A Collection of Ranger's Apprentice Theories

The Magic of Ranger Horses

"They say a Ranger horse can talk to its rider. Can tell him what it thinks, what it senses," says Young Bob in 'Tournament at Gorlan.' He's an authority on Ranger horses, seeing as he's the breeder.

Flanagan has flirted with the idea of magic throughout the series, though most mentions of the Ranger to horse bond can be explained away as the Rangers projecting themselves on a horse's random behavior. After all, talking to pets is nothing new, especially in a solitary life. This is sort of confirmed in 'The Wolf,' when new-Tug tells Will, "If it's in your mind, I know it." A projection of the Ranger would have all the background information a new horse should not have—and yet, what if Ranger horses could receive information from their masters' mind? What if Ranger horses are actually talking?

In 'Duel at Araluen,' Maddie slept peacefully when her Ranger-issued horse Bumper woke her up to inform her a ship is passing, then corrected her on ship terminology, claiming he hears things. Maddie accuses him of being a know-it-all, indicating a pattern of her horse knowing things she does not, and may not even know in her subconscious or from context.

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Ranger-verified statistics of supernatural cases are provided in 'The Sorcerer of the North': 95% are mumbo jumbo and trickery solved through physical violence or talking to Malcolm; 3% are mind domination and manipulation of a weaker mind by a stronger, like what Morgarath exercised over his Wargals; 1% are mass hallucinations that some people are able to create, similar to mind control but where people 'see' and 'hear' things that aren't there; and the remaining 1% has no logical explanation, a last resort far from satisfactory where Flanagan typically resolves his mysteries with one of the other three options.

Mumbo jumbo and/or trickery is highly improbable. This is science-based, like lanterns, hidden strings, and chemical compounds. The illusion is viewed with one's own eyes or heard with one's ears, but can be broken down into a series of work-arounds and special effects. If the most scientific explanation—projection of Ranger thoughts on a horse's body language—is rejected, then so too is the entire trickery category. No one is following Rangers in their day-to-day business, potentially out of the country, to maintain the illusion.

Mass hallucinations are similarly not promising for the same reason. How would only certain connections between Rangers and specific horses exist for the time they're paired? During the events of 'Scorpion Mountain,' a room of assassins must ingest a hallucinogen or relaxant to form this effect, and Rangers' diets are so varied it would be difficult to trace. Halt's secret "spices" for stews are not guaranteed to be in anyone else's preferred secret "spices" ('The Ruins of Gorlan').

If the coffee often believed to be a Ranger staple is the funky element, why don't the non-Rangers have a similar relationship to their horses after consuming the drink from the same pot? And in the presence of coffee over the events of 'The Tournament at Gorlan,' Leander and Berrigan share a flask of wine, and Egon drinks water, so only Halt and Crowley would be impacted.

This leaves the category of mind domination and manipulation, something Flanagan has used repeatedly with the Wargals, Kalkara, and the blue jewel used on Alyss in Macindaw.

It's possible to send visual cues and emotions through this link, proven with Morgarath and the Wargals, and how they stopped training when sensing Morgarath's anger or frustration. Eventually, he even transmitted speech training to convince the Wargals to speak. Whether the horses can transmit emotions or images that manifest as words, or the witty sentences themselves, this explanation is a winner.

Wargals are very, very afraid of horses—and it's all of them, after thousands of years without human interference, according to 'The Battle at Hackham Heath.' It can be deduced this might be a rational fear with a continued reason to be afraid. Of note, Flanagan does mention in 'The Burning Bridge' it was the actual Battle at Hackham Heath which formed this fear of horses, but other plot referenced in 'The Ruins at Gorlan' were retconned as well for the prequel series, and said series gave the impression that the fear came before the battle.

What's scarier than a four-legged, long-faced creature rubbing in mind domination by sending across witty slander?

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Halt has met a few people while traveling who claim they can read minds or send telepathic messages without any explanation other than they actually have that ability ('The Battle of Hackham Heath'). In fact, Morgarath seems to be one of the people able to send mental messages, as Halt and Norman, the man in the mountains, can feel Morgarath's messages to the Wargals as featherlight intrusions into the consciousness, where focusing on it causes it to disappear.

Rangers aren't in the upper hand with horses, though. Otherwise, Rangers would be able to clearly communicate with all horses, and perhaps even Wargals. On Saddler's Farm, Halt is supposed to choose a horse and only forms a connection with one of them ('The Tournament at Gorlan'). The saying is that a Ranger horse chooses the Ranger, and their horses tend to initiate the connection based on what their Ranger is feeling or saying, rather than the Ranger trying to speak to the horse like a conscious being. Rangers are extra self-conscious about talking to their horse because it seems imaginary—not a conscious skill.

Rangers are smart people; as Halt put it in 'The Ruins of Gorlan,' it's best if the intelligence force is intelligent. However, Morgarath is intelligent himself, and gets so exhausted he's out of breath while projecting images to the Wargals in 'The Battle of Hackham Heath.' Rangers are never out of breath from communicating with their horses, and don't appear to practice either, so it's just something that happens to them rather than something they do to their horses. Perhaps not so coincidentally, Ranger horses are specially trained and show signs of being exceptionally smart as well.

It's time to consider that Morgarath's horse, Warlock, has actually been dominating Morgarath's mind this whole time.

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Crowley: (switches to mental channel 7) Cormac, come in Cormac.

Cormac: This is Cormac. I'm retired, what do you want? Over.

Crowley: Stop eating all the grass on my lawn. Duncan likes his parklands green. Over.

Cormac: Roger that. Eat more grass. (continues munching on the Royal Parklands below the Castle Araluen, to the King's dismay)