Ravina walked back up to the counter and was first noticed by Patricia. "Finished so soon? Lia, you were quite accurate; she indeed possesses a keen intellect." The woman's comment only served to cause Ravina to lower her head as a tint of red spread across her face.
"See, what did I tell you? The little thing's a genius," Aurelia smiled brightly at Ravina, only just now noticing her forlorn expression. The girl lifted a hand, grabbing the fabric of Aurelia's dress and tugging to indicate she wanted to talk separately.
"Genius or not, she does look like she needs help with the test," Patricia's smile turned strained as she was caught between the perfect time to make fun of her old friend and her professional attitude of not making fun of new hopefuls—at least until after they signed the dotted line.
Aurelia was pulled aside by the young girl. “So what is it?” She asked the girl.
Ravina held up the form. While it was practically new, there was a smudge of fresh ink stained on it, an oddly clean squiggle of ink.
Aurelia could only blink at it.
“I uh…” Ravina tried to say, her words a little strained. She then mumbled something too soft to hear.
“What was that?”
Red-faced, Ravina repeated, “I can’t write!”
The moment of silence was almost deadly to the little girl.
“You can’t write?” Aurelia repeated, blinking, then a smile shadowed her face. “A daughter of a noble who can’t write, now that is interesting.”
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Ravina caught the stifled laugh. “Well, sorry, but were you not paying attention to why we are here in the first place!”
“Why we’re—” ah, well now that she thought about it, it did make a certain sense. A noble girl would be able to write by age 5, commoners, however, rarely learned unless they needed to. “Heh, well it's still kinda funny,” Aurelia admitted. She looked back at the paper. Beside the word "name" was a scribble of ink. “It's cute,” she offered.
Of course, she didn't know that inside the young girl was a woman who clearly remembered graduating from college. Writing wasn't even considered a skill—it was a necessity. Now that same woman was stuck being unable to form even the most basic of letters.
With red ears, she tried to defend herself. "I know how to spell!" she insisted. "I’m just… not practiced with writing." It was devastating to her how bad she was. Try as she might, she couldn't bend the pen correctly. Lines were easy, if not crooked. However, trying to finish an R would result in a sharp 2 with a line through it or a D with a tail. Either way, properly spelling her name was not available. To make matters worse, she had to use an inkwell, something she never had to use in her other world.
If it were only the name, she could have managed. However, it was a full, two-page form complete with dates and a signature.
"Okay, okay," Aurelia smiled despite herself. She turned to look at Patricia, who had a bemused smile that annoyed the blue-haired warrior. Tearing up the form, she flushed it into a bag tied to her belt, just ahead of her blade holster.
She slammed a small silver coin on the counter. "I need another form," she demanded. "Let's get a new one and a bit of help."
With a practiced motion, Patricia swiftly swiped the coin off the counter and into a box hidden beneath its bright brown wood. Pulling out another form, she also procured a stamp and pushed its wet ink into the "Application Fee's Paid" section. Flipping the paper, she spun it around as a feathered pen appeared in her hands, dancing around her fingers. Pulling out an inkwell, she replaced her snickering smile with a more professional one.
“So, Ravin, correct?”
Flicking a look at Aurelia, Ravina returned Patricia’s gaze. “Yes. R, A, V, I, N. Ravin.” The girl nodded at her words, a little of her embarrassment dissipating as she proved that she could, in fact, spell her name—well, most of it. She was only missing an ‘a.’
Patricia’s smile turned bemused as she observed the actions of a very proud child. Her pen’s blade barely touched the black of the well when it twisted sharply over the paper, printing out such beautiful and perfect words. “Lia, where on earth did you find this sweetheart?” she asked.
“Damn thing found me,” she admitted, causing the girl's shoulders to slump.
“There goes the backstory as well,” the girl in question whispered, though she didn’t know why she would have even bothered at this point.
“Quite adorable, really,” Patricia’s words, supported by her stifled laughter, made the image of a badass adventurer fly away quickly. To her horror, Ravina realized that she was going to be stuck as a cute sidekick behind Aurelia for the rest of her life. Or career. Thankfully, it would be short.