The Eagle And The Nightingales

She found a page to show her to T'fyrr's rooms, in plenty of time to use his bathroom and change into the gown she had brought with her. He was pacing the floor when she arrived, and turned to greet her with relief and disappointment.

Another sign of how we are bound, now; I know his feelings without needing to try to interpret his expression. The relief was because she was early; the disappointment he made clear enough.

'Theovere hasn't changed,' he said as she asked him how they had been received yesterday. 'He still hasn't done anything any differently. I don't understand_'

Before he could say anything any further, she seized his hand and drew him into the bedroom, away from the odd devices she recognized as Deliambren listening devices. She did not want the Deliambrens to know about the Bardic magic_at least, she did not want them to know that she was exercising it. They already knew there was something like it, of course, and they knew, from the results she got, that she used it. They might put 'magic' and 'harpist' together and come up with 'Nightingale.'

'Don't be impatient,' she told him as his tail-feathers twitched a little from side to side and he shook his wings out. 'Even with the magic, this is going to take time. For one thing, we didn't have the chance to select songs that would channel his mind in the direction we wanted it to go. For another, we are trying to change something that took several years to establish; we aren't going to do that overnight.'

He opened his beak, then shut it abruptly, as if he had suddenly seen what she was talking about.

'Besides, you aren't in the special Council sessions,' she continued. 'You have no access to the one place where he actually gets things done and issues real orders. You have no idea how he is speaking or acting within them. If I were the King_'

She let the nebulous thought take a more concrete form, then spoke. 'If I were the King, and I began to take up the reins of my duty again_I would know that I would have to be careful about it. The Advisors aren't going to like the changes we're trying to bring about in him, and they are powerful people. He can oppose them in small things successfully, but_' She shook her head. 'He was a very clever man, and I don't think that cleverness is gone. He was also a very observant man, and he must realize what has been going on. If I were the King, with my sense of duty reawakened, I would start working my will in very small things, taking back my power gradually, and hopefully by the time they realized what I was doing, it would be too late. And I would be very, very careful that I didn't seem to act any differently.'

T'fyrr nodded then. 'In a way, since he has let the power slip from his hands, Theovere has less power than any of them. Is that what you are saying?'

'More or less.' She moved back into the other room with its insidious little listening devices. 'Well, more to the point, what are we performing today? If you have anything that I don't know, I can probably pick it up with a little rehearsal.'

'Which you have cleverly provided time for by arriving early.' His beak opened in that Haspur equivalent of a smile, and she warmed with his pleasure in her company and her cleverness. 'Well, here is the list I had thought we might perform.'

He brought out a written list, which was thoughtful of him, and was what she would have done in his place. Armed with that, she was able to suggest alternatives to several of the songs she did not yet know, which left them enough time for her to pick up the melodies to the most important of the rest.

This time, she was no longer so tired that the white marble corridors blurred, one into the other, like the halls in a nightmare. She had a chance to make some mental notes as she walked beside him, his talons clicking oddly on the marble floor.

Did I have a nightmare involving these halls last night? Something about looking for T'fyrr in an endless series of corridors, all alike, all filled with strangers? Yes, and I kept finding single feathers, broken or pulled out at the roots_could you actually do that with feathers that long and strong? But I never found him, only rooms full of more strangers staring at me and saying nothing.

She didn't care much for the statuary, though. It all had a remarkable sameness to it, mannered and smug, beautifully carved and lifeless.

Rather like the Guild versions of our ballads, actually.

Was there a sculptors version of a Bardic Guild? From the looks of these statues, she suspected there must be.

Theovere wasn't responsible for this, though; she had seen his suite and knew for a fact that he had better taste than to order anything like this statuary.

Huh. A Deliambren has better taste than this.

Some other High King_or more likely, some other servants of some other High King were responsible. The King had probably waved his hand and ordered that the austere corridors be decorated, and lo_

There were statues by the gross.