“Big mistake,” Crow grinned when Penelope said she would do him a favor if he got away from her. “I can’t wait to come up with something embarrassing for you to do [i]when[/i] I win.” He waggled the stolen coin purse by its drawstrings teasingly. It had been a long time since he’d last had this much fun with someone. He was excited to pit his skills against the knight in a friendly match. He’d never challenged a city guard like this before either, though he supposed that had more to do with the fact that they would actually arrest him if he got caught than anything else. Regardless, he was looking forward to seeing how their competition would go.

“Please,” the former thief scoffed when Penelope told him not to make excuses. “It was a legitimate excuse last time, but I’m not going to lose today.” He might not have had any opportunities to practice a theft like this since he’d been stabbed by Jaxon, but he was still confident in his abilities. When she’d caught him in Wellspring, he’d been locked up in a tiny cell for a whole year, malnourished and stir crazy. This time, he wasn’t even two months out of practice and was still in fairly good shape, all things considered. He wasn’t nearly as disadvantaged as he had been before.

As she asked how much of a head start he needed, Crow considered the question before turning to her with a haughty smirk. “Just count to five and you won’t see me again ‘til this is all over,” he declared, trotting a few paces ahead of her and tossing the pouch up and down in his hand. “Oh, and by the way,” he mused, casting her a sly smile over his shoulder. “When you give up, just say so and I’ll come to you. No tricks though. If you say the words, the game is over.”

With that, he took off at a sprint, heading for the nearest side street. “May the best man win!” he called back to her tauntingly just before he disappeared around the corner.