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“Will?”
The ranger turned, dried salt crust in his eyes marking the tears from the morning. He wanted to respond, but he didn’t trust his voice enough not to crack again. So instead he looked wearily at Pauline, who rested her wrinkled, yet still somehow graceful hand on his shoulder.
“Would you come with me, Will?” She asked gently, a small reassuring smile tugging on her lips, despite the immense loss they all suffered last night. “There’s something I have for you.”
Will nodded and without looking back, he followed the older woman back into the castle and through the hallways. The walk couldn’t have taken more than several minutes, but time flowed differently for him. Whether it was just a fraction of a minute or few hours before they stood in front of Pauline’s and Halt’s chambers, he couldn’t tell.
The retired head of Diplomatic services let go of his arm that was providing her support and opened the latch on the door. She took a few steps inside and then looked back hesitantly. “I am sorry, Will, I didn’t realize.” She paused. “Would you rather wait here? It will only be a minute.”
Will nodded gratefully at Pauline and rested his head against the stone cold wall with a sigh, missing the sad look from her.
True to her word, the former courier was back shortly, pressing a faded brown envelope into his hands. “In the end, he didn’t give it to you then,” she said softly. “But I think that you should have it now.”
Will almost didn’t hear the last of her words, his gaze resting solely on the roughly, yet elegantly written name on the envelope as his tears were smudging the ink.
Will.
The envelope said.
===
Will sat down on the steps of the verandah, the afternoon sun rays playing on his face, and winced a little at the unwanted sound coming from his knee. Sable trotted to him and rested her head in his lap, earning herself a few gentle scratches.
He took a deep breath and with trembling hands, he finally took the half open brown envelope. He had actually tried to open it several times and days before, but his bleeding heart always betrayed him. But today was the day.
Dear Will,
you are graduating tomorrow. Crowley is gonna come and put on his stupid show of forgetting the oakleaf and you’re gonna be confused. People are going to come and celebrate the fact that you’re not my apprentice anymore. Which I find insulting to a certain degree, nonetheless, until you find the oakleaf wherever Crowley decides to lose it on the way here, you’re still my apprentice and you can be damn sure I am making you do chores tomorrow morning.
I am in a rather difficult fight, Will. I don’t want to see you go. If it were up to me, you’d stay my apprentice forever. I mean, someone has to keep doing the dishes. But at the same time, I can’t wait for you to continue writing your story on your own now. There’s so much in you for the whole world to see and Will, I need you to know.
I am very proud of you.
Proud of you as my apprentice. As my friend. And most importantly, as my son.
You might not know that, but you came into my life years before you shyly crept up on my porch thinking that this apprenticeship is a punishment for you. There is a story that I am not yet ready to tell, but one day you are going to hear it.
But now, before you hear it, it’s time for you go and for us to say goodbye.
It’s not gonna be our last goodbye, I believe. At least, as long as we still have Gatherings, we’re gonna have our goodbyes. But this is the one when it’s time for you to go out of the door and live a life of your own.
I wish there was a way to stop the clock, to turn back the time. But there isn’t. We have lived, what we lived and we can never truly relive all the times we spent dozing off in the afternoon sun on the verandah, times of you asking endless questions, and all the times you and Gilan tried to pull my leg. But, maybe I am saying to reassure myself and not you, we can continue forging these and new memories. Because that is life. It is going forward, leaving all the things said and done in the past.
Sometimes, it is sad. Sometimes it is painful to leave things behind. But sometimes, it can surprise you, what did life give you. What all the people around have given you. I was here to guide you through it for six years, but now it’s time for you to go and explore on your own.
You’re gonna make mistakes and you’re gonna get hurt. Because that’s what life is also about. But I want you to know, that while now it’s up to you to deal with it as you see fit, you will always have steady support in me and your friends.
So go out there and don’t let the shadow of your old gruff mentor stop you. There’s so much in you to tell the world.
I have many yet things to tell you and you have many questions to ask. And in time, you will get to ask them and I will answer you when I am ready.
Our life doesn’t end here Will. It is merely an end of a chapter. And maybe, in the future, one of the chapters will end with me not being in the next one. But that is still a long time away Will, don’t worry. And like I hinted before, while the past chapters can’t be changed, it’s all about what you remember of them. One day, I’ll tell you about the chapters before I came to Araluen. They are important to me, but never as much as the chapter when you came into my life.
I am proud to be your, now former, mentor. And to be someone close to what you can call a father, even though i am not as bold as to think I could replace him. There’s so much I want to say to you. But at the same time, I think you know.
Halt
===
He gently rapped his knuckles on the wooden door. There was a muffled sound of light feet coming to the door before it opened and revealed the graceful and kind face of lady Pauline.
“Hello, Will?” she said in a surprised but gentle tone. “I didn’t expect you to come for another few days.”
“Yeah,” he smiled softly. “Me neither, honestly. Can I come in?”
“Of course,” Pauline stepped to the side. “But Will, I still haven’t gotten to… His things are still all over the place.”
“As they should,” he laughed lightly. “No, that’s alright, Pauline. Take your time.”
Will stepped into the chambers and looked around. His smile didn’t fade but there was a single tear now in his eye. Wordlessly, he let himself be pulled into Pauline’s embrace as his eyes roamed around the rooms. Halt’s cloak was still hanged, his unstrung bow still resting against the wall. There were multiple coffee pots strewn around, some still having ground coffee in them.
He closed his eyes as he faintly heard his father’s voice echoing in the chambers.
After a few moments, he gently pulled away from Pauline’s embrace and reached into his pocket, pulling out a yellow envelope.
“I thought I might visit him today, I still haven’t done so since the funeral. And I wanted to ask if you’d like to come with me?”
Pauline tilted her head to the side, the enormity of what was Will asking her dawning on her and gripping her heart as her eyes read the word on the envelope.
Halt