Hey guys! Welcome back to Hear a Tale! First things first - review time!

Thanks so much to Citrus Chickadee for reviewing! Alfyn does such a good job of being upbeat and positive most of the time that it's easy to forget that he knows what it's like to be only a day or so away from death :') And yeah, it's fun to parallel what happened to him with his present day interactions with Ogen! Glad you enjoyed!

With that, on with the tale!

Relevant Events: Primrose's Chapter Three

44. Two Roads

Primrose took a steadying breath, eyes shut as she braced herself against the stone railing just outside of Revello's house. She could hear the former city watchman quietly conversing with Alfyn and Olberic, all three of them politely pretending that they didn't see her trying to regain her composure. They were waiting for her, she knew, but she wasn't ready to go just yet.

After already taking the lives of two men who had wronged her, the prospect of going after a third shouldn't have made her so much as blink. And indeed, it wasn't exactly the thought of killing again that unnerved her so - anyone who bore the mark of the crow surely deserved the fate that was coming to him - but rather the memories that had threatened to drown her ever since returning to Noblecourt.

It had been bearable when they had only stopped by a short while to help Therion find the ruby Dragonstone. Then, she had managed to stay out of the spotlight, keeping a low profile and avoiding most of the hollow ghosts of her past. This time, however, it was as though her former life had her in a chokehold.

She had seen old friends like Simeon and Revello for the first time in years. She had walked streets she had once known by heart, and now felt like a stranger to. She was currently a five minutes' walk from her father's final resting place, though she could not bring herself to face him yet.

It was all just…starting to be too much.

Primrose felt movement beside her and stiffened, only relaxing at the sound of a familiar, drawling voice and the soft clank of a chain link.

"So. Time for some breaking and entering, huh?"

The dancer opened her eyes, glancing sidelong at Therion. The thief had casually draped himself across the same railing she leaned against, and was watching her with one half-lidded yet sharp jade eye. Primrose suddenly had the impression that he could see straight through her, all the way to her anxiety-ridden heart.

"Indeed…" she murmured simply, looking away. Once, she had been a master of hiding behind a cool, expressionless exterior. It had been the very strategy that had helped her survive so many years working for a slime-soaked man like Helgenish, serving customers that were just as slimy. Yet the longer she traveled with this group, the harder it was becoming to affix the mask she had worn for so long. It was fine whenever she was in a better mood and actually felt like joking and teasing, but in moments of weakness like this…she was at a loss for what to do.

Therion grunted slightly in acknowledgment. "Think you can pull it off?"

"Therion…" Primrose sighed, glancing back at him with a grim expression. "It does not matter if I can or not. The fact is…I must."

The thief's eye narrowed, but he said nothing.

Primrose watched him for a moment before releasing another deep breath and gazing out at the town she had once called her home. "To tell the truth…I've thought about giving up more than once. I've wondered what sort of life I could live if I chose a different path. But each time I do…" She shook her head. "I can't imagine what the future would look like. This is all I know."

"Hm. If you say so." Therion's tone was so carefully neutral that it could only be deliberate.

"So if you're trying to talk me out of avenging my father - "

"That's not it," he cut her off before she could finish. He hesitated, and Primrose could practically see his mind carefully sorting through every last syllable of whatever he was about to say. "I just…know how easy it is to screw things up if you don't stay calm. So don't go losing your head in there…okay?"

The dancer's eyebrows lifted. There was surely a story behind that sort of advice - perhaps several, even. And more than that, there was emotion behind it - beneath the dull green eye, the grim twist of his mouth, the flatness of his voice, and the slouched, closed-off expression…Therion was actually worried about her. Enough to approach her in her distressed state, enough to offer quiet counsel instead of a barbed quip.

Coming from the notoriously sullen thief…it was actually quite sweet.

"Stay calm…I'll remember that." The corner of her mouth tilted up in a small smile. "Thank you, Therion."

His face reddened slightly, and he quickly ducked to hide most of his face behind his violet scarf. "Right, um…it's nothing, really. Just…promise me one thing, alright?"

"Hm? What's that?"

"When all this is over, when you're at the end of this path…there's gonna be two roads you're gonna have to choose from." Therion's eye flicked in her direction briefly before swiftly returning to staring fixedly at the ground. "One of those roads only leads to misery - that's the one you'll go down if you let your anger, guilt, shame, whatever drown you. Some people aren't satisfied with revenge, even once they get it. They just stay angry at the world forever and keep taking more and more so they can drag everyone else down to the pit of despair with them. I…need you to look me in the eye and tell me that you won't let yourself become that. That you'll take the other road - the one that lets you just finish this and move on with your life without becoming a miserable asshole like so many others. You're not the kind of person who should fall that far."

Primrose frowned, looking down at the golden bracelets that jangled on her wrists. "Mhm…one could argue that I've fallen far enough already."

"They could." Therion shrugged. "But they'd be stupid to try."

Her face softened as she gazed at the thief, who still hadn't lifted his head. Unbidden, her thoughts turned to Simeon, though she could not have said why. His and Therion's similarities started and ended at the comparable shades of their silvery hair - indeed, though they might have looked vaguely alike at a glance, with a closer look, it was clear that the two of them were all but polar opposites. If Simeon was sugar, all lilting poetry and gentlemanly charms, then Therion was salt, with his acerbic wit and sharp tongue.

And yet…when she had run into Simeon earlier, she had found that the charismatic sweetness her younger self had once admired now felt almost saccharine and cloying. Perhaps it was merely a side effect of how far removed Primrose had become from her own past. Those times had been beautiful once, but she could no longer look back on them without becoming sick to her stomach. The memories now tasted of poison rather than sweets.

Therion, though…he was solely a part of her present. He was blunt and sarcastic, but also straightforward and surprisingly honest for a thief. None of his words were ever sugarcoated, and yet he did not speak cruelly toward her either. Behind his brackish tone was a strong heart, one that had seen just as much pain as her own, but was still willing to believe that she could come out of her journey a better person. In many ways, he was a contradiction, but somehow, he was still entirely refreshing.

Perhaps Primrose was starting to prefer salt to sugar after all.

"...very well," she said at last, causing Therion to finally look up to face her. "I promise you…when all of this is done, I will do everything in my power to walk the road to light." A small smile touched her lips. "And who knows? Once I'm through with execution, perhaps I can help you kick your habit of larceny in turn."

Therion smirked. "You can certainly try," he replied. "But either way…good. A life of moping around wouldn't suit you anyway."

"Of course not," Primrose teased, nudging him lightly, "that's your job, after all." With a deep breath, she straightened, resting a hand on the hilt of her dagger. "Alright. I believe I'm ready now."

"Okay, then." The thief grinned and pushed himself off of the railing to stand beside her. "Let's go kill that black-feathered son of a bitch."

See you guys next time for Tale 45: Illusion!