The Eagle And The Nightingales

The little bright dot that was supposed to represent T'fyrr was just a little to the left of center_a dot that had not appeared on this 'screen' the other times she had used the device.

She smiled tightly; he was here. Getting him out_well, she would save the rejoicing for the moment that happened. She pressed the thumb-point again, and a set of numbers appeared.

Roughly fifteen feet below her; that would put him in the top floor, just below the attics. That made sense; they were probably thinking of him as a big bird. They wouldn't want to put him in a basement where he might catch a chill and die of shock. In these town mansions, unlike those in the country, the master and mistress had their private rooms at the top of the house, where you might get a breath of a breeze in the summer, and where all the heat rose in the winter. In a town mansion like this, the rooms at street level, next to the kitchens, were ovens themselves in the summer, and in winter, no amount of fuel kept them warm.

Her heart had led her here; it had once been a wealthy district, with huge homes showcasing the wealth of their owners. Now the area was shabby-genteel at best, and whoever lived here was usually out of favor, the tag- end of a once-prosperous family now running out of money, or the last of a long line dying out. As the homes were lost to their original owners, they were bought by other, less 'genteel' folk. She knew of at least three brothels here, and more ominously, one of the houses was rumored to belong to a dealer in illegal goods_very illegal, because someone had to die in order for those particular 'goods' to come on the market.

She had hoped she had the right district when she realized that mages tended to need buildings with a great deal of space to practice their art. She knew she had the right district when her street- urchins traced the blood and feathers showing up on the mage-market to this very area. People really didn't pay any attention to what children overheard.

If we survive this, perhaps I shall set up an information service and live off the results of that.

That was when she sent Maddy to Tyladen for one of the devices she had asked for. She herself had not gone back to Freehold since the guards arrived. Freehold would be watched_but she had a secure hiding place in Father Ruthvere's steeple, and others scattered elsewhere across the city. She had money sewn into the money belt she never took off except to sleep, and then kept beneath her pillow. She could look like whatever kind of woman she chose, and she was familiar with the 'bad' parts of Lyonarie. No guard or militia from the Palace could find her here if she did not want to be found.

The child returned with this, a set of closely written instructions, and the other child that Nightingale had asked her to find.

That was all she had been waiting for. She had waited until dark, then began scaling the walls and getting onto the rooftops of every likely building in the area_with help. She was not a thief, and she could not have done this alone, but she had the help of someone who was more at home on the rooftops of Lyonarie than beneath them. It was safer to operate this thing from above than from below. There was less chance of being seen, for one, and she really didn't want to be caught loitering out in the street with this bizarre-looking thing in her hands.

I don't believe I can claim it is a musical instrument.

Thanks to the fact that even here there was very little space between the buildings, and to the fact that her accomplice had some quite remarkable climbing and bridging devices at his disposal, she had mostly been able to scramble from roof to roof. That further limited her time on the ground; a good thing, even if it was hair-raisingly risky to pick her way across strange rooftops in the middle of the night.

She put the device away, and considered her options.

He is in the middle of the building, probably in a closet, as far as possible from a window. Now, how do I tell what room that closet belongs to?

A scrabbling of tiny hands and feet across the slates signaled the arrival of her partner in crime and guide across these heights. ' 'E 'ere?' whispered Tam, the chimney-sweep, a boy about thirteen years old, but as thin as one of his brushes and with the stature of a nine-year-old.

'Right below me, just about,' she whispered back. 'I'm certain they're keeping him in a closet, but how do I tell which room it's in?'

He chuckled. 'Easy, mum. By chimbleys. This 'un like drops down inter th' room ye want.' He patted it fondly, the way a driver would pat the neck of his horse. 'These big ol 'ouses, they got fireplaces fer ever' room. Wants I should go look?'

Before she could stop him, he had clambered nimbly up the side of the chimney, and slid down inside it.

She waited, numb with shock, expecting at any moment to hear the commotion from below that meant he'd been spotted and seized.

Nothing.

Then, off to the side, a faint whistle, the song of a nightingale.