Crow smiled as Penelope called him by his real name again, feeling his heart swell with affection for the knight. Even though she’d known it for a long time now, the fact that she couldn’t speak it often made it feel more special to him whenever she did find the opportunity to use it. It made him feel closer to her, since it reminded him that she was still the only one who knew who he really was aside from his title and reputation as a thief. He was glad that he’d told her.

When they parted, he made it back to his camp quickly from the clearing, since it wasn’t a long walk, and slipped past the waterfall into the cavern. All three of his companions were fast asleep on their mats and barely stirred when he returned. It was obvious that they were exhausted from the journey to and from Black Hollow. Crow wasn’t much better off. He yawned tiredly as his exhaustion hit him at once and made his way over to the sleeping area after he’d taken off his cloak and boots, collapsing less than gracefully onto his bedroll.

Once he had settled down comfortably, he drew his blanket over himself and closed his eyes, drifting off to get some much-needed sleep before he had to face Jaxon tomorrow.

--

The next morning, Crow was the last to wake, which was to be expected after he had stayed out so late the night before. After he got up, he and the others ate a small breakfast of dark bread together. He had been expecting them all to want to spend the day searching for Jaxon again, but to his surprise, none of them seemed interested in leaving the camp this time. There was an air of defeat amongst them as his companions seemed to give up on the hope of ever catching the murderer after three false leads.

While their hopelessness saddened Crow, he couldn’t say anything to change their minds about it. After all, they were right. There was no chance that any of them could bring Jaxon down when they were just chasing shadows. So, instead of complaining, he took the rest of the day to think through how he was going to approach Jaxon, since there was quite a bit he wanted to say this time.

First of all, he intended to confront the other thief about his attack on Gavin. He needed to know why Jaxon had tried to have the knight killed and whether or not he planned to go after Penelope too. He also planned to ask more about the upcoming raid that the murderer had planned. With the knights’ next shipment still so far from arriving, it might just mean the end of their battalion if Jaxon’s thieves stole the rest of their supplies and Younis attacked again.

Once he covered both of those questions, Crow was going to ask Jaxon if the Younisian baron would still be receptive to hiring himself and the rest of his companions to help sabotage the Brerratic knights.

With so many different things to think about, the day went by quickly for the anxious thief. The sun sank, and supper came and went, and it wasn’t long before he volunteered to wash everyone’s dishes again so he’d have an easy time slipping away for the next meeting.