“Aivas, aivas, aivas,” Master Robinton mused. “It doesn’t sound like a real word. An aiva, the aiva, many aivas!” He flicked one hand in a gesture of defeat. “You will stay the night, won’t you, Jancis? Our current cook has a way with fish that’s magical.” His charming smile brought an answering one from Jancis. “Then we can all get up to the Plateau in plenty of time for yet another revelation.”
After dinner, when Piemur went to check on Stupid, he invited Jancis to come along.
“That’s a terrible name to call any creature,” Jancis chided him as he led the way, glowbasket overhead, toward the fenced clearing where the little runnerbeast was accommodated.
“It’s an old joke,” Piemur said lamely, but even Jancis was impressed when Stupid nickered in response to his name and trotted over, thrusting out his nose to nuzzle his master. “You don’t mind, do you, Stupid? If I called you anything else, you wouldn’t answer, would you?”
Stupid waggled his ears and nickered again as Farli joined them, settling, as usual, on the little runner’s rump. He switched his tail, and she scolded him.
“They really like each other,” Jancis exclaimed. “I didn’t think runners liked fire-lizards or dragons.”
Piemur chuckled, leaning against the top rail of the enclosure, idly rubbing Stupid’s soft nose. By the light of Belior moon, Jancis looked slightly mysterious, the planes of her face touched by the white light.
“Well, it’s a fact Stupid shies away from any dragon, even Ruth. You haven’t been dragon food yet, have you, friend?” he teased. “But he and I and Farli make a pretty good team.”
“They say,” Jancis said, scratching just the right spot on Stupid’s neck and causing him to lean into her fingers, tilting his head, eyes half-closed,” that you and Stupid and Farli walked the entire coast of Southern.”
“Only from Southern Hold to Cove Hold. I got excused the rest of it.”
“Even that much took a lot of courage.”
“Courage?” Piemur snorted at the notion. “Courage had little to do with it. I was born naturally inquisitive. And,” he added in a sudden spurt of honesty, “it was one way to keep Toric from exiling me from Southern.”
“Why would Lord Toric do that?”
“He didn’t fancy me as marriage kin.” Piemur had shifted position so that he was closer to her, though still ostensibly leaning indolently on the rail.
“You? And Sharra?”
Piemur grinned. “For that matter, he didn’t fancy Jaxom as marriage kin, but he got talked into it.” Finally Piemur could appreciate the full irony of that confrontation. “He didn’t fancy his sister married to the lord of a table-sized hold.”
“What?” Jancis, appropriately indignant, ceased scratching Stupid’s neck and turned toward Piemur. “Why, Ruatha has one of the oldest Bloodlines on Pern. Everyone with marriageable daughters was hoping to attract Lord Jaxom.”
“Toric had bigger plans for Sharra.” Piemur worked his way a little closer to her as Stupid swung his head back to nip at a nightfly.
“How could he? Jaxom’s the only young Lord Holder. And they say they’re devoted to each other. She nursed him through fire-head right here at Cove Hold.”
“I know,” Piemur murmured. Smiling, he put both hands on the rail, one on either side of Jancis. When she became aware of the maneuver, he grinned down at her, waiting for her reaction. “And what do they say about Journeyman Piemur?”
She dared him, the dimple flashing in her cheek, a dark spot on her moonlit face. “What they say about any harper journeyman, of course. That they’re not to be trusted for a moment.”
Slowly, so she could escape if she really wanted to, and he hoped very much that she did not, he lowered his head and brought his arms up to hold her. “Especially not on moonlit nights like this, huh?” He touched her lips very gently with his, aware that they were parted in a smile and that she had no intention of ducking away at the last moment. Abruptly she was pushed forcefully into his arms. He tightened them to keep her from falling just as her arms went around him to steady herself. “Thank you, Stupid, that’ll do quite nicely.” And Piemur made excellent use of his runner’s headlong assistance.
If Piemur and Jancis were preoccupied with each other the next morning at the dawn breakfast that Master Robinton had ordered, the others were far too intent on arriving on time at the Plateau to notice. D’ram would convey the Harper, Piemur, and Jancis to the ADMIN building. Lytol had declined to go along.
“I think he’s noticeably fading,” Robinton murmured to D’ram as they strode to Tiroth’s clearing. “Jaxom remarked on it to me.”
“He’s fine, Robinton, really he is. It’s just that like all of us, he can’t do as much as he used to,” D’ram replied, his expression sad. “Jaxom’s news about a second child cheered him.”
“It cheered me, too. Ah, Tiroth, you’re very good to haul us to and fro,” the Harper said, giving the elderly bronze an affectionate clout as he climbed up to sit between the neck ridges. “Hand Jancis up to me, Piemur. I’ll see she’s safe. You can hold on to me as tightly as you wish, my dear.”
“You keep your hands to yourself, Master,” Piemur said in a mock growl, ascending first and then assisting Jancis to the position behind him. He ignored the protests from his stiff muscles and tender bruises.
“Where’s your respect for my age, my position?” the Harper demanded, laughing as he mounted just in front of the journeyman.
“Where it always has been, Master,” Piemur assured him heartily. “Where I can keep my eye on you!”
D’ram was chuckling as he mounted, and Tiroth’s powerful upward leap brought Jancis’s arms clutching at Piemur’s. He covered her hands on his chest with his, very pleased to feel her pressing so tightly against him. They all had a good view of the Dawn Sisters shining in the morning sky before Tiroth took them between.
The Sisters were still in sight when they arrived at the Plateau and skimmed up from the landing strip to the dark shadows of the mounds and the spot where the light of many glowbaskets told them the excavation crew was all ready to go. Indeed, they learned shortly, Master Fandarel had already outlined the area to be dug and the first shovelsful had been removed.
“Master Robinton, D’ram, good morning. Jancis, Piemur. We calculate a full span’s encrustation. I also deemed it wise to remove the tiles, so obviously a temporary cover. Last night I compared them with some still in place on the flying ships, and I believe that it is the same material, though none of the ships seem to be missing any significant number. That confirms my theory that originally there were more than three ships.”
“I think that’s likely,” Master Robinton agreed, shivering a bit in the cool dawn air. “The fire-lizards’ images always suggest more than three. Twice that many, and even with six the labor of transporting all those things from the Dawn Sisters to the surface here would have been astounding.”
Someone brought stools and hot klah so that Master Robinton and D’ram could be made comfortable while the digging progressed. Jancis and Piemur stood to one side, sipping at the klah. Piemur tried to suppress the irritation he felt that their private little dig had turned so official. Jancis was rather more subdued than he liked. This was her find, her hunch. She should be directing the work. True, she could not really expect to take precedence over her grandfather, but they all seemed to have forgotten that the whole effort was due to her discovery of the ancient drawing film. It had been one thing to ask Jaxom to help, but not the whole bloody Plateau, The lumps on his head began to throb.
As the sun came up, he realized that someone had worked hard during the night to strip the tiles from the roof. The panels stood completely clear, a long finger-length above the original roof. Some of the cladding remained on the walls, but a trench had been cut through the soil, right down to the tar-based material with which the ancients had paved the walks and roadways between their buildings.