Chap. 381 The Accusation

Chap. 381 The Accusation

He stepped out into the early morning light. A heavy fog lay close to the land, the rising sun tinting it with pink and gold highlights. There’s something about dawn that I just love, he thought. Although I didn’t get much sleep last night.

Siskin and Raventh emerged from the dragon bay. His dragon unfurled his wings.

Going out to do your business?

Yes, Raventh said, and to hunt. Falconth is already out there.

When did they return from Western?

Just this morning, before you woke up. Remember, their weyr is in the mountain, along with the bronzes. Siskin is going with me.

Good hunting!

Raventh waddled-it being the only term that adequately described his gait-into the center of the dragon meadow. Siskin clung to his neck, his hind legs tucked into the collar Glyena, his sister, had made for Raventh. Raventh paused, taking what wind there was into account, and launched. Beating hard, as the air was too cold for thermals, he rose into the sky and vanished.

It always unnerved him to see his dragon launch without him. Yet there was also the thrill of seeing the wondrous beast doing so. He was reminded, yet again, what a task it had been clean up after a dragon when they were still too young to go between.

K’ndar checked the items he’d strung about his body. Camera, check. Binoculars, check. Sample bag, check, although he didn’t expect to be taking any samples of the speartooth. That had been done yesterday, and he really didn’t feel like getting any more ick on him than necessary. I have reports to make, he thought, so I’ll be in the office most of the day.

He’d spent at least an hour the night before, watching the whers scavenge the carcass.Only because Marklen had said, “it’s a school night, Seth, we’ve got to get you to bed,” did they stop.

I was so glad the boy was the reason for ending the observation. I was cold to the bone. But it was definitely worth seeing!

As he passed the stables, he heard the familiar sounds of morning feed and muck out. Horses called for their breakfast. A few cows were lowing, wanting a milking before being turned out. Of the herd of cattle at Landing, only two were milk cows. Most people couldn’t drink milk, the mutation for lactose tolerance having been lost in the twenty five hundred years since Pern had been colonized. But people still could consume butter, and everyone loved cheese.

He heard a cock crow. It would be out, soon, scanning the skies for predators before it allowed it’s wives to emerge from the safety of the cavern. Cocks were fierce defenders of their flock. Those that didn’t protect their hens from the many native predators didn’t survive. He remembered seeing a small wherry going for his mother’s hens, and despite it being twice the size of the cock, had been attacked without warning-or mercy. Only because the cock couldn’t fly did the wherry escape, bleeding from a dozen wounds. I’ll give the wherries credit, he thought, they learn to leave chickens alone very quickly.

The sounds were comforting, in that it made Landing sound like home, or the weyr.

Then he was past the stables, heading downhill to where the speartooth had been dropped.

A crowd of winged scavengers, both wherry and avian, were perched on the volcanic rocks, waiting for the sun to warm them enough to fly.

Even though he’d seen scavenged skeletons in the past, still, he was amazed at how little there was left for anything larger than a wherry or a bird.

The netting had been piled a fair distance from the body, and was untouched. It would probably be buried somewhere nearby. The bones, the skull, the tail and the limbs, that at first glance appeared to be a cross between flippers and feet, were all fairly intact. But everything else; the skin, the entrails and much of the flesh, were gone. The bones had tatters of flesh on them, and only the long necked winged scavengers would be able to access the flesh inside the rib cage.

He took several pictures of the skeleton, knowing that others would be doing the same thing.

Interesting, he thought. In many ways, it was just another saurian skeleton. But in just as many ways, it was completely different. The skull would be especially interesting.

It stared at him with empty eye sockets. The odd crest along the top of the skull intrigued him. It HAS to be a nose, he thought, those holes are nostrils, I’ll bet my lunch on it. And the spears-they appeared to be twice as long now that the skull had been skinned and defleshed.

Despite the cold, he could see crawlers beginning to investigate the skull.

“Clean it up well, little beasties,” he said to them. I hope no one hears me talking to crawlers, they’ll think I’ve lost my mind.

He heard a rhythmic thudding. He turned to see Francie riding Donal bareback, trotting his way.

By the egg, but he’s still the most beautiful horse I’ve ever seen.

He stopped and nickered, hoping for a treat.

“Not when you’re in a bridle, Donal. You know that.”

Donal nodded in agreement. He scratched underneath the horse’s chin in lieu of a treat.

“Good morning, K’ndar! So that’s your new trophy!” Francie called.

“It is, and I’m so very glad that all my work was done after dropping it.”

Donal resisted going any closer to the skeleton. She didn’t force him.

“I told Raylan don’t even think of playing with it. I could smell it from the stables.”

He grinned. “A LOT of folks mentioned the smell. Where are your fire lizards?”

“Out with Motanith. She said Raventh and Falconth were going hunting and even though she killed a few days ago, she wanted to go, too. My trio went with her.”

Guilt twinged her heart. I don’t have to worry about her with the males. That herb the healers gave me keeps her from going into heat. I don’t want her mating. All the other dragons here are male. As are their riders-and she shivered, remembering what it was like living in a weyr and riding a green dragon. That was before she met Raylan.

Her heart softened at the thought of her weyrmate. Raylan is my mate, forever. I don’t want anything to do with K’ndar or the others, not like that. Yet, is it fair to Motanith?

“How’s Sky doing? I haven’t been to the stables yet this morning,” K’ndar asked, unaware that he was diverting her mind from her anxiety.

“Very well,” she said, “That healer is a master. He had that eye out just like that, and once the sutures are out, you won’t even know how bad it looked. After the sedative wore off, Sky immediately wanted hay. He seems much more comfortable now that the eye is gone.”

“He’ll be okay. Animals aren’t like us humans, in that to us, losing an eye is a ‘significant emotional event’, like our Weyrwoman used to say.”

“Ah, I remember her. Such a lovely person,” Francie said.

“Aye.” Is it bad that I’ve forgotten about Danelle, he wondered? No, not forgotten. I just don’t think of her much anymore.

Something was missing.

“Um, I don’t mean to get him started, but I notice that Sky’s not calling, and you have Donal out of his sight.”

Francie’s jaw dropped. “You’re right. I absolutely didn’t notice it! I must admit that I didn’t put Donal in with him and the Wanderer’s horse last night. I put him in an empty pen at the other end of the cavern. I was sick of it, K’ndar, I wouldn’t say this to just anybody, but you’re a horseman, too. I so missed my quiet early morning rides, like this one, just me and Donal. Sky was such a nuisance, and honestly, I wish, well…I won’t go there, but he was a never ending pain in the arse, crying and yelling any time I separated him from Donal.”

“It may be that now that he’s out of pain, he won’t go back to that,” he said, although privately he doubted it. But I have to give her SOME hope.

“I hope you’re right, K’ndar. I really began to resent Sky. I know, he’s just a horse, but damn it, he’s a pest. Never mind that his owner just abandoned him, she’s a pest, too.”

“I hope he doesn’t start up once the Wanderers come to collect their horse.”

“Me too, but K’ndar, he’ll be here for about two weeks.”

“I thought..I thought they said they’d be here today to collect him?”

“You heard right. But after you and Raylan left, after the healer finished with Sky, we noticed the chestnut was three legged lame. His left forefoot is abscessed. That poor beast, Yvanna pushed him hard with that foot. He must have been in so much pain, but still he carried her for stars knows how far. The healer cut it out, hit it with iodine and said he needs rest and to soak the foot every day in magnesium sulfate for two weeks.”

“Did someone notify the Wanderers?”

“I did,” she said, “Once the healer said he needs to stay here for a few weeks, I sent my lizards out to look for their camp. They found them, they’re a long ways out. I knew they don’t have a datalink, so then I got on Motanith, flew out there and told them, and they asked if they could leave the horse here until he heals up. Which, coincidentally, is the same time when Sky will have his sutures out.”

And hopefully, by then, Sky will have transferred his neuroticism to that horse rather than mine, she thought. That’s not nice, I suppose, but damn it, I’m tired of it.

“Maybe by that time Sky won’t be so desperate about Donal. Maybe he’ll stick with the chestnut. That’s a dirty trick to play on the Wanderers, but, that’s horses, isn’t it?”

“K’ndar, I’m glad you spoke what I’ve been thinking. I DO hope he transfers. I really don’t believe he’ll just ‘get over it.’ Herd bound horses seldom do.”

She stroked Donal’s neck. I am so grateful you’re NOT like Sky, she thought.

“I’m not going to apologize for resenting Sky. I couldn’t do a thing with Donal without Sky going all neurotic. I know he’s just being a needy, clingy horse, but K’ndar, it was like I had two horses, one a real problem child,” she said, agonized.

“Just like that new woman’s dog.”

“Oh, don’t start me on HER, I haven’t met her but I don’t WANT to. How can she get away with all this shite she’s pulled? Abandoning a horse? Taking advantage of Lorenzo, him paying for it’s upkeep? Letting her dog just roam free?”

“I know. Did Raylan tell you what that dog did?”

“No! You know, I didn’t hear him barking last night. What’d he do?”

K’ndar began to laugh. “Ah, you would have loved it, Francie. He came running down the hill, took one long sniff of the carcass and…”

“Oh, please, PLEASE tell me he rolled in it! Please!”

“Oh, he did, Francie. He’s a champion roller, within minutes there wasn’t a centimeter on him that wasn’t covered in dead, stinking, rotten meat. I bet he picked up ten kilos of slime, all rubbed into his long fur. I can only imagine what his owner did when he finally went home.”

Giggling, she said, “I’ve no idea where she’s quartered, but I bet had I listened, I’d have heard her screeching.”

———————————————————————————————————–

He was deep in writing up his reports of the recovery when Raylan entered his area. His boss had a datalink in his hand.

“K’ndar, I have a note from Administration’s Chief Evvelin, saying a complaint has been lodged against you and she wants to get your side of the situation. She would like to see you ASAP.”

It took him a moment to drag his attention from his report.

“A what? A complaint?”

“Yes, although she makes no mention of what it entails. Do you want to tell me before you go and talk to Evvelin?”

K’ndar looked blankly at Raylan, trying to grasp whose toes he’d stepped on this time. He saw Raylan was concerned, but somehow he knew it wasn’t at him.

But it had to be the launching from the dock at Western Hold. Sheesh, but those people were soreheads.

“The only thing I can think of is the dock. Does she say it’s from Western Hold?” he asked, resignedly.

“A dock?”

“Yes, sir. I was at Western Hold yesterday, with P’jar. When I learned about the speartooth, I thought, wow, I want to go find one right now. I was on their precious dock at the time. I’m not going to blame Raventh, he’s not responsible, but he decided to come and pick me up right then and there, and we launched from the dock. I had no idea it was forbidden, I guess I’ve pissed off the entire Hold. I was going to get with P’jar today when he returns, and ask him who I need to go and apologize to. Probably their Holder,” he sighed.

“Did you damage the dock?”

“No, it’s solid rock, it must be at least ten meters thick, though I didn’t measure it. I’m sorry, Raylan, I guess I should have told you first.”

“I would have thought it a waste of my time, K’ndar, I can’t believe their knickers are all in a twist from a launch from their dock. But what do I know.” He ran his hand through his thinning hair.

“Sorry, sir. Okay, I’m heading for Evvelin’s office now.”

“Not without me,” Raylan said.

“It’s okay, boss. It’s my error, it’s my ass chewing.”

Raylan was torn. Do I tell him I’m going with him to protect us both? The accuser didn’t have the courtesy to talk to me first. No, the shithead went right to Evvelin. That’s unprofessional.

I sometimes hate being your boss, K’ndar. You make it so hard for me to keep from being your friend. You’re a good bloke, honest, hard working, you’ve never whinged at the tasks you’ve been handed, you’ve never tried to duck responsibility. The few times I’ve had to correct you, you’ve taken it to heart with never a grudge.

“That’s not it, K’ndar. The accuser didn’t have the courtesy to contact me first, he didn’t have the courtesy to allow me to handle it. No, he went right to Evvelin. I hate being blind sided.”

“Me, too,” K’ndar said, grateful that Raylan would be on his side. “I trust her, sir. She’s always played fair with everyone. When she says ASAP, it’s a polite way of saying right now.”

“Aye, but I’m sure she’d understand if you were held up for a while.”

“That’s okay, boss. If I have an ass chewing coming, I want it right away. That way I take my punishment and get it done as soon as possible.”

He’d been in Evvelin’s Admin section, but never in her inner domain. But having been in a Weyr, he knew, that the smile on a person’s face on the outside sometimes went away when one was in their office.

“Sit down, K’ndar, and Raylan, you’re here with him why?”

Raylan cleared his throat. He, too, felt the pressure of possibly being on the wrong side of Admin.

“Ma’am, your message to me was the first indication that my staff member, K’ndar, was in trouble.”

She looked up at him over her glasses. “You were not contacted first, you mean.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She shook her head. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”

That perplexed both men. “Ma’am?” Raylan said. Both he and K’ndar noticed that her air wasn’t so much one of judgment but rather, of exasperation.

“K’ndar, did you or did you not, yesterday, transport a very dead, decomposed and extremely smelly creature, and drop it here at Landing?”

So prepared to discuss the launch, K’ndar was completely gobsmacked.

“Ma’am?”

“Did you drop a dead animal, one highly decomposed, downwind of Landing’s stable?”

“Um, yes ma’am, I did.”

“Why did you drop it there?”

Raylan interrupted. “Ma’am, as you know, K’ndar is Landing’s staff biologist and one of three available dragon riders. He’s brought in scientific samples in the past, and I directed him from the very first to put any dead animal downwind, of the compound, of the stables, even of the compost piles. So if the location is the issue, it’s my fault, not K’ndar’s.”

K’ndar felt a glow of relief that Raylan was standing up for him. I was just doing as I was told, he thought.

She held up her hand. They both noticed that her eyes were full of amusement, not anger or discipline.

“I know, that Raylan, I remember looking at that jaw thing when K’ndar first brought it in. I cannot for the life of me even begin to comprehend what the rest of the creature looks like. And I commend you both for trying to keep the smell of such finds from making everyone sick to their stomach.”

She sighed, and set her datalink aside.

“That’s all I wanted to know. Thank you, sirs, for your time.”

“That’s it?” K’ndar couldn’t help but say, “It’s not the launch from the dock at all?”

“Uh, ma’am, wait a minute,” Raylan protested, “That’s it? Just ask me and K’ndar two questions and we’re dismissed? What in the world is going on? Who complained and might I add, didn’t have the courtesy to come to me first? That is MY complaint ma’am, to be lodged against this person.”

“I know nothing of a dock, K’ndar.” She visibly controlled herself to keep from laughing. “Raylan, you’re right, the person-well, let me ask you this. While you were out by this saber tooth? did you happen to see a dog approach it?”

“Ahh,” Raylan said, “Light dawns on me. Yes, ma’am. That dog, it’s the one that the woman whose name I still don’t know and don’t WANT to know, the arborist?”

“As far as I know, there’s only one dog that’s been constantly reported for roaming, digging, assaulting, you name it, here at Landing. So yes, THAT dog. Big dog, long cream colored hair, one that has no manners whatsoever and completely ignores any sort of command.”

“It ran right to the animal, ma’am, it’s called a speartooth,” K’ndar said, “No one called it, it came right on it’s own. It started rolling in the mess. Ma’am, I’ve heard it barking around my quarters for the last month, and everyone in the stables has been complaining about it chasing the livestock. Among other things,” K’ndar said.

“Yes, the dog. I can’t tell you how many complaints I’ve gotten about that damned beast,” Evvelin said. “I’ve had several ‘discussions’ with its owner, all to no avail. She came in here this morning-she barged right past my assistants, shrieking that a dragon rider-you, K’ndar, as P’jar only signed in at Flight Ops this morning, had deposited a dead animal at her quarters door with the express purpose of enticing her dog to roll in it.”

She struggled to contain her mirth…and failed. She began to giggle, then submitted to laughter.

“Oh, my stars, K’ndar, Raylan, I can only imagine what it smells like.”

“It was bad, ma’am, that dog was nose to tail filthy,” Raylan said, laughing.

“To make matters worse for her, Orlon happened to be in the area when the dog ran past him. He took one whiff and knew immediately what had happened and what was going to happen, so he pinged his office and told them to shut off the water to her quarters. Otherwise, he told me, he would have had ‘yet another bloody drain blockage of dog hair to ream out,” he said, and please forgive my language.”

K’ndar, relieved, began to laugh, too.

She rubbed the tears from her eyes, then tried to assume a stern expression.

“She demands I administratively discipline you, K’ndar, despite all the problems she, and her dog have caused. She shrugs off all my admonishments like water off a dolphin’s back.” Which pisses me off mightily, she thought.

“Ma’am,” Raylan said, bitterly, “She can’t just jump the chain of command. That’s not right. Never mind that K’ndar doesn’t have it coming.”

She looked at him. “She is digging her own grave, Raylan. I’ll be blunt. She’s on my shit list. She is racking up as many transgressions as she can, whether purposefully or out of stupidity, I don’t know, but she’s too far gone now for any rehabilitation. It will make it far easier to ‘release’ her when she has exhausted her usefulness, which, in my humble opinion, can’t come soon enough. I insist you keep this to yourselves, sirs. I don’t want her forewarned. I want it to be as complete a surprise to her as all her actions have been to all of us.”

Raylan made a zipping sign across his lips.

“But I must be fair, ” she continued, “So, K’ndar, here is your Official Disciplinary Admonishment. Ready?”

“Yes, ma’am,” K’ndar said, somehow realizing it wasn’t going to be bad.

She forced an unrealistic frown.

“You have piss poor aim, dragonrider K’ndar. You missed her quarters COMPLETELY. You are dismissed.”