The Eagle And The Nightingales

The Deliambren crossed his arms over his chest, his dour expression reflecting a smoldering anger beneath the stoic surface. 'I told him about your vanishing, the warrants that he had signed, the attacks and the kidnapping. I told him that now that the warrants had been signed, by his hand, neither you nor Nightingale had any protection or rights under the law. He was very_stunned.'

T'fyrr only growled; he had lost all patience with the once-great High King about the time his captors had pulled out his third primary.

I am not entirely certain I even want to help him now....

'I told him the Church had you in sanctuary,' Harperus continued, 'convinced that both of you were innocent of any wrongdoing. And I showed him how all those things that you had been hinting at were true, all the abuses of nonhumans, all the things that had been happening to human and nonhumans alike. I guessed that he might have been so thoroughly shaken up that he might actually listen instead of dismissing it all.'

'Well, was he?' T'fyrr asked. It would take a miracle_

But evidently that miracle had occurred. 'Enough to issue orders immediately revoking the warrants on you two, and to take the Seneschal and a gaggle of secretaries into a corner and start drafting interkingdom edicts granting basic rights to all peoples of all species,' Harperus said with a note of triumph. But his triumph faded immediately. 'That was when, according to the Seneschal, that mysterious woman struck. He called for breakfast; it arrived, and with it a lace handkerchief and a message. Theovere picked it up, opened it, and read it before any of the bodyguards even thought to look at it first_and he collapsed on the spot.' Harperus shook his head. 'I looked at him, and I'm baffled. There's no contact poison I know of that would work that way, and he shows no other signs of poisoning other than being in a coma no one can wake him from.'

T'fyrr looked aghast at Nightingale, who only nodded, her lips compressed into a thin line. 'If our enemy can hire mages to pluck T'fyrr from the sky, she can certainly hire a mage to write a note-spell to try to disable or kill Theovere. There was nothing on the note when they looked at it, right?'

'Right,' Harperus replied, looking at Nightingale with respect and a little awe. 'But it didn't kill him_'

'It doesn't have to,' she pointed out. 'If he is in a coma, he could stay that way indefinitely. The Advisors can reign as joint Regents on the pretense that someday he might wake up. This could go on for years. Come to think of it, that's better than killing him for their purposes. If a new High King was selected, they'd all be out of their positions.'

'But what can we do?' T'fyrr asked, puzzlement overlaid with despair. Now_we have no choice. Nightingale and I may have a day or so to escape while our enemies obtain new warrants for us, but what of all the nonhumans in the Twenty Kingdoms? What is there left for them but to gather what they can and flee? 'We are not physicians, and even if we were, surely the King's own doctors know best what is good for him.'

'The King's doctors are as baffled as I am,' Harperus replied. 'And I am baffled by the message I received less than an hour ago.' He raised his eyebrows and looked straight at Nightingale as if he suspected her of some duplicity. 'The messenger seemed human or Deliambren, but had_unusual eyes and ears. And he spoke in riddles.'

The corner of Nightingale's mouth twitched. 'Go on,' she said. 'That sounds like an Elf to me. I happen to know there's one_ah_in the area.'

In answer, Harperus handed her a piece of paper. She took it, and read it aloud for the benefit of T'fyrr and Father Ruthvere.

''Tell the Bird of Night and the Bird of the King that the High King can be sung back from the darkness in which he wanders, if the guard-dog is released to return to his home. Half of the futures hold Theovere high, half of them hold him fallen. If the two Birds should sing to him as one, hearts bound, wrongs remembered but not cherished, their enemies may be confounded. No Elf, nor human mage, nor brightly-conceited artificer can command the power to accomplish this, for this is the magic of the heart and the Sight.''

'I'm not certain I care for that 'brightly conceited,' part,' Harperus muttered under his breath. Nightingale must have heard him anyway, for she treated him to an upraised eyebrow.

'Does this mean that Nightingale and I have_the ability to sing him out of this?' T'fyrr said incredulously. 'But how?'

'It was accomplished by magic,' Nightingale pointed out. 'It's possible that magic can undo it. There might even be a mage somewhere inside his mind, holding him unconscious; if that's the case, Bardic Magic could reach Theovere in a way no other magic could duplicate_or block.'

T'fyrr thought about that for a moment, and nodded. 'I believe that I see,' he said, and roused what was left of his feathers with a hearty shake before straightening up and holding his head high. 'Those in a coma are said to understand what happens around them. We must go, of course_'

'Wait a moment!' Harperus objected, blocking the door. 'I haven't told you the rest of it. If you flee now, you'll be outrunning warrants that won't ever have a chance to catch up with you before you cross a nonhuman border. If you stay, try, and don't succeed_the Advisors are spreading the rumor that Nightingale is the female assassin and in the hire of T'fyrr. They're saying as proof of this that there was no trouble until T'fyrr