“Oh, probably when I was scrubbing Zaranth this afternoon. She hunted today and needed a good wash.” Hunting and bathing Zaranth had taken longer than Tai had planned. Knowing that the Archives were more likely to be unoccupied on Turnover days, she’d been anxious to get there—and not careful enough to avoid barnacle-covered rocks when rinsing the stiff brush she used on Zaranth’s hide.

“That can happen,” he said with rueful agreement. “Are you weyred along the coast or inland?”

Tai tried not to freeze at the question: bronze riders with an eye to mating with Zaranth the next time she was “ripe” always wanted to know where she could be found. Zaranth wasn’t even close to her cycle. “Coast,” she replied quickly. Almost too quickly. “Do you spend a lot of time at Honshu?”

“Coast, huh? See much of the Monaco dolphins?”

She made herself relax. She was being overly suspicious. “Yes, I do.” She smiled. Thinking of her dolphin friends always made her smile. It seemed to have a similar effect on F’lessan, who grinned back at her. He had such a merry smile. Just as Mirrim said he had.

“Natua has a new calf. She showed him off to Zaranth and me,” she said, quite willing to talk about dolphins.

“She did?” F’lessan was really interested. It showed in the way his eyes sparkled and his whole face lit up. “Golanth and I must take the time to admire him.”

“She’ll show him off to anyone, she’s so proud.”

“I’m better acquainted with the Cove Hold and Readis’s pods, you see,” he confided in her.

“I know,” she replied.

“Quite likely,” he said, shooting her a teasing glance. “Dolphins like nothing better than to gossip. They can spread news faster than Runners. We have too many animals on this planet who can talk back to us humans.”

She gave him a startled look and then let herself chuckle. “I suppose we should be grateful that fire-lizards can’t talk.”

“A large mercy,” he agreed. “It’s bad enough they sing!”

“But they add such beautiful descants.”

“I suppose so,” he replied amiably.

She knew that Lessa, his mother, had a prejudice against fire-lizards. Mirrim had said it was because no one had known how to control the creatures when they were first brought to Benden. Did F’lessan share her bias? She didn’t know what to say to change the subject. He spared her by speaking first.

“What has you so interested in Rukbat system charts?”

“Ah!” She was grateful for the change in topic. “Well, I’m close enough, being at Monaco Bay, and I was an apprentice …” She floundered a moment.

“So you said …”

“So I’m often asked to check out figures on the original charts, which are much too valuable to be anywhere else.”

“Good Master Esselin.” F’lessan’s tone was facetious.