Will Treaty - Blog Posts

ABSOLUTELY FOUL OMFG

HELP- I’m looking at official art of will treaty to draw him vs how I thought he looked as a kid and-

IM SOBING WHY IS WILL SO PATHETIC WET RAT IN THE OFFICAL ART LIKE

HES SO SAD LOOKING

My boy looks like he just clawed his way out of a sand pit 💀/lh

Full body drawing of what I think will treaty looks like :)), he’s so pathetic wet rat coded I love him <3 (Fr tho bro can never catch a break in the books 💀)

This is so rough but I always thought Will was more neat, his canon design is so greasy white boy looking I can’t 💀

Also I imagined he had some scruff before royal ranger cuz like- his mentor was Halt. That man was infamous for his pathetic appearance

HELP- I’m looking at official art of will treaty to draw him vs how I thought he looked as a kid and-

IM SOBING WHY IS WILL SO PATHETIC WET RAT IN THE OFFICAL ART LIKE

HES SO SAD LOOKING

My boy looks like he just clawed his way out of a sand pit 💀/lh

a few things with this

Not quite to the prompt, but imagine Horace is trying to alley-oop Halt over a wall or something and just....severely overestimates how much strength he needs to move this 5'3" wiry man and fucking LAUNCHES him into the air. Literally the most undignified scream anyone's ever heard from Halt as he suddenly know what it's like to be a bird. He's so lucky he managed to catch himself on the top of the wall bc he would have faceplanted directly into the ground on the other side. He still hasn't forgiven Horace and has banned him from ever speaking of it again

While he may not be the most delicate with injuries, if he's around, Halt is the first person Horace will go to if he's hurt, especially for stitches. Despite Halt's unintentionally rough treatment of bruises, he's actually surprisingly gentle when giving people stitches

When they were travelling together after Halt's banishment, Horace had to make sure Halt would eat. Halt was practically drowning in guilt and self-loathing at the time, though he tried to hide it bc he didn't want to make himself a burden on Horace. Unfortunately it manifested as Halt having little to no appetite for a good while after they first left Araluen, and once he noticed it Horace would subtly make him eat by refusing to start his meal until Halt had had the first bite

Halt also helped Horace practice with his sword when they first started travelling (before the Gallican knights anyways). At the time, Horace just figured Halt knew his way around a sword bc he'd had Gilan as an apprentice, but once he and Will learned a bit about Halt's past he connected the dots

Halt will poke fun at how much Horace eats, but also makes a genuine effort to ensure that he doesn't go hungry. He'll joke about Horace asking for seconds, but also subtly make his plate if you know what I mean

He also taught Horace the benefits of being a sarcastic little shit, only to immediately regret it when Horace inevitably betrayed him with it

One time Halt sprained his ankle really badly and absolutely refused to acknowledge it (bc he's Halt "Everyone Can Have Problems Except For Me Because It Would Make Me a Burden" O'Carrick) and Will just sent Horace a Look and Horace Immediately nodded and scooped Halt up bridal style to take him to the nearest infirmary while casually ignoring the violent death threats he's receiving

After book 8 when Will went ahead of them, Horace was trying his best to subtly make sure that Halt was okay. I mean, realizing that you're the last surviving member of your family besides a nephew you've met once would hurt, even if your family sucked like Halt's did. Horace wasn't very subtle and Halt noticed pretty much immediately, but he secretly appreciated the sentiment

There's more but I just can't think of them rn. I love them so much and I genuinely don't think their relationship earns enough attention

I need to see shit of Halt and Horace taking care of each other.

Or really just any content with those two. I love their relationship and their dynamic so much my two boys.

Will: Dumbest scar stories, go! 
Cassandra: I burned my tongue once drinking tea. 
Alyss: I dropped a hair dryer on my leg once and burned it. 
Gilan: I have a piece of graphite in my leg for accidentally stabbing myself with a pencil in the first grade. 
Horace: I was taking a cup of noodles out of the microwave and spilled it on my hand and I got a really bad burn. 
Halt: 
Halt: I have emotional scars.

Bonus:

Will:

Will, concerned: You good dad?

Halt, sobbing on the floor: I don’t know what I’m crying more about, the fact that I’m not ok, the fact that someone finally asked me, or that you just called me dad.

Halt:

Halt: I love you too son.

Will, looking at Halt, Pauline, and Crowley: Someone forgot to tell the third wheel that they're a tricycle

Will: I just saw Halt drop his cup of coffee

Will: It's been 45 minutes but he's just staring at the puddle on the ground, tears silently streaming down his face

Will: Honestly, at this point I'm too afraid to help

Halt: Will?

Will: Yeah Halt?

Halt: When it's only 7:30 in the morning and I've already heard a question that I know will be one of the top three dumbest questions of the day, it depresses me

Will: Sorry Halt

YOU.

You are ABSOLUTELY CORRECT and I don't know how I missed that. It just makes it even sadder every time someone makes fun of him for it.

BUT...

I think I can make this even worse

Now imagine, Halt's seasickness is caused - not just by brain trauma - but by a combination of that and a mentally scarring and fundamentally traumatic experience like... oh, I don't know

Your twin brother trying to drown you while on a fishing trip

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE

because this wouldn't be the first time trauma has made Halt sick at the sight of reminders of it. In particular, a certain line from book 8, when Halt is telling Will and Horace about his childhood, and he mentions that Ferris tried to poison him with a plate of shellfish, but it only made him violently ill to the point where he almost died

What does he say? Oh, that's right. He says, "I still can't face the sight of a plate of shrimp." HMMMMMMMMMMM Even worse??? When he says this he's joking about it

Nice trauma response you're making jokes about there, Halt. It's funny because we all know for a fact that if anyone else were to make jokes about their responses to trauma, he would be all over their asses

To sum it up, Halt gets physically ill when presented with trauma related triggers (specifically childhood trauma), and the brain damage only exacerbated that fact

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk and goodnight

Halt's Brain Damage

I mentioned Halt's head trauma in an earlier post, and said that I would elaborate on it. Well, this is my elaboration. Keep in mind, I am not a health care professional, I am only certified to perform first aid. I am only speaking from what I have witnessed in someone who has had a similar condition from a motorcycle accident, and from what I find and cross-reference in my internet search on the matter.

Halt, as we know, has suffered MANY blows to the head - a lot of which could have been fatal if not for the intervening hand of Lady Luck and some very conveniently placed Plot Armor™. Now something that both the characters in the books, and probably a good portion of the readers either don't know about or haven't considered is the resulting brain damage - or more specifically, the damage done to Halt's gray matter.

For those of you who don't know (no shame), gray matter is tissue in the brain that is largely responsible for motor functions, emotions, and memory. Gray matter cells are known to be the longest lasting cells in the body, but they do tend to degenerate and die as people get old. There are other things that can speed up the process of gray matter cell death, most notably Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, and traumatic brain injury.

I have a friend who was once in a bad motorcycle accident that resulted in a metal rod and screws being put into his wrist, and a sudden increase in gray matter cell death brought on by the head trauma. He was a teacher of mine and currently has a wife, daughters, and grand daughters, and he is just over fifty years old. I had the same class with him all year for 4 years (JROTC), and during that time, I was able to see how the condition affected him as time passed. He does make jokes about it, and is very open with it. I also asked him if it would be okay to post this beforehand, don't worry. The symptoms that Halt experience in my headcanon align with this because it is my closest experience with it.

Obviously, these characters don't know what gray matter is, but that doesn't mean it won't affect Halt, and some of these symptoms are things that Halt experiences in the books. I'll give examples of that too.

One of the symptoms of gray matter damage is difficulty controlling emotions. Now you may be saying, "But Void, Halt practically patented the ability to control emotions," and you're right. However, we all know that Halt has a pretty quick temper that can lead to some rash decisions - and this seems to get slightly worse as the books go on. One of the biggest emotions that people with damaged brain matter have issues dealing with is anger - closely followed by sadness and feelings of emptiness (AKA signs of depression).

Another symptom of gray matter damage is memory loss. The only example of this I can think of off the top of my head (that doesn't include when he was poisoned which is a whole other type of trauma) is when he had extreme trouble finding the correlation between the red hills and Redmont in book 7. Then again, it was a stressful situation and no one can be expected to notice everything. Not to mention that he was the only one to make the connection at all. This one and the next one are more for angst potential then as current existing evidence. Imagine really quick as Halt gets older that the memory loss starts slow - forgetting that he already told someone something, forgetting where he put something, etc. Small stuff. But later, it gets worse. He starts to forget meeting new people, important past events, how to cook certain things, or even just trailing off in the middle of a sentence - unable to remember his original purpose for speaking, almost as if a sort of fog has started blocking things out. A lot of times, he'll know that he knew it at some point, but sometimes, he doesn't remember that he knew that thing in the first place. Sometimes gentle reminders will work, and other times, entire stories, recipes, and tasks will have to be completely re-hashed with him.

The final symptom I'm going to cover in this already too-long post is how gray matter damage affects fine motor skills and language. I'm fairly certain that there is an example of this somewhere in the books, But I would have no clue where to look. We're going full angst potential on this one boys. Again, it starts small - some slight tremors in his hands here, a troublesome button there. Then, it gets worse as the years pass. Having difficulty tying knots, writing getting more and more difficult, cutting his hand while trying to prepare food, dropping his mug of coffee for no apparent reason, sometimes slurring his speech, forgetting certain words from other languages, not realizing that he had reverted back to Hibernian in the middle of a sentence because his brain temporarily stopped being able to comprehend Araluen speech.

Halt doesn't want to tell anyone that the changes in his behavior that he can't seem to control frighten him. He's never been genuinely afraid of his own mind before up until he could no longer control what happened. It was a type of fear he was unfamiliar with, but couldn't stop from growing every time he failed to tie a knot, or someone told him about an event he couldn't remember. Everyone else was afraid too, but they toned down their own fear whenever they saw that desperate look in Halt's eyes that he couldn't quite hide, the one that begged for any confirmation that he wasn't crazy.

What the hell. I just wrote an entire essay. You know those posts that say, "In this essay I will discuss..." but they never get to the essay? Yeah, that but completed. This was born from the fact that Hal't has had a bunch of head injuries and I immediately thought 'haha brain damage go brr' and proceeded to write that in essay form. If you've made it to the end of this monstrosity, more power to you.

I'm going to try to go into a coma now.

Heads up, there's going to be quite a few on here, because I have a lot to say on the matter. Mind the tags, there is some potentially triggering stuff here

Halt's back is covered with scars from beatings his father gave him as a child. He also has a nick on his left ear from where a bandit threw a knife that narrowly missed his head. The place where the poisoned arrow hit him in book 9 left a permanent discolored scar that always reminds Will how close he was to losing his teacher. There is a split in his right eyebrow and an accompanying scar that goes all the way up to his hairline from a close call with a bandit that actually knew how to use his sword. Halt has multiple scars on his scalp hidden by his hair from the number of times he's been hit on the head (there are other side effects as well, but I'll make a separate post on that later). The wounds from the Kalkara are still on his leg, and will cause chronic pain when the weather changes, or after a particularly long day riding. There are self-inflicted injuries on his inner thighs, the oldest being from his childhood, and the newest being from after Will was taken. He's not proud of them, but he is proud that he hasn't relapsed since - though he has come close plenty of times.

Will has a couple lash marks from his time as a slave, and the nerves in his fingers and toes are damaged from the exposure he suffered through in the yard. He has exactly one scar on his wrist from an attempt on his own life, but thankfully Halt recognized the signs from his own experiences and put a stop to it before he got worse. The incident was actually what lead to Will learning of Halt's own struggles, though Halt didn't tell him that the issue was right behind him rather than a long time ago.

Alyss has a scar along her palm from a deep cut from when she was first learning to use her dagger. She wasn't being irresponsible or anything, but she had dropped it and reacted on pure instinct by catching it. Unfortunately, while she did catch it, her hand had wrapped around the blade. She's still a bit embarrassed by it, and she learned the number one rule of a falling blade the hard way: let it fall and get clear, DO NOT try to catch it.

Jenny has countless burn scars on her hands and arms from accidents in the kitchen - both as a student to Chubb, and in her own restaurant. There are so many that the nerves in her hands have been damaged to the point where she is completely unable to feel texture.

George is completely content with the only major scar he has being from the arrow he was hit by in Nihon-Ja.

There's more swimming around in my brain, but I'm tired and this post is long enough as is.

This is your invitation to talk about what scars you think the RA characters have and how they got them

This is the first fic I've ever written and posted, and I literally woke up at 1 AM to write it, only to immediately fall back asleep once I was done. I hope to write more in the future, especially when I get back from my 5ish month hiatus around the end of November, so let me know how I did!

More Ranger's Apprentice Headcanons Because I Have No Self-Control (featuring bullet points!!)

I'm back on my bullshit, so buckle up buckaroos, it's gonna be a bumpy ride

ALSO, before I forget, I received an anon ask about if it was okay to write about my headcanons and such, and that is absolutely 100% okay!! I would love to see other people's interpretations of my thoughts, that's why I put them out there, so please feel free to interpret them as write about them, just give me credit, and let me know so I can see it!

Halt snorts when he laughs, but only if you really get him going. When he does, he'll turn bright red and try to cover his face, which works all well and good if the reason he's laughing so hard is because someone caught him super off-guard with a joke. However, nine times out of ten, he's only laughing that hard because someone decided to test his ticklishness (usually Crowley, but the others do it too once they find out), which means he can't cover his face without almost immediately moving his hands to grab the wrists of whoever's attacking him out of reflex

Speaking of Halt being ticklish, he would never admit it even under threat of death, but he actually doesn't mind being tickled. It shows him that people care enough about him to get close and try to make him laugh. He also finds it kind of nice to just be able to let loose and laugh when he usually can't out of fear of either vulnerability or tarnishing his reputation. Needless to say, if he lets you get away with tickling him, it's the ultimate sign of trust (kind of like a cat laying so its stomach is exposed and trusting you not to attack it)

When Halt is focusing on something, he has a habit of sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth (which I believe is something Horace actually noticed in KoC)

Halt has a bad habit of biting the sides of his fingers when he's nervous. If Pauline or Crowley happen to notice, they'll gently bat Halt's hands away from his mouth

If there is ever a mission that requires disguised infiltration in a high-class setting, Pauline and Crowley will almost always be the ones to handle it - and not just because of how well they coordinate off each other and work together. The main reason is because they both noticed how tense and jumpy being in that sort of environment made Halt after their first such mission. He never brought it up to them, and until KoC, they didn't understand the reason why (though they both had their theories)

Due to his royal upbringing, Halt is actually a very good singer and can play the piano as well (I don't know if the piano existed at this point in time. It's fiction. leT ME HAVE THIS)

Halt said that he can't face a plate of shellfish without throwing up, but he was underselling just how much even seeing a serving of shellfish deeply disturbs him. He'll usually start having a panic attack within the first few minutes, his mind telling him that the food is laced in poison, and that he is 16 years old and back in Clonmel.

Halt and Will both have severe PTSD, but only Halt is ashamed by it. At first, Will was ashamed of the way he was affected by his trauma, but Halt and his other friends shut that down really quick. Halt however, never had anyone who knew about what he went through, so he never had anyone to tell him that his struggling was okay. He was afraid that Will would end up the same way as he did, which is why he fought so vehemently against Will thinking he was doing a "bad job" of handling his trauma

Halt is very much a "do as I say, not as I do" kind of teacher. I mean look at him. This man's never even heard of self-preservation, but god forbid anyone he cares about pulls some self-sacrificing bullshit (that he pulls maybe 30 seconds later)

The O'Carrick Curse

I just talked about a headcanon in the comment section of a fic that I just read, and realized that maybe I should post it here too.

In the fic ("who you are" by mipmaps on A03) Will ends up offering the surname 'Treaty' to Halt, who accepts, which I am absolutely in love with because of the headcanon that I am about to share with you guys.

I feel like Halt sees the surname "O'Carrick" as a curse, especially when he considers how miserably and/or tragically every O'Carrick (that we know of) has lived and died.

~ Halt mentioned that his parents argued all the time and were pretty much straight-up neglectful to everyone but Ferris. (I also headcanon that they were abusive, but I'll go more in-depth about that another time).

~ Ferris was so blinded by greed that he tried to kill his twin brother multiple times over a throne, and did so terribly at being king that he was most beloved by the people when that same twin was pretending to be him - not to mention that when he finally started to do better, he was instantly murdered for it.

~ Caitlyn spent her childhood being neglected and forced to grieve as the one person who truly cared for her apparently died, and she was the only one who really knew who was behind it. She also spent her whole life being sickly, and it was eventually what killed her, leaving her son (who I'm sure Halt was grateful didn't carry the same name) alone with her snake of a brother.

~ And Halt. He was also neglected his whole childhood to the point of being so afraid of hurting his parents' relationship that he would rather run away and leave everything he had ever known and loved behind then tell his parents that his brother was trying to kill him. Speaking of, his twin brother - with whom he spent his entire childhood, and loved in a way that only twins can - tried to murder him on three separate occasions for a throne he didn't even want in the first place. Shortly after this, Halt lost the man who he had come to see as a father, and had to deal with the survivor's guilt brought on by being saved by Will's parents, and leaving Will himself orphaned. He also didn't tell a soul about who he really was until literal decades later. He had to give up a second home in order to save his son apprentice that he felt responsible for losing in the first place (whom he has almost lost multiple times - the majority of which he felt responsible for). Then, he lost the man that he considered a brother (or perhaps a lover????). Not to mention the fact that by book 8 - aside from Sean - his whole family was dead.

I feel like Halt was bittersweet about his standing as the last of the O'Carricks. One reason, is he's glad no one else has to carry the burden of the (in his mind) cursed name. A part of him however, wonders if perhaps Halt was the curse all along. That was another reason that Halt didn't offer Will the O'Carrick name at his graduation, he was afraid that sharing a surname with Will would leave his former apprentice vulnerable to his curse.

When Will first offered his surname to Halt, the older ranger teared up, and Will was startled when Halt seemed to be on the verge of breaking down.

Before Will could start apologizing, Halt found himself pouring out all of his thoughts about the curse that he had feared his whole life, and his fear of inflicting it on Will and causing him the same misery. Will was completely stunned, because the only other times Halt had been this vulnerable were when he was telling Will about his mother, and when he spoke about his own childhood, and even then, those times were nothing like this. He had never heard this self-loathing from his teacher before but as he processed the words, he realized that it must have been hidden deep within Halt all this time.

Will took Halt's hands in his own, cutting off the older ranger's uncharacteristic rambling, and looked deep into his stricken eyes. "Halt," his quiet voice cut through Halt's mind like an arrow, "You are many things, but a curse is not one of them." Halt's eyes misted over, and it was all he could do to maintain eye contact. Will had never seen this level of vulnerability and hurt in his teacher's gaze, and he would do anything to take his pain away.

"You are not a curse, or a burden, or a monster, and it is not your fault that things with your family turned out the way that they did. You were as much of a victim as they were, if not more so." Here, Will took a deep breath, and bent slightly to maintain eye contact with the Hibernian whose dark gaze had drifted downwards to hide his shame. "Do you know what you are?" The soft question was rhetorical, for Will needed no one to give him answers besides his own heart and memories, "You are a protector, a kind soul, and the greatest man I have ever known. And I am proud beyond belief to call you my friend, mentor, and father."

At this, Halt's gaze snapped back up in shock. How could Will still say that after seeing him like this? After all the broken promises, and the hurt and heartache cause by simply being associated with the former prince? However, before he could speak his thoughts, Will plowed on. "I offer you my surname, not out of a sense of debt or obligation, but because I love you, and I wish for the world to know that we are family, and nothing - no self-believed curse, no painful pasts, and certainly no self doubt - will ever stop me from seeing you as my father. I offer my name because I see how much pain your own brings you, and if I can do even one thing to show you the same care you have always showed for me, then I will gladly do so."

By this time, tears had begun to flow freely down Halt's face, and Will's own eyes burned as well. Slowly, Halt nodded and whispered his acceptance which Will had to strain to hear. The younger ranger pulled his father into a strong yet warm embrace that he could only hope expressed the love he had for the slight man before him.

As Halt melted into the embrace, he felt as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, and though it would never truly leave him, the pain of his curse finally melted away as accepted the family he had feared for so long.

Random Ranger's Apprentice Headcanons (mostly Halt tbh)

I might elaborate further on some of these later, and I definitely have more than I'm posting this time around. Let me know what you guys think. I love having conversations about this shit

~ Will has found that the best way to ground himself during panic attacks or hard days since returning from Skandia is to hold a warm hand and a mug of coffee. He wasn't allowed to have coffee as a slave, and while Cassandra (then Evanlyn) held his hand, hers was always cold

~ Halt has a hard time sleeping because he is constantly plagued by nightmares. When Will was taken, he started having them about his death, and how the apprentice would blame Halt for being too slow

~ Halt is actually ambidextrous. He was born left-handed, but his parents forced him to learn to use his right hand due to left-handedness being seen as a sign of the devil. He still prefers to do a lot of things with his left hand though

~ Crowley is an only child. His parents tried for years, and it was only after they had given up that his mom became pregnant with Crowley. He is close with his parents, but he was unable to talk to them at all after Pritchard was banished up until Morgorath was defeated out of fear of putting them in harm's way

~ It was never diagnosed, (because, yk, the middle ages), but Halt actually has POTS syndrome. It wasn't too bad when he was younger, he would get out of bed and black out sometimes, or he would stand up and have to freeze for a moment until his head and vision cleared, and doing extreme exercises was fine, but walking up the castle steps could only be done with controlled deep breathing. However, in the last year of Will's apprenticeship, it seemed to get worse. The first time he full-on passed out in front of someone, he and Will had made camp, Halt had stood up only to collapse back to the ground. Will was frantic, and practically cradled Halt in his lap until he became responsive again about 12 minutes later

>> Will had never been that terrified in his life, because it was the only time that Halt was ever completely unresponsive when it was just him and Will throughout his whole apprenticeship. The guilt of that terror was what convinced Halt to see a healer (though it didn't do any good)

~ Pauline is 100% open to the idea of bringing Crowley into her and Halt's relationship, but they are both too scared to bring it up to her, so she has to do everything herself

~ He would only say this under threat of imminent death, but Arald sees Halt as a younger brother, mind you, a younger brother who constantly causes chaos and deserves to be cuffed around the ear sometimes, but still

~ Alyss once punched someone in the face and threatened their life for insulting Will behind his back

~ Before KoC, Will played a Hibernian ballad at a ranger gathering, but never noticed Halt slipping away with tears in his eyes, as he had picked one of Caitlyn's favorite songs

~ Believe it or not, Halt is actually incredibly ticklish. Will and Gilan learned this after Crowley pinched his sides at a gathering and Halt shrieked and leapt into the air. They will never let him live it down, and Crowley is obsessed with the weakness, finding it absolutely hilarious and adorable

~ Horace cried the first time he held Maddie. Then Will came to meet her, and he cried even more

~ Halt's regular handwriting is a strange mix between cursive and print, but he can copy anyone else's handwriting with little more than a glance. It's a skill that exasperates anyone who has to read his reports, because if they annoy him beforehand, he'll use their own handwriting

~ Before coming to Araluen, Halt had never seen a snake before, and his unfortunate first meeting was with the renegade rangers when a (fortunately non-venomous) snake got tangled in his blankets and he woke everyone else up screaming absolute bloody murder. Since then, he always freezes at the sight of a snake, and Crowley tells the story any time he's reminded of it

"I'm not short. I'm just uncommonly untall."

-Halt, Will, and literally every ranger besides Gilan

Halt: You ever just look back and cry-

Will: Halt, it's okay to miss your childhood-

Halt: -tears of relief that you don't have to deal with that anymore?

Will: ...Halt, are you okay?

Halt: I'm fine, why?

Whatever you do, don't think about how the song "Remember Everything" by Five Finger Death Punch fits Halt and his childhood trauma to a T.

I'm not going to go into a full analysis. I'm not going to go into a full analysis. I'm not going to go into a full-

FULL ANALYSIS AHEAD (disclaimer: "Remember Everything" does not belong to me)

"Dear mother, I love you. I'm sorry I wasn't good enough. Dear father, forgive me. Cause in your eyes, I just never added up. In my heart I know I failed you, but you left me here alone."

Halt talks about how Ferris was the favorite child, and how his parents fought all the time. We all know by now about Halt's tendency to blame himself for things (as seen in "The Battle for Skandia" and "Erak's Ransom"). He probably blamed himself for his parents arguing all the time - hell, he literally said that he refused to tell his parents that Ferris was actively trying to kill him because he thought that Ferris was the only thing they cared about and he didn't want to take that away from them. Even though it was his choice, Halt was a kid. He probably felt at least a little bit abandoned and betrayed that his parents didn't seem to even notice anything amiss before Halt ran away.

"If I could hold back the rain, would you numb the pain? Cause I remember everything."

Something else that is touched on in the fourth book is Halt's tendency to deflect conversations that confront him on his fears and such. It's a fairly offhand note, but it has some pretty big implications. Halt has this need to make sure that everyone else is okay, while simultaneously ensuring that no one ever sees his suffering. He is constantly shielding other people, and feels guilty when he requires that same protection.

"Dear brother, just don't hate me for never standing by you, or being by your side."

I refuse to believe that Ferris was the murderous evil twin from the start. There was probably a very large portion of heir childhood where Halt and Ferris were close, before Ferris became obsessed with the crown. That would be a good reason why Halt only suspected Ferris later on. I feel like Halt would spend a lot of time telling himself that it was something he did that sent Ferris over the edge, and he would blame himself for the betrayal.

"Dear sister, please don't blame me. I only did what I thought was truly right."

I can't be the only one who thinks that Halt always regretted leaving Caitlyn behind, but he knew it was either that or kill Ferris, which is something I don't think he would ever be capable of doing. He loved his twin too much.

"It's a long and lonely road when you know you walk alone."

I know that Halt wasn't technically alone, and he became part of a massive found family, but not being able to tell anyone about the things he went though, and the people he left behind as well as his reasoning would have been isolating - if not crushing - for anyone. Hell, no one knew his real last name or anything about his past for just about 24 years. Not even mentioning the fact that when he finally admits it, he is 41 years old, so he has hidden this for well over half his life, not counting the 17 years he actually lived in Clonmel. That is a long time to carry around huge amounts of trauma without telling anyone who cares about you.

"I feel like running away, I'm still so far from home."

This one is fairly obvious. However, it is not talked about nearly enough that Halt is a runaway. Let that sink in for a second. What do you think of when you hear the term 'runaway' in reference to a child? For most, it's the thought of a kid escaping an abusive household and living on the streets with nothing but a backpack filled with belongings. That was what Halt did at 17. Except he had to go all the way to a foreign country to escape his situation. And the only person he ever saw from home again was the person who had made him leave in the first place.

"I'll burn it all to the ground before I let you in."

This is pretty much Halt's whole philosophy on showing any sort of emotion to people. He didn't smile around Will until months into his apprenticeship, and it took years until he was able to summon the courage to tell Will the truth about his mother. And again, the whole 24 years of absolute secrecy about his childhood doesn't exactly show someone that is willing to open themselves up to others.

"Please forgive me, I can't forgive you now."

Halt still blames himself for the rift between himself and Ferris, but he is also consumed by hurt and betrayal over the fact that Ferris cared more for the crown then he did his own brother, and I can't blame him even a little bit for feeling that way. Especially considering that when they do finally meet up again, Ferris shows no real sign of regret for his actions.

All-in-all, this just feels like a violently Halt-esque song. The pain and regret is something I think his character suffers a lot of, and this captures that really well.

If you made it to the end of that ungodly ramble, kudos to you because holy hell, I think I was temporarily possessed by the god of angst.

Can we just take a moment to realize just how screwed up Halt's apprenticeship was?

First things first, the fact that it was probably only about 2.5 years at most. According to timelines that I have seen worked out by others, and have worked out myself, Halt probably would have been a few months after his 15th birthday when he met Pritchard, and it's pretty bold to assume that they started training together the day they met. When Halt left Clonmel, he said he was around 17 and a half, so that's maybe 2 years of training. Not to mention the fact that he wasn't even living with Pritchard at the time and was also learning how to rule a country. He probably didn't receive much one-on-one training from the renegade rangers, but I could believe that Pritchard picked up the slack again once they met up. But then Pritchard dies. And then Halt gets his silver oak leaf.

what.

But wait, there's more! Not only did Halt receive absolute minimal training time, but he didn't have the proper equipment either. TEY talks about how the only proper equipment he had was a bow, and that everything else was pretty much jury rigged (like his double scabbard). He didn't even get to start training with a proper ranger horse until months after the very end of his official training. He most likely had to practice with either the closest equivalents to ranger tools or Pritchard's sets.

When you really think about it, Halt probably had to learn most of his skills on the job without backup in Redmont.

But, it gets worse.

You may say, "But Void, how can it get any worse?" and I'll tell you.

There are a few events whose timelines have to be adjusted due to Flagagank's inability to remember his own character's ages (*cough cough* Halt's time with the Temujai *cough cough*), and this means that a lot of the really important missions that Halt was sent on early in his career that are mentioned throughout the books - such as stealing the Temujai horses and taking down whoever that one guy with the mace was - all took place as Halt was still trying to make up for the gap in his training.

Let's put a little perspective on it.

Imagine Will for a minute. Now imagine that he didn't start his training for a good 6 months after Choosing Day, and that he didn't live with Halt, but rather with Baron Arald. At the same time he's training with Halt, he's learning how to do Arald's job, while also fending off assassination attempts. Now, a little under halfway through Will's training, make him leave the country and shove him into an active war situation. He and Halt don't get to meet up until about a year later. Then a few months after that, Halt gets McFucking Murdered. Then, make Will a full-fledged ranger and assign him to a fief.

That's exactly what happened to Halt.

Bro.

It's no wonder he's always so hard on his apprentices. Man has no idea what a normal apprenticeship looks like, he was making shit up as he went

Edit: I think Tumblr ate my posts, so we're trying again to see how it goes

Battle of Skandia is def one of his best books, the Will he warning the water hits me like a fucken bullet train every single time

Also consider:

- Halt telling Will he can do whatever the the fuck he wants to while training the Skandians to shoot

- The fact that the women and children aren’t just locked up somewhere and actually play a role in the battle unlike every other book/film I’ve read recently

- Actual good reason to use volleys instead of free firing

- Halt telling Horace not to give a shit about companionship when the Skandians are running alongside their horses

- Skandians straight up just keeping up with horses on foot just bc they don’t like riding them

underrated scenes from the battle of skandia

read this book in one sitting in a hotel hot tub… here we go

(every scene. it’s every scene)

- the very first page, when it takes Will a solid five minutes to figure out that the sound of dripping water means Thaw

- when Halt and Horace are heading to Skandia from Teutlandt, and Halt can tell that Horace is holding in a question, except Horace has decided not to ask the question, and Halt is going *absolutely nuts* because he wants to know what the question is

- Will tracking Evanlyn and the Temujai who captured her for hours on foot through the snow, despite being desperately out of shape, and he continues on by remembering everything Evanlyn’s done for him

- Halt arriving just in time to save will from the Temujai, and they’re both crying at the reunion. also Tug going batshit crazy when he senses Will in the vicinity and then refusing to leave his side…. yes these are tears in my eyes

- Halt: “I left what I considered a fair price” for the Temujai horses… the fair price being Absolutely Nothing, of course. also, he says this was two decades ago. also, Halt is thirty-six in this scene.

- when Halt and Erak scout the Temujai army for the first time and Halt shoots the Temujai scout from behind cover by picturing where he is in his mind!! what the fuck!!!

- when Halt and Erak escape from the Temujai army and Halt slaps Erak’s horse with his bow to keep it galloping and Erak is clinging on for dear fucking life

- when Halt and Erak return from scouting the Temujai army and Erak dismounts his horse by falling face-first into a snowdrift

- Will regaining his shooting ability, and Erak returning his double knife scabbard because he hoards everything he gets his hands on

- Evanlyn going nuts because she can’t help with the war effort, sneaking onto Slagor’s ship, being trapped there for eighteen hours, discovering an undercover plot, getting exposed as Duncan’s daughter and invoking Ragnak’s Vallasvow to kill her, and turning the fuckin tables on Slagor by exposing him in turn

- Halt dressing up as a Skandian in extremely oversized clothing and subsequently throwing up in the Skandian helmet

- Will and Halt recruiting and training a hundred slaves as archers for the battle, and Will demonstrating incredible leadership skills despite being?? seventeen??

- every moment during the battle, when the little plots and counterattacks that Halt has devised goes exactly to plan, including: Will’s first archer volley taking down an entire Ulan (group of sixty), Will facing literally fifty Kaijin sharpshooters, Horace being the ultimate shieldmate, and Evanlyn directing volleys like a badass. this trio is unmatched.

- also, randomly, POVs from FOUR temujai characters, including the intelligence colonel that exposes Will and Horace’s archers. honestly appreciated because they broke up the battle scenes and Flanagan actually did a fair bit of worldbuilding and characterization

- Horace and Will fighting back-to-back, and Horace tells Will to duck and he flips his sword behind him and stabs the Temujai that Will is fighting

- Evanlyn facing down the deputy general of the Temujai army and his personal bodyguard, not being the slightest bit afraid, and the moment before the downstroke Will throws a knife and kills him

- Halt: “there is not the SLIGHTEST chance Erak becomes Oberjarl” then Erak: “i’m the new Oberjarl” Halt: “i fuckin called it. reverse psychology”

- Horace being knighted by Duncan and appointed to the Royal Guard.

- when Crowley returns Halt’s silver oakleaf and Halt knows that he’s home at last.

CHOOSE YOUR TREATY

But seriously, I wanted to draw this for so long now. It always excited me, for no apparent reason, when Will was changing his ranger uniform.

Also: Skandia Will is there 100% only because I needed an excuse to draw him with slightly longer hair (XD).

Seriously tempted to write a time-travel fic about Will meeting teenage Crown Prince Halt and royally screwing things up in the process. Someone slap me with a brick.

a series of incorrect quotes based on personal interactions:

tennyson: don’t listen to anything this man says. half of what comes out of his mouth is lies!

halt: no

halt: more than half, i’d say

duncan: when halt began teaching crowley hibernian, i was convinced the two of them would use it to talk about me behind my back

*muffled hibernian bickering in the background*

duncan: as it turns out, they mostly use it to antagonize each other without my interference

halt: do we have to go to this funeral? i don’t even know this man!

pauline: he’s dead, if that helps, so you aren’t likely to meet him!

halt: it doesn’t help

will’s fortune cookie: your persistance will soon pay off

will:

will: I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I

crowley: i don’t see how anyone can drink their coffee with honey. it’s disgraceful

halt, behind him, pouring a copious amount of honey into his coffee: oh, yes — truly unthinkable

crowley: *writes “project” on a chalkboard* alright you motley lot, what should we name this project?

berrigan: operation oakleaf

farell: project coffee-beans

halt: mission ‘see-that-morgarath-never-shows-his—sorry-backside-outside-of-gorlan-again’

crowley:

crowley: *underlines “project”* we’ll think on it

will: *carefully places the final card on top of his card tower and sits back proudly*

pre-character development horace: *turns on fan*

In Halt’s Peril, we learn that Will has never ridden Abelard before. Will thinks to himself that Abelard probably wouldn’t throw him off even without the passcode due to them being so used to each other…

This idea struck me one night and i have only drawn it now

But this has already been done so heres the link to the art by @burnin0akleaves

Anyway

Older will kinda looks like halt but thats not halt theyre both will

Greybeard halt!

This took a ridiculous amount of tears and time

Best worst part? Will doesn’t blame Gilan at all. Never once did it even cross his mind that it could be Gilans fault that he got stuck in Skandia, if anything he blamed himself, thought he could do better, be better. Will loves Gilan, it’d tear him apart to know Gilan blamed himself.

Will was just so happy that Gilan cared about him, was kind and funny and helped him train. He would never blame Gilan for his misfortune. He wouldn’t blame Halt either, he was just so glad they loved him enough to come find him.

"Halt and Will" this, "Will and Horace" that, I'm a little insane recently so can we please. please can we talk about Gilan and Will because I'm being driven up the WALLS about them

Gilan first meets Will at the Gathering and he's like, "oh, this dude is tiny. but he's polite and Halt trusts him, so I do, too." and then they find out the Kalkara have been released and that Halt wants him- which is cool, whatever- and Will to go and help him track it. And he's completely fine to put his own life at risk, because he knows Halt and the kingdom and himself, but the moment it processes that Will is going to be walking into danger, he completely stops. I mean sure, he comes around to the plan, but one of the first things he says is, "But he's only a boy!" He barely knows this kid and wants him far away from any kind of danger. And when he listens to Halt, when he sees that Will is fully capable of taking care of himself, he even places trust in him, allowing him to ride Blaze to Redmont and beyond.

And then he takes him on a mission in the Burning Bridge. Can we just. Really process that. Like we all talk about Halt grieving Will after watching him be shipped away, but think about Gilan, who had left Will in charge and the next time he hears about him, he's probably not alive. The guilt would tear him apart. That was his brother, that was the boy he joked with and gave advice to and watched grow, and he left him for only a few days and suddenly he was gone. Not only did he have to grieve, he had to grieve on his own- Halt was spiraling, Crowley was trying to keep Halt in control, and the Rangers still had work to do. He couldn't react like Halt because someone still needed to help search for the convicts. He could only stand by, knowing it was his fault, blaming himself for leaving, unsure if his brother was alive or dead, watching his father become closed-off and wreckless.

When the time comes, he can't even search for Will. Halt goes, losing his title- the way he had even met Gilan, his shared aspect with the man, the part that had initially made him family- to find his brother without him. Gilan has to wait for a year, now without two family members rather than one, unsure if either of them were okay. He didn't even know if they would come home. And still, he has to blame himself, because if he had just taken Will with him back to the kingdom, if he had waited a little while longer, none of this would have happened.

And then Will comes back. The bright boy he had known so long ago is now even smaller than when Gilan had first met him. He has a hard time remembering things and gets cold too easily for a boy his age. His skin is pale and his eyes are tired, and deep down Gilan thinks that he did this. Will went through things no Ranger, especially no Ranger's apprentice, should go through, because of one careless mistake on Gilan. He doesn't know what even happened to him! All he knows is that Will and Halt have changed and Gilan hasn't. He tries to bond with him again, and everyone tells him not to blame himself, but holy shit it all went so wrong and Gilan barely had the chance to know.

And they end up okay, of course. Gilan works to give Will advice in his last year of training, as the mocking-older-brother he is, he makes fun of him when the younger apprentices model themselves after him. But I really think, deep down, Gilan still thinks about what could have happened if Halt hadn't been faster. He thinks about what might have happened if he had been smarter. Gilan wakes up in a cold sweat knowing that he ruined anything and was lucky for it all to be okay.

Anyway, I think we should have more bonding scenes for Gilan and Will and I want them back and I miss them and they mean so much to me and htey're brothers and and

Don’t imagine Will coming home from Skandia. The scars that encase his back, the ache from cold deep in his bones that never quite goes away.

Don’t imagine him flinching away from Halt, eyes shut and shoulders tensed, expecting to be hit. Don’t imagine how his badly still shakes from the after effects of warm weed, the thought of using the salve makes him nauseous. Don’t imagine the nightmares that drag him from sleep screaming, unable to breathe as Halt desperately tries to calm him.

Don’t imagine how he hates winter now, what used to be his favorite, he can’t stand the snow or the thought of being cold, he unable to go outside without a thick coat on.

Don’t imagine how he hate water, especially cold, the phantom pain and chill from working the paddles burning in reminder of the effort.

Don’t imagine how he can work through pain, how he drives his body to the brink of collapse before Halt stops him, how he’s to terrified of failing to allow himself a break, to terrified he won’t be able to continue training.

Don’t imagine how Will 17 and was taken as a space as a prisoner of war, only to fight in another one to protect the same people who enslaved him.

I'm back with more drawings!

Some more art because I love these silly little characters too much