After the meeting was over Darthañan, Frigglene and Albella said goodbye to the guests and began to walk towards Mr. Crispa's villa to pick up the children. The death pact would be carried out the day before leaving because the necessary ingredients were quite precious and due to the number of people who would participate per group, the amount of these precious materials increased considerably.
“I am impressed by how everything ended, but I did not expect them to be allies. I have to thank you for your help, although I don't want to sound ungrateful. I do not understand why Mr. Darthañan proposed those conditions that do not favor us enough.”
Darthañan smiled.
“Just call me Darthañan, you and your family are our benefactors. As for the conditions that I proposed there are several things that I had to consider. On one hand, although I am a noble I do not have the power of my family to be able to help in the event that things end in war. For this reason, and because we do not have the help of your father, I proposed that whoever gets it first can keep it.”
“But doesn't that put us at a disadvantage against them?” Albella asked, not understanding Darthañan's reasoning.
“We would be at a disadvantage if we do not to place that condition. Thanks to the fact that we will make the death pact, only one group can keep what we find.”
Albella stopped looking at the human's back and asked again “But only a group could have kept the object anyway, I still don't understand. How does this benefit us?”
“Without that condition, the three groups would ally against us and after obtaining the object, they would decide among themselves how to distribute the profits.” Frigglene answered, grabbing her husband's arm and looking at him with a frown to keep him quiet. This was not the time for him to start complicating things.
Albella thought about it for a moment and as soon as she understood it. She told them her conclusion as she started to walk again.
“Does that mean that now as only the first one to get it can keep it, then each group has to compete, taking away the opportunity for them to ally?”
“Bingo!” Darthañan replied.
In the middle of that conversation they arrived at Mr. Crispa's villa.
“Good afternoon Mr. Crispa” the three greeted when they met the Krisyll.
Hearing the greeting, Mr. Crispa put down the book he was reading and got up to return the greeting.
“Good afternoon, how was your meeting?” Asked the tutor of the children.
" Everything went pretty well for how prepared they were, " Albella replied.
“Frigglene was right. Darthañan becomes quite competent when the situation becomes serious.”
“Hey!” Darthañan protested, but before he could ask for explanations the excited cry of one of the children interrupted him.
“Sister!” Mushi screamed running at full speed when he saw that the one who was coming to collect them was not a servant but his beloved older sister.
The little lepiota leaped as soon as he was close and hugged her tightly. Of all his siblings, Albella was his favorite.
“Hello Mushi, were the stables any fun?” Albella returned the hug and lifted him into her arms.
“Well, we tried cheese” Mushi answered, taking out from one of his pockets a small piece of cheese.
“It is very tasty, look, I keep this delicious piece only for you” he said excitedly offering it to his sister.
Albella seeing the crushed, dirty piece of cheese that had been in her little brother's pants all day; she had to use all the self-control she could find to avoid showing a disgusted face.
Taking a handkerchief out of the floral blazer she was wearing, she grabbed the piece of cheese her little brother offered her. She then wrapped it up and kept it to throw it away as soon as she said goodbye to her brothers.
“Thank you very much, I'm not hungry right now, but I'll save it for later” Albella lied giving a kiss on the cheek to her little brother.
“Hmm!” Mushi nodded, returning his sister's kiss.
“Where are the others?” Albella asked, putting him back on the floor.
" They are over there deciding what to do with Destroyer, " Mushi replied, pointing behind a cabin.
“Destroyer?”
“A red panda. Theodor prevented him from choking on a seed this morning.” Mr. Crispa intervened, seeing not only Albella but also Darthañan and Frigglene confused looks.
“AH! I see and who gave it that name?” Darthañan asked looking at Mushi.
“Shimu and Tod chose it. They say that is the coolest name there was” Mushi replied with a bit of shyness grabbing his sister's leg.
“Isn’t it strange that a red panda appears in Lhimkio?” asked Frigglene frowning at seeing the incident as suspicious.
" It must be one of the animals that live in my mom's bamboo gardens, " replied Albella.
“Well, what are we waiting for? We are going to see the famous Destroyer” Darthañan said, taking his wife by the hand and starting to walk towards where Mushi had pointed out.
When they reached the meadow where the children were, they could see Elizabeth enjoying the show. Lutza was holding the restless red panda, who was trying with all his might to break free from the hands of the purple glass gorilla. Ten steps from Lutza to the right was Theodor and ten steps to the left was Shimu.
“Ready! the fifth time's the charm” Shimu said a little upset “If Destroyer walks towards you, you can take care of him, but if he walks towards me I will take care of him.”
“But he has chosen me the last four times” Theodor answered raising his arms to the air already frustrated.
“No, no, no. Only the fifth is what counts, everyone knows that” Shimu affirmed.
Elizabeth knowing that this could last much longer and seeing that the adults had arrived decided to end the dispute.
“Okay now that there are grownups as judges this is the only and true time!” she screamed, standing up and placing her hands on her waist with her head up.
The two little boys jumped a little surprised by the sudden appearance of the adults, but soon they agreed to Elizabeth's words.
“Ready Lutza, you can free it now” Elizabeth ordered.
Lutza carefully gripping Destroyer so as not to accidentally crush him, slowly released him. Destroyer when free, looked sideways, on the left was a vegetable yelling things he didn't understand and on the right was a sheared ape with its arms outstretched.
“Come, come here Destroyer!” Shimu shouted with all his might.
Destroyer looked both ways again, but soon he felt again the warm aura emanating from the ape with only hair on its head.
Thus Theodor earned the rights to care for the Destroyer.
What happened next was Shimu exploiting in a super tantrum where he cried and screamed as loud as his lungs left him. Albella at the end had to grab him and carry him in her arms. Asking for excuses for her little brother's behavior, she left the villa together with Mushi walking by her side.
Darthañan and Frigglene said goodbye to Mr. Crispa and, walking with their children, began heading towards their villa. On the way out, they met Dr. Kolia who was coming to pick up Lutza and greeted him with courtesy. Theodor and Elizabeth were still looking at him in fear, the vaccines had left them wary of Dr. Kolia.
Once it got dark, after having eaten and while Theodor played with destroyer. Elizabeth began to tell her parents the story of the goblin and the dragon. Every time Crispa told them a story, Elizabeth would come to her house to retell it from memory. With several peculiar changes in things she forgot.
After Elizabeth story Frigglene went out for a moment to meditate before getting the little ones ready for sleep. While Darthañan remained talking to Elizabeth.
“And how did you find the stables? Where there many interesting animals?” asked Darthañan lighting a pipe that he took from one of the cupboards in the living room.
" It was quite interesting, " Elizabeth replied, climbing onto her dad's lap to sit down.
“We met a mouse man and a cat man ...”
“There was also a wooden tiger, Crispa said he had an all weird name like Somethingbagh” Theodor interrupted giving his opinion on the most interesting part of the day for him while playing with Destructor.
“It’s Lakadeebagh” Elizabeth replied crossing her arms annoyed that her brother had interrupted her.
And grabbing her dad's cheeks to make sure he paid attention to her, she continued what she was saying.
“As I was saying, Mr. Cat and Mr. Mouse need our help, so I promised that we would help them.”
“Hahaha that's great. My little angel helping those in need” Darthañan laugh hugging his little girl.
Darthañan would never have expected that his daughter was talking to him about quinoids from Madame Dembe's group, he simply assumed that she was telling him of animals that his daughter found in the stables. Not knowing that the praise he was giving her daughter at that moment had just cemented in Little Elizabeth mind the objective of helping those two men, just as the goblin had done with the dragon.
