Ratface was house bound. Well, inn bound. She didn’t have a home.

It was by unanimous decision that she wasn’t allowed out of the inn until they left. Abigail offered to go get their loot and certification from the guild, but was voted to stay with Ratface. Part of that was because she was the only one who was enough of a deterrent to keep the adventurers away.

The other part was that they weren’t convinced she wouldn’t beat down the entire guild. She was still very visibly angry, and she said, “get their certification,” like it was a threat and not an administrative task.

Isabelle had gone out with Albert and Tiffany. She had put them in full illusions and instead of the three people Ratface was used to seeing, she was presented with two old men and a young woman in her prime. Albert and Tiffany seemed grumpy in their old men disguises, but Isabelle had waved away their concerns.

“It’s perfect. Old men are always grouching about something. You were born for these roles.”

She’d ushered them out before they could get a word in otherwise and left Abigail and Ratface to mill about at a table.

Abigail was reading the paper, and she made an annoyed noise before slapping it down in front of Ratface.

“Look at this nonsense,” she said. She pointed to the front page.

Ratface looked at the page. It had a sketch of a goblin terrorising children in a sewer followed by a full article. She stared at the foreign writing in front of her. Goblins used runes that were all straight lines and dots. Reading goblin was like making pictures out of constellations. In comparison, this was common script. She could tell because it was sweeping curves, and it took so long to write a single word.

“I can’t read this,” she said.

Abigial looked at her in surprise.

“You can’t read?”

“I can’t read common,” Ratface clarified, “I can read goblin and struggle my way through elvish given that it’s just copying goblin.”

“I think the elves would disagree with that,” Abigail said. A hint of a smile in her voice.

“Well, it’s true,” Ratface said. She crossed her arms in a huff. Yes, stating that goblin text was older would get you in trouble, but she’d still heard her mother loudly arguing with any goblin who said otherwise. She didn’t do it anywhere an elf would hear though which basically meant she only argued about it in her own home.

Ratface was already out of elf country and saying bad thing about elves gave her a little thrill.

Abigail scanned the newspaper then pointed down at a series of letters.

“That’s your name,” she said.

Ratface dipped her finger into her drink and drew on the table. She drew a little picture that if you tilted your head looked like a tiny rat baring its teeth.

“That’s what it looks like in goblin.”

Abigail looked with interest and then wiped the table before the owner could tell them off. She started to read the paper to Ratface as she explained what the different letters meant.

Abigail was clearly annoyed by what they’d written but Ratface couldn’t really get too bothered by it. It wasn’t like it was anything surprising. The newspaper insisted that it had all been part of her master plan to lure the poor children down to the ambush. Ratface was a little flattered by how competent that made her sound. Their version of her was a monster sure, but at least she was an effective one.

She was upset when they finally got to her name. They’d called her rat face with a space.

“That’s horrible. Why would they do that?” She asked.

Abigail shrugged.

“That’s just how your name translates.”

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“But it’s all wrong. You know enough goblin to know my name. How can you not see the problem?”

“I know it translates to rat face but that’s about it. A lot of goblins have the same name, so adventurers learned it. I guess that it’s made its way into common knowledge?”

“This just means the face of a rat,” Ratface grumbled, “my name, ‘Ratface’ means a to be like a rat; noble and helpful to the community.”

“Well, everyone is assuming your name means the face of a rat.”

Ratface hissed. No wonder why people always laughed when she said her name. They were missing all the nuance. Even her brief explanation to Abigail didn’t really get across what her name meant. Most Ratface’s ended up becoming village heads, or raiding leaders. That’s why so many adventurers recognised it.

Abigail saw how visibly upset she was and pushed her drink towards her.

“I’ll know what it means, at least.”

Ratface grumbled but that did make her feel better. She’d just have to become famous enough that the name was associated with her deeds rather than what a rat looked like. She paused at that. Fame wasn’t really something she could afford to gain. She’d always assumed she’d end up a raiding leader like her mother but now she didn’t know what she’d be. So far, her plans extended to being alive and that was it.

“Do you have a plan for me?” she asked Abigail.

The woman drummed her hands on the table in thought before answering.

“As I said before, I aim to help you. My main plan is to give you the tools to survive in this world. I’ve focused on violence because I suspect outside of goblin lands you will struggle and in them you seem to be hunted as well. Where we’re taking you will be someone who might be more useful. I don’t say the place in case anyone is watching.” She looked out the window. “It looks like the others are back. We’ll be heading out soon.”

The door pushed open and sure enough the rest of their group came in. Their illusion faded off them as they entered the relative safety of the inn.

Isabelle took a seat at their table and the others followed suit. Her friends’ faces were giddy which hadn’t been the expression she’d expected. She looked at them curiously and they slid her a gold coin.

“That’s your split of the loot,” Albert said. He was practically bouncing in his seat and that clued her in that it was a good haul. Tiffany was a farmer’s daughter so only knew a bit more about quest prizes than Ratface did. Albert’s sham of a father was an adventurer though so if he was excited clearly it was a lot.

“How’d it go?” asked Abigail. Her tone dry.

Isabelle huffed.

“Oh, you know how she is, ‘surviving the adventurers is also part of the test’” Isabelle said. Her tone was high pitched as she mocked the instructor. It was a terrible impression, but Ratface was inclined to give it full marks given that the instructor had nearly gotten her killed.

“She compensated well enough for it through,” Isabelle conceded, “a full apprentice certification for all three, as well as buying all their loot at highest estimated price.” She pushed a small book over to Ratface. “She even included a written endorsement of Ratface here.”

Ratface picked up the passport and leafed through to where the endorsement was. It was written in common so the only thing she could read was ‘rat face’.

“I suppose this is good,” said Ratface.

Isabelle chuckled.

“I think she was worried that Abigail would come down if she didn’t. She seemed a little too relieved to see me instead of you.”

“It always works,” Abigail said. Her face split into a grin. Ratface looked at her in confusion.

“Do you know what the second most important thing for an adventurer is?” Abigail asked.

“Reputation?” said Albert.

“Not quite but that helps with it. The second most important thing for an adventurer is to make sure they get paid.” She shrugged at their looks, “we send Isabelle because she comes across as reasonable, but the implication is clear. Don’t give us a fair price…” Abigail began.

“…and I send over the angry old lady,” Isabelle finished.

Ratface nodded at the concept. Her mother had done a similar thing when raiding. Have a big ugly goblin standing next to her while she offered a reasonable deal to whoever they’d caught.

“The trick to raiding,” she’d explained to Ratface, “is to fight as little as possible.”

Apparently being an adventurer had more in common with her mother’s work than either side would find comfortable admitting.

Abigail pushed herself out of the table.

“Well, that’s enough dilly dallying for us. Isabelle, did you get a wagon?”

Isabelle nodded.

“Outside and loaded up apart from whatever’s in our rooms.”

“Then let’s get to it.”

A quick scrabble through the room to grab her few items and her still sleeping rat and Ratface was on her way. They made their way out of the village. People gave Ratface heated looks, but nobody was brave enough to act on them. They got out of the gate and on their way out. Ratface sighed. Finally free.

A woman stepped out of the forest and Ratface resolved to stop tempting fate. The woman was holding a spear, but she didn’t look aggressive. She didn’t even acknowledge the rest of them and instead faced Albert.

“Albert,” she said.

“Mum.” He tensed up like he was bracing to be stabbed.

“Daryl told me what happened,” she began. She sent Ratface a heated glare then turned back to Albert.

“I can’t understand why you’d side with a goblin, but I can’t live with my son thinking I hate him.”

She handed the spear to Albert, and he took it with shaking hands. Now that it was closer Ratface could see the craft that had gone into the thing. Isabelle was eyeing it with interest so it must have some enchantments on it.

“I was going to give you this on your first real adventure. I guess I still am.” She choked back a sob but pushed through. “Take it and remember that even if I don’t understand your decisions, I still trust you to make them.”

She faded back into the forest and was gone before Albert had a chance to respond. He stared down at the spear then kept walking.

Ratface eyed the forest, then let out another sigh. Now. Now they were done with the village.

She looked around but this time nothing corrected her.