“But she raised her head and said your father’s name. Aillel shooed everyone out but me, and together we told her the sad news. She wept quietly for a while and then asked for you. We laid you on her breast and she said, ‘My son.’ She cried a little more and stroked your head weakly. Then she said you were to be named Amyrian, and gave up the ghost.
“Aillel and I agreed to keep the name secret: it sounded like a name of considerable power, and such things should be kept hidden. So we presented you to the dun as Daffyd, but you were soon known as Cricket.”
“Is it true?” Cricket asked. “Did all of that stuff really happen, or is it just a story?”
“There is no such thing as just a story,” Harper said. “But I swear by my true name that it happened as I have said.”
Cricket sighed heavily. “I wish I had known them.”
“Me too.”
“What were their names?”
“Rhodri and Etara.”
Cricket rolled the names around on his tongue. “I am Amyrian macRhodri. My mother was Etara of the birds.”
“Keep this secret, boy,” warned Harper.
Cricket nodded. “This is my story,” he said. “It doesn’t belong to anyone else.”
The old man and his student soon had a comfortable schedule: the mornings were given to basic lessons with the rest of the dun’s children, while afternoons were spent telling stories or practicing the flute, usually in the hayloft, but occasionally in the snowy hills nearby. Cricket didn’t understand why the stories were important until the day that Harper asked him how many stories he thought he knew.
“I don’t know,” answered the boy. “As many as you’ve ever told, probably.”
“Oh, I don’t think you know that many.”
Cricket felt insulted. “Try me,” he challenged.
“Alright, give me a good story for a marriage.”
“Arthur and Guinevere.”
“And another.”
“Finneas and Diana.”
“How about for a birth?”
“Lugh’s birth.”
“Good for a boy, but what about a girl?”
“Aliesa?”
“Alright. Give me one for a courtship.”
“Diarmud and Ophia.”
“Not really; that belongs with elopements, because Ophia was actually betrothed to Aileon.”
“What about CuChulainn and Emer?”
“Excellent.” Harper looked at his young charge. “Do you see what I’m getting at?”
“Sure. That there are suitable stories for certain events.”
“It’s more than that, though. Listen closely: there are two ways of learning and telling stories. One is by cycle, which is the entire history of one period or one person.”
“Like the story of Finn macCumhal?”
“Exactly. But there are many little stories, like Aliesa’s, that don’t fit into any specific cycle. How do you memorize them?”
“By hearing them so often that you can repeat them by heart?”
“Don’t get smart with me, boy. We memorize them by a second method, which is grouping. There are sixteen groupings, from journeys to wooings, and each has its own stories. Now, there is also the third method, which is not well remembered, and that is learning a story for every day of the year.”
“What’s today’s?”
“It just so happens that today is the story of Gwydion’s son, Llews.”
“Does that belong to Gwydion’s cycle?”
“No, Gwydion doesn’t have his own cycle. It belongs to the Bardic cycle along with all the stories about Gwydion, Taliesin, and Amergin, the three greatest bards.”
Cricket sighed. “This is getting confusing. What does all this have to do with the music?”
Harper laughed. “I said the same thing many, many years ago, when I first found out what all was involved. And this is just for the stories; we haven’t even started on riddles and genealogies. But the answer to your question is this: what I am teaching you is not just the music, although that is certainly a major part of it. But I also want you to be able to sing, write songs, tell stories, settle arguments, and many other things besides. Do you want to quit?”
Cricket spread his hands. “I can’t. I could just as soon quit breathing.”
Harper sighed fondly. “I know exactly what you mean.”
They spent that year learning about cycles, categories and days, and when Cricket had mastered those concepts around the second month after midwinter, they spent the next two months learning the different uses of riddles and chants.
Cricket felt like crying when Harper left for the summer, but he decided to use the time as well as he could. He practiced his flute often, trying to tease songs out of it, and he said the stories out loud whenever he was alone. The way his voice jumped and cracked bothered him; he wondered if he would ever be able to shape and shade the words the way the old man did.
Harper returned in the early winter, just after the first snow. He stood at the gate and played, and was startled to hear bird song answer him. He looked around and found Cricket in a tree, flute in hand, laughing at his trick. “You’re late,” the boy accused.
“It was a difficult year,” the old man replied. “May I come in?”
“Of course.” The boy clambered out of the tree and opened the gate.
“You’ve gotten taller,” Harper observed.
“Put some flesh on my bones, too, as Cook says.” He closed the gate and they started across the yard. “So what made you late?”
“The king has died, and his niece Elhonna was confirmed as queen. That kind of event always throws off the normal order of things.”
“Your pack seems larger than normal, too.”
“That was another reason I was late. I forgot that I’m not a young man anymore, and packed a heavier load than I’m used to.”
“What do you have?”
Harper cocked a steely eye at him. “Don’t you have something you’re supposed to be doing?”
“Yes,” the boy responded. “I was to watch for you and escort you to Aillel when you got here.”
“Were you?” Harper proceeded to walk in silence, ignoring Cricket’s continued questions. “Well, here we are,” he said, stopping in front of Aillel’s door. “You can run along now.”
“Will you play tonight?” the boy asked eagerly.
“If I can get my fingers thawed. Now go on, I have business to conduct.”
He shook his head as the boy went his way, and knocked before opening the door. He was shocked to see the circles under his friend’s eyes, but he hid his concern in a bow. “Chieftain, I ask permission to play in your dun for the winter.”
Aillel ignored protocol by saying waspishly, “And you’ve taken your time getting here. What happened, did you get lost?”
“I accept your kindness with gratitude, and will do my best to serve well,” Harper answered sarcastically, throwing himself into the chair. “I got here as fast as I could, you know.”
Aillel sharpened his gaze. “What’s happened?”
“Ard Righ Brian died just after the summer solstice.”
Aillel’s face turned ashen. “It’s not war, is it?”
“No, but it was close. He had no children, and the rumblings might have become violent if his niece Elhonna hadn’t simply stepped in and taken over. Besides, you know how much even a peaceful succession disrupts the country.”
“Did the Lia Fial seal her reign?”
Harper nodded, remembering the ear splitting wail from the stone that proclaimed the worth of the sovereign of Glencairck. “She has been accepted as Ard Righanna,” he assured his friend. “So much so that I couldn’t hear myself think for a good thirty minutes.”
“Would that I might be so lucky,” Aillel muttered. “So what’s in your pack?”
“You’re as bad as that not-so-little boy you set out as guard for me.”
“He asked, did he? Well, it’s no surprise.”
�
��No, but what I have in here is.” Harper grinned. “I was going to leave it with you, but now I’m not so sure I can trust you.”
“You’re asking for a sound thrashing,” Aillel threatened.
“And who would touch me? Even though no one else knows I’m a true bard, they all treat me as such.”
“If I have to, I’ll do it myself.”
Harper laughed, but began undoing the laces on his pack. “I concede. I still remember a black eye you gave me eons ago.”
Aillel’s face cracked into an answering grin. “And I remember the whipping I got for it, too.” What his friend pulled out of his pack sobered him again. He stared for a long while before asking, “Are you sure?”
“It was your idea, and after hearing him play that flute today, I’m convinced myself.”
“When are you going to give it to him?”
“I missed Samhain, so it will have to be midwinter. I’m not waiting till Beltain.”
“Fine. In the meantime...”
“In the meantime I continue with his education as I see fit.”
Aillel shrugged. “As you like. I’ll tell you this much, though: he has been telling stories, properly, every night since Samhain.”
“Really?” Harper mused. “How good is he?”
“It’s hard to say. His voice is starting to change, and he hasn’t tried to sing, but he’ll tell a story and play his flute, which has made him much more accepted in the dun. I’ll tell you, there was a time when I thought his curiosity was going to drive us all crazy.”
“Well, it sounds as though he’s been taking after me for quite a while, then.”
The first part of the season passed much the same way as the year before. Cricket, who would turn twelve during the feast, continued to improve with the flute until he could repeat anything that Harper played, although the lack of harmonies bothered him.
At the Midwinter Feast, Harper told the story of how Amrig received the first harp from the god Ogmah, and then presented Cricket with his Midwinter gift: an old harp, plain and scuffed, but sound. The young boy promptly offended everyone by playing a very unmusical chord, but Harper laughed and clapped him on the back. “Playing the harp is not something that happens magically,” he said. “But if you’d like, we will spend the rest of the winter figuring it out.”
Cricket nodded eagerly and tried to make a pleasing sound, but had less success than before. Seeing everyone wince and shudder, Harper added, “We’ll practice in the barn.”
Cricket picked out the chords that Harper showed him, feeling the strings sting his tender fingers. “Will I get calluses like yours?” he asked, trying to shake the pain away.
“Yes, though not as soon as you’d like. You also need to stop biting your nails, so you can pluck the strings as well,” Harper said. “Have you heard your harp’s name yet?”
“No,” Cricket said. “What is it?”
Harper laughed. “It doesn’t work that way, as you well know. Didn’t you listen to the story last night?”
“Of course.”
“Well, how did Amrig name the first harp?”
“When he touched the strings, the harp spoke to him.”
“It works the same way for you,” Harper said. “You play, and you listen.”
“Will it actually speak?” Cricket asked, looking skeptically at the instrument in his hands.
“Not out loud, no,” Harper said. “But you will hear her voice. Try it. Just strum all the strings and listen closely.”
Cricket cocked an eye at his teacher, but he did as he was told, listening for something that might sound like a name. He pursed his lips and squeezed his eyes shut, hearing the tone of the harp over and over. “Nnn—Lynna”
“Lynna?” Harper asked.
“No,” Cricket said slowly. “That’s not quite it... Anlynna.” He opened his eyes and smiled broadly. “Her name is Anlynna.”
“It’s beautiful,” Harper said. “Now, what else do you know about harpers? Think about the Bardic cycle.”
“A bard has no honor price,” Cricket said promptly.
“And why is that?”
“Because they must be free to say anything to anyone. Taliesin made that rule when Ard Righ Urien tried to force the first bards to bring him the names of anyone who might be speaking against him.”
“And the first Bardic war was fought to preserve the bards’ rights. Ard Righ Owain further rewarded them by allowing them to wear six colors in their cloaks. Only the king—or queen—can wear more.”
Cricket thought about that, and about bards in general. “The stories tell us how to act, don’t they?”
“They certainly do,” Harper agreed.
“Well, what about the Academy that Taliesin founded? Does it still exist?”
“It does, but not the way it used to.” A look of regret mixed with disgust crossed his face, but he quickly hid it, and sat plucking a low note over and over.
“Are you going to tell me?” Cricket asked after several minutes passed.
“I suppose,” he said, and this time it was a look of great sadness that came over him. Shaking it off, he looked Cricket in the eye. “Listen well, because this is a story of petty men and how they corrupted a system that had lasted for a thousand years.
“After Gwydion died, the magic of the bards seemed to retreat somewhat. Maybe it was something that he did before he died, or maybe those receiving the stars were too concerned with all of their other duties to believe in the wonder all around. But for the last two hundred years, nothing much has happened. The Three Magical Chords—one for laughter, one for sorrow, and one for sleep—haven’t been heard, and the Faerie lands seem to have retreated even further from the world of men.
“The Academy has reflected this trend. Magic is still taught, but not highly encouraged once the training is over. And the Pen Bardd still awards stars to those that graduate, but instead of being open to all men and women of talent, now you need to have a noble sponsor or a lot of money to get in.
“That’s why crossains have achieved a kind of prominence. They have their own schools now, and can wear four colors in their cloaks, although they still can’t judge. And they don’t follow the rules that a bard is supposed to.”
“What kind of rules?”
“I’ll answer with another question: who was Flynn, and why did he flee from Queen Diedreme?”
“Flynn was one of the bards of Ard Righ Corgan. Diedreme tried to seduce him, but he fled the house, leaving his cloak in her hand. The King sent the three sons of Berrig to track him down, but he claimed the protection of the Pen Bardd instead. A trial was held in the Academy, and Flynn was absolved because he was shown to be an honorable man who had always followed the Bardic code, which states that a bard shall touch neither the women nor the drink of the hall.” Cricket stopped and scratched his head. “What happens if a bard falls in love?”
“Then he must ask permission of the lord in order to marry the woman,” Harper replied.
“And what does it mean by not touching the drink? Wouldn’t you get thirsty?”
“It means you don’t get drunk.” Harper was quiet for a few minutes, strumming barely audible chords from his harp. “I don’t know if you’ll ever go to the Academy, Cricket, but you should always conduct yourself like a bard, even if you’re only a simple crossain. And acting like a bard means that you only use your talents for the good of Glencairck.”
“I just want to learn how to play the harp,” Cricket said.
“You have to think about the rest of it, too. Someday you’ll leave this dun and enter the wide world, and when you do, you need to know how to act.”
“You can’t come with me this summer, Cricket, and that’s final!” Harper crossed his arms, silently daring his student to ask again.
Cricket held back for a few minutes, pacing a tight circle in the dirt outside the barn. Finally he swung towards Harper and said, “Can you just tell me why? In a way that I can accept?”
Ha
rper’s posture relaxed a bit, and he said, “Think of it this way. You’re not going because you can still learn more here than on the road with me.”
“That’s not the real reason.”
“No, but it is a reason.” Harper sat down on the edge of the water trough and sighed, “I considered taking you with me, truly I did. But there’s a certain amount of unrest that comes with a new sovereign, where people test the strength of the monarchy by testing the laws. And although I can protect myself, I’m not certain I can protect you as well.”
“I can take care of myself,” Cricket declared.
“Against arrows and swords? Against bandits who are willing to kill for a half-empty pack?” He put a comforting hand on Cricket’s shoulder. “Practice your harp and flute. Practice telling the stories. And I was serious about the learning. I even have an assignment for you.”
Cricket managed to swallow his disappointment and ask, “What is it?”
“I want you to learn everything you can about everyone in this dun.”
“I don’t understand,” Cricket said, his curiosity beginning to reassert itself. “I already know about everyone here.”
“Can you tell me why Agnes has such a short temper?”
“She just does.”
Harper shook his head. “That’s not good enough. I want to know why Aillel never has to raise his voice, why Julia swings her hips more than any other woman, why Orlan’s tools are always better kept than anyone else’s. Things like that.”
“But how do I learn these things? I don’t think even they know.”
“You’re probably right. So not only do you have to get the answers, but you have to figure out how to get them. I’ll give you a clue, though; if you ask direct questions, you’ll never learn anything at all.” Harper looked at the angle of the sun and picked up his harp case. “I’ve got to get started if I’m going to get anywhere today.”
Harper lost his breath when Cricket wrapped him in a fierce hug. “Keep safe, you,” the boy said into Harper’s chest.
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