“Maybe,” Crow murmured absently, eyeing the books on the shelves as Penelope suggested that his father expected that he would be able to learn to read quickly. Having never tried it before, he had no idea how long it would take him to master something like that. Amongst all of the thieves in his group, Simon was the only one who had been even somewhat literate, and even after all the time he’d spent poring over books, he’d acknowledged that he hadn’t been able to progress very far. Based on that, it sounded like reading and writing was a difficult thing to learn.  However, mastering spoken language was supposed to be difficult too, and he’d been able to pick that up no problem. Perhaps there was something to the knight’s theory after all.

As Penelope went on to say that the whole trip had been overwhelming, Crow nodded in agreement. When they had left the knights’ camp in the beginning, he’d expected the whole thing to go by quickly so he could return to the outer villages again after just a few days. Instead, the journey to the castle had been nothing short of exhausting, and now there was a chance he wouldn’t go home at all. In the span of just one evening, everything had changed. He didn’t even know what to think anymore.

He held Penelope a little closer as she reminded him that he still had time to make his decision. He knew she was right, but he couldn’t help feeling like a heavy weight was bearing down on his shoulders. Although his father had made it sound like he could take all the time he needed to choose a path, he didn’t doubt that the king would be expecting an answer soon. After all, he probably had more important things to do that sit around the castle, waiting for his estranged son to make up his mind about whether or not to take the job. The thief didn’t want to leave his father hanging for too many days. He would have to come to a decision eventually.

Crow was drawn from his thoughts when Penelope spoke up again to ask if he had ever tried to learn how to read or write before. “Never,” he shook his head, looking down to meet her gaze. “It wasn’t really something I thought would be useful to me, since I’ve never needed it before, so I haven’t bothered trying to learn.”

As she went on to suggest that she could teach him, his eyes wandered back to the countless books. “Hm,” he grunted thoughtfully. It honestly wasn’t something he had ever been interested in learning before, since he tended to prefer spending his time learning skills that he deemed useful to himself. However, she seemed excited to teach him, and he [i]did[/i] have plenty of time to kill while they stayed at the castle…

“Alright,” he answered after a pause, turning back to her with a fond smile and running one hand through her hair. “I don’t see why I shouldn’t learn how. I mean, we’ve got all these books here already, so we might as well put some to use.” He leaned down to kiss her playfully on the nose. “Show me what you’ve got, teacher.”