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It was an old house, its marble pitted by decades of salt spray, the carvings round the windows worn to anonymous bumps. The ground floor flooded most winters, so that its continued existence as each spring arrived was the subject of some celebration. Fortunately it had been built with four floors, and the top one, being the driest, was entirely given over to the old man's collection of instruments and manuscripts.
Master Treakin must have been waiting behind the door, so quickly did he respond to their knock.
‘Taese, welcome. Thank you for bringing him. Quickly now, Caedun, upstairs and get ready. We've a lot to do.'
Caedun trotted up the creaking stairs, leaving the old man to be polite to his mother. Pulling a wooden stool with a cracked seat to the centre of the room, he sat down and unwrapped his harp, his fingers sliding across the strings as it emerged from its leather case. Only one string was out of tune since the morning; he tightened it a fraction, smiling as the pure note hummed out into the room. This, he'd decided long ago, was his favourite place in the whole world. The furniture was old and worn; there was a distinct curve to the top of the table which left one of its legs two fingerbreadths from the floor, and the cupboards leaned against one another like runners at the end of a long race. Only the window was new, wood and glass so well fitted you could drop a feather down its length and no draught would stir it. No salt spray would reach Treakin's treasures. All around him, from hooks and pegs knocked into the walls, or piled on shelves, sat more instruments than Caedun dared count. He'd not even seen them all, because most were wrapped in soft leather or laid in padded wooden boxes. Some of the leather cases were plain, while others were tooled in flowers and leaves or scenes from the great songs. The boxes ranged from stained and battered rectangles that held the pipes and flutes he used for practice, to intricately carved ebony, glowing cherry and a pale, glittery wood he'd been told came from the elven lands.
This was a room where you could smell the music, in the mingling of dust and paper and polish, and something else that he couldn't put a name to. He took a deep breath, plucking a chord, feeling the air shiver with the sound.
‘Well.' Master Treakin stood at the top of the stairs, watching him, one hand running through his neat grey beard. ‘Are you ready to play for the king?'
He flattened his hands to the strings, silencing them. ‘I hope so.'
‘So do I. Now then, have you played today?'
Caedun nodded.
‘Good.' Treakin picked up his own harp. ‘Alderen's Treasure, I think. That'll be a good start.'
They played all afternoon. It wasn't the sort of playing Caedun liked; he preferred new songs, his heart always beating faster when Treakin picked out an unfamiliar phrase on his flute or went to the cupboard and riffled through the stacks of paper for something he hadn't seen before. Today they practised the songs the old man had decided they would play for the king, repeating the difficult parts over and over until Caedun was finger and voice perfect.
He was lucky to have kept his voice until now, he knew.