You do not cry, said the teacher, a man with a voice that was more comforting than sunlight.

Ansset shook his head. Sometimes, he said.

Before, answered the teacher. But now you will learn Control. When you cry you waste your songs. You burn up your songs. You drown your songs.

Songs? asked Ansset.

You are a little pot full of songs, said the teacher, and when you cry, the pot breaks and all the songs spill out ugly. Control means keeping the songs in the pot, and letting them out one at a time.

Ansset knew pots. Food came from a pot. He thought of songs as food, then, besides knowing they were music.

Do you know any songs? asked the teacher.

Ansset shook his head.

Not any? Not any songs at all?

Ansset looked down.

Ansset, songs. Not words. Just a song that has no words but you just sing, like this, Ah-- and the teacher sang a short stretch of melody that spoke to Ansset and said, Trust, Trust, Trust.

Ansset smiled. He sang the same melody back to the teacher. For a moment the teacher smiled, then looked startled, then reached out with wondering eyes and touched Ansset's hair. The gesture was kind. And so Ansset sang the love song to the teacher. Not the words, because he had no memory for words yet. But he sang the melody as Rruk had sung it to him, and the teacher wept. It was Ansset's first lesson on his first day at the Songhouse, and the teacher wept. He did not understand until later that this meant that the teacher had lost Control and would be ashamed for weeks until Ansset's gifts were more fully appreciated. He only knew that when he sang the love song, he was understood.