a belt knife to defend himself. His father had always rounded up all the men in the Hold to go after the big marauders. He missed her for more practical reasons later on, when mourning turned to regret: he had no more of her long strong tail hairs to braid into rope.

He also had very few clothes left. It was apparent that the dolphins had not informed people of his whereabouts. There were moments, despite his full and exciting life with the pod, when he could almost wish they had disobeyed him. But then Cal or Tursi or Loki the Poet would do or say something and make him so glad that he was a part of their lives that his mood would swing up again.

The worst of the storm season passed, and he could gather some of the green shoots that supplied nutrients he didn’t get from fish or what root vegetables remained in his immediate environs. He really ought to start a garden in the glade where he’d kept Delky, he thought. Her manure would be good fertilizer. He knew what to plant and where to get the starts, and took some time off from the pod to organize his garden. That’s when he came across Delky’s tail. He almost didn’t bring it back with him. The urge to bury it as a tribute to its former owner was great, but common sense overcame sentiment and he made a bundle of the long hairs and stuffed them in the pack he had with him.

On his way back he heard the bell, heard the Report sequence, and broke into as fast a run as he dared with the precious starts and sprouting plants he had gathered. Constant swimming had improved the muscles in his bad leg so that he could achieve a
respectable speed, but he was breathless by the time he reached his cavern.

There was only one dolphin pulling the bell, and that surprised him. It was also the largest dolphin he had ever seen. That should have warned him.

“I’m here, I’m here,” he blurted out, breathless, propping his pack against the inner wall before approaching the pool. “Is someone hurt? Where’s Cal? Tursi?”

“They come when I call,” the dolphin said, rearing her splendid head up, her flippers out of water.

“Are you hurt? Do you have a bloodfish?”

“Yes, I come to you to remove bloodfish,” she said. “It cannot be scraped off.” She turned on her side and eased slowly by him until he saw the bloodfish, precariously near her sex organs.

“Good thing I honed my knife, then,” he said, and slipped into the water. “Over here. And what’s your name, please?” he asked as he took three good strokes to where an underwater protuberance gave him a place to stand while he ministered to dolphin needs. “I like to know the name of my patients,” he added jovially in what he had decided was his “heal-ering” mode.

“I was called Theresa,” she said, gargling her words slightly as she remained heeled over to place herself close to him.

“That’s a very fine name. One of the originals, isn’t it?” he asked. “I’m Readis.”

“Your name is known. You call yourself the dolphineer.”

“You speak really well, Theresa,” Readis went on, his fingers, now deft at this task, assessing the depth
of the bloodfish’s sucker. Often now he could get the whole thing out without severing the head first. If he punctured the thin skull at just the right point, the sucker released. He found the spot on the bloated body and inserted the thin knifepoint, and with a deft flip of the point, the bloodfish came off. With a flip of his wrist, Readis sent the parasite flying to the wall. It slipped down on a trail of blood until it lay, after two final convulsions before it expired, gape-mouthed: “I’m always glad to get rid of those vicious things for you.” He looked down at the minute hole and shoved water hard against her flank to rinse the puncture. “There, that should close shortly.”

“Thank you, that was well done, dolphin healer.”

“Oh, I’m not a healer by any means, though I can do small repairs now,” Readis said, washing his knife blade before returning it to its sheath. And he’d need a new one soon, as the salt water was rotting the leather. Whatever had the Ancient dolphineers used? More of their versatile plastics?

“I had heard of major healings?” She eased herself back so that she could focus her eye on him.

He smiled down at her, accustomed to such dolphin maneuverings. She was one big mother. And old, judging by the scars on her melon, though all looked long healed. Could she be full of calf? Near to birthing? None of his pod were carrying young. He very much wanted to be present during a birth. It was such a magical moment, especially in the sea.

“Don’t I wish I was able for major stuff,” Readis said, leaning back against the side of the pool, still supported underwater by the wide protuberance. “Maybe I could get more training … but I’d need to
have more people working with me as dolphineers before I could take time off.”

“You are not the only dolphineer,” she startled him by saying.

“I’m not?” He jerked bolt upright, the sudden movement whooshing water over her eye. She blinked.

“There are dolphineers at Eastern Weyr, at Monaco Bay”—she was the only dolphin he had heard pronounce it correctly—“Paradise River, Southern, Ista, Tillek, Fort, Nerat Bay …”

“There are?” His heart sank within him. He would not be the first new dolphineer. The new Hall he had so proudly thought he might found was a dream dying in a single, casual sentence. Others had preempted his grand idea. He might as well go home now and take whatever punishment his father decreed for him. He probably wouldn’t be able to go back to school, so he’d lost that opportunity, too. He might even have lost the best chance to secure Paradise River. But he would have to make it very plain to his mother that he must swim with dolphins. He couldn’t give that up now. He was nearly eighteen now, he realized suddenly, if he’d counted days correctly. He was old enough to go off on his own in any case. Maybe, maybe, he could just come back here. He already had the makings of a small hold. And if he could prove enough land around him, under the terms of the Ancients’ Charter, he could own that. And he’d have Cal and Tursi to swim with, he could listen to Loki’s poems, and …

“Come, swim with me, Readis,” Theresa said in
the very gentlest tone he had ever heard a dolphin use.

“I’m sorry, Theresa, I don’t feel much like swimming right now.” For all he was nearly eighteen now and thus considered a man, a sob caught in his throat and he turned his face from the dolphin’s knowing eye.

He was knocked off his perch by a deft swipe of her rostrum. He was coughing as he bobbed up, and she was facing the cavern entrance.

“Come, Readis, swim with me.”

“I need my vest.” He extended one arm toward the ledge, meaning to climb back up.

“No vest is needed if you swim with Theresa,” he was told, and he was nudged away from the side of the pool.

“I didn’t mean to offend you …”

“None taken,” she replied.

He caught her dorsal fin with his right hand. Her tow was deceptively smooth, but the speed with which he passed out of the cavern told him she was fast. Just outside the cave, they were joined by others, and Cal poked her head up on the other side of him, grinning.