The bath was obnoxiously big and Ratface loved it. She was floating in the middle of it surrounded by bubbles which was absurd. There was even a little lip on the bath she could put Halmir in and he made happy little squeaks as she paddled over and brushed his hair.

She’d been in here longer than she’d cared to admit, and her skin was starting to prune. She’d spent so long cleaning herself that she was pretty sure she’d left a copy of her in the bottom of the bath.

Suncat came in and dropped clothes and a towel next to the bath. She looked at Ratface’s pile of armour and wrinkled her nose.

“I’m not touching that,” she said.

She left with that and Ratface kept lying in the water. It had been a long week, a long month really. This was the first time she’d had a proper moment to clean herself off and it was nice to not feel grimy. She was never going to let herself get that dirty again.

She only got out of the water when it started to get cold. She wiped herself and Halmir dry, who’d fallen asleep again.

She chucked on the clothes Suncat had left. They were too big but at least they were comfortable. They had a lot of pockets which Ratface appreciated.

Her pile of clothes and armour were stacked on top of each other. She didn’t want to ruin her clean body with them, so she wrapped it up in the towels and chucked them in her room. She grabbed Halmir too but brought him with her downstairs.

It took her a while to find the rest of her group but eventually she found them out in the garden. It was weird to see everyone out of armour. Tiffany had a farmers dress on and had wrapped her hair up in a bow.

Albert was in a loose white shirt and black pants. It confirmed Ratface’s belief he was a rich boy.

Isabelle looked much the same though there were no illusions on her. Ratface realised how many illusions the other woman put on that she hadn’t noticed. She looked tired and her hair was frizzy. How much magic had she used just to look good? Ratface thought about it more and realised it good way to hide her bigger illusions if she got caught out. Remove the illusion that made her hair look better and no one would look for any of the bigger ones.

The last person she noticed made her pause. Abigail was out of her armour in a wheelchair. She was still a giant of a woman and even out of the armour she looked like she could get into a fight with a golem and win. She was holding Claudette’s hand who was in a chair next to her.

Ratface settled down next to Abigail and did her best not to keep staring at the old woman.

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“I got injured fighting an elf when I was younger,” said Abigail.

“She won incidentally,” Claudette interjected.

“It got me kicked out of my job in the royal guard. I thought it was the end for me.”

“That’s when she met me,” Claudette said. She looked at Abigail lovingly, “She was still so charming even after losing her job. I said I’d do the work for free if she took me out for dinner.”

Abigail pulled up the back of her shirt and revealed a strange contraption welded onto her spine. There was tiny golem cores inlaid in it.

“Technically, it took both of us to make,” Abigail tapped the writing over the contraption. “A lot of the runes are my work but connecting it to me was Claudette’s. It’s not perfect; it can hurt to walk around without the armour, but it is quite literally life changing.”

“You’d think this is what we’d be famous for but instead she’s famous as an adventurer and I’m famous for seducing her,” Claudette said. Abigail blushed at that, and Isabelle chuckled in the background.

“Uhm,” Tifanny interrupted, “Can I ask why we’re here?”

Claudette clapped her hands to get all their attention.

“First and foremost, to relax. That’s what today will be all about. After that I would ask you to think about what you want to get out of here.”

Ratface kept silent as she glanced at Halmir. She wanted to know what was behind the glamour, but she also wanted to help Halmir. She stroked his fur in concern.

“What’s with the big rat?” asked Suncat. She plopped next to Ratface.

“He drank rat noble blood,” said Abigail.

Suncat perked up at that. She looked at Claudette.

“My new project,” she announced to the woman. Ratface looked over to the other goblin. She was grateful to other girl for taking care of her. After her experience with the adventurer guild, it was nice to just be helped with no questions asked.

“On the condition that you get Ratface to help you,” Claudette said. Suncat grumbled but nodded it was fine.

“Well, with that solved, come here Ratface. Let’s have a look at that glamour.”

Ratface came closer and Claudette grabbed onto her. The burning eye stared through Ratface and into something inside her. She could feel the glamour tightening on her skull the more Claudette stared. The pain got worse and worse and Ratface was worried her skull was going to split apart.

Claudette let go of her and the eye looked away. The glamour in her settled down. It even helped ease her pain now that it wasn’t under scrutiny.

“Well Isabelle, I’m honestly surprised you didn’t suffer worse after dealing with this,” said Claudette. She looked back at Ratface.

“There’s not one but two glamours running around that head of yours. One of them is odd.”

“So, you can’t deal with it?” Ratface asked.

Claudette gave her an offended look.

“Please. There’s yet to be an elves magic I couldn’t crack. If anything, this makes me more curious. Still, it’s not going to be over in an evening. So, my proposal.” She gestured at them all as she leaned back into her seat like it was a throne.

“Stay here for at least a few months. Tomorrow you can meet the town, and I can introduce you to people who can help you reach your potential. Once I deal with Ratface’s glamour, we can see what you want then. Deal?”

The kids glanced at each other, seeing no real other option they nodded.

“Fantastic. That’s for tomorrow. For the rest of today relax and eat, you all look like you need to. If you need anything grab myself, or one of my apprentices.” With that she went to go make dinner and left them to it.

Albert and Tiffany came and joined Ratface and Suncat. Suncat acted aloof with them but was coaxed into conversation by her refusal to leave the other goblin alone with adventurers.

The night sky was pretty and the dinner lovely. It wasn’t even stew!

It was a relaxing night and Ratface’s face hurt form smiling by the time she went to bed.