“Menolly?” Mavi was handing out sea salt and spice-root to the head cook when Sella imparted her news. “Menolly?”
“Yes, Menolly. She’s gone. Not been seen, and she’s the one left the Hold doors unbarred. With Thread fallingl”
“Thread wasn’t falling when Yanus discovered the doors open.” Mavi corrected Sella mechanically. She shuddered at the thought of anyone, even a recalcitrant daughter, caught out in the silvery rain of Thread.
“Alemi said no Thread got through the dragons, but how can he be sure?”
Mavi said nothing as she locked up the condiment press and spun the rollers. ‘Til inform Yanus. And Til have a word with Alemi, too. You’d better take care of Old Uncle.”
“Me?”
“Not that thaf s real work, but it is suited to your temperament and ability.”
Yanus was silent for a long moment when he heard
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of Menolly’s disappearance. He didn’t like untoward things happening, such as the Hold doors being left unbarred. He’d worried about that all during the Fall and the fishing after the Fall. It wasn’t good for a Sea Holder to have his mind diverted from the task at hand. He felt some relief that the mystery had been solved, and a keen annoyance and anxiety about the girl. Foolish thing for her to have doneleave the Hold that early. She’d been sulking ever since that beating. Mavi hadn’t kept her busy enough to make her forget the nonsense of tuning.
“I’ve heard that there’re plenty of caves in the cliffs along the coast,” Elgion said. ‘The girl probably took shelter in one.”
“She probably did,” said Mavi briskly, grateful to the Harper for such a sensible suggestion. “Menolly knows the coast very well. She must know every crevice by now.”
“She’ll be back then,” Yantts said. “Give her time to get over the fright of being out during Threadfall. Shell be back.” Yanus found relief in this theory and turned to less distressing business.
“It is spring,” said Mavi, more to herself than to the others. Only the Harper caught the anxious note in her voice.
Two days later Menolly had not returned, and the entire Sea Hold was alerted to her disappearance. No one remembered seeing her on the day of Threadfall. No one had seen her since. Children sent out for berries or spiderclaws had encountered no trace of her, nor had she been in any of the caves they knew.
“Not much point in sending out a search,” said one of the shipmasters, mindful that there was more surety of catching fish than finding any trace of a foolish girl. .Particularly one with a crippled hand. “Either she’s .safe and doesn’t choose to come back, or…” ; “She could be hurt … Threadscored, a broken leg t.Ox arm…” said Alemi, “unable to make her way back.”
“Shouldn’t’ve been out anyway without letting some—
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one know where she’d gone.” The shipmaster’s eyes moved towards Mavi, who did not catch this implied negligence on her part
“She was used to going out for greens first thing in the morning,” Alemi said. If no one else would defend Menolly, he would speak up.
“Did she cany a belt knife? Or a metal buckle?” asked Elgion. “Thread doesn’t touch metal.”
“Aye. We’d find that much of her,” said Yanus.
“If TTiread got her,” said the shipmaster darkly. He rather favored the notion that she’d fallen into a crevice or over the edge of the bluff, in terror at finding herself out during Threadfafl. “Her bod/d wash up around the Dragon Stones. Current throws up a lot of sea trash down that way.”
Mavi caught her breath in a sound very like a sob.
“I don’t know the girl,” Elgion said quickly, seeing Mavi’s distress. “But if she did, as you say, stay out a good deal of the time, she’d know the land too well to go over the edge of a cliff.”
“nireadfalTs enough to rattle anyone’s wits…” said the shipmaster.
“Menolly is not stupid,” said Alemi with such feeling that everyone looked at him in surprise. “And she knew her Teaching well enough to know what to do if she were caught out.”
“Right enough, Alemi,” said Yanus sharply and rose to his feet “If she were able and of a mind to return, she’d have done so. Everyone who is abroad is to keep a sharp eye for any trace of her. That includes sea as well as land. As Sea Holder, I cannot in conscience do more than that, under the circumstances. And the tide is making. To the boats now.”