The next day in Mr. Crispa's villa the 5 little ones were reunited, but unlike playing as they usually did, they were currently arguing with their faces full of seriousness.
“Lutza doesn't understand.”
Elizabeth sighed and rubbing her temples, as her father sometimes did, she decided to explain to her friends what she had just said.
“Do you remember the cat and the mouse misters that we met in the stables?”
" It wasn't a mouse, it was a rat, " Theodor interrupted. Of the five he was the one who had the most fascination for books where he could see photos and drawings of animals and creatures of all kinds.
“Hahaha yes he was a rat, he was a rat” Shimu started to laugh rubbing his belly. In his case, he didn’t spoke to correct Elizabeth's mistake, but just because calling him a rat man seemed funny to him.
Elizabeth clutched her head. For most of the morning she was trying to explain the magnificent plan she had devised before sleeping. Sighing again, she begun to speak again.
“What I'm trying to say is that they had a problem and we can help them.”
“Why?” asked Shimu. He was used to having everyone in the castle serve him, helping others sounded like being a servant.
“Don’t you remember the story of the goblin and the dragon that Mr. Crispa told us yesterday?” Elizabeth replied puffing her cheeks and frowning. Shimu was the one who made her hot tempered more easily.
“Ahhh! If we help him they are going to owe us a favor” Shimu said hitting the palm of his left hand with his right fist.
“But what could two stable animal men give us?” Shimu asked not seeing what he could earn from two people who lived in a stable.
“They could give us more cheese” said Mushi while drawing something on the ground with a branch he had found.
“Lutza wants cheese.”
At that moment a more or less similar scene appeared in everyone's mind. Radan handing them a huge treasure chest, thanking them for the help, and with a bow he opened the chest revealing hundreds of bars of cheese inside it.
“The moral of the story is not about helping others so they owe us a favor. The purpose is to show that everybody’s life is better if we all are kind with everyone” replied Elizabeth waving her arms to deny what Shimu had said.
But her words reached deaf ears, the other four children found themselves savoring the delicious cheese bars with dried fruits in their minds.
" You don't have to say anything else Eli, my noble person will help the stable men " Shimu stood up with energy.
“Lutza also helps.”
“I, I will help too, but I don't know how we can help them” Mushi said grabbing the edges of his shirt.
“Don’t worry, I know what to do” Elizabeth replied. Her eyes sparkled, the little girl could see herself as a heroine.
From her mind banished the issue that everyone had decided to help just to get more cheese.
“Tomorrow we do not have to come to study, so Mushi and Shimu will invite us to their house to play. When we go there, we will look for the opportunity to escape from the caretakers and we will go to the stables to ask what they need help with.”
Elizabeth stood up, crossed her arms, and looked at the other children with pride. Her plan was foolproof. The little girl had heard her parents and Mr. Crispa talking about how smart she and her brother were. They had learned to speak and move in a short time with ease, reaching the level of development of Shimu and Mushi, considered geniuses for their age. And she, being the smartest of all, felt that she was not very different from the main characters in Mr. Crispa's stories.
Ate the same time, but in a different place Darthañan, Frigglene and Albella were in a meeting to plan how they were going to organize for the expedition. In the study they also included Hegani, the ent who had brought them to the city who worked as Vorpiax's finance minister; and Veigar a ubax with the features of a chrysanthemum, its face and petals closest to the face were reddish in color, while its other petals were white. Veigar was the military commander of Vorpiax. Unlike his delicate appearance, his voice was deep and his behavior violent.
“How dare those bastards threaten us?” Veigar hit the table angrily.
“When Master Helvella returns, like my great grandfather I will invade their lands and destroy their cities.”
“Calm down Veigar, let the young miss finish what she was saying” Hegani said with the same slow voice as always.
“Due to the risk of being attacked we cannot make mistakes with the amount of forces that we send to the expedition” Albella resumed “Veigar I need you to organize an elite team that guarantees that we can obtain what is producing all that energy while maintaining the city safe.”
“I myself will go and bring the object with my own hands!” Veigar shouted offering to carry out the mission getting up on his seat.
“No, I need you to command Vorpiax security, the life of our citizens is above the benefits that object can grand us.
Frigglene's eyes widened and a smile appeared on Darthañan's face. It was hard enough to find nobles who said things like that. What was the sacrifice of the few for the prosperity of the many? This type of large scale decisions was what permeated within people with power, distancing them from others and generating the feeling of superiority.
Darthañan thought for a moment about giving Albella a bit of advice since what she had just said not in all cases was correct, but in the end he decided to keep his words. These were not his family's lands, Helvella must have trusted Albella's character enough to leave her in charge of such a city when she was so young.
Also, the idealistic ideas Albella had just expressed were not bad in peacetimes. The moment life asked her to make a difficult decision, Albella would learn about reality and if her father hadn't told her about it yet, Darthañan had no reason to meddle in that.
“Understood” Veigar replied, sitting down again.
“I will take care of selecting my best men to guarantee that everything turns out perfect.
" I expect nothing less from you, Mr. Veigar, " smiled Albella.
Then, the feminine lepiota directed her glance to the enormous ent.
“Hegani have you had any problems collecting the materials for the death pact?
“We have already collected 80%, according to my estimates, within four to five hours we will have everything ready.
“Very well, as I told you, don't worry about the costs. Our guests will pay for their parts.
Hegani and Albella smiled at each other, because they would obviously take the opportunity to put a "slight" cost over the materials that their enemies would use.
“On the other hand, Mr. Veigar, I am a little worried that I have let them see the faces of Darthañan and Frigglene. I'm thinking it was a mistake on my part to let them show their faces when my father had made it clear how dangerous it could be.
“Don’t worry young lady. Although I cannot stop them from investigating the identity of the nobleman who ruined their plans, I have planted false information that in the best case they will leave our guest alone or in the worst case will give us more or less a month to decide what to do.
“Thank you very much” Darthañan and Frigglene said at the time bowing their heads.
“Do not worry, you are the dear guests of our lord and I will do everything possible to keep you safe.
Then they began to talk about topics that, although important, were not as delicate as the previous ones. During the rest of the day they were organizing the transport, provisions and special reaction measures that they would need to guarantee that none of their enemies managed to keep the valuable object.
It was in the middle of that conversation that they decided to act as if Darthañan was a separate party, they would place a limit on the number of people that each group could send and they would arm a team of lepiots with special armor that would cover them and help them to pass as humans. To reassure them, Darthañan offered to make a second death pact in which he would promise to deliver to them if his group managed to get hold of the object.
Albella refused Darthañan's proposal, but suggested a clause that could be placed in the pact where any of the groups could deliver the object to whoever they wanted if it was voluntarily without any external pressure.
When the afternoon came and only small details were missing, Darthañan and Frigglene excused themselves to go and pick up their children. Once 5 minutes passed, Veigar couldn't help but ask.
“Young miss why did you not accept his proposal? We do not know how valuable the object we are going to find is and greed is a poison that can kill even the best of relationships.
“Don’t worry Veigar, I can guarantee you that if his group finds the object and it turns out to be very valuable his actions will only benefit the grand scheme of my family's plans.
