The following two months were a low point in Crow’s life. Unable and unwilling to deal with the complex emotions that came from losing Penelope, he spent most of his time in and out of the tavern in Silverpool, getting drunk to cope with the pain. Evelyn continued to take care of him during this time, making sure he didn’t cause trouble enough to draw the attention of the local knights, who, by this point, were on the lookout for the runaway thief. Even though she didn’t know why he was so distraught—he refused to tell anyone what had happened—she made it her goal to help him move forward and remember who he was.

Eventually, her efforts paid off. After he had grieved for two months, the pain Crow felt faded into a tolerable numbness. He finally came to terms with the fact that he was never going to see Penelope again and thus attempted to take the first steps towards moving on: He sobered up and went back to stealing from the knights in the outer villages. In returning to his old life, he found solace and began to come back to who he had been before.

However, as winter approached, he started to realize that he wasn’t quite the same as he had been a year ago. He missed having company and found it lonely to be traveling alone. So, when he encountered a rogue band of thieves in the inner kingdom, he was quick to accept the leader’s invitation to join. He spent the following two seasons with them, until he had a fallout with the leader that made him realize how degraded the other thieves were and that they were not the kind of people he wanted to associate with.

Fortunately for Crow, he wasn’t the only one in the group who disliked the decisions made by the other thieves. Three other members went with him when he left: Simon, Alistair, and Rikki. They abandoned the thieves with him in the hopes that he would be a better leader, and over the course of their following travels around the inner kingdom, became close companions of Crow.

After spending such a long time away from the outer villages, Crow and the others return to see what had happened to the peasants in their absence, only to discover that the war with Younis had begun. They choose to stay in the hopes that they would be able to do something to help the villagers who were getting caught up in the battles. During this time, Crow wrestles with his trauma from his childhood until he manages to overcome it for the most part. Able to fight without freezing up for the first time, he masters duel wielding daggers and starts to defend himself along with the peasants in the village with the new weapons. It is also during this time that his hatred for knights grows. He becomes unafraid to kill in self-defense, no matter which kingdom the attacking knights come from.

As the war becomes more intense, the thieves come to admit that there is nothing they can do to save the villagers from the war, so they leave. For a short time, they take refuge with Evelyn and Hazel Ansgot before they move on to Crow’s home village, Myrefall. This is where they remain for the following two seasons, including one especially brutal winter in which Crow contracts a chronic cough that he keeps secret from the others. As the battles rage on between Brerra and Younis, the thieves continue to do their best to help the villagers survive the onslaught.

--

“Did you see the looks on their faces?” Alistair snickered. “Absolute horror.”

The band of thieves made their way through the woods as they headed back to Myrefall after a successful day of raiding Brerratic knights. They had just stolen a sack full of weapons that the new king had delivered to reinforce the frontline. Of course, their goal wasn’t to sabotage the forces of their kingdom, so they would return the weapons… for a price. Simon, the only semi-literate one of the bunch, had left a small, empty satchel along with a hastily scrawled note attached to a tree in the knights’ camp: [b][i]IF YOU WANT YOR SORDS BACK, BREENG THIS TO THE TAVERN IN NORCREST VILLAJ FILD WITH GOLD.[/i][/b] All they had to do now was sit back and wait for the knights to get desperate enough to comply with their demands. As previous experience had proven, it was only a matter of time.

“What did you expect?” Simon rolled his eyes. “They just lost a third of all their new weaponry in the middle of a war. Of course they’re going to be frightened.”

“You have no sense of fun,” Alistair snorted and then turned towards the others. “We should celebrate! These weapons are going to make us rich when the knights pay our ransom. Let’s go to the Ivory Hatchet tavern tonight.”

“A mug of ale does sound good right about now,” Rikki grinned, turning to the fourth thief in the group with a playful nudge. “What do you say, boss?”

Crow adjusted his hold on the bag of weapons he had slung over his shoulder and returned the female thief’s look with a smirk of his own, “Sounds great to me. You three go on ahead. I’ll drop these off at the camp and meet up with you later.”

“Alright!” Alistair pumped his fist in the air excitedly and slung an arm over Simon’s shoulder. “Come on, you big grump. We’re going to get wasted.”

“Please don’t,” Simon groaned as the energetic thief led him forcefully towards the village, leaving the others behind.

Rikki didn’t follow after them right away. Now alone with Crow, she looked up at him with a mischievous glint in her dark eyes and then flung her arms around his neck, leaning up on her toes to press a kiss to his lips. He met her sudden advance with equal enthusiasm, slipping his arms around the small of her back. After a moment, he pulled back and laughed, “What was that for?”

“Nothing,” Rikki shrugged, breaking away from his grasp and casting him a flirtatious wink. “Just felt like it. That’s all.” With that, she turned and trotted after the other two thieves, leaving Crow to watch her saunter off from behind.

He shook his head at her blatant teasing and kept walking through the trees to drop off the stolen weapons at their hideout. Even though he didn’t intend to get drunk with Alistair and Rikki—he knew Simon wasn’t going to get intoxicated either, since the other thief was too uptight to let himself go—a mug of ale at the Ivory Hatchet did sound good to him. It would be nice to celebrate the successful raid with his companions, so he wanted to catch up with them as soon as he could.

It didn’t take long before he arrived at the edge of the camp, but when he got there, something felt off. It had been faint, but he could have sworn he heard the snap of a twig coming from the small ravine that he and the others had made into their home. He frowned, setting down the sack of weapons behind a tree and drawing his daggers from a belt around his waist. He crouched down and moved silently towards the source of the noise, moving with precision that he had remastered since his escape two years prior.

Once he was close enough to see who or what was in their hideout, he stopped behind another tree and peered out to take a look. To his annoyance, there was, in fact, a person invading his home—and not just any person: A knight, wearing the colors of Brerra. They had been discovered.

Crow tightened his grip on his weapons, narrowing his eyes coldly at the knight as he tried to decide what to do. There was only one intruder, so easiest course of action would be to simply kill him before he could spread word to his comrades. However, the thief was hesitant to do that. The knight wasn’t directly threatening anyone, so to take his life felt wrong. No, he couldn’t just kill him in cold blood. He had to think of something else.

Having decided on a plan, Crow slowly and quietly rose to stand up straight. He cocked back the dagger in his right hand, took aim, and then hurled it towards the knight. The blade flew through the air and embedded itself in a tree just next to the intruder’s head. The knight let out a startled yelp and spun around to defend himself. However, the thief was faster. Before the intruder had a chance to draw his own weapon, Crow slammed him back against the tree and held his second dagger up to his throat, glaring icily as he held him pinned.

Now up close and personal with the knight, two things made the thief falter. The first was that the knight wasn’t a man at all: it was a woman. The second was that this woman was someone he knew.

“Olivia?” Crow said, wide eyed with surprise.

As he said her name, Olivia stopped struggling against his grip and looked up to meet his gaze. She stared at him for a moment before her own eyes widened with recognition. “Wait… Crow? Is that you?”

Crow nodded wordlessly, still reeling from the unexpected encounter. He hesitated for a moment and then released the female knight, retrieving his dagger from the tree as he stepped back from her. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same question,” she said, her brown eyes sweeping slowly over him. “You do know there’s a war going on here, don’t you?”

“No,” Crow drawled with a sarcastic roll of his eyes. “I just thought everyone was dropping dead of their own accord.”

“Hm,” Olivia smirked. “I missed that feisty attitude of yours.” Her eyes swept over him once more. “And my, my... You’ve changed quite a bit, haven’t you? I almost didn’t recognize you.”

“I should hope so,” Crow grinned, crossing his arms over his muscular chest. “The last time you saw me, I had just gotten out of prison.”

“I see,” Olivia licked her lips and met his gaze again. “Well, you look good, Crow.”

“Thanks,” he took a step closer to the knight, deciding to test her a bit as he recalled how she had been interested in him before. “You look pretty good, yourself, love,” he said in a murmur, lowering his gaze to her lips. “You know… I think I owe you for last time, wouldn’t you say?”

“Tempting,” the knight smiled coyly. “But are you really willing to do that to Penelope?”

At the mention of her name, Crow’s gaze darkened and he recoiled from the knight. “That isn’t funny,” he curled his lip at her scathingly.

“What are you talking about?” Olivia blinked, seeming confused by his reaction.

Crow wavered, caught off guard by her casual behavior. He would have expected Olivia to be more serious when speaking about her dead comrade, even if they had been rivals. Recovering quickly, he went on, “You know what I’m talking about. It’s true that I loved her long ago, but she’s gone now. I heard the news from the knights in the outer villages.”

“What news?” Olivia’s innocent tone was beginning to annoy him.

“The news that she and William got attacked,” he spat. “Don’t play dumb with me. I know that she’s dead.”

Olivia stared at him for a moment before a bemused smirk crossed her lips, “Oh, Crow… You poor, misinformed thing.” She stepped closer to him and went on in a whisper: “Penelope isn’t dead.”

Crow felt his heart skip a beat. “W-what?” he leaned against a nearby tree, suddenly dizzy.

“That’s right,” Olivia continued cheerily. “Penelope’s alive. In fact, she’s in the outer villages right now. We’re part of the same battalion…”

Crow missed the rest of Olivia’s words as she chatted carelessly on. He couldn’t believe it. For the last two years, he had believed Penelope was gone, but she wasn’t. She was alive—and she was nearby. His heart pounded excitedly in his chest. He had to go find her. He needed to see her again. It had been so long…

[i]But what if she doesn’t want to see me?[/i] The thought appeared in his mind, casting a shadow of doubt over his excitement. If she hadn’t been killed, then why didn’t she come to be with him in the outer villages? He felt a pang of sadness. She must have changed her mind about being with him after all.

“Crow.”

The thief snapped back to attention as he felt Olivia prod him, “Sorry. What?”

“I [i]said[/i],” the knight smirked. “What do you say? Do you want me to tell you where she is?”

Crow hesitated at the question. His heart screamed at him to say yes. He missed her so much. However, his head told him no. She had chosen her life, and it wasn’t with him. He didn’t know if he could handle running back to her, only to be rejected and sent away. [i]But at least I would know for sure,[/i] he argued with himself. Even if it hurt, he had to talk to her one more time. He had to find out why she had left him. He needed the closure.

“Yes,” he said after a long pause, meeting Olivia’s gaze determinedly. “Tell me where she is.”