He feels an open summons and lets it grab him -
"I am King Eoppa of Bernicia, and that"—he gestures toward the unconscious crowned man in the back seat—"is Arthur of Britain.
I do plan to release you unharmed, but only after you agree to stop attacking your neighbors. Don't worry, they're getting the same deal. I'm not even going to make you swear fealty to me, but do remember that the thing about not fighting is backed up with overwhelming force."
King Muirchertach isn't paying attention. He's clinging to the fairy.
Cam glances at "King Eoppa", but doesn't verbally comment on the deception.
"I heard you the first time. Why do you care if I raid the Britons?"
"I happen to think it's better for all England if kingdoms rise and fall for reasons other than who's best at throwing rocks at each other. To that end, you will accept the allegiance of any provinces that want to join your empire, and allow any of yours to join someone else's. Or else: Daeva. Got that?"
Muirchertach has got that, but doesn't accept yet. He's still petting.
Cam murmurs very quietly in Hank's ear: "He doesn't trust her unbound yet. That doesn't mean he couldn't decide later to go ahead and try summoning a maker or a changer, just as loose as I am and probably not as nice."
"Doesn't it? He doesn't trust her unbound yet, let alone someone who's both a stranger and even more dangerous. I'm not going to say there's no risk, but this has been going on for decades at least, apocalypse-free."
"He likes the status quo. If all his vassals leave and even unbinding his fairy doesn't fix it to his liking?"
"OK, so it could conceivably happen. But if we need that level of certainty, wouldn't we have to kill him? The only other option would be imprisoning or re-binding the mover, and if anything that would only make him more likely to get desperate."
"I'm thinking bug him. Although given how he's acting with that girl it might be awkward to have someone staff the surveillance feed."
"Ideally we'd have some way to listen only to summoning-related conversations, but it's still better than the alternatives. I vote do it."
"Voice recog could theoretically do it but I don't think I have any software that knows this era's Gaelic. Just listening won't cut it, though, he can draw without saying a word."
"You mean a camera? That sounds extremely distasteful." He glances at the pair. "Is there something that can keep track of whether he's drawing?"
"Nnnnot really. Even if I set something up attached to his hand nothing says he has to draw with his hands."
"I'm open to other suggestions, but this guy knows how to summon daeva and is not about to be very kindly disposed towards us."
"I ran out of ideas at dismissing and re-binding her."
"That could still work. She could surveil him without so much awkwardness about his personal life. We keep a close eye on him for now, and - you got married, right? I will assume here that you didn't pick somebody random without redeeming qualities. We mail your wife instructions on how to summon me. The fairy is informed that if she, or any other summon belonging to her king or people he teaches, produces a daeva who causes trouble, even if they manage to kill you, I show up and start bumping summoners off. Once this is set up we can leave them more to their own devices, and then we're at least set up for damage control if anything smaller-scale than 'wrecking most of Europe' happens?"
And probably tell more people as well. Summoning itself may be secret, but there are any number of people I'd trust with 'if I die, draw this on the floor.'
What if our Irish friends do the same? Everyone starts killing anyone who might be a summoner?"
"Our Irish friends know way less about summoning - for now, anyway, I suppose they could get lucky and find someone who knows as much as I do or is willing to go fetch a book on it and translate - you know what we could do that doesn't involve killing him that'd neutralize his summoning capabilities is keep this guy in space in zero-gravity. No floor to draw on, no summons. Not exactly pleasant, and if we left him his fairy friend she could haul them to the planet lickety-split..."
If they spread around even that one diagram, and want revenge, I'm quite confident in a clever mover's ability to wreak havoc while staying close to a summoner."
"What are you whispering about?" the mover asks. "You're not forgetting about the capsule, are you?"
"The capsule's intact," says Cam. "We're talking about how to make sure you two don't make mischief. Any bright ideas?"
"All you want is a - a non-aggression pact, right?"
But those we can enforce with daeva. The mischief we're worrying about involves summons."
"I only know the one circle." Muirchertach didn't hear the last time this came up. "I already can't summon and bind anyone else."
"That you have persisted in this state of mediocre education this long is already kind of miraculous," says Cam.
"No, but - well, I'm disinclined to make suggestions. Options for making very sure that you can't summon anybody else and wreak havoc, or teach other people to do it efficaciously, include lots of things that would be unpleasant for you in various ways. But maybe we can just operate in good faith."
"Since my head is still attached to my body, there's obviously something you want me to do. If that just means not trying any dangerous summons, I was already going to do that."