Chapter Sixteen
The shard had gone eerily still beside me, and I eyed its twinkling purple form with dread.
Where the hell was I supposed to hide something that large and recognizable from a group of trained soldiers whose sole purpose was to find it?
“The longer you stall, the more impatient we become!” Nuro bellowed out. “Open the gate, or suffer the consequences.”
Nuro had a big set of balls to threaten me on my own land, but denying them entry now would only make things harder for the other people in Gladewood.
As much as I hated to admit it, I couldn’t tell them to piss off.
They were the King’s Hands, a literal extension of his power, and while I liked sticking it to the man as much as the next person, I couldn’t become a traitor to the crown.
My life had been, up until Drakar came along, ?simple. I’d been content farming and providing for the town I now called home, and I had zero intention of getting involved in things that didn’t concern me.
But when Drakar brought the shard to Old Reldan Lake and forced my hand, I’d been thrust into this messy and sticky web. And now, I had to let the King’s men onto my land and pretend I didn’t have the one thing they wanted.
My farmhands had stumbled out of the barn and were staring at me with wide eyes. Even Ellyn and Fang had made their way out of the house and were watching me expectantly for my next move.
It was down to me how I handled this, and I couldn’t put their lives at risk for delaying the inevitable.
An uncomfortable silence settled across the farm, and it was so thick and heavy that I thought it was going to choke me out.
I had to act, and fast.
“Get inside,” I said to the shard as I ushered it toward the house. “Hide under the bed and stay there. I’ll try to keep them out of the house.”
“Don’t you think that’s the first place they’ll look?” Ellyn whispered to me.
“It’s so obvious that I hope they look elsewhere,” I replied. “Nuro knows I’m smart. Call it… misdirection.”
“I hope you’re right,” Ellyn said as her eyebrows pulled down into a sharp ‘V’ shape.
“Me, too,” I said with a weak smile before I turned to the long stretch of path leading to the gate.
This was it. This was the moment I’d been dreading. And now, there was no running from the golden soldiers sitting outside the threshold of my farm.
Once the shard had disappeared into the house, I gave silent permission to the vines to open for the soldiers and pulled Ellyn against my side.
“Get back to work,” I said to the farmhands, who were still standing like statues outside ?the barn. “Act like it’s a normal day. You’re finishing up work, and you’re about to go home.”
“R-Right.” Briony nodded her ginger head and grabbed her husband’s hand. “Come on, Fergus. There’s one more cow left to milk.”
The others slowly shuffled back into the barn, but Brom remained outside. His face was stoic, and his shoulders were squared. He stared at me with those narrowed brown eyes, and I knew what he was silently telling me.
If things got hairy, he’d be there.
I didn’t want it to come to that, because if we injured or killed a Hand of the king, we’d be in a lot more trouble than we already were.
“Go,” I said with a reassuring nod. “Everything will be fine.”
I heard Brom grunt before he turned on his heel and marched back into the barn.
“Fang, get back inside,” I ordered the pup, who had been growling at the soldiers lurking beyond the wall.
The wolf let out a low whine, but I gave him a stern look that left no room for argument. As he trotted back indoors, I heard the familiar sound of the vines squelching as they peeled themselves back.
When the vine wall finally unfurled itself, every single soldier who’d waltzed into town the other day was revealed atop their pearly-white mares. They shimmered like a legion of golden statues as the afternoon sun caught the metal.
Nuro was at the head of the party, and it was he who nudged his horse over the threshold first.
The others followed suit, and I spotted Aila beside Lieutenant Giian. She kept her head bowed low, and out of everyone marching toward us, she looked the most uncomfortable to be here.
They made their way slowly toward us, and I noticed their eager eyes scanning every inch of my farm as they approached my house.
Ellyn pressed herself tighter against my side and rested a hand on my chest. No doubt she could feel my heart rattling against my rib cage, but I kept my face neutral and unbothered.
I couldn’t give anything away. I’d already managed to keep the shard a secret from Shaar and the Hands for this long, and I had no intention of making my life more complicated by them finding out now.
“Nuro,” I greeted the Commander as he pulled his horse to a stop in front of me. “What an… unexpected visit.”
“A necessary one,” the stoic soldier said bluntly. “I’m glad you saw reason in letting us in.”
“There was a delay,” I said. “Magic isn’t as strong here, so the wall didn’t open as quickly as it would have in Gladewood.”
“I’m sure that’s the truth,” Nuro said in an unconvinced tone. “We’re here to inspect your farm. You can either join us and let us do what we need to, or be difficult. The choice is yours.”
“What do you need to inspect my farm for?” I frowned. “Shaar isn’t here.”
“You can never be certain,” the Commander said. “He’s a slippery fellow. You and I have seen it firsthand. This is simply to rule out all possibilities.”
Bullshit.
They weren’t here for Shaar. They were here for what was hiding under my bed.
“Search all you want,” I said. “I don’t think Shaar would choose to hide in the dirt on my farm out of all the other places in Gladewood Crossing.”
“Split off!” Nuro ordered in a loud, booming voice. “Hand Lieutenant Giian, take four men to the pig pens and coops. Hand Braun, take three to the barns. The rest of you come with me to the crop fields.”
The golden soldiers split off into the designated groups, and I felt my throat dry up as they sprawled across my farmland like unwanted ants.
Every swallow felt like nails tearing apart my esophagus, but I kept calm and squeezed Ellyn’s hips.
“Why don’t you stay here while I accompany Commander Nuro?” I asked my wife.
In other words, guard the door and make sure no one gets inside.
Ellyn seemed to understand my hidden question, and she nodded with a shaky smile.
“Of course,” she murmured. “I’ll read my book on the porch while I wait.”
Ellyn whisked herself away into the house to grab a book as a distraction, and I forced myself to follow after Nuro and his small squad of soldiers, who had begun making their way down the dirt trail toward my crops.
Aila had hung back and offered me her hand, just as she’d done numerous times before. I swallowed my pride and took it, and I hoisted myself up to sit behind her on her saddle.
She kicked her horse’s side without a word, and the white mare puffed her lips as she trotted over to Nuro.
The soldiers had spread out across the vast landscape, but as soon as they forced their horses onto my irrigation fields, I couldn’t hold my tongue anymore.
Hooves sank into the hardened mud, and the crops I’d been growing by magic were trampled beneath the horses’ heavy weight.
“Can you not trample my crops?” I called out in agitation. “You can see everything from the dirt track!”
“A thorough investigation is needed,” Nuro dismissed. “Calm yourself.”
“Shaar hasn’t shrunk himself down and hidden behind a goddamn leaf,” I snapped. “This is unnecessary, and you know it. Call your men out of the fields.”
“You do realize who you’re talking to, don’t you?” Nuro asked as he partially turned his head in my direction.
“Yeah, a Hand of the King,” I drawled with a roll of my eyes. “But as the biggest provider of food for Gladewood, a town you’ve supposedly been tasked with protecting, I think you’d want to not trample that food supply.”
Nuro eyed me up and down with his cold, piercing green eyes, and then he grunted.
“Don’t trample the crops,” Nuro ordered his men with a dismissive wave of his golden hand. “Especially not a crop as rare as firevyrn.”
My blood ran cold as the commander recognized the fabled magic crop. The only reason I’d been able to awaken the once dormant seeds was because of the shard. No one else had managed to do so since the Emberstone was shattered, which meant it growing on my farm put me right under the microscope.
“Yes, it is rare,” I said calmly. “Which is why I’d appreciate a little more care from your men.”
“That’s firevyrn?” Aila asked as she turned to the crop with wide eyes. “I… I thought it was impossible to grow.”
“It was,” Nuro said as he rolled his gold-plated shoulders. “But Noah here has somehow managed it.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat as his scrutinizing eyes tried to pick me apart, thread by thread.
“Tell me, how is it you have managed to grow a crop no one else has in hundreds of years?” the Commander asked as he pulled his horse to a stop. “Strange, for a human farmer like you.”
My heart was hammering against my chest, and I could hear the heavy pulse in my ears, but I forced my voice to come out calm and steady.
“We had Starfall not too long ago,” I said. “It’s one of the things that saved this town.”
“Other than you,” Nuro said dryly. “Starfall isn’t enough to reawaken the magic in those seeds.”
“I’ve been transparent about the shard passing through these parts,” I added before he could call my bluff. “It reawakened the magical animals in the Mist Woods, so I didn’t question things when it reawakened these crops, either.”
All eyes were on me now. The men scattered across the fields had paused in their ‘searching’ and focused their attention on me. Clearly, having firevyrn beneath their feet had surprised them.
“You don’t need to look so suspicious,” I said curtly. “Magic is just a way of life here now. My wife has powers, just like most of the elves in town. Just because I’ve managed to grow firevyrn doesn’t mean anything.”
“Well, of course,” Nuro said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “After all, what could it mean?”