Chapter 8

The following morning dawned bright and cheerful for the group as one by one after having breakfast they proceeded to the reading hall. As soon as everyone had entered the room the quiet atmosphere of excitement was visible by everyone and it was with great relief that Duncan asked "Who wants to be narrator today?" Despite a few hands being raised the King continued "No one? Oh that's a shame I suppose I'll have to read it myself." The others accepted this with a good natured chuckle while Cassandra rolled her eyes at her father's ways.

"Ah yes this chapter seems to be more on Halt's bad temper." Duncan laughed. Halt grumbled unhappily while the others sat up straighter to listen.

"INTO HIS OWN MOAT, YOU SAY?"SAIDSIRRODNEY.

He paused to think about the fact. Lady Pauline noticed that he didn't seem overly shocked by Halt's action. If anything, there was a look of grim satisfaction on his face. The Baron frowned at Rodney's tacit approval.

"Of course Sir Rodney would like that." Horace said while laughing, it may have been a while but he doubted he could ever forget his mentors ways.

"Well of course I am glad that he got thrown into a moat, it serves him right but the point is you can't deal with people you do not like that way." Baron Arald said while looking at Halt.

Halt shrugged. "I was only providing a service that no one else was willing to do, that is how I deal with idiots not people I don't like." Halt finished. Before Arald could open his mouth to retort but Duncan continued reading, effectively cutting him off.

"I know the man deserved it," he said, "but we can't have people going around throwing knights into the moat. It's not…diplomatic."

Lady Pauline raised one elegant eyebrow. "Indeed not, sir," she said.

"And Halt has been altogether too high-handed about it all," he continued. "I'm going to have to speak to him about it. Most severely."

"You're going to have to speak to me severely? How terrifying." Halt muttered. The Baron fortunately hadn't heard him

"Do not worry Arald you did do the right thing." Pauline assured him calmly.

"How can you take his side?" Halt turned to her now but stopped abruptly when he noticed her stern look.

"You were behaving childishly by taking out your anger at others Halt. I will support whoever is right not who is related to me, though of course I do still love you." She smiled at him. He blushed slightly before murmuring an 'I love you too' back.

"Wow Halt behaving childishly who had ever heard of such a thing?" Cassandra asked the crowd, her grin pasted to her face.

"Excuse me are you one to talk of childish behaviour?" Duncan turned on her.

"What?" She asked innocently but her eyes twinkled with mischief.

"You are possibly the most childish person I know." Duncan retorted not unkindly. The others silently agreed, they did not agree out loud for they knew her temper.

"But Daddy" She exclaimed extravagantly.

"See my point is proven." The king exclaimed.

"I have a right to be childish right now my child needs to soak up my good humour." She explained. The others laughed at her logic and Alyss was the only one with enough courage to say.

"Even if you didn't have a baby inside you, you would still be acting this way." Cassandra blushed and glared at Alyss while Alyss raised a cool eyebrow back. Others in the room perceived the tension between the two and all the men were just about ready to dive underneath the table when simultaneously they all heard a very odd sound: laughter. The two women were laughing with each other as if sharing an inside joke and the participants in the room all collectively released a breath they didn't know they took. Will was particularly glad. He didn't want to have to deal with an issue like that again.

"Speaking of that when do you plan on having your own baby Mainwaring?" The princess asked smugly. It was Alyss' turn to blush slightly now as Will once more hid behind a curtain of her hair.

"Continue reading please." Jenny asked, sensing her friends embarrassment.

"Someone certainly should," Pauline agreed, and Rodney grunted a reluctant assent.

"He definitely needs taking in hand."

"You wanted to see me, my lord?" said a familiar voice, and they all turned guiltily toward the door, which Rodney had left open when he barged in.

"Oh dear that is pretty embarrassing glad I wasn't there." Gilan said cheerfully while everyone else pointedly looked away from Halt's glare.

"You would be surprised Gilan of the embarrassing things I have heard from your conversations with people, do you want me to share some to the people in this room?" He asked menacingly. Gilan now blushed a beetroot red while Jenny looked at him curiously. What on earth would he have been talking about to people that was so embarrassing?

"Why does Rodney always have to leave the door open?" The baron groaned.

"With all due respect sir you shouldn't have been gossiping about Halt anyway." Will said meekly.

"Like you can talk you love to gossip." Horace countered. Gilan and Halt nodded at the statement.

"What? No I do not." Will denied vehemently.

"Yes you do." Alyss added. The others laughed at Will's complete humiliation and Arald felt slightly better, inwardly thinking that he and Will had quite a lot in common.

Halt stood there, clad in his gray-and-green mottled cloak, his face half hidden in the shadows of the deep cowl. It was uncanny, the Baron thought, how the man could appear almost without a sound. Now Arald, like his two department heads, was conscious that he had been caught talking about Halt behind his back.

Pauline would never say this but the cloaked mystery of Halt being a Ranger only fuelled her attraction to him.

He flushed in embarrassment, while Sir Rodney cleared his throat noisily. Only Lady Pauline appeared unconcerned—and she had a lifetime of practice at appearing unconcerned.

Everyone laughed at the last statement knowing full well how calm and collected she could appear at times.

"You didn't even have the decency to look ashamed." Halt said laying it on a little thick. Pauline was not impressed.

"You are my husband why would I look ashamed?" She asked pointedly.

"Well I certainly was not your husband at that time why were you not ashamed then?" Halt countered.

"Because I have no shame." And with an inconspicuous wink that only Halt saw she gestured for Duncan to continue reading.

"Aaahhhh…yes…Halt. Of course. Of course. Come in, won't you? Shut the door behind you, there's a good fellow." As he said these last words, Baron Arald shot a baleful glance at Sir Rodney, who shrugged guiltily.

Halt nodded greetings to Lady Pauline and Sir Rodney, then moved to stand before the Baron's massive desk.

There was a long and increasingly awkward silence as the Ranger stood waiting. Arald cleared his throat several times, not sure where to begin. Inevitably, it was Lady Pauline who broke the impasse.

"Of course we all know how gifted she is in making people feel at ease." The Baron said, trying to flatter her. Others nodded readily.

"I imagine you're wondering why the Baron asked to see you, Halt," she said, relieving the tension in the room and forcing Halt to say something—anything—at the same time.

The Ranger, taciturn as ever, glanced at Pauline, then the Baron, and replied in as few words as possible. "Yes, my lord."

But it was a start and now Baron Arald had been given a chance to gather his thoughts and overcome his embarrassment. He brandished the letter in Halt's general direction.

"This…" He managed in time not to say "brouhaha" again. The word was being grossly overused, he thought. "This…business with Sir Digby, Halt. It's just no good. No good at all!"

"I agree, my lord," Halt said, and the Baron sat back in his chair, a little surprised and quite a bit relieved.

"Uh oh you can tell something is wrong when Halt agrees so readily." Horace joked. The others laughed while Halt huffed in annoyance. It seemed everyone was picking on him today and now more than ever he was regretting his bad temper in the book.

"I should have known that it wouldn't be so easy." Baron Arald replied sighing a bit.

"Excuse me I can be a very agreeable person most of the time." Halt replied gruffly.

"Yes only when you agree with what is going on as soon as you don't agree all hell breaks loose." Will said while grinning. Alyss decided to take pity on the man that resembled her father in law.

"Leave him alone he was only doing what he thought was right at the time even if it was a bit eccentric." Halt smiled at the young woman next to Will and thought about how lucky Will was to have a wife like her. Though truth be told a man like Will definitely needed a woman like Alyss to keep him under control.

"Thank you Alyss, you seem to be the only one who understands where I am coming from." Halt said.

"It's odd because most of the time nobody ever really understands where you're coming from." Gilan intervened.

"I still have some pretty embarrassing secrets I could tell the people in this room from your apprenticeship, do you want me to tell them?" Halt asked politely but there was a sarcastic undertone. Gilan blushed in embarrassment and kept quiet while Jenny was left to ponder exactly how she was going to get those secrets out of him.

"Halt." Pauline said warningly.

"But blackmail is so much fun." Halt moaned.

"Only blackmail enemies not your friends." Her tone sounded as if she were admonishing a naughty three year old.

"But blackmailing your friends is the best part." Halt mumbled quietly.

"Did you say something dear?" Pauline asked sweetly.

"No." Halt grumbled but he still looked at his wife with adoration.

"You do?" he said.

"Yes, my lord. The man is a nincompoop and a fool. Even worse, he took me for a fool as well. I suppose I can understand that he might want to keep some of his men for the planting season. But to try to hide them in the forest from a Ranger? Why, that was a downright insult. The man needed to be taught a lesson."

Will Horace and Cassie roared with laughter at Halt's choice of insults.

"Nincompoop!" Horace roared going red in the face. The others around the table laughed for a long while.

"We need to add this to our vocabulary list, who knew Halt knew such colourful language." Cassandra asked to no one in particular. Will stopped laughing immediately.

"Oh I for one knew all right." He said darkly. He had just gotten a series of flashbacks when he used to be an apprentice and Halt would swear at him for doing things wrong. Alyss looked at her husband and then looked at Jenny. Both girls were thinking the same thing. They were going to have to ambush Will in order to find out all his embarrassing moments. How to ambush a Ranger though…

"But was it your place to teach him, Halt?" the Baron asked. Now Halt raised one eyebrow in reply.

"I don't recall seeing anyone else prepared to do so, my lord."

"Perhaps Halt acted in haste—in the heat of the moment?" Lady Pauline interjected, trying to give Halt a graceful way out of the situation.

"Ah of course Pauline would try and defend him." Arald said knowingly and a little smugly. Pauline smiled at him letting this one pass. She had gotten used to him boasting about how he knew Halt and Pauline harboured feelings for each other.

But the Ranger simply looked at her, then back to the Baron, and said: "No. It was pretty well thought through. And I didn't rush at all. I took my time."

Lady Pauline shrugged. The Baron's expression showed his exasperation. He would be willing to give Halt some leeway in this matter if the Ranger would only allow it. But Halt was obviously determined to be pigheaded.

"Then there are no mitigating circumstances, Halt," he said firmly. "You have acted excessively. I have no choice but to reprimand you."

"Ooh that is an awkward situation." Gilan said while letting out a low whistle. The baron glared at the young ranger and he ushered the king to continue reading.

Halt considered the matter before replying. "An awkward situation, my lord, since I am not technically answerable to you. I answer to Ranger command and, ultimately, to the King."

The Baron opened his mouth to answer, then closed it again. Halt was right. As the Ranger attached to Redmont Fief, he was required to cooperate with the Baron, but he was independent of the Baron's authority. That fact and Halt's intentionally unhelpful manner were beginning to get under the Baron's skin. Once again, it was Lady Pauline who suggested a compromise.

"Perhaps you could inform Halt, in an official manner, that you are displeased with his actions," she said. The Baron considered the suggestion. It had merit, he thought. But the wording could be a little stronger.

"'Displeased' is too mild a word, Pauline. I would rather use the word 'vexed.'"

"I would be most discomforted to know you were vexed, my lord," Halt said, with just the slightest trace of mockery in his tone. The Baron turned a piercing glare on him.Don't take this too far,it warned him.

"You know you really wouldn't want to test his patience Halt." King Duncan said wisely. Arald nodded in agreement. "He may be fat but he still has some moves." Duncan said again. Arald spluttered in anger while the others laughed.

"Then we shall make it 'extremelyvexed,' Lady Pauline," he said meaningfully. "I leave it to you to put it in the right form." He looked from her to Halt. "You will receive the official notification of my displeasure tomorrow, Halt."

"I tremble in anticipation, my lord," said Halt, and the Baron's eyebrows drew together angrily.

"I think that will be all, Halt," he said, very obviously restraining his temper. Lady Pauline shook her head slightly at Halt's sardonic tone. He was walking a very fine line, she thought. The Ranger now bowed slightly to Baron Arald, turned and left, closing the door quietly behind him.

The Baron let his breath out in an angry sigh.

"The man is impossible!" he said. "In all the time I've known him, I have never seen him like this. He's touchy, bad-tempered, sarcastic! What on earth is the matter with him?"

At those words Halt began to feel a bit of shame. Had he really been that bad tempered? It hadn't seemed that way to him. He knew he was a little moodier than usual but he didn't realise it was having this effect on people.

"And to think he was only acting this way because he missed Will." Jenny cooed. Everyone laughed while a hint of red appeared on Halt's cheeks. No one was going to let him forget this one. He was starting to hate the book more and more. Will had also flushed in embarrassment. He never realised he had meant that much to Halt as his ex mentor never seemed to vocalise his feelings.

Sir Rodney shook his head. Like the Baron, he had known Halt for many years, and counted him as a friend.

"Something is obviously bothering him," he said. "But what?"

"Oh men are so oblivious." Cassandra complained stating the obvious. None of the men in the room had the heart to argue knowing that she was probably right. Before the women in the room could gossip about this universal fact Duncan cleared his throat and continued.

"Perhaps he's lonely," Lady Pauline said thoughtfully, and both men looked at her in amazement.

"Lonely? Halt?" said Sir Rodney incredulously. "Halt's never been lonely in his life! He lives alone. He likes it that way!"

"He did," said Lady Pauline, "but things have been different for the past year or so, haven't they?"

"You mean…Will?" the Baron asked, and she nodded.

"Think about it. Halt has only ever had two apprentices. There was Gilan, five or six years ago. And now Will. And he's a rather special young man."

Will blushed a heinz tomato red while everyone laughed at his reaction.

"This is why I don't compliment him so much he gets way over his head" Halt said.

"Oh come on Halt I think he's deserved it." Duncan snapped.

"If this is his reaction to such a tiny form of compliment imagine what will happen when he hears the rest Pauline has to say." Baron Arald joked. Pauline laughed with him remembering the rest of her words. She looked at Will now still heavily flushed and felt a surge of motherly affection for the young man. He was so humble, polite and honest. It wasn't the first time she thought Halt and her were lucky to have a son like him.

The Baron nodded, not sure she was right but willing to listen. "He's that, all right."

"The sign of a good Baron is to be willing to accept advise even when he doesn't agree with it." Duncan said wisely. Cassandra snorted.

"As if you can talk Dad." She said in amusement.

"Excuse me-" Duncan started, his ego bruised slightly but his daughter interrupted.

"I believe there was a certain someone who refused to allow me to go to Arrida to discuss negotiations?" Cassie asked impatiently. Duncan blushed but said quietly.

"That was a completely different matter." Everyone in the room looked around, uncomfortably aware that an argument could break out any second. Only Pauline seemed to be mildly comfortable with the situation.

"Why don't you continue reading sir?" Horace asked politely. The king smiled at the young knight.

"I've told you many times Horace, call me Duncan." He smiled. Cassandra huffed but let the matter go.

Lady Pauline was warming to her theme now. "He's amusing and interesting and talkative and cheerful. I should imagine he's brightened Halt's life quite considerably."

Will flushed with pleasure at the praise. Is that really what everyone thought of him? He didn't realise it until now. Pauline was smiling at the young man with genuine love and without realising it Will stood up and went to hug her, letting all his feelings pass through.

"Aww that is so cute" Jenny said happily while Gilan smiled at her adoringly. She was the cute one to him. As Will returned to his seat still red in the face Jenny added. "Wow if only my home grown tomatoes could look as red as your face…" Everyone burst out laughing at her comment while Will turned if possible even redder. Only Horace felt pity for his friend knowing how embarrassing it was to hear so much praise. Horace was used to compliments and awe by now due to his reputation but it didn't mean he had to like it. Alyss looked at her husband and smiled loving the fact that he didn't know how highly regarded he was. Somehow to her it only added to his charm.

"Not only that," Rodney put in, "but he saved Halt's life as well."

"Exactly," said Lady Pauline. "There's a very special bond that's developed between those two. Halt has become as much a surrogate father as a mentor to Will. And now he's sent him away. I think he's missing him. He'd never admit it, but I think he's been enjoying having a young person around."

She paused to see what the Baron thought. He was nodding agreement.

"You could be right, Lady Pauline," he said. "You could be right." He considered the matter for some seconds, then said thoughtfully: "You know, it might be a good idea if you were to have a talk with him."

"I, my lord?" said Lady Pauline. "Why would I have more influence over him than anyone else?"

"Oooh" There were collective gasps around the room at Baron Arald's mistake. The Baron flushed in embarrassment.

"I would never have made that mistake but in all honesty how did you get out of that one?" Duncan asked Arald.

"Just a bit of idle flattery my Lord." He said still proud at the way he had handled that situation so many years ago.

"It wasn't idle at all my lord it was completely overdone but I let him do it anyway for it made him look like a nincompoop." Pauline stated. Arald blushed while Halt grinned at his wife. She was picking up his vocabulary well enough not to mention he found it extremely pleasing to see the Baron squirm.

"On the note of the Baron's near death I think it is time for a little tea and coffee break don't you." Duncan mused. His throat was starting to get a little dry. The others nodded their assent happily enough.

I sincerely apologise for such a late update but this is part of a chapter. I couldn't do the whole one it took too long so I thought I would give you three quarters of it. Anyways there is something WRONG WITH THE CHAPTER TITLES sorry about it it's really messed up I can't fix it so you'll just have to bear with it. Anyways please leave loads of comments and the next part of this chapter should come in a day or two.

Adios mes amigos,

Oakleaf Girl.