RESONANCE
Act I, Scene IV
Act I, Scene IV
At the Hourglass, in Ul'dah.
"In Lominsa City, where the lasses are pretty,
I met a fair femme; Morning Mist was her name
She served breakfast vittles, made fresh on the griddle;
They tasted right pleasant; her lips did the same..."
The door to his room at the Hourglass shut tightly behind him, the dull thud and click of the latch serving to cut off the simple lyrics, leaving him simply humming along instead; he set his pack at the door, leaving him carrying only the lute, in its hip case, and the massive, gaudy Allagan-style hat, its unrealistic feather fluttering in the breeze of the closing door, that he'd purchased on Pearl Lane but a bell ago.
Dim shadows from the table lamp, glittering from the fireshard used to light it, were cast behind him. The room was neither the cheapest nor the best that the Hourglass had to offer, its decor being a mix of ochre walls and simple, age-faded paintings, but it did offer one particular advantage for a man like himself. It was located in one of the farther corners of the old building, which meant that sounds were less likely to travel both into and out of the room, just the sort of arrangement that suited a bard in need of space and time to practice.
He kept the hummed tune going to himself, and paced the six steps to the modest bed, turning himself to fall rump-first upon it, hat still clutched in his hands. His boots came off with a pair of kicks, and he stretched out, back to the headboard and against the pilow, and set the chapeau upside-down in his lap.
"Now, then, let's see if you're worth spending gil with scavengers." He peered into the bowl of the hat, and again caught sight of what the street seller seemed not to have noticed or cared about, stuffed into a torn seam - a visible corner of worn and discolored parchment sheet, with a pair of what appeared to be musical notes written neatly upon it. Gloved hands reaching into the hat, one pulling the seam apart, and gingerly tugging at the parchment.
By all rights, the thing should have torn, or even crumbled to dust, but with the luck that Oschon reserves for fools, little children and wayward bards, it held together, and within moments, Nathan held before him the small scroll, intact. Much of the writing on it was familiar in style to him, but unintelligible, with what looked like a long title at the top, and a modest paragraph of the unreadable flowing script at the bottom, in what might have once been a deep crimson ink, but which had browned with time and smudging. However, what was between these areas was something that was encouragingly and comfortably familiar to him.
It was musical notation, the full presentation of the tiny pair of notes he'd spotted in the first place.
Though many had considered his traveling troupe of a family to be wild-hearted wastrels, the truth was that they had been dedicated to the musical and performing arts, and that their leaders, the First String herself included, were troves of knowledge about anything related to music, and ensured, through long but passionate lessons, that every member of the group knew and appreciated how to read song transcriptions made by people long dead and whose cultures would otherwise have remained unknown and alien. Nathan could not read the script on much of the page, as achingly familiar as it seemed, but by Oschon's boots, he damn well could make sense of the bars and notes scribed upon the page.
He licked his lips, and peered over the lines. Perhaps the foreign writings might have said something more about key, and which instrument the tune was made for, but there was no use wondering about it for now. He hummed the tune out under his breath, softly, and it was full of rising and suddenly-falling pitch, apparently of drawn and slow-tempoed notes, and he fancied that the light of the lamp flickered almost to the tune of the song. It was quite stirring to him, in fact, even muted, and he felt his pulse rising - it was something he'd never heard, a style he'd not experienced, and that alone made it of immense value.
His hands, in fact, did falter a bit from haste as he reached for the lute case beside him, and released the fasteners, steadying himself enough to remove the ornate instrument with greater care. His blood was stirred; few things, even the tender kiss and embrace of a lover, had ever effected him thus.
He paused to take a few deep breaths, and looped the instrument's strap behind his neck, securing it in place. His hands flexed, working themselves back from eager falterting to the tight control he needed, years of experience finally dampering the excitement of a boy receiving a Starlight gift.
He plucked the first note, felt it resonate, and then the second, proceeding through verse into the bridge; perhaps the song was not meant for a lute, but the instrument made a thing of wonder of it nonetheless, and he swallowed to help keep himself focused, eyes on the page, fingers on strings. The light again seemed to flicker in his imagination as he played, as if the very room itself wished to play along.
At the end of the first iteration of the chorus, something finally permeated the crocodile's smile and the sway of his body as he played - the lamp was, indeed, flickering in the room. No matter; fireshards did not last forever, and it would take only a quick request from the innkeeper to obtain a fresh one. In the meantime, the song must continue just as the show must go on. The notes continued to float from his fingers' skilled touch upon the lute strings, and he felt his pulse quicken again, despite himself, for the song was working itself to a crescendo. The hairs on his arm began to stand on end, and he felt a stiffness in the hair from his head, as well, as if it, too, might be crackling. It reminded him of...
The room filled with a sharp crack, the volume of which subdued the lute, and was plunged into darkness abetted only by the faint starlight coming from the window. The lamp's shard had shattered.
"But in the laugh there was another voice. A clearer laugh, an ironic laugh. A laugh which laughs because it chooses not to weep."
![[Image: 3610850.jpg]](http://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/1266293/pics/original/3610850.jpg)
