Trash Panda

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

Crow was too tired to deal with hiding the sheets properly xD

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

“I will,” Crow promised when Penelope told him to be careful, smiling softly at the kiss she touched to his cheek. As she stepped back, he did as well, nodding his head in a brief goodbye before turning to slip silently into the snoring nobleman’s room on his way back to his own. On the other side of the door, he allowed his eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness and then crept across the bedchamber to the window. He’d left it cracked open so that he wouldn’t have to bother with the latch this time.

Stifling a weary yawn, the viceroy stepped up onto the window sill and reached into the cold night air to grab hold of the cord that was still dangling outside. Even though he had the skills to climb back up without it, he was tired after spending half the night sneaking around the castle, and the rope would let him get back to his bed faster. No reason to look a gift horse in the mouth.

He leaned up on the balls of his feet to grip the cord higher and stepped off the ledge. For a moment, he swung by his arms until he managed to get his feet underneath him on one of the knots. Letting go with his right hand, he leaned over to the window and pulled it shut. There was no easy way to redo the inside latch. He just hoped the nobleman would assume one of his servants had left it open on accident.

Once the cord stopped moving in the air, Crow began his ascent, using his hands, thighs, and feet to hold onto the linens until he was high enough to grab onto the window sill. He hauled himself onto the ledge and rolled down into his room, too apathetic to bother making a more graceful entrance when no one was around to see him.

The viceroy got up from the floor and carefully reeled the cord back in, finally letting out the yawn he’d been suppressing as he dropped the fabric in a pile, which he pushed beneath his bed with one boot. Once that was done, he closed the window and stepped away from it to get ready for the night. He stripped down to his linen underclothes and laid down on the mattress, shivering slightly against the cool air that had filled the room while he’d left the window open earlier. It wasn’t as comfortable as usual, but with the thick blankets that he could bury himself beneath to warm up, it was plenty tolerable.

Crow let out his breath in a slow exhale and closed his eyes, relaxing into the cushioned bedding as he drifted off to sleep.

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

Understandably xD
I can't wait for the morning lol

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

Once Crow stepped out of the baron’s room, he turned around to close the door behind him. He let it click shut quietly out of habit, even though he knew Fischbach wouldn’t wake up to the sound. Judging by how hard he’d hit the other man’s head against that bedpost, he had a feeling Adam wasn’t going to wake again until the morning. It was just as well. By then, the others would have had a chance to wake up as well, and hopefully word would begin to spread that the missing jewelry had turned up right where it belonged.

He turned back around to find Penelope and discovered he didn’t have to go very far. By the time he’d closed the baron’s bedchamber door, she had already covered most of the distance between them. He raised a brow when she asked him if everything was okay. Apparently, his scuffle with Fischbach hadn’t been as quiet as he’d thought. He just hoped it hadn’t been loud enough to wake any of the nobleman’s sleeping neighbors, since he still needed to get back to his own room without getting caught.

“Just a baron who got a little too cocky for his own good,” the viceroy answered with a shrug. He glanced over his shoulder, offhandedly making sure they were still alone before he explained himself a little better: “I was going to put the rings on his dresser, and while I had my back turned, he came at me with a paperweight.” He shook his head at the ridiculousness of what had happened. “I don’t know if he was already awake or if he’s just a very light sleeper. Either way, he’s out cold now.”

He grinned at her proudly and held up his hands, which were now bare of the jewelry that had adorned them earlier, “Everything is back where it’s supposed to be. All that’s left is for us to get back to our own rooms and play dumb if anyone questions us in the morning.” He casted another furtive glance over his shoulder before wrapping his arms around her and pressing one more kiss to her lips. “I’m going to head back through the window,” he smiled at her affectionately when he pulled back. “I love you, Penelope, and I’ll see you tomorrow”

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

Crow's proud xD
He also had a little run-in with Adam

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

When he stepped out of the room, Crow caught sight of the three guards in the corner of his eye and turned immediately to his right to walk away from them. He was careful to set a pace that was slow enough to keep close to Penelope, yet just purposeful enough that he would look like he had somewhere else to be. It seemed to work as he heard the guards speak to their female comrade from behind. They sounded flustered at first, but quickly accepted that they were looking at their king, just like he’d hoped they would.

As soon as the guards were out of sight, he doubled back toward the other side of the hallway, matching Penelope’s grin with one of his own. “You’ve gotten good at this,” he agreed when he reached her side. “They had no idea you were lying to them.”

When she said she would wait for him in the hall, he nodded. “Alright. I’ll make it quick.” Leaning down, he touched a quick kiss to her lips and then turned to keep walking down the corridor, marking out which doors were which in his head. Fischbach is three doors down on the left, then Christopher is two doors after that, and Baltac is the last, he recited silently. Coming from the opposite direction as the Vermillions had directed him, that meant he should start with Baltac, who was six doors from the far end of the hall on his right-hand side.

When he reached the indicated bedchamber, he casted one more look around for good measure and slipped soundlessly inside. The interior of the room was pitch black, and the viceroy had to linger by the entrance for a moment as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. As he did, he could see the sleeping form of the man known as Baltac, alone in his bed. The noble’s chest rose and fell slowly, a good sign that he was still deep in slumber.

Silently, Crow crept over the wooden floor of the bedchamber, following the edge of the wall as he searched for a decent place to drop off the diamond pendant. He wanted to leave it in a spot where it would be easily noticed, but not so obvious that it would look like it had been intentionally placed there. His fingers trailed gently over the surfaces of furniture until he found a dresser with a mirror, not unlike his own. The glassy surface caught the moonlight, reflecting it off the pendant that dangled from around his neck and causing it to glitter in the low light.

The viceroy looked over the surface of the dresser until he spotted a collection of other jewelry strung up on a wooden stand. He smirked to himself and carefully took off the pendant, adding it to the rest. Hopefully when Baltac awoke in the morning, he would see it with his other valuables and assume he had missed it somehow when he’d thought it had been stolen.

With the first piece of jewelry returned, Crow snuck back toward the door and stepped into the hallway again. This time, he kept his right eye closed as he headed for Christopher’s room. It was another trick he’d picked up to work faster at night. If he was going to be dipping in and out of brightened spaces, he could save himself the trouble of letting his eyes adjust to the dark if one already was. It allowed him to keep moving without stopping every time he entered a room with no light.

It worked well in this case too. As he closed the door behind him, he opened his right eye and closed his left, looking over the bedchamber in search of Christopher’s dresser. He found it easily enough and set the bracelet down with the nobleman’s other valuables, just as he had done in Baltac’s room. Once it had been replaced, he slipped back into the hallway without a sound.

Feeling confident with how well the backwards raid was going, Crow stood a little taller as he made his way to Fischbach’s room. As he had done with the last two, he cracked open the door and slipped silently inside. In the blackness, he opened his dark-adjusted eye and glanced briefly at the bed to find that Adam was still sleeping soundly. The nobleman was lying on his side with one arm hanging over the edge of the mattress, completely unaware of the thief in his midst.

Crow smiled and crept over to the other man’s dresser to replace the “stolen” rings. However, when he reached it, he paused as he noticed that the surface of the furniture was clean. If Fischbach had any other jewelry, this wasn’t where he kept it. The viceroy crossed his arms over his chest with a frown, wondering if there was a better place to put the rings, until he remembered that this was the noble who’d framed him in the first place. It didn’t matter were he left the jewelry, because Adam didn’t need to be convinced that he’d misplaced anything.

Feeling better about the decision, he slipped the rings off his fingers and set them down on the dresser.

In the next moment, he flinched as he heard a floorboard creak behind him.

Without time to think, Crow ducked to the side just as someone’s hand flew past his head. He spun around to see Fischbach standing with a stone paperweight in his fist, precariously off-balance after his clumsy attempt to knock the viceroy out. The baron’s eyes widened slightly, and it became clear that he hadn’t expected the former thief to dodge his ambush. However, he recovered quickly.

“You messed up, thief,” he hissed, cocking back the paperweight to swing at him again. “As soon as the guards catch you here, you’re going back behind bars!” He grunted as he tried to strike the viceroy in the head once more.

Crow snorted. After dealing with knights and barons on the warfront who had much more skill, Adam’s weak attempt to attack him was child’s play. He caught hold of the nobleman’s wrist and twisted his arm behind his back, forcing him to drop his weapon with a pained whimper. “You were the one complaining that your rings were missing,” he shrugged carelessly. “I’m just giving them back.”

Adam curled his lip at him and took a breath. Realizing that he was about to holler for the guards, Crow quickly turned on his heel and knocked the baron’s head against the nearest bedpost with as much force as he could muster. The nobleman fell slack in his arms as he lost consciousness, and the viceroy rolled his eyes. “Should have just stayed asleep,” he muttered, dragging the other man’s body to the bed and tossing him unceremoniously onto the mattress.

He put some effort into making it look like Fischbach had never left his bed, pulling the sheets over his body and propping his head on the pillow. Once he was finished, he took a step back to review his work and gave a satisfied nod. However, he didn’t leave right away. Instead, he trotted over to the dresser and picked up the rings he’d set down. Out of spite, he slipped them directly onto the nobleman’s limp fingers. A petty little gift for when he woke up.

“Sweet dreams,” Crow grinned devilishly at the unconscious man. With that, he turned and made his way back to the door to rejoin Penelope in the hallway.

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

He's just happy she didn't fall xD

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

As Penelope readied herself to climb down the wall, Crow found himself holding his breath with anticipation. He was confident that she could make it, but since she had never done anything like this before—at least, not to his knowledge—it was more dangerous for her than it had been for him. He had the practice and know-how to keep himself from falling if he lost his footing, but she wouldn’t have the same skills or level head when making her way down a vertical surface. He wouldn’t admit it to her out loud, but he was a little worried that she might slip and cause herself to panic.

When he had been a kid, his mother had taught him to climb by having him practice on short walls that were low enough to the ground that if he fell, he would just get the breath knocked out of him. Of course, being young and reckless, he had lost his footing a number of times before he was able to make it from top to bottom without any mistakes. He just hoped that since Penelope was more mature than he had been at the time—and, if he was honest, more mature than he was even now—she would have the sense to be more careful. Regardless, he still watched her closely, his body tense as he prepared to catch her if she did fall.

Fortunately, even though the knight moved more stiffly than he did, she managed to get down the wall without losing her footing, and he let out his breath in a silent sigh of relief.

When she reached the window sill, Crow reached up to take her by the hand and guided her down into the room. He pressed a quick kiss to her cheek and squeezed her hand before letting go again. “That was great,” he whispered in her ear, casting her a fond smile in the dark. “And you don’t even have to worry about climbing back up later.”

Gently, he touched her arm to lead her quietly though the snoring nobleman’s room, making his way toward the door. Though he knew he could have crept past a lighter sleeper just as easily, he was glad they had been lucky enough to land in the bedchamber of someone in such deep slumber. Getting around him was much less stressful than creeping by someone who would wake at the creak of a floorboard. As long as neither of them bumped into anything, he knew they wouldn’t disturb the soundly sleeping man.

When they reached the door, the viceroy paused in front of it and leaned down to murmur to Penelope, “When we step outside, we need to head in opposite directions. I’ll walk away from the guards like I’m on my way to speak with someone else in this wing, and you go straight to them like I just gave you an order to relay.” He smirked at her wryly. “As long as we both act like we belong and don’t give them a reason to suspect us, I’m sure they won’t question anything.”

Without further delay, Crow turned back to the door and gripped the handle. He took a moment to envision the regal posture his father always took when he walked through the castle, squaring his shoulders to mimic it to the best of his ability. Once he felt confident that he had copied it well, he pulled open the door, imitating the king’s surefooted gait as he stepped into the hallway.

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

Crow noticed this time lol

Let Me Steal Your Heart [BuzzingBee + Dagger]

“It also helps that climbing down doesn’t take as much upper body strength as you’d expect,” Crow added as he walked over to the window. Undoing the simple latch that held it shut, he glanced back at the knight with a reassuring smile. “A lot of your weight will be on your feet, so you just have to focus on holding the cord. It isn’t too strenuous.”

Once the window was open, he turned back to it and carefully began to lower the loose end of the linens over the edge, snaking them down to the window below while being careful not to let the sheets slap against the glass. It would have been trouble if he made any noise and woke whoever was sleeping in the bedchamber below his, so he moved the makeshift rope slowly. Fortunately, it didn’t swing very much, so he managed to keep it from rapping on the window.

Once he was finished, Crow turned to Penelope to tell her to give him some space to climb down, but then paused as he caught sight of her face. She looked a bit pale to him as she peered over the ledge, and he wondered if she wasn’t as confident about climbing down as he’d thought.

When she took a step back and gestured for him to go first, he hesitated, studying her contemplatively. Instead of moving toward the open window, he stepped over to her and wrapped his arms around her back, leaning down to press a passionate kiss to her lips. He lingered for a moment before pulling back to meet her gaze with a soft smile. “You’ll do just fine,” he murmured, gently brushing her hair from her face. “And you don’t have anything to worry about. I’ll be right below you the whole time. I’d never let you fall.”

The viceroy touched another quick kiss to her lips and stepped back toward the window. “Right. It looks like it’s my turn then,” he peered over the window sill for a moment before lifting his right boot onto the ledge and hopping up. Having pulled stunts like this his whole life, he’d developed a good head for heights and wasn’t bothered by the steep drop. He knew he wouldn’t fall.

As he perched on the sill, he suddenly had a new appreciation for the clothes he’d chosen to don for the raid. There was a chill wind blowing that night, but beneath the thick layers of clothing, he could scarcely feel it.

He crouched down on the ledge to pick up the cord, grasping it firmly in both hands as he carefully turned around to face the room. He left a little room for the linens to fall slack and casted a wink at the knight. “See you at the bottom, love,” he said just before falling backward off the edge of the window.

As he fell, the cord pulled taut, and he tightened his hold on the linens to keep from losing his grip against the sudden jerk. The knots that he and Preston had tied at repeating intervals offered support for his hands, and once he was stable on his feet, he used them for help as he began to work his way down toward the lower window. He moved with caution, but it wasn’t difficult to reach it. The weathered surface of the wall provided plenty of traction for his boots, and the grips on the cord were close enough together that he could switch from one to the next with ease.

When he was just above the window, he paused to glance down at the remaining cord below him. He gauged its length for a moment and took a steeling breath. The next part was the riskiest, as well as the reason why he had elected to go first. Adjusting his hold on the cord, he wrapped a layer around his left hand to make sure it was secure and then leaned up, letting his feet fall away from the wall. However, instead of dropping, he moved in a controlled manner to prop his boots on the large knot at the bottom of the rope, using his abdominal muscles to keep himself from flailing in the air. He managed to land gracefully without slipping.

Crouching down on his heels, Crow reached into his boot with his right hand and withdrew his pick lock key. He took a moment to peer through the window, making sure the occupant was still asleep, before he gingerly slid the needle-thin tool through the crack between the window panes and dragged it upward to pull open the latch on the inside. In the next moment, a quiet click sounded, and the window popped open, admitting the viceroy inside.

He smirked to himself and lifted the key to his mouth. Putting the metal tool between his teeth, he brought his right hand back to the cord and silently eased himself onto the window sill. As soon as his boots were on a solid perch, he let go and dropped down into the bedchamber without a sound.

Once inside, he checked to make sure he hadn’t woken anyone—the man in the room was still snoring soundly—before he leaned his head out the window and looked up, gesturing for Penelope to come down with him.