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“Look who decided to break into my apartment.” I gave her a pointed look.
She rolled her eyes. “You promised me sushi, but you stood me up. What else was I supposed to do? You weren’t at the library, and I was starting to worry that my favorite musician had been kidnapped by werewolves or something that should be less likely than it is. For your first concert, the Undercity was a pretty edgy forward-thinking move. Come on. Let’s go tune some lamps, which was supposed to be your first assignment, and then you can get me sushi.”
I frowned at her. She looked on the thin side in spite of her bouncy energy. “When was the last time you’ve eaten?”
She waved my question away. “Don’t worry about me, just keep your promises. Come on.” She grabbed my arm while my concern for her starving to death shifted to the sad probability of her eating all of my groceries. Oh well. I could order more on my phone while ordering sushi. The Scholar had already deposited a generous lump sum in my bank account, a month’s advance to see me through whatever I needed while I transitioned away from the library.
My chest panged when I thought of it. Of course it did. What else would it do? I followed her, wishing that her hand was as good at stopping the pain as the Scholar’s. The first lamp we came to was right outside the library, where I’d never be able to go inside again. She stopped and pulled out her harp, but I turned and dragged her along with me down the street away from the sushi place.
“Where are we going?” she asked, tripping on the floral robe over her pants.
“I got fired today, and I don’t want to be reminded of it.” The words came out of my throat like spitting acid. I tried to swallow a few times before I managed. Why did it hurt so much?
“Ah. Not to be insensitive, but can you not afford sushi then? I might have to pay you back for the cereal I ate while I was waiting at your place, and a few other things.” She winced and looked guilty.
I sighed and shook my head, but kept walking fast and she kept up with me. “No, I got a temporary position at Song’s Lab, with a pay increase, so I can still buy you sushi.”
“Oh, that’s a relief. I wasn’t going to mention it, but the Music guild has no money, so if you wanted to work full time for pay, I have nothing to give you, but happily, you can keep working for rent.”
“Happily.” We went on to a lamp a block away from the library, and then came the real fun.
She started her lecture by gesturing at the flickering lamp post. “You see, each lamp is keyed in to a different part of the majestic symphony that is Singsong City. It’s a very technical piece that would require an entire orchestra, and if we had the resources to play to each lamp in the city, that’s all it would need, to find its place and be in tune. In the early days of Singsong, they say that they had wagons pulling musicians, and they took care of it that way, but it wasn’t efficient enough, and soon the lamps went out of tune. There was a big debate about taking them out altogether, but?—”
“Fascinating history lesson, Mirabel, but maybe we could wrap this up sooner rather than later. I need to get a good night’s sleep tonight before I go to work tomorrow.” Would I be expected to work nights? The human and the elf made up the majority of the translations team, so maybe…
“Sorry,” Mirabel said briskly. “I tend to get romantic about Singsong City. It has the most interesting history, musically, of any in the world. So many experiments formed the basis of the structure and… there I go again. This lamp is in your sector, which forms a certain piece of the overall song. This particular lamp should be in the key of G, but I won’t tell you the theory of it since you’re in such a rush to eat sushi. Let’s go then. The basic melody to awaken the tuning is as follows.” She played a song on her harp very slowly that I tried to follow the next time she went round. After the first time she played, the lamp started flickering, making different scratchy sounds like it was struggling to light.
Pansy started howling, and I played my guitar along with Mirabel.
“Good. Now, this is the ditty that goes with tuning lamps. It’s not great, but it will help you remember; ‘Singsong, Singsong, making music all day long. Singsong, Singsong, come and play along.’ And see how I ended it on no note? That’s where you fill in what note this lamp is supposed to be. Try it with me.”
We sang together while people walking past stared at us, getting more looks than I got when I went out with Anna. People always stared at her because of her scars, but the looks were no less uncomfortable with Mirabel. She genuinely didn’t see anything that wasn’t music related. If she were hunting new musical talent, she’d probably stop every person passing and ask them to sing a scale or pluck her harp to see if they had potential.
It took fifteen minutes of singing to the lamp for me to finally get it in tune. Mirabel was delighted and dragged me on to the next lamp, Pansy trotting with us, tail wagging happily. Yes, Pansy was easy to please; he just needed music and my public humiliation.
The next lamp took me twenty minutes, because Mirabel didn’t help me as much. Pansy howled loudly, and I struggled to play the strings and sing the ridiculous ditty at the same time, but the magical lines of music didn’t awaken and pull me in, and the ache from my missing library was starting to make breathing, and therefore singing, difficult. I got the lamp to flicker in tune with an unpleasant screech, and then Mirabel grabbed my arm to haul me to the next lamp. She led me in a large circle that would end by the sushi place, but I was going slower and slower, until she was doing more of it than less. On the block a street up from the Sushi place, where I could also the corner of the library, she faced me with her hands on hips, a frown on her face.
“Are you sick or are you messing up intentionally? It won’t work. You are this sector’s musical maintenance specialist or you’re out of your apartment.”
I shook my head and tried to refocus on the lamp, but I couldn’t even remember the tune even if I’d been able to sing it, and my fingers were sore and stiff.
“What a happy evening it turned out to be,” the smug official Gray who had almost run me over said, sauntering over to us with a smile that he turned on Mirabel before his eyes rested on me. “You’re a maintenance musician? You haven’t been at it for long, but I’m sure that you have great potential.” He was so condescending. “How did you decide to become a musician, my blond angel?”
“Are you interested in volunteering?” Mirabel snapped at him, clearly less than impressed with his money or his class. “No? Then move along. We’re working.” She eyed him while he smiled back easily.
“You know,” he said, leaning towards me, while looking at her, “I congratulate you on your new choice of companions. She is much more worthy than the last one you had.”
Now I remembered what the Scholar had stopped me from doing, that was absolutely essential, particularly when I’d been fired this morning, sundered, and now had to run around with an insane musician singing to lamp posts.
I punched his face, just so, snapping his head back and breaking his nose. Blood blossomed from said nose while he stood there, blinking in surprise at me. “What did you do that for?” he blustered, appalled, and insulted.
I punched him again, same nose, but that time my fist slipped on the blood, and I broke a blood vessel in my fist. I was holding my guitar in my left hand, so I only had the one fist to use, but if he said another word, I’d hit him again.
He stepped back, covering his nose to protect it like he should have done in the first place. Poor baby, wasn’t used to paying for the words that came out of his ugly mouth.
“Are you mad?” he sputtered, eyes huge and shocked.
“Angry, yes,” I said, stepping forward with my fist cocked again. I’d was about to punch his stomach when Mirabel grabbed my wrist and dragged me away from my target, with Pansy trotting happily along, satisfied after her long evening exercise.
