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littleperilstories · 5 months

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The Prince of Thieves (new and improved) - looking for readers!

For the last few months, I've been working on editing The Prince of Thieves, a story novel which was originally published on Tumblr and ao3 between October 2022 and June 2023. As I work through the last few chapters and prepare to write the new opening, I thought I'd put out some feelers...

By the end of this month (hopefully), I'll be seeking feedback on this manuscript!

I would love to connect with folks who are:

okay with whump (I would never call my writing gory, but there is LOTS of angst, captivity and restraints, hopelessness, torture, illness and bodily injury)

comfortable giving honest feedback on the characters and story

willing to point out any particularly egregious typos once in a while if/when you spot them

fine with it being pretty. uh. long. let's ballpark 150k? will give a final word count when it's done.

able to use Google Docs or Microsoft Word

able to provide feedback by ***February 29, 2024

***If I take too long to finish editing, this date will get moved back, of course. :)

✨ express your interest here. ✨

Details below the read more!

Here's the silly tongue-in-cheek blurb:

guy and gal get arrested and tormented by super cool, totally normal constable while pals on the outside freak out and make bad decisions; fun 1800s prison vibes with a side helping of angst and chosen family

Below is a more blurb-y blurb:

The goal of Iustitia aecum, the notorious thieving gang, is to steal from the rich and give to the poor. For a few years, that’s exactly what Jamie, Will, Colette, and Geoff (as the gang’s inner circle) do; they slip through the fingers of the law time and time again.

One day, everything goes wrong.

Will, by a stroke of fateful misfortune, falls into a trap meant for Jamie, the real leader of IA, and ends up in prison—in the custody of Constable Baden Hatchett, an officer who is willing to do whatever it takes to get Will to crack so he can bust IA and bring all its members to justice.

With execution—his brother’s and his own—hanging over his head, Will resolves to take his secrets to the grave, swearing not to betray the only family he has left.

Bree Cooper is one of IA’s runners, privy to no secrets save for one she learned by chance…that she was never supposed to know. When she, too, falls into the hands of the constabulary, she is forced to reckon with her past (a complicated history with Constable Hatchett himself) and her future (the gallows).

Will and Bree’s lives were already intertwined, and when they find each other again behind bars, they will rewrite the stories fate has planned for them—together.

Genre: drama, historical/period piece, whump / POV: 1st-person most of the time, 3rd-person for flashbacks / Narrators: multiple (5 of 'em)

sneak peek to see if the style is for you:

It’s cold up here on the roof of the boarding house—that’s why no one else is up here, probably—but there’s something delightfully bracing about the wind scrubbing the day’s dust from my skin while the stars gaze down. It’s delicious, almost wicked, to peer into the city streets from so high. Up here, no one else can see me. Up here, no one can say a damn thing when I pull up my sleeves. There’s no one to gasp or gawk as I reveal the soft, scandalous flesh of my arms and trace my fingers along, throwing into sharp relief what must remain invisible at all other times: black-as-night ink painted on the canvas of my skin. It’s a shame the tattoo would send me to prison if the constables saw it, because it’s beautiful. Sometimes I just stare down at the details—the leaves bursting from a tree in full bloom, the ring around its swirling, entwined roots. Would anyone else, other than my fellow runners or the constabulary, know what it means if they caught a glimpse? I’m not so sure, but they’d certainly be confused if they saw it on my arm. Silas Cooper’s daughter, tattooed like a common criminal? A gentlewoman like her? How? Why? What happened? I scowl into the night. Breanna Cooper died with Silas, or at least I like to think she did. When I think back on the girl who stumbled, dry-eyed, away from her father’s deathbed and then ran from the man she was supposed to marry, out into a chilly autumn night much like the one I’m gazing into now, I don’t recognize her—don’t recognize myself. That girl ran into a life of nothing, yes. But isn’t that also what she ran away from?

✨ express your interest here. ✨

Friends who have already read TPOT, you are welcome to do a reread if you want, but there's never any pressure, ever. 💕

Thanks for your time!

#self-reblog #reblog to the old LPS #lps the prince of thieves #seeking beta readers #looking for beta readers #lmk if you want to do a swap!!

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littleperilstories · 6 months

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Whumptober 2023 Masterlist

The Prince of Thieves: Are You Nobody, Too?

Historical, nineteenth century

Day 1, Day 5, Day 14, Day 15, Day 30 (5 prompts, 1 story, posted Oct 1)

Bonus chapter for The Prince of Thieves. After she runs away from IA, Bree takes it upon herself to learn how to fight.

Man of Letters

Fantasy

Reading order: Day 22 | Day 16 & 19 | Day 24 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Days 3 & 4 | Day 21 | Day 2 | Day 26 | Day 9, 13, 17, 20, 27

A man falls in love, loses her, tries to save her, and then gets blamed for her murder. No names, no resolution, but operate on the assumption that it ends happily at some point.

The Prince of Thieves: Box in Your Heart

Historical, nineteenth century

Day 25, Day 27, Day 28, Day 29, Day 30, Day 31 (6 prompts, 1 story, posted Oct 31)

Bonus chapter for The Prince of Thieves. Colette follows Will on a particularly bad day. Months have passed since his rescue, but as it turns out, healing is never quick or easy—and neither is change.

No. 1: “But now this room is spinning while I’m trying just to fill in all the gaps.” | Swooning | “How many fingers am I holding up?”

No. 5: “You better pray I don't get up this time around.” | Debris | Pinned Down | “It's broken.”

No. 14: “Feed me poison, fill me ‘till I drown.” | “Just hold on.”

No. 15: “I don't need you to help me I can handle things myself. | Makeshift Bandages | Suppressed Suffering | “I’m fine.”

No. 30: “It’s okay, just to say, ‘I’m not okay’.”

No. 25: “You’re not delivering a perfect body to the grave.” | Storm

No. 27: “You drew stars around my scars; But now I’m bleeding.” | Scars | “Let me see."

No. 28: “We might not make it to the morning; so go on and tell me now.” | Bloody Knife

No. 29: “I only sink deeper the deeper I think.” | Troubled Past Resurfacing | “What happened to me?”

No. 30: “It’s okay, just to say, ‘I’m not okay’.” | Borrowed Clothing | “Not much longer...”

No. 31: “I thought that I was getting better.” | Emptiness | Setbacks | “Take it easy."

No. 2: “I’ll call out your name, but you won’t call back. | “They don't care about you.”

No. 3: “Like crying out in empty rooms; with no-one there except the moon.” | Solitary Confinement

No. 4: “I see the danger, It’s written there in your eyes.” | Shock

No. 7: “I paced around for hours on empty; I jumped at the slightest of sounds.” | Alleyway | Radio Silence | “Can you hear me?”

No. 8: “I’ve got soul, but I’m not a soldier.” | Outnumbered | “It’s all for nothing.”

No. 9: “Learning everything ain't what it seems, that's the thing about these days.” | “You're a liar.”

No. 13: “It comes and goes like the strength in your bones.” | Infection | “I don’t feel so good.”

No. 16: “Would you lie with me and just forget the world?” | “Don’t go where I can’t follow.”

No. 17: “You’re the lump in my throat and the knot in my chest.” | Touch Aversion

No. 19: “I’ll take one final step, all you have to do is make me. | Floral Bouquet | “I’m not as stupid as you think I am.”

No. 20: “People don’t change people, time does.” | Blanket | “You will regret touching them.”

No. 21: “See the chains around my feet.” | Restraints | “Don't move.”

No. 22: “They never saw us coming, ‘til they hit the floor.” | Glass Shard | “Watch out!”

No. 24: “I’ve got a head full of chemicals; mouth full of ridicule.” | Goodbye Note | Neglect | “I thought they were with you.”

No. 26: “Sometimes I get so tired; I don’t even know myself.” | Seeing Double | Working To Exhaustion | “You look awful.”

No. 27: “You drew stars around my scars; But now I’m bleeding.” | Scars | “Let me see.”

#cheeky lil RB to the sideblog where it all began

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littleperilstories · 8 months

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FYI! Find me now @little-peril-stories 💕

#icymi

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littleperilstories · 8 months

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The Queen of Lies: Masterlist

THE QUEEN OF LIES is a tale of quiet courage, inner strength, and forbidden love—and the ways we can change our lives for the better if only we take a leap of faith.

Story Intro | Contents [Warnings] | Mood Board | Vibey Song Lyrics | Ao3

Chapter 1 | The Whipping Post: Breanna Hatchett witnesses a brutal punishment while searching for her husband at the prison where he works.

Chapter 2 | The Constable and His Wife: Breanna recovers from her shock; Baden learns that she saw everything at the whipping post.

Bonus scene #1 | Worthwhile: The thief wonders if he's seeing things after the flogging.

Chapter 3 | The Looking Glass: Breanna goes out for lunch and gets some advice from a friend.

Chapter 4 | The Boy in Chains: Breanna visits the thief in prison.

Bonus scene #2 | Real: The thief goes through his usual coherent, polite internal monologue during the visit from some woman named Breanna.

Chapter 5 | Stealth and Secrets: Breanna does several things she isn't supposed to do.

Chapter 6 |

Chapter 7 |

Chapter 8 |

Chapter 9 |

Chapter 10 |

Chapter 11 |

Chapter 12 |

Chapter 13 |

Chapter 14 |

Chapter 15 |

Chapter 16 |

Chapter 17 |

Chapter 18 |

Chapter 19 |

Chapter 20 |

Chapter 21 |

#icymi #here's the Breanna Hatchett AU in all its glory #wip: Breanna Hatchett AU #lps the queen of lies

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littleperilstories · 10 months

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Happy STS!

Imagine you decide to re-work your story as a completely different genre (I'll leave it up to you which!). Would the plot still work? What would change?

Happy STS! Thank you, Anna, for the ask!

Love this question - so fun.

I mean, I have officially turned TPOT into a romance with TQOL. :D More on that..............soon :)

I do not think either of them would work as contemporary/modern fiction. I briefly daydreamed up a 'modern AU' storyline months and months ago, but in my efforts to avoid certain problems that arose by trying to move the story to a modern setting, I ended up changing pretty much everything and realizing by the end of the four-hour drive during which I was imagining this that it wasn't even the same story anymore, so that went into my brain's recycle bin. 😂

I DO think they'd work in sci-fi or fantasy! 🥰 Especially sci-fi! But both! Actually I don't want to think too hard about either of those because it seems like a bit too fun of a path to explore. 😂 But imagine...like...space prison? Sci-fi, high-tech jail cells? Cool heist-y tech IA use for stealing?

Or bring magic into the mix...maybe IA used it for stealing stuff but then how would you stop prisoners from using it inside the jail...maybe like a kryptonite situation, or something like @i-can-even-burn-salad's morlit shackles.......😍

Mystery? ...maybe? Thriller? Sure but I think plot changes would be necessary. Maybe make Hatchett even more corrupt and have IA also want to take him down while also trying to find Will? Horror? Oh I'm sure there's fertile ground there, but that's a no thanks from me. Someone else can write that if they wish. 😅 Have at 'er.

<3 <3

#happy sts!#storyteller saturday #starlit-hopes-and-dreams #ask game

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littleperilstories · 10 months

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Happy STS!

Have you ever gotten decently far into a story and realized that your title made no sense? How much does your initial premise mean to the development of your story?

Um, happy STS/a very belated Storyteller Saturday (one week later) to you, Anna! Thank you for the ask!

I don't think that this specific situation has happened. I did write all of Fen and Freddie without ever giving it a real title. 😅

In non-Tumblr writing stuff, I planned out the title for Book 2 (abbreviates to I&I...this girl loves alliteration) and then got rid of the character that one of the words was supposed to represent. I had to do some reflection: change the title or make it work? (Spoiler: rewriting it for Camp Nanowrimo starting TODAY...rip angsty heist AGAIN lol...and the plan is to make the title work! So far, anyway.)

Um...initial premise...

Um, apparently, it means very little? TPOT changed a lot from the first idea (which was Bree-centric); I quickly grew to hate the initial premise for The Curiosity Collector (Douglas sucks so much, the Ash/Laramie stuff was much more fun to write); my non-Tumblr novel has changed beyond recognition from its initial premise (tbf I was a kid, so that’s expected, lol).

#happy sts!#storyteller saturday #ask game

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littleperilstories · 11 months

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Robin Hood References & Easter Eggs in The Prince of Thieves

Character Parallels (very loose/approximate)

Jamie Wardrew - Robin Hood/Robin of Loxley

Will Wardrew - Robin Hood, Will Scarlett

Bree Cooper - Marian

Const. Baden Hatchett - Sheriff of Nottingham

Jr. Const. Michaelson - Sir Guy of Gisborne

Colette Haris/Meunier (a miller's daughter) - Much the Miller's Son

Geoffrey Marks - Little John

Allan Armstrong Dale - Alan-a-Dale

Other References & Easter Eggs

literally just them wearing hooded cloaks sometimes *cracks up*

stealing from the rich and giving to the poor is IA's whole modus operandi

"I gave her Robin this time around" (Chapter 4) - I mean...

"Bree Langley. Bree Sherwood. Overton. Walsh. Carlson" (Chapter 13) - Sherwood Forest is the setting of many Robin Hood stories

the medic, Mr. Gysborne, obviously named after Guy of Gisborne

Geoff being a big guy but then having a cute little animal like a Hare as his code name. Right? Like Little John? Right? Right??

Will's code name being Fox (Robin Hood is an anthropomorphic fox in the Disney Robin Hood from 1973)

Allan Armstrong Dale abbreviates to Allan A. Dale (reference to the character Alan-a-Dale, but also: Joe Armstrong played Alan-a-Dale [and Jonas Armstrong played Robin Hood] in the 2008 BBC series Robin Hood)

"Verie" (very) ... "Much" ... ok it's a stretch but still kinda counts? I think I’m hilarious.

“Some well-known petty thief. Always gave a different name. Reynolds. Brooks. Marks" (Chapter 32). Kevin Reynolds directed 1991's Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Mel Brooks directed 1993's Robin Hood: Men in Tights.

Bulwell and Lenton are neighbourhoods/areas of Nottingham, UK (...as far as I could tell from Google Maps & Wikipedia, anyway).

Colette's real last name, Meunier, is a French surname meaning "miller"

#lps the prince of thieves #lps Easter eggs

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littleperilstories · 11 months

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The Prince of Thieves: Finale III - The Window

Mood Boards | Chapter Titles | Also on A03! | Playlist | Story Intro

Warnings: okay there are a few angsty moments but come on it's the last part it's fine

Previous | Masterlist |

Word count: 2547 || Approx reading time: 10ish mins

Part 3: The Window

Teaser: She’s not how I expected to find her—though, honestly, I’m not sure what I was expecting. I guess I’m probably not how she expected me to be, either.

Will

Well, as far as reunions go, I can’t say this is the one I was hoping for. Or, in fact, expecting.

Bree Cooper gives a shrill, gasping scream and throws herself away from me, her knife plummeting to the ground. Sitting up, I rescue it from the snow, tossing it into the air and watching it spin. After I catch it in my hand again, I hold the knife out for her to take.

“Why the fuck were you sneaking up on me?” she demands, snatching it back. She must be cold. Her cheeks have gone a brilliant shade of red.

“I thought it was you,” I say. Just barely glimpsing her face as walked didn’t quite give me the confidence to know for certain it was her. “I was trying to catch up so I could see your face and make sure. You know. Before I said hello.”

Her voice is still a little gaspy, as if she can’t quite catch her breath. “You scared the hell out of me!”

“Didn’t seem that scared.” I rub the back of my head where it smacked into the frozen ground. “That was a nice move.”

“God, Will!” She closes her eyes. “I could have killed you.”

I can’t help it. I raise my eyebrows, trying not to laugh and hoping she won’t be hurt. “You think?”

Her eyes snap open just in time to catch the look on my face. “It’s not funny.”

“It’s a little funny.”

She stares at me, and I wish I could know what she’s thinking. So much has changed since the last time we laid eyes on each other.

If I dwell here for too long, I’ll see the cuts on her skin. I’ll hear her muffled screams and sobs. I’ll see her running away to find my brother—the last I saw of her before she vanished.

I’ll feel every moment of loneliness the last year brought, every question, every why? that plagued my sleeping and waking hours.

Not a good idea to dwell.

She’s not how I expected to find her—though, honestly, I’m not sure what I was expecting. I guess I’m probably not how she expected me to be, either.

“What are you doing here?”

It strikes me as she asks her question that we’re both still on the ground, literally freezing our asses off in the snow. I get to my feet, wincing as a harsh wind sweeps through the trees. When she starts to do the same, I reach down to help her up.

She hesitates, then presses her gloved hand into mine, letting me pull her upright.

“I needed to go for a walk,” I say, rubbing the sore spot on my head again. She managed to knock my wool hat off. It’s dusted with snow now, but I pull it back on anyway because my ears are stinging from the cold. “The inn we’re staying at’s pretty nice, but it’s noisy. And stuffy. Someone’s kid woke me before the sun was even up.”

“No, I mean…” She sighs, wraps her arms around herself, clutching her elbows. “Here. In town. What are you doing here?”

For a few seconds, I just stare. “Really? That’s what you want to talk about? You want to know the reason we’re in this town? There’s nothing else you want to—”

“Never mind.” Bree turns, and before I know it, she’s moving—walking away from me. Just barely, I hear her whisper, “I knew this was a fucking mistake.”

“Where are you going?” God, this is falling apart fast. Maybe she’s right, maybe this was a mistake. “Just—just—”

If I move fast, if I run, I could catch up, grab her hand, make her look at me, make her tell me why she—

I can’t make my feet follow.

“Just leave me alone,” I hear her say. She doesn’t turn around to face me as she speaks so her voice is hard to catch, drifting away in the wind.

For a moment, I’m ready to. Why should I follow her? Chase her and demand answers she clearly doesn’t want to give? Answers she maybe doesn’t even have? Why should I care?

No.

I lost her and now I’ve found her and she’s here and what if I never see her again, for real? What if this is the last chance? What if destiny is throwing me one last fateful meeting—you wanted this, you stupid bastard, now don’t fuck it up—and there will never be another after today?

You wanted this, Will Wardrew, and you’re a fool if you expected it to be easy.

“I’m following you!” I yell after her. Just in case she decides to pull her knife on me again.

“Why?”

“Because I want to!”

“Why?”

“Because I want to see you! And talk to you!”

Stupid me, I thought that last thing might actually get her to turn around. She just speeds up.

God, I’m an idiot.

I recognize the inn where we’re renting rooms as we get closer—then have to stop and gape as Bree Cooper suddenly kicks into a run and bolts right into it.

“What the fuck?” I don’t mean to shout it out loud, but that’s what happens. A few as scandalized-looking passersby shoot me dirty looks, which I ignore.

“Will?” It’s Colette who speaks, because of course she just happens to be right here, her arms full of whatever she picked up in the market, but it’s Jamie, because of course he’s here, who’s glaring at me. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” I look away so I don’t have to see the mix of annoyance and concern on their faces—Here we go, Will’s having one of these days again.

Tilting my gaze upward, I glimpse movement above—movement in one of the windows. A face at the glass. Pale and startled before it vanishes and a white curtain takes its place.

I’m doing it before I’m even really thinking—limbs moving too fast and too recklessly, or at least that’s what I can gather from the furious yells from below.

“What the fuck are you doing? Get down!”

No.

It hurts a bit, more than it would have hurt to do the same thing a year and a half ago, but I manage to swing myself onto the pitiful balcony outside Bree Cooper’s window.

“Get down from there, you idiot! Do you want someone to summon the police?”

They’re right, they’re absolutely right. I should get down, apologize, help Colette in her frantic insistence to strangers on the street that I’m not some sort of depraved predator breaking through some girl’s window. Yeah. I should jump back down.

I rap my knuckles against the glass.

When Bree appears, she looks mad, but I’m expecting that. “Can you let me in?” I ask. “It’s cold out here.”

“For fuck’s sake! What the hell did you do?”

“I climbed up here.”

“God, Will! Why?”

“Saw you at the window and it seemed easier to climb than take the stairs and figure out which room was yours.”

With a groan, she pulls me inside, but she loses her balance and we both spill onto the floor with a thud.

“Oh,” I say, still able to hear Colette anxiously trying to save my ass outside, “can you maybe just yell down there that I’m not some pervert here to attack you or whatever?”

“No,” she says. “I am not drawing attention to the fact that I just let you into my room through the window. Get out.” She jumps to her feet and darts for the door. “You’re not supposed to be in here. You’re not allowedin here.”

“Says who?”

“Says my landlady and boss, and I’d like to keep my job, so if you please—”

“Wait,” I say. “Just wait. Please.”

Her hand is on the doorknob. Shaking. But not twisting. “What do you want, Will?”

Every question I’ve had for her in the past year gutters and dies in my throat, coming out only as, “I want to know if you’re all right.”

“I’m fine.” Her voice quivers. “Now can you please leave before I get in trouble?”

“Will that make you happy, if I leave?”

Bree nods.

With a sigh, I head for the door, and she opens it for me. The moment I cross the threshold, though, I turn again. “Now give me a real answer. Are you all right?”

Her look of sadness morphs into one of shock, then into a glare, as she realizes I’ve left my hand against the doorframe.

“Please don’t break my fingers,” I say. If she wants to slam the door in my face, she’s either going to have to wrestle me away from it or close it on my hand.

“For fuck’s sake,” she whispers. “You’re so annoying.”

“You’re not the first person to ever tell me that.”

Bree laughs—actually laughs, and it is one of irritation, no doubt, but it’s real. “Why are you doing this?”

“I spent over a year wondering if you were dead.”

“I’m not.”

“Why’d you run off like that, Br—”

“It’s Lucy,” she says quickly, her face flushing. “Call me Lucy.”

Good god, a whole life she’s built in a year. A new name, a new job, a new home— “Why’d you leave?”

She closes her eyes, all traces of amusement gone. “Why do you think?”

“You could have stayed. With us. With…”

Bree is already shaking her head. “Did you really want me around? That reminder?”

Yes, is what I want to say. “I was worried.”

“I’m…” She swallows hard. “I’m sorry. I felt like it was the right thing to do. After…everything.”

“The right thing? Don’t let Allan hear you say that,” I say, and her face goes red again. “He knows you robbed—”

“Don’t let me hear who say what?”

Shit. There he is. On the narrow stairs and drawing closer, from the sound of it. “Nothing! Go away.”

“Is he up there?” Fuck. Jamie sounds pissed. Really pissed. “Tell him if he fucking moves, I’m going to kill him.”

Bree presses a hand to her mouth, and now she’s laughing again. No, there are tears on her cheeks—no, it’s both. She’s crying and laughing at once. “I think you might actually be the one in trouble.”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Jamie keeps his voice down as he appears on the landing of the stairwell, probably trying not to disturb any of the other guests but failing miserably. “What the fuck were you thinking? Were you thinking? Why—”

At the sight of Bree Cooper, and of me blocking her doorway with my arm, he freezes. “Oh, for god’s sake.”

My brother stares, silent and astonished, as if he can’t comprehend what he’s seeing.

“What? Is it him? What’s he doing?” Colette’s voice floats up from one of the lower steps. “Is he all r��”

“Yes. It all fucking makes sense. Go back downstairs. It’s… I’ll tell you in a minute.” To me, managing to still look mad while also looking kind of like he wants to laugh, he says, “We are going to talk about that shit you just pulled. You’re lucky Colette can sweet-talk anyone.”

“Fuck off, Jamie,” I say as he disappears, and he actually does bark out a laugh.

Bree starts to giggle, too, letting go of the door and sliding to the ground, one hand pressed to her head. “This is… This is all so ridiculous.”

“I found you. Again. Again,” I say. “I’m not just…”

I’m not just letting you disappear this time doesn’t seem like something I can say, or should say, so I let the words break off.

I, too, lower down so we’re both sitting on the floor—Bree inside her room, me in the hall. It’s going to be irritating for someone who wants to get past, but right now, I don’t care. “I was worried.” It isn’t until the words are out that I realize I’ve already said them. “Really…worried.”

Nervously, she twists her fingers. “I know. I’m sorry. I truly am.”

“You were all right?” I ask. I know I’m repeating myself yet again, but I need to know. To know for sure. “After… You know, after everything?”

She takes her time in answering. “I suppose. After some time. It wasn’t easy.”

“You must’ve been lonely.”

“I’ve always been lonely.”

Fuck. Fuck.

“Were you?” she asks softly. “Were you all right? After?”

That is not an easy question to answer.

She’s still twisting her hands together, and it’s starting to make me anxious, too. I hold out my hand instead, hoping she’ll take it. To my surprise, she does.

“Not really,” I say.

Her head tilts to the side, and the unruly braid of her hair slides off her shoulder and behind her back. “I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault I tried to kill Allan at least twice.”

“Allan,” she murmurs. “He’s still with you.” I nod. “So, you didn’t succeed in killing him.”

“No. Not yet, anyway.”

That gets another laugh out of her. Once it fades, she asks, “You got my letter, though, right?”

“Yeah.” I don’t tell her I still have it. “It didn’t make me feel any better.”

She bites her lip, and her eyes get this sheen in them that wasn’t there before. “I’m sorry. I thought it might… I don’t know, I thought it might help somehow.”

“I would’ve rather just talked to you.”

She shakes her head. “Do you really mean that, Will?”

“Yeah. I do.” There’s a lump in my throat now. “Because I never thanked you. For running back. For—for Jamie. For saving him. I owe you. I owe you for that.”

For a few moments, only the faint sounds of the dining room downstairs answer me.

No laughter now—just tears. Silent, heavy, sorrowful tears, streaking down her face.

When she tries to tug her hand away to wipe her eyes, I grip a little tighter. Reach out my free hand to wipe her tears. Like I’ve done before.

“Don’t, Will.” Her voice is a whisper as she leans away. “Please.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t take it. I can’t.”

I don’t know what that means, but I pull my one hand back and let go with the other. She scrubs her face with her sleeve.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles.

“Don’t be sorry.”

The tiniest smile pulls at her lips, and she changes the subject. “Are you staying for long?”

Something about the topic switch, the mundanity of this question, makes my stomach sink a little. “I don’t know. Might go somewhere new in the spring. Probably a bit snowy now to go anywhere far. You?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. It’s all right here. I guess.”

An old woman opens her door and totters out into the hall. She must be at least a hundred and fifty; there’s no way she’s going to be able to step around or over me.

Sighing, I scooch closer to Bree’s door until there’s enough room for her to pass, and I realize only once the woman’s halfway down the stairs that Bree didn’t move, and our bodies are pressed against one another’s.

Ending A: it ends with a kiss

Ending B: it ends with a promise

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littleperilstories · 11 months

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The Prince of Thieves: Finale II - The Woods

Mood Boards | Chapter Titles | Also on A03! | Playlist | Story Intro

Warnings: being followed, fear of attack/getting jumped

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Word count: 1612 || Approx reading time: 7 mins

Part 2: The Woods

Teaser: Goodness, I truly was a fool to think that the past would never catch up to me. Perhaps deep down, I knew that at some point, some part of my old life would leak into this one—the meeting of Bree and Lucy.

Bree

Sleeping is impossible, and when I rise in the morning, I’m more tired than when I fell into bed. Victoria is still dead to the world, but she won’t be for long. It’s my day off, but not hers, and perhaps any minute now she’ll be up, too, and then I might have to face her questions. I managed to avoid them last night by pretending to be fast asleep when she came up to bed. If she catches me now, though, I won’t be able to escape her interrogation.

And I do not want to talk.

Goodness, I truly was a fool to think that the past would never catch up to me. Perhaps deep down, I knew that at some point, some part of my old life would leak into this one—the meeting of Bree and Lucy.

It just feels so soon.

I know it’s not, not really. It’s been over a year now since I left the city. Long enough that the bitterness of that day, of slipping away in the late-autumn freeze, has faded. I’ve almost managed to forget how piercing the wind felt as I wended through the streets looking for a shawl or a blanket to swipe from somewhere. It’s a distant memory, how frightened I was that someone would look at the fading-but-visible marks on my face and start asking uncomfortable questions. A long, long year since I caught one of the last trains out of town before the snow came, my ticket purchased with stolen money.

Money I took from a man who was eating in this very inn last night.

Fuck.

I throw myself into my whites, making sure to pull on an extra pair of stockings to ward against the cold, then hunt for my heaviest dress, a dark blue woollen one. It’s pretty, but it is the warmth of the wool that I’m after, because I can’t stay in here. Here, where Victoria can ask too many questions; here, where the inner circle of IA and the doctor who betrayed the constabulary might be sleeping as we speak.

And I need to think.

They didn’t see me. Of that, I’m mostly confident. None of them were even looking my way when I fled the room. I’m safe. Surely, I’m safe.

My hands are shaking when I grab my coat and yank it over my arms. I drop my heavy grey shawl twice before I manage to tie it around my shoulders.

Air—that’s all I need. Clean, fresh, biting air. It will wake me up and clear my head and perhaps quieten some of the panicked thoughts that simply will not stop screaming through my mind.

“And where do you think you’re going?”

Son of a bitch.

Stella, the inn’s owner and my boss, is already downstairs, sitting in her favourite spot by the window with her hands wrapped around a hot cider. I can hear Celeste, her friend who helps her with the inn who everyone knows is her lover, rustling around in the kitchen, singing softly to herself. “In vain you tell your parting lover / You wish fair winds may waft him over…”

“Thought you were sick,” Stella says, narrowing her eyes. Her hair is more grey than gold at this point, and sometimes Victoria and I have noticed that she looks a bit like a prune with all her wrinkles, but her mind is sharper than that of possibly anyone else I’ve ever met. She’s going to want answers about why I disappeared during the dinner rush last night, and I don't think she’ll be very gentle in her words at all if she’s not satisfied with the ones I give.

“Alas! what winds can happy prove / That bear me far from what I love?”

I draw a long breath and try to look pathetic. “I… I am. Yes. I am sick. I’m going to see the doctor.”

“You want me to send for him now?” She narrows her eyes. “Fetch him here? Shouldn’t go walking about in the cold if you’re ill.”

“Alas! what dangers on the main / Can equal those that I sustain / From slighted vows and cold disdain?”

“No—No, that’s all right,” I say, trying to not stammer too much, which is hard when her piercing gaze is boring right into me. “I’m feeling a bit better, but I think perhaps I should just…”

Stella looks me up and down with undisguised suspicion. “You better not be in a delicate condition there, little miss Lucy, or you’ll have to go somewhere else.”

“A… A delicate condition?” She stares into my very soul until I finally realize what she means, and when I do, my face burns hot as coals. “No! No, it isn’t that. It can’t be. I promise.”

“I hope for your sake, Lucy,” Stella says, “that you’re telling the truth. Being unmarried but working hard is one thing. Being unmarried and—”

My voice is nothing more than a squeak. “I’m not—”

A clatter interrupts my frantic insisting. “Now, Stella.” It’s Celeste calling, still invisible, from the kitchen, clearly eavesdropping now that she’s done singing. “Leave the poor girl alone and let her get on.”

Bless Celeste and her gentle heart. She’s the less terrifying of the two of them.

“Thank you,” I mumble, heading for the door. “I’ll be back later.”

The cold air, instead of being painful as it sometimes is in the dead of winter, soothes the burning in my cheeks. A delicate condition, indeed. All Victoria and I do is work. When does she think, exactly, I’ve had the time to get myself into a delicate condition?

That was a conversation I never expected to have with my employer, and I pray I will never have it ever again.

Dawn breaks smoothly and sweetly over the town. I clamber through the snow to the top of the hill, panting a little when I get there but feeling glad I made the climb. By some stroke of luck, I get there just in time to enjoy the sunrise, relishing how it spreads a warm glow over the town’s roofs, turrets, and gables. The dawn promises it will be beautiful today, with a sky clear and blue, a welcome gift after the stormy gloom of yesterday. The morning rays are a balm—somewhat—to my nervous, restless mind.

It isn’t long before my thoughts shove past my sorry attempt to be present in this beautiful winter morning.

He’s here. They’re here.

Up on the hilltop, alone, I can look back on yesterday evening with some small sliver of distance. With no one else around, just me and my memories and my thoughts, I can clasp onto the strange, wiggly feeling that kept me up all night.

Astonishment I felt, yes, but that isn’t what had me tossing and turning.

Terror—that too, but again, it is not terror I’ve captured up here where no one else can see what is surely plain on my face.

No, it’s something else entirely—remarkable, unfamiliar, unbearable, and freakish, let loose after a year of being heaped in a corner gathering dust.

Happiness.

Joy.

They’re here—he’s here—and he’s all right.

He is safe and alive.

I feel a tug on that thread, beckoning me to follow that feeling, coaxing me, telling me to caress that gossamer string so it can show me what thoughts await me at the other end. I do not obey. I’m not ready to face down those thoughts, those feelings.

I don’t think I am, anyway.

Am I?

How long I stand in the snow, it’s difficult to tell, but when my toes begin to go numb, I know it’s time to get moving again. A little regretfully, I say goodbye to the glistening sun that bounces off the town below, then make my way down the hillside again.

I wind my way through the woods, walking slowly and humming Celeste’s song in a feeble attempt to occupy my mind. The closer I get to town, however, the louder my worries grow. What if Will and the others are still there? What if they’re staying at Stella’s inn—my inn? What if the next time we cross paths, I can’t get away from them? What will I say if that happens? Do I want that to happen?

Do I want to see him face to face?

I don’t.

I do.

Would he want to see me?

I…

So deafening are the worries in my head that I notice too late that there are footsteps behind me, crunching through the snow.

Growing faster. Heading right toward me.

Someone’s chasing me.

For a moment, I’m frozen with fear.

Fuck this. I’ve been here before. I have been frightened and helpless. Powerless against stronger arms held against me—my father, that man in the alley, Hatchett, Michaelson. I have been powerless against the fucking world, but I will not be again.

I am not the same girl from that alley, nor the girl I was a year ago.

I spin and leap for my attacker before he can get his hands on me, the element of surprise acting as my other weapon as I sweep my foot against his legs and knock him to the goddamn ground, my blade pressed against his throat.

“If you fucking lay a finger on me, you fucking pervert—”

“Whoa,” Will Wardrew says, his eyes wide. He has the gall to look impressed instead of scared, even though he’s the one flat on the ground with a knife at his neck. “Hey, Bree. Where in hell did you learn to do that?”

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littleperilstories · 11 months

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The Prince of Thieves: Finale I - The Inn

Mood Boards | Chapter Titles | Also on A03! | Playlist | Story Intro

Warnings: uhhh...baby spit-up?, vague mention of someone dying?

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✨ Did you come here from Chapter 49? There are two bonus chapters that come between 49 and 50:

💚 Box in Your Heart (Colette and Will)

🍂 Are You Nobody, Too? (Bree and Henry)

Word count: 1590 || Approx reading time: 7 mins

If you normally read on Ao3, the whole dang Chapter 50 (in all its obscene-word-count glory) will go up on Thursday like usual. If you wanna read it in its three parts, keep an eye on Tumblr.

If you normally read on Tumblr but would rather read the whole freakin thing in one fell swoop, Thursday is your day. :)

Part 1: The Inn

Teaser: The innkeepers called her Lucy, and they certainly had no reason to suspect that it might not be her name at all.

The well-travelled road that connected the harbour towns to the inland ones was dotted with villages, and in these villages, one could always find a place to spend the night. Even in the throes of winter, when the winds howled most violently and the snows sometimes blocked the road entirely, inns and taverns were chock-full, brimming with customers, spilling from the seams with road-worn travellers and familiar locals seeking food, wine, and the company of others.

In one such inn, nestled in a cozy town that had been built up perfectly midway between the city and the great lake to which so many tourists flocked in the summer, as a deep snow fell beyond the steamy glass windows, a girl was working. She was bone-weary most days, and just a bit shabbier than the other inn girl, but she smiled at her patrons nonetheless. It was a winning smile, coy when it needed to be, shy sometimes, wide and beaming at others. The innkeeper, a widow who split her managerial duties with a dear friend who shared her lodgings on the top floor, had never seen any reason to suspect that there was anything strange about the girl. They didn’t mind that she was often quiet; in fact, they rather preferred it. They’d noticed her slap away a few too-bold gentlemen a few times in the months since she’d come to them looking for a job, but that hadn’t caused any trouble so far, and as they figured, many a young woman would do the same if a handsy customer forgot himself when he was a bit too deep in his cups.

The innkeepers called her Lucy, and they certainly had no reason to suspect that it might not be her name at all.

On this night, as the dinner rush roared to life, raucous and frenzied, keeping the girls running without a moment’s rest, as the innkeeper and her dear friend barked orders and roasted chicken and boiled potatoes and kept watchful eyes over the dining room, and as the snow that had been falling steadily throughout the day finally began to wane in its onslaught against the frozen earth, the girl whose name was not Lucy was run ragged. The table in the corner demanded more beer; the family by the window had an infant who had just spit up onto the floor, and while she thought the child to be a charming little thing, he had just increased her workload significantly, for she did not know where there was even a clean towel to be found; and a little boy had just darted gleefully in front of her as he raced around the room, very nearly causing her to spill a glass of wine down the front of her dress.

The girl, whose name was not Lucy but Breanna, and who preferred to be called Bree when she wasn’t telling people to call her Lucy, gave herself a single moment to feel proud that she had managed not to soak herself in blood-red wine before she hurried to the customer who awaited the drink, an old man who appeared to her eyes to be well on his way to one hundred.

The old man thanked her quietly as he accepted the wine, slipping an extra coin into her palm before she scurried away to help the family by the window. The girl whose name he did not remember most days reminded him of his daughter who had died many years ago. He liked to see her smile. Sometimes, however, he thought that she looked sad, when she was behind the bar, facing away from the innkeeper and the woman who was not her wife, when the room was quieter and less hectic, when she seemed to believe no one was looking. The old man never asked the girl if she held anguish in her heart. He merely hoped it was his failing eyes and the poor light from the fire and the lamps that made her look so sorrowful.

So intent was the girl no one called Bree on finding a clean towel—desperate to avoid using her own apron to assist the harried-looking mother with her child—that she did not notice a shadow pass by the window, heralding the arrival of yet another group of guests.

“I’ll find you something,” she promised the mother, who nodded gratefully while the child flung his arms into the air and caught his father on the chin with his fist.

“Check the crate below the stairs!” Calling a suggestion of where she might find a towel, the other inn girl gave Bree’s hand a squeeze as they passed each other, the other arm wholly occupied as she carried a steaming bowl of soup to the boy who had nearly spilled the old man’s wine mere minutes before. It was his second bowl of soup; he had knocked the first one to the floor in a fit of excitement over a story his older sister was telling, and while the innkeeper had initially insisted that the family must pay full price for the second bowl, she’d capitulated when the boy had fixed her with a wide green gaze and given her a gap-toothed grin, and she and the sister had agreed that half-price would do instead.

Bree unlatched the stair-cupboard door, found the crate in question, and rummaged around until she found a stack of ratty but mostly clean cloth. Murmuring a few words of exhausted gratitude coloured with near-silent expletives, she scrambled back to her feet. She took only a moment to appreciate the delightful solitude and relative quiet of the cupboard before she hurried back out into the chaos. The mother accepted the towel gratefully, just in time, as her young son repeated his unsavoury activity from earlier, this time across her shoulder.

Ducking her head to hide an expression that was equal parts amusement and disgust, Bree wiped away the offending substance with her shoe, pinching the soiled towel with two fingers as she hurried to the back to dispose of it.

The other girl, who asked others to call her Victoria and who had no reason to do otherwise as she was indeed named Victoria, smiled broadly and welcomed the group who stumbled in from outside. She bit back a sigh—a group of five, they were, and she was already anticipating the headache it would be to squeeze them in somewhere—but she consoled herself that they were young and pleasant-looking and four of the five were rather handsome fellows who might leave a few extra coins upon the table if she beamed and winked and giggled just so. How striking, she thought, was the melting snow against the coppery-brown hair of two who might have been brothers and the dark beards of the pale, fidgety man and the astoundingly tall one behind him.

Victoria let her gaze rove around the room, searching for a place to seat them but also for her colleague, intending to whisper conspiratorially the next time they brushed elbows, “Have you seen those fine gentlemen who just came in?”

Bree was, in fact, right then returning from the back room, her hands now clean, still dripping water onto the floor. As she noticed the group that had just entered, her footsteps faltered and came to an abrupt stop. Her eyes grew wide; her cheeks grew wan. The old man drinking wine heard her cry out softly in surprise.

Victoria did not hear it, but she gaped in confusion as her friend staggered backwards, face now ghostly white, and then vanished back through the door through which she’d just entered.

“What is wrong with that girl?” the innkeeper demanded. Nothing escaped her eyes or ears. “Where does she think she’s going?”

“I—I think she must be quite ill,” stammered Victoria, unsure of how to answer. “Shall I check on her?”

“No. If she’s ill, we don’t want her anywhere near the guests. You’ll just have to move a little quicker till it calms down in here. Now chop-chop. I’ll come help you when I can.”

Sighing loudly and this time not even attempting to hide it, Victoria hurried across the room to bring the new group to their table.

The young man who had just entered, whose hair did not know if it was red or brown, whose face was sprinkled with freckles and whose body was sprinkled with scars, whose hands were busy brushing the last dregs of snow from his coat, felt a shiver run down his spine. Suddenly, though he did not know from where this feeling struck him, he was quite certain something had happened that he should have seen but had been too distracted to notice. When he looked around the room, however, he saw nothing but merry travellers and piping hot plates of food and frothy pints of beer and the smile of the bargirl who approached to direct them to their table.

At the back of the inn, clothed in nothing but her dress and apron, the girl whose secret was suddenly in great peril clung to the wooden doorway, gasping in the frigid night air, tears freezing to crystals of ice upon her lashes. For she knew that group who had just come in for a meal, knew their faces and their names and their past. This was not what frightened her.

Breanna Cooper knew that group, and worst of all, she knew they knew her, too.

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✨ Did you come here from Chapter 49? There are two bonus chapters that come between 49 and 50:

💚 Box in Your Heart (Colette and Will)

🍂 Are You Nobody, Too? (Bree and Henry)

Next time on The Prince of Thieves:

Tagging: @starlit-hopes-and-dreams, @gala1981, @kixngiggles, @whither-wander-whump 💕

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littleperilstories · 11 months

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The Prince of Thieves: Connected Far Beyond a Miracle

Mood Boards | Chapter Titles | Also on A03! | Playlist | Story Intro

Warnings: mention of jail, aftermath of traumatic events, fear of suicidal ideation/self harm (mentioned), very vague reference to a previous death wish (not explicit at all)

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✨ Feel free to navigate forward to Finale Part 1, but if you're interested, there are two bonus chapters that come between 49 and 50:

💚 Box in Your Heart (Colette and Will)

🍂 Are You Nobody, Too? (Bree and Henry)

Word count: 3562 || Approx reading time: 15 mins

Connected Far Beyond a Miracle

Teaser: “What are you doing out here?” I demand when I make my way outside. It’s freezing, the wind whistling through the bare branches and nearly skinning me alive. “Do you want someone to see you? Recognize you?”

Jamie

I nearly lose it when I look around one day and Will is nowhere to be seen, and when I ask Colette if she’s seen him, she hasn’t, and then when I ask Geoff where the fuck he is, he can’t tell me, and when I check with Colette’s giggly stepsister who always somehow seems to know what Will is up to, she doesn’t know.

“Someone please tell me he didn’t fuck off without telling anyone.” The pain in my side is actually starting to fade—some days it doesn’t even hurt at all anymore—but now that it’s more or less gone, I’ve got that familiar why-is-my-brother-like-this headache back in its usual, throbbing spot in my temple.

“He went outside.”

I blink. I didn’t even bother asking Allan. Will still avoids him like the plague.

“What do you mean, went outside?” Colette pales. “What if someone—”

“He’s by the window. In the back.”

For fuck’s sake. Doesn’t Will realize that if the wrong person spots him, he’ll have the constables crawling all over Colette’s family’s house? “Why didn’t you stop him?”

Allan is nice, and he’s good at what he does, but he doesn’t have much of a fucking backbone.

“Because I didn’t feel like getting punched in the face.”

I rest my case.

Walking is mostly easy at this point, but standing up and sitting down still send a twinge bolting through me if I do it too fast. Still. I’d rather take ten seconds of pain than see Will in chains again.

“What are you doing out here?” I demand when I make my way outside. It’s freezing, the wind whistling through the bare branches and nearly skinning me alive. “Do you want someone to see you? Recognize you?”

“It’s the back of the house, Jamie. No one’s going to see me.”

“Are you willing to take that bet?”

“Yes.”

If I didn’t think it would make him flinch away from me like I was trying to throttle him—which, to be fair, I do want to do that, some days—I’d grab his arm and drag him back into the house. “Why are you out here?”

“I’ve been inside. For…” He stops. Clenches his jaw. Glares into the stormy-grey sky. “I’m losing my mind. I needed air.”

Geoff, who followed me back here, nudges my side. His meaning is clear: Sounds like someone I know.

“Shut up,” I say to him.

Will glances at me, scowling and ready to fight.

“Not you.” I jerk my head at Geoff. “Him.”

Leaning back against the wall, crossing his arms and planting his feet like a five-year-old, Will says, “Just go back inside. I’ll be in soon.”

“You’re not even wearing a coat.”

“It’s not that cold.”

“Will, get your ass back in the house.”

“No.”

What the fuck am I supposed to do, short of dragging him back by the hair? Can’t even do that, since Colette cut it all off. “Will, please.”

“No.”

Turning to Geoff, I give him a look to say, Please help. It’s not likely he can do anything, either, but Will sometimes listens to him when he won’t listen to me. And at least Geoff can wrestle him back inside if needed.

With a shrug, though, Geoff raises his hands in the air. “No one else is around.”

Great. He’s taking Will’s side. When I look back at my brother, he still looks pissed off, but there’s a smugness to it now.

You’re acting like a child, I want to say. I hold my tongue.

“Go back inside,” he repeats. “I’m not going to do anything stupid. Or are you all still afraid to leave me alone for too long?”

Fuck. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.”

There was a part of me that thought that once we had Will back, everything would settle. Perhaps not exactly go back to the way it was, but at least feel closer to normal.

I could not have been more wrong.

Nothing about this has been straightforward. Me, I have pain one day and none the next. Maybe that shouldn’t be too surprising. But Will… He’s laughing and goofy one moment and ready to stab a fork through Allan’s hand an hour later. He’s fine, and then he’s lost in a forest of thoughts so murky I wonder if he will be able to find his way out of it.

Breathe, Jamie. Just breathe. In and out.

“Tell me what’s on your mind,” I say to Will when I’m calm enough to actually say something nice.

The warmth of Geoff next to me pulls away. I start counting the seconds until he reappears with a coat and scarf in hand.

“Nothing,” Will says, his eyes fixed on something in the distance. When I follow his gaze, I don’t see anything worth staring at for hours. Just the promise of snow in the clouds. A brilliant red bird flitting from branch to branch.

“You’re the worst liar I’ve ever met,” I say. “What’s wrong?”

His jaw tightens. “I wish you’d all stop reminding me of that. I know. I fucking know.”

I was not expecting that to set him off. “All right. I’m sorry. I…”

“I tried,” he says. “I tried. To lie. To protect you. To protect…her.”

My headache intensifies. I have tried so fucking hard not to say anything that would bring him back to prison. Back to those weeks of torment.

All for nothing, apparently, because I’ve gone and done exactly that. “Will, I—”

“He knew, anyway,” he says, and I’m taken aback by the anger in his voice. “Somehow he fucking knew what to look for in their old arrest records, and I’ve been trying to figure it out, but no one… No one says anything. Even you. You got arrested and you never fucking told me and he had that old record and that’s how he knew your name, and I can’t believe you never said anything, Jamie, and that happened when Ma was still alive—”

“Will—”

“—And Bree told him we were brothers, but how did he know what name to look for? He already had it by the time I gave in, when I thought he was going to kill Bree, and—and—”

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I confessed to Geoff, and only Geoff—told him about the letter I sent, the promise I made to turn myself in if Will walked free. The promise I reneged upon once we had Hatchett to bargain with instead.

“I’m sorry,” I say. I was nineteen, young and foolish, the day I met Geoff, the day I was arrested, the day the constables got my name—the day that would all these years later fuck up everything for all of us. “For not telling you. I shouldn’t have kept it a secret.”

“You didn’t trust me?”

“You were fourteen,” I say. “You were a kid. I didn’t want you getting ideas.”

“Fine. Whatever.”

I know I can’t keep the rest of it from him, that if I do, I’ll be tearing apart the already shaky foundation we’ve been trying to rebuild since we got here. “Hatchett knew what to look for because he had my initials. I sent him a message.”

Will jerks away from the wall to stand up straight. “What?”

“I said I’d turn myself in if they let you out.”

I stumble backwards into the brick, pain scraping into my back, when Will reaches out and shoves me. “What the fuck did you do that for?”

Fuck. He’s got tears in his eyes, and so do I.

“Because I didn’t want to watch you get hanged, you idiot!”

“But it’s fine for me to watch you get hanged?”

“It’s not the same. IA was my idea. It was never your responsibility.” Never Will’s sin to atone for.

His hands curl into fists, and I wonder if he’s going to hit me. Maybe he should. Maybe I deserve it.

Then Will relaxes his muscles and looks away.

“I’m so tired,” he says. “I’m so tired of being mad all the time. Of the memories. Of being sad. I don’t want to remember any of it. But then I don’t want to fucking forget it, either. And that pisses me off. It pisses me off so much. I should. I should want to forget it. Why…”

I open my mouth, but he keeps going.

“I have to just be here and stay stuck inside and keep thinking and thinking and remembering. Do you think anything happened to—to him? Do you think he can’t sleep at night? Fuck that. He just went back to work and, yeah, maybe he’s still pissed off and looking for us but he doesn’t have to deal with this shit, but I do, and it never fucking ends, does it, and I just want to not be mad for even just a few minutes, but if I forgot it all then I’d forget—”

He turns away completely, and I can only tell from the movement of his arm that he’s wiping tears from his face.

“It’s not fair,” he says, but I can’t tell if the words are really meant for me.

Geoff finally reappears, clutching my coat, and Will’s too. I pull mine on and wait for my brother to face me once more. Dimly, I’m aware of Geoff squeezing my hand before he steps away again.

“It’s all right that you’re mad,” I say. “You have every right to be.”

It’s a long time before Will responds. Eventually he turns back outwards, not exactly facing me, to lean against the wall again and stare out at the nothing that’s so captivated him. I manage to get him to shrug into his coat, but he doesn’t seem to fully recognize me or even really know what he’s doing.

“Did you know that you knew her, kind of?”

The question is sudden, and with no context, I have no idea what it even means. “What?”

“Bree. Her dad was that prick you worked for. Who kicked you all out.”

The memory sends a shiver down my spine. “Silas Cooper. I noticed they had the same name.”

“She’s the girl who ran out of the house. That was her.” Will draws a deep breath. “She remembered your name. For a little bit, I was so sure she knew who you were. She didn’t though. But when he knew your name, I thought—I thought maybe she—” He stops. Shakes his head. “She swore she didn’t.”

He seems calmer now; his breath isn’t quite so quick and ragged, and his eyes look less wild.

“It’s funny,” he says. “Well, not funny. Weird. Fucked up, maybe.”

“I can’t read your mind, Will. What are you talking about?”

He picks at his nails. Avoids my gaze. “Bree. All the ways our paths crossed. More than once. She was the girl who tried to help you when she was a kid. And I was there the day Colette found her and dropped the coin. And she was…the girl from that night.” Will speaks quickly, something like guilt flashing across his face. “The snowstorm. You remember.”

“Oh. Yeah. She told me.”

“She did?”

“Yeah.”

Another long pause, and I brace myself for another abrupt subject change that he’s going to expect me to follow. Instead, he continues, “And then she got arrested right after me. And Hatchett picked on her when he had me wh…”

Even though he doesn’t finish the sentence, I understand what he’s referring to when he says, “He made her count.”

“And?”

“And what?”

“And what about all of that?”

He swallows hard, and his face goes red—nothing, I suspect, to do with the biting wind. “Why did we keep meeting like that? And then how could she just leave without saying goodbye?”

God, the look on his face. We’ve both been heartbroken before, more than once. And I know this look.

“I almost get it,” he says. “If she’d stayed… You know, when she looked at me, she’d be reminded of him, right? Of Hatchett. Of jail. And I… I wouldn’t want that. Right? They hurt her, too. Not just me. So I get it. I guess.”

God, if we were still kids, if he were still little, I’d pull him into a hug whether he liked it or not. Now I can only stand there and watch him stumble over his words, trying so desperately to say what he means.

“Life kept bringing us together. Like we were supposed to meet. To know each other. You know? Like it meant something. But then she fucked off. She fucked off, and she didn’t even say goodbye.” He turns his head away. “I guess it didn’t mean anything. And I’m just a fucking idiot. Like I always have been.”

“You’re not an idiot, Will.”

“Yes, I am.”

Fuck it. He’s my brother. He’s hurting.

“You’re not,” I repeat. “You went through hell. Hell. And you’re here. Still here. You survived. That makes you strong as fuck. Not an idiot.”

He’s my brother and he’s hurting and for the first time, he doesn’t flinch away when I get close. Pull him into a hug. He stiffens, though, and for a moment I wonder if he’s going to bolt. But he relaxes after a few seconds. And he doesn’t run.

Still, though, he doesn’t say anything, and I fear he’s lost again. “Do you want the rest of the story?”

“Hmm?” It’s like he’s hearing my words from far away. Slowly, he tugs out of my grip, and I let him go. “Which story?”

“What happened after Geoff and I met. In…” I cringe. “In jail.”

“I know how that story ends.” He sounds so tired. “You’re in love and you’re going to live happily ever after.”

“Don’t be a smartass about it. You don’t know the whole story.” I watch his face for surprise, but there’s still distance there. “I only knew his name after that day, but nothing else. Didn’t know where to find him.”

I wandered around town for two weeks, looking for work, yes, but that wasn’t all I was searching for.

“It was by chance, I guess, kind of, that we met again. But I was trying my damnedest to find him.” I hovered around that hideous tavern almost every day, and in the end, I bumped into him down the street from our home.

“What the fuck?” I remember yelping. “What are you doing here?” For some reason, I felt hot. For some reason, I looked up and down the street, wondering if Ma or Will could see us. For some reason, even though my family was falling apart for the second time, I felt happy.

I tell my brother how we saw each other every day that summer. How, more than once, Geoff and I had to dodge Will and his friends spinning through the streets so he wouldn’t spot us and ask questions I knew I was not ready to answer.

I skip the details of the first time our hands brushed, or the first time his hand clasped mine. I do not mention the first time we kissed, or the first time I ran my fingers down the smooth dark skin of his bare chest—

“Jamie? Was there more, or what?”

Whoops. Maybe Will’s not the only one who’s a little lost.

“And then Ma got worse,” I say softly. These memories—in the deepest, darkest, murkiest ravine of that forest of the past—these are ones on which I don’t wish to linger. “And it just…stopped. We didn’t…” God, even remembering this is painful. “We didn’t see each other again. For years.”

Will is quiet, and his eyes are back on the sky, but I can tell he’s listening.

“And then one day my brother poached on someone else’s territory, picking pockets where he shouldn’t have been,” I say, and the corners of his mouth tip upward, “and this terrifying girl with curly hair and the biggest fucking guy I’ve ever seen were about to cut him to shreds—”

“Don’t be an ass,” he says. “She wasn’t going to cut me to—”

“Oh, yes I was.”

We both jump at the sound of Colette’s voice. She’s out here now, and Geoff, too. Snow, soft and white and gentle, is starting to fall. I watch the snowflakes sparkle against Geoff’s dark hair for precious moments before they melt, and he meets my eyes, smiling. How’d you end up on this story? he seems to ask.

“And wasn’t that big guy with her,” I say, “the same goddamn asshole who broke me out of jail years before?”

Geoff grins and looks away.

“If people are meant to find each other,” I tell Will, “then they just do.”

I can see him shivering, but my stubborn ass of a brother isn’t going to be the one to suggest going inside. “I’m glad you found each other,” he says.

“Me too.”

Geoff and Colette move in unison: he to stand next to me, and she to grab Will’s hands, which are starting to turn red from the cold. “So. Are you ready to come inside and get warm yet? Geoff made tea.”

“I suppose.”

“He supposes,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “Well, I suppose that Verie also baked a sponge cake and wants everyone to have a taste and shower her with praise.”

I swear I see Will’s eyes light up. Slightly—but it counts.

“Come on,” she says to him, and a sense of peace washes over me when Will finally agrees to go back inside, where it’s warm. Where it’s safe.

Geoff holds me back, gripping my arm with that firm yet gentle grasp when I try to follow.

“Just one,” he says. The snowflakes are still fat and lazy, drifting slowly like sugary fragments of stars. They cling to him now, no longer melting right away.

His kiss—god, his kiss. The sweetest and most perfect gift that, for a time, I thought I’d never enjoy again.

“I love you.” Words I don’t say enough. To him. To Will. To anyone.

“I love you, too.”

In the kitchen, Verity is fussing over her sponge cake, glancing over at Will through her lashes. Colette looks annoyed, and when Will’s not looking, I see her step on her sister’s foot.

“Stop making a fool of yourself,” she hisses. Verity just rolls her eyes.

Of course, Will doesn’t notice. He’s sunk his hand into his pocket, and his gaze is distant again. When I draw his attention, though, he comes back right away.

“You all right?”

He nods.

At that moment, Allan walks in, and I wince, certain that the peace I’ve just managed to chase down is going to be gone the second Will opens his mouth.

“So.” Will fixes Allan with his best tough stare, which wouldn’t cow any of us but makes the doctor shrink a little. I shoot a glance at Geoff, silently telling him to be ready to hold my brother back if needed. “Are you the reason they were hiding all the sharp stuff from me?”

Allan frowns. “What?”

“Did you…”

“Did I what?”

Will glances at me. “Did you tell them,” he says finally. “What I asked you to do.” So flat it’s barely a question. So quiet and ominous it makes me shiver.

Allan seems to catch Will’s meaning. “I didn’t breach your privacy in any way, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Impatiently, redness creeping into his face, Will says, “I don’t know what the fuck breach means.”

“I didn’t repeat any conversations we had while you were my patient. Because that would be unethical.”

For a moment, silence.

And then—

“Thanks.”

Allan blinks, nods, and mumbles an acknowledgement, and Will doesn’t say anything else.

“Why does everyone look so sad?” Verity asks. “Get yourselves to the table and enjoy my delicious, perfect cake.”

When the cake is gone from our plates and we’re all sipping tea, with Verity and Colette in quiet conversation, Geoff drawing soft circles on the back of my hand, and Allan reading a newspaper, I notice that Will is reading, too.

It isn’t a book or a newspaper in his hand, though, but a piece of paper, creased to all hell. Haphazard fold lines all over it. I don’t have to ask what it is.

As if he can feel my stare, he looks up. He must be able to read me as well as Geoff can, because he hesitates, then heaves a sigh and hands me the letter.

Will, it says, Thank you for saving my life, and for your forgiveness, even if I don’t know if I deserve either. Get well. Stay safe. And please, please, please be happy. I promise I will never forget you. Bree.

“She’ll be all right,” I tell him, clearing my throat and handing the letter back. “I’ve got a feeling.”

Though it seems like he wants to laugh, he doesn’t. “You’re probably right. She’s too fucking stubborn to die.”

“Language,” Verity admonishes from across the table, and Will grins at her.

With his breath tickling my ear, Geoff whispers, “He’ll be all right, too.”

Suddenly, my heart feels more full than it did before. “Promise?” I whisper back.

“Promise.”

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✨ Feel free to navigate forward to Finale Part 1, but if you're interested, there are two bonus chapters that come between 49 and 50:

💚 Box in Your Heart (Colette and Will)

🍂 Are You Nobody, Too? (Bree and Henry)

Stay close, can you feel the love between the two of us? / Let go, we can disappear inside the universe

If you look inside / Read between the lines / Everything is gradual / When you see the signs / The comets all collide / Everything is magical

We're interstellar hearts / Whenever we're together / Can't resist your gravity / It took a million miles to find you / Stars to fly through / Spark of perfect chemistry / This is our future / We're meant to find it / We will go further / 'Cause we're just interstellar hearts / In cosmic time / We shine

I don't understand the elements, the chemicals / But we both know we're connected far beyond a miracle / When you look inside / When you see the signs / Everything collides

I never knew that I could fall so hard, oh

Insterstellar Hearts - Awake or Sleeping

Next time on The Prince of Thieves:

Tagging: @starlit-hopes-and-dreams, @gala1981, @kixngiggles, @whither-wander-whump 💕

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littleperilstories · 11 months

Text

From Chapter 49, "Connected Far Beyond a Miracle" (coming tomorrow).

#lps the prince of thieves #lps-teaser #will wardrew is a snarky little sh*t #whump #whump story #will you believe me if I say there is a little bit of sweetness in this one?#yes mostly angst #but #I swear #finale makes it worth it

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littleperilstories · 11 months

Text

The Prince of Thieves: They Left You Wondering Just Who the Hell You Are

Mood Boards | Chapter Titles | Also on A03! | Playlist | Story Intro

Warnings: blood, aftermath/memories of traumatic events, reference to (fear of) self harm/suicidal ideation

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Word count: 2725 || Approx reading time: 11 mins

They Left You Wondering Just Who the Hell You Are

Teaser: While Will was lost in his thoughts, staring at Jamie or the sky and avoiding looking any of us in the eye, Jamie was watching him, too, and whatever he saw scared the hell out of him.

Colette

Some days, Will seems like his old self.

Having Jamie back, seeing him alive and healing, is the thing that seems to give him the most energy. A lot of the time when Will is sitting with Jamie in their room, or every time Jamie manages to take a few more steps than he did the day before, he’s smiling. Laughing.

There are other moments, though. Quieter ones. More sombre. Darker.

When night falls, when it’s just the crackling fire that warms and illuminates the sitting room, I see him look away from the flickering light like it pains him.

In silent moments, though he is sitting still, I hear him catch his breath like he’s been running.

Sometimes, he stares down at his hands like he’s never seen them before.

He gazes out the window, watching the horizon, staring into the sky, even when there’s conversation swirling and bubbling around us, like he can’t hear a thing.

Wide-eyed, he watches Jamie. Like he’s terrified that if he falters in his tireless vigil for even an instant, his brother might disappear.

Jamie knows something’s different; Geoff knows, too. For a while, at Jamie’s behest, we did our best to keep Will sequestered in the sitting room or in his room or anywhere else, away from the kitchen and everything inside it and all the macabre possibilities it presented. Because while Will was lost in his thoughts, staring at Jamie or the sky and avoiding looking any of us in the eye, Jamie was watching him, too, and whatever he saw scared the hell out of him.

None of his fears came to pass, though, and now the smiles are beginning to outnumber the empty, haunted stares.

Some days.

“Hey.” I tap Will on the shoulder. He’s sitting in my father’s chair—which is quite amusing because no one else dares to go near it, and yet Will steals it every day and Father hasn’t said a word—with a book on his lap that he clearly has no interest in even pretending to read. “Come help me.”

“With what?”

“Dinner. Come on.”

That makes him roll his eyes like a saucy twelve-year-old, and something loosens in my chest that before was too tightly wound.

“Here.” I brandish a cutting board and a bowl of potatoes, still dark and beaded with water. “I’ll peel. You cut.”

He accepts the wooden board, raising his eyebrows when I nod my head toward the knives by the window. “Oh, you’re all trusting me with sharp things now, are you?”

Shit. I freeze, unsure of how to answer. “What are you talking about?”

With a sigh, he says, “I’m not that stupid, you know. Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”

“You’re not stupid.” My face is hot. Of course he noticed. All he does—all we’ve been letting him do—is sit around and think and notice things. “I’m sorry.”

Will doesn’t answer, and as with every silence that stems from him these days, I wonder what thoughts are going through his head. Sometimes, it’s not so bad—still comfortable if a little strange, coming from him. This one, though, feels worrisome. “What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing.”

I shouldn’t be surprised by this answer. It stings anyway. “You’re a terrible liar, Will.”

His knife slips, hitting the cutting board, and the heavy wooden handle sends it clattering to the floor.

“Fuck!” He jumps back, the knife just missing his foot. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s just a knife,” I say, but his face tightens, and again I wonder what is happening behind his eyes, what memories are repeating in endless torment that he won’t speak out loud. “I mean… I mean, it’s fine. You’re fine. I’ll grab a clean one.”

“I’m sorry,” he repeats. “I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not.” Where is all this coming from? I bite my lip when I turn away, hoping he can’t see the worry on my face.

He shakes his head, mutters, “Thanks,” once I hand him a fresh knife, then clamps his mouth closed and starts to cut again.

I keep my eyes on the silky ribbons of potato skin piling up under my paring knife. Maybe I’ve made a mistake, bringing him in here. “Will…”

He doesn’t answer. Doesn’t glance my way.

“You can talk to us, you know.”

“What do you want to talk about?”

I hate that fucking tone, the one he uses when he wants to piss off whoever he’s talking to, and I don’t understand why he’s using it against me. I breathe in through my nose, trying to scrape up my patience. “Anything. That’s all I’m saying.”

Thud. Metal on wood. Thud. Thud. “Why didn’t you ever tell us about your family?”

I nearly nick my thumb. He’s really determined to get under my skin. He knows very well I don’t want to talk about it.

But.

I glance over at him, at his gaze that doesn’t leave the bobbing knife, up and down, up and down. For an instant, I’m under an overcast sky, watching Jamie and Bree Cooper stare down the constabulary to make a trade for his freedom. For an instant, his bruises are still fresh—deep purple and mottled grey and stark against his skin. “Because I didn’t want to.”

“Why?”

If I bite down any harder on my tongue, it’s going to bleed. “Because…” I don’t know how honest I should be—how honest I want to be, or how honest he wants me to be. “I left because of a fight with my father. He said… He did something that hurt me. A lot. No, not like that,” I say quickly, watching his face change. “Just… We had different ideas about what my life should be, and when he realized those two ideas could never be reconciled, he had something to throw right in my face. And when he did that…” I swallow the lump in my throat. “I said some awful things, too. In front of my stepmother. In front of Verie. And then I walked out the door and said I was never coming back.”

“You did come back, though.”

“I know.”

“Is all that why you never told us your real last name?”

I wince. “No. I…” God, it’s complicated. “Well, I was so pissed off. I didn’t want to use that name when I left. And then once we started IA…” I bite the inside of my cheek as I finish speaking. What would be different if Jamie had had the same foresight as me, all those years ago? If the constables hadn’t had his real name?

Silence.

When Will speaks again, the antagonizing tone is gone. “But I still don’t really get why you never even mentioned that you had a family.”

“You actually want to know? You probably won’t like it.”

He nods, still not looking at me.

“I thought…” God, it’s embarrassing now. “I was scared you three would… I don’t know. You and Jamie, your parents died, and Geoff, well, I’m not exactly sure what happened to his family, but I’m pretty sure they’re not around anymore, and I thought… I thought if you knew I had this big stupid fucking house and all this bullshit, you might… I don’t know.”

“You thought we’d be pissed about it?”

“Well, I thought maybe you’d resent me. That I had all that and…left.”

The time before he answers lasts a little longer, dragging between us. “That’s fucking stupid.”

I burst out laughing.

Despite how he still won’t meet my eye, how his hands are shaking ever so slightly, Will wears a tiny smile, too.

“Are things better now?” he asks. “Or…getting better, or…whatever?”

Are they? They must be. When I came back from Allan’s after finding Jamie there and promising to bring them somewhere safe, I was ready to do anything to get my father to send his carriage. I’d have driven it myself. Fallen to my knees and begged. Pulled out my knife and forced him to let us borrow it.

In the end, I did none of those things. I didn’t need to. He took one look at my face, listened to my request, and said yes.

“I think so,” I say, praying he’ll let the subject drop.

We move on to carrots after the potatoes. Will doesn’t complain about the work, which in itself is a wonder, because two months ago he’d have been squirming and doing anything he could to get out of preparing dinner.

“Did you see her?”

“Hmm?” The question pulls me out of my thoughts—ever-present worries about what the hell we’re going to do when winter is over and it’s time to move on.

“The day she left. Did you see her?”

Her. Who? It takes me a moment to realize he means Bree. Oh. “She was there when I first broke in. She was gone by the time I went back to get them with Geoff and my father.”

“Was she all right?” His voice is so quiet, almost timid, like I’ve never heard it before—like he’s scared to ask. Like he’s scared to know the answer.

He hasn’t mentioned her, or what was in the note she left, since I gave it to him, and to be honest, with everything else that’s been going on—being back at home and with Jamie’s recovery and worrying about everyone else every second of every day—I haven’t given her much thought, either.

“She wasn’t hurt bad after the trade,” I say carefully, though that’s something he knows because Allan mentioned the wound on her arm in conversation with Jamie once. She wasn’t hurt wouldn’t be true on its own, but She looked fucking miserable, while true, doesn’t seem like the wisest thing to say to him, right now or ever.

Only the knife on the cutting board answers, until finally he says, “That’s good.”

His knife slips again, and this time a sliver of red appears on his finger. With a hiss, he jumps back, though he manages not to drop his knife on the floor this time.

Time slows, blood seeping from the line along his skin. Will just stares at it.

“Hey.” Dropping what I’m doing, I reach for a clean towel. “Wash that. Come on. Put something on it to stop the bleeding.”

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m…”

After pulling him over to the washbasin and making him clean the cut, I press the towel against his hand. “Will. You’re fine. It’s just a cut. It happens to everyone.”

“Yeah.” He shakes his head. “Sorry. That was stupid. I’m an idiot.”

“For fuck’s sake. No, you’re not.” I grab his other hand and force him to hold the towel himself. “I almost cut myself earlier. Does that make me an idiot?”

Nothing would make me happier than if Will were to look me in the eye, smirk, and say, “Well, yeah.”

He just shakes his head and mutters, “I guess not.”

If I let him, he’ll drift away, wander off still clutching the cloth to his hand, lost in his thoughts, and I can’t help but think his thoughts are probably not the best place for him to be right now.

“Stay here for a few minutes,” I say, keeping my voice light. “Hold that till it stops bleeding and I’ll help you wrap it up. I can finish the rest of the chopping. It’s not much.”

“Thanks, Sp…” Realizing what he’s saying halfway through the word, he stops, and then I get what I’m looking for—a laugh. Short and a little dark, but a chuckle nonetheless. “Thanks, Colette.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I say, turning back to the cutting board. Racking my brain for a topic that will distract him, I settle on, “Why don’t I teach you how to play chess tonight?”

His answer is immediate. “Ugh. No.”

That’s a bit of a surprise. I thought he’d want a bit of levity. A bit of fun. “Really? Why not?”

“I don’t need to learn chess,” he mutters. “It’s just another boring thing to do ins—”

He stops.

When I look up from the cutting board, he’s clenched his jaw. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Will. What?”

Fussing with the towel against his finger, he starts, “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but…”

“But…” I echo, hoping it’ll prompt him to say more. When he hesitates, I add, “You can tell me. I promise I won’t think you’re ungrateful.”

“I just… I…” Will sighs. “I’ve been inside. For… For so long.”

Of course.

Weeks stuck in the dark as a prisoner. Now, weeks stuck here, no longer a prisoner—but not far from it.

“I’m sorry, Will.” The last of the carrots swim in front of me. “I know it must be hard. Really fucking hard.”

“Yeah.” He blows out a long breath. “And I get it. I… I get it. Jamie can’t go anywhere. He—They—They’re probably still looking for me. Us. And now it’s winter and moving around is twice as hard. And we’re lucky to be here at all, and I know that. I know that. But still…”

He quietens, and I know I won’t get much more out of him.

I wait for my vision to clear before I dip my hands in some clean water and turn to him. “Let’s see how that finger’s looking.”

Gingerly, I check on the state of his cut. It already seems to be finished bleeding. “Beautiful.” This hyperbolic accolade makes him snort.

“Here’s a different idea,” I say when it’s bandaged properly. “Want me to cut your hair?”

This, he considers, which is a good thing, because that moppy head is a complete mess.

“Come on,” I say, elbowing him in the side. “You look like a shaggy dog.”

“Yeah,” he says, reaching up to tug at his hair, which is brushing his shoulders now. “Guess you probably should. It’s pretty bad, isn’t it?”

“You can say that again.”

I don’t say the next thing that comes to mind, which is that my silly sister is probably going to mourn the loss of his hair—I’ve caught her gazing at him quite openly when she obviously thought no one was paying attention—and I’m probably going to have to make sure she doesn’t do anything unseemly like steal any of it to squirrel away in a locket somewhere. Even though I’ve already told her more than once that pining after the mess of a man in front of me is a ridiculous idea.

“Whatever you’re thinking about,” I warned her the first time I caught her watching him with stars in her eyes, “stop it, now.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she sniffed.

I rolled my eyes and hoped she’d listen.

The second time, I smacked her on her arm and said, “What are you doing? You’re courting disaster. Look at him. He’s a disaster.”

“I know,” she said, her cheeks bright red.

It was only yesterday that I had to say, “Verie, you’re being an idiot. If Father knew you were pining after him, of all people, he’d kick all of us out of here faster than you could blink.”

She just sighed and didn’t bother to deny or argue.

My sister, a naïve fool, falling in love with my friend, an oblivious fool. In fact, the only good thing about this whole stupid scenario is that he’s so fucking oblivious, he hasn’t noticed Verity practically tripping over herself to sit next to him and making excuses to be close to him at every turn.

As if she can sense that I’m thinking about her, Verie herself skips into the kitchen, rosy-cheeked and smiling. “This looks fun! What’s going on here?”

“Chopping vegetables,” I say, rolling my eyes before shooting her a warning look. “Yes. It’s been thrilling.”

She throws back a split-second glare of, You’re so annoying, Lettie before she notices that Will’s hand has a new bandage. “What happened?”

“Kitchen brawl,” says Will solemnly. “But you should see the other guy.”

The look of utter confusion on Verie’s face is priceless. When Will jerks his head toward the pile of chopped carrots, she nearly tumbles over with giggles.

“You’re both ridiculous,” I say. But I, too, am smiling. And the best part: So is Will.

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Tagging: @starlit-hopes-and-dreams, @gala1981, @kixngiggles, @whither-wander-whump 💕

[Banner ID: A narrow horizontal, rectangular banner featuring a barred archway. The bars and the stone walls evoke the feeling of a dungeon or prison. There are burning candles on either side of the archway. The title of the story, The Prince of Thieves, appears in white text in the centre of the image. The author's username, abbreviated to LPS from littleperilstories, appears in the bottom right corner in partially transparent text. End ID.]

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