Please tell me this is some kind of really weird joke.

  Dwynfel: “You can’t be serious…”

  Kiyui: “Why not?”

  Dwynfel: “How the hell are we supposed to infiltrate the Anubis empire and rescue this kid exactly? The empire is insane… their army is massive… the only reason they haven’t advanced north and taken over this whole area is because we allied ourselves with the Equines. They could wipe out the whole area… you told me all of this yourself when we were travelling to the Violet Forest. Why would he even ask you to do this? Surely, he must know how dangerous this is.”

  Kiyui looked pensive. He seems to really care about this Annis guy.

  Kiyui: “He is desperate. Petri is not a pleasant man. I dislike Gustav, but Petri is a thousand times worse. Petri is a full-on sadist. And he does not refrain from indulging in his proclivities with children. And I do not mean teenagers or even kids in the beginnings of puberty. I mean small children, toddlers… babies. The man will abuse anybody, and take sick pleasure in it. Now, imagine knowing all of that, and finding out that your son has been assigned to him as a slave. You would resort to anything.”

  Dwynfel: “Then surely, he would have tried to do this himself by now. He’s already in the empire. He is in a much better position to rescue his son.”

  Kiyui: “Because the Anubi are kept track of at all times. They are the pride of the royal family. If he were to disappear, he would be hunted down. His son would instantly be put under watch; he would have no way of getting to him. And even if he did somehow manage to get to his son, security in the empire is so extreme that he would never be able to get out of the city, never mind escape to a safe place.”

  Dwynfel: “Given everything that you have just said… what on earth makes you that we can somehow rescue this kid?”

  Kiyui turned to me and gave me a devious smile… which is something I’ve only seen him do before when suggesting something of a sexual nature. I’m really hoping he doesn’t have a plan that involves some crazy sexual nonsense…

  Kiyui: “Well, we have a rare opportunity. Petri is taking a small force north to raid Purresia for slaves. The royals never travel anywhere without their personal Anubis with them. So, they will both be out of the empire and vulnerable.”

  Dwynfel: “Should we not be more concerned with the fact that they are raiding your home for slaves?”

  Kiyui: “We use that as a distraction. We warn the Purresians and help them defend against the raid, while a small group go to the prince’s camp and rescue Annis’ son.”

  I have to hand it to him… he has put some thought into this… but…

  Dwynfel: “But if we rescue the boy won’t they just hunt him down like you said? Or worse… blame the Purresians and attack them?”

  Kiyui smile got bigger and a gleam appeared in his eye. Whatever he has in mind he is clearly very proud of it.

  Kiyui: “Ha ha, now this is the clever bit. We frame the lizardmen.”

  Dwynfel: “What?”

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  Kiyui: “The Viridescent clan to be specific.”

  Oh gods… this is going to get complicated, isn’t it?

  Dwynfel: “How exactly do we do that?”

  Kiyui: “While most of their group is out attacking Purresia. You and Damecus go to the prince’s camp. Annis gave me the location where they will be setting it up. We cover Damecus in tribal markings and put him in a big skull mask or something, have him go on a rampage through the camp, shouting on about the viridescent clan the whole time. While they are distracted, you sneak in, kill the prince, find the boy, and give him to Damecus. With most of the people in camp injured or dead, Damecus makes sure that he is witnessed carrying the boy away to the east. The survivors will assume that the lizardmen have taken him and when the failed slave raiding party returns, they won’t have enough men to go after them. It will be more important for them to return the prince’s body to the empire.”

  Dwynfel: “And what if they launch a campaign against the lizardmen for killing their prince?”

  Kiyui: “The king has many sons. I doubt he will care enough to compromise his great army to go on a campaign against a force that he doesn’t know he can defeat. From what I have been told, he isn’t exactly a caring father. Probably why all his sons are so fucked up. And even if he does launch a campaign against them, the Viridescent clan are intent of dominion over the area anyway, somebody setting out to kill them wouldn’t exactly be a bad thing.”

  This could actually work… we’d need to work out specifics… attack formations… how best to defend Purresia… we’d need to get Damecus to agree… which probably won’t be difficult… he hates the Viridescent clan. We need to travel to the east anyway to give Flora’s mask to Svampe… the travel time of doing that may actually allow us to avoid a degree of aftermath as well.

  Dwynfel: “That is a very good plan, Kiyui. When did you come up with all of that?”

  Kiyui: “When I was waiting for you two to wake up. You two looked so peaceful that I didn’t want to wake you, so I used to time to think.”

  Dwynfel: “Well, I’m impressed. Just one question… what do we do with this kid after we rescue him? Does he have a mother we can return him to?”

  Kiyui: “Annis is his mother.”

  Dwynfel: “You said Annis was his father.”

  Kiyui: “He’s both.”

  I swear he is just trying to confuse me.

  Dwynfel: “What?”

  Kiyui: “The Anubi are all hermaphrodites.”

  Dwynfel: “I have no idea what that means.”

  Kiyui: “They have both male and female genitalia.”

  Dwynfel: “And he impregnated himself?”

  Kiyui: “Yes. The reason why the royals of the Anubis Empire are so obsessed with them is because the Anubi do not pass on their own traits to their children when mating with other species. All of the princes look almost exactly like the king. The royal family uses the Anubi for breeding purposes. When a new prince is born an Anubi is forced to impregnate himself in order to create a butler for the new prince that will grow with him and spend his life serving him.”

  Dwynfel: “Then why does this fully grown Petri have a child for a butler?”

  Kiyui looked down and became quite saddened.

  Kiyui: “This is his third butler. The last two died at sixteen and fourteen. He likes to keep them… young.”

  Fucking hell…

  Kiyui: “Annis’ son is only five. We have to get him out of there.”

  Dwynfel is not a fan of his new fame... and he definitely dislikes that everyone thinks him part of some ancient prophecy. He is even more disturbed by the quite frankly insane lives of the upper classes that he has gained insight into recently. He hopes that aiding Kiyui in the rescue of his friend's son will provide him with a welcome distraction from all of this. But things rarely seem to work out as he would like.