The Sorcerer of the North (Book Five, Ranger's Apprentice)

Will is now a fully-fledged Ranger, with his own sleepy Fief to protect. However, Will finds it a little too sleepy. The only real action he has seen is from a small group of raiding Skandians. Just as he begins to settle in, his childhood friend, courier, and sweetheart, Alyss, appears with an urgent message. Will has been given a mission in the frozen north and will receive the rest of the information at the Ranger Gathering. At the Gathering, it is revealed that in Norgate Fief, the leader of the local garrison was struck down by a strange illness. The townsfolk claim that it was the work of the Evil Sorcerer Mallakam, who lived a thousand years ago, reborn. It is Will's job to pose as a jongleur, a traveling performer, a cross between a bard and a jester, and discover who is really behind the murder. As clue leads to clue, Will begins to realize that there is more to this mystery than meets the eye. When Alyss is captured, the intel mission soon becomes a desperate rescue that may very well decide the fate of Araluen.

The Sorcerer of the North is the first book in which Will is a Ranger. The transformation seems abrupt from an apprentice with at least two years remaining, to becoming a fully-fledged Ranger. John Flanagan realized that he never wrote about how Will became a Ranger. He does so in Book 7, Erak's Ransom.

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