Yu-Gi-Oh is the property of Konami and Kazuki Takahashi, and this work is only a very appreciative celebration, from which we hope to derive no profit of any kind.

Nobody spoke. They just walked in the door in a group together, with Yuugi holding the letter, and Yami holding Yuugi, and Pegasus following along behind.

"Tea's in the drawing room, Master Yuugi." One of the housemaids, Sally, was just coming out of the library as they went by. "An' Cook says she'll be that worried, if it comes back uneaten again today."

If she was surprised when Yuugi walked right on past without acknowledging her, she didn't say anything, of course. It wasn't her place. But it left Yuugi feeling guilty. – Guiltier than he already did, that is, because now that the blow-up was definitely coming, he was starting to feel like the one responsible.

"I …I'm sorry." He just whispered it to the other two, as they went upstairs together.

"Yuugi, hush!" Yami said at once.

"Don't be ridiculous," his partner chimed in. "It's not as if you forced us…" – They'd reached the first floor; his voice died away as he noted the half-open drawing room door. "I suppose we'd best go in." He sounded very nervous.

Yuugi led the way. How bad could it be, - He found himself echoing Pegasus' unconvinced-sounding words to himself. – it was just Father. Mother wasn't even here, she was in the village at a Women's Auxiliary meeting, planning the church New Years Fete. …Just one person, and that someone who loved him. He swallowed. If there had to be just one of them, he wished it was Mother, who at least didn't always look at him like she disapproved of him all the time.

Pushing the door open, Yuugi walked into the drawing room, Yami and Pegasus a few steps behind. "Father, I have something to tell you." He tried for Donald's firm tone. - It was Yami's firm tone, he knew now, but it was still what he wanted, the tone of one man speaking to another, who was his equal.

Father was on the sofa with a book on his knee, a plate of food on the table next to his elbow. "You're late," he said looking up. "Do you think that shows proper appreciation for the good food Cook makes for us?"

"I…" Yuugi could feel all the proper manliness of his tone draining away. He was just a boy again, a bad boy getting in trouble from his Papa, the way he usually felt in Father's presence. "A …a letter came today, Father," he said.

"A letter?" Father's expression changed, as if he could feel the emotions in the room.

"It's about Donald." Yuugi handed the pages, now crumpled, and the envelope with the foreign stamps on it, to his Father. "It's…" He fought to get the words out. "It's his death certificate, Father."

"Donald…" Father's voice was just an echo. He looked up, past Yuugi, to where Yami and Pegasus stood in the doorway. "But he's right there… If this is some kind of a joke, Yuugi," he began, but the truth was written on all their faces. Father's face seemed to deflate. He unfolded the letter – Yuugi could see his hands shaking as he held it up and read it. Then, "it's a death certificate," he whispered.

He looked to Yami and Pegasus again, but now his face just looked desperate. "These things happen, don't they?" he said. "The Home Office makes mistakes."

"It's no mistake," Yami answered in a low voice. His head was down; Yuugi couldn't see his face, and there was no expression in his voice. "I am not your son, Your Lordship. I am an imposter."

"An…" Father looked toward Yuugi. "Do you understand what he's talking about?"

"Yes, Father," Yuugi answered, his voice soft and trembling. "Y-Yami explained." He threw a quick glance at the others in the doorway. Why did he feel that his loyalties here were divided? It made no sense. But he knew he felt as responsible toward Yami, as he did toward his own father.

"They're conmen." He stumbled through the explanation. "Yami and Pegasus. Yami was going to pretend he was Donald, so he could get the Lochmaben Emerald, and…"

"What? And you knew about this, Yuugi?"

"Only just now," Yuugi said. "They told me."

Father stared, his face a blank, first of confusion, and then of icy, hopeless despair. "My son is dead," - He said it very softly. - "gone. And you stand here, defending a pack of conmen and imposters, Yuugi."

Yuugi felt the force of his words deep into his soul. They weren't true, not really; he hadn't defended Yami yet. But he meant to, didn't he? It was what he was going to do, if it came to that. This was the moment, Yuugi thought, when his loyalties stopped being divided, and he chose whose side he was on.

"Out of the room." Yuugi had never seen such a cold, hateful look on his father's face. There was anger there, and it wasn't just directed at Yami and Pegasus, but at him as well. "Get out, all of you," Father said. "I have to think. – I must talk to your mother about this. Yuugi, is there a telephone at the Vicarage do you know?"

"I …I'm sure I don't know, Father."

"Just go then," Father said. "I don't even want to look at you right now, Yuugi. And as for you," he added, looking up and fixing Yami and Pegasus with a hard stare, "I'll see to you two later."

"But Father…"

"Go!"

Yami, watching, saw the look of pain that went across Yuugi's face as his father sent him away. Guilt crawled through his stomach. - This was his fault, his and Pegasus'. – But with it, went a resolve that he would be there for Yuugi, he would protect him …somehow, some way …If there was any way he could protect him, when he was facing prison himself.

What had happened to all his promises that they'd be together, he asked himself, as he followed Yuugi, and Pegasus followed him, down the stairs and into the library on the ground floor? Here he was, powerless, with no way of protecting even himself …Or Pegasus, because he was the reason his partner was still here, wasn't he? Pegasus could be halfway to Drumfires and that local that would take him to London by now, couldn't he, if he hadn't chosen to stay?

"Father loves us," - Yuugi stopped, as if realizing what he'd said. "I …I mean he loves me," he said. "But Don …ah, Yami, he won't have you arrested, not when he realizes how much you mean to me. He can't," he said, his voice going a little thin at the end.

"And he won't arrest Pegasus, because…" Yuugi stood stock-still just inside the doorway of the dark library, as if he couldn't go any further, not with his feet, and not with his thoughts either. Wordlessly, Yami moved to stand beside him, his arms around Yuugi's shoulders trying to provide comfort even when he half wondered if there was comfort left for any of them.

"He won't arrest Pegasus, because Pegasus is going to escape." Belying his words, what Pegasus actually did, was to switch the electric lamps that lighted the room, going from one to the next, as careful as a well-trained housemaid. "There's no one watching us," he said. "The Earl is so kerflummoxed that he forgot to set a guard. From the looks of him, we might have until morning before he remembers."

He wasn't acting on his words, and he must have known Yami wasn't going to. Maybe this was his idea of an encouraging speech.

"You could come with us, little Yuugi." Now he stood next to the table nearest the window, idly flicking through a copy of Punch. – From his angle near the door, Yami could see columns of dense print, and George du Maurier cartoons, as the pages of the magazine went back and forth, Pegasus paying them no attention at all. – "You might not make such a bad addition to our little band. And of course Yami would be pleased, wouldn't you?" He looked up, meeting his partner's eyes, his face looking almost as hopeless as Yami felt.

"I never cared much for freedom anyhow." Pegasus dropped onto the sofa with a sudden movement. He ripped open the magazine randomly, and stuck his nose into the pages, all his motions violent. "Highly overrated," he said, "all those decisions and whatnot that one must make for one's self." And he was silent.

Pegasus had said something about him becoming a partner with him and Yami, and in a way, he sort of had, Yuugi thought. The decision to step outside the law wasn't even a new one. He'd known what he was doing back when he first admitted he was in love with – He'd thought. – his brother. He'd known that it was a crime for one man to love another, no matter who he was, but he hadn't turned back. Now this was where he belonged: In the company of conmen and thieves.

But it was hard for him to think of Yami and Pegasus as criminals (which was probably proof that he belonged with them even more). Yuugi looked at Pegasus, who sat flipping through the pages of an old issue of Punch, with only the faintest tension around the shoulders to show this wasn't just any idle afternoon for him. There was good in the man, whatever his past might be: He'd had the chance to flee, but he hadn't taken it. He'd stayed here out of loyalty for Yami. Yuugi leaned closer into Yami's arms. His ex-brother, his pretended-brother, whatever one wanted to call him: Yami had tried several times, to tell who he really was. Looking back, Yuugi remembered all of them. And today when his secret had been found out, and he could have run, what had he done instead? Not only had he stayed here, but the only things he'd done were to minister to Yuugi's needs, and try to protect his partner.

Father was taking an unconscionable long time to send for him again, Yuugi thought. He wasn't sure how long they'd been in here, - From where he was sitting on the sofa nearest the door of the library, he couldn't see the clock in the corner of the room, and he'd forgotten his watch on his bedside table. – but it seemed like hours, hours and hours and hours.

He wondered how much longer Mother would be out. She'd send for him, wouldn't she? She wouldn't be so caught up in mourning one son that she forgot she had another one, like Father. …Even as he thought that, Yuugi pushed back against the thought. Father did love him, he'd shown it over and over again. It was just that he… Somewhere at the back of his mind, knocked the idea that Father just loved Donald more, but Yuugi wouldn't let it in. He leaned into the arms of one man who most demonstrably did love him, and tried – unsuccessfully - to put the problem of his parents out of his mind. And the clock ticked along – He could hear it tick, even if he wasn't at an angle to read it. – and more hours went by, until somehow Yuugi woke to find himself curled on the sofa, with Yami drooped halfway on top of him.