Hello again! I have uploaded two chapters so I hope you like them both. I know I said I would upload on a Saturday but I decided I wouldn't have a set date in case I didn't have time to write a chapter.

Disclaimer: I don't own rangers apprentice and I never have. It all belongs to John Flanagan except for my characters.

Mark sat looking at the grass below him. He was sat in a small three with his cloak hanging next to him. He looked around the small clearing and could just make out Arianna walking into the stables. She walked out again with a puzzled look on her face, she was sure she had checked everywhere but she still couldn't find him. Mark laughed, he was playing hide and seek with Arianna and he had been sat in the tree for about ten minutes. He had only climbed a couple of branches into the tree so that Arianna could still see him. He had even taken off his cloak so that he wouldn't blend into the forest behind him.

"Mark! Mark!" he heard Arianna shout. She was looking everywhere except up. No one ever looked up. They looked left, right and down but never up.

"Mark, Where are you?" Mark could hear her shouting. He was surprised Alyss hadn't come out yet wondering what was going on, but then she was very busy doing things for the diplomatic service. How had he got to sitting to sitting in the most uncomfortable tree in the world waiting for a ten year old girl to find him? He thought for a moment. Will had given him the day of and he had gone out with his friends. He waited at the gate to Redmont castle for Joe and Tom and then they had gone off into the village. They had walked around the village showing each other what they had learnt in their crafts and how much the liked it.

Joe and Tom had both changed since Mark had become apprenticed to Will. They had all grown taller, which was to be expected as they were all growing boys. Joe had gotten stronger and looked more muscular than before and he said that, "When you went on runs up hills with rocks on your back and swung a sword around all day I wasn't expecting to not become stronger. In fact I would be slightly disappointed if I didn't."

Tom had grown up and was more mature than before but he became his childish self when he had spent a few minutes with Mark and Joe. Mark also noticed that Tom smelt a little of horse poop, but then he did work with horses all day. Tom also had a yellow-green bruise on his right arm which was in the shape of a horse shoe. Luckily he hadn't broken anything but he couldn't use his right arm very well.

Mark had also changed. Now he was a lot stronger and not the stick he was before. He had also become very nimble and extremely sneaky. He had even decided to jump out on Joe and Tom when they were at the gate and he had scared both of them half to death. At three o'clock he headed back to the cottage to find Arianna pestering Alyss to play with her but Alyss as she was doing some work for Lady Pauline. Arianna turned round in time to catch Mark walking through the door and she asked him to play with her. Mark had said yes and now he was up a tree with a branch digging into his back.

He looked out at the cottage, he could see the stables and the archery range but he couldn't see Arianna. He scanned all over the clearing but Arianna definitely wasn't there. What if she had fallen over and hurt herself? Or what if someone had taken her? Mark quickly expelled the thoughts from his mind. No she was only tricking him. She had seen him and decided to hide herself. He looked out at the clearing again and looked at all the spots to hide. She wasn't there and he was starting to get really nervous. He got ready to jump down from the tree when he felt a pair of hands on his back and someone shouted 'Boo' in his ear. Mark lost his grip on the tree and fell to the ground. He looked up at the tree and let out a sigh and a laugh of relief at the same time. Arianna was looking down at him.

"Don't do that" he said.

"Do what?"

"Scare me like that!" he said as he stood up brushing himself off. "I thought you had hurt yourself"

"Sorry. I didn't know it would scare you so much."

"No I am sorry, you just scared me. I don't think your dad would be happy if you got lost or you got hurt." Mark looked at Arianna.

"Are you all right?" Arianna asked as she looked at Mark up and down.

"Yeah im fine"

"No you're not! You're bleeding! I'll go get mum." With that she ran off to the house.

"Arianna stop. It's just a scratch." He walked off after her limping slightly. Maybe it wasn't a scratch he thought. Alyss fussed over him. She liked Mark, he was a good boy and from what she could tell he was a good apprentice. She cleaned up his knee to stop it getting infected and then bandaged it up to stop the bleeding. There was quite a bit of blood.

"What happened?" she asked as she washed the bowl of water she had used to clean Marks leg.

"Nothing I just fell over, that's all." Alyss looked at Mark for a few seconds. She could tell that wasn't everything but left it as it was. She could tell that Mark didn't want to talk about it and she wasn't going to push him.

"I think I might go to my room." Mark stood up and went into his bedroom closing the door behind him. He limped over to his desk and pulled a map out of the draw. He laid it flat on his bed and looked at it concentration written all over his face.

The map Mark was looking at was a map of Araluen. It was a very simple map and showed the main fiefs in Araluen. It showed the rivers in Araluen and all the main points like the Solitary Plain and Thorntree forest. Mark remembered where the Tarbus River was because it was the closest river to Redmont. At the top of the map it showed Picta and its border and at the bottom in showed Celtica and its border. At the bottom it also showed Morgarath's Plateau. Mark didn't know much about Morgarath because Morgarath died before Mark was born, but he did know that Morgarath had started a war against Araluen. Will had also told him that Morgarath had got the Skandians involved too.

Will had given Mark the map to learn all of the main points and places in Araluen. Mark found it a little boring but he studied it any way when he had nothing to do. He did this because he knew that he needed to know the main parts in Araluen when he was a ranger. As he was looking at the map he heard Will open the door and come into the house, he then he heard Arianna run up and shout Daddy. Mark looked back at the map. In the middle was a fief called Gorlan. Whenever he wanted to ask Will about it he was never here. He quickly got up regretting it as pain shot through his leg. He winced and limped over to his bedroom door. Will was sitting at the table with Arianna on his lap.

"Hello Mark" Will said looking up at his apprentice.

"Hi. I was wondering what Gorlan fief is. I've never heard of it." Mark sat down at the table to take the weight of his leg.

"Ok, remember the first day you became my apprentice I told you about Morgarath and that he tried to take over Araluen twice." Will looked at Mark to see if he remembered.

"Yeah my granddad fought in the first battle." Mark smiled as he thought about his family. "He lived in Araluen for a while."

"My dad fought in that battle too" Will said. There was a silence as Will and Mark thought about their family. "Anyway Morgarath was the Baron of Gorlan until King Duncan became king. The castle is in ruins now."

"Ok" Mark started to walk back to his room but was stopped by Will.

"What happened to your leg?" Mark sighed he had hoped Will wouldn't notice.

"Oh I fell over." Mark hoped Will wouldn't ask any more questions but knew he would. He turned round and saw that Will had one eyebrow raised. "I.."

"I had asked Mark to play hide and seek with me and he said yes." Arianna quickly said before Mark could say any more. "Then I was hiding up a tree and Mark found me so he climbed up to get me but then I slipped and Mark stopped me falling but he fell out himself." Will looked at them both. Arianna had spoke so fast that it took him a while to figure out what she had said.

"Thank you Mark, Arianna you should be more careful. Next time don't climb any trees."

"Ok dad." She looked down at the ground. At first Mark thought she was pretending to be sad but then he realised that she was actually smiling and trying to not let her dad see.

"Well I should go back to my room," Mark said before turning round and limping to his room. He went and sat back on his bed and looked at the map. Ten minutes later he heard a knock on his door. He got up and opened it expecting it to be Will. He was a little shocked to find Arianna waiting patiently at his door. He let her in and then went and sat back on his bed.

"I'm sorry about you hurting your leg" she said.

"Don't worry you didn't know I would fall out of the tree." Mark smiled as he said this. In all his life he had never fallen out of a tree but he did now because a ten year old had scared him. "Why did you tell your dad that?"

"Well you have been an apprentice ranger for a while now, I didn't think you would really want to tell my dad that a ten year old girl had crept up on you and scared you. I could tell that you were thinking about something at the time and I didn't think you would want to tell my dad that you were weren't paying attention to the things around you. I didn't want you to get in trouble with him." Mark looked at her and smiled.

"Thanks, but you didn't need to lie to your dad for me" Mark said.

"I didn't lie really. Everything did happen but it was just the other way round." Arianna stopped for a second considering whether to say what she wanted to next. "You are like a brother to me." Mark stopped what he was doing to look up at her and smile.

Did you like it? I know not much happened in this chapter but I wanted to concentrate on Mark and Arianna's friendship. The idea of Mark falling out a tree was given to me by Alex the Rogue thank you, although I don't really know how I got the rest of the chapter from that. Thank you to everyone that reviewed my last chapter Hibernia12, Alex the Rogue, AmazingWriter123, AriannaTheRanger and Lorrie the Ninja Elf.