A/N: Here's the last chapter! I hope it proves enjoyable. Thanks for reading!

Guest: Thanks! X)

TrustTheCloak: I'm glad you didn't think it was too action-y; I was actually quite worried about that. Poor grumpy Halt, he is pretty soft-hearted deep down, isn't he XD But that's just one of the many reasons he's so loved. I'm always sad when stories end too XD Thanks so much for your kind words and your review! It totally made my day!

Jammeke: Aww thanks :3 Yeah, now that you mention it fire usually do spell disaster in one form or another in RA (poor, poor Alyss ;-; ). Halt and Gilan have some of my favorite dynamics so I love to write and read about them. Thanks so much for the review, I really appreciate it!

Chapter 3

It was nearly midnight before things settled again. By then the bandits had been taken into custody. Everyone who had been injured in the robbery had been seen to by the healers and, in some cases, given a place to stay. The fire was under control, down to smoldering embers, and no other buildings were at risk of burning. The village had quieted down and Halt and Gilan were finally able to head back to the little cabin in the woods. In the morning they would have to meet with the Baron to decide what was to be done about the bandits and to help deal with the fallout from everything. But, for the moment, Halt was grateful to head back and get some rest. He was keenly aware that both he and Gilan needed it.

They had both been patched up, but would both benefit from some time to heal. Gilan was a little bruised, singed, and had suffered several minor burns. Halt's left hand and right arm had been burned too. Both master and apprentice were still coughing intermittently from the smoke of the fire.

As soon as they reached the cabin and settled Abelard in for the night, they sat opposite each other around Halt's table, nursing cups of coffee. A heavy silence descended between them, both seemingly content to sip at their drink and listen to the weight of their thoughts. Halt was staring sightlessly at a knot in the table when he was shaken out of his thoughts by Gilan moving suddenly. He'd sat up straighter as if suddenly remembering something.

"…Halt?" he began questioningly.

Halt glanced up curiously at him, too tired to voice one of his usual sarcastic rejoinders.

Gilan fidgeted a little. "Remember how you gave me permission to go souling on the condition that I give you half of everything I got while I was out?"

"Yes," Halt nodded. "That is, in fact, what I told you."

Gilan's shoulders slumped in something like resignation. "I'm sorry, Halt, I lost all the pastries I got in the fire."

Halt was unsurprised. "I'd noticed you didn't have any. But I just assumed it was because you'd decided to offer songs instead of poetry."

Gilan offered his mentor an indignant look. "My singing's not that bad," he said, a little defensively.

Halt only raised an eyebrow.

Gilan flushed before shooting Halt a viper smile. "I'll prove it; how about I give you a little sample."

"No!" Halt said. "No samples."

Gilan subsided, but the smile on his face and the bright flash in his eyes told Halt he wasn't about to forget the idea anytime soon. Gradually though, his smile faded into something more wistful and disappointed.

"I was looking forward to them, you know," he admitted a touch sadly. "I was actually looking forward to a lot of things tonight," he added ruefully, rubbing at the back of his head.

At his words, Halt glanced at all the preparations he'd been in the middle of: his half-finished lanterns, the sweetbread that had been set to cool, and the other ingredients he'd taken out but not had the chance to prepare. He realized then with mild surprise that, just perhaps, he might have been looking forward to some things too.

Maybe it wasn't entirely too late. Halt rose to his feet to fetch the pastry that had probably long since cooled in its perch in the window.

"Gilan," Halt began and then trailed. "Just… here," he said finally, shoving the sweetbread cake he'd cooked earlier in the day unceremoniously towards his apprentice along with two plates and some cutlery.

"What's this?" Gilan asked curiously.

"You wanted a Hibernian custom—well, here's one." Halt grunted out in reply.

Gilan's tired face lit up as Halt passed him a slice of the pastry and then cut a piece for himself.

"What is it called?" Gilan asked wonderingly, his excitement almost contagious.

"bairín breac, or barmbrack, they're a traditional Summer's End desert," Halt replied before moving to light the one turnip lantern he had managed to finish.

"It's good," Gilan pronounced happily after having tried a bite. He glanced around and then pointed to the turnip lantern with his fork. "Is that a Hibernian custom too?"

Halt nodded. "They're supposed to ward off evil spirits," he said, then turned a withering look on his student. "But it's obvious they don't work all that well."

Gilan seemed to find that terribly funny for some reason Halt couldn't completely fathom. But, then again, Gilan seemed to find most things amusing one way or the other. Hearing his student laugh after the harrowing terror they both gone through, after nearly losing him to the fire was more warming than Halt was willing to admit, let alone acknowledge. He was surprised when he felt the very faint trace of a mirroring smile on his own face despite himself. This night could well have ended much differently. Halt briefly closed his eyes before shaking his head to dispel the thought as much as the image. He realized then for the first time that somehow, without his even being aware of it, he had grown… used to having Gilan around.

"What's this?" Gilan asked suddenly when his fork struck something solid in the cake. Without waiting for an answer, he bent over his plate to pull the offending object out. Unwrapping it, he pulled out a twig.

"Um, Halt… why is there a stick in the cake?"

"Bad luck, Gilan."

"Bad luck you put twigs in the cake?" Gilan asked, puzzled.

"No," Halt shook his head. "Bad luck in general. Getting a twig means your whole upcoming year is going to be filled with misfortune."

Gilan frowned momentarily at the offending object before looking up at Halt, eyes sparkling as sharply as his smile. "What kind of tradition is that? I mean, you could just avoid the bad luck entirely by not putting any twigs in the cake in the first place—then nobody would get it."

Funny thing was that Halt distinctly remembered asking that very question himself when he was younger. His parents and younger brother hadn't much appreciated his asking: seeing it as a mere disruptive challenge to tradition for the purpose of breaking the joy of the moment. The extremely patient, and almost forcefully tolerant, answer he had received had been that the bad luck is inevitable and the twig just divined out whomever fate dictated was going to bear the lion's share of it that year. But Halt discarded that answer in favor of another entirely.

"Where would be the fun in that?" he asked his apprentice wolfishly.

Gilan's nose crinkled indignantly at that answer but he didn't miss a beat, his smile never once faltering. "With me, because I'd not be having any bad luck," he challenged.

Halt dismissed that as unimportant. "I don't see how that's relevant. Besides, it gives me an excuse to give you more chores," he said, the words made sage by his blank expression.

"You did this on purpose, didn't you? I bet you put twigs in all the pieces!"

Halt, who had been calmly making his way through his own piece during their conversation, paused to pull out his small cloth-wrapped bundle from the pastry as soon as his fork struck. He unwrapped it to reveal a coin.

"See this?" he asked, blank-faced. "This means that I'm going to have a very fortunate year."

"That isn't fair," Gilan protested under his breath with a sad shake of his head.

"Life isn't fair," Halt said knowingly, before taking another bite.

"Then I suppose you won't mind me blaming you for all of my misfortune this year. After all, it would be your fault for cursing me with the twig."

"Do as you please," Halt shot back, "but that won't stop it from happening… or me from enjoying it."

Gilan laughed. "Now I know you did it on purpose. I bet you memorized what was in every piece. I want another one!" he reached toward the Barmbrack.

Halt pulled it quickly away. "One piece is more than enough. Sweets are unhealthy, you know."

"So is misfortune!" Gilan pointed out.

And, though he did have a fairly good point, Halt refused to acknowledge it. It kept things more interesting that way. The two of them lapsed into a comfortable silence after that, lulled by exhaustion and the quiet evening. Halt looked out at the tiny pinpoint light of the turnip lantern, then at the Barmbrack, and then finally to his singed and exhausted apprentice: an apprentice who was still smiling and happy anyway—perfectly content, curious, and excited to share in these few broken remnants of old tradition Halt had managed to pull together. Halt couldn't quite quell the sudden sense of contentment, connection, the simple joy inherent in family, shared tradition and belonging. He sat back with a sigh, content to just be in this moment. It was enough.

~x~X~x~

Epilogue

~x~X~x~

It was about two weeks later when things had finally settled back into normality again. The tavern and Ambrose's house were being rebuilt, and the village was recovering. Halt and Gilan's burns were mending well, and they'd begun to settle back into the familiar routine of lessons and training. Hollis and his men had been sent to trial and, needless to say, Halt wasn't overly optimistic over their prospects. Considering all the trouble and pain they had caused, Halt couldn't say he was very sympathetic either.

Halt was comfortably reading reports near the hearth fire when Gilan came bursting into the cabin, an excited grin lighting up his face and practically bounding with eagerness. Obviously, he'd picked up some sort of exciting news while running errands in Wensly. Gilan set down the bag of supplies he'd gathered before sidling up to Halt.

"Well?" Halt asked blankly. "I assume by the look on your face you've got something you think you need to say."

"You'll never guess what I overheard when I was in Wensly," he said.

Halt didn't particularly care to hazard a guess, but didn't need to. Gilan continued on as if he nether noticed or cared about the silence that had greeted him in answer.

"I've become a local legend!" he grinned.

"More like local nuisance," Halt snorted in response, shooting his student a withering look.

But Gilan was neither withered nor put off.

"A lot of the village is still whispering about what happened on All Saint's Eve. Apparently, they think that there was no way I should have escaped the building alive, and think I used Ranger magic to save myself. They might have got the impression that Rangers can turn into spirits and fly short distances—along with all the other dark magic we do," Gilan said, barely able to keep from laughing at the ridiculous notion. "In fact, a lot of them were behaving really weirdly when they saw me: like they were scared and impressed at the same time. That's actually why I tried to figure out what was going on in the first place and eavesdropped a little when they thought I left."

Halt nodded. He'd heard the rumors too. They had spread across the town fairly quickly after All Hallow's Eve. Maybe Gilan thought it was fun now, but he might well change his tune in a couple of weeks when the novelty of it wore off and the weight of the mistrust settled in more deeply in its stead. A story like that was definitely good for the Ranger reputation, it was true. But they had that reputation for a reason. People were wary of Rangers and this would only increase that. Being a Ranger was often a very lonely and solitary life because of it. Halt shook his head.

"As I said, local nuisance," Halt repeated flatly, his mind flashing back to the several late Summer's End pranks that Gilan had tried to pull on him recently—and especially the one this morning. Coffee was sacred and not to be tampered with, in Halt's opinion.

"I think you might have confused the definition of legend a little—it doesn't mean anything close to nuisance," Gilan replied. Then, in a show that was more daring and entirely more foolhardy than Halt had seen of him in a while, he added, "and besides, people call you that more than me anyway."

"Do they now?" Halt shot Gilan a glare. "For that enlightening piece of information, you can spend the rest of the evening in your room doing charting assignments." Halt pointed to a pile of papers at the corner of his desk.

Gilan moved to gather the papers as asked, but the sudden mischievous sparkle in his eyes plainly said that he didn't know when to quit today—and didn't have an ounce of self-preservation on top of that. Sure enough.

"You would send a legend to their room?" Gilan asked with feigned indignance. "That seems awfully presumptuous."

That did it.

"Tree," Halt said flatly, entirely unamused.

Gilan nearly dropped the papers, his expression falling.

"But, Halt—"

Halt cut him short with a gesture that brooked no argument and followed his apprentice out. As he watched him disappear into the branches of an evergreen, he called after him. "Do you know what I heard, Gilan? I heard that legends have to scour all the cookpots."

Gilan's head appeared suddenly, upside down, from the branches.

"But Halt, you said I'm not a legend at all. I'm only a nuisance," he offered his mentor a hopeful, innocent smile.

"And nuisances get to scour the pots and beat the rug," Halt said blankly.

"In that case, I think I'll go back to being a legend."

"And, in that case, you can clean out the stables too. They've gotten pretty dusty from how old this conversation is getting."

Yes, everything was back to normal—or at least as close to normal as could happen whilst things settled into a somewhat new, but not entirely unwelcome, sort of balance, Halt thought with a shake of his head. Apprentices…

The End

A/N: Thanks again for reading! I hope this proved to be an enjoyable diversion. Reviews are loved if you are of a mind to leave one! I also appreciate constructive criticism as I'm eager to learn and grow as a writer.

So, according to my research, bairín breac, or barmbrack is indeed and actual Irish All Hallow's Eve tradition. (They've actually got quite a lot of fascinating/awesome traditions.) And since Hibernia seems to be pretty similar to medieval Ireland I kinda ran with it XD. Also, for those reading my other story, I promise I'm working on getting the next chapter out whenever I manage to snag some free time. This month has just been a little on the nasty side and I'm feeling a little burned out. Ah well, such is life I suppose ._.

I wish you all the very best until next time! I hope you all have an amazing weekend with lots of coffee XD (that is if you're partial to the stuff) XD

~ATGTJ~