Chapter Text
Pauline looked in despair at her surroundings. The last thing she remembered had been on the road to her next diplomatic assignment in Farroway. She’d never made it. Her company had been ambushed on the road, and she had been extremely troubled to see another woman who could have been her twin, wearing the same courier dress she wore.
And now she was being held in this dark room which offered her no means of escape. Although she was a courier, and was trained as such in self-defense, she wished—not for the first time—that she possessed the same tactical knowledge as the rangers.
However, she had picked up quite a few tricks from being around Halt and Crowley. It was because of this that she had been able to subtly tense her wrists as they had been bound, and had just managed to work them free.
She glanced downwards, rubbing her fingers over the chafe marks left by the rope. It was much better than having them stay bound.
Her captors, in some seeming act of mercy, had left her with a chair, and she now sat down, thinking. She had already examined the walls and the door. There were no cracks, and they were smart enough not to place the hinges on the inside, so it all seemed to be a dead end.
Anything you’re given can be used to your advantage , she thought. That had been one of the earliest lessons she’d learned when training to be a Courier. Whether it be in the form of a statement, words, or material, there were always options.
She looked down at the chair, a grim smile playing about her lips. Oh, she would make full use of what they’d given her.
About an hour later, she heard footsteps. Time to find out if this works , she decided.
She stood by the door, her back flat against the wall, hands gripping her makeshift club tightly, and waited. While sitting in the chair earlier, she’d noticed a slightly protruding nail in the backing. She had removed the nail ( with much effort , she added mentally, looking at her raw fingers), and had then detached a large piece of wood acting as the support for the back. Once this was done, she’d braced the nail into the wall and had driven it into the edge of the club, giving herself a brutally efficient makeshift weapon.
She had stared at it for a good long while, wondering if, when the time came, she’d be able to use it in a deadly manner. She’d never taken a life before and she didn’t want to start now. But then she had closed her eyes, and relived with horrible clarity the violent deaths of her escorts, systematically cut down as they tried to protect her. The attackers hadn’t harmed her, but she’d been blindfolded and led to this place. She reflexively rubbed her upper arm, her skin still stained with the blood of one of the men who’d ridden with her, killed with a sword thrust though the heart.
When she opened her eyes, there was a fire present in them which hadn’t been there before, and she made up her mind. She would do whatever it took to get justice.
The door creaked, shuddered, and swung open, bringing her back to the present. She took a silent deep breath, needing to steady herself but not wishing to alert her captors.
A man appeared in the doorway, carrying a tray of food and a glass of water.
Pauline felt her spirits lift slightly—both of his hands were already occupied, leaving him more easily at her disposal as he stepped into the room, looking about for her. His eyes grew wide as he caught sight of her brandishing her club.
Swiftly, she pushed off the wall, using the force to pivot and swing the club into the back of his neck. Her stomach turned at the horrible meaty thud the nail made as it was thrust in, but she held steady. Slowly, as if in shock, the man stared at her and sank to his knees. Then, just as quickly, he slumped to the floor and the light left his eyes.
Pauline froze and stared at the motionless corpse for a moment, and her fingers loosened in her moment of shock, causing her impromptu weapon to clatter to the ground. She flinched as it bounced, once, twice, and a third time.
Blinking hard, she forced herself into motion. The door was open and escape was now a real possibility. A quick moment of thought brought back the turns she’d managed to vaguely catalogue on her way in, even though she had been blindfolded.
She leaned down to pick up her weapon again, the wood solid in her grasp. Then, she turned towards the door and ran. If she was caught, there was no chance she’d be left with an opportunity like that again. She knew with perfect clarity that her situation was dire, and she’d been captured and her escort murdered for a reason.
A reason she didn’t intend to stay and figure out. She flew past pairs of torches on the wall, only passing long enough to grab one of the flaming braziers. It would make another useful weapon should she need to use it.
Loose stones clattered underfoot as she fled, and she cursed (in a very dignified manner, of course) as she realized that the ground was transitioning to dirt. She had to be underground.
But she remembered that from the way in. She had walked down a flight of stairs, then she’d gone up again. Just up ahead would be a right turn, and then—
She stopped short.
Up ahead wasn’t a right turn. There were five. All of them were corridors opening right and she had no idea which one it was.
Panic began to solidify amid the adrenaline in her veins. Which one was it? Frantically, she tried to remember how sharply she’d turned on her way in.
A shout echoed through the hall, making her head whip around. The torchlight in her hand caused eerie shadows to flit behind her and she knew her time was running short. They had to have found the empty cell and body by now.
Throwing all caution to the winds, she randomly chose the fourth hallway, hoping against desperate hope that it would prove to be the right one.
She ran as fast as she could, knowing that, due to the loose dirt floors, her footprints would instantly reveal which ever path she took. Speed was her only choice.
A sudden twist in the tunnel had her skidding into the opposite wall, hands thrown out instinctively to preserve momentum. Unfortunately, she automatically released her makeshift weapons to brace herself against the impact. Frantic, she picked up the club but had no time to grab the torch as well. The thudding footsteps behind her grew closer with every pounding beat of her heart echoing in her ears.
The path took her to a hallway lined with doors. Shouts echoed from one of them, and she froze, her feet resting against the gravel. She had long since torn off her light and impractical courier sandals.
The noise continued, and she felt her mind come to a full stop as she more fully comprehended the sound.
It was screams. Her breath grew fast, pure disbelief and fear rooting their coils deep inside the growing pit of her stomach.
She knew that voice—the voice that was now in such tangible agony.
Thoughts of her own safety forgotten, she quickly located the room from which the noise came and dashed towards it.
There, as she threw open the door, was Will. She didn’t know how he came to be here, but she knew that the young apprentice had become like a son to Halt, and by extent, she had also come to know the young man quite well and had developed a maternal sense towards him.
Her mouth ran dry as she took in the sight of him. He was thrashing against the table to which he was tied, yelling in pain at seemingly nothing.
She rushed in, desperate to help him. As soon as she reached his side, she laid a hand on his head, intending to alert him to her presence.
“Will,” she breathed, searching his face for any sign of recognition. “Will, it’s me.”
Whatever she expected, it hadn’t been for Will to violently flinch away from her touch, his eyes flying wide open and a wordless cry of fear leaving him.
Quickly though, his eyes focused and he saw her. Such pure, unabashed relief crossed his face that it broke Pauline’s heart, though it was followed closely by utter devastation.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he rasped, trembling and in obvious pain.
Pauline ignored him and began to work on loosening his bonds as quickly as she could. “Where are you hurt?” she asked, almost afraid of the answer. There were no visible injuries, nothing that would cause such pain.
Will slumped back, complete exhaustion lining his features. “My head, and everywhere else too… I don’t know why.” His brows furrowed as another tremor shook through him. Pauline gripped his hand tightly, still frantically working the ropes. “Powder,” he eventually managed to say. “They gave me this powder…” he trailed off, unable to continue.
She shushed him. “It’s going to be okay, I’ll untie you and then we’ll both get out of here.” Pauline felt rage beginning to overcome the worry. Will had done nothing wrong, and she knew that, should circumstances come to it, she’d have no problem using her club on each and every person who had taken part in this.
She had just managed to loosen the rope around one of his hands when the men burst into the small room. Pauline kept working, but her progress was abruptly halted when a hand roughly grabbed her arm and yanked her away. She let out a small cry of pain.
Will looked up at that, taking in the sight of the intruders.
“No!” He yelled, his voice breaking and colored with panic. “Let her go!” He attempted to lunge forward, one of his hands freed from the ropes.
The guards ignored him, and roughly wrenched Pauline’s arms behind her back and tying her wrists together. When she resisted, thrashing and kicking, another stepped in and grabbed her by the hair, forcing her head back into a posture of submission.
Will watched in horror as Pauline struggled. He tried to release his other arm, but the pain, exhaustion, and lingering effects of whatever they’d given him made it impossible to properly control his limbs.
He flinched as Pauline crumpled to the floor, a guard finally bringing her down by roughly kicking the back of her knee. Will could begin his mind beginning to break. Pauline wasn’t supposed to be here. She wasn’t supposed to be a prisoner. A terrible thought struck him. What if they were doing the same thing to her as they were doing to him??
He let out a half sob, watching the usually composed diplomat thrash about as she tried to break free.
Pauline fought frantically, arms and legs flinging out to provide her with any chance to loosen their grip on her. She had to help Will—the poor boy was trying to escape his own bonds, though his attempts were feeble and visibly disoriented.
A lance of shattering failure shot through her heart as she realized that no matter how hard she fought, she wouldn’t be able to escape with him at this point. Still, she refused to give up entirely, and still she struggled to escape their grasp.
Finally though, one of them managed to land a heavy blow to her chest, and she felt it as the air was driven out of her lungs with startling force. Stars appeared in her vision as she was forced backwards. The muscles in her chest spasmed in protest, and she found that she couldn’t wrest them back into control long enough to draw a breath.
Will saw all of this happen, helpless to do anything but watch as the woman who’d treated him with such boundless kindness and respect sank to the ground, still clawing weakly at the guards. He watched, yelling and screaming at them to let her to go, to stop hurting her, to “LET HER GO!!”.
Pauline couldn’t breathe. Her chest felt like an iron band was wrapped around her lungs, squeezing and pulsing and forcing out all the air. Managing to wrest her head around long enough to look back at the men standing over her, she registered that one of them was holding her down with a knee to the back, hence the lack of air. Still fighting, she dimly registered Will’s voice screaming at her to get up. It sounded as though it was coming from a great distance. The world around her swirled and blurred. There’s something , she thought, as even her ability to rationalize faded away to nothing, there’s someone I need to…
Will looked on in horror as Pauline stopped fighting and went limp. Her eyes were closed, and he couldn’t seem to make his vision focus long enough to detect any sort of rise and fall in her chest. Despair sank down into him as he considered with horrible realism the events that had just transpired.
Pauline could be dead, and it was all his fault.
- 0 -
The sun was setting as Halt poured two cups of coffee. He added a bit of honey to both and opened the door to outside, searching for Will. Since his apprentice was in the middle of stealth training, he didn’t expect to see the boy right away. He kept looking, sensing every movement. It was odd--usually he could spot Will fairly soon as he was still in training after all, while Halt was a fully trained ranger. His heart started to beat just a little faster, when after several minutes of searching, he had found no sign of Will. That’s when he noticed another sound, a scraping of some sort. He searched around till he found the source, spotting Tug. The horse was very agitated--something was wrong.
Instinctively trusting the little ranger horse, Halt began to feel a small pit of worry open up. He hurried back inside to gather his weapons. Though he was sure that there would be nothing wrong, it was better to be safe than sorry. Strapping his quiver onto his side, he gathered up his knives and slid them into the sheathes he always wore. Lastly, he strung his deadly longbow.
Internally he shrugged. If Will was perfectly fine, at least he could teach him a lesson about staying hidden while also remaining aware and on the lookout for pursuers.
After he had properly prepared, he went outside to mount Abelard. Tug led the way, taking him into the forest. The more they rode, the more that pit of worry inside Halt grew. He knew Will could handle himself, but he was still an apprentice. If he was caught off guard by someone skilled enough, there's no telling what could have happened. These thoughts filled his head, until at last Tug came to a stop at a stream. Halt, searching every bit of the area around him, focused his gaze on a red liquid. It was hard to make out the shape in the growing dusk, but his trained eye saw it. This alone might not have been a sign to worry, as an animal could have injured itself, but his heart began to race as he saw a broken arrow caught on some foliage a little ways down the stream.
At this sign of irrefutable evidence, Halt closed his eyes briefly. There was now no way he could simply write off his concerns as unnecessary worry. He thought back to when he had told Will to do the stealth exercise. He hadn’t noticed anything out of place—no strange tracks around the area Will was going to be in. Then again, nobody ever dared get into strange business around a Ranger’s cabin. And for good reason.
After this brief moment of internal thought, Halt opened his eyes again. He would certainly teach whoever it was that there was good reason why nobody messed with the Ranger Corps, especially the apprentices. To do so was to invite countless adversaries bent on your demise. Halt’s eyebrows furrowed, both in concern for Will and the implications of a mug larger plot at hand. Will, even as an apprentice, was still a force to be reckoned with. For someone to take him like this, while he was so close to the cabin...... he banished the thought from his mind.
Halt would send a pigeon to Crowley and then to Gilan and inform them of the situation, but for now he had to follow he trail if he wanted any chance of finding Will.
Keeping his mind focused, he followed the stream for awhile, hoping to find something that would help him get back on his pursuit. After awhile, he stopped dead in his tracks. Laying against the rocks, was a bow, Will’s bow. He quickly ran to retrieve it, also seeing patches of a mottled green fabric stained red. The fear for his apprentice grew, what if Will had been shot? What if...No, he couldn’t afford to think this way, he had to keep a clear head.
But the amount of blood on the forest floor.... it would be devastating for a grown man, let alone his young apprentice. Tendrils of fear crept around his mind, solidifying and taking hold as endless possibilities flew through him. Unwittingly, he couldn't stop picturing Will, his eyes glazed as he stared unseeing, injured and bleeding.
A shuddering breath took hold of his chest. Halt hadn’t even noticed that he’d let his mental ramblings go on too long. A string of curses escaped his lips as he realized just how grave the situation really was. But he was letting the trail go cold. Every second he lingered, Will could be farther away than before.
Swiftly, the grizzled ranger knelt down to the ground on one knee. After only a brief hesitation, he let his fingers touch the ominous puddle of blood spilled over the leaves. The feel of the slimy substance felt so inexplicably wrong. Yet Halt mentally distanced himself from his emotions and forced himself to observe.
By the stage of congealment, it was less than an hour old. A further examination of the immediate area revealed two sets of footprints—Will’s and another man’s, though the second set showed signs of concealment. So the adversary was trained in the tracking arts. But nothing escaped a ranger. Broken stalks and branches told a silent tale of a struggle between the two. Scattered leaves then showed that Will had collapsed on the ground and was left for a few minutes—to account for the amount of blood on the ground. Likely, this was when the man had tried to conceal his tracks. From there, Halt could tell that Will had been picked up. And by the absence of blood droplets around the faint footprints leading away, the man had at least patched Will up to stop the bleeding.
Halt felt some relief course through him, easing slightly the fear now rooted deep inside. If Will was dead, there would be no reason to carry him away and bind his wounds. And clinging to this small piece of hope, he set about following the trail, anger coursing fiercely through his heart at whoever would dare to hurt his Will.
On horseback Halt had the advantage of speed and stamina. While the attacker had to carry an injured boy, Halt had all the stamina and ability of a ranger’s horse. With this newfound advantage, Halt’s determination rose. But other thoughts crept into his mind. What if the man hadn’t been working alone and later met up with a partner? What if he had a getaway planned? Taking a rangers apprentice was no easy task, and he had to know he would be pursued quickly. He also had the training and stealth to get a shot off on Will...a thought Halt shuddered to think about. He had to keep focused, worrying about Will’s health was something he could do when he found him. Each second he stood thinking was just a little longer his apprentice was in the clutches of his kidnappers.
Eventually Halt broke out of the woods, into open fields. He desperately looked around, hoping to find a glance of someone. It seemed hopeless for a moment, then he saw him. A man hurrying through the long grass, definitely carrying something large, Halt drew his bow and urged Abelard forward, quickly gaining ground on the man. He soon was in shooting range, but realized soon he couldn’t shoot for worry of hurting Will, so he drew his knife and hopped off Abelard, tackling the man. Scrambling to knock out the kidnapper, he quickly achieved this goal. He quickly turned to tend to Will, but then realized something was wrong.
It wasn’t Will, it was a stuffed dummy wearing the cloak of his apprentice...he had been fooled. He let out several curses in frustration and anger both at him and the real kidnapper. While he had underestimated the man, he had followed the obvious trail and wasted too much precious time, his apprentice would be hours away by now. But not all Hope was lost, he now had someone to interrogate.
Soon Halt found himself back at the cabin, and getting off Abelard he tied up the man to a nearby tree. Carefully securing the knots, he grabbed a chair from near the front door and sat down facing the man, a cold look on his face.
“What’s your name?” Asked Halt, his question was met with silence. “Alright I really don’t care about your name, where’s my apprentice?”
More silence. Halt drew his knife, and with no hint of a joking tone, looked at the man with a glare.
“You kidnapped my apprentice and shot him." He leaned in close, letting the malice bleed through his gaze. "And now I’m going to do worse to you if you keep up this silent act.”
The man remained silent, but couldn’t hide the fear in his eyes. He was trained and would die for his cause, but he had heard the great stories of the ranger Halt and knew he didn't make false promises.
The man quailed under Halt’s glare, squirming in fear and discomfort at the tight bonds, knowing there was no easy way out of this for him. He wriggled his hands and attempted to wrest them free of the ropes, but to no avail. The only thing he accomplished was to aggravate the sores on his wrists. When he finally admitted defeat, he turned his gaze to the experienced Ranger sitting calmly in front of him. He had known when he was assigned this mission that he would be dealing with Halt, which was why he was also provided other means of escaping. And a nervous glance at the knife in Halt’s hands made his choice quite easy. And so he closed his eyes and, for the first time, spoke.
“Death to the Ranger Corps.”
And then he knew no more.
Halt felt his blood drain away as he looked on in absolute disbelief at he man in front of him. He hadn’t known what to expect from the interrogation, but it certainly wasn’t this. Just a few seconds ago, the man had uttered a blood chilling statement, and the next he simply convulsed and went still.
“No. No no NO!”
Halt stood up and threw his chair at a nearby tree. Dimly, he registered the resulting crash as it shattered against the unyielding wood. He had heard of such poisons being given to members of high-secrecy missions. This ran deeper than he thought.
For the first time, Halt felt true despair coiling in his soul. He gingerly opened the dead man’s mouth and saw what he was looking for. A tiny capsule embedded in a tooth.
He was out of options. Any trail had either long gone cold or was indiscernible even to him. His only lead was dead, and he now knew he was dealing with something much larger than he had previously thought. And his apprentice was still missing.
Feeling dangerously close to breaking his façade again, Halt stumbled numbly inside and began to compose a message to Crowley and Gilan.