accustomed to spending those earned minutes practicing with the Harper. So Menolly was not surprised to find herself, eventually, outside Petiron’s door.
She was surprised, however, to hear voices in his room. She was about to charge angrily through the half-open door and demand an accounting when she heard her mother’s voice clearly.
*TTie room won’t need much fixing for the new Harper, so it won’t”
Menolly stepped back into the shadow of the corridor. The new Harper?
“What I want to know, Mavi, is who is to keep the children up in their learning until he comes?” That voice was Soreel’s, the wife of the First Holder and therefore spokeswoman for the other Hold women to Mavi as Sea Holder’s lady. “She did well enough this morning. You have to give her that^ Mavi”
“Yanus will send the message ship.”
“Not today, nor tomorrow he won’t. I don’t fault Sea Holder, Mavi, but it stands to reason that the boats must fish and the sloop’s crew can’t be spared. That means four, five days before the messenger gets to Igen Hold. From Igen Hold, if a dragonrider obliges by carrying the messagebut we all know what the Oldtimers at Igen Weyr are like so let’s say, Harper drums to the Masterharper Hafl at Fort is another two-three days. A man has to be selected by Masterharper Robinton and sent overland and by ship. And with Thread falling any time it pleases, no one travels fast or far in a day. If 11 be spring before we see another Harper. Are the children to be left without teaching for months?”
Soreel had punctuated her comments with brushing sounds, and there were other clatters in the room, the swishing of bed rushes being gathered up. Now Menolly could hear the murmur of two other voices supporting Soreel’s arguments.
Tetiron has taught well…”
*He taught her well, too,” Soreel interrupted Mavi. “Harpering is a man’s occupation…”
8
“Fair enough if Sea HoIderTl spare a man for it” Soreel’s voice was almost belligerent because everyone knew the answer to that “Truth be told, I think the girl knew the Sagas better than the old man this past Turn. You know his mind was ranging back in time, Mavi”
“Yanus will do what*s proper,” The finality in MavTs tone firmly ended that discussion.
Menolly heard footsteps crossing the old Harper’s room, and she ducked down the hall, around the nearest bend and down into the kitchen level.
It distressed Menolly to think of anyone, even another Harper, in Petiron’s room. Obviously it distressed others that there was no Harper. Usually such a problem didn’t arise. Every Hold could boast one or two musically able men and every Hold took pride in encouraging these talents. Harpers liked to have other instrumentalists to share the chore of entertaining their Holds during the long winter evenings. And it was also the better part of wisdom to have a substitute available for just such an emergency as Half-Circle was experiencing. But fishing was hard on the hands: the heavy work, the cold water, the salt and fish oils thickened joints and calloused fingers in the wrong places. Fishermen were often away many days on longer hauls. After a Turn or two at net, trap and sail line, young men lost their skill at playing anything but simple tunes. Harper Teaching Ballads required deft quick fingers and constant practice.
By putting to sea to fish so quickly after the old Harper’s burial, Yanus thought to have time enough to find an alternative solution. There was no doubt that the girl could sing well, play weH, and she’d not disgraced Hold or Harper that morning. It was going to take time to send for and receive a new Harper, and the youngsters must not lose all progress in the learning of the basic Teaching Ballads.
But Yanus had many strong reservations about putting such a heavy responsibility on the shoulders of a
girl not fifteen Turns old. Not the least of these was MenoHy’s distressing tendency toward tone-making. Well enough and amusing now and again in the long winter evenings to hear her sing them, but old Petiron had been alive to keep her to rights. Yanus wasn’t sore that he could trust her not to include her trivial little whistles in the lessons. How were the young to know that hers weren’t proper songs for their learning? The trouble was, her melodies were the sort that stayed in the mind so a man found himself humming or whistling them without meaning to.