Vest rushed towards me, gripping his dagger with both hands. I yanked on a cloth pouch, snapping the thin cord that affixed it to my belt. The bag came free, and I emptied its contents in Vest's direction.

“Ah!?” Vest cried out, having realized what I’d just done. He tried to skid to a stop, but it was too late. He slid right across the sea of scattered grape-sized glass spheres. To his credit, he stayed upright for longer than I had expected him to. Nevertheless, Vest bellowed as he lost his balance, flailing as he toppled to the group.

One of the reasons I was so on edge was that I had no idea what these guys were capable of. How strong were they? How fast? Was there something about their physiology that invalidated my usual tricks? In this case, I wasn’t confident that the marbles would work.

I was already turning my attention to Orange, who was only steps away from taking swipe at me with his weapon. Rather than let him do that, I took out the sharp table knife I nabbed from a food stall a while back.

I mean, it was a perfectly good weapon, and it was practically begging to be stolen! Who just leaves cooking equipment out like that, unattended?!

Taking a step back, I gripped the blade of the knife with the thumb and index finger of my right hand, keeping it hidden beneath my cloak. I had my left hand on a pouch at my waist. I made sure Orange could see it, my elbow pushing the cloak aside. The moment I saw his eyes move to the pouch; I threw the knife at Orange. It buried itself at least a quarter inch deep into his right shoulder, near the socket.

Orange cried out in pain, clutching the wound, the blood rapidly dyeing his orange fur a deep crimson. Seeing an opening, I ran over and gripped the handle of the knife with one hand and slammed the other against his torso. He fell backwards, and I tightened my grip on the weapon, pulling it free. Orange hit the ground with a sickening thud.

One down.

I spared a moment to check on Lloyd. He was using a crude but effective weapon to keep his opponent at a safe distance; a long sack containing a stone. Lloyd was hanging in there, but I could tell he was weaker, both in strength and speed, than his opponent. The situation was a stalemate. But that was fine. If he could keep his opponent pinned down, that meant I had one less enemy to worry about.

Vest was already recovering, having climbed to his feet while I delt with Orange. But when he saw his friend had collapsed, blood soaking his fur, he froze. Vest’s eyes went wide.

I bent over, grabbing Orange by the scruff of the neck and hauled him to his feet. That was unexpected. He was much lighter than I had thought he would be. Even though I was currently weakened, my movements sluggish and strength only a fraction of what it should be, I had no trouble lifting the Ratatoskr.

I brought my knife up, pressing it to his throat, or where it should have been. “Oi! If you want your buddy here to live, drop your weapons and step back!” I demanded.

Vest’s face cycled between rage, frustration, fear, and despair. At least, that’s what I thought they were. I wasn’t well versed in Ratatoskr facial expressions.

Vest glared at me before glancing over at the Ratatoskr Lloyd had been fighting. The two stared at each other, having a silent exchange of words.

Giving your opponent time to think during hostile negotiations can lead to undesired outcomes. Don’t let them plan, don’t let them reconsider. Make the choice easy, a good and bad option, and force them to pick the ‘good’ option before they consider doing something unexpected.

I pressed the knife harder against Orange’s throat, drawing a bit of blood.

Vest dropped his dagger, throwing his hands in the air. “Stop! Ok, ok! We surrender! Just let him go, please!” Vest begged. All traces of the confidence and bravado from earlier had vanished. Only seconds passed before I again heard the sound of metal clanging against stone. The remaining Ratatoskr had surrendered.

“The sheaths too,” I demanded. At first he seemed confused, then indignant. Vest had realized he wasn’t just getting beat, he was being mugged. He hesitated. Then, his shoulders slumped, head bowed in defeat. The two conscious Ratatoskrs complied, and I heard the sound of leather striking stone.

“Step back. More. There, now don’t move,” I ordered. Lloyd scurried around, collecting the blades and sheathes. He nodded, informing me he had finished his task. I threw Orange towards the two Ratatoskr. We booked it, navigating the twisting, labyrinthine streets, leaving our assailants to deal with their injured comrade.

“That turned out better than expected,” Lloyd remarked. We were currently resting at an inn; having paid with the money I had fleeced from Orange before I tossed him aside. There wasn’t much to the room, four wood walls, a full-sized bed, a chest at the foot of the bed for storage, a table, and two chairs. Lloyd was sitting at the table, inspecting the weapons we purloined during the recent encounter.

I groaned, looking over at Lloyd. My muscles hurt, I was more exhausted than I’ve ever been in my entire life, er, lives?

But even so, I could still be proud of the fact that we had, technically, won that fight. The confidence I had in my capabilities had been shattered as a result of the encounter with the bastard that killed me and Lloyd. I started second-guessing myself. Had I made the correct choices? Thinking back, something felt… wrong about that situation.

I wracked my brain for the remainder of the evening, replaying the scene over and over. Where did things first go wrong?

We ate dinner in silence. The inn had a rather generous deal; one free meal per night. We had bread, a bowl of soup, and a large serving of ham, which we were very happy about. Living in the slums, the only kind of meat you could afford were the dry, preserved kinds. Jerky, for the most part. We viewed anything more as a luxury, a waste of money, even if it tasted far, far better.

There was another reason to smile. The innkeeper told us that there was a place to wash off out back. By all appearances, it was just a simple shed. The interior, though, was designed in such a way that water would drain to one side of the room and flow out of the shed. A handpump was present, allowing a bucket to be filled with water for washing oneself.

This level of convenience was unheard of in the slums. Even the cheap inns in our old city didn’t have a sophisticated facility such as this, only the middle-class and higher ones did. Was the standard of living in this city that much higher than our old one?

A meal and a bath. Back when we were planning our next moves, I had set my expectations low. A roof overhead, a slice of bread or dried meat. That alone would have been satisfactory, let alone dinner, a bath, and a bed.

“Damn, I’m so tired that I can’t even blink.” We had returned to our room with full bellies and free of dirt and grime.

Lloyd rolled his eyes. “Yet it seems you still have the energy to complain…,” he mumbled.

I snorted. “Yep, always.”

There was a long stretch of silence as I gathered my thoughts. “Hey, Lloyd?”

“Hm? What’s the matter?”

“Where did I screw up? With the…,” I trailed off, letting the words hang in the air. Lloyd mumbled, having understood what I was trying to get at. I remained silent, letting him think.

Not even a minute passed before he had his answer. “From the beginning,” he stated bluntly. tilted my head a bit at that. “I mean since the moment we saw him up close,” he continued. I still didn’t know what he was alluding to. “We thought he was weak, slow. That if we just knocked him down, we’d have enough time to subdue him. My estimation of him based off his appearance was far from ‘slightly off the mark,’ it wasn’t even close to the skill and strength he displayed against you.”

That was exactly it. I thought he was weaker, slower than he really was. And it wasn’t just a slight underestimation, it was far worse than that. I’d never felt that confident in a wildly inaccurate assessment before. An ominous feeling crept on me. I shuddered a bit despite myself.

Lloyd shrugged. “Well, I don’t know what caused it, but we can worry about that tomorrow. For now, let’s just get some rest,” he advised as he pulled the covers over him. I hesitantly followed suit, too tired to argue.

It was only a few minutes later that we put out the candle lighting the room, and we soon fell into a deep, deep slumber.