Anne McCaffrey - Tower & Hive 3 - Damia's Children

VIP免费

2024-12-07 0 0 533.24KB 294 页 5.9玖币

侵权投诉

man and Mrdini worked to create prosperous worlds and guard against the

terrible threat of the annihilating Hivers.

And now, in the deeps of Space, Mrdini scouts had crossed the path of

three Hive ships - ships that were giant hulks of cell units, bearing the

queens and workers out into space, to breed and multiply and destroy

wherever they found a viable planet.

It was the four elder children of Damia - Laria, Thian, Rojer and Zara -

all uniquely talented in their various ways, who were to play their part,

helped by their long-time Dini friends, in the

conquering and investigation of the Alien threat of the Hivers.

One of the world's leading science fiction writers,

Anne McCaffrey has won the Hugo and Nebula

awards for science fiction. Brought up in the U. S.

and now living in Ireland, she is the creator and

bestselling author of the unique Dragon series.

Also by Anne Mccaffrey

DRAGONFLIGHT

THE RENEGADES OF PERN

ALL THE WEYRS OF PERN

RESTOREE

THE SHIP WHO SANG

DECISION AT DOONA

GET OFF THE UNICORN

THE CRYSTaL SINGER

KILLASHANDRA

CRYSTAL LINE

PEGASUS IN FLIGHT

THE ROWAN

DAMIA

CORGI BOOKS

DAMIA'S CHILDREN

A CORGI BOOK : 0 552 13912 2

Originally published in Great Britain by Bantam Press,

a division of Transworld Publishers Ltd

Reverently dedicated to

Richard Woods, O. P.

aka Pendragon, Fullfret Faxdragon,

Cap tooth Fangbite the Whistler

Hurry fast R ushdrake

Sir Walter McDragon

Slipknife Ouchblend the Reckless

Shortblast Spleen fume the Apoplectic

Dragon rabbit Eggsnitcher the Wily

Thick head Diddlewit the Forgetful

Snatch fin ger Jewelheist the Avancious

Snapdragon Fastsnatch

Harpmaker, Storyteller, GOOD Friend

Set in 1 1/12'pt Linotype Sabon by

Chippendale Type Ltd, Otley, West Yorkshire.

Corgi Books are published by Transworld Publishers Ltd,

by Transworld Publishers (Australia)

She deliberately kept her eyes forward, curbing Saki's intention

to gallop up the last hill to home, because she knew the `dinis would

have dropped to four legs to make the steep climb. Tip and Hgf were

awfully sensitive about being caught on all fours. Like humans, the

Mrdinis assumed bipedal stance as soon as their back muscles were

well

enough developed to support the long trunk.

Her father said that he thought the `dinis had been much relieved

to learn that human children also had to learn how to walk upright.

When Saki's twitching ears and a waft of a musky leathery scent on

the breeze announced their arrival, she acknowledged them with a

whistle/click.

She couldn't quite make the sound as well as her brothers Thian

and Rojer, but she did better than Zara who hadn't the hang of it at

all yet. Kaltia wasn't even trying though she signed well enough to be

understood by the `dinis as Morag did. Her youngest siblings, Ewain

and Petra, were too young to have more than the most rudimentary

contact with their pairs.

Despite saddlebags full of the day's catch, Saki marched

vigorously uphill, careful not to tread on the flipper feet on either

side of her. Tip and Huf - which were Laria's mental tag for her

identifiable noises that way, ranging from fear to bravado, agreement,

dislike, curiosity, concern, enjoyment and what passed for `Dini

laughter.

Neither species could quite manage the varied sounds needed to

reproduce the subtler nuances of the other's speech but human body

language could add emphasis words and so could `Dini body move-

ments.

Their five fingers were as dextrous in reproducing arbitrary

patterns as their oral cavities were in producing understandable,

pitched noises that humans could copy. Both languages, as spoken by

the other species, were refined to somewhat limited vocabularies that

fortunately could be extended into quite a few technical areas: such as

space travel, basic engine design, biological and meteorological

sciences, metallurgy and mining.

Laria's mother and father, Damia and Afra Raven Lyon, had spent

the past fifteen years developing and refining this communications

bridge apart from the Dreamings - with Mrdini colleagues. Laria had

been the earliest human test subject. Constantly surrounded from birth

by adult Mrdinis, and then young Tip and Huf, she had absorbed pos-

ture

and sounds just as any child learns another language from early

overworked they were glad of any assistance - had taken adult pairs of

`dinis into the pits and shafts when the Mrdinis had `dreamed' their

willingness to do so. The tough and suspicious Aurigaean miners had

discovered that the `dinis were instinctive colliers, hard workers, and

unusually strong.

`Hey-YO, ' cried someone behind her. Turning, Laria saw her

brother Thian, his white lock flopping across his face, on his chunky

black pony, Charger, round the bend, Mrg and Dpl trudging along be-

side

him.

Not for the first time did Laria regret that the conformation of

the `Dini made it impossible for them, with their stout short legs and

stumpy tail, to straddle the hardy little Denebian hybrid ponies that

humans employed. When they were younger, she'd occasionally put

Tip

and Huf up on Saki, Tip in front where she could hold on to it, and Huf

riding pillion behind, its fingers latched tightly to her belt. But it

wasn't the most comfortable way to travel and now her mates were too

heavy to ride Saki with her.

`Good hunting, Thian?' Laria called back.

`Plenty for pot and spit, ' her brother yelled, grinning hugely.

always as well satisfied by the huge gardens.

The Tower could, of course, have brought in any supplies needed

but it had become a matter of family pride and honour for this

household to supply its own needs - human and Mrdini - either from the

high plateaux and valleys behind Auriga City or from their fields.

Saki was too eager for her warm stable and supper to be held back

to wait for Thian so Laria let her walk out, her tired young `Dini

mates hauled alongside.

As they finally reached the terrace level, lights were already

beginning to augment the dimming day and illuminate the broad

courtyard. Saki's hooves clattered across it, summoning the resident

pets: Coonies, Darbuls and what Laria had termed Slithers, the Mrdini

equivalent of a pet.

Neither reptile nor bird, neither furred nor feathered, but

loving, affectionate, dependent on assistance to survive anywhere,

Slithers had - to everyone's great astonishment - become accepted by

Coonies, ignored by Darbuls, and endeared themselves to the humans

useful household creatures. Their existence and nurture by Mrdinis had

been a curiously important factor in the acceptance of the aliens: `Any

critter that cares for a pet - even one as repulsive as that slithery

brought the catch up to the kitchen wing, the other helped with hay and

feed for the horses. That set the already stabled animals to stamping

and snorting.

Have all the ponies been fed? Laria asked, broadcasting her

thought more than directing it to either parent.

Please, darling? Had some late Tower traffic, replied Damia.

What splendid hunting you've all had!

Laria `ported the feeds into the mangers, adding the special

vitamins and salts that two of the newest ponies required until their

digestions altered to Aurigaean grasses. As usual, the four `dinis II

clacked in loud appreciation of her kinetic skill.

WE FEED PONIS, WE MAKE PONIS `APPY, Tip and Huf chanted,

although

they themselves had done nothing, but as Tip and Huf were hers, any of

her achievements were also theirs. Laria gave a small, almost

inaudible sigh of resignation: for all their years in a Talented

household, the `dinis were always more charmed by small teleportations

like this than any major workings from the Tower. Cargo and ships just

disappeared from or appeared in cradles whereas now the `dinis could

see the movement from one place to another.

WE FEED PONIS PLUS, Thian's pair, Mur and Dip, added.

parents

would recommend for family communications but then the circum-

stances

were unusual. Conversations between humans - when the `dinis could

not

follow verbal speech - would be rude so they often `pathed rather than

discourteously `spoke' what their guests could not understand.

The entire Raven-Lyon family, including eight month-old Petra, was

considered by the Governmental Authority to be acting as official

liaison representatives to Mrdini. Telepathy allowed the family the

privacy and ease to discuss intimate matters which might have to

exclude the `dinis.

As soon as Laria, Thian and Rojer had seen to the comfort of their

ponies, they and th other `dinis went up the ramp from the stable

complex to the Hall where most of the combined household's activities

took place. With their `dinis' help, Morag was already plucking,

skinning and eviscerating the catch. Zara, who would not butcher

animals, was washing and preparing vegetables and greens. Afra and

Flk

were trussing bird and scurrier beast for the spit while Damia and Trp

were doing multiple tasks with the rest of the meal. The `dinis were

their own but tone could be interpreted in this home of sensitive

Talents.

Anything new? Laria asked.

Nothing at all, darling, Damia said. Can you do some more

carrots? You know how Flk and Trp adore them but they haven `t got

the

hang of using scrapers.

Vitamin A! Laria replied with a mental grin, and `ported two more

bunches from the storeroom, holding them up for her mother to approve

the quantity.

A nod sufficed and Laria began preparing them.

TIp and Hgf immediately came to her assistance, their single poll

eyes glittering, for they were as fond of carrots as the adults. Once

she had scraped, they sliced, Tip and Huf twitching their upper torsos

happily, their `heads' bent so that their single poll eyes were focused

on what their hands were doing. Ordinarily, `dinis brought whatever

they were working on up to eye level but when attempting a human task,

they tended to adopt human postures.

Some people said they couldn't tell one `Dini from another but

that's because they didn't work closely with a pair. Laria recognized,

文档加载中……请稍候！
如果长时间未打开，您也可以点击刷新试试。

下载文档到电脑，查找使用更方便

5.9 玖币 0人已下载

立即下载 VIP免费下载

摘要：

manandMrdiniworkedtocreateprosperousworldsandguardagainsttheterriblethreatoftheannihilatingHivers.Andnow,inthedeepsofSpace,MrdiniscoutshadcrossedthepathofthreeHiveships-shipsthatweregianthulksofcellunits,bearingthequeensandworkersoutintospace,tobreedandmultiplyanddestroywherevertheyfoundaviableplane...

展开>> 收起<<

Anne McCaffrey - Tower & Hive 3 - Damia's Children.pdf

共294页,预览10页

还剩页未读，继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

Anne McCaffrey - Tower & Hive 3 - Damia's Children

相关推荐

开通VIP享超值会员特权

作者详情

相关内容

热门标签

举报选择: