Chapter Text
Part One – The Beginning of the Path
It was early December. Late autumn blended into early winter. Damp leaves lay beneath a thin layer of first snow, pressed into the ground and locked in a delicate frost.
In the forest, on a small clearing, stood a modest wooden cabin. Still wrapped in darkness, it looked like little more than a shadow among the trees. Smoke rose lazily from the chimney, its curls dissolving into the clouds above. All around stretched that ordinary quiet—the kind that settles when the forest is only just waking from sleep, preparing for a new day.
In one of the rooms, a calm, steady breath could be heard, broken now and then by a single, soft snore.
Will turned onto his other side, smiling faintly in his sleep. The bed creaked quietly, and a moment later everything sank back into drowsy stillness. The blanket wrapped him in feathers and pleasant warmth, like a shield holding him in the world of dreams, guarding him so reality wouldn’t break in too soon.
Then reality knocked on the door of his room.
“Boy. You should have been on your feet a long time ago.”
Will grumbled in displeasure. Instinctively, he pulled the blanket up over his head, protecting what remained of his sleepy harmony.
Halt, however, was still waiting behind the door—unmoved and unyielding. Hearing no sign of the boy getting up, he added warningly, as was his habit:
“I’d rather not have to call you a second time.”
His footsteps faded into the kitchen, leaving behind the bitter taste of morning.
Will wrinkled his nose and sighed, throwing the bedding off himself. He flinched slightly as the warmth vanished.
Even though nearly three months had passed since he’d become the ranger’s apprentice, he still couldn’t get used to the early wake-ups his master imposed on him.
“Criminals are definitely still asleep,” he muttered to himself and tossed the blanket into the air; a moment later it fell back down, spreading evenly across the mattress.
He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and let his gaze wander sluggishly around the room. Oh. Yesterday, after a hard training session, he’d tossed his clothes onto the chair rather carelessly. One pant leg lay on the floor. His boots were discarded haphazardly, as if pulled off mid-stride—which was exactly what had happened. His shirt was twisted into some irregular bundle. Good thing Halt hadn’t come in, or he’d have gotten a morning lecture about keeping things tidy.
He gathered his clothes and dressed quickly. Then he glanced down critically and, with a long sweep of his hand supported by sheer force of will, tried to smooth out the wrinkled shirt.
“Uh… he won’t notice,” he thought when the fabric refused to cooperate.
He stepped out of the bedroom with a confident stride, and almost immediately the smell of frying eggs reached his nose.
“Good morning,” he said cheerfully.
Halt slowly lifted his gaze from the hearth to look at him.
“Morning started some time ago,” he stated dryly.
The boy glanced out the window.
“It’s still dark,” he observed lightly.
The older ranger moved the pan, and the smell grew even richer.
“That’s because it’s winter,” he explained in an obvious tone. “So the sun rises later.”
“If it can, then so can we,” Will announced plainly, as if he were explaining something self-evident that everyone ought to know.
Halt looked at him for a moment.
A moment longer.
As though he needed to make sure he’d heard that correctly.
Finally, he shook his head, pulling himself out of the trance his apprentice’s statement had thrown him into.
“That’s not how this works.”
“Why not?” the boy tilted his head slightly.
“Rangers always get up early,” Halt explained. “Regardless of the season.”
“But—” Will waved a hand through the air, as if weighing some philosophical truth of life, “—when it’s dark, you can’t see anything anyway.”
Halt froze with the wooden spoon in his hand, needing a moment to consider whether he himself had definitely woken up.
“That’s not—” he cleared his throat. “Set the cutlery on the table.”
The youth obeyed without argument. Then he sat down at the table, scooting himself almost all the way under its edge. He folded his hands in front of him and watched every one of Halt’s movements.
Halt slid the eggs off the pan. In the meantime, the water for the coffee had already come to a boil, bubbling softly.
“Want help?” Will asked, watching as his mentor swiftly transferred the eggs onto a plate while his other hand was already reaching for the mugs.
“Sit,” came the reply.
The boy sighed and rested his chin in his hand. He waited. And watched. Just like every day. Halt liked to do things himself.
With practiced ease, the man divided the food and poured hot water into the coffee from the kettle hanging over the hearth. His movements were efficient, learned—befitting someone who had repeated the same routine every day for many years.
“Enjoy your meal,” he said when the man set everything down on the table. The ranger merely grunted something in reply.
They ate in silence—just like always. At the beginning of his stay here, Will had still tried to talk, but he’d quickly realized it was like speaking to a wall, one his mentor effectively hid behind. A meal was a meal. Not a conversation.
“So what are we doing today?” he asked at last, when Halt took a sip of the coffee waiting on the table.
The older ranger was silent for a moment, staring straight ahead. He’d heard him. Will knew that. He’d learned it on the very first day of his training.
“Sir Halt… what will you teach me first, sir?”
Halt didn’t answer right away. So Will asked again:
“What training are we starting with?”
Silence. The ranger didn’t even lift his gaze. Will frowned. He’d already drawn in a breath and—
“Boy, I heard you the first time.”
Will snapped his mouth shut with an audible click.
“But you didn’t answer,” he pointed out quietly.
Only then did Halt look at him—slowly.
“Because I’m not obligated to.”
Will instinctively tightened his grip around his mug. The first days of training had been strange. It wasn’t bad, exactly—the older man provided food and a roof over his head. And a promising future within the ranks of the Royal Ranger Corps.
But on the other hand—there was Halt. Just that. He was Halt. Will had the impression that every day looked exactly the same, like a learned routine. Wake up, eat, train, a few grunts, then sleep. He’d hoped that leaving the orphanage would mean less loneliness—and it had been quite the opposite.
He sighed quietly and took a sip of his coffee. He grimaced slightly—it was too bitter. His mentor sweetened his with a single spoonful of honey. Will had asked more than once for two spoonfuls. Halt never remembered. Or didn’t want to remember.
“I need to go to the market,” the ranger said at last. Will straightened immediately.
“Can I go with you?”
Halt lifted his gaze to him—slowly, without a trace of the enthusiasm Will was practically radiating.
“No.” The answer came quietly, but as firm as a hammer strike. “I’ll do the shopping. You’ll focus on studying the maps.”
The boy almost physically sagged in his chair.
“That’s so boring…” he sighed.
“But necessary, if you want to become a ranger.”
Will already had his mouth open, ready for further argument, but he knew it wouldn’t bring any results. And would most likely only earn him additional duties. There was no arguing with Halt.
“But someday…” he began uncertainly. “We’ll go together?”
Halt set his mug down a little harder, as if trying to drive his words into his apprentice’s head.
“Will,” he said in a low, weary tone. “You’re here to learn. Not to go shopping with me.”
Will quickly took a sip of his coffee, just to occupy himself with something. He didn’t even feel its unpleasant bitterness anymore—something else had settled over him instead.
***
The late morning dragged on unbearably. Will sat at the table, drawing a map based on the terrain Halt had given him. He didn’t like it. He always got lost trying to read the legend. He couldn’t properly transfer trails and roads. A path too narrow here. A river there. And here again—a hill instead of a gentle rise. Once, he’d led a unit of imaginary knights to a bakery. A full day’s march out of the way. Well. Before fighting the enemy, one ought to eat properly. Halt, however, had held a different opinion.
It frustrated him. He had to lock the maps inside his head so that one day he could lead a unit at a moment’s notice, find the right route, or simply not get lost himself. The older ranger repeated it often: This isn’t learning the names of rivers and cities. It’s memorizing spatial relationships. And a ranger needed that just as much as sharpened arrows.
“Maybe when I run into an enemy, I’ll just choke him with these maps,” he muttered to himself, flipping through the stack of pages.
He was fifteen. To him, sitting over any kind of papers was the same as wasted time. He wanted to act. To shoot a bow, track, learn silent movement—maybe take part in some mission. In short, do what rangers did. But his mentor preferred theory.
Eventually, tired and irritated, he set the quill down. Too quickly—a small blot of ink spilled across the paper, forming a dark blue puddle.
Will snorted to himself.
“Well. There we go. A new pond.”
He didn’t worry about it much. The map was probably poorly made anyway. It always was.
He rubbed his stiff neck, stretching his head from side to side. A pleasant warmth filled the room—almost soporific. The wood crackled in the fireplace, as if the sound itself were encouraging him to take a longer break.
He glanced out the window to give his tired mind a moment’s rest. The sun was already nearing noon. Bare tree branches swayed gently in the wind.
He rested his hand against his chin. It always looked the same. Halt left—he stayed behind alone.
He began tapping his foot against the table leg, keeping a steady rhythm, counting seconds. Only he didn’t know toward what.
Tap. Tap.
The cabin was filled with calm. But not the soothing kind associated with a hearth and safety. This calm was exhausting. As if it had settled into every corner, draining the will to act.
With nothing more interesting to do, he looked at the bookshelf against the opposite wall. He skimmed the titles with a passing glance. From this distance he couldn’t read them, but still he recited them silently, one by one—he knew them all by heart.
Then his gaze settled on the small side table nearby. He imagined what might stand there instead of that old, awful bowl with a chipped edge that occupied it now.
His eyes wandered across the floor, as if there might be anything interesting there. Then, for a change, he stared at the ceiling, scanning it inch by inch.
Tap. Tap.
He wished he could go with Halt to the market. Or anywhere where something—anything—was happening.
Tap. Tap.
At last, he looked back toward the window. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught some movement on the railing. He noticed a small titmouse. The little bird was searching for something, pecking through the snow. Its yellow belly stood out against the white, and its blue head bobbed up and down in a comical motion as it kept checking its surroundings.
Without thinking for long, Will pushed his chair back and walked over to the cupboard. He took out a slice of bread wrapped in a cloth—Halt was going to buy more anyway.
He threw his coat over his shoulders, and when he opened the front door, a wave of cold flooded the cabin. He shut it quickly so as not to let the room chill, then began tearing the bread into smaller pieces. He frowned, focusing on the task as if he were preparing rations for an entire garrison.
The little bird watched him with interest, tilting its tiny head.
“You already know what I’ve got planned for you,” the boy smiled, lifting his gaze to the titmouse.
A cheerful chirping answered him. With the crumbs in his hand, Will placed them on the wooden beam so the little bird could take them on its own.
The titmouse happily began pecking at the offered meal, swallowing crumb after crumb in quick succession.
Will smiled, pleased with his small gesture, and had already started to turn back inside when suddenly—
SLIP. THUD.
He skidded on the frost-covered wood and, with a grace worthy of a sack of potatoes, landed hard on the porch.
“Damn it,” he muttered under his breath as he realized what had happened.
Before he could get up, he heard footsteps crunching in the snow—and right after them, a familiar voice.
“I’ve never seen anyone study maps while lying on the ground.”
Will lifted his head. Halt was looking down at him, one hand resting pointedly on his hip. In the other, he held a wicker basket filled with groceries.
“I was just—”
“You decided to connect with nature, so you’d remember every detail better?”
Heat rushed to the boy’s face as a blush spread across his cheeks. Under different circumstances, he might have taken it as a joke. But Halt’s official tone made every misstep feel ten times worse.
“I wanted to feed a bird.”
“What bird?”
“A titmouse,” Will said, pointing at the railing, where at the moment there was nothing but snow and a handful of bread. “Which… was here just a moment ago.”
“Mhm,” the older ranger hummed, climbing the steps. “Get up.”
Will obediently rose to his feet. He brushed the snow off himself, and when his mentor passed him without a word, he spread his hands slightly to the sides, as if to say: Yes, I’m fine. Don’t worry.
By the time he stepped inside, Halt was already unpacking the groceries. Fresh bread. Vegetables. There was even wine. Will frowned. There was an unusually large amount of it all.
“Are we expecting someone?” he asked.
Halt paused, fixing him with a look.
“Yes. Titmice, pigeons, and an entire flock of sparrows.”
“But birds don’t drink wine,” Will noted, ignoring the irony in the man’s voice.
Halt clicked his tongue and didn’t pursue the subject. He finished unpacking, putting everything in its place.
“Is the map finished?” he tossed over his shoulder.
Will answered with a strange sound somewhere between a groan and a breath pushed through his nose. The older ranger raised an eyebrow.
“Just show it to me.”
The boy handed his master the sheet of parchment—crumpled and smeared with ink. It looked as though someone had decided to pour all their frustration onto it.
“What’s this?”
“A map,” the boy announced proudly, as if hoping that a confident tone might save his work, if only a little. Even something worthless could sometimes be turned into gold—at least in his head.
But not with Halt. The man merely frowned.
“A map,” he repeated slowly.
He turned the sheet a few more times, unable to decide from which angle to look at it. Finally, he sighed and set the parchment back down on the table.
“Make a new one.”
“But—”
“Will,” he interrupted firmly. “This isn’t a matter of whether you want to. A ranger—”
“—has to be able to find his way in the field,” the boy finished for him, quoting the rule. “Yes. I know.”
“Then sit down and do it properly this time.”
With a heavy sigh, the boy took his place at the table. He prepared a fresh sheet, took the quill in hand, and once again began transferring the information from the original map.
For a moment, Halt watched him in silence. When he was satisfied that the boy was actually working, he turned to preparing lunch.
Will reacted immediately when he heard the familiar sound of a knife slicing through vegetables.
“Can I help?”
“I can handle it.”
“But I could—”
“Will. I cook. You study.” There was something in the ranger’s tone that left no room for discussion.
“Fine,” the apprentice sighed, bending over the table once more.
The sound of the knife striking the cutting board echoed through the room—steady, measured. Decisive. Just like the man holding it.
When he finished, Halt lingered for a moment, looking a little longer at his hands. Then he glanced at the boy at the table—hunched over, carefully transferring the terrain onto the page. Still unaware.
His gaze flicked to the wine he’d bought, now standing unobtrusively in the corner.
“Tomorrow,” he thought to himself.