As Will passed through the gates of Castle Redmont four days later, the guards shouted to warn others of his arrival. Who's waiting for me? This trip wasn't urgent at all, no one should have even noticed I was gone. As he and Tug trotted through the archway, a few people noticed and waved in greeting, while others stared up in awe at the Ranger. It wasn't that he never visited the castle, most of these people were familiar with him by now. But for some, they never got past the fact that he was a famous Ranger. They would never treat him like an equal. This was something Will always resented about his fame, but something he had also learned to live with.

Tug had only just slowed to a stop in the courtyard when Gilan and Alyss came bursting out of the double doors leading to the Great Hall. He sighed with relief at the sight of Alyss. It had been a difficult week, spent traveling through dark forests alone without his bow, and the unsettling memory of her apparition in the fires ruining his sleep. But if he thought he was going to have a moment of peace, he was wrong.

"I got your message," Gilan shouted, waving a piece of paper around in his hand and jogged up to Tug.

"What message? Aren't you supposed to be back at Castle Araluen?" Will snapped back, irritated that Gilan hadn't even let him get off his horse before bombarding him with news. He swung himself off Tug, and turned only to catch Alyss as she threw herself into his arms.

"You almost got yourself burned to death, you idiot!" she cried as she squeezed his neck so tightly Will could hardly breathe.

"How do you - " he croaked, and Alyss finally relinquished her hold. He sighed. "How do you know about that?" He turned back to Gilan, confused. "I didn't send a message."

Alyss raised an eyebrow. "Gilan got the letter from the Baron of Stamford, the letter you apparently told him to write."

Will was dumbfounded. "I only told him to write a letter if another fire happened. It's only been four days." He met Gilan's eyes. "Where was it? What burned down this time?"

Gilan scratched his neck anxiously. "A tavern at Drexel. A small fief, only a few kilometers north of Stamford along the edge of the Solitary Plains."

Will pressed Gilan further. "Did they find anything? In the wreckage? Were there any witnesses?"

He held up a hand to fend off the barrage of questions. "Nothing survived the flames, and no, no one saw who started it, they only saw it once it had engulfed the entire building."

Alyss squeezed his hand. He could tell she was worried, but that she was holding it together for the sake of Gilan, and maybe for even for himself. "It's just like the fire you got caught in. The Baron sent a full report of both."

Gilan, having gotten over his initial excitement, was peering at Will strangely. "Call me crazy, Will, but aren't you missing a few things? Where's your cloak? And your bow?" His eyebrows climbed farther up his forehead with each question.

Will raised an eyebrow shrewdly. "Where do you think they've gone? Perhaps they're where my saddlebags disappeared to? Maybe I just lost them all and they're waiting in the forest for me right where I left them." Gilan looked pointedly' over his shoulder at Tug, noting the lack of saddlebags, the empty bow case, and the slightly charred quiver and arrows.

Alyss squeezed his hand again, but not as gently this time. "Don't be mean, Will," she said sternly, although she was very unsuccessfully hiding a smile.

Gilan rolled his eyes and turned away from them both. "Look at this, now it's both of you ganging up on me, two against one! That's not fair!" He threw his hands up in mock outrage. But after a moment of silence, he turned back around and was met with two very unforgiving stares. "Fine, I know all his stuff probably got burned up, I just didn't think of it right away."

"Come inside." Alyss turned away from Gilan, letting him off the hook. "You have to tell us what happened, I know everything couldn't have been included in the Baron's report," she gestured to the doors.

Gilan nodded. "I'll take care of Tug for you, you must be tired. The Baron reported you were wounded, do you need care for that too?"

Will waved him off. "No, nothing a little burn salve can't heal. I was lucky, just some singed hair and a nasty burn on my palm, but nothing else."

Gilan led Tug away towards the stables and Alyss pulled Will into the empty Great Hall, tucking themselves into a far corner where they might get an ounce of privacy. It was only then that Will noticed Alyss's nervous hands, her hesitation to speak even though something was clearly on her mind.

"I missed you." He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close.

"I missed you too." Her voice was muffled as she pressed her face into his shoulder.

"Are you alright? I'm sorry you had to hear about the fire from a report, I was going to tell you when I got back. I didn't think this one single fire would open up an entire ring of arsonists."

"Is that what it is? Arsonists?"

"We can't know for sure. Only time will tell."

She buried her face in his shoulder again. He looked down at the top of her head worriedly. "Are you certain you're alright?"

She shook her head, settling against his chest. "Now's not a good time. I'll explain later."

"Are you sure? You seem upset."

Her eyes were watery, but her lips were pressed together in a way that told him not to push her to answer him. She was barely holding it together as it is, and if there was one thing Alyss hated, it was being vulnerable in public or in front of people she didn't fully trust. If they had been in private, or back home in their cabin, he would have asked her about it further. But here, in the center of the castle where eyes were always on them, he would wait.

He gently brushed some hair out of her face. "Tell me later, as soon as you can. I'll be waiting."

She nodded, swiping at her cheeks, checking for any traitorous tears. She found none.

Gilan's head popped out behind the open door, and saw the two in the corner, obviously having a moment. He hated to ruin it, but time was of the essence. "I'm sorry, both of you, " he started, and they turned toward him. "Will, we really need to talk."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

"So let's see this stone, then."

Will removed the cloth he had wrapped it in, and placed it on the desk between himself and Gilan. In the dimming light of the window in the Baron's office that they were borrowing, the stone had a strange shine to it. Will had been chewing on the inside of his cheek nervously as he told Gilan about the strange occurrences in the fire in Stamford, and they had read the reports from the Baron. The details had been the same, another shop had burned down in Drexel, adding another fire to the growing list. Will remembered the stone being plucked from the ashes of the inn, and he realized yet another strange thing.

"Gil, I got this stone from a pile of ash. It should have been coated in dirt and soot, but it wasn't."

Gilan reached across the table and took the stone in his hands, feeling its smoothness and running his fingers across the strange design. "It's sparkling clean, as if you washed it in a river."

Will turned the clothes he'd used to wrap it over in his hands. "It's clean, like it was never burned or dirty in the first place. I was filthy with ash coming out of that fire, I have no idea how this stone wasn't."

"Odd," Gilan said quietly, and gingerly placed the stone back on the table, like it might bite him. They both stared at it in silence for a long moment. The strange figure in the design flickered eerily in the light from the torches on the wall. It facelessly stared up at them, Will could swear it was almost alive.

"Do you know what this symbol means?" Gilan asked.

"No, I have no idea. I was hoping you knew."

"It doesn't look Araluen to me. But maybe it's not a language, maybe it's just a picture."

Will shrugged. "I was going to take it to the castle library, see if anyone there knows."

Gilan took a thin sheet of paper and laid it over the stone. He then took a stick of charcoal, a very fitting medium, Will thought, and began rubbing the stick over the paper. The pattern underneath showed through quickly, and only a few moments later Gilan held up a perfect rubbing of the image. Scratched out in black, it looked even more ominous.

Gilan shook his head, placing the paper down on the desk again. "Back to the matter at hand. Was there anything else strange about the fire? I know you were in the middle of it, did you see anything else?"

Aside from my strange hallucinations? "Nothing, really."

Gilan raised an eyebrow. "You don't sound very sure."

Will sighed. "I'm fairly certain it was all the result of inhaling too much smoke. My brain was all fogged up, I don't know what I saw."

"What did you see?" His eyes widened and he stood up, leaning towards Will.

"It's going to sound ridiculous. Don't laugh." Gilan nodded with a small smile, and Will resigned himself to the truth. "While I was trying to escape, I thought I saw... strange things. Like visions. The fire burned everything so fast, faster than it should have, I didn't have time to really get a good look."

Gilan turned away, facing the window. He folded his arms and his fingers tapped his elbow, either because he was thinking or he was nervous, Will couldn't tell which. Perhaps it was both.

"For now, we'll write it off as hallucinations, since that is a very logical explanation. But Will," Gilan turned back toward him, a worried expression on his face. "Remember that we have no idea what's going on here. For all we know, your visions could have been real."

Will shook his head. "They can't have. I know they weren't."

"How?"

He lowered his gaze, not meeting Gilan's eyes anymore. "I just know."

Gilan sat down heavily and picked up his pen. "I understand if you don't want to tell me. But we have to keep every possibility open." He added the sheet of paper covered in his writing to his notes stacked high on the desk around him, like tall trees in a forest. "What are we going to do about this stone?"

Will shook his head, shrugging. "There's not even enough evidence to tie it to the fires, all I know is that it was in the wreckage of one. What about all the others?"

"I can send out riders to scour the wreckages for more stones, to see if there are others. Until then, we don't know if these fires are connected. The lack of eyewitnesses is very odd, to say the least."

"Agreed. You'd think someone would have seen something."

He nodded gravely. "I'll send out the riders, and they'll be back within a week. I'm going to send a drawing of this image to everyone in the Corps, to see if anyone knows something."

Will stood and gathered his things. "I'll write the letter to Horace and Evanlyn, they'll want to hear about this as well."

"Thanks, that'll save me the extra report." They shook hands, and Will turned to the door. Just as he stepped over the threshold, Gilan's voice stopped him.

"Will, just so you know, I'm glad you didn't get burned alive in that inn."

Will smiled back at him. "Me too. It's good to be back."