Ansset looked at him unblinkingly.

Damn, but I hate dealing with children, the Chamberlain thought. They aren't even the same species.

You're a Songbird. You're incredibly valuable. Therefore you will not go outside without permission. My permission. You will be accompanied by two of my men at all times. You will follow the schedule prepared for you, which will include ample opportunity for recreation. I cannot have you out of my ken at any time. For the price paid for you, we could build another palace like this one and have room lefft over to outfit an army.

Nothing. No emotion at all.

Have you nothing to say?

Ansset smiled slightly. Chamberlain, I have my own schedules. Those are the ones I will keep. Or I cannot sing.

It was unheard of. The Chamberlain could say nothing, nothing at all as the boy smiled at him.

And as to your authority, Riktors Ashen already explained everything.

Did he? What did he explain?

You don't control everything, Chamberlain. You don't control the palace guard, which has its own Captain appointed by Mikal. You don't control any aspect of imperial government except palace administration and protocol. And no one, Chamberlain, controls me. Except me.

He had expected many things. But not to have a nine-year-old boy, however beautiful, speak with more command than an admiral of the fleet. Yet the boy's voice was an admirable lesson in strength. The Chamberlain, who was never confused, was thrown into confusion.

The Songhouse said nothing of this.

The Songhouse doesn't speak, Chamberlain. I must live in certain ways to be able to sing. If I can't live as I must, then I will go home.

This is impossible! There are schedules that must be followed!

Ansset ignored him. When do I meet Mikal?

When the schedule says so!

And when will that be?

When I say so. I make the schedule. I give access to Mikal or I deny access to Mikal!

Ansset only smiled and hummed soothingly. The Chamberlain felt very much relieved. Later he tried to think why, but couldn't.

That's better, the Chamberlain said. He was so relieved, in fact, that he sat down, the furniture flowing to fit him perfectly. Ansset, you have no idea what an incredible burden the office of Chamberlain is.

You have a lot to do. Riktors told me.

The Chamberlain had very good self-control. He prided himself on it. He would have been distressed to know that Ansset read the flickers of emotion in his voice and knew that the Chamberlain had little love for Riktors Ashen.

I wonder, the Chamberlain said. I wonder if perhaps you might just sing something now. Music soothes the savage breast, you know.

I would love to sing for you, Ansset said.

The Chamberlain waited a moment, then gazed questioningly at Ansset.

But, Chamberlain, said Ansset, I'm Mikal's Songbird. I can't sing for anyone until I've met him and he's given his consent.

There was just enough of mockery in the Songbird's voice that the Chamberlain went hot inside, embarrassed, as if he had tried to sleep with his master's wife and found that she was merely amused at him. The child was going to be a horror.

I'll speak to Mikal about you.

He knows I'm here. He was quite impatient to have me come, I heard.

I said that I would speak to Mikal!

The Chamberlain whirled and left, a quick, dramatic exit; but the drama was spoiled when Ansset's voice came gently after him, gently and yet exactly loud enough that it could have been whispering in his ear: Thank you. And the thank you was full of respect and gratitude so that the Chamberlain couldn't be angry, indeed could think of no reason for anger. The boy was obviously going to be compliant. Obviously.

The Chamberlain went straight to Mikal, something that only a few were allowed to do, and told him that the Songbird was there and eager to meet him, and was definitely a charming boy, if a bit stubborn, and Mikal said, Tonight at twenty-two, and the Chamberlain left and told his men what to do and when to do it and adjusted the schedules to fit that appointment and then realized:

He had done exactly what the boy had wanted. He had changed everything to fit the boy.

I have been outclassed, said the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach.

I hate the little bastard, said the hot flush in his cheeks a moment later.

The contract said he'd be here for six years. The Chamberlain thought of six years and they were long. Terribly, terribly long.

3

The palace had no music. Ansset finally realized it with relief. Something had been nagging him since he arrived. It was not the impersonal search by the security guards or the casual way that he seemed to be fit into a machine and processed. He expected things to be different, and since everything was strange compared to life in the Songhouse, none of it should have felt wrong. He had a far from cosmopolitan outlook, but the Songhouse had never allowed him to think that the Songhouse way was right and all other ways were not. Rather the Songhouse was home, and this was merely a different place.

But the lack of music. Even Bog had had music, even lazy Step had its own songs. Here the artificial stone that was harder than steel carried little sound; the furniture was silent as it flowed to fit bodies; the servants went silently about their business, as did the guards; the only sounds were of machines, and even they were invariably muffled.

On his visit to Step and Bog, he had had Esste with him. Someone to whom he could sing and who would know the meanings of his songs. Someone whose voice was full of inflection carefully controlled. Here everyone was so coarse, so unrefined, so careless.

And Ansset felt homesick as he ran his fingers along the warm stone that was so unlike the cold rock of the walls of the Songhouse. He hummed in his throat, but these walls absorbed the sound, reflected nothing. Also, he was hot. That was wrong. He had been raised in a slightly chilly building since he was three. This place was warm enough that he could cast away his clothing and still be a little too warm. How can they be comfortable?

His unease was not helped by the fact that he had been alone ever since the obsequious servant had led him to a room and said, This is yours. No window, and the door had no device that Ansset could see for opening. So he waited and did not sing because he was not sure someone would not be listening-that much Riktors Ashen had warned him of. He sat alone in silence and listened to the utter lack of music in the palace, unwilling to make any of his own until he had met Mikal, and not knowing when that would be, or if it would happen at all, or if he would be left forever in a place where he might as well be deaf.

No.

That is also wrong.

There is music here, Ansset realized. But it was cacophony, not harmony, and so he had not recognized it. In Step and Bog the moods of the cities had been uniform. While individuals had had their own songs, they were only variations on a theme, and all had worked together to give the city a feeling of its own. Here there was no such harmony. Only fear and mistrust to such a degree that no two voices worked together. As if the very melding of speech patterns and thought patterns and ease of expression might somehow compromise a person dangerously, bring him close to death or darker terrors. That was the music, if he could call it music, of the palace.

What a dark place Mikal has made for himself. How can anyone live in such deafening silence and pain?

But perhaps it is not pain to them, Ansset thought. Perhaps this is the way of all the worlds. Perhaps only on Tew, which has the Songhouse, have voices learned to meet and mix harmoniously.

He thought of the billions of pinpoint stars, each with its planets and each of those with their people, and none of them knew how to sing or hear anyone else's song.