Story [Ranger's Apprentice] - Home - angst, h/c (based on books by J. Flanagan)

Title: Home
Rating: G
Author: Obi the Kid (hlnkid@aol.com)
Summary: Takes place after Halt and Horace are reunited with Will and Evanlyn in the beginning of book 4. Will comes to terms with the recent past.
Disclaimer: These characters and their world belong to John Flanagan. I in no way claim to own them. I?m only playing in the fandom for a short time and appreciate the world and characters that Mr. Flanagan has created with his book series ?Ranger?s Apprentice.?

Note: I stumbled onto this series about a month ago while wandering around the book store. The series is aimed at teens obviously, but me, being in my 30?s have found myself very attached to the characters and universe that John Flanagan has created. I?m looking forward to the other books in the series being published here in the US. I don?t know if my small story here will lead to me writing any others, but I hope it will. I?ve been writing Star Wars based stories for about 8 years now, so it was fun to step outside that fandom into something else. Please excuse any minor errors or typos. I think I got them all, but those pesky little things can creep by sometimes. Thanks for reading.

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Home
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The quieting fire crackled softly. The burning embers struggling for air to maintain their grasp on life. The Ranger gazed across the dying orange glow where Horace and Evanlyn had finally succumbed to sleep. The days harrowing events, followed by the reunion of the four of them after so many long months of pain and angst, had gotten the best of them. Halt held the responsibility of their lives in his skilled hands. Hands that could fire arrows from a longbow almost faster than a man could blink. Though the hands had not been fast enough to stop his apprentice from being captured and enslaved. Will had survived though. With Evanlyn?s friendship and his own strength of character, he?d come out of this trauma scarred but alive.

Halt glanced around for his apprentice. Will had excused himself after they?d eaten their catch, then vanished into the forest, his dedicated pony, Tug, following closely behind. The elder Ranger wondered at the boy. The differences he saw him him were worrisome. Captured, tortured as a slave and then enslaved as an addict of warmweed, Will?s spirit seemed shaken. Part of what Halt so enjoyed about him had been taken away. The pure innocence of his questions and his curiosity. Halt had missed the young presence. And would even admit to missing those constant questions that the boy was famous for throwing at him. Thinking to himself, he wondered if the Will he had taken as an apprentice would return to him in time.

Upon their reunion, they didn?t speak much of the time that Will was held captive. Evanlyn?s retelling captured enough details for understanding. They spoke even less of the warmweed addiction. Halt refused to blame the boy for what had happened. Truth be told, he blamed himself more than anything else. Certainly there was more he could have done to find him sooner. No second guessing. He could have left Horace behind. He could have?no. It wasn?t worth it. He?d done all he could. What mattered now was that this one young student that meant so much to him, was home. Home at his side, where he belonged.

One day they would truly return home. Halt had explained his expulsion from the Kings land and from the Ranger corps, never considering that Will would lay blame on himself for Halt having to take such drastic action just to come to his rescue. But Will did just that. Wondering, if he?d only waited for Gilan. If he?d only been able to keep the fire on the bridge from burning out. If only he had done so many things differently, perhaps his teacher would not have been expelled from the life that he held so dear. The inner conflict was evident, surfacing hard for Halt to see, but there seemed to be little he could do to force Will to see things differently. Halt felt no shame for the boy. Found no fault in him. Only pride. Pride in his courage. Pride in h