Chapter Three
"
–DSCH
The servitude should have dulled me. The revulsion of it dulls me now, but I did carry some mark of enthusiasm for producing rather effortlessly a fanfare Zlaya Trudnaya approved to be her herald. Through that lack of even forced effort, though, I knew I needed to write the piece down. That and the fantasia on Zlaya's old fanfare that my mind had set itself on developing no matter how unappreciated the end product would surely be. I seldom play my own work anymore, but I could certainly go to a keyboard right now and reproduce the piece for you down to each turn, crescendo, and tenuto. As for Zlaya's new tune, I recall the melody, I can hum it, but for all it's been overplayed I would miss some of the finer details. Which is a fact that doesn't even bother me–an artist knows his work only as much as he wants to.
It was quite late at night when Zlaya finally decided she'd heard enough from me that first day. Upon a short announcement of such, she went directly to her chamber, I'll assume anyway. Other activity in the hall dropped down as well, with the buglers, servants, and vermin officers heading their own ways. Presumably everyone in Mtsensk's day ended when Zlaya's did. Except for mine, then and later. For her ignorance, Zlaya did apparently enjoy music, so I figured there must be some sort of rehearsal room, study, or archive somewhere in the building. Someplace where I could work. Or at least someplace I could find some paper to write on.
Many smaller corridors branch off the main hall of Mtsensk. I stood up from the piano bench and glanced around the room at all of them, completely without direction on which to follow. I probably should have just followed the buglers out, but I'd hesitated enough that they were all gone before I could do so. Finally, I resorted to following the last beast to leave down the corridor across the hall from where I'd been playing. A beast in uniform should know something, even if I'd taken the wrong route.
The corridor was long and dark; torches along the wall illuminated further intricacies of design. I followed quietly, timidly as the officer continued. Or at least as quietly as consciously possible. Everybeast can have his habits. Mine, at the time unfortunately, is to tap my paws against something in a random rhythm or to sometimes whistle. Tapping was noise enough this time; my guide turned around with a snarl. She was a rather large, sturdy rat of clear high rank. Frankly, her forward presence frightened me very much, as did her low-pitched growl of, "Who are you? What order of business allows you in the Officers' Hall?"
I gulped nervously, footpaws shifting on the stone floor. Wrong turn. A mistake. Though saying nothing or turning to leave would have been a bigger one. "Pardon me...I'm a bit lost. No business here, just lost. I'm Mitya, the new musician, Zlaya's new pianist..."
The rat's eyes continued their pressure upon me, but I felt it release a little, as did her fierce expression. Paws moving from an accusatory point to rest on her hips, she grunted and added, "Then I suppose you certainly wouldn't know what was where."
I nodded again, scratching an eartip nervously still. "Zlaya put me to work right away. I've seen the front gate and the main hall. I was told where my quarters are. I've seen nothing else, nothing else at all."
"If you know where your quarters are, what are you looking for then?" The rat's expression assumed a more criticizing aspect again. My own expression remained pathetically helpless as I stood there, my eyes unable to stop flickering to the red and gold insignia on her drab coat. Looking at them, I felt a bit silly. An artist, a musician in a military dictatorship's capital. I was almost ashamed at the time. And so was how I explained. "I was looking for a music room, a study...someplace I could work outside my quarters. Is there one?" My last question was very soft indeed.
The rat sniffed again as she considered my question. She was probably scanning through the long list of rooms in Mtsensk in her mind. Finally, wordlessly, she turned with drill-tuned crispness, moving briskly back down the hall, motioning for me to follow along in an afterthought. We came back to the great hall, only to go (logically) down the corridor beginning right next to the piano. This was as dim as the Officers' Hall; I wondered how a beast could remember which door was which. We did approach a singled out one eventually. From a pocket, the rat produced a ring with many keys on it (all the same, they seemed–memory and distinction again). Selecting one, she unlocked the room with a dry click, smoothly opening the door as she extracted the key from the lock.
I peered inside, making use of a lantern to interrupt the pitch black that greeted me. The room smelled old and seldom used; the clutter the light revealed appeared to have not been touched recently. Not in many seasons. This surprised me. For Zlaya's apparent appreciation of music, the facility should have seemed used. I wondered why it wasn't; I hadn't a clue as to why when I was first introduced to the place. I figured perhaps I would have been taken to the well-used buglers' area or something like that. "Here?" I asked, just for confirmation.
The rat nodded, speaking more casually as she set about removing the key to the room from her keyring. "I know it's a bit dark and unkempt, but it's quiet. If anybeast tells you to get out of there–and there's a good chance that'll happen–tell em you have the express permission of Marshal Raikh to be in there. Should be enough." Unceremoniously pressing the key into my paw, she turned and left me to my melodies.
It is with such characters as Marshal Raikh that one must consider whether they're trying to write a history or a narrative tale with suspense and adventure. It's hard to hold up both, as reminiscing mixes up order and sequence of events, as histories can seem so dry and impersonal. The common creature, however, is already fully aware of the outcome of my dealings with Raikh. They don't need another history from someone more personal with this "grand saga." But then again, suspense wouldn't be suspense for those. For you rare reader in Mossflower, then, who knows not what happened, I leave that issue for now as Raikh left me in that dark study. In the dim and dusty room, I had little trouble locating manuscript paper and pen, so I ceased my wondering and quickly applied myself to put to the page my forced notes of the evening.