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on a stool.
    ‘We’re in a period of change and readjustment, Menolly,’ he said, managing to speak and eat simultaneously without choking on food or garbling his words. ‘And you are likely to be a vital part of that change. Yesterday I exerted an unfair pressure on you to join the Harper Hall … Oh yes, I did, but you belong here!’ His forefinger stabbed downward at the floor and then waggled out at the courtyard. ‘First,’ and he paused to swallow klah, washing down bread and cereal, ‘we must discover just how well Petiron taught you the fundamentals of our craft and what you need to further your gifts. And …’ he pointed now to her left hand, ‘… what can be done to correct that scar damage. I’d still like to hear you
play
the songs you wrote.’ His eyes fell to her hands in her lap so that she was aware of her absent-minded kneading of her left palm. ‘Master Oldive will set that right if anyone can.’
    ‘Silvina said I was to see him today.’
    ‘We’ll have you playing again, more than just those pipes. We need you, when you can craft songs like those Petiron sent me and the ones Elgion found stuck away at the back of the harper’s shelves in Half-Circle. Yes, and that’s a matter I’d better explain …’ he went on, smoothing the hair at the back of his neck and, to Menolly’s amazement, appearing to be embarrassed.
    ‘Explain?’
    ‘Yes, well, you hadn’t obviously finished
writing
that song about the fire lizard queen …’
    ‘No, I hadn’t actually …’ Menolly felt that she was not hearing his words properly. For one thing, why did the Masterharper have to explain anything to
her
? And she’d only jotted down the little tune about the fire lizard queen, yet last night … Now she remembered that he’d mentioned the song, as if all the harpers knew about it. ‘You mean, Harper Elgion sent it to you?’
    ‘How else would I have got it? We couldn’t find you!’ Robinton sounded annoyed. ‘When I think of you, living in a cave, with a damaged hand, and you hadn’t been
allowed
to finish that charming song … So I did.’
    He got up, rummaged among the piles of waxed slates under the window, extracted one and handed it to her. She looked at the notations obediently but, although they were familiar, she couldn’t make her mind read the melody.
    ‘I had to have something about fire lizards, since I believe they’re going to be far more important than anyone has yet realized. And this tune …’ his finger tapped the hard wax surface approvingly, ‘… was so exactly what I needed, that I just brushed up the harmonics, and compressed the lyric story. Probably what you’d’ve done yourself if you’d had the chance to work on it again. I couldn’t really improve on the melodic line without destroying the integral charm of … What’s the matter, Menolly?’
    Menolly realized that she’d been staring at him, unable to believe that he was praising a silly tune she’d only scrawled down. Guiltily, she examined the slate again.
    ‘I never did get a chance to
play
it … I wasn’t supposed to play my own tunes in the Sea Hold. I promised my father I wouldn’t … so you see—’
    ‘Menolly!’
    Startled, she looked up at his stern tone.
    ‘I want you to promise me – and you’re now my apprentice – I want you to promise me to write down any tune that comes into your mind: I want you to play it as often as necessary to get it right … do you understand me? That’s why I brought you here.’ He tapped the slate again. ‘That was a good song even before I tampered with it. I need good songs badly.
    ‘What I said about change affects the Harper Hall more than any other craft, Menolly, because we are the ones who effect change. Just as we teach with our songs, so we also help people accept new ideas and necessary changes. And for that we need a special kind of harpering.
    ‘Now, I still have to consider Craft principles and standards. Especially in your