INTERLUDE THREE

I have always loved to sing, to play… and, especially, to dance.

Even when I was a toddler, the rhythm of music compelled me like nothing else, and the uncertain stumbling of a child would fade, as I instinctually moved in time to whatever I heard.

Music was a part of my education, and the one that made me happiest: I danced in the hallways and corridors; I danced on the terraces and patios; I danced in my father's audience chamber and my mother's sitting room. And in all these places, I sang.

Why sit still, when you could move? Why abide silence, or even speech, when you could fill a room with song?

But more than just enjoying the freedom of music, I learned its discipline. A thousand melodies and steps from a hundred different worlds… and each I mastered more easily than most children learn to clap their hands.

Thus, years later, when I had been taken and trained in the… less polite… arts, there were many things I didn't have to learn.

I already knew them better than the teachers they provided.

It was a mixed blessing: I had less time before being pushed onto the stage, both literally and figuratively.

But, once there, I was clearly something special…

…and everyone knew it.

Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three