The Farmer's War (Golden Guard Trilogy Book 3) by Elise Kova
After a long stretch of silence, Craig rose to the bait. “And why is that?”
“Because it would be a shame for a member of the Golden Guard not to march with the rest of us.” Craig grew still, like a fawn suddenly aware of a predator lurking nearby.
“What are you talking about?”
“You heard I’d been made a member of the guard… but you didn’t seem to hear that the membership was conditional.” Daniel reached into the satchel he wore slung over his shoulder and retrieved a second bracer nearly identical to the one he currently wore on his wrist.
Craig’s face traversed the spectrum of emotions. Surprise, desire, appreciation, skepticism, and then—what Daniel had expected least—anger.
“I don’t want your charity.”
“This isn’t charity. You earned it,” Daniel insisted. He kept talking before Craig could get in another self-deprecating word. “Raylynn insisted too.”
The mention of his mentor soothed Craig some. “She did?”
“She did. And Baldair was enthusiastic as well. He even said, ‘Daniel and Craig, sounds good together, like its own name.’” Daniel laughed at the thought.
“Why did you do this?” Craig’s hands half-hovered in the air. Daniel knew he was just about ready to accept his new role, but hesitation lingered.
“Why?” He thought it would’ve been obvious. “Because if I get sent out on a mission, how in the Mother’s fiery dawns will I ever find my way?”
“So I’m to be your navigator?” Craig’s grin gave away that his words were not, in reality, rooted in ire.
“Because I may have started to enjoy your company?”
“May have?” It wasn’t good enough either.
“Because I’m told this guard is all about brotherhood. And are you not my brother?”
That did it.
Craig extended his forearm and Daniel twisted his wrist into the golden bracer. “And since you are indeed the brother I was never born with, I wanted to see your dream come to pass.”
Craig slowly pulled his arm to his chest, running his hands over the bracer now extended from wrist nearly to elbow. Daniel noticed his reverence for the token, and felt reaffirmed in his decision. Craig would be a good addition to the guard, that he knew. No one else in the army wanted it more than him.
“Well, now that my dream has come to pass... we shall see to yours.”
“And what dream is that?” They resumed their walk back toward the center of camp.
“Your position in the castle—which you are all but assured now.” Craig tapped his bracer. “And your Willow, married and fat with your children.”
Daniel laughed. “If she so chooses to bestow children on me, then yes.”
“And you know, through it all, Uncle Craig will be there to help.”
“Uncle Craig?” Daniel repeated, amused.
“Is that not what a brother is to his brother’s children?”
“You are right, indeed,” Daniel agreed with a small smile.
“Trust me, I’ll always know the way.” Craig threw his arm around Daniel’s shoulder and the two walked toward the Camp Palace.
Daniel turned his eyes skyward, toward the infinite stretch of blue above them. He wondered if Willow looked up at the same sky, if she longed for him as he did for her. He would find out soon enough.
For the first time, Daniel felt like his life was on course for far greater things than a farmer’s son ever could have hoped.
Epilogue
Craig stared out the window listlessly. War had followed them from the North. The army had returned with all the fanfare and celebration one could expect, hollow victors waving banners without meaning.
Soricium still had not fallen. Despite the Emperor’s bold claims, none of them had any reason to believe the conflict would end before winter was over. Time and again, the Northerners proved nothing if not resourceful, determined, and cunning.
In the fading light of the sun, he could still see the smoldering remains of a good portion of the Southern Capital. A few determined Northerners had done much damage, and not just to the capital. If there was any hope of integrating them with the South, it had been lost with this attack.
And then, there were the even stranger circumstances that had thwarted them.
Craig turned his eyes to a patch of town at the apex of it all. There, the buildings had been blown to gravel. A windstorm in the capital, a vortex of sound and gale. Craig shuddered at the mere thought of such sorcery.
The door to the sitting room opened and Craig’s attention pulled away from the destruction to a familiar silhouette.
“Baldair is looking for you,” Raylynn announced.
“For what?” he asked, though he was already moving toward the door.
“Who knows with him anymore.” Raylynn shrugged. “He seems genuinely concerned for Prince Aldrik’s play thing?”
Craig had always noted that Raylynn never dropped the elder prince’s title. For all her brazenness and lack of care, she remained true to decorum for only three: the Emperor, the Crown Prince, and the Lord of the West.
“The girl who made the windstorm?” Craig remembered Baldair mentioning the sport he’d been having at his elder brother’s expense, but it seemed par for the course for the two of them—nothing of note.
At least, nothing of note until the word “Windwalker” entered the conversation.
“He’s in his room.”
Craig never thought he would’ve been given easy access to the Imperial quarters of the palace. But with the golden cuff on his arm, nothing was off-limits. Still, the gilded splendor of the palance never lost its shine with Craig.
Baldair was just where Raylynn said he’d be, pacing around the billiards table in the sitting area of his personal chamber. His crown—a simple golden circlet—had been discarded haphazardly along with his ceremonial cape. There was a rare knit to the prince’s brow.
“You wanted to see me?”
“Ah, yes, Craig…” Baldair seemed slow to recollect why he had summoned his most recent addition to the Guard. “I have a task for you.”
“Yes?”
“I need you to guard the prisoner. The girl, Vhalla Yarl.”
“The one from last night…?” Craig asked hesitantly. “She’s a sorcerer, shouldn’t Jax—”
“No.” Baldair shook his head. “Jax draws too much attention just by breathing. It must be you. But take off your bracer. Don’t let her know of your association with me just yet.”
“Why not?” There were forces at play here beyond Craig’s understanding—that much was becoming more apparent by the second.
“I put her in this situation.” Baldair ran a hand through his hair. His strained tone prevented further inquiry, despite Craig’s burning desire for details. “I don’t think she’ll want anyone associated with me.”
“Bracer will be removed, then.”
“Go to her promptly. She’ll be in need of new guards soon enough.”
“What happened to her last ones?”
“A fate you won’t have to worry about.” Baldair smiled sadly, but left his cryptic answer lingering.
“One thing…” A thought crossed Craig’s mind that couldn’t be put aside once it had jumped to the forefront of his thoughts. “I’d like Daniel to be stationed with me.”
“I was going to suggest it, had you not brought it up.”
That was one of the many things Craig appreciated about the prince—his attentiveness to his loyal subjects.
“How is he handling things?”
“Not well.” Craig had been having a hard time getting the man to say anything the past few days.
“I’m not surprised.” Baldair sighed heavily. “So many things need fixing… Maybe we should stop breaking them for a while.”
The statement
“I’ll go find him now.” Craig dismissed himself.
Daniel was out by the training field. He’d taken to scribbling in a notebook ever since Willow had left him, but he never let anyone else see what he wrote, not even Craig. As expected, the leather book snapped shut the moment Craig approached.
“We have a job,” Craig said before Daniel could send him away.
Daniel merely blinked at him.
“I know you’re still stinging from Willow.” At the mention of the woman’s name, Daniel became profoundly interested in the stitching on his journal. His friend made no motion to speak, or even look at Craig, but the reaction was overall improved from the inconsolable man Daniel had been a few weeks ago after Willow had announced her intentions for another. “But there’s a person. She needs our help.”
He may have been exaggerating a bit, but the heavier words seemed to carry the desired weight. At the very least, Craig hoped this mission would once more imbue his friend with a sense of purpose. Daniel had seemed lost since he no longer had a wife to fight for and a home to build.
“Who?” Daniel asked softly.
“Her name is Vhalla Yarl, and Baldair has informed me that we are to protect her.”
Daniel was still and silent, processing in his own reticent way. Finally, he stood. It was the first moment in recent memory that he seemed to stand fully upright—to fully embody himself.
“Then protect her we shall.”
Sorcerer… Soldier… Savior…
Who is Vhalla Yarl?
The Golden Guard are tasked with the protection of eighteen year old library apprentice turned elemental sorcerer Vhalla Yarl. Now, read her story in the Air Awakens series.
BOOK ONE
A library apprentice, a sorcerer prince, and an unbreakable magic bond...
The Solaris Empire is one conquest away from uniting the continent, and the rare elemental magic sleeping in seventeen-year-old library apprentice Vhalla Yarl could shift the tides of war.
Vhalla has always been taught to fear the Tower of Sorcerers, a mysterious magic society, and has been happy in her quiet world of books. But after she unknowingly saves the life of one of the most powerful sorcerers of them all--the Crown Prince Aldrik--she finds herself enticed into his world. Now she must decide her future: Embrace her sorcery and leave the life she’s known, or eradicate her magic and remain as she’s always been. And with powerful forces lurking in the shadows, Vhalla’s indecision could cost her more than she ever imagined.
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A new world from Elise Kova
Her vengeance. His vision.
Ari lost everything she once loved when the Five Guilds’ resistance fell to the Dragon King. Now, she uses her unparalleled gift for clockwork machinery in tandem with notoriously unscrupulous morals to contribute to a thriving underground organ market. There isn’t a place on Loom that is secure from the engineer-turned-thief, and her magical talents are sold to the highest bidder as long as the job defies their Dragon oppressors.
Cvareh would do anything to see his sister usurp the Dragon King and sit on the throne. His family’s house has endured the shame of being the lowest rung in the Dragons’ society for far too long. The Alchemist Guild, down on Loom, may just hold the key to putting his kin in power, if Cvareh can get to them before the Dragon King’s assassins.
When Ari stumbles upon a wounded Cvareh, she sees an opportunity to slaughter an enemy and make a profit off his corpse. But the Dragon sees an opportunity to navigate Loom with the best person to get him where he wants to go.
He offers her the one thing Ari can’t refuse: A wish of her greatest desire, if she brings him to the Alchemists of Loom.
About The Author
Elise Kova has always had a profound love of fantastical worlds. Somehow, she managed to focus on the real world long enough to graduate with a Master’s in Business Administration before crawling back under her favorite writing blanket to conceptualize her next magic system. She currently lives in St. Petersburg, Florida, and when she s not writing can be found playing video games, watching anime, or talking with readers on social media.
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Elise Kova, The Farmer's War (Golden Guard Trilogy Book 3)