Then a fierce eagle stooped, and landed brutally on the hart's back. Zymas saw at once what he must do. He took the eagle in his hands, turned it upside down, and thrust its feet under the hart. The talons reached and seized, spanning the wound, binding the edges together far more firmly than the rat's teeth. Then, still upside down, the eagle devoured the rat, every bit. The stag was saved because Zymas had set the eagle in its place.
"Palicrovol," said the voice, and Zymas knew it meant the eagle.
"Nasilee," said the eagle, and Zymas knew it meant the rat.
Nasilee was the name of the King. Palicrovol was the name of the Count of Traffing. Zymas awoke then, and lay awake the rest of the night.
Before dawn he took his fifty men and went to the village, and in moments the people had surrendered. The patriarch of the little village tried to explain why the taxes had gone unpaid, but Zymas had heard the excuses a thousand times. He did not hear the old man. He did not hear the moans of the women, the crying of the children. He only saw that each one stood before him with the face of a great old stag, and he knew that his dream had not come to him by chance.
"Men," he said, and all heard his voice, though he did not shout.
"Zymas," they answered. They called him by his unadorned name because he had made it nobler than any title they might have given him.
"Nasilee gnaws at the belly of Burland like a rat, and we, we are his teeth."
Puzzled, they did not know how to respond.
"Does the true King hang these helpless ones?"
Unsure what kind of test Zymas was posing, one of the men said, "Yes?"
"Perhaps he does," Zymas said, "but if he is the true King, then I will follow a false King who is