Trisha couldn’t budge, transfixed by the witch’s stare, and only when Asa gave her a sharp shove with her elbow did Trisha realize the ceremony was done. Time for the music to commence.
Eldric raised the flute to his lips. Asa watched Bran. Bran watched Trisha. Trisha watched Gareth. Three. Two. One.
Music shot out. The Feast had begun.
As Trisha played, she caught a glimpse of white hair disappearing through the open doorway. Her shoulders relaxing, Trisha loosened her control of the magic. It hummed, drenching the drone of Gareth’s hurdy-gurdy, the whistle of Eldric’s flute, Asa’s fiddle, and Bran’s lute. Feeding off the song’s energy, its power stitched their notes together, spinning in the air like a creature of flame and light.
Asa’s fiddling sent fire coursing through Trisha’s veins, Gareth’s drone grounded the song, and Bran’s complex thrumming wove through the notes. Trisha’s fingers plucked gentle chords from her lyre as her voice flitted above the music, accompanied by Eldric’s flute.
They played through the sunshine, with the servants bringing food, mead, and beer, the warm golden light moving unseen across the sky. From the open windows, the smells of hay and burning fires carried inside. Asa’s sharp-chinnedsmile stretched wide. Her fox-eyes winked at Blainor’s shields, while Eldric’s demure flute-playing skirted excess flirtation. Gareth, fatherly and steady, cranked the hurdy-gurdy, anchoring their wildness before it could go overboard.
Bran, with his deft lute, strayed outside of their agreed set, but Trisha couldn’t fault him. He loved Moorhafen: its dark gray granite, its past, what he’d lost. His adoration bled through every note and every strum. Trisha’s attention remained on her lyre and the lyrics of their song. She didn’t look at the Warlord, but she couldn’t forget him, nor his silence and what it held within. When the pause came, they all breathed out in relief, exhausted and exhilarated.
“Your first Midsummer. What do you think?” asked Asa with a sly wink. “Plans for the bonfire?”
Trisha’s spine straightened. “Plans?”
“The best part of the day,” Asa declared, snatching a chicken leg from the tray of a passing servant. “We burn to call forth the sun,” she said after a swallow. “But my favorite is to burn for other things. There’s plenty by the shore. Memories, old loves. Newplaythings.”
Trisha opened her mouth, trying to catch Asa’s unspooling thread. “I?—”
“Asa! Your mind’s more rotten than a bog’s breath,” Bran huffed as he turned toward the fiddler, clenching his lute. “Shouldn’t surprise me you haven’t changed a bit.”
“And you’re still a man too stiff to realize there’s a birch stuck in your ass.”
Deciding it would be better to avoid whatever had happened in their past, Trisha gripped her lyre more firmly. “Actually, I’m unsure what to expect from the bonfire.” Her gaze alternated between Asa and Bran. “Seems it’s more than just burning some driftwood.”
“It’s rather fun,” Eldric said behind Asa’s shoulders. Hesmiled. “Don’t let these two convince you otherwise. Music, dancing. Drinks. That sort of thing.”
“Not to forget the main reason. The pyre,” Gareth added. He brushed a hand over his instrument and leaned in his chair, nodding at Trisha. “You should come, just for the experience.”
All this conversation about fire served only to remind Trisha of her last entanglements with Blainor. Unable to resist the impulse, she glanced toward the long table where the clan chiefs sat. Her heart jolted as she met Blainor’s eyes. Leaning back in his seat, he raised an eyebrow.
Trisha spun around, blinking rapidly. “B-Bonfire sounds lovely.”
“Prepare to burn your past to ash,” cheered Asa. “Perfect night for it.”
“After our next set, that is,” Bran said pointedly.
Asa rolled her eyes. “Killjoy.” But she didn’t object, finding her spot and lifting the fiddle back to her chin.
The next section was at Bran’s insistence: a chance for each individual player to take the stage. It allowed a moment of respite after hours of playing, but Trisha recognized Bran’s true intent. He hadn’t given up his hope of reclaiming his old teacher’s position as the Warlord’s Bard.
He could have it for all she cared. Neither she nor her magic minded who listened to her song: a royal court or a group of commoners. Trisha slumped back in annoyance as she resisted the need to turn. The silent wall that was Blainor’s presence stood there, at the periphery of her mind, immune to the temptations she wove into the melody.
She straightened and propped the lyre against her knee, then switched it to the other side. Asa’s violin crooned a lively folk song in duple time, Trisha’s feet drumming at its tempo. Considering her own piece, she tested her control over thepower pulsing in her bones. It swelled, as though sensing her intent.
Yes,purred her inner beast, reaching out its tendrils.Let me fly.
Trisha’s turn came after Bran’s complex ballad. She took the spot, testing the audience. A slight smile when she recognized dare in Bran’s gaze. The bloody war song had left the audience in a state.
Running her fingers over the strings, Trisha released a crystalline sound, a drop of rain over ice. A deep breath. Another pluck. Faster and faster, her hands moved, the music cascaded, growing stronger. Magic bolstering her song, like deep wells in the ground feeding into a river, it streamed through the smoky air, an echo of something new about to be born.
A hush fell in the hall. The thick smoke thinned, a fresh breath replacing the heavy odors: yeast and honey, the charred meat, and the sharp tang of sweat.
Trisha’s concentration was on the song, the honeysuckle scent of her magic wrapping her in its cloak. It reveled in her music, in the sound of her lyre. It was the song the hatchlings sang when they broke through their shells. The same tune fawns hummed when pushing up onto their legs for the first time. Trisha sang, loud and clear, in an unbridled joy of witnessing life. How a baby sucked for the first time, the shyness of a first kiss, and how death brought life and remade the world.
The night might kill the sun, but each morning, it was reborn. The road was wide, stretching, never-ending. A secret to be discovered behind every curve. Her magic danced through the strings, weaving them in its honeydew aroma. It rejoiced in Trisha’s song. And no man or woman could resist their call. Hands joined, feet shuffled. Even through her fervor, Trisha sensed movement and heard cheers. Laughing, couplesspun across the open space, following the wild melody she coaxed out of her lyre.
