Horace crossed his arms. "Will, please. Please don't make this any harder than it already is."

A flash of red-hot anger crossed his friend's face, before it was over-taken once more by the frustrated helplessness that broke the knight's heart. And while his friend's most prominent emotion comforted Horace on whether or whether not Will was involved in this, the emotion that seemed to be actively concealed concerned the tall knight. If Will was innocent, he wouldn't have such fierce anger. If Will was guilty, his helplessness wouldn't be as prominent.

His friend was hiding something.

"Seriously Horace? You seriously think I had something to do with this?" the smaller Ranger snapped back. There was also the irritation to think of, Horace added.

They were standing in front of each other, Horace on the lower step to Will's porch, and Will standing on the porch itself. Even with Horace standing on the lower ground, Will was still slightly shorter then him, but they were closer to eye-to-eye contact, which Horace did think was necessary for this conversation. The Ranger's cloak could be seen thrown over the back of a chair on the deck, and his bow was currently leaning up against the same chair with his cloak. Horace could see no sign of Will's quiver, but his double sheath was still attached firmly to his waist, with both the hefty saxe knife, and his lighter, smaller, throwing knife.

Horace resented the fact that he had to watch Will for sudden attacks. That he had to scan Will for his weapons, to know if he was dangerous. Will was his friend! Horace had known Will for pretty much his entire life, and he couldn't bring himself to believe that . . .

"Will, I don't know what I'm thinking right now. All I know is that there is a shit-ton of evidence that you had something to do with what happened to Duncan! And honestly? I want you to prove me wrong! Please, it'd make things so much easier having you help me with this," he's evading the question, Horace realized that, but couldn't help but hope there was another reason as to why.

Is it possible he's being blackmailed? Or maybe we're missing more then we think, and we're just grasping at straws – deadly straws, hurtful straws – and Will just so happened to be the victim of my colleague's blind reach?

Will shook his head, grunted, and looked away from Horace. They stood like that, possibly for a few minutes, probably only for a few seconds, before Will turned and looked back into the house.

"Will . . . " Horace started, but the Ranger didn't turn back. He kept his faced turned towards the cabin behind him.

The knight swallowed his growing annoyance, and took the opportunity to look around. He already knew this cabin as well as his own rooms back at Castle Araluen, and little had changed. The clearing was still, the little cabin, which Will had claimed from Halt, was clean and cluttered at the same time, which Will somehow managed to make charming. The small front porch still had the pair of chairs, and –

There were two mugs of coffee on the porch.

Will was waiting for him to leave. He hadn't counted on Horace seeing the cups, or he had forgotten about them entirely.

Now Horace could feel his anger rising. Did Will have something to do with this? What if he actually did know something?

He recalled the anger he saw in Will's eyes earlier. If something pissed the small Ranger off enough, he would react. Violently, and with purpose. One of the most memorable times Will let his anger get the best of him was in Macindaw. Alyss was captured, and Will took it upon himself to deal with it. He even went as far as to risk a siege with only thirty men. Will even told Horace when they were alone underneath the cart that he wanted to meet Keren to 'at least put an arrow in his eye socket', preferably not with Alyss around.

Maybe the anger wasn't directed at him. Maybe he had meant for him to see the mugs.

"You know what, Will? Screw this. Forget I said anything. You want to help me with something? It's in Kicker's saddle bags, so come on." He had left Kicker further from the porch, nearly in the middle of the clearing. He turned to move, and started walking without checking to see if Will was following. He didn't need to check. Footsteps, near silent ones, were following directly behind him. They sounded to Will's normal stride, so Horace didn't worry about someone else other than the Ranger following him.

When he got to Kicker, he threw open the saddle bags, and started to rummage around. Will stood silently next to him, arms crossed, back stiff. After a few minutes of 'rummaging', Horace paused in his search, looked into the saddle bag deeper, then continued he search, seemingly intent on finding what he wanted help with.

"So," Horace started casually, but quiet enough that anyone in the cabin couldn't hear, "you want to tell me who's your new lady friend?"

Will was silent, then "His name is Damien Stone, thanks."

Horace pulled out the dagger he had found months ago, and slipped it into the sheath he'd found earlier, and slapped it into Will's outstretched hand. His friend's face was stone, but there seemed to be a weight lifted from his shoulders.

"Ohh, I know her," Horace said as he closed the saddle bags, and mounted Kicker, "I remember taking her to a few dances a couple months ago. Damn, I took her, but she never danced with me. But she looks killer at the Waltz."

Will smiled sadly, looking up to his friend. "Yeah. I've danced with her a few times myself. Only once during the Waltz. And she is."

"Killer?" Horace asked.

"Killer."

"That's good to know. Hey, thanks for warning me about the Waltz, I was thinking about asking her to dance real soon." Horace moved to turn Kicker around, and back towards the trail before another thought caught up to him. "Oh, and buddy? Keep that dagger on you. You never know when you might need an extra blade."

(A/N): I know I don't usually have notes at the end of these, but I thought I'd just say: I'll be using the name Damien Stone as an all-around name, usually for the same persona of "he wants to kill Duncan, he's a bad guy". Cool? Cool.

Also, in case you didn't get it, Will's 'new lady friend', or his blackmailer, is named Damien Stone. Horace has 'taken her to a few dances' or met him before, but never 'danced with her', or fought with him himself, but he says 'she looks killer at the Waltz', or extremely dangerous. Will 'danced with her a few times' 'only once during the Waltz', or fought with him a few times, only when he was dangerous. The killer part is what it is, 'And she is. Killer? Killer.' Because he actually is a killer. And when Horace says 'I was thinking about taking her to dance again real soon', he's basically implying that he's getting ready to beat the shit out of him for screwing around with his friend. :)