In an instant, Mouse was at his throat. “Who are you?”

The man put his hands up. “Nothing, no-one, I’m just a lowly unicorn. Just a lowly, lovely unicorn.”

Mouse frowned. After a moment, he backed away. He lowered the shortsword but kept the blade at the ready. “A unicorn?”

“You saw me transform, right? A unicorn.”

Mouse’s eyes narrowed as he considered. Some magical beasts could transform into a bipedal form, often taking on the physical characteristics of whatever bipedal race lived nearest as they did so. Dragons were infamous for it. Unicorns, though?

They’re too rare. Even I hadn’t seen one until today. What I know about them comes from nursery rhymes and rumor. He hesitated. “You knew I was a man? Don’t unicorns only allow women to ride them?”

“It’s humans who decided all unicorns prefer women. No one bothered to ask the unicorns,” the unicorn said haughtily.

“You don’t care, then?”

The unicorn gave him a disgusted look. “Not at all. I prefer to be ridden by men. Some prefer women, and some don’t want to be ridden at all.”

“Then the talk about… unicorns only letting chaste maid—people touch them is false too, I take it?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Do you think I rushed all the way here from the stables for fun?"

Ah. Mouse nodded slowly.

“It’s just a preference, that’s all. Just a preference!” the unicorn protested.

“I didn’t say anything,” Mouse replied.

The unicorn put his hands on his hips. Before he could speak, Mouse waved him down. He nodded at Reginald, out cold on the floor. “I’m not going to let him get off this easily. Any ideas?”

“Mmm… I know a place. A good place to leave an asshole like him,” the unicorn said. He glanced at Mouse, then offered a hand. “I’m Spar, by the way. And I won’t tell anyone you’re a virgin if you don’t want me to.”

Mouse pulled a face. Everyone’s already assuming it anyways, thanks to you. Still, he took Spar’s hand. “Mouse. But when I’m dressed as a man, you can call me Twain.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Mouse? Twain? Did your mother hate you? What stupid names,” the unicorn laughed.

Mouse glared. And ‘Spar’ is better?

After a moment, he shook his head, dismissing Spar. Mouse hiked up his skirt to sheathe his shortsword in his thigh sheath, then knelt beside Reginald. After a thoughtful moment, he yanked Reginald’s trousers down.

“Whoa! Not in front of me, please, my poor eyes!” Spar covered his eyes with his hands.

“We’re all men.” Mouse freed Reginald of his trousers, then undid his jacket as well. The man was left in a vest, a long shirt with ridiculous frills and cuffs, and his boxers.

“But it looks so scandalous with you in that dress,” Spar said.

Mouse shot him a glare. He yanked a sheet out of the bed, rolled the comforter back up, and laid the clothes out on top.

“Are we playing house?” Spar asked, peering over Mouse’s shoulder.

“Illusions work best when they’re anchored in a physical object.” He closed his eyes and crossed his wrists over each other, hands splayed over the clothes. The silver scars on his arms lit up with pale moonlight. All over the room, shadows twisted to life, quivering. They darted to the bed one by one and began to twine together.

From out of the dancing shadows, a human shape took form. Shadow flowed and paled, shaping a rough impression of a face. At the clothes, the shadows rushed forward, replicating every stitch and fray perfectly from the jacket and pants on the bed to the illusory body. The illusion blurred again at Reginald’s shirt, his flouncy cuffs half-made, impressions of white and fluff more than fully rendered objects, then rushed forward again as it met his trousers.

At last, an illusory Reginald laid on the bed. He appeared cast in shadow, as if the candle by his bedside failed to light his bed, and blurry around the edges. Mouse wanted to blink to clear his eyes, but forced himself not to as he surveyed his work.

Close inspection would reveal it as a fake, but it would pass at a glance. He nodded to himself. Not bad for a warrior like me.

“Oooh, fancy.” Spar poked the shadow-Reginald. The shadow rippled where he touched it, breaking like water to show the clothes beneath.

Mouse caught his hand. “Stop it. You’ll disrupt it.”

“What’s it for, anyways?”

“An alibi.”

“An alibi? For what?”

“It isn’t, ah, diplomatically sound to knock out a member of the host country’s nobility and drag his unconscious body somewhere unsavory on your first night in said country. Better if he’s seen sleeping quietly in his bed before he makes the questionable decision to sleepwalk to that unsavory place all on his own. Better yet if someone sees me also sleeping quietly in my room around the same time, so that I couldn’t have possibly been involved.”

“But he was going to—”

Mouse gave him a look. “I’m a foreigner. Do you think they care what he was going to do? No one stopped him from leaving with me—the humans tacitly agreed to turn a blind eye to whatever he wanted to do. Even if he did harm me, nothing guarantees that they would care, or believe me. And now I’ve knocked him out and kicked his family jewels, not in that order. Execution isn’t out of the question.”

Spar frowned. Something came to him suddenly, and the frown vanished into a nod. “That’s fair. He is the Crown Prince, after all.”

“He’s the… what?” Mouse asked. Cold sweat broke out down his spine. I kicked the humans’ Crown Prince in his jewels?

“Crown Prince Reginald V, heir to the throne," Spar confirmed.