Linsan carefully adjusted the bow in the sunlight on the windowsill. The smell of flames wafted through the window and blew past her, along with the steady thumps of Miska's fists.
Har held out his hand for his towel.
“Thank you,” she said as she returned it.
“That's my good towel,” he muttered as he walked away while inspecting it.
Linsan looked at the bow. The glued spline was still in place but she didn't dare test it out. Any movement would loosen it and risk damaging her work.
She returned to her table and sat next to Brook.
“Should we buy you a second one once we get to Rihemlan? I have the money and you need it for your music.”
Linsan shook her head. While she could see why Brook would suggest it, it wouldn't work. “It doesn't work that way. My magic works with the instrument in question. Anything we could buy from a shelf would have been played by others. Their energies would be already in the wood and I would be fighting their resonance.”
Resonance, the field of energy that surrounded anything magical. That was why the ceilings were so high in the pub to keep Har's magical light away from the people below. The buggy's engine was large for the same reason, though she didn't understand how the twisted metal somehow protected the core of magic that was buried deep inside.
“So we get one commissioned.” Brook took a bite of her lunch. She was once again wearing her blue dress with matching gloves. It was whole unsuited to their plans, but Linsan was afraid of upsetting Brook by suggesting she switch into the plainer morning dress she had seen.
She squirmed uncomfortably. She had insisted on her blue fascinator and blue gloves because “a proper lady would never been seen in public like this.” She glanced back at Har and then to her meal.
Linsan shook her head at the statement. “Even a basic violin takes over a month to make.”
“We don't have that time.”
“I know. And that is probably the lowest quality piece, something they make for students. That usually means they use lower quality woods and stains to constructor it. The stress of my music and dancing might be too much for the body, which would then leave us without an instrument. Which is one reason the Sterlig's trees were probably our greatest asset. Most of our violins were grown from wood that we've seasoned for half a century.”
“Half a century!?” Brook exclaimed. “Fifty years just to get some wood!?”
Har scoffed from the kitchen.
Linsan looked up from her food. “That's why the Sterlig family was devastated when we lost our forest. We had spent generations breeding the right trees for the ideal wood and we were curing generations of musical instruments when it went up in flames. People would pay us a century ahead to make the perfect instrument for their grandchildren and then…” She choked on the sad memories. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath and set down the knife. “… when everything burned up, we had to pay back those commissions to avoid debt collectors. Both our savings and reputation were ruined forever in that night.”
Brook slumped down and said nothing. She looked down at her tea. It was in a large beer mug and Linsan could see the heavy cream and sugar swirling at the bottom.
“It will probably take us two or three centuries until the trees grow large enough to produce good wood again. Assuming there is enough seedlings that has the right combination of resin and strength. Then another fifty before we can even start to make an instrument. After that… no one knows how long it would take before Sterlig meant something in the music world again.”
“Four hundred years… what do you do? Get someone with plant magic to grow it faster?”
“Magic warps the sound and creates resonance. It has to be the long, hard way. An isolated valley away from other magic and tended by hand by folks without the ability to accelerate the growth.”
“How do you recover from that?”
“Learn as much as I can from my father and then teach my children in hopes they will pass it down before we forget everything. Have faith, I guess.”
“I guess you'll have to find a husband then.” Brook's voice was low.
Even though her parents never brought it up, Linsan knew she was the last of her line. But as she told Brook earlier, she had no interest in man or woman. She shrugged. “I don't have to birth a child to call it my own nor do I have to share blood to call someone family. I don't even need them to have my name to walk in our traditions.”
She looked up and smiled. “With those rules, I have plenty of time before I need to make a choice. Nor do I have to do… that with anyone. I mean, I can't say I won't change in ten years or thirty, but right now, the idea of having children of my own leaves me feeling cold.”
Brook looked up and there was a brief flash of vulnerability, and then she smiled sadly. “I'm sorry.”
“You didn't start it.”
“No, I meant I'm sorry for being upset about our money problems. We recovered in a matter of months but your family lost everything in the fire.”
Linsan nodded slowly.
“We'll get it back.” Brook slid a piece of paper over to Linsan.
“What's that?”
She held it up. “Y-You said we had to learn new songs. I had a few that I thought might work but… I don't know their names or anything.”
Linsan grinned as she inspected it.
While Brook's handwriting was beautiful and calligraphic, she had never learned how to write or read music. She had “lots of string instruments and…” with lines showing the notes rising and falling.
Combing through her mind, Linsan tried to puzzle the names from the notes.
Brook blushed and looked away. “It's okay if we use only your songs. You know how—”
“No, I know most of these.”
Her dark curls bounced as she turned back sharply. “They are? I mean, you do?”
Linsan hummed through the first one.
“That's it!”
“Ode to the Champion and this one is What Comes of the Nightbird, my mother auditioned for the play that introduced that one. These are really good songs for us, Brook. They have solid rhythms for you and I can adapt the music to my violin.”
“R-Really?” Brook looked surprised. Then she beamed with a relieved smile.
Encouraged, Linsan hugged her. “Come on, let's learn how to turn these songs into something violent.”