As the dragons broke from between over the Cove, the Harper’s tall figure was visible on the beach, his impatience to hear of their explorations echoed by the firelizards who did dizzy spirals about him. When he saw the state the group was in, and how impatient they were to swim clean, he simply divested himself of his clothes and swam from one to another, hearing their reports.
It was an altogether deflated group that sat about the fire that evening.
“There’s no guarantee, is there,” the Harper said, “that even if we had the energy to excavate all those hundreds of mounds, we’d find anything of value left behind.”
Lessa held up her spoon with a laugh. “No intrinsic value, but it does give me a tremendous thrill to hold something my hundred-times ancestress might have used!”
“Efficiently made, too,” Fandarel said, politely taking the small object and examining it again. “The substance fascinates me.” He bent toward the flames to scrutinize it. “If I could just …” and he reached for his belt knife.
“Oh, no you don’t, Fandarel,” Lessa said in alarm and retrieved her artifact. “There were other bits and pieces of the same stuff discarded in my building. Experiment on them.”
“Is that all we are to have of the ancients, their bits and pieces?”
“I remind you, F’lar,” Fandarel said, “their discards have already proved invaluable.” The Smith then indicated the spot where Wansor’s distance-viewer had been sited. “What men have once learned to do, can be relearned. It will take time and experimentation but…”
“We’ve only begun, my friends,” said Nicat, whose enthusiasm had not been daunted. “And as our good Smith says, we can learn even from their discards. With your permission, Weyrleaders, I’d like to bring some experienced teams, and go about the excavations methodically. There may have been good reasons for the rank system. Each file might belong to a different craft or-”
“You don’t believe, as Toric suggests, that they took everything with them?” F’lar asked.
“That’s irrelevant,” Nicat said, dismissing Toric’s contentions. “The bed, for instance, was unneeded because they knew they could obtain wood wherever they went. The little spoon for another, because they could make more. There may be other pieces, useless to them, which might very well form the missing elements of the Records which did come down to us, in whatever mutilated fashion. Just think, my friends,” Nicat held up one finger along his nose, closing an eye conspiratorially, “the sheer quantity they had to take from those buildings after the eruption. Oh, we’ll find things, never fear!”
“Yes, they had to take great loads from those buildings after the eruption,” Fandarel murmured, frowning as he lowered his chin to his chest in deep thought. “Where did they take their possessions? Certainly, not immediately to establish Fort Hold!”
“Yes, where did they go?” F’lar asked, puzzled.
“As far as we could tell from the firelizard images, they headed toward the sea,” Jaxom said.
“And the sea wouldn’t have been safe,” Menolly said.
“The sea wouldn’t,” F’lar said, “but there’s a lot of land between the Plateau and the sea.” He stared at Jaxom a moment. “Can you get Ruth to find out from the firelizards where they did go?”
“Does that mean I can’t excavate more thoroughly?” Nicat asked, sounding irritable.
“By all means, if you’ve the men to spare.”
“I do,” Nicat replied a bit grimly. “With three mines worked out.”
“I thought you’d started to reopen the shafts Toric found in the Western Range?”
“We’ve been examining them, to be sure, but my Hall hasn’t reached a miner’s agreement with Toric yet.”
“With Toric? Does he hold those lands? They’re far to the southwest, well beyond Southern Hold,” F’lar said, abruptly intent.
“It was an exploring party of Toric’s which located the shafts,” Nicat said, his eyes shifting from the Benden Weyrleader’s to the Harper’s and then to the Smith’s.
“I told you my brother was ambitious,” Sharra said softly to Jaxom.
“An exploring party?” F’lar seemed to relax again. “That doesn’t make it a Holding then. At all events, mines come under your jurisdiction, Master Nicat. Benden supports your decision. I’ll just have a word with Toric tomorrow.”