All right. Oh, can you tell it's me? XD! I start every chappy or story like that, I know. That's a sure sign it's me. It's like my...signature or something. So how about we get on with the story and read? XD!

Unlikely Hero

Summary: How did Halt really meet Pauline; and what happened when he did? Was it a disaster, or love at first sight? Halt/Pauline Halt/Crowley

*Rated T for swearing and some violence. Parents are strongly warned.

Chapter One: Suspicions

As always, Crowley was busy. He was always doing something seemingly important, Halt thought somewhat bitterly. It was as if he tried to drive him away. As if that would ever happen; Crowley was the only one Halt wasn't too shy to talk to. And Halt was incredibly shy.

He didn't like Redmont fief very much, nor the castle; it was much too noisy for his taste, too crowded. Most of the time he wondered how on earth he was still alive, surviving this horrible place. Dun Kilty was even better than this place, in his opinion, and he had run for his life from that place. It had either been that or be killed by his twin brother, Ferris, who wanted the crown. Halt hadn't wanted the crown at all, but, of course, he had been the first born, and thus destined for a life of being the crown Prince of Hibernia. He had hated it.

Since he was ashamed of both running away and being a Prince, Halt made sure to keep his position in life a secret from everybody except Crowley, who had found out eventually, by guessing and putting together all the clues, such as why Halt looked so much like Prince Ferris, why he had a very thick Hibernian accent, and other things among those.

But unlike everyone else who noticed these strange aspects about Halt, Crowley persisted on knowing the whole truth. Halt both admired and hated him for it. Crowley had found him briefly after he had run away from his home and ended up in Araluen, and Halt still marveled at how Crowley had managed to teach him the ways of something called a Ranger, a protector of the kingdom, and Crowley still marveled at how everything came easily to Halt, the last person he had expected to get the hang of any of the training.

Training. Halt had never done such a thing before at Dun Kilty, knowing that all he had to do was call for a servant to do anything for him: get him something to eat or drink, fetch him a book to read, bring his younger sister to his room so he could talk to her for a while in quiet voices so that Ferris or their parents would not hear them, so that they would not know about the special bond Halt and Caitlyn shared, or that Halt really could talk, and was not, after all, a mute.

Halt was most certainly not a mute.

With a muffled curse he gripped his hand, as he had just cut himself on his throwing knife; having been bored, he had gone down to the edge of the forest to continue training with his bow, saxe knife, and throwing knife. While pondering, deep in thought, he had unconsciously squeezed the sharp blade of the smaller of the knives in his left hand, effectively making a deep slice appear on his palm. Crimson blood slipped quietly down the inside of his forearm, and he moped at it with his cloak sleeve.

Ranger cloaks. They were so odd! A mixture of greens and grays, something Crowley called camouflage, Halt could practically become invisible while wearing it. Being invisible was something that he liked, having had always wished for invisibility when he was a year younger, as he had been seventeen when he had run away from Dun Kilty.

"Damn," Halt muttered, clutching his still-bleeding hand. If anything, the flow had increased in speed and amount. Brilliant; this was exactly what he needed. Dropping his stained throwing knife to the ground, he gritted his teeth against the pain, and wrapped his hand up in a piece of cloth, torn straight from his tunic. Then he ran back up the the castle, knowing that he needed to clean the wound to fight infection.

He had always been a small boy, quite a bit below average height, with dark hair he kept a bit long and sharp, stern features, as well as keen, very dark brown eyes and fair skin, as if he had just gone through a somewhat warm winter and was freshly pale, but still with color to him. His voice was quite deep, but soft-spoken, with that wretched accent that betrayed him as a Hibernian, and people were usually surprised at how intelligent he was.

Having reached Redmont's castle, Halt slipped into the courtyard, but froze in place when he saw Crowley. Crowley was suppose to be working, wasn't it? In his room. Not out here in the courtyard—with a girl his age! What was this? Crowley had told Halt he needed to work, and was extremely busy. Not too busy to be out here with a girl, Halt thought curiously. So this was why his friend had seemed so distant and work-plagued all week.

At least now he knew. But who was the girl? Even from this far-away distance, Halt could tell that she was very pretty; she was tall, like Crowley, with long blonde hair and fair skin, and she carried herself erect with dignity and grace. That was all Halt could see, though; her back was to him.

And now he was angry. Crowley had lied to him! His temper had always gotten the better of him, and of course he stormed right over to where his one and only friend was, with that girl. "So you can put off your work to be with her," he cried as he came up behind Crowley, "but you can't even spend two minutes talking to me?"

"H-Halt?" Crowley spun around, looking devastated at being caught, and went pale, and then red. "Ah—I have no idea what you're talking about. I was just, uh..."

"What the hell is this?" Halt demanded, still very hurt and angry. He raised both hands accusingly, and Crowley caught sight of the bloody, saturated cloth around Halt's wound, and his face blanched.

"What have you done to your hand, Halt?" he exclaimed.

"It doesn't matter right now!" Halt snapped. But Crowley caught his wrist in an iron grip and removed the sopping cloth carefully, grimacing as he saw the wound.

"Dear God, Halt, what did you do to yourself?" He sighed quietly. The girl, who was definitely beautiful now that Halt could see her clearly, with her pretty blonde hair, flawless face, and large gray eyes, peered around Crowley to take a look, and blinked in both concern and shock. In Halt's opinion, the wound wasn't very serious, but these two acted as if the world was coming to an end!

"You need to get a physician or somebody to clean this up," Crowley said seriously. "You'll need a lot of stitches, Halt. How did this happen?"

As always, Halt mumbled the reply. He hated admitting to any weaknesses, and now that the initial anger and outrage was over, his shyness took place again. The fact that this girl was extremely attractive didn't make it much better, and he stumbled over the words.

"What?" Crowley said, frowning. "I couldn't hear you. Stop mumbling so much, and speak up."

"I was training...," Halt muttered, a bit more loudly, and pulled his wounded hand out of Crowley's grasp. He hated being babied like this. "I held onto my throwing knife too hard. Nothing very serious; I'll be fine in a moment."

Crowley rolled his eyes. "Of course you will; you're only bleeding all over the place. And you tore your tunic. Go put on something decent, and Pauline here will go get a physician with me. We'll be back in a little bit. Oh, and Halt?" he added as Halt turned away, glaring at the world in general. "You'd better tell your mentor what happened, or else he'll most likely mommy all over you."

"I've never heard the word 'mommy' used as a verb," the girl—Pauline?—said in a voice that was every bit as graceful and pretty as her figure. "I'll have to use that term more often; I quite like it."

Halt scowled, and stalked out of the courtyard.

So how do you like it so far? ^?^ I just luvvers Halt soooo muchers :D! XD geez I'm a dork. Well, Halt is 18 in this, by the way. There will be tons of chappies for you guys(:

Anyway, this story is rated T for many reasons. First of all, Halt and Crowley swear, as you read from when Halt was angry at Crowley and when he—oopsies—cut himself. Second of all, there is some violence and blood. There is also kissing in some parts. So parents are strongly warned of this. I'll write some more in a bit haha! I might even write like, 5 chappies today. That would be ahwesome. So what do you do now? Read and rate, of course XD!

Velvet out!