“We should get to work,” Lorana said, ignoring them. She moved outside of the hut, eyeing the gear Disaller had brought.

“I presume you’re hoping to set the bell up on the raft,” Disaller said as he approached. “Who are you hoping to attract?”

Fiona and Kindan exchanged glances, wondering how Lorana would answer.

“Dolphins,” she told the Lord Holder directly.

Disaller nodded to himself. “Good,” he said. “If you were hoping to attract one of the Deep Ones, I’d say you wouldn’t have a chance.”

“‘Deep Ones’?” Fiona repeated questioningly.

“Surely you’ve heard the stories of the huge dwellers of the deep?” Disaller said, raising an eyebrow in surprise. “They go to depths well beyond the range of our trawlers.”

“Have you ever caught one?”

“Caught one?” Disaller repeated, sounding outraged. He shook his head fiercely. “We’d no more catch one than we’d harm a dolphin.

“They help us; sometimes I think they herd the fish like the dolphins.” He nodded toward Kindan. “Harpers tell us they came on the Great Crossing.”

“Really?” Fiona asked in surprise. She turned to Kindan. “I’d never heard anything about them.”

“Nor had I,” Kindan said. He had a faraway look in his eyes, which Fiona recognized as a desire to dive into Records; a look rare for Kindan.

“My instructions say the dolphins,” Lorana said, gesturing to the raft. “We’re to get their attention and then return their gifts.”

“Gifts?” Disaller asked, eyeing Lorana’s carisak carefully. “Gifts from the sea?”

Lorana nodded.

Disaller’s beard twitched again in a smile. “I checked our Records,” he said with a nod toward Kindan. “I don’t suppose it would surprise anyone to learn that Wind Blossom had visited here.”

“I’m surprised your Records survived,” Kindan said, eyeing the corrosive sea mist critically.

“These did,” Disaller said. “They were carefully preserved, written by Lord Holder Malon himself.” His eyes twinkled. “He seemed to think it important.” He cocked his head to the distant hills. “Something to do with the dragons?”

“Lord Malon was very perceptive,” Kindan said.

“Wind Blossom said we had to return them,” Lorana said, her tone verging on anxious.

“The tools used to save the dragons?” Disaller guessed. “What would the dolphins do with them?”

“I don’t know,” Lorana said. “But Wind Blossom’s daughter made it clear that it was important that they were returned.”

“Very well,” Disaller said, gesturing to Kindan to help him as he took one end of the raft. The two men hauled it to the surf and Disaller, wearing oiled waders, pushed it behind the surf with a stiff pole while Lorana and Fiona held firmly on to the mooring rope.

Satisfied, Disaller returned to them and tugged on another rope that lay nearby. “This’ll raise a sail,” Disaller said, tugging on the rope. “The wind’s in the right quarter.”