Fourteen-year-old Will has one great dream: to become a knight in the Kingdom of Araluen. If only he would grow!! As the smallest of all the orphans being kept by the Baron, his chances of being chosen for Battleschool are slim. When he is finally assigned an apprenticeship, it is his abilities to move across a field unseen, climb steep tower walls like a spider, and his great inquisitiveness that land him an assignment with the Ranger instead. The next days are filled with learning about Rangers—they are the intelligence arm of the king’s forces. The next months are filled with practicing the skills Rangers use—knife throwing, stealth moving, tracking the enemy, listening in without being seen, and learning to work with his unstoppable pony Tug. In the meantime, Will’s friend Horace is having a harder time in his assignment at Battleschool. He is humiliated, harassed and beaten by three upper classmen, and he thinks the authorities intentionally look the other way. A deep resentment starts burning inside of Horace, with a bitterness that threatens long-term trouble. He doesn’t realize that his instructors look at him as “a natural”, with the talent to be one of the great swordsmen of all time. Horace alienates his friends, including Will, and then they face life-threatening danger together. Bigger trouble lies ahead as rumors of war whisper through the intelligence community, and Will joins his master in facing the dangerous beasts called Kalkara that are slaying the military leaders of Araluen.
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