Chap. 275 Dust Bath

Chap. 275 Dust Bath

K’ndar heard hoof beats. Of course, he went outside to see.

Orlon, Landing’s chief mechanic, pulled up. On the back of his horse drawn cart was a long tripod ladder atop a collection of tools, ropes, etc.

“Hello, K’ndar! I’ve got a ticket here, to see about ‘high shelves”?

“Hello, Orlon! Yes, please, there’s some crates on them and I’m far too short to reach.”

Orlon laughed. “Would you mind if you sent your dragon out, what’s his name?

“Raventh”

“Raventh. Aye, if you would ask him to vacate his bay? This horse, here, I don’t know how happy she is with dragons. Most of Landing’s horses are used to ‘em, but this ‘un’s a new one to me and I don’t want her bolting with all my gear in the wagon.”

They heard the dragon bay door open.

I heard. I’ll be at the far end of the meadow.

Thank you!

Shortly, they saw Raventh trudging to the dragon meadow.

“That were quick. He heard us, I imagine?”

“He does. He’s doesn’t mind, Orlon, he’s smart..and kind.”

“From what I know, all dragons are. Git up, mare, let’s go around the corner,” he said, clucking to the horse.

K’ndar followed, unable to keep from watching the mare’s way of going. I may be a dragonrider now, but I’ve been a horseman since birth, he thought.

The mare threw up her head, her eyes rolling at the sight of Raventh, but she merely quivered.

K’ndar reached her head and introduced himself. “It’s okay, girl. There’s a lass! He won’t hurt you.” He stroked her neck to calm her. Nicely made little horse, he thought.

After several moments, she calmed down. The mare pawed, smelling the water in the dragon trough. “Do you mind if she drinks first?” he said to Orlon, asking out of courtesy. But it was unnecessary.

“Of course, K’ndar. The beasts get fed and watered first.”

He led her to the dragon trough and she plunged her muzzle into the water, drinking deeply. K’ndar watched her ears flex at every swallow. When she was done, she raised her head, water dripping from her lips.

“All done? Good girl. Back? Back..” he said, and the mare obediently backed the wagon up til it just reached the open bay door.

“You act like you’ve handled a horse or two,” Orlon said.

K’ndar grinned.

“I was riding before I could walk. Even before I was born, Mum routinely rode while pregnant. Need a hand with the ladder?”

“And gear, yes, please.”

They manhandled the ladder into the bay, along with ropes, blocks and a bag of tools.

“How’s that toilet switch working?”

He’d forgotten that the man had replaced the switch with a manual one, to prevent Siskin from playing with the toilet.

“Oh, um, great! Siskin hasn’t figured it out, yet.”

Orlon looked at the opening mechanism for the large bay door. “And the bay door? But I sees it’s working.”

“Yes, sir. You do good work, everything is shipshape.”

Orlon laughed. “Shipshape. Shipshape. Me granddad used them words, he was a seaman before he got hurt.”

“What happened?”

“I were just a lad, then, K’ndar, it were my first-and last! ever sea voyage. I was down below with most of the hands, trying to manage cargo what had come loose in high winds. Cargo needs to be balanced, and tied down tight. Even so, chains can break. That cargo, crates as big as you and me put together, walked around like they had feet. The ship, tossing back and forth, seas coming over the taffrail. One barrel of molasses had fallen over and broken open, woof, what a mess! The crates were sliding and banging into each other. Stars help you if you were in between, you’d be squashed to death! Or worse, just all broke to pieces. I was so scared, too scared to even puke. Cap’n sent every hand he could spare into the hold to secure the cargo. Grampa wouldn’t normally have been aloft-he weren’t a topman, you know, but did know what to do. He volunteered to climb the mainmast, to stow a topsail. Wind blew him right off the crosstrees and he fell. He almost went overboard and we wouldn’t have been able to turn about to rescue him, never mind putting out a boat! He got caught in a ratline. Wrenched his leg off at the knee, but he lived.”

K’ndar cringed, a sympathetic pain stabbing him in the chest just at the thought. “Oh. That was bad.”

“Aye. Put me off being a seaman, I can tell you. I Iike to have both my feet on solid ground. The sea, she’s deadly. She’ll kill you if she can. I won’t ever let her get a second try at killing me, I don’t trust her. Or ships.”

“I don’t either. I get seasick,” K’ndar said.

“Me, too. Didn’t take me but that one trip to learn that. It weren’t but a month but every day were a year long, puking me guts out. I lost a lot of weight on that trip, and that was when I were thin as a rein. Not like now, hehehe,” he said, patting his ample belly.

“When we came to Southern, they put Grampa ashore to be mended. Me and my brother went with him, ‘to see to him’, but really it was to jump ship. I didn’t really care for Grampa, he was sour and mean, and he didn’t give much thought to us. Once we saw he was going to live, we lit out. I’ve never been North since then.”

“But at least you DID get out to sea.”

“Aye. Here, pull that leg out, and hold it whilst I get the other two legs situated.” Orlon said, as they erected the tripod ladder.

“Me, I got seasick on a docked ship,” he said.

Orlon roared. “Not at sea? In port?”

“Yes, sir, it was going up and down on a ‘gentle swell’, they said, and still I lost my breakfast.”

Orlon laughed until tears ran from his eyes. Somehow, K’ndar thought, it isn’t embarrassing anymore, especially if I can make someone laugh like this?

“Right then,” Orlon said, wiping his eyes, “Oh, my sides. I need a good laugh like that to break up the webs in me lungs. So. What am I to do now that I’ve got the ladder set up?”

“Up there, see that shelf? There’s two crates on them, one there, and one over there,” he said, pointing. One’s pretty big. They’re both so covered in dust I can’t tell what it is, but there’s some markings on it.”

“You can see it from here?”

“No, my fire lizard sees it and sends me images.”

“Oh ho!! You’re pretty clever there, Bluey,” Orlon called to Siskin, settled on a shelf at eye level. “Does he talk to you, like your dragon?”

Finally, someone who’s not weyrbred but still knows something about dragons.

“No. He doesn’t talk, but he does understand speech, and he can send me what he sees. It’s how Grafton gets along so well, he’s blind but his fire lizard, Fafhrd, sees for him.”

“I’ll be switched! I allus wondered how he did that. He’s…he’s a good man, K’ndar, he’s like the captain of the ship even though he’s not a councilman. I’d sooner tackle a wher than to cross him, even with him being blind and all.”

“I know that. I feel it, too.” He put a hand on the ladder. “I’ve never seen a ladder like this one,” he said.

“I built it. It didn’t take me but once to fall off one of the regular ones to realize they’re plain dangerous. This one? It’s solid, once set up. A tripod is always more stable. You need more room, true, to carry it around and deploy it, but once it’s up, it’s steady. Those shelves, there?”

“Yes, sir.”

Orlon looked up at the ceiling. “Ah, there’s one,” he said to himself. He dug out two ropes, a block, and webbing out of the tool bag.

“Where’s your brother?” K’ndar asked.

“”E’s off somewheres, I don’t know and don’t right care. Grafton sacked him,finally. Many was the times I wish I’d not told him I was jumping ship in Southern. He’s a parasite, and I’m a soft touch. He’s got me all figgered out. Won’t volunteer for nothing ‘less he’s cornered. His greatest talent is looking busy while doing pretty much nothin’. But he’s not stupid. Inside that knothead of his is a sharp mind. He’s a dab hand at fixing things like buckets with a leak, or rebuilding a block, like this ‘un. Getting him to actually DO it is the problem.

We’d get a ticket, like this ‘un, and I’d need his help and he’d manage to skinny out of the job. Had ‘sumpin more important’ to do. At first, when we first got here, he was pretty reliable, but the last few turns, I mean years, he just went useless. I think it were the drinking he did. Grafton had ‘advised’ him at least twice. Tink, he thought he knew just how far he could push Grafton. But he didn’t. I’d tell him, look, lout, you’ve been skyhooting out on me, I’m tired of it. You better shape up or Grafton will serve you your head and when he does, I’m not going to stop him,” but he just laughed. Then one day he just disappeared. His quarters empty and left a wreck, but he’s gone. I don’t dare ask Grafton what happened, but I have a good idea. Probably went lookin’ for the Wanderers to sponge off them.”

“I wouldn’t dare push Grafton. He’s like a bronze dragon all on his own.”

“More like a gold, K’ndar. They have very little sense of humor, from what I hear.”

K’ndar laughed. “Were you ever Searched? Most groundpou…most non-dragon riders I know who aren’t weyr folk seem to know nothing about dragons.”

Orlon shook his head. “I weren’t ever Searched. But I’ve…well, I meet all kinds of people, K’ndar, been that way since I was a kid. I listen and learn. I wanted so badly to be a dragonrider. It looked exciting and dangerous and manly at the same time, yes? Oh, the girls always wanted dragonmen in their beds. You have a reputation, you know? I was thrilled just to watch when dragons were flying. I’d risk my life watching from cover when you’d be fighting Thread.

Those formations! so..so perfect. Like you all were in one mind, never a collision. Blinking in and out of between, flaming Thread, calling out to each other, throwing big bags of firestone, ducking and diving, your dragons so beautiful…it was incredible. The teamwork was worth the show all on it’s own! And then, you can go all over the world, just like that,” he said, snapping his fingers. “I wanted to see the world, that’s why I agreed to join my grandfather on a ship. If I couldn’t ride a dragon, I could still travel. But,” he shook his head, mournfully, “That didn’t work out. Either.”

“I’m sorry,” K’ndar said. He remembered feeling the same thing as a young kid, wanting to escape a tyrannical father and live an exciting, dangerous life, and thinking the only way was by dragon. Thank the stars it happened.

“Ah, it’s alright, K’ndar. Being a kid in a port you’d never seen before, on a different continent, not knowing a soul-that was exciting all on its own. Once grampa was set, me and my brother agreed we weren’t going back on a ship. We’d been paid off by the Captain, I think he was glad to be shed of us and had no plans on taking us back. I don’t blame him, I was pretty useless. We lit out from the port, and got rolled almost immediately. There’s men who prey on seamen, especially young boys like we were. Two big louts come up to us, ask us what ship, and pfft! I’m looking at a dagger what looks like a meter long in my face. “Your money or your life, boy, your choice.”

So there we are, without a home and without a coin. We walked. And walked, K’ndar, for days, hungry, cold, scared of Thread, wore out our boots. I was so footsore I truly considered taking ship again, any ship, as long as it carried me.

“We took up with a clan of Wanderers. Most weren’t too happy taking on strangers. They’re funny, K’ndar, there’s no mean in them, mostly, I guess, but they allus keeps an eye on you if you’re not family. They know the value of money, and there’s no better horsefolk. They were allus on the move, keeping a day or two ahead of Thread, knew every cavern and overhang, I think, on all of Pern. I learned a lot about how to survive without money.

I learned so much from them, from gelding a horse to building a solar oven to helping a woman birth a baby. K’ndar, thank the stars you was born male. You don’t ever want to push a baby outa your belly. You gain a new respect for the woman who lets the man live who got her pregnant in the first place.”

K’ndar laughed.

“I learned a lot, K’ndar. One man, he took a shine to us and said, I’ll teach you my trade, boys. He was a master with metal things, they call ‘em ‘tinkers’. Tinkers can fix a pot with a hole in it, they melt little bits of metal with a hot iron, it’s called soldering. My brother took to it like he was born to it. For all his worthlessness, he could take a bit of metal, heat it up, file it down, bend it this way or that and turn it into something else. Those Wanderers, they don’t let nothing go to waste. I was allus called Orlon, but they were so taken with my brother’s talent that they called him Tinker. It stuck. I can hardly remember his milk name anymore.

We’d been with the Wanderers for about a year, when we heard that Landing wanted young folk with skills. The Wanderers didn’t trust Landing folk-they don’t trust no one but their own kin-but we got a last ride in a caravan to the river and walked from there. We were hired on. I worked with Aivas! He taught me how to read schematics, those are wiring patterns, how to fix things like yon door opening panel. I got deeper and deeper into it, if Tinker was a born tinker, I was born to be a general handyman. I can fix just about anything, give me time to look her over and then, I can usually fix it. What I can’t, the database teaches me. There was and still is a need for the likes of me here at Landing, and it’s why I still have a job here. When Aivas’s goal was met, he shut down and died. Lots of folks who had hired on were devastated. They were lost, K’ndar, like suckling puppies whose mum has died. It were as if they’d lost their mate, or their own mind. If they didn’t turn to a different job, one not so glamorous, they were sent off. Some died from suicide! Me, I’d always known Aivas were just a machine, a smart one, but still, not alive. So we stayed on and now I’m Maintenance Chief.”

Orlon tested the ladder and then climbed to eye level with one of the shelves.

“Woof, there’s about a ton of dirt and dust up here, dead critters-whoa, K’ndar, that crate is BIG. I’m not going to be able to shift it myself.” He pushed it. It wouldn’t move. “There’s something in it, too, I’m thinking, I can’t get it to move. That’s alright, I see it has handles. That’s good.”

He climbed halfway down and extended a hand. “Hand me that block, would you please? and two ropes, one’s short and one’s long.”

Happy to be of use, K’ndar obeyed. Orlon climbed back up, all the way to the top of the ladder. He reached up and unfolded an attachment.

“What’s that?”

“It’s a flush mounted D-ring, it’s an attachment point that is set below the surface so you don’t trip over it when it’s not in use. Quite useful, actually. Once I get ‘er hooked up, I’ll reeve the rope annnd ’ware your head, K’ndar, I’m dropping one end of it.”

The long end of the rope fell to the foot of the ladder. Soon the other end, with a snap at the end followed. “See that webbing there? No, there. To the right of the bag, aye, there you go. Secure it to the snap and send it up. Makes for less climbing up and down for me.” K’ndar obeyed and sent the webbing up to Orlon.

He climbed down to the level of the shelf and secured the Y shaped webbing to the crate’s handles. Then he snapped one rope to the Y’s junction, and the other to one of the handles.

“Shards, but it’s thick up here,” he said, snorting, “this thing’s been up here forever. Phew, it stinks, there’s been something living up here-or dying. Crawlers, bugs. Okay, headache! Sending the tag line down now.”

The end of a rope fell to K’ndar’s feet. Orlon climbed down. “Let’s shift this ladder over that way. There, that’s good, we just want some working room. See, the D-ring in the floor? Hand me that smaller block, in the bag. Aye. There you go, we’ll just attach it, reeve the cargo line to it and we’ll have that crate down in a minute. Your job, K’ndar, here, take this rope, it’s the tag line. You hold her steady as I’m lowering the crate. Your job is to keep the load steady, don’t let it go to swinging! Understand? Just so’s we can bring her down nice and easy.”

“Yes, sir,” K’ndar said, nervously. Orlon checked the blocks, then put put some tension on his rope.

“Ready?”

K’ndar nodded, not certain if he was ready or not.

“Right then, on three! One, two, three…” Orlon pulled on the load rope. They heard a screech as the crate began to move. It shoved twenty five hundred years worth of dust over the edge. A cloud of dust, ash, bones fell into a torrent, covering everything, to include them.

With it came…teeko lizards.

Siskin launched. It seemed as if there were a dozen. They fell to the floor and dashed to freedom…except one.

“Steady there, K’ndar, just hang on!”

K’ndar could barely see the load but managed to keep the crate steady til it

settled on the floor. It was followed by finer dust and bits of detritus.

“Shaff!! What a mess” Orlon said. K’ndar sneezed.

“Shards, this will take all day to clean up,” he said.

“Aye, and there’s still one to go,” Orlon said. He’d taken the brunt of the

cascade. He brushed bits of bone and piles of dust off his head and shoulders.

The air was full of fine particles that got into their eyes, their noses, their mouths. Orlon shook his head and detached the webbing and tag line. Air currents set the cloud to swirling and getting ever deeper into their faces.

“Hmm,” K’ndar said, “Some of this is volcanic ash. It HAS been up there a long time.”

“You make a good helper, K’ndar. Iffen you ever get tired of chasing down bugs, let me know, I’ll take you on.”

“Thank you, I think. Is it always this dirty a job?”

Orlon laughed. “And you’re a biologist? I won’t say. I don’t want to be scaring you off.”