In addition, he had been present at several private meetings between the King and his Advisors, in his capacity as the King's Personal Musician. He'd heard quite a bit there, too. He just hadn't realized that it meant anything.
"I believe I know what you need," he said. "There are several of the King's Advisors who are against the expedition, but they have not been showing their hands openly."
"Yes!" Tyladen exclaimed. "And we couldn't tell how the King himself really feels about it."
T'fyrr coughed. "Oh, the King_well, he is very enamored with your technology, though he refers to it as 'Deliambren magic.' He would like to have still more of your little wonders, and as long as he has that desire, he will be swayed in favor of letting you have anything you want, within reason. However_the Advisors are not the only problem you have to deal with."
"They aren't?" Tyladen looked puzzled.
"You forget," T'fyrr said, trying not to sound bitter, "how much these people are herded by the opinions of their religious leaders. There are several of them who are not happy with your 'magic' and are quietly lobbying the King against it. They are not necessarily the ones who are against nonhumans, by the way."
The Deliambren's eyebrows rose sharply. "Ah! I see! Yes, the religious leaders who hate and fear nonhumans are depressingly easy to recognize, but I had not realized that there were others who might be against technology."
T'fyrr snorted. "Think about it. Your ways have the potential to prove some of their assertions are a pile of mutes and castings, and that would be bad for their business. Of course they fear you! Now, since I know what it is that you need, let me name you some names."
He closed his eyes and brought up faces and attitudes in his mind's eye, then began to recite all that he knew. In the background, he was vaguely aware of a faint hum that was probably one of the recording-crystal devices at work, and of a steady tapping, which might mean that Tyladen was taking notes in some other way. He was rather surprised at the sheer volume of information he had, really. It wasn't only the King's Advisors who were important, it was also the factions with whom they were involved.
All of those factions were represented by people, and all of those people had names, descriptions, attitudes_weaknesses that could be exploited, perhaps_likes and dislikes.
He had to stop, rest and enjoy some cool water more than once in the course of his recitation. It all took a very long time, even for someone like him. His people relied on oral history before they met the Deliambrens, and as a consequence they were very good at organizing their memories. Still, it took time to get everything out, and when he was finished, he was well aware that it was very late.
"That was fabulous," Tyladen said with admiration as he tapped a few more things into some sort of device on his desk and slipped the device itself into a drawer. "You are going to prove to be a lot more useful than you thought, I'm sure of it. This is all information none of our human agents were high enough to obtain."
"I hope you are correct," T'fyrr told him sincerely. "I was not as sanguine about this position of mine as Harperus was; I simply did not see what a simple musician could learn that would make any difference to all of us."
It was the Deliambren's turn to snort. "Well, most 'simple musicians' can't hear a mouse squeak five hundred sdaders away, either. You're overhearing far more than anyone has any reason to believe. Don't let them know that, whatever you do."
"I won't!" T'fyrr hastened to assure him. "My safety lies in that, as I know all too well! Don't think for a moment that I am not aware of that."
"Good." Tyladen pushed himself away from his desk. "I need to go into the back and transmit all this home. Can you see yourself out? Oh_you can feel free to stay a while if you want. I left orders that whatever you ask for is no charge."
After all that_hmph. I should hope so. Then T'fyrr chided himself for the uncharitable thought and thanked his host. "Perhaps I will. Right now, I should like just a drink of something for my throat, and then I will look around a little, perhaps."
"Whatever." The Deliambren opened a door in an apparently blank wall. "Enjoy yourself." He slipped inside, and the door closed behind him, leaving, again, an apparently blank wall.
Evidently Tyladen literally meant for T'fyrr to show himself out. And evidently he trusted T'fyrr not to snoop around in the office, either.
Not that it was any kind of a temptation, no more than it had been a temptation to snoop in Harperus' exotic travel-wagon. If this had been a library full of music recordings, perhaps, but there was nothing likely to be in this office that would hold even a hint of interest for T'fyrr.
Not unless there is something on the personal records of the musicians here_
No. No, he would not try to look up Nightingale to see what had brought her here. That would be rude.
But he could go out and at least listen to her sing without revealing his presence. That wouldn't hurt anything or anyone.
Maybe, if the opportunity presented itself, he could find a way to contact her discreetly, privately. A note or a message, perhaps.
So with that thought in mind, he opened the door and walked out into the main room, which was once again crowded with dancers, preoccupied with the idea of seeing his friend again, and a little surprised at the pleasure that gave him.
It can't be T'fyrr. But how can it not be? It must be_but how can it be him? The thoughts circled one another in her head, mutually antagonistic. For a while, Nightingale was so taken aback by the appearance of a Haspur who could be T'fyrr's twin that she didn't pay a great deal of attention to the customers as people, only as her audience. That is, she reacted to them and paid attention to the way in which they reacted to her, but as a group, not as individuals.
And she also wasn't watching them for potential trouble. She used to keep a careful eye on every person in her audiences when she was on the road, because she never knew who or what was going to cause a problem for her. Sometimes trouble came from someone who just happened to be offended by the lyrics of a particular song; sometimes it came from a more obvious source, a drunk, or a person who had arrived with his own set of prejudices riding his shoulders like a pack. She had gotten out of the habit of looking for problems in her audience since she'd been here, and maybe that wasn't such a good thing....
It wasn't until her second set was over that she shook herself out of her reverie and began that kind of "watching" that was normally second nature and due entirely to a Free Bard's healthy sense of self-preservation. Even when trouble erupted around a Free Bard, it generally came to include the Free Bard, even if it hadn't been intended to.