Melroe was snuggled up in his hairy chest, napping in the middle of the Grand Hall. He had cleverly turned his head to the side so that nobody could see him, but his body had since then slipped off the chair, and now half of it was lying on the ground.

The senior officers had all focused their eyes on Cardiff instead. They were waiting for the interrogation to be over.

A single butterfly stood on his knees in front of Cardiff. He was chained, and the heavy shackles were seeping deep into his scales. Everyone else kept a distance from him, focusing all their energy on standing still and not moving a single muscle. Nobody wanted to appear close with the traitor.

Cardiff looked down at the officer in the middle and didn’t bother to remove his chains. Keeping him tied up was a safety measure he wasn’t going to ignore. Many had attempted escape in the past, even those with injuries far more serious than these.

“Identify yourself, officer,”  he finally flapped.

The one in the middle could barely move his wings; the chains tied to his ankles and arms were restraining any movement he tried to make.

“Bob Cardui. My name is Bob Cardui, honourable Butterman!” he cried.

Cardiff didn’t nod; he just kept looking at Bob’s tied up body as if it was a nuisance he barely had time to deal with.

“You are the one who broke the code of honour, are you not?”

Bob nodded his head, all six of his legs shaking.

“I am! I am!” He was trying to fight back the tears, but the pain was starting to cloud his mind.

Cardiff stood up and got closer to Bob.

“Do you regret your actions?” he asked in a cold, lifeless tone.

“I do! I regret them all!”

Cardiff nodded to the other officers.

“And you; none of you wish to speak up for this forsaken soul? Nobody has ever had anything to do with him?”

The crowd remained as still and silent as before.

“Officer Bob, when I first asked you about your whereabouts for the days prior to the incident with the civilian, you lied. You lied about being here with other officers. How pitiful is that?”

Bob continued laying on the ground without flapping a single word.

“Furthermore,” Cardiff continued,” I asked explicitly who the organizer of these illegal gambling events is. You denied that as well, yet there are several officers who claim you are behind everything. Do you plan to deny this as well?”

Bob tried to lift his wings, but the pain from the shackles was too intense. They were sinking deeper and deeper into his scales with each movement he made and were leaving scars.

The other officers stood still, as if they were statues. Bob could clearly see with the corners of his eyes that nobody was going to flap anything; they were all here to witness his punishment. He wondered if that was something they had mentally prepared for in advance, or if they wanted to let themselves be surprised with Cardiff’s verdict. He could smell the curiosity in the air. How unsurprising it was that some were here simply out of curiosity. There were many rumours going around about what happened to traitors, but very few butterflies chose to stay until the very end to witness everything. And the list of things Bob had supposedly done wrong appeared to have no end in sight.

Cardiff walked over to Bob and gave him a sudden kick which sent him flying across the room. The other officers gasped for a second, then resumed their lifeless expressions.

The sudden smell of blood from Bob’s ankles woke up Melroe.

“A betrayal like this has to be punished according to its severity,” Cardiff flapped.” Officers, let this event be a warning to you. Anyone who betrays the Grand Patrol will not be forgiven.”

Melroe sleepily extended his proboscis and slurped some water he had left inside his personal vase. 

“Cardiff, that’s enough. Let them disperse.”

Cardiff glanced over quickly at Melroe, then signalled the officers to leave. Every last one of them exited the hall as fast as they could; nobody wanted to stay and witness the horrors of this punishment, especially now that the “Fluffy One” was awake.

“Brother, what is it? You missed half, if not all of the traitor’s testimony,” Cardiff flapped sharply as soon as the doors closed.

“This process is stupid. Everything is stupid. I told you that a million times. And I also know everything I need to make a decision.”

Cardiff threw as annoyed look at the water leaking from the side of the vase.

“You’re not supposed to make a decision. This is just a public warning. All you had to do was not question my authority.”

Melroe grabbed a bit of dirt from the flower pots on the table and mixed it with the water until it turned into mud.

“Look, brother, nobody enjoys torture as much as I do. But this one is different. I would like to keep him around for a little longer,” Melroe finally flapped after finishing the last contents of the vase.

Cardiff looked at the bruised body on the ground. Bob was quietly weeping, curled up in a shapeless blob.

“Lizard’s tongue! Why would you want that?” Cardiff asked.

Melroe stretched the corners of his lower jaw to imitate a smile.

“It’s very simple, brother: when was the last time you saw a human’s sock? I can tell you that I have never gotten a hold of one.”

“That’s because you refuse to talk to humans unless you have a knife with you.”

“So do you, Cardiff.”

“That’s not the point.”

“That’s exactly the point: this one might turn out to be quite skilled at communicating with humans. There is something different about him. Maybe that’s why a human trusted him to such an extent. We both know how rare something like that is.”

Cardiff thought for a moment and then nodded.

“You might be right. Perhaps we could make use of this one. Yes… I’ll personally make sure he gets put to good use. If he does have a talent for such things, there is no point in letting it go wasted on something routine, like transporting goods from the human realm.”

Melroe nodded and snuggled up in his chair again. The smell of dry blood wasn’t something that could keep him awake for long.