all you’d ‘ave to do is go look for yourself, mate. You ‘ave
the keys, and we ain’t ‘ardly goin’ to dig our way out o’
this cell while you’re gone.”
‘ ‘That is true.” The jailer started for the stairs. ‘ ‘Do not
get any funny ideas. You cannot cut through the bars, and
there is no one else here but me.”
“Oh, we ain’t goin’ anywhere, we ain’t,” Mudge insisted.
“By the way,” Jon-Tom added offhandedly, “as long as
you’re going upstairs, maybe you could do something for
us? This is an awfully dank and somber place. A little
music would do a lot to lighten it up. Surely working
down here day after day, the atmosphere must get pretty
depressing after a while.”
“No, it does not,” said the porcupine as he ascended
the stairs. “I like it dank and somber and quiet, though I
would be interested in hearing the kind of mxisic you could
play. You see, Chenelska told me you were a spellsinger.”
Jon-Tom’s heart sank. “Not really. I’m more of an
apprentice. I don’t know enough yet to really spellsing. I
just like to make music.”
“Nonetheless, I cannot take the chance.”
“Wait!” Jon-Tom called desperately. “If you know
what spellsinging’s all about, then surely you know that a
spellsinger can’t make magic without his instrument.”
“That is so.” The porcupine eyed him warily.
“Well then, how about this? You bring down my duar,
my instrument, but after you give it to me you chain my
hands so I can’t pull them back through these bars. That
way if I tried to sing anything that sounded dangerous to
you, you could yank the duar away from me before I could