| Halt's Ranger Apprentices | This is War | Volume 2 |

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Will, Horace and Evanlyn scampered back to where Logan and Alex awaited.

They both stood with the horses underneath a shadow that engulfed them with darkness almost invisible to anyone except Will who had his eyes trained eyes of a ranger.

He could make out the tense shoulders of the brothers and the way the huddled underneath their cloaks trying to form a barrier between the bare parts of their skin and the cold harsh wind. But, if everything went to plan, they wouldn't feel even a tiny bit of the cold when they set the bridge alight, and let the flames lick the bridge to ashes.

Only if it worked.

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The two rangers had scouted for an hour before the sun had fully hidden itself under the horizon completely, gathering as much information as possible to aid in the slowly forming plan.

Annabelle's original plan had been good, but as they found their way through the cave of pitch blackness, still unaware of the hiding Skandians, who were just as unaware that they were moving past them, they found camps spread out with awaiting forces of Skandians and Wargals to join the war, and a new plan began to form.

Along with their break-through information that the Skandians were working in favour for Lord Morgarath, they had come across an empty Skandian camp, seeming to be the only one unoccupied. Assuming they had gone to another camp and could be back any moment went to leave, when a barrel caught their eye, seemingly attempted to be hidden underneath branches and leaves. After looking inside, a black powder settled comfortably inside it, the smell making the two rangers wrinkle their nose in disgust as it tickled up their notrils.

They decided to take a handful, the importance written all over it from the way it had been hidden. The Sun had disappeared when Annabelle and Gilan ventured away from the camp and the construction. They studied it for a moment, decided what to do with it after they came to the conclusion that it must need something else to aid in it's importance and it's usefulness.

Annabelle had dipped her finger in, letting the powder smother her index finger like a layer of skin and poked out her tongue, but didn't get to taste since Gilan slapped her hand away, telling her of the poison that could be lacing it. And so, they kept a long gaze on it, Gilan finally huffing, giving in to the mystery and volunteering that they forget about it and go on with their plan.

But Annabelle felt a tingling in her mind, like it felt so obvious what it was meant to be for. It had to be meant for something, and something important that would make the Skandians hide it under shrubs. And that's when she realised what the scent that made he nostrils flare from the black powder smelt like.

Smoke.

If it smelt like smoke, maybe it produced smoke, what produced smoke?

Fire.

Grabbing a pinch of the black powder so it could settle a little way away from the rest of the bigger pile just to be safe,she gathered the stone and flint that she and Gilan had been using for their fires. She stuck three time before the fire engulf the powder, and a gasp struck through both Gilan and Annabelle's mouths as a small puff of fire seemed to attempt to jump up to her before a small stream of smoke was all that was left in replacement of the black powder.

She recalled how it was like the fire puffed like a red cloud, saw how the grass beneath it had singed to black, and how the smoke streamed up like a mourning for the dead grass it had given death to as the needles folded into each other.

Gilan grabbed Annabelle's shoulder tightly, his breath audibly loud as it rushed through his lips, his chest heaving wide to small, against her arm. She didn't need to look in Gilan's eyes to know that he had come to the same conclusion as she did.