The New Elite (The Exceptional S. Beaufont Book 4) Read online




  The New Elite

  Exceptional S. Beaufont™ Book 4

  Sarah Noffke

  Michael Anderle

  This book is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Sometimes both.

  Copyright © 2020 Sarah Noffke & Michael Anderle

  Cover by Mihaela Voicu http://www.mihaelavoicu.com/

  Cover copyright © LMBPN Publishing

  A Michael Anderle Production

  LMBPN Publishing supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  LMBPN Publishing

  PMB 196, 2540 South Maryland Pkwy

  Las Vegas, NV 89109

  First US Edition, March 2020

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-64202-787-7

  Print ISBN: 978-1-64202-788-4

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Chapter 103

  Chapter 104

  Chapter 105

  Chapter 106

  Chapter 107

  Chapter 108

  Chapter 109

  Chapter 110

  Chapter 111

  Chapter 112

  Chapter 113

  Chapter 114

  Chapter 115

  Chapter 116

  Chapter 117

  Chapter 118

  Chapter 119

  Sarah’s Author Notes

  Michael’s Author Notes

  Acknowledgments

  Books By Sarah Noffke

  Check out Sarah Noffke’s YA Sci-fi Fantasy Series

  Books By Michael Anderle

  Connect with The Authors

  The New Elite Team

  Thanks to the JIT Readers

  Angel LaVey

  Deb Mader

  Debi Sateren

  Diane L. Smith

  Dorothy Lloyd

  Jackey Hankard-Brodie

  Jeff Eaton

  Jeff Goode

  Larry Omans

  Micky Cocker

  Misty Roa

  Nicole Emens

  Paul Westman

  Peter Manis

  Veronica Stephan-Miller

  If we’ve missed anyone, please let us know!

  Editor

  The Skyhunter Editing Team

  For Craig F, my favorite gillie.

  Thank you for all your help making the Scotland setting come alive.

  — Sarah

  To Family, Friends and

  Those Who Love

  to Read.

  May We All Enjoy Grace

  to Live the Life We Are

  Called.

  — Michael

  Chapter One

  Over one thousand years ago

  The undulant waters of the North Sea crashed into Captain Quiet’s ship, nearly scuttling it in the stormy seas. He’d never seen a storm like it.

  The ship, the McAfee, was used to negotiating the trade route but had never done so in a storm of this magnitude. No one else had dared to voyage out when the storm clouds promised torrential downpour, but Quiet had no choice. Their cargo was of supreme importance.

  He thought of the families below the deck seeking refuge from a warring nation, unable to live any longer in their home country. The refugees staying on land wasn’t an option. They would have been captured again and imprisoned.

  Then there would have been no way for Quiet to rescue them. The only options were to leave immediately and voyage across the seas in the deadly storm and hope Mother Nature cut them some slack. Alas, it appeared she wasn’t going to take pity on the crew of the McAfee.

  The howling winds ripped through the mainsail and tore it in two, making the ropes whip out and knocking one of the crew to the deck.

  Quiet spun and pointed to the men trying to stabilize the mainmast. One more heavy wind would crack it in half.

  Without a word, the Captain of the McAfee sent one of the crew members to help the fallen sailor.

  Quiet had always been called so by his crew, although it wasn’t his real name. They always seemed to understand him, even though he was so soft-spoken. It was just how he was made, and he would have it no other way. When he did speak where others could hear him, people listened, an excellent reason to always be less instead of more. He had never minded being physically smaller than the magicians, elves, and fae on his crew. Size was a relative thing for him.

  Right then, his low center of gravity kept him steady as his men stumbled across the deck. The storm was getting worse. The McAfee
tilted violently to the side, nearly capsizing yet again.

  They wouldn’t make it through the storm to their destination. None of them would survive the night. Quiet knew that with absolute certainty.

  He had one option. It would save the refugees. It would save his crew and the McAfee.

  But it would, without a doubt, kill him.

  Chapter Two

  A gnome’s magic could be stored for an extended period of time. Unlike magicians, gnomes could vault away power like a savings account, allowing it to build.

  Quiet had been doing so for years. He couldn’t remember the last time he had used magic, preferring to do things with his hands and his mind instead. This situation was precisely why he had been hoarding his magic.

  Maybe subconsciously, he’d known something of this magnitude would happen, or perhaps it was only destiny. Quiet wasn’t sure if he believed in such things. Right then, it didn’t matter because his voyage had come to an end.

  He grabbed the ship’s wheel and began to mutter a series of incantations. The crew wouldn’t know what had happened until it was too late for them to do anything. The important thing was, they would be safe, and the families would be unharmed. The McAfee would land in the calm waters of the Atlantic Ocean, unscathed and ready to sail another day.

  The spell he was knotting together wouldn’t kill Quiet, but it would make him pass out and where he landed, well, that would ensure an eventual death. He wouldn’t be on board the McAfee anymore, the only place he’d ever thought of as home.

  But that was exactly why he had to save it.

  The gnome rotated the ship’s wheel three turns to the right, managing to remain steady as the crew was thrown back and forth across the deck.

  He whipped the wheel the opposite way, two turns, as the mainmast creaked, a dangerous sound that hinted of last moments.

  Finally, Quiet stepped backward and bowed his head in a final goodbye, rain splattering his face and covering the tears flowing down his cheeks.

  The McAfee flickered. Quiet worried the spell hadn’t worked. He glanced at his feet that remained on the moving deck. When his ship disappeared around him, he smiled, knowing his spell had worked.

  He had transported his ship, its crew, and those they had rescued to calm, safe waters where they could sail on to a better place.

  Briefly suspended in mid-air, Quiet said a simple goodbye to the Earth he’d loved all his life and would no longer see again, then he plunged into the unforgiving waters of the North Sea to be swept up in the great storm. He could save an entire ship and its people, but ironically not himself. Not if he was going to funnel all his power into ensuring the spell worked, and there was no reason to do anything unless it was done right.

  The exhaustion hit him as soon as he plunged into the freezing cold sea. Waves buried him and carried the gnome away.

  Chapter Three

  The afterlife tasted like sand.

  To Quiet’s surprise, his body still hurt after death. He thought he’d feel weightless. Free. Finally, at peace.

  But instead, everything in his body screamed for his attention. Especially his lungs.

  He rolled over on to his back, and that’s when the eruption began. Coughs rocketed from the little gnome’s body and made him think he’d choke on his lungs. The idea he still had lungs after drowning in the North Sea was especially perplexing.

  Quiet continued to cough, a seemingly unending sound that was especially loud in his ears even though they were clogged with water.

  Rolling over once more, Quiet got to his hands and knees and spat out what felt like a gallon of water. It filled his mouth and triggered his gag reflex.

  Dying was horrible. He hoped it would be over soon, but something told him it might not. It might have been his gasping for air, even as his chest burned and his face felt hot.

  He shook his head, and wet hair spattered across his eyes. All Quiet wanted was for this death thing to be over. It appeared death, like everything in life, was a process. He crawled across the sandy beach, which he fully believed was a part of his hallucination.

  He was sinking to the bottom of the North Sea. That was what was happening.

  The granules of sand under his fingers was the strangest sensation. The cold wind whipping across his water-soaked body was surreal, and the heaviness of the emotion that he’d never see the world he loved again was the worst heartache he’d ever known.

  It all had to be an illusion, he thought to himself. The thought sent him back on his tailbone to sit and look at the choppy sea, feeling as though surrender was a fake breath away. The gnome rocked back and forth, his hands in his lap as he shivered violently. He wasn’t sure why he saw whitecaps and a gray sky and a storm in the distance when Quiet knew he was drowning. It was just how death was, he guessed.

  He had never done it before, so it made sense it would feel all strange and disorienting. Death, like life, had to be a bit like trickery. One moment you think you’re going to win and then it all crashed down. Just like Quiet had thought they’d get away scot-free with the refugees, or like so many times in life when things felt comfortable and then became the hardest thing in the world.

  The Captain of the McAfee sat staring at the ocean, wondering when clouds and sky and angels would welcome him to the afterlife.

  It didn’t come.

  When hunger and thirst set in after a long hour, something he hadn’t expected appeared.

  “Hello, dear,” a woman’s voice sang beside Quiet.

  He turned his head and found a creature who looked more like a tree than a person. Her skin was brown and flakey like bark. Her hair flowed like vines, and her eyes were the color of the bluest sky. They blinked at him in a way that made Quiet feel unconditionally loved.

  “Who are you?” Quiet asked. He found it strange how he had a voice.

  “I’m Mother Nature,” the figure said.

  “Mother Nature?” he asked. He spoke louder than he usually did. “Is this heaven?”

  She shook her head of vines. “Oh, no. You’re still alive, but not for long unless I save you, which I intend to do.”

  “What?” Quiet questioned. He was thoroughly confused. “How can you save me? I died.”

  “No, not quite. But you’re close. And, I’m Mother Nature,” she argued. “I can do whatever I like. After your brave sacrifice, I have a proposal for you. It will mean you live an extraordinarily long life.”

  He looked at the sea he loved so much, at the world he’d cherished all his life. Finally, he stared at the strange woman he felt intimately acquainted with. “What is it? What would you have me do to stay here on this Earth? I’ll do whatever it takes, Mother Nature.”

  “You can start by calling me Mama Jamba,” the woman said and laid her bark-covered hands over Quiet’s, taking away any pain that remained in his being. “You and I are about to start a friendship that will last a very, very long time.”

  Chapter Four

  Present day

  The groundskeeper for the Gullington spooned sugar onto his bowl of hot porridge, his attention honed on sprinkling it evenly.

  “How is Bell?” Sophia asked Mahkah when he entered the dining hall of the Castle. His boots were muddy as he pulled off his gloves, and there was dragon blood on his cloak. He’d obviously been on the Expanse, changing Bell’s bandages again.

  He nodded, sniffling, his nose red from the cold. Spring was warming up the Gullington, but not by much. “She’s better, although only marginally. It’s going to be a long healing process for her,” Mahkah answered

  “Relatively speaking,” Evan stated. “A year isn’t really a big deal in the scheme of things when you’re a dragon.”

  “You wouldn’t want to be down for a year,” Sophia said, her lips pursed and a disapproving look on her face.

  “Girl, I was down for close to a century, with nothing to do,” Evan complained. His eyes flicked to Quiet, spooning more sugar onto his porridge.

  “But you could still
walk,” Sophia argued. She watched as Wilder slipped into the seat across from her, carefully keeping his eyes down and trying to be inconspicuous.