Playing the Horned Lyre

For Spooktober 2024, word "horned"

Kayvin woke suddenly, breath coming fast, heart pounding, blankets and furs flung back against the walls of his sleeping pit. He could not remember the nightmare which had wakened him. He knew it had ice, crystalline shards piercing him with biting cold and hot pain, ice entrapping him so that he could not move, must lie in eternal prison with spears through his torso—

He jerked sharply to the side, rolling into himself as if he were back in his egg. He inhaled for a long count of six, held his breath for four, exhaled for six, repeated. He closed his eyes against the dark and made himself see the numbers as he counted, black ink against textured paper, pulling each sheet aside to count up as he inhaled, laying them down again as he exhaled.

He sat up, his pulse still fierce in his chest but no longer deafening. He needed music.

He got up from the sleeping pit and walked half-dressed through the moonlight to the cabinet where he kept small instruments. He selected a horned lyre and padded back to his bed. The deep pit would keep the sound mostly to himself, if he played quietly.

At first he played an old tune, a fragment of folk song with a progression he had always liked, just to get his stiffened fingers moving. Then he began picking out a new melody, letting the notes come to him singly, the rhythm irregular and imperfect as he experimented. After a few moments he began repeating, choosing the best from the variations which came to him and setting them in order, picking a refrain, linking the bars together.