Warning: the following post contains spoilers for A Test of Honor and The People’s Champion,
In A Test of Honor, Sir Aidan Franklin fought on behalf of his late family to reclaim their land and became the figurehead for a planetwide revolution…
In The People’s Champion, he turned an enemy into an ally and led the rebels to a victory in Klauston that resulted in the death of King Ethan…
Now the rebellion is in greater danger than ever.
The true enemy of the Caledonian people has been unmasked; the Mages who cast themselves as humble specialists and advisers have been ruthlessly keeping the people in feudal darkness through control of the weapons supply and skulduggery, crowning and dethroning kings for more than a thousand years in secret.
To see what challenges lie ahead, let’s look first at the factions in One World One People.
- Royalists – King Ethan is dead and the dedicated feudalists have declared their loyalty to a new king — House Franklin’s longtime rival Lord Daniel of House Meadows. The Eastlands are teeming with a massive coalition army dedicated to smashing the rebellion and restoring order to the land with the edge of their swords.
- The People’s Uprising – Battle-weary and exhausted from two years of protracted fighting, the rebels who follow Aidan and his friends are nearing their breaking point. Their leaders, The People’s Council, constantly squabble and fight amongst themselves while the army is demoralized by the dismal enemy siege of Klauston where Marke and Ygretta are trapped. However, Idris, formerly Aidan’s squire and now a knight in his own right, believes the Commons of Caledonia are ready to stand with them. He may just get his chance to find out.
- The Magic Tower – The headquarters and stronghold of the Wizards Guild is nestled comfortably among the thick-walled fortresses of the Southern Marches. They farm sunlight for energy which they utilize as the planet’s sole supplier of energy weapons and powered armor. They have recently reactivated an ancient nuclear silo near the small eastern town of Kutenbe but still need to crack its encryption before they can use the fearsome heavensfire to destroy the rebel cities and bring iron-fisted order to the planet once more.
- Zumbarindians – The eastern isles of Zumbarindi were once a democratic republic and their dream has always been to restore that fabled golden age. Unfortunately for the People’s Uprising, they have seized the opportunity presented by this war to declare their allegiance to King Meadows in exchange for political emancipation when the war is over. However coolly pragmatic their motivations might be, Aidan hopes he can convince them to join with like-minded brethren against royal oppression.
- Peyrolans – After their marshal agreed to withdraw from the war, the western islanders seem content to tend their crops and await the conflict’s conclusion. They still control a large number of relatively fresh soldiers and their leaders may well decide to return to the fighting, if they can be sufficiently persuaded.
- Alliance of Federated Worlds – A mishmashed confederacy of every pro-democracy, anti-feudal world in the galaxy, the alliance has sent a special operative to Caledonia to assist the rebels in their struggle for freedom.
You may recall that at the end of The People’s Champion, Aidan made contact with the Alliance and requested they send an agent to assist the beleaguered People’s Uprising. One World One People begins with that agent arriving on Caledonia to help them win the war. His name is Peter Chen and he is a veteran agent in an unforgiving business. He’s got sleek, functional kinetic armor, a submachine pistol that outmatches any weapon native to this world, and a coarse, sarcastic nature that he often uses to speak practical hard truths.
Finishing this series was at times a pure adrenaline-fueled adventure and other times a sisyphean quest. Now that the third book is nearly in reader’s hands, I feel both a strange sense of cathartic satisfaction and a bittersweet bewilderment that I actually reached this point. Over? Really? For the last two years, this story has been the primary focus of my creative energies and it seems almost nonsensical to believe that it’s coming to a conclusion. And yet, the one universal truth of existence is that all things end. We may as well do our best to end them well.
You can pre-order One World One People from Amazon!
