Chap. 424   A New Class

“So, this is the steppe?” Francie asked.

 “Yes. I know it looks pretty barren, but yes, we are on the edge of the Kahrain Steppe, and no, it’s not barren at all,” K’ndar said, fondly.

She looked at him, askance. The wind was just this side of cutting through her heavy riding jacket. There wasn’t a tree or a shrub to be seen. She heard a lonesome, haunting whistle, from a bird so small it was unseen.

Other than the wind, there wasn’t a sound. The silence only made the steppe seem all that much bigger.

“I don’t know, K’ndar, it looks barren to me.” She shivered. “It’s so empty.”

“I know. But it’s late winter. I know a lot of people might fear it, it’s okay, I agree, it’s empty. There’s life all around us, it’s just staying low. Remember when we read the pilot’s journal, how he said he loved interstellar space because he could see infinity? I know how he feels. I DO. I feel it now. I can throw my eye a thousand kilometers and see nothing but earth and sky. At night, the stars are sitting on the horizon, Francie, in the daytime, you can see clouds between the legs of your horses.”

“Well, I suppose so, I believe you and I’d like to see…wait. What’s that?”

K’ndar paused. “What’s what?”

“Didn’t you hear it? Like a groan?”

For one long moment, all he heard was the wind.

Then he heard it, and smiled.

“That’s a lion.”

“A LION.”

The sound repeated, from very far off. It was a loud roar, followed by a series of shorter ones.

K’ndar grinned. “Hear what he’s saying? “Whose land is this? Mine, mine, mine.” It’s probably a pride male, but I’ve heard the females roar, too.”

“I know there’s lions, I just, well, wasn’t expecting them. They don’t sound like tigers, I note.”

“Different habitat, Francie. The lion has to have his challenge heard at long distances. The one time I met the tigers up north, thanks to you! he was in deep forest. Either way, lions and tigers are a very necessary part of the environment. If we didn’t have Terran predators, the Terran herbivores-horses, pronghorn and cattle, would have denuded this steppe. People slam Tubberman for bringing them, but he knew what he was about. One of the worst things about us humans is we’re an invasive species and we brought others with us. The balance needs to be in place. Oh, lions.  I wonder if we can find them.”

“K’ndar. You aren’t serious, you want to go FIND the lions?”

He nodded. “Yes. They’re beautiful animals, they live in great families called prides. It’s a matriarchal society, the females raise up their daughters in the same territory, the males, at two, are rousted from the pride by the pride males. The pride males are not related, to the females, of course, they won’t mate their daughters. They protect and defend the pride’s territory. Come on, let’s go see if we can find them.”

“K’ndar, I’ve read your reports. They might attack us. They did  attack a  dragonrider in Honshu and his dragon will always be disabled.”

“True. But don’t dismiss your dragon’s instincts. Motanith will not allow you or her to get hurt. We won’t be near them and trust me, lions can’t fly.”

I’m not afraid of them. They’re just big cats Motanith reassured her.

After a five minute flight, K’ndar saw a cloud of scavengers swirling over a certain spot.

“There’s a kill there, Francie, and the scavengers are over it, so you won’t have to worry about the lions attacking us. They’ll either be so full they can’t move, or they have moved on. I hope I’ll see a small saurian scavenger that is driving my crazy. They’re so elusive! I don’t know anyone who’s ever seen them in daylight. They’re the ones who’ve cleaned up the specimens I’ve brought in, after the whers take off the big hunks.”

She looked at him from across the space between their flying dragons.

“Okay. I trust you, K’ndar, and yes, I’d love to see the lions but I’m still wary.”

“Which is a wise thing to be,” he said, reassuring her. “We won’t do anything stupid.”

And, of course, I neglected to bring a camera, he thought. But I think P’jar has it.

There were no lions, nor saurian scavengers. What there was, was a great heaving pile of bickering scavenger wherries and a handful of avian ones. More circled overhead, unable to find a spot at the table.

“Good grief, look at the size of some of those wherries. I had no idea they’d get so big.”

“It looks like a horse, so I’m pretty sure it’s a lion kill. Cheetahs don’t dare take on a big animal. They’re pronghorn specialists.”

“You’re sure of that?”

“No. But I have never seen a native saurian herbivore, well, wait, I did once, that was way south of here, and it was a night.  I think P’jar is down there right now, surveying. Remember when I lost Siskin? That was the night I spent out there on the edge of the steppe, and we found a skeleton of an herbivore?”

“I DO! I remember bringing Robson out to collect the skeleton.”

“I saw a few live ones, but it was in the middle of a very dark night. I’ve never seen them since. But then, I haven’t been this far south since the original survey.”

As their dragon’s shadows passed over the kill, they spooked the scavengers and the avians from the kill. One raptor, seeing Francie’s three fire lizards on Motanith’s neck, swooped to snatch one of them. Francie instinctively pushed her face into her dragon’s neck spines to keep the raptor from attacking her face.

Her fire lizards all hissed but stayed quite attached to Motanith. She roared sent the bird tumbling into the sky. The others fled to a safe distance from the dragons to land and grumble.

“Woohoooo!” K’ndar shouted, always thrilled to see a dragon use its telekinetic power.

“Is it okay? Are they gone?” she shouted, turning her head sideways.

K’ndar laughed. “Yes! Motie kicked that one almost into space!”

Francie laughed, but it was a bit shaky. “I sure didn’t expect that!”

“Neither did I, but I still think it’s such a cool thing dragons can do. But now, we can see what the kill is.”

Siskin launched as their dragons turned on a wing to hover over the kill.

“Yup. It’s definitely a horse,” K’ndar called.

“WAS a horse,” Francie corrected.

Siskin landed at the rear of the kill. Most of the meat on the upper side of the horse was almost gone. The blue fire lizard trundled to the back end and tried to pick up the tail, but it was still attached to the horse. He dropped it and pounced on a crawler that was working its way out of the carcass.

“WHAT is he doing?” Francie said. Her fire lizards dropped down to the kill to join Siskin in his hunt for crawlers.

K’ndar laughed. “I trained him to find and collect horse tails.”

“You’re kidding. Not from live ones, I hope?”

He laughed. “Of course not. Only dead ones. I make things out of them.”

Land please? And keep an eye out for the lions

Raventh backwinged and landed. They’re a long ways off

He got off to collect the tail. “It’s obviously a wild horse,” he said, “If there’s a brand on the hide, it’s underneath. But I don’t see any sign that it’s ever been shod.”

Motanith landed a few moments later. Francie did NOT get off.

“You make things out of the tails? What kind of things?”

“Chokers, head stalls, it’s a hobby. I’ve not made one in a long time, but horse hair is perfect for it.”

He grasped the tail and feeling resistance, pulled his dagger and cut the tail bone at the end of the spine. Lovely roan, he thought, I hope you didn’t suffer.

“I’m used to the stink of a dead animal, but this one really does,” Francie said.

He paused.

“You’re right.” He stuffed the tail into a collection bag. “There’s a tang of something familiar that isn’t usually from a dead animal,”  he said, “As if I’ve smelled it before.”

I can smell it, too Raventh said.

Siskin, having eaten at least two crawlers, landed atop Raventh’s head and began to groom.

Where have I smelled that odor before?

“Francie. This is definitely a lion’s kill,” he said, seeing the pawprints. “Looks like at least three, one’s a VERY big male.”

He pulled a sketch book out of his backpack and began sketching.

Keeping upwind of the kill, he saw a few smaller paw prints.
“These look saurian. Sort of like susi paw prints, but too small. But I never heard of a susi killing mammals. For that matter, I’m not sure if they’ll even eat mammalian flesh.”

The wind shifted momentarily, sending the entire pungent load of dead horse and ‘something else’ fully into his nostrils. He backed up hurriedly. The unusual scent on the kill suddenly pinged his memory.

I remember. It was that animal the jungle human brought. It made you stink Raventh said.

YES!

“I know what this is! I do, these prints are from the musk lizard!”

“Oh, no, don’t even go near it,” Francie shouted, very glad to not be nearer than they already were. “The smell of a dead horse is bad enough, the smell from a musk lizard is far worse. You smelled like one for a few days.”

K’ndar laughed, but it was wryly. “Not too badly, I hope. I did keep to myself for a few days and took about a thousand showers.” He bent down to get a closer view of the tracks. Most had been obliterated by the scavengers, but several were very clear. They look relatively fresh, he thought. I bet this horse was killed late last night. The musk lizard that Rand, the jungle forester, caught in his trap was strictly nocturnal, the anatomists dissecting said so based on the eye structures.”

 He knelt down to measure the prints, then sketched it.

“I’m amazed all over again. I thought that the musk lizard was strictly a jungle beast, but no, this is the same scent, the same tracks. They’re moving out here.”

“It doesn’t mean they can’t live in places other than the jungle. Is this the small scavenger you’re looking for?”

“No. That one, I’ve seen the back end of one at midnight. They’re a much different body shape. This, well, I know very well how a musk lizard is shaped. They’re squatty, and decidedly predators. Rand saw one grab a full grown sow almost twice it’s size and carry it straight up a tree.”

There is a herd of animals ahead of us. They are moving slowly, like cows Raventh said.

Motanith said something similar to Francie.

Pronghorn? Horses? Cattle? he asked Raventh.

I can smell them. It’s not your animals.

“There’s animals a long way off there, and me, dumbarse, forgot his binocular.” What in the world was I thinking? But we didn’t come out here to find anything other than the boulder.

Francie laughed. “Maybe the stars heard you! Let’s go look.”

________________________________________________________

He was filled with astonishment-and elation.

“Francie! Look, they’re the animal we found on survey!”

A herd of about thirty animals eyed them with suspicion as they landed.

“Don’t dismount,” K’ndar warned, “I can tell that they’re this close to bolting. They’ve probably never seen a dragon before but running away is always a good option when they see a predator.”

“That’s the survey where Siskin took off one night? You stayed out there waiting for him? I brought Robson, the anatomist, to pick up a skeleton?”

“Yes, yes, and he did!  What ever happened to him?”

“He’s here on Pern, that’s the only thing I can definitely say about him. He’s a polymath, but still a Wanderer. I can contact him via fire lizard but there are times he just doesn’t respond.”

“Does he have a fire lizard?”

“No. But my three know him and have served as messengers. He seems to have this ability to know when I need him, even without my sending a message.”

“Whatever became of the skeleton? I remember transporting it to Landing, I dropped it in the area where I’ve dropped others. But I forgot all about it until just now.”

“I feel stupid saying this, but I don’t know. I really don’t.”

Her attention was drawn to the herd in the distance. “My, they’re lovely beasts,” she said. “They’re big. I wonder if they can be ridden?”

“You’d need a ladder, Francie, just to get aboard. I bet they’re about twenty hands. That back slopes from the withers to the rump. I don’t know how you’d fit a saddle to that back.”

“I could try it bareback,” she said, chuckling.

“I’ve seen you ride bareback. I bet you could.”

“If I remember correctly, the skeleton had about a dozen long spikes on its neck. These don’t have them.”

“Hmm,” K’ndar said, “Now I’m beginning to doubt they’re the same beast. I don’t see any spikes, either. When I get home, I’m going to nail my binocular to my neck.”

Francie laughed. K’ndar began to sketch the animals.

They were tall, with long, elongated necks and a long aquiline head. One of them had a trio of horns on the head, one in the middle of the top of the skull, and one on either side of the head, pointed forward above the eyes. Their coats were counter-shaded, the top and sides a warm reddish brown with creamy stripes on the sides. The bellies were yellowish and unmarked. A long bony tail ended in a brush. Their feet were pads, the forelegs not used for locomotion, ended in long blunt claws. As they watched they saw the herd relax, seeing that the dragons weren’t getting any closer. They slowly moved across the steppe, digging with their clawed forearms and reaching down to eat whatever they’d uncovered.

“I see what they do with their claws now,” he said, “And I bet I know what it is they’re digging up. Prairie root. It’s very nutritious, and it’s best after a good hard freeze.”

“Is it toxic to mammals?”

“No. It’s strictly survival food in my opinion. I’ve tried it. It’s okay to eat, tasteless, honestly, and it takes about a day of hard boiling to where you can get a knife into one. But you don’t want to eat them unless you are literally on death’s door. Gas? If you think the musk lizard scent is bad, just eat a few of the roots. You’ll be banished from wherever you’re living.”

She laughed.  

They heard an oddly muffled sound of galloping feet.

I see two more approaching them. Raventh said.

“Look, Francie. Two more approaching the herd. They’re in a hurry, too.”

“They have horns atop their head, like the big one in the herd,” Francie said. “I bet only the males have horns,” she said.  

Just then the only horned one in the herd made an odd, bleating sound and approached the two approaching ones, his neck arched.

A long row of spikes rose from the horned animal’s neck to stand up straight. They were covered by a thin, opaque membrane.  

“Whoa!” K’ndar shouted, “There’s the spikes! It IS the same beast!”

The male’s spiked membrane suddenly flushed a brilliant red that pulsed up from the neck to the tips of the spikes.

“Ahhhhhhh, there they are, that’s an alpha male display if I’ve ever seen one,” Francie said.

The two approaching males stopped and bleated. One slashed the empty air with is clawed forelegs, as if warning the herd male of his intent. They, too, raised the spikes atop their necks. It challenged the herd male with a sputtering sound. Their membrane’s color, however, was a weak orange.

The herd male suddenly bolted straight at them, bleating. One of the bachelor males stood his ground, the other turned and raced off. The herd male lowered his head and crashed into the second bachelor, its horns sinking deep into the younger male’s shoulder. The young one screeched and staggered backwards, green blood flowing freely. It slashed at the herd male, leaving green stripes. The herd male attempted to gore him again, but the younger one turned and raced away, the herd male chasing him.

“Whoa”, K’ndar said, “Those horns must be sharp!”

“I think riding them might not be such a good idea,” Francie said.  

“I think I’d just as soon stick with riding horses and dragons,” he said.

They watched as the herd male returned to his harem.

“Look at him. He’s prancing,” Francie said. The herd male’s harem clustered about him, then returned to digging up roots.

“I remember you saying you used to go out on the steppe all on your lone,” she said.

“I did. Sometimes, to escape my father, I’d pack a week’s worth of food, a tarp, and a blanket and head out on Jordan. I had a cavern that I called my secret home. I did a lot of exploring.”

“Did you ever see these beasts?”

“Never.”

“Because, K’ndar, I realize now that I have never seen or heard of a native prey land animal. I know about whers, and the many different wherries, some of which are predators. Now I know about a susi and the musk lizard, but not once have I even heard of an animal they prey on. The predators have to eat SOMETHING bigger than a crawler or a tunnel snake. Why? Why haven’t we ever seen a herd of prey animals, until today?”

K’ndar paused, considering. “I’ve been thinking that, and I believe I know why. It’s because they have realized it’s not Threading anymore.”

“Meaning?”

“You know better than I do that there are spots all over Pern where Thread never fell. Or if it did, the trees and plant life had evolved ways of surviving a Thread fall. Animals couldn’t though, so they instead found “refuges”..a place, like that chezznut forest that must be thousands of years old, where they could live, eat, and survive. Now that Thread is no longer falling, they’re making their way out onto the steppe, maybe because of increased numbers, they’ve been able to reproduce and have to find new habitats. Maybe it’s just because they can. If so, it’s a pattern of dispersal and refuge that they’ve been doing for millions of years.”

He felt as if a gift had suddenly been put before him. “Which means that there are other animals out here, and all waiting for me to find them,” he said, the prospect filling his mind with joy. “My word, I have a lifetime to find them.”

She watched the herd as it slowly made its way away from them. “I think, once we get back to Landing, I want to look at that skeleton of this animal that you found.”

“I feel stupid,” he said, “I completely forgot about it! I dropped the bundle at the spot where I’ve put my other specimens for scavengers to clean. I don’t remember seeing it, and I was at the spot just a few days ago, after we had Sorath moved to it.”

“I didn’t see it either, K’ndar. I’d forgotten all about it, too. I don’t remember if Robson took it out of the canvas tarp or not.”

She frowned. “That was a good sized bundle, too, too big to not see. I don’t think it was ever unwrapped, do you?”

K’ndar shook his head. “I know I didn’t open it, and even wrapped up, and this long after the return, SOMETHING should be noticeable.”

“It’s almost as if it reconstituted itself, and walked away from where it was dropped off, still wrapped up in the tarp.”

“Or was stolen before it could be cataloged.”

They looked at each other, coming to the same conclusion.

“You don’t suppose L’ichen…”

“Damn that L’ichen. I wouldn’t put him past him to steal it.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think he did, K’ndar. Not to give him the benefit of the doubt, still, maybe I’m jumping to conclusions. Why would he want a stinky bundle of bones? If we’ve discovered these animals today, surely, they’re far more extant fifty years from now.”

He nodded.

“I think I’ll make a cairn at this spot. I don’t guarantee these animals will be here by the time I return with a camera, but they hopefully will be close.”

“We’re leaving?”

“For now, I think so. We’ve ascertained that the boulder has been stolen, but we’ve gotten a consolation prize. And I want to see if that bundle of bones is still there.”

____________________________________________________________

“It was and now it isn’t,” K’ndar said, his hands on his hips. “I know I dropped it right here, but I don’t see a tarp. Didn’t Robson take it with him?”

“I thought he did, but maybe he didn’t because it stank. His pack horse would never have tolerated it.”

“I’ll send Siskin to find it.”

“Don’t bother, K’ndar,” she said, pointing, “I can see a bone, even from here. See that bit of white? The grass is tall but it’s dead. That’s got to be a bone. The skeleton is still here, it’s hidden by the grass.” She walked to the bone. “The whers must have pulled it all this way to keep from being seen. Look. Here’s a bone, here, here, there’s the pelvis. We didn’t think about the whers.”

“Aye. I didn’t think they’d go for carrion. I don’t remember how long that beast had been dead, although I think Robson did. They must have torn open the bundle minutes after sundown. I see the ribcage, the grass has grown through the fenestrations. I see a leg bone. What a dunce I was! I should have thought about whers.”

“And here’s the tarp, it’s all torn up,” Francie said, further down the rise from where the bundle had been dropped. “Maybe this is why Robson hasn’t responded to my fire lizard messages. He’s pissed, and I don’t blame him. I owe him a tarp, if nothing else.”

The area was strewn with bones here and there. “You can see tooth marks on some of these bones,” she said. “Something’s been chewing on them.”

“Yes. They scattered the bones everywhere. I’ve seen whers do that, the younger ones will be chased off a kill, so they’ll steal a leg or a wing and take it off somewhere where they can eat in peace.”

“These are all hind end bones,” Francie noted, “I’m betting the front end is further down hill.”

They moved in the direction that made sense. Here was a leg bone, scraps of tendon still holding a matted paw. Something about the paw tingled in his mind, something unusual. Three toes, ending in blunt claws. That’s typical saurian, but this doesn’t LOOK saurian. I’ve never seen saurian feet look like this.

“These bones, they’re so nice and clean now. No stink.” Francie interrupted his reverie.

“The scavengers and the dermestids do a great job,” he said.

“The what?”

“Dermestids. It’s an insect that eats everything on a carcass, they’re tiny so they can get into the smallest gaps. There’s another creature I saw on this skeleton, before I moved it here, it was a worm of some sort, eating holes in the bone.”

She picked up a bone. “This one has them.” She stood up to get the crick out of her back. “Hey!” she said, “I can see the skull!

 They hurried to the spot.

“It’s all here! The skull, most of the neck bone, spikes, too, all disarticulated but still. And there’s the scapula! Woohoo!” Francie whooped. She picked the scapula up. “Look! This scapula has just one hole, right in the center. It’s not like the worm holes, either.”

K’ndar reached down to touch the skull. He pulled it upright. The horn in the center of the top of the skull was almost 30 mm in length and thick at the base. The horns on either side of the main spike originated at the top, then curved down and forward. They were just slightly smaller in length and circumference then the main one.

“It’s SOLID,” he said, “The skull between the horns must be three times as thick as the jaws.”

The teeth, he noticed, were typical of an herbivore.

“That makes sense, K’ndar. We saw the alpha male ram his horns into the younger one.”

He was about to touch the horn’s tip when his mind said, no, be careful.

“Even if it’s clean bone, I think I won’t touch the tip just yet,” he said, hoping to make Francie laugh, “The last time I was so careless with a new beast I got musked.”

She giggled, remembering the distinct odor that had covered K’ndar from a brief touch of the musk lizard’s tail.  “Look how sharp they are, especially the top one. Here, let’s try something. This scapula has a hole in it that’s a lot bigger than the worm holes. Do you see, there are NO worm holes in the skull. I wonder…”

She tried fitting the scapula’s hole onto the top horn.

“It almost fits,” she said, “the hole is a lot bigger than the horn.”

“He couldn’t have stabbed himself, Francie. I think you’re right. This one was gored by a bigger male.”

The side of the skull that had lain on the ground was matted with dead grass-and something else. The tingling in his mind grew louder.

“We saw how they fought. The males compete by goring. I would have thought they’d slash with those long claws. But no. That hole is just too conveniently placed for it to be anything but purposefully administered.” He paused, trying to parse out what the idea in his head was saying.

“I’ve seen bulls fighting many times. Two evenly matched bulls will sometimes fight to the death, but I don’t ever remember it going that far. At least not with ours. Bull fights are usually more pushing matches with a whole lot of bluster, the smart bull doesn’t want to break a horn. That’s what we saw on the steppe, one of the bachelor males ran away rather than fight the herd male, the other foolishly attempted to fight him. But he DID manage to run away. He wasn’t disabled.”

“In this case, though, look,” Francie said, sticking her finger into the hole, “the horn penetrated this scapula, and it’s thick.  It went right through, like a crossbow bolt. That has to be a disabling blow,” she said, “never mind painful. I’m betting it was lame.”

“Yes. And being lame, the predators took it down. I believe, too, that in this beast’s case, it was killed by a pack of feral dogs. The ones I saw were big enough, ferocious and completely unafraid of humans. They were definitely chasing these animals. Only our dragons, especially Rath! ran them off.”

“I remember the size of the head of the one Rath killed. They were Lord Toric’s brutes. I remember the collar had a worn, brass tag on it with his name on it.” *

“Yes. I’ll bet my boots Lord Dorn had words with Toric about his killers running loose on Dorn’s Hold. I’m also sure they killed some of his livestock. I’ll ask D’mitran if they hunted those dogs down. I know Lord Dorn well enough, he isn’t afraid to call Toric to task.”

He moved the skull to where the ‘stuff’ was layered on the side that had been on the ground. “I’ve got this thing shouting at me in my mind, it’s something so obvious and I’m just not seeing it!”

He went back to where the leg with a foot pad was laying. Picking it up, he felt the same fuzz as on the skull, but without the grass.  

The tingling in his mind became a loud ring. He returned to the skull and put the foot next to the skull.

“Francie. Look. This side of the skull, it was on the ground so the dermestids couldn’t get to it.”

“Okay?”

“It’s faded but you can see it’s still got some of the color we saw on the live ones.”

“And?”

His fingers ran through the grass, pulling it away. Tufts of what wasn’t grass was matted and rotted but still remained on the bone. It looked precisely like the hide of the dead horse that had been rained on.

“Francie. This is HAIR!  Look, it’s hair or I’m a wherry.  No saurian on Pern has hair. Wherrys are a completely different class than the saurian, and they have feathers that are different from those of birds. Only non-native mammals, like us, have hair.”

The implications hit him.

“This beast, these spike necked animals, they’re not mammals, but they’re not saurian, either. It’s a whole new class of native animals!”

*Chapter 308, “A Busy Night”, and Chapter. 309, “Whose Doggy is That?” Jan 2022, relates the survey where K’ndar first found the skeleton.

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