Kettik is a small, wiry kobold with rust-red scales, a cream-colored muzzle, and sharp amber eyes. One horn is chipped near the tip, and a narrow leather cord holds several stolen brass keys against his throat. He wears fitted leather armor beneath a patched burgundy coat, with a blackened silver charm hanging from his belt as the focus for his pact magic. His claws are stained with ink, lamp oil, and soot from years of lockwork and clandestine errands.

Kettik is quick-witted, suspicious of authority, and intensely loyal once someone has earned his trust. He treats every room as a puzzle and every conversation as a possible con, but he is unexpectedly gentle with frightened people and small animals. He enjoys dramatic entrances, even when his version of drama is dropping from a ceiling beam and announcing that everyone should remain calm.

Kettik grew up beneath the streets of a river city, in a kobold warren wedged between old foundations and forgotten drainage tunnels. His clutch survived by taking what larger folk left unguarded, then by taking what they guarded badly. Kettik became the smallest and quickest of the tunnel runners, a talented pickpocket who could slip through a market crowd, a barred window, or a chimney flue without making more noise than a rat. His criminal work was never entirely selfish. He stole medicine from wealthy apothecaries, food from predatory merchants, and once an entire locked chest of blankets for a family whose home had burned.