The Ruins of Gorlan

Will’s home for the first 15 years of his life, Castle Redmont stands on a hill at the center of a forested fief ruled over by the powerful, yet kindly, Baron Arald. The hilltop castle “was a massive, three-sided structure, facing roughly west and with a tower at each of the three corners” (47). It’s built of nearly indestructible ironstone that seems to glow, at dawn or dusk, with red light; hence, the castle’s name. Will’s yearmates become apprenticed to several of the castle’s Craftmasters, while Will is sent to the nearby forest for training in the Ranger arts. The castle is Will’s childhood home; later, it represents the prosperous, peaceful world that Will strives to protect from outside enemies.

The Stone Flutes on the Solitary Plain are “a circle of standing stones built by the ancients, smack in the middle of the windiest part of the Plain […] arranged in such a way that the wind is deflected around the circle, and through a series of holes in the stones themselves. They create a constant keening sound” (189). Perhaps meant to discourage strangers from visiting, the Flutes stand in the region where the Kalkara monsters make their lair.

In reality, a similarly shaped circle of tall monoliths, Stonehenge—built thousands of years ago by a mysterious ancient culture, perhaps for religious or astronomical purposes—stands in the south of England. Where Araluen stands in for England, the Stone Flutes are positioned roughly at the site of Stonehenge. Stonehenge, too, may have been built with music in mind: It hums in a brisk wind. (Cascone, Sarah. “A Remarkable New Study Suggests That Stonehenge Was Built to Amplify Sound During Ancient Ruling-Class Rituals.” Artnet, 3 Sep 2020.)

The Stone Flutes serve as a foreboding warning to Will and Halt as they travel closer to the Kalkara’s lair. The Flutes are often described to emit an unbearable moaning as the wind passes through them, and they’re located in a remote part of the kingdom. The Flutes become the signal for the end of civilization and begin Will and Halt’s confrontation with the evil they’ve sworn to battle as Rangers.

A hooded cloak in mottled green and gray is standard issue to Rangers, who use its coloration as a disguise. Rangers rely on invisibility when they spy on foreign enemies, and the cloak’s color combination helps to camouflage them: “the Ranger could wrap himself in that strange, mottled, gray-green cloak of his and seem to melt into the background, blending with the shadows until he was invisible” (37). It also imparts a sense of mystery to those who wear it. It’s a symbol of the craft and cleverness of the Rangers.

The depiction of the Ranger’s clock throughout the narrative reflects Will’s journey as an apprentice and his character growth throughout the story. At first glance, the cloak worn by Halt is a signal of secrecy, doubt, and mistrustful concealment that Will does not understand. As Will begins to train under Halt, the cloak becomes a welcome badge of honor and a sight for relief as he locates his master in times of peril. Becoming a fully-fledged apprentice in his own right, the cloak becomes one of protection and safety by the end of the novel. The transition reflects Will’s inward and outward growth as he left behind the doubt of his childhood to grow into the well-versed Ranger’s apprentice.