The flickering shadows danced on his face as we inched closer. I glanced at his eyes, but quickly averted my gaze when my stomach tied into a knot. His arms grabbed mine tightly and within seconds he'd slammed me into a nearby wall. He put a finger in front of his mouth, signaling me to be quiet. His gaze was serious and his focus was on something, or someone in the nearby street.

Heavy steps and clinking of coins echoed through the empty street and came closer. I could recognise a man with long grey hair in the dim light with great difficulty, but I didn't get the time to further observe him. Gilan dragged me along with him to follow the elder gentleman, who I assumed was the Majordomos we'd met today. Though I wasn't sure, I hadn't had much time with him.

We followed him silently, through countless alleys until we arrived at the main street. He seemed to fly, his feet barely made a sound when they connected to ground. When we reached the end of the street- and of the village- we'd already caught up to the man with a heavy bag full of coins. He was about ten meters in front of us.

The majordomos wasn't making any haste with the bag. He kept his head down and didn't pay any attention to his surroundings.

We ran over the field to the edge of the forest and kept following the edge, running parallel to the street in the direction of the castle. The shady man on the street kept falling further and further behind.

After sundown the sentry guards had left their posts at the beginning of the small headland. The only guard left was the one in the castle, behind the let down for the night portcullis. And there were soldiers patrolling on the walls of course.

Following the road, we came out by the castle's first tower, where a steep path led to a wrought iron gate. It had a small door in it, through which the majordomos had probably slipped out to the town.

"Like always, a secret entrance." Mumbled Gilan half to himself, startling me thoroughly since we both hadn't said a word since our almost kiss.

I furrowed my brows and stood still, glaring at my mentor. "And you didn't think of this this morning?"

He looked over his shoulder with a mischievous grin and replied: "No."

I was one-hundred precent sure that he'd thought of it, but that his inner teacher voice told him to throw me out the window. Somehow I suspected that this voice was heavily influenced by his former mentor, Halt.

As I was about to follow Gilan through the secret entrance he suddenly turned around and grabbed my wrist, which sent me flying into his chest. I kept my eyes fixated on the ground, to distract myself from the bubbling warmth that crept up my body. Gilan's grip tightened  and for a second I thought, or rather hoped, we'd pick up where we'd left off earlier. But instead he let go and took a step back, mumbling a quick sorry.

"You need to go to our room, if you get caught here too in Ranger's clothes we'll have a lot of explaining to do." He whispered, while nodding his head towards the stairs.

I gave him a weak smile, nodded and followed his advice. It wasn't very hard with all of the dark shadows in the dimly lit castle halls that I could use to blend in.

I did hate the fact that at missions like these I had to be sidelined, but on the other hand nobody would ever suspect me to be a Ranger, which was the best cover I could ask for. It had saved my life before and I imagined it would many times after that.

When I arrived I pushed open the heavy oak door, I immediately took off my shoes and threw them in a corner. I unbraided my hair and changed into a long white nightgown. It was a bit itchy. I threw a longing look at Gilan's bags which I knew were filled with all sorts of comfortable shirts. Could I take one? Do friends share clothes too? I decided against it, whatever the answer was it'd only confuse me further.

I placed my hands on the edges of the sink and stared at my reflection in the mirror intensely for a moment. My hair had grown out again. With horror I thought back to the moment I had to cut it. It sent a cold shiver down my spine and I quickly shook my head, throwing a splash of cold water in my face to cleanse out the memory and any other that might try to creep up on me. My grip tightened as a heavy nausea clenched my mid-rif. The thought of even thinking of it had been too much. Just after the battle it had been worse though. I decided it would be better to lay down.

So, I slipped under the heavy covers and just as I'd found a comfortable position the door croaked open and Gilan walked in. Another, but different wave of nausea washed over me coincidentally at the same moment, so I focused on my hand laying in my lap hoping to calm my stomach. Maybe it was a side effect of a fake pregnancy.

"How'd it go?"

"He hid the money in a safe," he explained as he took off his cloak and carefully hung it over one of the chairs at the end of the bed, "I'm not sure if he's in league with Foldar though."

Then he continued to pull his shirt over his head, without a warning. My face probably lit up a brighter crimson than a crispy apple and I hurriedly took a sip of water from the cup on my night stand. But of course luckily for me at that exact moment some of it went down wrong.

"I don't think-" I stopped and tried to cough nonchalantly, earning a raised eyebrow from Gilan. I waved it off and continued.

"I don't think he was in town-" I coughed again, a bit more aggressively this time- "-tonight."

From the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of him changing into his night clothes, which only made my cough worse. Gilan stopped and studied me a bit longer this time.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

I gave him an unconvincing thumbs up, downing some more water, with my gaze tightly wrapped up on the wall, in hopes of stopping this embarrassment.

When he finally slid into bed, I'd already laid down and I watched him also laying down but with his back to me. He then turned around, our noses almost touching. His eyes flickered over my face and I immediately imagined him closing the gap between us. Why did my mind always go there?

"Did you find anything that could help us track Foldar down?"

I was snapped out of my fantasies and was brought back to reality with a harsh blow.

"Not much," I answered while shaking my head and pursing my lips, "I got caught up before I got the chance to look for tracks."

Gilans frowned. "With what?"

I fiddled with my fingers and sucked in a shaky breath. "Oh.. well, you know... just..., just my little brother."

His eyebrows sparked up in surprise as I told him, but then a smile broke through. "That's great, you always went on about how much you missed your siblings! Which one was it, Steven or Fred-"

I slowly shook my head and he immediately stopped rambling. "What's wrong?"

I got upright, threw my legs over the side of the bed, then turned my face away from him. Pressure started building behind my eyes and soon enough the tears were rolling. I wanted to tell him, but I was sure as soon as I'd open my mouth my voice would shatter.

The mattress moved under me and suddenly Gilan softly tapped me on my shoulder. When I looked, he had his arms spread open. I took the invitation gladly, letting myself fall into his embrace and crying my eyes out. He held me so tightly, like he was afraid I could slip away at any moment. I loved every second of it.

"I never should've left." I croaked out against his chest.

"You made the right call," his fingers ran through my hair and with his other hand he'd secured my waist, "nobody would've won if you'd stayed."

"But at least it would've been me that suffered, not them. I can take it."

"What are you talking about?"

I pushed myself off Gilan to look at him. "Steven, he's doing all the things I did, Gil! The thieving, the scheming and-"

My eyes went wide, because it was in that moment I realised something very important. I threw off the covers and jumped out of bed. Frantically I rummaged through my Ranger's uniform, that laid spread out over the bathroom, until I got my hands on my pants. I felt around in the back pocket and soon enough felt a small piece of paper in it.

A/N:
Sooooo guys, long time no see. Heh. I'm really sorry for not updating for this long. BUT I'm back now and I can even confirm that there will be a third book. It'll be the last one, but it's going to be a lot of fun I promise you! If you've got any theories/ suggestions about what might happen in it feel free to comment it :). Have a nice weekend and see ya next week❤️!