Deep breaths. I focused on breathing as I approached the stage. It was a short walk, nothing more than a half dozen steps, but they felt like they stretched into eternity as my anxiety rocketed.

  You’ve done this before, more than once. You’ve got this.

  “You’ve got this.” Encore whispered into my ear, barely cutting through the sound of dozens of overlapping conversations.

  “We’ve got this.” I responded as I put a foot on the first step, reaching up and scratching him behind the ear. His body was stiff and quivering, but relaxed under my hand.

  “We’ve got this.” He repeated back as I stepped up on the stage and pulled my lute free. A few people noticed and ceased their conversations, turning to look my way, eyes wide with excitement. Most of the crowd didn’t notice my arrival on the stage. That was okay.

  Encore hopped off of my shoulder, growing to stand as high as my knee. He strolled forward as if raised on the stage, his nervousness from earlier a distant memory. His confidence inspired me and I poured five magic points into Radiant Winds, strumming the first few notes as Encore leaned forward and produced two circular speaker-like objects on his back where his wings would normally sprout.

  He provided an undertone, also strengthened by my Explosive Resonance. Our melodies cut through the crowd like a blade through water, and silence fell as hundreds of eyes turned towards me. Nervous doubt tickled the edge of my mind.

  I looked down at Encore. The speakers on his back reverberated with the bwuah bwuah bwuah sound he produced. I focused on him and on the song that I had played hundreds of times. It was elegant, harmonizing order and chaos. I finished the song with a flourish, sending a dozen orbs of radiant energy the size of two fists spiraling out into the room.

  The orbs flew over the crowd as the last notes echoed into silence, then drew them back and stored them in my Songcache. Acting on spontaneous inspiration I twirled as I pulled the orbs into the Songcache, enacting my lute’s Resonant Reconstruction skill to change it into a bawi. The twelve charges of Radiant Winds sank into the newly formed bawi as I finished my spin and I pulled the bachi free from behind the strings on the neck of the instrument, slamming it down as the last notes of the first song faded.

  I began performing Phantasmal Foxfire. Encore shifted his stance, swaying with the rhythm and shifting his sounds to a knock, knock knock, as I wove music that alternated between quick picks and powerful strums, sending a silver horse-sized kitsiho running in the air away from us and over the crowd.

  The kitsiho split into four humanoid shapes, and I knew which story I would tell.

  “Listen now, and hear!” I shouted, my voice riding on the waves of music and forming details in the illusions, strengthened by the instrument and by Encore’s assistance. “The tale of those most dear.”

  The four figures shifted, taking form. A proud high elven man with kind eyes and shining plate. Keen eyes staring from a beautiful high elven woman in flowing robes. A mischievous smile on the lips of a ferret beastkin. Intermingled looks of caution and trust on the face of a wood elven man.

  I lost myself in the melody, performing it perfectly again and again as I told the story of our friendship to the town of Arid Spur. The perfect performance further enhanced the illusion. I used it to tell the tale.

  We sat around a table, laughing and drinking. Every small action, every heroic deed, I memorialized in sight and sound. The words poured from me, as if siphoned by the story itself, as I told of our journey into the crypts. Hordes of undead fell to blade and flame. We fought atop rocking ships amongst black waves in the moonlight. Laughter by campfires on a campsite nestled between a desert and a grassland. Exploring Fort Ethers. I retold it all, knowing what to say, guided by magic and memory.

  I brought them back to life for an hour as I told our tales. The illusions shifted, solidified, tittered on the cusp of tangibility. History played out a second time. We adventured together, laughed together, killed together, lived together.

  I slapped the bachi against the strings one final time as I brought the song to a close. The illusion shifted and dissipated as we embraced around a campfire. The first lie of my performance, though it seemed as real as the rest. Seven adventurers standing around a fire and holding hands. It was nothing more than a flicker, then the illusion dissipated in a fine technicolor mist or magical energy.

  Tears filled my eyes, spilling down my cheeks as I enacted Resonant Reconstruction and shifted my instrument back to a lute. I glanced to my friends, those that lived. Abernathy, Katarina, and even Sebastian stared back with tears glittering in wide eyes.

  I looked around the crowd and saw hundreds of enraptured, but dry, eyes. They didn't know what had happened. How could they? I had ended the story as we camped for the night at that accursed water station. Phantasmal Foxfire was the wrong song for that. I didn’t want to remember that night with vivid illusions and spoken words.

  I plucked the first few notes of Requiem Vitae, and Encore shifted into his wisp form, drifting up in the air in front of the stage in graceful loops. He accentuated the gentle melody with twinkling chimes. I felt the song take hold of my heart, simultaneously hurting and healing. The song flowed through me, shaped by callused fingers and a callused heart that bled nonetheless. I played the entire song, hitting every note, and I could feel the energy from the song building in the crowd, a tangible surge of emotions.

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  The song ended and Encore shifted, sliding along the ground and panting heavily. He lay his head on my foot as I performed the last of the song. The last few notes drifted into a sea of silence. No one spoke. No one breathed. All was still.

  “I dedicate this performance to the beloved fallen. Gone, but not forgotten.”

  The silence lasted for another heartbeat, before being eroded in an avalanche of emotion. Dozens of overlapping exclamations mingled with sobs. I scanned the crowd. Some cheered. Many cried, either openly of into obscuring hands. Others began speaking amongst themselves with mixtures of melancholy and nostalgia.

  My friends hurried to the stage. At some point, Katarina had put that battered hat on stage. It was filled with a combination of Copper and Silver coins, with a few Gold sprinkled in — much to my surprise. She whisked it into her inventory as she walked around the stage and wrapped me in a tight hug.

  Her scent filled me. A heady mixture of floral sweetness mingled with the tang of oil. The smell of home. I hugged her back, burying my face in her neck as she did the same to me. We stood together like that for several seconds. I took another deep breath of her, and we separated. She had a small, sad smile. She whispered to me.

  “That was beautiful.”

  I saw the words more than heard them in the noisy inn. She squeezed my arms an released me, backing up and allowing Abernathy and Sebastian to hurry forward. I turned and scooped up Encore, who was still exhausted from maintaining his wisp form for the duration of the last song. He lay in my arms, limp but aware and looking around.

  Encore: Thank you. I pushed a little too far in the end there.

  Chanter: Will you me okay?

  Encore: Yes, I just need some rest. This is nice, please keep holding me like this. No, no, don’t rock me. I am not an infant. Just hold me. Thank you.

  I smiled, stroking his soft fur as Sebastian shouted to be heard over the crowd. “Wow! Chanter, man! What an incredible performance! That was fricken nuts! It was like a movie! How did you do that?”

  Several people surged forward and spoke to me at once, and the next half hour was a chaotic chain of interactions as one person after another made their way to our table to speak a few words with me. They were mostly words of thanks, or of remembrance of the lost. They told me of their lost wife's, brothers, sons, friends. I listened, happy to hear, exchanging small words of appreciation.

  The interactions showed no sign of waning after a half an hour, and I waved down Patty, who had seen to our needs with the eyes of a hawk. “I need to get some rest. We leave early in the morning. I want to meet with everyone, but…”

  “Say no more. I understand.” She replied, straightening and taking to the stage. “Listen up!”

  Her voice boomed with the familiarity that hearkened to years of speaking over drunk crowds. “Chanter’s going to be turning in soon! If you want to make your gratitude for his performance known, please do it by written note, gift, or coin. Leave it with me, and I’ll see that he gets it in the morning!”

  The crowd groaned, but the long line of people that had formed broke up. Many returned to their own tables. A few left.

  “Thank you,” I said as Patty stepped down from the stage.

  “No, thank you! Never, in all my years, have I seen a performance like that. Ask me, it was worth the room and drink for you and your friends ten times over, not counting the business you brought in. Is there anything I can do for you lot before you turn in?”

  “If you don’t mind showing us to our rooms, that would be more than enough.”

  “And maybe an ale to go.” Katarina added.

  Patty filled a mug and brought it to Katarina, who laughed and accepted, before leading us up the first flight of stairs. “We were gonna put you in a few of these rooms at first. They are good, simple rooms. But I talked to Dagut and he agreed. We ain't got no high rollers at the moment. Third floor is empty. Got four rooms up there, and they’re yours for the night.”

  She led us up the second flight of stairs as she spoke.

  “Really? Top floor rooms?” Sebastian said from behind, his voice high with shock.

  “Really. Chanter and his cute fox earned it ten times over.”

  “Thank you so much,” I replied. I couldn’t think of what else to say.

  She took out four keys and led us each to a door, leaving the key with the person that took the room. I took the last room.

  “There is a bell there,” she pointed to a bell attached to a string that went down into the floor. I had heard her say the same thing three times now. “If you need anything, anything at all, you ring that bell and I’ll come running. Any time of night, you hear? You are a high profile guest in this inn. Got it?”

  I smiled. “Got it. Thanks again, Patty. For the hospitality, for the room, for everything.”

  “You’re welcome. Goodnight. Remember the bell if you need anything.”

  “Goodnight!” I turned as she pulled the door closed behind herself, looking around the room. It was massive, taking up a quarter of the floor. The entry room had a couch, a long table that sat low to the ground, and several chairs. All of the furniture was made of tightly woven wicker. Three doorways led from the living room. The first was a large walk-in closet lined with empty shelves. The second was a bedroom. I looked at the bed and wondered how they got it into the room. It was several times larger in every dimension than the door, topped with a thick red blanket and a half dozen pillows.

  I was walking to the third door when a message popped up.

  Katarina: HOLY SHIT GUYS THEY HAVE BATH TUBS!!! CHANTER I LOVE YOU!

  Katarina: Fuck. How do you delete messages. Oh god this is embarrassing. Pls don’t take that the wrong way, Chanter. I’m just thrilled about the bath tubs.

  Chanter: So… you don’t love me?

  Katarina: Shut the fuck up. THEY HAVE BUBBLE BATH LIQUID! WHAT?!

  I laughed as I opened the third door. Sure enough, it was a bathing room. A large tub took up a quarter of the room, flanked by several shelves lined with various bottles of differently scented soap. To my amazement, they had two faucets. One had a small red stone embedded in the handle. The other had a small blue stone. I turned the red, then the blue, adjusting the temperature to a comfortable level — just above scalding.

  “Wow. For a small desert town, they have a killer inn.” I began sniffing the bottles. “Ever take a bath?”

  “Yes, my homeland is famous for hot springs, though the temperamental mountain cooked a few too many people and they were restricted for a time. I rather enjoy a hot soak.”

  “Meeee too. Come over here and help me pick out a good scent.”

  “I am fond of cherry blossom.”

  “You know what?” I picked up a pink bottle with a cluster of cherry blossom petals painted along the side. “I think we’re in luck.”