CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Patrons, Maids and Metheglin
I RESTRUNG MY LUTE. It was a fair distraction while Stanchion gathered opinions from the crowd. My hands went through the routine motions of stripping the broken string away while I fretted to myself. Now that the applause had died, my doubts had come to plague me again. Was one song enough to prove my skill? What if the audience’s reaction had been due to the power of the song, rather than my playing of it? What of my improvised ending? Perhaps the song had only seemed whole to me….
As I finished removing the broken string I gave it an idle look and all my thoughts fell to a jumble at my feet.
It wasn’t worn or flawed as I had thought it would be. The broken end was clean, as if it had been cut with a knife or snipped with a pair of scissors.
For a while I simply stared at it dumbly. My lute had been tampered with? Impossible. It was never out of my sight. Besides, I had checked the strings before I left the University, and again before I had come on stage. Then how?
I was running the thought in circles in my head when I noticed the crowd quieting. I looked up in time to see Stanchion take the last step onto the stage. I hurriedly got to my feet to face him.
His expression was pleasant but otherwise unreadable. My stomach tied a knot as he walked toward me, then it fell as he held out his hand the same way he had held it out for the other two musicians who had been found wanting.
I forced my best smile onto my face and reached to take his hand. I was my father’s son and a trouper. I would take my refusal with the high dignity of the Edema Ruh. The earth would crack and swallow this glittering, self-important place before I would show a trace of despair.
And somewhere in the watching audience was Ambrose. The earth would have to swallow the Eolian, Imre, and the whole Centhe Sea before I gave him a grain of satisfaction over this.
So I smiled brightly and took Stanchion’s hand in my own. As I shook it, something hard pressed into my palm. Looking down I saw a glimmer of silver. My talent pipes.
My expression must have been a delight to watch. I looked back up at Stanchion. His eyes danced and he winked at me.
I turned and held my pipes aloft for everyone to see. The Eolian roared again. This time it roared a welcome.
“You’ll have to promise me,” a red-eyed Simmon said seriously, “That you will never play that song again without warning me first. Ever.”
“Was it that bad?” I smiled giddily at him.
“No!” Simmon almost cried out. “It’s…I’ve never—” He struggled, wordless for a moment, then bowed his head and began to cry hopelessly into his hands.
Wilem put a protective arm around Simmon, who leaned unashamedly against his shoulder. “Our Simmon has a tender heart,” he said gently. “I imagine he meant to say that he liked it very much.”
I noticed that Wilem’s eyes were red around the edges too. I lay a hand on Simmon’s back. “It hit me hard the first time I heard it too.” I told him honestly. “My parents performed it during the Midwinter Pageantry when I was nine, and I was a wreck for two hours afterward. They had to cut my part from The Swineherd and the Nightingale because I wasn’t in any shape to act.”
Simmon nodded and made a gesture that seemed to imply that he was fine but that he didn’t expect to be able to talk any time soon and that I should just carry along with whatever it was I was doing.
I looked back at Wilem. “I forgot that it hits some people this way,” I said lamely.
“I recommend scutten,” Wilem said bluntly. “Cut-tail, if you insist on the vulgar. But I seem to remember you saying that you would float us home tonight if you got your pipes. Which may be unfortunate, as I happen to be wearing my lead drinking shoes.”
I heard Stanchion chuckle behind me. “These must be the two non-castrati friends, eh?” Simmon was surprised enough at being called a non-castrati to collect himself slightly, rubbing his nose on his sleeve.
“Wilem, Simmon, this is Stanchion.” Simmon nodded. Wilem gave a slight, stiff bow. “Stanchion, could you help us to the bar? I’ve promised to buy them a drink.”
“S,” Wilem said. “Drinks.”
“Sorry, drinks,” I stressed the plural. “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them.”
“Ah,” Stanchion said with a grin. “Patrons, I understand completely!”
The victory tankard turned out to be the same as the consolation one. It was ready for me when Stanchion finally managed to get us through the throng of people to our new seats at the bar. He even insisted on buying scutten for Simmon and Wilem, saying that patrons have some claim to the spoils of victory as well. I thanked him earnestly from the bottom of my rapidly thinning purse.
While we were waiting for their drinks to come, I tried to peer curiously into my tankard, and found that doing so while it was sitting on the bar would require me to stand on my stool.
“Metheglin,” Stanchion informed me. “Try it and you can thank me later. Where I’m from, they say a man will come back from the dead to get a drink of it.”
I tipped an imaginary hat to him. “At your service.”
“Yours and your family’s,” he replied politely.
I took a drink from the tall tankard to give myself a chance to collect my wits, and something wonderful happened in my mouth: cool spring honey, clove, cardamom, cinnamon, pressed grape, burnt apple, sweet pear, and clear well water. That is all I have to say of metheglin. If you haven’t tried it, then I am sorry I cannot describe it properly. If you have, you don’t need me to remind you what it is like.
I was relieved to see the cut-tail had come in moderately sized glasses, with one for Stanchion too. If my friends had received tankards of the black wine, I would have needed a wheelbarrow to get them back to the other side of the river.
“To Savien!” Wilem toasted.
“Hear hear!” Stanchion said, lifting his own glass.
“Savien…” Simmon managed, his voice sounding like a stifled sob.
“…and Aloine,” I said, and maneuvered my great tankard to touch glasses with them.
Stanchion drank off his Scutten with a nonchalance that made my eyes water. “So,” he said, “Before I leave you to the adulation of your peers, I have to ask. Where did you learn to do that? Play missing a string, I mean.”
I thought for a moment. “Do you want the short or the long of it?”
“I’ll take the short for now.”
I smiled. “Well in that case, it’s just something I picked up.” I made a casual gesture as if tossing something away. “A remnant of my misspent youth.”
Stanchion gave me a long look, his expression amused. “I suppose I deserve that. I’ll take the long version next time.” He took a deep breath and looked around the room, his golden earring swung and caught the light. “I’m off to mix the crowd. I’ll keep them from coming at you all at once.”
I grinned relief. “Thank you, sir.”
He shook his head and made a preemptory motion to someone behind the bar who quickly fetched him his tankard. “Earlier tonight ‘sir’ was proper and good. But now it’s Stanchion.” He glanced back in my direction, and I smiled and nodded. “And I should call you?”
“Kvothe,” I said, “just Kvothe.”
“Just Kvothe,” Wilem toasted behind me.
“And Aloine,” Simmon added, and began to cry softly into the crook of his arm.
Count Threpe was one of the first to come to me. He looked shorter up close, and older. But he was bright-eyed and laughing as he talked about my song.
“Then it broke!” he said, gesturing wildly. “And all I could think was, Not now! Not before the ending! But I saw the blood on your hand and my stomach knotted up. You looked up at us, then down at the strings, and it got quieter and quieter. Then you put your hands back on the lute and all I could think was, There’s a brave boy. Too brave. He doesn’t know he can’t save the end of a broken song with a broken lute. But you did!” He laughed as if I’d played a joke on the world, and danced a quick jig step.
Simmon, who had stopped crying and was on his way to becoming well-buttered, laughed along with the count. Wilem didn’t seem to know what to make of the man, and watched him with serious eyes.
“You must play at my house some day,” Threpe said, then quickly held up a hand. “We won’t talk of that now, and I won’t take up any more of your evening.” He smiled. “But before I go, I need to ask you one last question. How many years did Savien spend with the Amyr?”
I didn’t have to think about it. “Six. Three years proving himself, three years training.”
“Does six strike you as a good number?”
I didn’t know what he was getting at. “Six isn’t exactly a lucky number,” I hedged. “If I were looking for a good number I’d have to go up to seven.” I shrugged. “Or down to three.”
Threpe considered this, tapping his chin. “You’re right. But six years with the Amyr means he came back to Aloine on the seventh year.” He dug into a pocket and brought out a handful of coins of at least three different currencies. He sorted seven talents out of the mess and pushed them into my surprised hand.
“My lord,” I stammered. “I cannot take your money.” It wasn’t the money itself that surprised me, but the amount.
Threpe looked confused. “Whyever not?”
I gaped a little bit, and for a rare moment I was at a loss for words.
Threpe chuckled and closed my hand around the coins. “It’s not a reward for playing. Well, it is that, but it’s more an incentive for you to keep practicing, keep getting better. It’s for the sake of the music.”
He shrugged. “You see, a laurel needs rain to grow. I can’t do much about that. But I can keep that rain off a few musician’s heads, can’t I?” A sly smile wound its way onto his face. “So God will tend the laurels and keep them wet. And I will tend the players and keep them dry. And wiser minds than mine will decide when to bring the two together.”
I was silent for a moment. “I think you might be wiser than you give yourself credit for.”
“Well,” he said, trying not to look pleased. “Well don’t let it get around or people will start expecting great things from me.” He turned and was quickly swallowed by the crowd.
I slid the seven talents into my pocket and felt a great weight lift from my shoulders. It was like a stay of execution. Perhaps literally, as I had no idea how Devi might have encouraged me to pay my debt. I drew my first carefree breath in two months. It felt good.
After Threpe left, one of the talented musicians came to offer his compliments. After him it was a Cealdish moneylender who shook my hand and offered to buy me a drink.
Then there was a minor nobleman, another musician, and a pretty young lady that I thought might be my Aloine until I heard her voice. She was the daughter of a local moneylender, and we talked of small things, briefly, before she moved on. I remembered my manners almost too late and kissed her hand before she left.
They all blurred together after a while. One by one they came to give me their regards, compliments, handshakes, advice, envy, and admiration. Though Stanchion was true to his word and managed to keep them all from coming at me in a mass, it wasn’t long before I began having trouble telling one from another. The metheglin wasn’t helping matters either.
I’m not sure how long it was before I thought to look for Ambrose. After scanning the room, I nudged Simmon with an elbow until he looked up from the game he and Wilem were playing with shims. “Where’s our best friend?” I asked.
Simmon gave me a blank look and I realized that he was too far into his cups to catch sarcasm. “Ambrose,” I clarified. “Where’s Ambrose?”
“Scoffered off,” Wilem announced with an edge of bellicosity. “As soon as you finished playing. Before you’d even got your pipes.”
“He knew. He knew,” Simmon singsonged delightedly. “He knew you would get them and couldn’t bear to watch.”
“Looked bad when he left,” Wilem said with a quiet malice. “Pale and shaking. Like he’d found out someone’d been lanting in his drinks all night.”
“Maybe someone was,” Simmon said with uncharacteristic viciousness. “I would.”
“Shaking?” I asked.
Wilem nodded. “Trembling. Like someone’d gut-punched him. Linten was giving him an arm to lean on when he left.”
The symptoms sounded familiar, like binder’s chills. A suspicion began to form. I pictured Ambrose, listening to me glide through the most beautiful song he’d ever heard, and realizing I’m about to win my pipes.
He wouldn’t do anything obvious, but perhaps he could find a loose thread, or a long splinter from the table. Either one would provide only the most tenuous sympathetic link to my lute string: one percent at best, perhaps only a tenth of that.
I imagined Ambrose drawing on his own body’s heat, concentrating as the chill slowly worked into his arms and legs. I pictured him, trembling, his breath growing labored, until finally the string breaks…
…And I finish the song in spite of him. I grinned at the thought. Pure speculation of course, but something had certainly broken my lute string, and I didn’t doubt for a second that Ambrose would try something of the sort. I focused back in on Simmon.
“…it up to him and say, No hard feelings about that time in the Crucible when you mixed my salts and I was nearly blind for a day. No. No really, drink up! Ha!” Simmon laughed, lost in his own vengeful fantasy.
The flood of well-wishers slowed somewhat: a fellow lutist, the talented piper I’d seen on stage, a local merchant. A heavily perfumed gentleman with long, oiled hair and a Vintic accent clapped me on the back and gave me a purse of money, “for new strings.” I didn’t like him. I kept the purse.
“Why does everyone keep going on about that?” Wilem asked me.
“About what?”
“Half the people that come over to shake your hand bubble over about how beautiful the song was. The other half hardly mention the song at all, and all they talk about is how you played with a broken string. It’s like they didn’t hardly hear the song at all.”
“The first half don’t know anything about music,” Simmon said. “Only people who take their music seriously can really appreciate what our little E’lir here did tonight.”
Wilem grunted thoughtfully. “It’s hard then, what you did?”
“I’ve never seen anyone play ‘Squirrel in the Thatch’ without a full set of strings,” Simmon told him.
“Well,” he said. “You made it look easy. Since you have come to your sense in pushing aside that Yllish fruit drink, will you let me buy you a round of fine dark scutten, drink of the kings of Cealdim?”
I know a compliment when I hear it, but I was reluctant to accept as I was just beginning to feel clear-headed again.
Luckily, I was saved from having to make an excuse by Marea coming to pay her respects. She was the lovely, golden-haired harper who had tried for her talent and failed. I thought for a moment that she might be the voice of my Aloine, but after a moment’s listening to her, I realized it couldn’t be.
She was pretty though. Even prettier than she had seemed on stage, as is not always the case. Talking, I found she was the daughter of one of Imre’s councilmen. Against the tumble of her deep golden hair, the soft blue of her gown was a reflection of the deep blue of her eyes.
Lovely as she was, I couldn’t give her the concentration she deserved. I itched to be away from the bar to find the voice that had sung Aloine with me. We talked a while, smiled, and parted with kind words and promises to speak again. She disappeared back into the crowd, a wonderful collection of gently moving curves.
“What was that shameful display?” Wilem demanded after she had gone.
“What?” I asked.
“What?” he mocked my tone. “Can you even pretend to be that thick? If a girl as fair as that looked at me with one eye the way she looked at you with two…We’d have a room by now, to say it carefully.”
“She was friendly,” I protested. “And we were talking. She asked me if I would show her some harp fingerings, but it’s been a long time since I played harp.”
“It’ll be a lot longer if you keep missing passes like that,” Wilem said frankly. “She was doing everything but taking down another button for you.”
Sim leaned over and lay his hand on my shoulder, the very picture of the concerned friend. “Kvothe, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about this very problem. If you honestly couldn’t tell that she was interested in you, you might want to admit the possibility that you are impossibly thick when it comes to women. You may want to consider the priesthood.”
“The both of you are drunk,” I said to cover my flush. “Did you happen to notice from our conversation that she is a councilman’s daughter?”
“Did you notice,” Wil replied in the same tone, “how she looked at you?”
I knew I was woefully inexperienced with women, but I didn’t have to admit to it. So I waved his comment away and got down off my stool. “Somehow I doubt that a quick romp behind the bar was what she had in mind.” I took a drink of water and straightened my cloak. “Now, I must go find my Aloine and offer her my earnest thanks. How do I look?”
“What does it matter?” Wilem asked.
Simmon touched Wilem’s elbow. “Don’t you see? He’s after more dangerous game than some low-bodiced councilman’s daughter.”
I turned from them with a disgusted gesture and headed off into the crowded room.
I didn’t really have any idea how I would find her. Some foolish, romantic part of me thought I would know her when I saw her. If she were half as radiant as her voice, she would shine like a candle in a dark room.
But as I thought these things, the wiser part of me was whispering in my other ear. Do not hope, it said. Do not dare hold hope that any woman could burn as brightly as the voice that sang the part of Aloine. And while this voice was not comforting, I knew it to be wise. I had learned to listen to it on the streets of Tarbean, where it had kept me alive.
I wandered through the first level of the Eolian, searching without knowing who I was looking for. Occasionally people would smile or wave. After five minutes I had seen all the faces there were to see and moved to the second level.
This was actually a converted balcony, but instead of tiers of seats, there were rising ranks of tables that looked onto the lower level. As I wended my way through the tables looking for my Aloine, my wiser half kept murmuring in my ear. Do not hope. All you will earn is disappointment. She will not be as beautiful as you imagine, and then you will despair.
As I finished searching the second level a new fear began to rise in me. She might have left while I was sitting at the bar, drinking in metheglin and praise. I should have gone to her straightaway, fallen to one knee, and thanked her with my whole heart. What if she was gone? What if no one knew who she was or where she had gone? A nervousness settled into the pit of my stomach as I took the stairs to the highest level of the Eolian.
Now look what your hope has gotten you, the voice said. She is gone and all you have is a bright, foolish imagining to torment yourself with.
The last level was the smallest of the three, hardly more than a thin crescent that hugged three walls, high above the stage. Here, the tables and benches were more widely spaced and sparsely populated. I noticed that the inhabitants of this level were mostly couples and I felt something of a voyeur as I passed from table to table.
Trying to appear casual, I looked at the faces of those who sat talking and drinking. I grew more nervous the closer I came to the last table. It was impossible for me to do so casually, as it was in a corner. The couple sitting there, one light haired and one dark, had their backs to me.
As I approached, the light-haired one laughed and I caught a glimpse of a proud, fine-featured face. A man. I turned my attention to the woman with the long dark hair. My last hope. I knew she would be my Aloine.
Coming round the corner of the table I saw her face. Or rather, his face. They were both men. My Aloine had left. I had lost her, and with that knowledge I felt as if my heart had been tipped from its resting place in my chest to topple and fall somewhere deep inside me near my feet.
They looked up, and the fair-haired one smiled at me. “Look Thria, young six-string has come to offer us his respects.” He eyed me up and down. “You’re a fair one. Would you like to join us for a drink?”
“No,” I murmured, embarrassed. “I was just looking for someone.”
“Well you found someone,” he said easily, touching my arm. “My name is Fallon and this is Thria. Come and have a drink. I promise to keep Thria here from trying to take you home. He has a terrible weakness for musicians.” He smiled charmingly at me.
I murmured an excuse and took my leave, too distraught to worry whether or not I had made an ass of myself.
As I made my desolate way back to the stairs, my wise self took the opportunity to berate me. That is what comes of hope, it said. No good. Still, you are better having missed her. She could never have been equal to her voice. That voice, fair and terrible as burning silver, like moonlight on river stones, like a feather against your lips.
I headed to the stairs, eyes on the floor lest anyone try to catch me in a conversation.
Then I heard a voice, a voice like burning silver, like a kiss against my ears. Looking up, my heart lifted and I knew it was my Aloine. Looking up, I saw her and all I could think was, beautiful.
Beautiful.