It was a different Ratface that woke up the next day.

  Well, no, it was the same Ratface, but she was more resolved to not lie to her friends. She even had every intention of telling them all until she saw the goblin scratched into her bedside. It was a lot cruder than the dolls.

  The glamour was still watching her then. A necessary evil really. If she insisted on them both leaving, she was pretty sure they would have cut their losses and taken her.

  So, she kept her thoughts close to her chest as she went out for breakfast on the train. She’d woken up later than the rest of them and they were each wandering around the place to check it out now that they were allowed to. Apparently, the short man had come by to let them know that everything was recharged and safe for them to use. A conversation Ratface had missed sleeping in.

  Albert and Tiffany had been cornered by Fulgora early on and invited to her bunk. Abigail was working on her amour in their room. No doubt keeping out of sight of Lily.

  So it was just Halmir and Kryssa that joined her for breakfast. The rat boy watched the two of them with knowing eyes as he ate his breakfast. It was clear he knew that something had happened but didn’t seem concerned he didn’t know.

  That made sense really. If either of them was going to do something secretive, he would be the one they took. It was funny to Ratface how quickly she’d come to rely on the rat she had once considered emergency rations.

  Ratface gestured at Kryssa.

  “Elf,” she said. Halmir tilted his head in a question, and she wiggled her hand. He glanced out the window and nodded. He didn’t know exactly what was going on now, but he had the gist.

  It was risky but she figured that the glamour couldn’t be sure she’d told Halmir anything. It’s not like her could stop her saying the word elf when Kryssa literally looked like one.

  A thing that was getting her side eye from the other two people in the restaurant. Lily and her squire kept giving them distrustful glances. The champions golden eyes glittered as she did so.

  Hmm, Abigail had warned Ratface that some others could see magic.

  She got out of her chair and wandered over to the other table. There was a pop as something landed on her shoulder followed by Kryssa coming to stand at her side.

  “I assume you’re planning something you think is very clever?” she asked. Her tone made it clear what she thought of Ratface’s plan.

  Ratface shrugged. Her plan was simple. Based on a few assumptions she’d made.

  The first was that the glamour and elf were at least partly here for her and the other goblin. Given they’d nearly wiped out a demon forest to get her last time, it seemed likely. The fact they were working towards other goals didn’t change that.

  But they hadn’t taken her yet had they? Instead, they’d made deals with her to get closer to this city. They needed her to distract someone’s gaze and there was only one person here with glowing eyes.

  Ratface stopped just in front of Lily’s table. She offered the champion a grin she wouldn’t see through the helmet.

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  “I hoped that I might ask you a question,” she said.

  “And why should I answer it?” Lily asked with a sneer. Ratface hesitated.

  She didn’t know if she really understood the champion, but she was desperate.

  So she threw out her one bargaining chip. The one that she’d want, if her mother was a traitor.

  “I can tell you about a Abigail’s life,” she offered. Lily’s eyes flashed at the suggestion.

  Yet she traced in the air and the sound around them quieted. She gestured for the three of them to sit.

  “What’s your question?” she asked. She sounded tired. The anger in her drained out without its target to focus on.

  Ratface pulled out the health potion vial and handed it to Lily.

  “Is there anything weird about this?” she asked.

  “You approached me for this?” Lily asked. Ratface nodded. It was the only clue she had to there being something weird about the healing potion. She knew something was up with it. Guilt wouldn’t move an elf. Not in a human city.

  She almost smiled at the thought. Once upon a time she would never have thought so openly about the elves’ flaws. Funny how them trying to capture her changed her tune.

  Lily handed the vial to her squire.

  “What can you tell about it Anna?” she asked. So that was her name, Ratface tucked it away for later. The girl eyed the vial critically.

  “It’s definitely elven, you can tell by the clarity of glass. Yet this isn’t how they make their vials.”

  “Excellent work Anna. You can wait to tell the difference until our traitor’s squire has upheld her end of the bargain.”

  Ratface frowned at the mark against Abigail, but she held her tongue.

  “What do you want to know?” Ratface expected to ask of her exploits, but Lily surprised her.

  “Does she have friends?” she asked. Ratface tilted her head.

  “She’s well respected in the adventurer community,” she offered. Lily shook her head.

  “Respect is not friendship, who makes her laugh?”

  “Well, she’s with the Witch of the woods. They are too sweet for old people.”

  Lily’s face scrunched up into amusement.

  “She was always so besotted with her partners. It made dinner parties so awkward,” said the champion. She gestured for Ratface to continue and Ratface babbled about things she’d noticed on their adventures. None of them were secret Abigail had asked her to keep, just little snippets of the old knights life. Lily listened attentively and only held Ratface to pause when she saw more people coming in.

  “A fair trade,” she told Ratface. She gestured at Anna who looked at Lily in confusion.

  “The vial isn’t round like how they usually make their vials. It’s also old. Really old.”

  Lily took the vial off of Anna and handed it back to Ratface.

  “Roll it around and you can hear the difference. It’s a multifaceted thing. Easier to grip supposedly. Where’d you get this again?” she asked.

  “I found it in Halvin’s rest,” Ratface lied. Lily nodded.

  “Mm, it makes sense something like that would be there.”

  Ratface said nothing but the hand holding the vial felt cold. Multifaceted. They meant it had too many faces. She rolled the vial over the table and she could feel the faint noise as it rolled onto a new face. To her it sounded like screaming. She nodded and stood up to leave but hesitated.

  “You don’t talk like someone who hates her,” she said to Lily. The champions hands clenched.

  “I assume you told you what happened?”

  Ratface nodded. She wouldn’t say to Lily that she didn’t think Abigail was at fault. It wouldn’t go well, and the knight wouldn’t appreciate it.

  “What she may have neglected was that the prince was with her. It’s why she was fighting at all. He was my betrothed.” She looked towards Ratface, but her eyes were somewhere else. Ratface felt she could see that day reflected in her eyes.

  “When I got there his body was laying in front of her. There was no sign of her sword strike on him, but plenty of the goblins.” Her face twisted into a sneer for a moment before returning to sadness.

  “I could have forgiven her even then, if she would just condemn the goblins. But she refused to do so, and so the Queen sent her away. As banished as she could be as a favoured of the Lady.”

  Her eyes refocused and settled on Ratface.

  “So I lost my betrothed and my mentor, all because she refused to bend even when I needed her to.” Some of that anger returned to Lily but mostly her eyes seemed sad.

  “Go on traitor’s squire, I’ll see you at the dinner before your last trial.”

  Ratface walked away but her hands clenched. A part of her understood how Lily felt. The part that wished her mother had just sent Ratface and herself away, instead of the rest of the goblins.

  Yet her mother had done it to save her people. How much worse it must hurt, for her world to be cut down by one of the people who held it up.