Chap. 383 The Dog and the Horse

Chap. 383 The Dog and The Horse

Finally, K’ndar thought, as he walked out of his small workspace, I’ve cleared my decks and finally have some free time. I’m going riding!

The doors to the outside whisked open. The scent of a lovely, if cold day hit him. This winter had been an exceptionally cold one, for Landing, but having grown up on the frigid steppe, he was used to cold temperatures.

He touched Raventh and Siskin.

Siskin, come. We’re going to the barn.

The fire lizard appeared, chittering. He got the distinct feeling that Siskin was jealous.

“You still resent not being able to come inside, don’t you, little one?”

Siskin muttered imprecations as he landed on his shoulder.

He does not understand why Fafhrd can go into the buildings but not him Raventh interpreted.

Tell him it’s because Fafhrd’s a bronze. That’s the only excuse that I can think of that will make sense of it.

“It’s okay, Sis. We won’t let Fafhrd come into OUR weyr, how about that?” he said to the lizard.

I can’t tell if he’s mollified or not, he thought. And I doubt I could be honest about Fafhrd. He goes where he, or his master, Grafton, wishes. Although I’ve never had Landing’s Headman ever abuse his privilege of access anywhere in Landing. I don’t think he’s capable of rude or obnoxious behaviour. That’s partly me. I don’t give him any reason to come looking for me. Even if he is blind.

Siskin’s tail gently wrapped around his neck. It’s not just support for him, he thought. It’s also affection. I’ve noticed fire lizards are like cats, some use their tails as a means of keeping in touch with the other. I remember our old ginger cat, she would walk alongside us and always had a tail touching our legs. As if to say, I’m here. All her kittens did the same thing.

A soft, warm lizard tail is better than any woven scarf, he thought. A cold wind made him pull his cap from his jacket pocket. It had seen better days. He suddenly realized how old it was. His mother had knitted it for him about the same time he’d left his home cothold for Kahrain Weyr. And Kahrain and Landing, both being much further north and thus closer to the equator than his home cothold, didn’t have the typical frigid weather of the steppe. Thus, he’d not worn it very often.

I never learned to knit, he thought, I just don’t have the patience. Maybe I’ll go home for a day or two, ask Mum for a new cap. But first I have fun.

That morning, his datalink pinged.

“K’ndar, it’s Francie. Do you have a few minutes?”

“Um, yeah, I was headed for the barn. Why?”

But she’d rung off. Within a few minutes, he heard her fire lizards greeting Siskin in Raventh’s bay. At the same time, his pedestrian door pinged. He let Francie in. She was carrying a tray covered with a light cloth that emitted a mouth watering scent.

“Have you had breakfast yet?” she’d asked.

“Um, even if I had, whatever is on that tray is telling me I should say ‘no’.”

She laughed. He led the way to the small dining table in his kitchen.

“I didn’t put on a kettle for klah,” he apologized, “There’s always a kettle on in the lunchroom at work.” Indeed, he thought, tomorrow starts my week for our building’s lunchroom. Klah, water, and nummies from the bakery.

“No matter. Water will do,” she said. She placed the tray on the table.

“It’s funny,” he said, as he filled a carafe with water from the faucet, “I still am astounded at the amenities I have right here. I turn this knob and water comes out. I don’t have to go out to the well my parents dug and pump the water up through lightwood pipes that had to be replaced every few years. Although I think by now they have a turbine that pumps it up, but it’s been a while since I’ve been ‘home’.

A LONG while, he thought.

Francie laughed. “I know. I always feel humbled when I go somewhere where people are still cooking over a low fire because wood was so precious back then or worse, using blackstone that has such a horrible dust, and using an outhouse for a latrine. And here I have lights at night, and a heating system tapped into the thermal vents underneath us, and a toilet that I can use in the middle of the night without having to get dressed up.”

It makes me wonder, she pondered, if this is the start of what used to be called a privileged class. That’s what the Charter explicitly forbids. But don’t the Lord Holders already have that? Stars, I do NOT want Pern to end up like Earth did.

He placed two large goblets on the table, along with two trenchers. “Well, we still eat off trenchers,” he said, “Orlon told me that the Ancients didn’t have wooden trenchers, theirs were made of ceramic. They didn’t survive the earthquakes, apparently.”

She nodded.”They were called ‘dishes’. The lava did as much damage as the quakes, I read. A building was unearthed last month, it had been used for cooking for a lot of people, it was all metal racks, and food preparation tables, with storage for cookware. The ware was indeed ceramic, the floor was absolutely covered with broken bits of hundreds of dishes, mugs, you name it. They said it looked as if it had snowed, there was so much of it. And there were big machines to clean them. At least that’s what they believe, all the machines were crushed when the ceiling collapsed from the weight of the ash. One of Ar And Dee’s folks said even if they could reconstruct one of the machines, it wouldn’t work because the water lines and seals were made of a substance called rubber that just disintegrated with age or maybe heat from the lava? I don’t know what rubber is, just that we don’t have it here on Pern.”

She uncovered the tray and placed two of the pastries onto his trencher. He took a bite. He groaned in gustatory appreciation. “Whoa, Francie, this is incredible.”

“They’re called dann ishes. I found a recipe for them on the computer. And last summer I learned how to preserve berries, there’s a lot of fruits that didn’t survive colonization, but we do have marionberries, and blueberries, and the tartberries from Vulcan.”

She took another of the pastries.

“Igen Hold has been experimenting with solar ovens. They build a box out of sandstone, you know, and line it with aluminum, luckily, they’ve found huge deposits of the mineral that refines into aluminum. And you know that Igen has plenty of sunlight. I guess it bakes a loaf of bread in half the time our usual bake ovens take.”

“Oh, I do indeed know about the sunlight in Igen. When I was there I learned about a smelter they built out in the desert, maybe that’s where they’re making the aluminum. Shards, but it’s hot there, even in winter.”

The pastry demanded his attention.
“My stars, Francie, but this is so good.”

She smiled. “Thank you. But don’t think I’m doing this out of the goodness of my heart. Raylan said to bring them over because if he eats one more he’s going to need to have his pants waist let out ‘even more.”

K’ndar snorted. “I’m lucky,” he said, “I never had to worry about gaining weight. I’m just too ornery, I guess, the weight just stays off. So to what do I attribute this wonderful breakfast?”

“K’ndar, I’ve got transport duty today,” she said, “I’m taking Lord Cecilia up to Harper Hall.”

“I know. I saw your name on the duty roster.”

“Good. Finally you’re reading it on the datalink?”

“Yesssss, Mother. You’re as bad as Jansen. And Raylan is a tattletale. I’m reading the duty roster every day now, like a good boy,” he snarked, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

She laughed. “Anyway, Lord Cecilia is taking several datalinks there to teach new Harpers how to use them. Data and Ar and Dee have given her most of the datalinks that Fleming had stolen. She’s of the mind that the old ways of teaching just aren’t engaging kid’s minds anymore.”

“Like the Teaching Songs?”

“Yes,” she said, as she pushed another pastry his way. “The kids aren’t interested in the songs anymore. They don’t cover much, as you probably remember, not much in the way of technology, and we both know technology is growing fast. They want books, they want a datalink, and while Landing has decided that not everyone gets one, still, the kids learn faster that way. So the council decided, every Hold, every Crafthall, every Weyr gets at least one, and the Harpers need to learn how to use them, first.”

“But not the outlanders, people like me, who grew up in a remote cothold?” cothold?

“No. Sorry to say, but apparently not. Maybe in the future?”

“Can’t they make more of them?”

She shook her head. “That’s the problem. Ar and Dee is trying hard to find a replacement for substances called rare earths. I guess the components inside the links used these minerals. Apparently, there’s just not much of it here on Pern. Or at least it’s not been found, yet. Remember, the Ancients called this place Pern by saying Primarily Earth like, Resources Negligible.”

“I remember hearing that. Lord D’nis has been doing a lot of historical research, and told me that the ‘resources’ meant a substance called petrolum. He says it’s what wrecked the climate on Earth. I’m glad we don’t have it here.”

She nodded, glad too.

“Funny, I loathe my datalink, I’d much rather talk face to face. But everyone else, it seems, would love to have one. I much prefer books. I can stop at a page and read it again and again until I understand. Yeah, the Teaching Songs were good for memorization but NOT always for understanding. That, and the Songs didn’t teach me what I was interested in. There’s no song that tells you how birds fly, for instance,” K’ndar said.

“You can’t blame the Harpers, they can only teach so much. I was lucky, although I didn’t think so at the time. Telgar Weyr had a permanent Harper, and he made sure we learned.”

He nodded. “Where I lived, a Harper would show up for a week once every six months, she had a route and that took her all over south Southern. And I’m one of those people who needs to DO things with my hands in order to learn. Singing about algebra was utterly useless. It just didn’t stick.”

“Come on, eat this last one.”

“No, please, Francie, they’re awfully good but I’m full. What’s this favor you want me to do?”

“How do you know it’s a favor?”

He grinned. “You’re like the big sister I never had, Francie,” knowing it would please her being thought as such, “You wouldn’t ask me if you didn’t think I could do it..or would refuse.”

She laughed, indeed, loving that he thought of her that way. She’d always treated him like a kid brother.

“You’re right. I’ll be up north for a few days, and P’jar’s next on the list for transport duty. So I was wondering if you’d exercise Donal for me? If it’s not too much of a request? I work him for about an hour. Just don’t pop him over jumps, he does NOT like to jump.”

He laughed. “Oh, boy, I dunno, I’ll have to think it over. Okay, I’ll do it.”

__________________________________________________________

What a pleasure it was to ride the black bay gelding.

He’d walked into the barn, greeted the hands, and found Donal’s bridle in the tack room. He almost collided with Lorenzo, Landing’s Herdmaster.

“You’re riding Donal?”

“Aye. Francie asked me to, she’s heading North for a few days. Like I’d turn down a chance to ride him?”

Lorenzo laughed. “He’ll like that. He needs a good work out at least three times a week. Not going to saddle him?”

K’ndar grinned, unconsciously straightening the bridle. “Not me, sir. Officially, I can’t use her saddle, it’s too small for my arse. Truthfully, I’m too lazy to actually saddle him up and clean it afterwards. Besides, I was riding bareback before I could walk.”

He walked out to the gelding’s paddock. Donal approached him with a happy nicker. He gave the horse a hunk of carrot, bridled him and asked for a knee. The horse merely looked at him, puzzled.

No, dumbskull, he said to himself, he’s not a dragon.

He led the horse out of the paddock to a mounting block and mounted. Siskin landed on his shoulder.

He felt the bay’s muscles working, he could feel every step. It’s so different from riding a dragon, the hardest part, these days, is not being able to communicate telepathically. But I can still talk to him, with my hands and my seat.

He cued the gelding to take a path to where he’d dropped the speartooth. I want to look at it, see how far it’s come in being eaten up, he thought

It had been fairly well cleaned. The bones shone white in the wan winter sunlight. The various scavengers and the whers had done an excellent job of removing the meat the teams couldn’t remove from the bones. After I put Donal up, he thought, I’ll come back here and get a better look at it.

He laughed in his head, remembering the dog that had rolled in the stinking mass of decomposed and rotted meat.

As if hearing him, he saw what appeared to be a dog, far off in the distance.

Yup. Same dog. Doing something, I don’t know what. She’s still allowing it to roam. Some people refuse to learn.

Hmm. Something’s odd about the dog. I don’t have my binocular, it looks different.

Hearing him, Siskin launched and flew to hover over the dog. He sent images of the dog digging a hole.

The dog had been clipped. Badly, or with a dull scissors. Its fur was growing back, but it was obvious the only way the owner could have cleaned him up was to shave him.

He laughed.

________________________________________________________________

“That bloody dog is still hanging around, I see,” he said, as he groomed Donal after the ride.

Lorenzo was moodily sharpening a hoof knife. “Aye, he is, but at least I’m finally able to keep him out of the barn.” He held the knife up to his eye to check the edge. This knife-the design hasn’t changed in thousands of years. I like tools that work, he thought. Sometimes technology is over rated.

“How do you do that? How do you keep him out of the barn?”

“Ah,” Lorenzo said, “Here, look at this.”

He put the knife in his tool kit and offered K’ndar a small, tapered box. It had a small screen on the front end and a button.

“What is this?” He said, turning it over. His thumb automatically caressed the button.

“Don’t push the button!” Lorenzo warned, “It’s called a dazer. Ar and Dee’s techs created it for me, they gave it to me yesterday. It’s got a small battery inside. When you push the button, it emits a loud, ultrasonic noise, far too high frequency for us to hear, but animals can. It hurts the dog’s ears. And cats, and fire lizards and horses, so don’t push the button.”

“Ah,” he said, suddenly feeling as if the box might bite. Siskin looked at it curiously. He let the lizard sniff it. Siskin politely did so and then ignored it.

“And?”

Lorenzo laughed. “This morning, well, I knew the mutt would be coming in, he chases the cats so he can eat their breakfasts. The horses were already out, so were the two cows, and the cats were hiding, so I didn’t have to worry about hurting anything other than the dog. Right on schedule, here it comes, trotted past me as if I were nothing but a tree trunk. I shot the dazer at him, just once, and whoosh, he fled. Not ten minutes later, here he comes back, as if nothing had happened. In fact I thought nothing had happened. I zapped him again, this time he yelps and runs away. But talk about stubborn? He only ran a little ways, then sat down and watched me. The very second I entered the office, out of his view, he galloped in, the crafty bugger. He wasn’t taking no for an answer! This time I waited until he was all the way in the barn and pressed the button ten, twelve times. He ran away shaking his head, and hasn’t been back.”

He shook his head, still peeved at the obstinacy of the dog. “I wish they made one for people. I’d hit the dog’s owner with it.”

He laughed.

“He’s south of the speartooth, digging up something. He’d been shaved,” K’ndar said.

Lorenzo laughed again. “Aye, apparently his owner had to clip him, he was that filthy.”

“The day I dropped it, oh, man, that thing stunk and we laughed when the dog rolled in it. Jansen told me later that Maintenance’s Chief, Orlon, saw the dog running towards it’s quarters and had her water shut off, so that it wouldn’t bugger up the drains in her quarters. AGAIN.”

Lorenzo chuckled. “Orlon’s a smart man. I wouldn’t have thought that fast.”

“Did you know, she lodged a formal complaint against ME for her dog’s rolling in the dead speartooth.”

“That sow! She didn’t!”

“She did. She insisted I’d dropped it at her door explicitly to entice her dog to roll in the dead animal.”

Lorenzo smirked. “Can’t trust you dragonriders,” he said. “Yeah, she’d do that, no doubt. What did Admin do to you?”

“Chastised me for having ”piss poor aim because I’d missed her quarters completely.”

Lorenzo roared.

Suddenly, K’ndar realized that the barn was quiet.

“Um, I just realized, Sky is quiet. He’s not crying. In fact, I don’t recall seeing him at all?”

“True enough. Put Donal in his pen and I’ll introduce you to our new horse.”

“In the pen? Not back in his paddock?”

“I’ll be feeding in a few minutes anyway.”

He led the gelding into his pen and released him. He scratched the horse’s withers. “Thank you, lad. That was a good ride. I’ll be back tomorrow.” Donal nickered, then turned to the hay he’d not cleaned up earlier.

Lorenzo led the way through the cavern to the paddocks. A small horse dozed beneath the cover of the leafless trees, one hind leg cocked in relaxation.

“See her? She’s just barely legal horse size, just a smidgen above 14.2 hands.” He whistled and the mare pricked her ears and trotted to the stone fence. He reached out to stroke her neck with one hand and gave her a bit of carrot with the other.

“Oh, my stars,” K’ndar said, “She’s beautiful. Whoa. Look at her color! She’s a bay, but I’ve never seen one that looks more like red wine!”

“Aye,” Lorenzo said, “she is a love, she is. Gentle as a lamb. And she’s pregnant.”

“How is it she’s here, and where are Sky and the Wanderer’s chestnut?”

Well,” Lorenzo said, “The healer came out last week to take out Sky’s sutures. He’s a master, K’ndar, if you’d not seen that eye of his you’d never have known it had been horribly infected and painful. Sky attached himself to the chestnut, just like he did with Donal. The Wanderers came by two days ago, to collect their chestnut. He’d recovered nicely from Yvanna’s abuse. He had feet like rocks, K’ndar, I trimmed him up and will need a new rasp. Those Wanderers, they’re fabulous horse breeders. Their horses are sound in mind and body.”

“They are. I have nothing but respect for them. So what happened?”

“Well, remember the man who made the promise for all Wanderers?”

“Remember? How can I forget? It made chills run down my spine.”

“Mine, too! He showed up with the same two men, his brothers. He was leading this lovely little mare. He asked me if I was willing to give him Sky.”

“He wanted Sky?”

“He did. He said he needed a new cart horse, and Sky was just what he wanted. But he didn’t have the money to buy Sky AND pay for the two or three weeks he was here. I kept telling him the care was free, but he’d not have that. I told him it was worth a few weeks of hay and feed just to hear him promise Yvanna a painful death. They all laughed at that, but K’ndar, it wasn’t a haha laugh, it was a, um, a promise laugh. As if to say, yeah, we will keep it, too. So was I interested in bartering? This young mare, she’s only eight, who’s not only pregnant but is just the right size for teaching kids to ride AND is both a cart and a riding horse. Was I willing to swap? Sky for the mare? Pfft.” The man flipped a hand.

K’ndar shook his head. “That was a no brainer. I would have paid for her, if I were in the market for a new horse, even if she’s small. Look at her legs! They’re faultless. She’s solid. My word, I can’t fault her, well, she’s just a bit long backed, but otherwise? she’s as good a horse as Donal.”

“My thoughts exactly. I would have given them Sky for nothing. He was a pain in the arse. I would have forever resented him for needing so much of my attention, but he was just being an anxiety ridden horse. And in all other attributes he was a fairly good one. The Wanderers didn’t care if he was herd bound, the chestnut was going back, too.”

“Knowing them, I would be surprised if they couldn’t somehow get him to stop being such a baby. Did the dog woman hear of it?”

“I don’t know and don’t care. He was MY horse, she’d abandoned him, I had witnesses. I had a long chat with Admin about her and the horse, and as far as Admin’s concerned, Sky was mine to do with as I chose. They even reimbursed me for the money I’d spent on him.”

He sighed. “But the woman is still here, and I am sure that she’s going to come here wanting ‘her’ horse back. I don’t look forward to that confrontation.” He looked worried.

K’ndar caught his eye and raised his skyward with a knowing look. Lorenzo caught it. “But not for long, eh?” he asked, hopefully.

K’ndar just shrugged. Lorenzo knew that K’ndar knew but couldn’t say so.

“Let’s just say she will be looking for new quarters soon.”

“Can’t come soon enough. And this time, she’ll be walking to Cove Hold or wherever she came from. I’ll be switched if I take her to the port in one of MY pony carts. And I hope you don’t take her dragonback.”

“Nope. I don’t know a dragonrider who’ll take a dog. He’s going with her. That’s written in stone.”

“Let’s hope she does. It wouldn’t surprise me if she dumps the dog, too. She probably won’t notice, but when the healer was here, he, um, tended to the dog.”

“He was hurt? Sick?”

“No, but he was his usual pest, trying to hump the Healer’s leg while he was attending to Sky. Kicking at him didn’t stop him, he was all over the healer’s legs. His pant leg smelled like his last patient, a female dog. I’ve never seen a healer, animal OR human, lose their patience, but he was close.”

“I don’t understand how some people can be so blatantly uncaring and irresponsible. She’s probably laughing at how she gets away with so much and the rest of us just allow it.”

“That’s what the healer said,” Lorenzo snickered. “”I thought all dogs had be be neutered here at Landing? And kept on a leash? he asked, and I said, yeah, his owner has been told that over and over, she just ignores it. Covers her ears and sings Lalalala I don’t hear you! Talking to her is like talking to the Red Star. She insists being neutered would damage the dog’s ‘self esteem’.”

Then he laughed, K’ndar, and after he finished with Sky, he said, in this funny tone of voice, bring that horny little bastard to me, I want to check his level of esteem. And you,” he meant me, “might want to find something else to do in your barn. Anywhere out of my sight, please.”

“What did he do?”

“Well, see, K’ndar, he was looking out for me. He immediately grasped the whole situation. I have no idea what he did to the dog, because I was busy taking care of my animals. I didn’t see a thing. But, you know how it is here at Landing. South of here, it’s returned to wilderness. We have whers out there, and giant wherries, some long legged animal that’s fast as light, there’s even a susi comes by now and then. There’s no telling what a loose mutt will get into out there. Things happen. I lose a cat now and then to the longlegged ones, even though the cats do NOT wander, they’ve learned they’re on the menu of half a dozen predators.

So I’m thinking, that dumb dog, I think he went for that female wher, the one with the two little ones? And she attacked him. Who knows, but somehow, K’ndar, somehow that dog lost his bollocks. Imagine that!”