Happy Holidays Everyone!! This is my present to all of you readers out there!! Thanks for reading this year!! XD I hope this story has been worth the time it took to read it. I've certainly enjoyed writing it on. Without further delay, read on!! ~~~~

Will glanced over at Aaron, looking somewhat unsure of himself. However, he didn't look nearly as uneasy as Aaron herself did.

" What do you think he'd do if he knew we both lied to him at the same time?" Will inquired after the silence had dragged on for long enough.

" Find and kill us in the most humiliating way possible," Aaron answered very bluntly to his question. Will gave a sigh. This did nothing to comfort him," but that's nothing compared to what I'm gonna do to him for humiliating my master. Tying him up like a sack, beating him up, calling him Sunfonroy . . ." her voice trailed there as her hands clenched into tightly rolled fists. She grit her teeth tightly, daring the sob to try and make its way out of her body.

" He'll pay for this. Silly, Urosia, you don't know the extent of my fowl words." her words entered the air with a wave of deep strength and resolve that Will had never heard before in his life. " Come on, Will. I've got a Master to save." ~~

" Wait, so that was your Master?" Will asked, riding Tug alongside Rurin with Aaron. " Why didn't he recognize you?" Aaron's face was hidden from Will at this angle, but he was able to hear what she said to him when she spoke even so.

" He did recognize me." Aaron replied, and Will gave an interested look at her. He'd watched the whole thing, and there had only been the slightest hint that the battered older man even realized that Aaron was a person at all. To look from the outside end, that's what it seemed like. Aaron, however, knew her master better then that.

" Really?" Will couldn't help but ask this.

" You idiot!" Aaron snapped at his question harshly. Will jumped from the sharpness in her voice. " Don't you get it?! If my Master hadn't pretended not to know me, we would've been captured for sure!" Will hadn't thought of that. " Urosia was right, but he needed my Master's reaction to confirm that I was his student. When he gave none and pointed out my gender it disoriented the bastard enough that we got away unscathed." She shook her head,
her expression fell to her hands. " All I had to do was make a lie to fit the story."

Will nodded understanding as to what she was saying and was silent. For a moment things stayed like this.

" I think what you said back there really convinced him, though." Glancing up, Will saw Aaron grin at him, rubbing one of her reddened eyes. Will smiled back at her. Knowing that made him glad that he was able to help, even if only a little bit.~~

" It occurs to me," Aaron commented, slowly, " that Gilan and Halt are totally going to kill us for going off without them." Will glanced over at her, their horses moving at a walk, staying out of sight of the back of the army, but close enough they would be able to catch up with them in a good, hard cantor. Giving a sigh, Aaron added. " My Master won't be thanking us either, I suppose."

" I find that hard to believe." Will said, remembering the broken looking older man. Aaron only shrugged to him.

" That's just the way he is. He'll most likely start cursing and cussing in every language he can think of before he even thinks that he should thank us." Aaron replied, looking down at the ground at the tracks. For anybody who even had the slightest tracking ability, the trail was easy to spot even from astride a horse.

" Well, he'll at least think of thanking us eventually." Will grinned at Aaron as he said this, shrugging his shoulders to dismiss the fact that it might take awhile to get the thanks they would deserve.

" That's the idea." Aaron said, glad to hear the optimism Will was putting into this rather bad situation. " You don't have to help me if you don't want to, Will, I mean," she hesitated a moment, " it's not like you have any real reason to put yourself in danger like this. After all, you've never met my Master. I couldn't ask you to help out like this-"

" It's fine," Will interrupted, waving away the worry she was showing him," I would do the same if it was Halt, so I understand. Besides, you would help me if it was the other way around, right?" he asked. Aaron stared a moment. That was quite a vote of faith Will would've given her, if it actually was Halt and not her Master. She hesitated again, conflicted. Then, she set herself straight, remembering her conversation with Gilan not that long ago.

" Yeah," she said, hiding her worried face in the coil of the cloak Gilan had given her all that time ago, back in his actual fief rather then here," you're right. I would help."Will smiled disarmingly at her, then slowed Tug to a stop. Confused, Aaron did the same, waiting to hear what had made Will stop like this. " What is it?" Will glanced over at her.

" They stopped." he replied, dismounting Tug in a practice, smooth movement.

" Really?" Aaron asked, sliding down to the ground after Will now. Will gave a firm nod of his head, very sure of himself. Focusing now, Aaron could see why he was sure of this fact. There was the faint sounds of a large group of people near by and there was a light glow of a fire being started. Aaron glanced over at Will. " Setting up camp, already?" she inquired to him. He shrugged.

" They've got a lot of people and horses to attend to. Besides, its getting pretty late." Will turned his gaze upwards to check the position of the sun. Aaron did the same.

Truth be told, she hadn't noticed that the sun had gotten as low as it did in the sky now. Taking note, she did agree with Will, it was getting late. The sun would be setting soon enough, and having an encampment of men out in the dark trying to set up a camp would be no easy task. Now was the most reasonable time to make a camp with so many people and horses to care for.

" We'll have to be careful to keep from being spotted by any scouting teams looking for fire wood or something like that." Aaron murmured to Will and he nodded agreement to her. Actually, he even glanced over his shoulder, uneasily, looking all around in a nervous sort of way.

" Could we have been followed?" Will asked, suddenly. That had been something to consider. Urosia may have let them all go, but that didn't mean he wouldn't still have people following after them. Aaron gave a vague nod to the fact that this may have been done.

" Maybe, but I don't think so." she told him, the explained. " I mean, we're only two people, how much damage could we possibly inflict in an ambush." Will's brows rose up in a way that reminded Aaron a lot of the way Halt made an inquiry with his eyes rather then his voice, as he so often did.

" They have been following after you all this way, you know. You've certainly proved to them by now that one person can be very dangerous even by his or herself." Will informed her. This was another comment that made Aaron stop and stare at him. That, despite that it was true about the situation, seemed almost too romantic sounding to be realistic. Seriously, one person can make a huge difference? How cliche did that sound when spoken aloud? It took Aaron a moment to recover from this statement.

" Yes, but they most likely believe that all my braver was all from desperation of being chased by an army." Aaron said, slipping forwards on hands and knees, then hiding into the shadows, trying to get closer to get a better look at this campsite being made. " The majority probably think that I'm just some innocent victim at this point, thanks to that lie I told." With that she became sad again, remembering that had all been thanks to her Master again. Will came up and joined her, patting her shoulder and smiling at her.

" We'll get him back," he insisted, firmly to her," no matter what." Aaron blinked at him a moment, then gave a smile behind the hood of Gilan's cloak.

" Yeah." she answered, nodding once to him. " Thank you."

Getting on the ground once more, she slid along to a different tree nearby to hide, glancing around the side of it. Trying to get a good view of the layout of the campsite itself. She focused the most on finding her captive Master, however. Finally she found him.

" He's along the other side." she hissed over at Will, and he nodded, confirming that he'd heard hear and knew where to look.

" We'll need to find a way around the guards." Will whispered in reply to her.

" Let's take this one step at a time from the beginning, Will." Aaron said, and got down on the ground for the third time to sneak away so that she and Will could talk more freely.

They talked all the while until the sun sank away from the sky, disappearing over the horizon and out of sight. All the while they did their best to keep watch for any of the soldiers sent out to find supplies.

" Go on." Aaron hushed to Rurin, stroking his nose affectionately. Rurin tossed his head, meaning he understood what she was telling him, and with one final pat from Aaron he walked off as if without a care, Tug following along after because Will had instructed him to do so.

That didn't mean he liked this though, Tug preferred to be close to Will so that he could help in case of any danger. Only because Will had told him, he followed this bumbling stallion away, and out of sight of the two people.

" Hope this works." Will said to Aaron, who giggled at him.

" Got any advice on how to sneak up on people?" she asked him with a grin, tilting her head at him, clearly interested in what he would tell her about this.

" Seriously? You don't know?" Will was surprised to hear this question come from Aaron of all people. She frowned, disappointed with him. Holding out her arms in a gesture of frustration, she said to him.

" Do I look like a Ranger to you?" Will became bashful, scratching the back of his head with embarrassment. Oops, he hadn't meant to make Aaron mad or anything.

" You seem it a lot of times though." Will said in reply. Sighing, Aaron shrugged to him.

" My Master was a Ranger at one time. He always taught me what I would be useful in certain areas while we were traveled. That didn't include stalking people in the woods like this," she then spoke thoughtfully as she added, " I could tell you how to sneak up on people in the desert or the plains. I can also teach you to give convincing lies, though you probably guessed I could do that from before. Anyways, any advice?" she persisted. Will took a minute to think about what Halt had taught him about this.

" Well, Halt always tells me-"~~~~

Well, that's the chapter. What next? Only I know!! LOLZ!! Hope you enjoyed the chapter and your holidays! Reviewing me would be a wonderful gift for me!! Thank you very much!!