[Kransha]

The aged man’s heavy eyelids managed to elevate again, his deep eyes behind them resting on the visage of a young-looking man with the delicate silhouette of a fiddle sitting in his hand with the sturdy bow of that instrument gliding along gently vibrating strings. The device sung in his hands, its melancholy tune filling the room like billowing puffs of smoke from a pipe, though the sweet sounds of this were ten fold more pleasing then wheezing lungs beneath tawdry outfits. The long notes, resonating with a finely crafted vibrato, filled the depths of Osric’s mind, throbbing like a rhythmic heartbeat in his ears, which nearly melted when faced by the mournful melody.

Swinging his rigid leg off the other chair, Osric pulled his own chair smoothly towards the focal point of that sound, the notes growing more prominent and defined as he neared their source. He heard the words clearly now, each mouthed syllable perfectly shaped and falling like a single raindrop on a placid crystal pool, creating a serene ripple that sounded like a tremulous echo within Osric. The elder listened silently to the chord-mingled lyrics and bowed his head, as had most others within earshot.

It brought back ill thoughts that Osric had long tried to push from his mind’s lonely annals in vain. The voice faded slowly, though the notes still poured from that violin clasped like a fragile but energetic bird in the man’s hand. Soon enough that too became no more than a quite hum which evaporated smoothly into the absence of sound. Osric blinked, wonderment and astonishment twinkling in his eyes. The dark feeling lingered, brought on by the cheerless nature of the piece, but he seemed uplifted by its beauty. The man now listened avidly to the violinist’s words as he concluded. The words of this soulful man almost stung at Osric as he talked dispiritedly of “the broken hearts and the piles of dead that lie about in frightening numbers.” The warrior of Aldburg was stricken with shrouded memories of what he’d seen himself in the service of Rohan during the war that seemed so long ago, now considered yet another one of the grisly battle stories he could tell to Rohirrim pups swarming around a crackling campfire.

Osric, finally regaining his senses entirely, glanced around to see that no one was speaking, or even attempting to make a noise to disrupt the solemn aftermath of that work of music. Though it seemed nearly blasphemous to violate the silence, Osric spoke up, his grizzled baritone barely carrying to the violinist and singer, but still stood out in the utter hush that had descended on this section of the White Horse.

“A stirring song, sir, and your words ring true as well. You have true talent with that device and an unchallengeable philosophy, which I would dare any being in this room to disagree with. You, sir, have a way with both word and music, and I commend you for both. Indeed, it has been a great many winters since I have heard something of that caliber.”