The Eagle And The Nightingales

imagine finding someone for herself as she sang those love songs of longing and loneliness. It was quite another to find herself presented with a resolution.

And yet, hadn't she wanted someone exactly like this? Well, the old Gypsy proverb advised, 'Be careful what you wish for, you might get it.' She could not have designed a better partner than T'fyrr, for they were alike enough for joy and different enough for exploration.

And, oh, doesn't that open up a number of possibilities? One can just imagine....

She fiercely shoved that little voice back into its corner. One thing at a time, she told it. We'll take one thing at a time, and the most important comes first. We must deal with the High King and finish the task we have begun, assuming it can be finished.

T'fyrr was all ready when she emerged, and he had cleaned up the room and put the bed into the wall, too. Perhaps he felt as uncomfortable with that particular piece of furniture so blatantly on display as she was.

Of course he is. He's feeling what I'm feeling, which will ensure that he feels the same! Oh, what a bother! No more polite and discreet lies just to salve his feelings! If we disagree on something, one of us will have to find a way to persuade the other, or the bad feelings will chafe between us until we are half- distracted!

They went downstairs together, to find that they were so early this morning that they were, by the standards of Freehold, still up late. The sun was just rising and the last-shift dance group performing its final number. So Tyladen would still be awake, not a bad thing, since she wanted first to speak with him. She was quite prepared to wake him, if she needed to.

Not that she was sure when he ever slept. The Deliambrens didn't seem to have the same sleep needs as humans did; she thought, perhaps, that he slept in the mid-morning hours, perhaps a little in the afternoon, but never for more than two or three hours at a time.

Of course they don't need to sleep the way we do. They don't have to sleep deeply enough for dreaming. They express their dreams and nightmares in their clothing.

Tyladen was still awake, but looked a bit surprised to have both of them strolling into his office together, and at that early hour. Nightingale shut the door firmly and put her back to it as T'fyrr leaned against the wall, giving him the advantage of looking down at the Deliambren.

'First of all, Lyrebird was attacked yesterday. She was hurt, and so was I, in trying to help her.' His face was without expression, but Nightingale knew that every word was carefully chosen. 'You might take note of the bruises, if you should happen to doubt my word.'

Nightingale had sent word down at the same time that she had ordered the food that she was indisposed; presumably, Tyladen had found a substitute singer for last night. He just nodded, mobile face solemn for a change. Then again, there wasn't much he could respond to, yet.

And he didn't know that they were together, in more than one sense.

'We have reason to believe that the attack was more of an attempt to gain control over me than because she got in the way of some gang or other,' T'fyrr continued. 'In fact, we believe that the same person who was behind the other two attacks on me here was behind the one on her.'

'That makes sense,' Tyladen said cautiously, looking from Nightingale's face to T'fyrr's, as if he was trying to put a number of disparate bits of information together and not coming up with much. 'Perhaps she ought to quit her position here, then, and move to the Palace? She doesn't precisely need to work here anymore, and surely you have_'

T'fyrr deliberately leaned over and placed both taloned hands on Tyladen's desk, scoring the surface. 'Enough of the nonsense, Tyladen! We both know why I come here! Its not because I'm savoring the nightlife, nor because I happen to enjoy this lady's playing! We both know that I would still have to come here even if the lady moved into my suite at the Palace, so that I could continue to report to you! I'm your little Palace spy, Tyladen, an unpaid spy at that, and its about time you and Harperus began giving me a bit more protection! And you might as well start offering that same protection_no, more protection_to Lyrebird!'

Tyladen didn't bat an eye; he simply put on a skeptical expression and said, 'I can't see any good reason why_'

'Because,' Nightingale interrupted him, 'my name isn't Lyrebird. It's Nightingale_Nightingale of the Free Bards and the Getan Gypsies. And I've been working here on behalf of the Deliambrens without any support since I arrived.'

For the first time in her life, Nightingale actually saw expressions of shock, dismay and surprise pass across a Deliambren face. And for the first time in her life, she saw one caught at a loss for words. Tyladen sat in his chair with his mouth half open; his lips twitched, but he couldn't seem to get any words out.

It would be funny, if the situation weren't so serious. He looked exactly like a stunned catfish.