Notation and Improvisation by ArizonaPoppy

Chapter 2: Out of Bounds

But the women [of Erendis's household] were chary of their speech to the child, fearing their mistress; and there was little enough of laughter for Ancalimë in the white house in Emerië. It was hushed and without music, as if one had died there not long since; for in Númenor in those days it was the part of men to play upon instruments, and the music that Ancalimë heard in childhood was the singing of women at work, out of doors, and away from the hearing of the White Lady of Emerië. --- Unfinished Tales, Part 2, Ch 2, Aldarion and Erendis, pg. 194

It was the notes that drew her there. What kind of music had no words? No one was singing, but yet there it was. Ancalimë looked up at her nurse. Nurse was busy talking to the other adults. Ancalimë looked around the entry hall. Nobody else was paying attention to her. She took a step back as a test. They continued their chatter about the latest news from Emerië. No change.

Ancalimë crept back a little more from the adults. With each step her eyes darted back and forth. Still no sign they noticed. She inched along the wall, facing the adults, until her fingers felt the doorframe. She slipped through.

She was at one end of a long room. Apart from a large stained-glass window at the far end, the room was dimly lit. Ancalimë could just make out colorful tapestries depicting scenes of nature and the First Age on the walls. Large wooden beams disappeared into the darkness overhead. The music seemed to be coming from above. It was clearer here. The notes made a little slap and then rang, filling the hall beyond.

Stealing softly into the hall, carefully placing her feet in the floor rushes so as not to make noise, she sought the source of the music. Turning in a circle, she spied a balcony, with a set of stairs spiralling upward. Ancalimë set her foot on the first step and climbed, her hands tracing along the cool of the stone wall.

Inching along, she reached the top of the stairs. In the loft, a man sat with a large box on his lap that looked like a pear with strings. He was facing partially away from her, reading from a stand lit by candles on either side. Ancalimë held her breath lest she blow the candles out. The man was completely absorbed in the music; he did not see her. His fingers moved back and forth across the strings and the long neck of the box, creating the music. The music was plaintive and slow. It twined around her chest and her ears, making her want to cry.

She leaned forward. The floor board creaked under her foot.

The man looked up. His fingers froze, notes half-plucked.
“Goodness!” he exclaimed, smiling. “It seems there is a mouse in the gallery.”

Should she flee? Her heart hammered in her ears.

“Don’t worry, I’m not upset.” He held his free hand out to her, palm out. He held his other arm still around the box. “I was just practicing for the banquet this evening.”

Ancalimë took a step forward. “What…” She blinked. “What is it?” She pointed to the box in his lap.

The musician looked down and then back up at her. “It’s a lute. Would you like to try?”

“May I?” She raised her eyebrows.

The musician beckoned her forward. She crossed the short distance to where he sat, weaving amongst the empty chairs and music stands.

“Here’s what we’ll do,” the lute player explained. “You strum the strings here.” He pointed to the area over the hole in the lute’s lid. “...and I’ll play the fingerings,” he finished.

Ancalimë hesitated, then resolutely dragged one finger against the gray strings. As they caught on the pad of her finger, they made a rich array of notes that rang through the hall and then died away.

“Good, now keep going like that,” the musician said.

More confident, Ancalimë strummed the strings again, nodding with each pass. The musician’s fingers moved up and down and across the neck playing a simple counting song that she recognized: “One, two, three, fishes in the sea.”

“Four for the seagulls by the shore,” she mouthed in time. She looked up at the musician and smiled.

“Keep going,” he nodded. His eyes were warm.

“Five, six…”

“Ancalimë Emerwen Aranel, come down here right now!”

The musician froze. Her heart fell into her stomach.

Ancalimë looked over the railing. It was Grandmother Almarian. She jumped back into the shadows again.

“I see you up there, where you have no business being. Leave the gallery, and come back down.”

Ancalimë lifted her chin. She looked down her nose, like she had seen her mother do with servants or people beneath their class. “This is not over,” she said, as imperiously as she could.

“Until next time, Mouse,” he whispered.

Chapter End Notes

This chapter was a stand-alone entry in the March 2020 Teitho contest on the prompt of "Rebellion." Thank you to the Teitho voters!