Dragon’s Kin

Chapter X

Zenor was furious with them when he found out two days later. “You went down there by yourselves! You could have been killed. What if something had happened to you?”

“Dalor knew,” Nuella replied just as hotly.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” Zenor said to her.

“Well, I was talking to you,” Nuella snapped back.

Kisk gave a worried cheep and nudged Kindan.

“Stop it, both of you,” Kindan said, his voice quiet, his pitch—thankfully—deep, and his tone firm. It had, he realized as Nuella and Zenor both gave him startled looks, the tone of command to it. He suppressed a smile and continued with his momentum, saying, “Zenor, we were as safe as we could be, maybe even safer because we had Kisk with us.”

“An untrained watch-wher makes you safe?” Zenor cried in disbelief.

“And how do you expect her to get trained?” Nuella inquired in a tight voice. Her hands were balled into fists at her sides.

Kindan started to say something, to try his “command voice” again, but Kisk nudged him with her head, stood up off her front legs, and flapped her tiny wings at him, making a throaty chirp. Kindan cocked an eyebrow at her. Kisk repeated herself, complete with chirp.

“You two, we’re going to have company,” Kindan said.

“What?” Zenor said. “How do you know?”

Kindan gestured. “Kisk told me. A dragonrider.” The watch-wher shook her head firmly, unmistakably. “Two dragonriders?” Kisk nodded vigorously.

“You’ve been practicing!” Nuella exclaimed delightedly. “What’s it like?”

“Well,” Kindan said, consideringly, “it’s almost like I get images from her—but it’s not. And I guess it’s more like communicating with a fire-lizard than with a dragon. Or maybe somewhere in between. Whichever way it is, she tells me until I understand her.

“Zenor, would you run and warn Master Zist?”

Zenor glanced at Nuella. “What about her? Shouldn’t I get her back to her room?”

“No way!” Nuella cried. “I’m staying right here.” She stalked over to Kisk and wrapped her arms around the watch-wher’s neck.

Zenor flushed with anger, but Kindan gave him a quick calm-down gesture. “Please, Zenor, I’m sure the Harper will want to know.”

Zenor’s mouth worked angrily. “Well at least hide, Nuella. Don’t let them see you.” Nuella’s response was to bury her head in the watch-wher’s shoulder with an audible hmpph. Zenor grimaced again but left.

“It’s not my secret anyway,” Nuella muttered softly into Risk’s tough hide.

“What?” Kindan had been distracted, wondering what two dragonriders could want.

“I said, it’s not my secret,” Nuella repeated. “It’s Father’s. He’s the one who doesn’t want anyone to know about me.

“His mother was blind too, you know. He’s afraid it’s passed on, that any daughter we kids have will be blind, too. And he’s afraid that it makes him look weak—as if anyone would care. It’s not like he’s the one who’s blind.”

Kindan sensed that Nuella was telling him because she just had to tell someone. He also guessed that she felt she couldn’t tell Zenor—or was afraid.

He tried to say something comforting. “But Larissa—”

“It’s too early to tell, still,” Nuella interjected. “I could see just fine until my third Turn and then, over the course of a year, everything got blurry and dim.”

“Does Tarik—”

“I think that’s why Father keeps him around,” Nuella said. “He’s afraid Tarik will spread tales. He’s afraid about what’ll happen to me, if I’ll ever get married—”

“Zenor—”

“Him!” Nuella snorted. Kisk curled her neck around to butt Nuella gently on the shoulder with a soothing mrrrgll.

Kindan, whose ears had gotten much better under her tutelage, asked, “Nuella, are you crying?”

“No,” Nuella said, but Kindan could hear the tears in her voice. “Why should I be? I’m fine. I’ll be just fine. I don’t need to get married, you know. I’ll take care of myself. I have plans, you know.”

“Plans?” Kindan repeated. “What sort of plans?”

“Secret plans,” Nuella said. “I’ll be okay, don’t you worry about me.”

Kindan was rather sure that Nuella’s plans were secret even to her. He tried again to comfort her. “Nuella, I’ll always be your friend. Kisk and I will always be there for you.”

“How?” Nuella asked, turning away from Kisk’s side and wiping her eyes. “How can you say that? What happens if there’s a cave-in or something? What if you’re killed, both of you? What then? What are you going to do then?”

“We won’t be killed,” Kindan said firmly. “If there’s a cave-in, Kisk and I will dig ourselves out. And then we’ll dig the others out, too. Zenor and Dalor and everyone.”

“Don’t put yourselves out over Zenor,” Nuella said grumpily. Kindan reached out tenderly and brushed the tears off her face. She caught his hand in one of her hands and wiped her tears with the other. “Thanks,” she said softly. “I’m okay now. It’s just sometimes ... I wish I could see.” She made a rueful face. “I wish I could see Zenor’s face when I get him angry. Oh, I can feel the heat of his blush—who couldn’t?—but I don’t know if it’s the same...” She trailed off and her face took on an abstracted look. “I’ve just had a thought,” she said slowly. “If I can feel the heat off Zenor’s face, I wonder if Kisk could?”

“Well, I—”

Nuella shook her head briskly. “No, I don’t mean like that. I mean like maybe her eyes see heat.”

“See heat?” Kindan repeated blankly.

“Well, her eyes are huge, aren’t they?”

“To see in the dark,” Kindan objected.

Nuella shook her head in disagreement. “Or maybe it’s not the light that she sees, but the heat. And everything is so much hotter during the daytime that it’d be like looking at the sun to her.”

“An interesting theory,” a man’s voice said behind her.

Renna was on watch duty that night. She had been so proud of herself when Kindan had had to give it up so that he could raise the watch-wher. “It’s not because you’re Zenor’s sister, you know,” he had said when he’d told her. “It’s because you’re the most responsible. I’m sure you’ll do an excellent job.”

Renna was sure that she had. It was hard being the one to set watch, and she had had to do a lot more to make sure that everyone else did their jobs. She would wake up in the middle of the night and check up on the younger watchers. Sometimes, she found one asleep. She usually had a lot of fun sneaking up on the laggard and shrieking in his—it was mostly the boys who fell asleep—ears.

Tonight she was spelling Jori, who was taking extra long over her dinner. Renna didn’t really mind, though; she liked the late evening up on the watch-heights. Her ears were good and she could hear almost every word spoken as it rose up from the valley below, echoing off the hard cliff walls. She also had a great view of the lake under the night stars.

When two dragons popped out over the lake, she jumped with delight. They were huge, larger than anything Renna had ever seen—certainly larger than Kisk, Kindan’s growing watch-wher, and tar prettier. She watched in awe as they glided over the houses and landed on the hillside that led up to the mine entrance.

A man’s voice drifted up to her. “J’lantir, are you sure?”

She watched the two dragonriders dismount. The dragons rose again, flew toward the lake, and then plunged with frightening abandon into the water. Renna was afraid they’d drowned, until they popped back up again, bobbing like large wooden rafts on the water. She shivered. It was a cold night—dragons must have tough hides to like that water. Or maybe they’d just come from a hot place.

“Lolanth felt a strong presence,” the other dragonrider, J’lantir, replied. “J’trel would know for sure, M’tal, but my guess is that there is a young girl here who could ride gold ... only—”

“What?”

“Well, Lolanth tells me that this girl is in constant darkness,” J’lantir replied in a puzzled tone.

“Trapped? Is she in danger?” M’tal pressed.

“I don’t know. Lolanth seemed to think that the girl had been that way for some time,” J’lantir replied.

“You don’t suppose she’s blind?” M’tal wondered softly.

“Maybe that’s it,” J’lantir agreed. “What a pity, to be so gifted and not able to Impress.”

Their voices grew fainter as they headed down toward the watch-wher’s shed.

“This Camp looks to Telgar—and D’gan won’t Search,” M’tal said after a moment. “I think we shouldn’t mention this to anyone.”

“I think you’re right,” J’lantir agreed.

“Ah! We’re expected,” M’tal said with a laugh. “Gaminth tells me that Kisk is curious about your Lolanth and wants to come out.”

“Well, at least we know she can talk to dragons,” J’lantir replied with a chuckle. “I’ve told Lolanth to say ‘later’ to her.”

The two dragonriders ducked into the shed and their faint voices were cut off from Renna’s hearing. She ignored the sounds of the dragons splashing in the lake below as she recalled the conversation. For one thrilling moment, she’d hoped that perhaps they had been talking about her, and that she might be the one who could ride gold. Did they mean a gold dragon—a queen dragon? Wouldn’t that be marvelous, Renna mused. But then she’d heard M’tal saying that maybe the girl was blind. Renna ran through the list of girls in the Camp. She knew of no blind girl. Perhaps they were thinking of a baby or something. But if they were, she mused, wouldn’t their dragons be able to tell them? Maybe the girl was hidden someplace—but who would keep a person hidden away? Anyway, where could anyone hide someone here? In the mine? She shook her head. That would be too dangerous. But she couldn’t think of anywhere else, and she’d been everywhere in the Camp! She creased her brow in thought. Everywhere ... except the second floor of Natalon’s hold.

Renna spent the rest of her watch in thoughtful silence. She didn’t even grumble when Jori arrived back half an hour late.

“Nuella, this is Lord M’tal, Weyrleader of Benden Weyr,” Kindan said as the two dragonriders entered the shed. He looked at the other one. “My Lord—”

“J’lantir, rider of Lolanth, Wingleader at Ista Weyr,” the second dragonrider supplied deftly.

“You must be Kindan,” he went on jovially, holding out his hand. Kindan shook it quickly. J’lantir turned and held out his hand to Nuella. Kindan started to sidle unobtrusively over to her, to give her a nudge but stopped when he saw J’lantir and M’tal exchange a thoughtful look.

Before the silence grew too large, Nuella raised her hand. J’lantir quickly moved to grab it.

“I’m Nuella,” she said. She quirked an eyebrow at him and then her face fell. “You moved, didn’t you?”

“I did,” J’lantir admitted. “How did you know?”

“I can feel it in the angle of your hand,” she replied. She moved closer to him, letting go of his hand and raising her own. “Would you mind if I touched your face?” she asked very nervously. “That’s the way I get to know people.”

“Not at all,” J’lantir replied gallantly.

Nuella raised her hand up, hesitantly. Her fingertips touched his chin, then traced his jaw, his lips, his nose, eyebrows, and forehead.

“You’re sunburned,” she said with surprise. “Is it still warm at Ista, my Lord?”

“Sometimes the sun can burn worse on cloudy days,” J’lantir admitted. “However, in my case it comes from flying above the clouds, where the sun is still shining. At Ista the clouds sometimes gather very low.”

“You fly above the clouds?” Nuella repeated, awed.

“I do,” J’lantir affirmed.

M’tal stepped beside him. “I am M’tal,” he said to Nuella, reaching out to her. She found his hand and shook it and, with his permission, traced his face.

“Do you have a good Harper at Benden Weyr, my Lord?” she asked when she had finished.

“A good Harper?” M’tal mused. “Why yes, we do. Why do you ask?”

“It seems to me that your face laughs a lot,” Nuella answered. “I thought maybe that was because your Harper was funny.”

“He is,” M’tal replied with a laugh. “I’ll be sure to tell him you said so; I think he’ll be very pleased.”

Nuella dipped her head in acknowledgment, only partly hiding her blush.

“Nuella,” J’lantir said after a moment, “you had an interesting theory about how watch-whers see.”

“I think they see heat, my Lord,” Nuella responded.

M’tal said to Kindan, “J’lantir has been asked by his Weyrleader, C’rion, to learn all he can about watch-whers. I suggested that it might be a good idea if you and he pooled your knowledge.”

Kindan nodded, looking at the other dragonrider with increased interest.

“How could we test it?” J’lantir wondered aloud.

“I’ve been thinking about that, my Lord,” Nuella responded. “I thought maybe if we got a hot stone and a glow—”

“What a marvelous idea!” J’lantir exclaimed. “I think I would go with more than one glow, one dim and one bright, and maybe the same thing for the stones.” Very soon he and Nuella were engrossed in designing a complete test of the watch-wher’s sight.

“We could just ask her,” Kindan said to himself.

M’tal smiled at him. “But then it’d take away all their fun.”

“No, it wouldn’t,” Nuella said with her usual lack of deference. She put a hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry—I meant, my Lord.”

“She’s like that with everyone,” Kindan murmured.

“She’s got good hearing, too,” M’tal agreed, with a twinkle in his eyes. He turned to Nuella. “Nuella, I think that we all will be working together quite a great deal, so I think it best if we dispense with formalities and just get on with things—what do you say?”

Nuella’s eyes got very big. She nodded, speechless.

Kindan was no less amazed. “Do you mean you want me to call you by your name, my Lord?”

“It only seems fair,” J’lantir told them. “Besides, I’m not used to all this ‘my Lording.’”

“J’lantir is usually either flying upside down or is off somewhere reading,” M’tal said, clapping the other dragonrider on his shoulder. He leaned down to Nuella and whispered, “I heard once that he lost his whole wing for a week without noticing.”

“Only three days,” J’lantir corrected unflappably. He winked at Kindan. “It was quite peaceful.”

Kindan’s eyes widened at the thought of the dragonrider losing his wing of dragons, but then he grinned back, realizing that he was being let in on a joke.

“That couldn’t happen,” Nuella said, mostly to herself. “Dragons are telepathic!”

J’lantir smiled and wagged a finger at her; then, realizing that she couldn’t see it, he gently tapped her nose. “Very astutely observed, my Lady.”

The curtains of the shed rustled and Master Zist entered. Zenor followed, carrying a pot and some mugs.

“Ah, Master Zist, I have heard a lot about you,” J’lantir said, whirling to face the Harper. “J’lantir, rider of Lolanth, Wing-leader of Ista Weyr.”

Master Zist bent his head and said, “My Lord.”

J’lantir waved away the honorific. “I was just telling your Nuella that I prefer simply to be called J’lantir by my friends,” the dragonrider said. He looked earnestly at the Harper and added, “And I hope we’ll be friends.”

“I’m sure we will,” Zist replied with a grin. He looked over at Nuella. “Your father will be coming down shortly to greet the dragonriders.”

“He doesn’t want anyone to know about me,” Nuella told the dragonriders. “Please, let me hide until he’s gone.”

Both M’tal and J’lantir reacted with grave, concerned looks.

“It’s a secret he wants to keep,” Kindan added. “Master Zist tells me that some people need to keep secrets.”

M’tal looked grave. “A secret is never a good thing,” he said.

“Please?” Nuella begged. “It would hurt him a great deal, and he would be very angry with me.”

J’lantir gave M’tal a look. Unhappily, M’tal nodded. “We will keep your secret for now, Nuella,” he said. He cocked an eye at the Harper. “I will want to talk to you about this later, Master Zist.”

The Harper nodded. “I am not happy with this secret,” he said, “but I think it is not too harmful for the moment.”

J’lantir made a shoving motion toward Nuella, then stopped, a rueful expression on his face. “Go! Hide!” he said to her. “We’ll let you know when he leaves.”

“You won’t need to,” Nuella said as she turned to burrow into a thick pile of straw in one of the corners of the shed. “I’ll hear him leave.”

Natalon arrived not long after and stayed long enough to ensure courtesy all around. Then, sensing that the dragonriders wanted to work with Kindan and Kisk alone, he withdrew as soon as etiquette allowed.

“I could send something down from the kitchen, if you’d like, my Lords,” he offered as he was leaving.

M’tal shrugged a question to Kindan, who replied with a fervent nod.

“That would be excellent, Miner Natalon,” M’tal said. “Whatever you have—we don’t want to put you out.”

“Could you have some hot bricks sent down?” J’lantir asked.

Natalon frowned. “If you’re cold, my Lord, I think there’s a grate here someplace. We could start a fire.”

“No, I don’t think that’s necessary,” the dragonrider said. “Just some bricks, if you don’t mind.”

“I could carry them,” Zenor offered.

“You’re supposed to be asleep,” Natalon said, shaking a finger at him. “You’ve got work tomorrow, and I don’t need you all worn out.”

Zenor looked so crestfallen that Natalon grinned at him, shaking his head. “Besides, I think you might be imposing on Kindan’s hospitality.”

Zenor shot Kindan a pleading look.

“I’d be happy if Zenor could stay, my Lord,” Kindan said instantly.

Natalon glanced at the men. “If it wouldn’t be an inconvenience, it might be a good idea to have someone else be familiar with the watch-wher,” he suggested.

“Of course!” M’tal said, waving the issue aside. “Besides, another body would add to the warmth in here.”

J’lantir nodded vigorously.

“Very well,” Natalon said. “But no more than an hour, Zenor—unless my Lords say otherwise.”

“All right,” Zenor said, looking both very pleased and somewhat unhappy at the same time.

“Well, come along,” Natalon said to him. “You’ve volunteered to carry those bricks back down.”

Zenor nodded and turned to follow the head miner back to his hold.

“You know, you could just ask her,” Kindan repeated after Zenor and Natalon had left.

“Ask her what?” Master Zist inquired. Kindan started to relay Nuella’s observation, but was interrupted with a correction from Nuella, which then opened up a general conversation.

“You know,” the Harper said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, “the human body generates a lot of heat.”

“Are you thinking to perform a simple experiment with human bodies and glows?” J’lantir wondered.

Kindan pulled a glow out of its holder and held it up.

“Kisk, which is brighter to you, me or this glow?”

The watch-wher hesitated, then butted her head at Kindan’s midriff.

“There, I think we have our answer,” M’tal said.

“Hmm,” J’lantir murmured, lips pursed thoughtfully. “Well, we know one thing—a watch-wher is much smarter than a fire-lizard.”

“More patient, too,” Master Zist added drolly. “I hope Zenor brings back some food for her.”

“She just ate,” Kindan told him. He looked at the Istan dragonrider. “J’lantir, do you know how much they should eat?”

“Well, actually, I’ve only just started my investigations a fortnight ago,” the dragonrider confessed. “I met Master Aleesa”—his tone conveyed how the encounter with the prickly WherMaster had gone—“and decided that perhaps I should pursue other avenues.”

Master Zist bit back a laugh. J’lantir rewarded him with a pleasant nod.

“I have, of course, spoken with the wherhandler at Ista Hold,” he continued. “And I was surprised”—he cocked an eye at the Harper—“to discover that the Harper Hall had very little information on watch-whers.”

“None at all, from what I’ve found,” Master Zist agreed.

“C’rion decided that seeing as we’re getting nearer the next Pass, it would be a good idea to gather every scrap of information that might help us tending dragons during times of Thread,” J’lantir said. “I was assigned to learn about watch-whers.”

“When I told J’lantir about Gaminth being able to communicate with Kisk,” M’tal said with a wave at the attentive watch-wher, “he asked if he might be able to work with us.”

“I don’t know if I’ll get another chance to work with a watch-wher hatchling,” J’lantir said.

“Oh, she’s hardly a hatchling at this point,” Master Zist said.

“She’s over four months old now,” Kindan put in.

“She’ll be five months in a fortnight and three days,” Nuella corrected with precision.

“The youngest watch-wher I’ve seen is over three Turns,” J’lantir said. He asked M’tal, “You think they mature faster than dragons?”

M’tal nodded. “That was my guess.”

“I’d say you’re right,” J’lantir agreed. He walked up to the watch-wher and put a hand out, palm up and open, for her to sniff.

“It’s okay, Kisk,” Kindan told her. Kisk cocked her head toward him, then sniffed J’lantir’s hand again and licked it shyly.

“May I touch you?” J’lantir asked the watch-wher with a polite half-bow. Kisk whuffed back at him. J’lantir looked at Kindan. “Was that a yes?”

Kindan nodded. “Although maybe your dragon could talk to her,” Kindan suggested as an experiment.

“She’d like that,” Nuella agreed.

J’lantir brightened. “That’s a good idea,” he said. His face took on the abstracted look of a dragonrider talking to his dragon. Kisk watched him appreciatively, then gave a slight start and a chirp, and then a second gleeful chirp. She walked right up to J’lantir, positioning her shoulder under his hand, her neck craned back toward him to see if her position was satisfactory.

The group chuckled.

J’lantir dutifully ran his hands over her body, checking every muscle and gently exploring the shape of her back, belly, head, and tail. “Alike, yet unalike,” he commented to himself. He looked over at M’tal. “All the watch-whers seem much more muscled than dragons.”

“I’ve noticed that, too,” M’tal replied.

J’lantir touched Risk’s wing, gave her an inquiring look, and then said, “Lolanth, please ask Kisk to spread her wings.”

Kindan realized that the dragonrider had spoken out loud in order to warn everyone that Kisk would be moving.

The watch-wher chirped happily and ruffled her wings.

“The wings are awfully small,” J’lantir noted. He looked at Kindan. “Your father actually flew his?”

“Late at night,” Kindan affirmed.

“Amazing,” J’lantir exclaimed. “No one, even Master Aleesa, claimed that watch-whers could fly.”

“It appears that harpers aren’t the only ones who have forgotten about watch-whers,” M’tal said with a teasing glance at Master Zist, who just shrugged. The dragonrider turned back to J’lantir, saying, “What I was wondering was if we could teach watch-whers to talk to our dragons.”

“But didn’t Kisk here just talk to your Lolanth?”

“Indeed she did, but she was responding to being spoken to.

Can she address one dragon by name? Say, in an emergency?” M’tal said.

J’lantir pursed his lips in thought. After a moment he looked at the Benden Weyrleader with widening eyes. “So watch-whers could alert us to Threadfall? What a marvelous idea! Perhaps that’s why they were bred—”

“It won’t work,” Nuella interrupted.

“Pardon?” J’lantir was taken aback.

“Watch-whers are nocturnal,” Nuella said. “They could hardly send a warning during the day.”

“Perhaps in an emergency...” J’lantir suggested.

M’tal shook his head. “No, I suppose not,” he said.

“But they could still call for aid in emergencies at night,” Kindan pointed out.

M’tal nodded. “That could be useful. They could tell us about the weather, too.”

“An excellent idea,” J’lantir agreed.

“Merely being able to tell a dragon that help was needed would be a great boon to some of the outlying minor holds,” Master Zist said.

“Some of the minor holds that were snowed in had watch-whers,” M’tal said. His eyes grew sad. “If the watch-whers had been taught how to reach our dragons, lives would have been saved.”

“Well, then,” J’lantir said briskly, “this sounds like a worthwhile endeavor. When do we start?”

“I’d like to start as soon as possible,” M’tal said, with a nod to Kindan. “If that’s okay with you, Kindan. I know you need your sleep—”

Kindan burst out laughing. “I don’t sleep at night, not anymore.”

M’tal nodded, looking somber. “Ah, but I do. And my night comes to my Weyr hours before yours.”

“So does mine,” J’lantir added ruefully. “But I can probably arrange a chunk of time to work with Kindan and Kisk without causing too much of a disruption at Ista Weyr.”

“And you cannot,” Master Zist said to M’tal.

“But spring will be upon us soon enough,” M’tal protested. “If we can teach the Benden watch-whers before then, many lives will be saved.”

“Very well, then,” J’lantir said. He glanced around at the others. “It seems that we must learn not only how to teach Kisk here to talk with dragons, but learn how to teach the same to other watch-whers and their handlers.”

“She seems to do well already,” Nuella said. “I mean, she told Kindan that you were coming and how many of you—”

“And how did Kindan know what she was saying?” J’lantir asked curiously.

“Well, it just seemed right,” Kindan said.

“Fire-lizards are like that,” Master Zist said. “At least with some of their owners.”

“Yes,” J’lantir agreed. “And watch-whers seem to be smarter, more able. What I’m thinking of is training the watch-wher—and Kindan—so that they know and agree exactly on what they’re saying to each other, and to the dragons.”

“That would be excellent,” M’tal agreed fervently.

“And then taking that training and bringing it to other watch-whers and their wherhandlers,” J’lantir added.

“I imagine a harper should be involved,” Master Zist commented wryly.

“I’ll help,” Nuella put in eagerly. Kindan shook his head, totally unsurprised.

Over the course of the next several days, Nuella and J’lantir engaged in countless discussions about the best ways to train the watch-wher, and the vocabulary that was needed to communicate meaningfully between wherhandler and watch-wher. They agreed that Kisk would need to tell a dragon who she was and where she was, that she’d have to know how to communicate with a particular dragon, that she would have to know how to say such things as “emergency,” “fire,” “help,” “healer,” and “flood.” They argued over whether it was more important for Kisk to be able to use numbers than to say “avalanche.”

Kindan felt almost unneeded as the two would argue and then agree, move on, and start to argue again. They would stop to ask Kindan to get Kisk to do something or, worse, to ask Kindan’s opinion on their disagreement—Kindan learned early on to be diplomatic—and then the arguing would start up anew.

Often the evening would end with Nuella curled up asleep beside Kisk, J’lantir quietly departing before the first cock crowed, and Kindan too weary to think straight.

At the end of the third evening, J’lantir announced that he had to stay at his Weyr for a time, to report to his Weyrleader, check on his wingriders, and get some rest. Nuella looked so crushed that J’lantir gave her a hug.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back,” he reassured her.

Kindan figured that Nuella was so sad because she had had so much fun and excitement working with Kisk and J’lantir. He imagined that she would be very bored—not to mention grouchy—until the dragonrider returned.

“J’lantir,” Kindan asked just before the dragonrider departed, “do you suppose we could teach Kisk to go between like a dragon?” The thought had been on his mind for a while.

“Hmm,” J’lantir murmured consideringly. “Fire-lizards can do it, so I can’t imagine that watch-whers could not.”

“It won’t work,” Nuella said sleepily. Kindan started: He had thought she was asleep. “They have to see where they’re going, and they see heat,” she explained.

“So?” Kindan said.

“Ah, I see what she means,” J’lantir said. “A dragonrider has to give the visual reference for his dragon. So only a wherhandler who could see heat could give a watch-wher a proper visual reference.”

“And no one can see heat,” Kindan agreed glumly.

“I can imagine it,” Nuella murmured from her perch on Kisk.

“Why did you want to know?” J’lantir asked Kindan.

“If watch-whers could go between they might be able to rescue people, to bring them out of cave-ins and such,” Kindan explained.

“An excellent idea, Kindan,” J’lantir agreed. “Truly excellent. It’s a shame that it won’t work.”

“Goo’ ’dea,” Nuella agreed sleepily. She yawned and rolled over, facing away from them.

“Well, thanks anyway,” Kindan said, turning to join Kisk and Nuella on the shed’s straw floor.

J’lantir reached out and tousled the youngster’s head. “It was a good try, Kindan.”

Kindan was correct in his assessment that Nuella would be grouchy until the dragonrider returned. He spent several days cheering her up, enduring endless barbed comments from her, before he got her to agree to go back into the mines for more training.

“But only if you agree to explore every bit,” Nuella demanded. When Kindan agreed, she said, “We can go down when the shifts are off.”

The miners worked in the mine only three days in every sevenday. Two other days were spent grading and bagging the mined coal, felling more timber for shoring and supports, and general work around the camp. The last two days were left free for the miners, with the exception that everyone had to help on Camp matters, like quarrying for stone, repairing the road, or making furniture and crockery.

The pumps were the only parts of the mine that were constantly manned. Natalon would never allow a build-up of bad air. Not only would that make it impossible for the miners to return, but it would also allow any gas that leaked out of the exposed coal to accumulate in pockets large enough to cause an explosion, like the one that had killed Kindan’s father and brothers.

“Let’s start with the street Tarik’s working on,” Nuella suggested once they were in the mine and a peeved Dalor was on watch at the hold’s entrance to the secret passageway.

Kindan readily agreed and they turned north from the mine shaft to walk toward Second Street. Kindan had learned how to keep his pace count going while he was thinking or even talking—mostly through painful thumps from Nuella when he forgot.

“You’re even more blind down here than I am, Kindan!” Nuella had cried the last time he’d been forced to admit that he’d lost his count. “That’s it! From now on, you’re going to wear a blindfold,” she had declared. “You’ll have to rely on Kisk and your pace counts to avoid banging into things.”

She’d handed him a dirty scarf that she’d brought along to use as a mask against the worst of the mine’s dust. “You can put this on.”

When Kindan protested, she had told him, “Look, what if there’s a cave-in or something and all the glows are out? What will you do then? If you know your paces, and you’re comfortable in the dark, you won’t panic. And if you don’t panic, you’ll be able to help others.”

Kindan had been convinced. From then on he had donned a blindfold the moment they had safely exited the lift at the bottom of the mine shaft. And, apart from some truly amazing bruises on his shins, Kindan had walked unscathed. The bruises had faded as he learned to keep his count and to trust his memory. But privately he admitted to himself that his mental map of the mine was nowhere near as detailed or accurate as Nuella’s.

Now Kindan felt for joists by delicate touch—having removed several splinters after the first attempt—and walked with something approaching Nuella’s flowing grace.

When they came to Second Street, the tunnel down which Tarik’s shift worked and hauled out coal, Kindan checked for supports on either side of the junction. Nuella waited patiently after her own cursory inspection.

“I’m ready,” Kindan said, turning back around with his right hand trailing along the tunnel wall. He found the turn onto Second Street and started counting the paces to the street’s joists. After fourteen paces—ten meters, the usual interval for the first set of supporting joists—he grew puzzled. After twenty-one he grew alarmed.

“Did you feel any joists?” he asked Nuella, who was walking up the street on the left-hand side, opposite Kindan.

“No,” she said, sounding concerned. “Should we go back and check again?”

Kindan struggled with the desire to remove his blindfold and won, remembering Nuella’s sharp hearing. She’d know if he took off the scarf—the sound of rustling fabric would be a dead giveaway.

“Yes,” he told her, lowering his hands.

Nuella giggled. “You were going to take your blindfold off, weren’t you?”

Kindan let his sigh answer her. He counted his paces back to the entrance, turned, and carefully walked forward, searching for the joists. He stopped at nine paces.

“I feel something here, but it’s not like a proper joist,” he said. The wood was thin, and as he stretched his hands to touch the ceiling above him, he could only make out a thin beam of wood overhead.

“It’s not thick enough,” Nuella agreed. “Or wide enough.”

“It’s like half or even a quarter the usual,” Kindan said.

It was like that the whole way down the tunnel, they discovered. Kindan’s alarm grew as they made their way down. There were numerous side avenues dug off the street, more than he would have guessed.

“It’s almost as though Tarik has started mining this street,” he said. He knew from discussion around the Camp that the mine was supposed to be thoroughly explored before full mining would commence—and that the “room” mining would begin at the far end of the mine, away from the mine shafts so that any cave-in wouldn’t block rescuers. “This is bad,” he said.

“Yes,” Nuella agreed. “Father must not know—he wouldn’t allow it.”

They completed their exploration of Second Street and all its adjoining avenues with their nerves on edge. Nuella did not object when Kindan suggested that they change their exploration to First Street the next time they entered the mine.

Kindan hadn’t forgotten his notion about watch-whers rescuing people. Every chance he got, he tried to arrange an experiment to test Kisk’s capabilities, or to teach her something new.

But when he said he wanted to see how she might excavate a trapped body, Nuella would not allow him to try.

“Look, all I want to do is cover myself with some coal and have Kisk dig me out,” he’d protested when she’d first vetoed the idea.

“What if you get hurt?” she demanded. “What will we do then?” And, despite all Kindan’s arguments to the contrary, she absolutely refused to go along with it. What surprised him was that Kisk backed her up—he had expected that the watch-wher would accept his direction without dissent.

“Okay, okay, you two ladies win,” he grumbled in the end. His comment earned him a swift jab from Nuella.

“It’s not that we’re ladies, you fool, it’s that we’re being sensible,” she snarled at him. She sighed and added, “If you’re determined to practice this, let’s do it up in Kisk’s shed first before we try it underground.”

Reluctantly, Kindan agreed.

Kindan and Kisk returned to the shed, having seen Nuella safely back to her second-floor room in the hold. Kisk was still playful. Tired, but resigned to the need to wear Kisk out, Kindan decided to teach her a modified form of hide-and-seek. He would hide under the straw, which let him lie still, quiet, and almost asleep, while she would search for him.

Kisk was excellent at finding him. Kindan made sure that she turned her back while he was hiding and told her “Don’t listen!”—with little real hope that she wouldn’t. As the game progressed, he took to gathering small stones and tossing them in different directions to try to confuse her hearing.

The flaw with that plan, of course, was that even properly buried, he’d still have to tell her when to start searching for him, and the sound of his voice would give his location away. After some experimenting, he discovered a solution: He would throw a final rock at the curtain covering the doors. When Kisk heard that, she was allowed to start looking for him.

The game got more interesting then, as Kisk took longer to find him.

On the second attempt, having tossed the last stone at the curtain, Kindan squeezed his eyes tight, reduced his breathing to the barest trickle, and tried to think of nothing but blackness, doing his best to imitate the ground beneath the straw.

As he lay there, tired and sleepy, he started dozing off.

It was then, just on the edge of sleep, that Kindan thought he saw something—a glowing shape, like someone curled up in a tight ball just like he was. No, he corrected himself in amazement, it is me!

He heard the soft padding of Kisk’s feet as she made her way over to him. In his mind’s eye, he saw the shape get closer, saw the head become more resolved—not a face, but a sort of smudged oval-shaped rainbow—and then become obscured as bright jets, the orangeish-yellow color of flame, came streaking over it. He felt Kisk’s warm breath blow gently through the straw over his face, seeming to perfectly match the flame he was imagining.

Kisk bleeked happily.

Laughing, he opened his eyes and burst from under the straw to wrap his arms around the watch-wher’s head. “You found me!” he said. He hugged her tightly. “You great girl, you!”

“Describe it again,” Nuella demanded the next evening. “Tell me exactly what you saw.”

“I can’t, really,” Kindan replied. “It was like everything was the color of flames—”

“What’s that mean?”

Kindan pursed his lips, trying to think. “Did you ever look at something really bright—um, when you were little?”

“Like what?” Nuella asked, making a face at his question.

“Like the sun,” he said with sudden inspiration. “Or a flame.”

She shrugged. “Maybe.”

“Well, I’ve done that,” he went on. “And afterward, I’ve closed my eyes and I still have the image in them. It starts out as bright white and then slowly fades to yellow, orange, red, green, blue ... and out.”

“Go on.”

“Well, it was like that except that all the colors were there with the white bit being the smallest, in the center, and surrounded by different rings of color from yellow to blue.”

Nuella suddenly looked wistful. “Do you—do you suppose I could see Kisk’s images?”

“We can try,” Kindan said. “How about it, Kisk? Can you show Nuella your image when you find me?”

Kisk looked from one to the other and chirped a cheerful assent.

“Could you?” Nuella asked in a voice full of wonder. She closed her eyes tentatively, then squeezed them shut firmly.

“I’ll hide,” Kindan said. Kisk dutifully turned away from them. Shortly after Kindan threw his stone against the curtain, he heard Nuella gasp.

“Kindan, put your arm over your face,” she said. Kindan complied, casting aside his cover of straw as he did so. “Oh! Now the other one.”

Kindan obeyed, then impishly raised both arms over his head, clasped together.

“You put your arms up!” Nuella exclaimed. “You’re grabbing your hands—by the Egg of Faranth, I can see you!”

Kindan sat up and stared at her. Tears were rolling down her cheeks from her closed eyes.

The next day, he and Nuella started teaching Kisk how to find people buried under rubble. At Nuella’s suggestion, they started with having Kisk simply find individual people. Kisk loved this game and found Nuella, Kindan, Zenor, Dalor, and Master Zist—even though Dalor and Master Zist were in their respective cot-holds, and Dalor was tired from his shift work.

“Dalor doesn’t get into the mine any more than I do,” Zenor grumbled before heading off to sleep. “We’re both on pumps.”

“I’ll bet Tarik would let you come into the mine,” Nuella said.

Kindan gave her a startled look.

“Maybe you could ask to change shifts,” she went on.

“Tarik?” Zenor repeated, shaking his head. “I don’t know...”

“Well, suit yourself,” she said. “Either stop grumbling, or switch to Tarik’s shift.”

“What was that all about?” Kindan asked after Zenor had left.

“Remember how worried you were about the supports on Tarik’s street?” Nuella asked. When Kindan nodded, she explained, “Well, we can’t say anything about it to my father, because then we’d have to admit that we’ve been down in the mine. But if Zenor goes down with Tarik, then he can see the shoddy supports that Tarik’s been putting up and warn Father.”

Kindan and Nuella were pleased when Zenor announced joyfully that he’d switch shifts. “Best of all,” he’d said, rubbing his hands gleefully, “I won’t have to do the morning feeding! Regellan even thinks he’s getting the best of the deal, can you imagine?”

“There, that’s sorted then,” she said complacently to Kindan when she entered Kisk’s shed that evening. Kindan looked beyond her to the curtains, which had rustled closed behind her.

“Didn’t Master Zist bring you down?” he asked.

Nuella brushed aside the comment. “No, I came down on my own.”

Kindan’s eyebrows rose. “Isn’t that dangerous? What if someone saw you?”

“Well, they’d either say something or ignore me,” she said impatiently. “Seeing as no one said anything, I suppose they ignored me.” She patted her cloak and pulled off her hood. “It’s not like everyone isn’t dressed this way in this weather.”

Nuella was right: So far the winter had been particularly bitter and cold, and they were only just in the middle of it.

“Spring will be here soon,” Kindan said by way of consolation.

“Soon! And what good are we doing?”

Kindan was taken aback by her vehemence.

“We’ve been waiting here over a month and haven’t heard anything—and spring is coming,” she went on. “What about all those people? The ones Lord M’tal was worried about? The ones that might be flooded in the spring thaw?” She checked her anger with some effort. “I thought maybe I could help, you see.”

Then she frowned. “But nothing’s happened. And I’m no help at all.”

“You’ve helped me,” Kindan told her softly. Kisk gave her a reassuring chirp and walked over to butt Nuella’s shoulder with her head. “And Kisk. We wouldn’t know half what we know if it hadn’t been for you. Soon we’ll be ready to go into the mine and—”

Nuella’s derisive snort cut him off. “Sure, you’ll go into the mine and then what? What will I do then? ‘Thank you, Nuella, you’ve been a big help, now you can go back to your room. And don’t get caught!’” Her voice choked on the last word and she buried her head between her knees.

Kindan didn’t know what to say and the silence between them stretched out interminably. Finally he opened his mouth to speak, only to see that Nuella had held up a hand and cocked her head in the direction of the curtains at the doorway to the shed.

“You may as well come in,” she said out loud. “You’ve heard too much already and I just don’t care anymore.”

After a moment the curtains rustled and a small figure could be seen in the dim glow light.

“You look just like Dalor,” the figure exclaimed. It was Renna.

Nuella sniffed, breathing in the scent of the newcomer, and nodded her head in comprehension. “You must be Zenor’s sister,” she answered. “He has some of the same smells.”

“It’s Renna,” Kindan confirmed. He looked back and forth between the two. “Aren’t you supposed to be on watch?”

“Yes,” Renna said, “but Jori owes me.” She looked at Nuella. “I saw someone coming clown from the hold and—”

“You followed me because you thought I was Dalor, didn’t your Renna’s blush showed that Nuella’s guess had hit the mark. Kindan remembered that Nuella had once blackmailed Dalor into helping them get into the mines because, as she’d said, “I happen to know who he’s sweet on.” From Renna’s blush, Kindan guessed that the feeling was mutual.

Suddenly Kisk raised her head, chirped, and butted Kindan. He closed his eyes in concentration, accustomed now to passing images with Kisk.

“It’s J’lantir and Lolanth,” he said a moment later. Kisk chirped at Kindan again. Obligingly, he closed his eyes once more, concentrating on the images the watch-wher was trying to form. The images were a quick series: a heat-rainbow shape being pulled backward by an arm, the same heat-rainbow shape running so fast that the legs were a blur, the same shape banging its head repeatedly, bowing low, and, finally, running again. With a smile, he told the others, “He says he’s sorry he’s late. He’ll be here as quick as he can.”

“A dragonrider?” Renna squeaked.

Kindan nodded.

“Here?”

Kindan nodded again.

“Now?”

“Right now, in fact,” J’lantir agreed as he stepped into the shed. His cheerful look changed to startlement when he realized that the speaker was not Nuella. Then he cheered up again, looking at Nuella. “Your secret is out. Good! I was afraid—”

“Her secret is not out,” Kindan said, shaking his head. “Just compromised.”

J’lantir’s face fell. “Well, that may make things more difficult,” he said. “You see, the reason I’ve been gone so long—no, rather the reason why I’m back now is because things aren’t going well.”

“What do you mean?” Nuella asked.

“Wait a minute,” Kindan said, forestalling her. He turned to Renna, whose eyes were as big as saucers. “Renna, please go inform Master Zist that J’lantir is here. He may want you to bring refreshments, too, but please tell him that I’ve asked you to come back. Don’t say any more to him—tell him we’ll explain later.”

“I’ll be all ears,” Nuella murmured, her face gleaming with her usual humor.