The applause that greeted the final verse of the song was so deafening that Beauty rose on wing, squealing with surprised alarm. Then the crowd laughed and gradually the noise subsided.
“Sing something from your Sea Hold,” said the Master Harper in her ear as he played a few idle chords. “Something these landsmen might not have heard. You start: we’ll follow.”
The crowd was noisy, and Menolly wondered how she’d be heard, but as soon as she struck the first notes, the gather quieted. She used the chorus for introduction, giving the Masterharper the chording, and smiling, even as she sang, to find herself so well accompanied.
Over the applause when she finished, she heard the Masterharper saying right in her ear, “They’ve never heard that one before. Good choice.” He bowed, gestured for her to take a bow and then motioned to the harpers waiting just beyond the platform to start the second dance group.
Smiling and waving to various people, he led Menolly from the platform and back to the table where Lord Groghe was still enthusiastically clapping. Sebell grinned approvingly and rose to pass back to the Masterharper the very irritated little Zair.
Menolly would have preferred to sit down and recover from the surprise of her first public appearance as a harper and the warmth of the reception, but Talmor came up.
“You’ve done your duty by crafthall now, Menolly, let’s dance!” He spied Beauty on her shoulder. “But could she sit this one out? No telling how she’d misconstrue my man-handling you in a dance!”
The harpers had already struck a fast prance tune.
“Will she stay with me?” asked Sebell, offering his arm and a padded sleeve. “Zair didn’t mind too much…”
Menolly coaxed Beauty, who chattered with annoyance but allowed herself to be transferred to Sebell’s shoulder. Talmor, one arm about Menolly’s waist, swung her expertly and quickly into the whirling dancers.
After that, it seemed to Menolly that she’d no more than time to take a quick sip of wine to moisten her parched throat and reassure Beauty, before she was claimed by another partner. Viderian took her for the next set dance, with Talmor partnering Audiva in the same group. Then Brudegan caught her hand for a dance and, to her complete surprise, Domick after him. She acceded to Piemur’s boast that he could dance as well as any journeyman and master and wasn’t he her best friend, despite a lack of hands in height and Turns in age.
Quartets of singers spelled the dance players until Menolly was certain that every single harper must have performed. Both of the songs that Petiron had sent to the Harper were so frequently requested that Menolly writhed a bit with embarrassment until Sebell caught her eye, cocking an eyebrow and grinning at her discomfort.
As full dark settled over Fort Hold, the crowd began to thin, for those with a distance to travel had to start their journeys home. Stalls were taken down and folded away, the grazing heardbeasts and runners were captured and saddled to bear their owners down the roads from the Hold. The wineman, since he kept a hold in the Fort cliff, continued to serve those unwilling to end a gather.
Pecking Menolly urgently on the cheek, Beauty reminded her that the fire lizards had politely waited for their supper long enough. Abashed at her thoughtlessness, Menolly rushed back to the Harper Hall. On the kitchen steps, Camo sat disconsolately, his thick arms cradling an enormous bowl of scraps, his eyes on the archway. The instant he caught sight of her and the fire lizards wheeling and diving as escort, he rose, calling to her.
“Pretties hungry? Pretties very hungry! Camo waiting. Camo hungry, too.”
From nowhere, Piemur appeared.
“See, Camo, I told you she’d be back. I told you she’d want us to feed her fire lizards!”
Piemur stopped her breathless apologies as he handed out gobs of meat to his usual trio.
“Told you gathers were fun, didn’t I, Menolly? Told you it was about time you had some, too. And you sang just great! You should always sing ‘The Fire Lizard Song’! They loved it! And how come we don’t know that sea song? It’s got a great rhythm.”
“That’s an old song—”
“I never heard it.”
Menolly laughed because Piemur sounded as testy as an old uncle instead of a half-grown boy.
“Hope you know some more new ones like that because I’m so bored with all the stuff I’ve heard since I was a babe… Hey, you had the last piece, Lazy. It’s Mimic’s turn…there! Behave yourself.”
The hungry fire lizards made short work of Camo’s bowl. Then Ranly leaned out of the dining room window, urging them to come and eat before the food was cleared away. There weren’t many in the dining halclass="underline" Piemur had been right that they got scanty rations on a gather day, but the cheese, bread and sweetings were all Menolly could eat.
When the Apprentice Master marshaled the younger ones to the dormitory, Menolly quietly ascended the steps to her own room. The lilting strains of still another dance tune drifted on the night air. She’d done her first turn as a harper, and done well. She felt like a harper for the first time, as if she really did belong here in the Hall. Lulled by the music and distant laughter, she fell asleep, the warm bodies of the fire lizards nestling against her.
The next morning, looking from her window to the place where the gather had been held, she saw few traces of litter, only the dew-glistening trampled earth of the dancing square. Holders trudged toward the fields, herdsmen were guiding their beasts to the meadows, and apprentices dashed up and down the holdway on their errands. Down the ramp from Fort Hold paced a troop of leggy runners, fresh after a day’s rest, fretting against the slow pace to which their riders held them until they were past the ambling herdbeasts. They disappeared in a cloud of dust down the long road to the east.
Menolly heard the noise from the apprentices’ dormitory, and a soft, all but inaudible, creeling closer by. She threw on her clothes and dashed down the steps.
“Knew you wouldn’t miss, Menolly,” said Silvina, meeting her on the steps from the kitchen. She carried a tray, which she thrust ahead. “Do take this up to the Harper, like a pet, would you? Camo’s just about finished wielding that chopper of his for your fair.”
Menolly’s polite tap at the Masterharper’s door brought an instant response. He had a fur clutched around him and an insistently creeling fire lizard clawing at his bare arm.
“How’d you know?” he asked, delighted and relieved to see her. “Thank goodness you did. I really can’t appear in the kitchen wrapped in a sleeping fur. There, there! I’m stuffing your face, you bottomless pit. How long does this insatiable appetite continue, Menolly?”
She held the tray for him so he could feed Zair as they crossed the room. She slid the tray onto the middle the sandtable and, anticipating the Harper’s own requirements, offered Zair his next few pieces of meat while Master Robinton gratefully gulped down steaming klah. He grabbed a piece of bread, dipped it into the sweeting, had another sip of klah and then, his mouth full, waved at Menolly to leave.
“You’ve got your own to feed, too. Don’t forget to work on your song. I’ll require a finished copy later this morning.”