Ta-Vet was lost for a long time, wandering through the forest.

The baby wouldn’t stop crying and a part of him wanted to leave it, right there, as no one would ever know. Eventually, it tired itself out, and simply whimpered, hungry and tired.

Will you truly abandon this child, the sword asked. You are no different than your mother, Invictus.

“Don’t call me that,” he shouted. “I am not him. I will never be who she wants me to be!”

No child will ever be what their parent dreams of, good or bad. You are not special.

Ta-Vet let out a long sigh and just trudged on, trying to find his way out. He finally found a trail, and kept on it, hoping to find someone that would help. After an hour of walking, Ta-Vet became worried.

The baby was no longer fidgeting around or making any strange noises as it usually did. It looked sad and exhausted, and he was afraid the baby would die in his arms before he would find their way out. He walked faster, hoping that the trail would soon end. No longer did he want to abandon the baby and let it die. He didn’t want to be like Leofric.

Finally, Ta-Vet came upon a clearing, and a traveler’s inn was there. It had many vehicles instead of animal-drawn carts, an inn for the traveling merchants that made their way to the capital. Ta-Vet ran inside, bursting through the front doors.

All eyes in the room turned to look at him. He made a loud entrance, but their eyes followed him as what appeared to be a man holding a child that was not his entered the room. He was sweaty from running, and they assumed he was running away from someone, not towards the inn.

Nervously he made his way to the front desk, trying to ignore the stares of the people in the lobby.

“I would like some help,” he mumbled.

The woman at the front desk eyed him suspiciously.

“What is a Nightwalker such as yourself doing with a Daywalker child,” she asked. Ta-Vet did not have an answer that made any sense. He tried his hardest to lie, but the more he lied the more he was afraid she did not believe him.

“This is my son. He is hungry, please help.”

“Where is the mother,” she asked. “A man is not smart enough for such a task.”

“She… she is not here,’ Ta-Vet lied.

“Did you kill her,” the woman asked, shrill and angry. “This child is not yours! He doesn’t look like you!”

“He is,” Ta-Vet whispered. “She..she left us…”

It was the truth. Aeris had left Ta-Vet and this nameless baby to starve in the middle of a forest.

“What sort of mother would abandon her babe with you,” the front desk attendant said. Her upper lip went out in disgust, her distrust of all men quite apparent.

“She.. left because…”

Ta-Vet tried to come up with an answer to why a child would not look like its father and had only one answer.

“She cheated,” he mumbled. “I found out and she left. That's why he doesn't look like me.”

Everyone in the lobby was watching, pretending to go on with their conversations, curious about the screaming attendant, the baby, and the suspicious man. The attendant looked Ta-Vet up and down. His clothes were not those of a rich man, but they were neat and clean.

She assumed he was a trader nearby from his long jacket and boots, and when she looked at how weak the baby was, she started to calm down.

“It was a doomed marriage from the start,” she consoled him. “Miscegenation hurts everyone.”

Ta-Vet nodded quickly, agreeing with her illogical racism, hoping that she could help him.

“I don’t know how to feed it,” he said. “Please find someone.”

“I think I know someone that could help,” the woman replied. “She is of low class, so she might have something strange. Are you sure?”

Ta-Vet nodded quickly, and the attendant left. She was gone for about ten minutes, and with every passing minute, he was afraid that she had gone to call the authorities.

Instead, she returned with a young maid.

“This is Sarai,” the woman proclaimed. “She is not of good stock, but dire times call for rash decisions.”

Quickly Ta-Vet handed her over, and the girl fed the baby. It was greedy and ravenous. Its small fist waved around and clasped on her breast as it continued to drink deeply.

Ta-Vet looked away, quite modest as his mother said he was. Once done, Sarai smiled and rocked him, enjoying the time she spent with the baby and happy to have saved his life.

“Thank you! I’m so grateful,” Ta-Vet said.

“It is nothing,” Sarai smiled.

She grinned wide, and she pushed her brown hair out of her face.

“My chest hurts when I am at work, unable to feed mine, so you have helped me!”

Ta-Vet went through his knapsack and got out a few large gold coins. Sarai’s eyes went wide and she quickly took them, stashing them inside her pocket.

“Where did a man such as you get this kind of money,” she asked.

“You will get more if you keep feeding him,” he replied. Sarai quickly nodded, as she received what she made in a week in an hour.

Ta-Vet decided to stay at the inn until he could figure out what to do. He didn’t want to go back to the castle; he couldn’t. Even if he returned and told everyone the truth he feared that he would be put on trial for burning the children alive, a victim of Leofric’s crime.

Ta-Vet did not have much common sense, and he was not accustomed to wealth, so he began to buy nicer clothes, signaling to others that a rich man lived at the inn. People learned of the baby that was not his and wondered why would a young man keep a child. Ta-Vet spent his time trying to find a place they could stay where people would not continue to ask questions, but that was nearly impossible.

It would be one thing if the child was not his, but he looked so different from him that it was hard to make people believe he was not some kind of kidnapper.

Ta-Vet also took time to get accustomed to his new name, and his new sense of self. He told himself daily, pretend you are the rich man they think you are, and eventually they will believe it. It worked too well, and soon other long-term residents at the inn tried to ask him about the best places to trade, which goods he thought would have more demand.

Ta-Vet started to realize his disguise would not last long and decided to leave the Empire entirely. He knew he could not depend on the charity of Sarai, and now the baby seemed big enough to eat soft things and would crawl around his suite floor.

While watching the baby he wondered how old it was, and felt pain in his chest, as it would never know its birthday. Many questions in his head swirled around as he sat in the old wooden chair, tapping his foot.

He was anxious. Lately, Ta-Vet noticed that the baby looked like his mother. He started to think that she had pushed off another bastard onto him, and he was stupid enough to believe her lies.

One day while sitting in his suite, smoking out the window on the balcony, he realized the baby had no name. He had long stopped pretending that he wasn’t going to keep it, and even when he didn’t want to earlier he was paranoid that someone would do something to it.

He wondered every day if the other one was alive, worried that Aeris had simply killed it, but after a lot of consideration, he realized that was not the case. He knew that Aeris wouldn’t give him the dangerous items and not expect them back one day.

The next day he heard the news that the Empress had given birth to a son, and then he knew that she was still living, but wondered why she never looked for them. She sent someone out to search the forest for Ta-Vet, but they never found him, and Aeris assumed they had long disappeared together.

Ta-Vet only left the inn when he had no other choice, and he was still paranoid that someone was following them. That Leofric would set the inn on fire in his sleep, or eat the baby whole, or whatever strange nightmare he had at night. After hiding inside the inn for two months he finally decided to leave for the closest planet outside the Empire’s jurisdiction; Methuselah.

Sarai was truly sad to see them go, and she had hoped after their time together Ta-Vet would take interest in her, with his wealth and his kind demeanor. He told her the news when she came to his suite, and she sniffled, trying to hold back tears.

“I will miss the two of you,” she mumbled. “He is so lively, and you are the most intelligent man I have ever met.” Ta-Vet smiled and hugged her.

“You are his mother, in my mind,” he told her. “I cannot take you with us, but I would love to ask you for one last favor.”

“What is it,” she asked.

“He has no name. I am not a good father as you think I am.”

Sarai was shocked. “Why did you not name the babe,” she shouted. “He is not so weak that he could die soon!”

“I thought that...his mother would return soon,” he said. “That never will happen.”

Sarai was not sure she wanted this heavy choice.

“This is not my place,” she told him. “I care for him dearly, but I am not his mother.”

“You saved his life,” Ta-Vet insisted. “You should be the one to name him.”

Sarai was now honored, and she decided that she would do him one last favor. She watched as he crawled on the floor, grunting as he trudged along.

“His name will be Acheus,” she said. “Named after my favorite butterfly. He is pale and red, just like it.”

“That is a woman’s name! Do you want him to have trouble,” Ta-Vet asked.

“No it is not,” Sarai insisted. “Even if it was, it doesn’t sound like one.”

Sarai went over and picked him up, and he smiled, happy to play with her.

“I will miss you so much. Please write to me.”

“I will,” Ta-Vet lied.

The next morning he left, and everyone in the inn was sad to see him go. Acheus was very unaware of what was happening but was excited by the attention that so many people were giving him at once as they said their final goodbyes to him. Even the front desk attendant, Cinda, who at first was wary of Ta-Vet, now came to like him.

“I will miss you most of all Acheus,” she said. “Please come back Tyreceus.”

It took Ta-Vet some time to register who she was talking to, as he was still not accustomed to his new name. He muttered a quick yes, and then left, hoping that he could finally leave and never worry about the des Regalis family ever again.