The Yeoman: Crying Albion Series - Book 1 Read online

  About the Author

  Tyler Danann was born in the United Kingdom and he served in the armed forces in the 1990s and early 2000s. Having been on operations in the Balkans and traveled across the globe his experiences have afforded a rich sampling of worlds, ways and peoples.

  A global traveler; his research, imagination and adventure-spirit chronicle the new worlds of Terra's Edge.

  The Yeoman

  Crying Albion Series

  Book 1

  By

  Tyler Danann

  COPYRIGHT © TYLER DANANN 2015

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  This book is sold subject to the condition it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be copied, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated in print or electronic means, without the author's prior consent.

  This is a work of fiction. All the Characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

  Front cover and design by Kerry Hynds.

  Printed by CreateSpace, An Amazon.com Company

  ASIN: B019JAURWM

  ISBN-13: 978-1522846468

  ISBN-10: 1522846468

  Acknowledgments

  I'd like to express my thanks and gratitude to all those muses, family and friends who provided inspiration and support for my work.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1 — Person of Interest

  Chapter 2 — Crossroads

  Chapter 3 — The Ministry

  Chapter 4 — Apostates

  Chapter 5 — Polemic

  Chapter 6 — Retaliator

  Chapter 7 — The Alliance

  Chapter 8 — Clash of Tribes

  Chapter 9 — Gearson

  Chapter 10— Proclamation

  Chapter 11 — The Colonels

  Chapter 12 — The Cabal

  Chapter 13 — Media Noise

  Chapter 14 — Mission

  Chapter 15 — Escape

  Chapter 16 — Suspects

  Chapter 17 — Flux

  Chapter 18 — Intersection

  Chapter 19 — The Chase

  Chapter 20 — Fragile Sanctuary

  Chapter 21 — The Conflux

  Chapter 22 — Parting

  “Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society”

  Aristotle. 384 BC to 322 BC

  Yeoman – Independent land-owner, a volunteer warrior.

  Book 1

  Prologue

  It was a fine sunny day in the English countryside, the following previous ones had been showery drizzle. For several days now the military base, deep in Bedfordshire basked in the heat of late summer.

  From the base, situated at the top of a hill the lay of the land was noticeable. Off to the east three distant figures left a blue Ford Escort and entered the ancient forest. A young, confident blonde led the way followed by a slightly older man and a dark-haired woman. All of them were in their twenties and wore the olive drab uniforms of the British Army. Once they were deep in the forest the confident one turned back to the other two.

  “This is far enough,” she said smiling, her body full of warmth.

  “What have you brought us here for?” asked the brunette.

  “This wood is an ancient forest, there’s not many left in England these days. It’s perfect for us to make a bonding before the old oak trees.”

  “A bonding? You mean like a pact?” the young man answered rolling his eyes and looking to the other girl skeptically.

  “Well, we’ll be going our separate ways soon, we could end up never seeing each other again. I want us to make a pact, one that helps bring us back together again. That way, no matter what happens, we’ll always find each other in future times.”

  The brunette nodded and grinned in agreement. “Sounds like witchcraft,” she laughed brazenly.

  “It’s folk magic, in the olden times people did this all the time. Now what do you both say?”

  “You always were the space cadet, but I’m game,” the other woman said.

  “Me too,” the man said with a chuckle. “I don’t want us to remain parted forever after the fun times we’ve had. If this pact helps, I’m all for it.”

  “Alright! This will take a few minutes.”

  The blonde woman smiled again before producing a Wiccan knife and began speaking ancient words and oaths. The atmosphere grew serious though and even the bird song and outside noise grew faint somehow. After facing the oak and raising her hands she spoke some more before making a shallow wrist cut on herself. She wiped her cut on the side of a nearby oak tree. Then made a similar cut on the tall man and finally the dark-haired woman. The ritual concluded with both making separate blood-marks on the oak tree in a manner so that they circled and almost touched one another.

  The folk magic concluded with a prayer then the somber feeling in the clearing lifted.

  “That was pretty intense,” the man said, accepting a tissue from the witch to dab at his wrist. The brunette did likewise.

  “We’re joined now,” she answered. “If there’s danger, strife or troubled times in the world we’ll hopefully be reunited. This is to remain a secret, if we tell anyone outside of ourselves the pact could go terribly wrong.”

  They all agreed to this and together they hastened to leave the forest before they were missed. After re-entering the blue Escort they departed the area, heading up the hill towards the base.

  Chapter 1

  Person of Interest

  “So what's your business been in Ireland then?” the Junior Commissioner asked the Yeoman.

  “Oh not much, just driving around,” the Yeoman answered.

  “Just driving around?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Where did you stay?”

  “Various places,” the Yeoman said, “when I was driving around.”

  “I was expecting an address? A residence?

  There was a long pause as the Yeoman ignored the question.

  It was a brightly colored room and the plain day outside might as well have been a world away. For the occupants of the room it was one man in a three-piece suit and the other in well-worn plain clothes. The Yeoman was not in uniform, but he felt as if he ought to be. Outside the steady rumble of heavy goods lorries could be heard. Heysham Ferry Terminal was always busy during offloading, but soon the noise would fade. By that time and for many more hours he could remain detained. He wondered if the anti-terror team rooting into his vehicle outside had found anything. As a reservist member of the Yeomanry he'd be automatically on their radar. It was no secret that the Colonels were disgruntled with the new coalition regime. The registration of his Land Rover Defender would have been tied to his Reservist status, which in turn would have automatically flagged him up as a gun-owner.

  “Eric Weyland do you have an address in Ireland?” the small man’s tone became harsher.

  The Yeoman shook his head. “I wasn’t expecting a welcoming party on my return to Albion. Neither was I expecting a nameless Commissar to be asking me questions,” the Yeoman retorted.

  “My name is Junior Commissioner Brown,” the older man stressed, annoyed at Weyland’s jibe. “Now why were you in Ireland Eric?”

  “Just visiting the country,” the man responded.

  As the Junior Commissioner looked over the file he turned the pages slowly. His Person Of Interest was thirty-five years old, a shade over six-foot tall. Unlike a fair few men his age he showed no sign of drugs or drink abuse. His skin and eyes were clear and he moved with an athletic laziness, as if he was conserving his energy until it was most needed.

  Weyl
and knew the border-interrogator had him on ‘suspicion of external activities’. It was a recent law that allowed police investigations for border travelers on the flimsiest whim. Since the great land-slide election of a rabidly left-wing government things had been changing. It had been nearly a year since they took power and already things were going backwards again.

  It had been good times for people like Weyland in the past thirty-years. He was born just after the short but decisive Colonels Coup that started the rift throughout the land. A hard-right government that followed, backed by the military. Nearly twenty years of this had undone much of the lunacy of the previous governments. Even so, the rot was so deep the reform was being constantly undermined by scheming politicians.

  Weyland had heard the call to arms ten years ago on the eve of the brief, but bloody Colonels War. The firmly hard-right-wing government that followed effectively reversed the worst of the issues ailing the island. The professional politicians were done away with, a manufacturing industry was restored and the military reformed to being more resource-orientated and island-centric. Most important of all, a power-base away from London, in northern England was established. Thus giving the Yeomanry a check and balance on London’s commercial stranglehold. More importantly much of northern England became Albion, a nation within the nation.

  A volunteer force, independent from the old monarchy and loyal to Albion alone complimented the mandatory conscription. That had developed into the Yeomanry and, following completion of the conscription system, allowed a new standing army of volunteers to come forth. Many of the former conscripts transferred to the Yeomanry rangers, armored troops or the fledgling air-force but not Weyland. He had a different calling that saw him dispatched overseas.

  Years passed while he was gone and the winds of change blew once again. The hardline government, under threat of sanctions from more powerful countries formed a centrist Coalition with other political parties. There were no sanctions against Albion territories but it crippled the ultra-conservative leadership. The left-wing, always masters at winning over the young, had a field day. Once ‘their’ generation came of age the results became clear.

  High on the office wall a picture of the new Prime Speaker Veitch grinned down at Weyland like a mocking Hyena.

  “So whereabouts in Ireland did you travel Eric?”

  “Am I free to leave?” Weyland responded plainly with a bored tone.

  “We just have to complete our search first,” the man said smoothly, “Then there’s also the Anti-Terrorist Act that we used to… initiate our inquiries with you.” The Commissioner spoke the last part rather smugly.

  Weyland looked down at the black and white slip on the table. It reminded him that, thanks to the new powers granted last year in the parliament, coastal and airport security had the power to detain anyone they felt was under suspicion of what they deemed ‘terrorist activities’. It went on to state that he could be held for a maximum of nine hours and items he held could be confiscated for as long as two weeks.

  What perplexed the Yeoman was the fact a Junior-Commissioner was the man doing the talking. Normally a police sergeant or detective did border interviews. Why such a high-rank?

  A uniformed policeman came in through the door he’d entered. It led to a corridor and another door barred the way outside.

  “He’s got a crossbow under the driving seat!” he said to Brown who looked over at Weyland.

  “That’s not against the law,” he replied, causing the commander to shake his head at his underling who stomped out the door, obviously disgruntled that nothing was going down that avenue.

  “There’s a bill in parliament being tabled to outlaw those you know?” the interviewer goaded.

  “I wonder what they’ll outlaw next? Your own batons perhaps?” he retorted with a smile causing the man to flush.

  Brown clenched his fist. “Those are already—” he began to say before realizing Weyland meant they’d be outlawed to Enforcers. A notion he found ridiculous.

  “Are you traveling with your self-loading rifle?” the policeman asked, referencing the weapon every member of the Yeomanry was armed with.

  “Of course, it’s stowed behind the driver’s seat.”

  “With ammunition?”

  “It’s not much good without it now is it?”

  The short man perused the shipping manifest before taking a headmaster’s tone. “I don’t see any record from the ferry company of your firearm or ammo being registered.”

  “Of course not, it’s not a legal requirement to notify them. I have to leave my vehicle unattended while on that ferry, you can be sure I’m not telling the ferry crew what’s in my vehicle.”

  Weyland took out his Firearms Exemption Authority from his wallet with a satisfied smile and slid it across to Brown.

  Like many Yeomanry policies counter to Britain’s draconian weapons laws the validity of the authority was to the year 9999. Additionally it was transferable to members of his family, even fellow Yeomanry with an officers signature. In essence it was a theoretically unlimited and a subtle ‘up yours’ to any police harassment. The Commissioner looked at it briefly with disdain before sliding it back across the table.

  “I’m gonna be straight with you Weyland, I don’t like your kind. I’ve read your file, seen your reports, you seem to have a problem with how this country is being run.”

  “This country is being run by traitors and seditious pukes again. A blind man can see that.”

  “They were democratically elected! Unlike the coup that messed up this country about thirty years ago.”

  “That was by consent, endorsed by the working and middle-class folk sick and tired of being abused by the idiots in Parliament.”

  “Consent? I didn’t consent or agree!” Brown countered but Weyland spoke as if he’d not even heard him.

  “If it wasn’t for the coup there would have been a rebellion from the other factions of the military, then you’d really have seen a bloodbath!”

  “What about the police that were executed then? The politicians! The media-directors! The bankers! They lined them up against a wall and murdered them! Those are your Colonels actions.”

  Weyland nodded at this with a cool reserve. “I would have done it differently, sparing them death, but one way or another high-ranking traitors get what they deserve. They were enemy agents and that was proven!”

  “You’re crazy, that’s not how we should do things!”

  “Yes it is, you’re just too chicken-hearted to accept me telling it like it is.”

  “Rubbish. We know you’ve been traveling around Weyland. Places like America, India, places in Europe that have a nationalist or government.”

  ‘So they know some of my rovings?’ Weyland silently mused.

  “We don’t want you filling young minds over here with any nonsense.”

  “Nonsense is it?” Weyland countered. “The Jade people call it the Divine Mandate, it allows lethal force to manifest against those that wish ill-will on the local populace of a nation or people. People had forgotten this in the West, but not when the Colonels reminded folk of it! Over in the USA they fought a war for seven years to stay free from a tyrannical monarchy. So if that’s nonsense to you then you are obviously a half-wit or just trying to wind me up. Which is it?”

  The words flowed like a torrent of water from the Yeoman, stinging Commissioner Brown. The Commissioner knew from the files that Weyland was intelligent, a rabble-rouser and debater, able to speak with others. It was surely why the Colonels had sent him overseas. The question that eluded him, MI6 intelligence and even foreign intelligence was why?

  “Why do you plot against this island?”

  The Yeoman smiled enigmatically but said nothing, needling Brown who stared hard at the eyes that didn’t even look at him. A glassy-zeal or sheen seemed to radiate from them, something that conventional threats could not blunt. Weyland was a fanatic in his eyes, the sort of man who would kill others and not be afraid to m
ake light of it. There was an intensity to his icy blue eyes, it reminded him of a storm trooper just on the eve of an assault or perhaps a pilot about to dive-bomb an enemy position. Nothing seemed to sway him. Like a sudden turn of the weather, he was calm again.

  “Look, I don’t have a problem with you Enforcers as a rule. I don’t really hate anyone typically, even the traitors, but when things are out of order, Things have to happen.”

  The Commissioner went passive and held his hands up briefly. ‘Let the fool talk,’ he thought. ‘He’ll tell us what we know now he’s begun rambling.’

  “You know if it wasn’t for people like the Yeomanry we’d have been invaded and conquered by the immigrant hordes many times over. The Colonels know the score and speak out about it.”

  “The Yeomanry acts like a private army traipsing about this country though. Most of all though, it’s the fact you have carte blanch to wield military grade weapons. That’s a bit much isn’t it Eric?”

  “You only say that because your police tyranny was hamstrung by the Colonels Mr Brown. In the words of my old Colonel ‘Too many traitors in high places, starting from Junior Commissioner upwards.’”

  “You don’t think it’s outdated to have a militia bullying the police and shooting them during a coup?”

  “It’s never an outdated thing to have protection, the Yeomanry serve as a check-and-balance on the tyrannical powers of the police state.”

  “That’s nonsense, the police force protect people, chase criminals and investigate law-breakers.”

  “Good, then leave the Yeomanry to be the Yeomanry and concentrate on people actually breaking the law, not this thought-crime and harassment.”

  “You know when the firearms laws in this country were lax we had a man go on a spree killing in Wiltshire. He reminded me of a Yeomanry type.”