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sanctuary by force. You won't need to stay awake to avoid arrest. All you need to do is get
your strength back."
Nightingale sighed with relief and let down her guard. Weariness came over her then,
so potent it left her dizzy.
Fortunately they were not supposed to go up to the top of the belltower for one
thing, when the bells rang they would have risked deafness or even death up there. No,
there was a well-insulated tiring room at the base of the tower that they would be living
in for the next few days at the very least. It had a staircase that led directly up to the top
of the tower, so that once T'fyrr grew his feathers back a matter of two or three weeks,
at a guess he would have free access to one of the better take-off points in this district.
If he had to fly out, and he left at night, no one would ever know.
The two of them staggered into the tiring room to find that Father Ruthvere had been
there before them, laying out bedding, wash water and a basin, even food. One set of
bedding.
But by the time they reached the doorway, they were so tired that all they cared
about was the bedding. They literally collapsed into it, Nightingale only a fraction of a
heartbeat behind T'fyrr, and curled up together in a comforting tangle of limbs. She pulled
the blankets up over them both, as much to hide the sad state of his feathers as for
warmth.
He was asleep first; she listened to his regular breathing and allowed herself to weep,
very quietly, with relief and joy. Not many tears, but enough that she had to wipe her face
with a corner of a blanket before she was through. That released the last of her tension;
she had only two thoughts before slumber caught her.
We are as surely in prison here as in the gaol. We cannot leave without being taken
by our enemies. We have been caged at last.
It doesn't matter as long as we are together.
T'fyrr would never have known how long he slept if Father Ruthvere hadn't told him.
"Three days?" he said incredulously. "Three days?"
The Priest nodded, and T'fyrr shook his head. "I believe you, but "
"Well, you woke up long enough to eat and ahem," Father Ruthvere said, blushing.
"But other than that, you slept. Nightingale, too," he added as an afterthought. "Though
she stayed awake a bit longer than you did."
Probably healing me. That would account for how well I feel and the memories of
music in my dreams.
T'fyrr sighed and roused his feathers. "Well, what has been happening? Are we still
under siege?" he asked. "Or are our enemies satisfied to have us bottled up and out of the
way?"
Father Ruthvere played with his prayer beads. "The latter, I suspect," he said after a
moment. "You obviously cannot press charges against your captors since you are a
fugitive yourself, and as for Nightingale " He shrugged. "The nonhumans are in an
uproar, but there is no one to lead them and Theovere "
"And Theovere is near death."
They all turned as one, T'fyrr feeling the blood draining from his skin and leaving him
cold everywhere there were no feathers.
Harperus stood in the door to the tiring room, face drawn and as pale as his hair, his
costume little more than a pair of plain trews and an embroidered shirt. "Thank the Stars
you're awake at last," he said without preamble, as both Nightingale and T'fyrr stared at
him, trying to make some sort of sense out of his first statement. "Theovere was attacked
and is in a coma, his physicians are baffled " He held up his hands as T'fyrr mantled
what was left of his wings in anger. "Wait, let me tell this from the beginning."
T'fyrr subsided. "Make it short, Old Owl," he rumbled. "None of your damned
Deliambren meanderings!"
Harperus nodded. "Shortly, then. The marvelous music box broke down completely
this morning, and no amount of fiddling by Lord Levan would get it working again. The
High King sent pages looking for you, and found me instead, and I gave him an earful."
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
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