Tragedy in the Sands- Chapter 2

Summary : I know I'm going this backwards…. (Erak's Ransom) The tower which Will was shooting from collapses and the rest of the crew have to rescue him and save him before it's too late.

Authors Note: I did the math a while back and I found out that Will would be like 20 or 21 during this book but I am going to say that he is 18 or 19. Big thanks to my first two reviewers, TortoisetheStoryteller and moniquebowman who had awesome advice!

Halt turned back to Yusal and his two men, who by that time had noticed his presence. The man to the left was the quickest to react. He drew his sword and swung a round house curve at Halt. He promptly ducked under it and punched the man so hard he heard ribs snap and break. The man doubled over and dropped his sword, which halt scooped up and forced into his neck. The other man just stood there and trembled as Halt calmly approached. He begged for mercy. Halt responded with a slit across the minion's neck, then he turned to finish off the leader. Yusal, gone was his army and money, he had nothing left to fight for. He simply sunk to the ground and Halt swung a final overhead stroke which resulted in the beheading of the "forgotten of god".

The grim ranger stepped back from the edge of the killing rage that had overcome him when he remembered what had happened to his apprentice. He looked back up to the cliff hoping to see Will rising out of the ruins, but no such luck.

Halt came to the remains of the tower breathing in ragged breaths alongside Horace and Gilan; without saying a word they fanned out to search the wreckage.

Horace was a mess. The fight in the market place was almost over when the tower went down. He had been sitting on the executioner's platform steps, cleaning his "borrowed" sword when he heard the dreadful noise. He sat there with his heart in his mouth as he witnessed the tower collapse. He was still in shock until Halt was standing in front of him, forcing him to his feet. Together they took off sprinting towards the cliff with Gilan appearing at their side.

Now as Horace searched he hoped against hope that Will was going to tap him on the back, and be grinning that ridiculous, infectious smile at the panic he caused them. But it never came because Horace had his heart frozen at the moment; due to the fact that he had spotted a tuff of brown hair sticking out underneath a large beam, lying in a pile of rubble.

"HALT! OVER HERE! ...halt!" Horace's voice was all choked up and swollen shut from angst, so he hoped Halt had heard him the first time. He didn't think his throat would allow him to say it again.

Halt and Gilan came running towards him. They approached with hope filled eyes, which slowly drained as they surveyed their fallen comrade's hair and undoubtedly his body hidden underneath. Together, Horace, Gilan and Halt were able to lift the log up and place it aside to reveal the unconscious, bruised, bloody form of Will.

Blood was oozing down the youngest ranger's cheek due to a gash above his right eye. A large part of Will's brown hair, now bleached blonder by the sun, was darkening by the spread of blood that flowed out of his scalp. The way one of his arms lay, Halt could tell that it was broken, at the very least badly dislocated or fractured. But none of those injuries compared to the rapidly widening circle of crimson red coming through Will's shirt on his stomach. All three of them immediately knelt beside their brother and son as they looked for the source of the bleeding. They didn't speak. Shock, panic and pain had descended upon them in a thick murky cloud. Will was the only thing they could see. Halt struggled to keep his hand steady has he picked up the offending object, responsible for the hole in Will's side. A jagged piece of wood. It lay beside Will's limp, open hand. "He was probably conscious when he first fell and pulled it out." Halt thought.

Gil could see Halt was too distracted, so he charged himself with the duty of pressing his unhooked cloak onto the gaping wound to stanch the flow of blood; Will had already lost a lot of the precious liquid matter to the sandy ground. Meanwhile as Horace looked down on his friend he felt the first traces of guilt creep in to his heart. "If I had never gotten captured then Will would have never had to rescue us and be stuck in this situation." He told himself. But deep down he knew it was not his fault. Will would have done the same thing regardless, that was just who he was.

Halt had finally gathered himself enough to focus on saving the boy, who managed to wiggle himself in to a position to be considered his son. He felt for a pulse along his neck, it was there but faint and fluttery, not a good sign. He pulled his hand away and found that his two fingers were now covered in blood. It took a lot of self-control not to scream, so he just calmly wiped it on his cloak. He looked up at Horace and realized he would cope better if he had something active to do so he said to him, "Horace focus…he's going to be fine, alright? But I need you to go get healers NOW...HURRY!"

The last two words didn't apply to Horace. He took off his sword, so as to not slow him down, and just kept his dagger; then even though he wasn't completely himself, he still had his long legs which he used to great effect. He was off, his legs churning in a blur like right out of a Wiley coyote episode. Halt and Gilan watched him go and hoped he wouldn't faceplant.

Turning back to Will, Halt realized that Gilan had his torso wound as much under control as it could be. He instead grabbed a corner of his cloak and set to work trying to soak up the blood that was escaping out of the gouge on Will's scalp. When the blood flow had slowed considerably to a more comfortable rate, he relieved Gil from his position. Only when he settled down in the spot where Gilan had once occupied did the full gravity of the situation hit him. As he put pressure on Will's stomach, warm blood dribbled out, underneath the red soaked cloak, and stained his hands. He could have howled in despair and frustration but he did not want to frighten Gilan; he needed to focus of Will. But he suspected Gil already knew what he was thinking because he looked up and met Halt's gaze with fierce determination and reassurance, for which he was silently grateful for.

Just when Halt thought Will couldn't hold on much longer, Horace reappeared. And he had brought the healer.

Horace did not even seem to have broken a sweat whereas the healer had enough on him for the both of them. Horace had his hand firmly latched on his collar and was dragging him up the hill. He didn't relinquish his hold, until the healer went to kneel down beside Will. Like Halt, he felt for his pulse and then reached in to his satchel and took out a small vial. He knelt forward to drop some of the contents into Will's mouth but Halt stepped into intervene.

"Whoa, what are you putting in him?" he asked accusatorily.

"This is Angel's breath, as the local call it. It helps stabilize his body, which is going into shock." The healer replied simply.

"Why aren't you operating on him?" Horace chipped in demandingly.

"I can't do that here, it is not clean enough. Unless you want diseases and infection to kill him before he bleeds out." The healer replied impatiently.

Halt hesitated, part of his instincts told him to stay where he was and keep constant pressure on the wounded area. "Risk the disease." But another part said, "Don't risk it. If Will has lost this much blood then what is a little more?" He chose the latter.

"Fine lets go. Gil lets swap cloaks, tie yours to Will using Horace's belt. Horace, you keep it in place for him."

Now that Halt was back to his former self Gilan felt much more confident. As Gilan and Horace worked on tying the makeshift "Band-Aid", around Will's middle, on as hard as they could Will let out a small moan. They all stopped, and waited for Will to come round and open his eyes. When he failed to perform his friends looked to the healer.

"Don't worry he won't wake up. The angel's breath will see to that. But even so we should hurry." He reassured them.

Halt bent down and slipped his well-defined arms underneath the limp form of his slender apprentice. He lifted Will up in a bridal carry, which would have been sure to embarrass him had he been conscious. As he lifted him up, Will's head fell lightly on Halt's shoulder. He had to adjust his hand position when Will again let out at small cry of pain. Gilan and Horace looked at each other sadly. Even though they both desired for Will to be ok, it didn't seem to be pointing in that direction.

Stay tuned guys! Thank you again!