BooksBarbecue
Back Forsworn
Chapters (53)
  1. Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area- Western Half
  2. Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Eastern Half
  3. Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Full Map
  4. Important Trigger Warning
  5. Prologue
  6. PART I
  7. One
  8. Two
  9. Three
  10. Four
  11. Five
  12. Six
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Interlude: The River of Life
  20. PART II
  21. Thirteen
  22. Fourteen
  23. Fifteen
  24. Sixteen
  25. Seventeen
  26. Eighteen
  27. Nineteen
  28. Interlude: Fallow Fields
  29. PART III
  30. Twenty
  31. Twenty-One
  32. Twenty-Two
  33. Twenty-Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Interlude: Of Man and Monster
  37. PART IV
  38. Twenty-Six
  39. Twenty-Seven
  40. Twenty-Eight
  41. Twenty-Nine
  42. Thirty
  43. Thirty-One
  44. Thirty-Two
  45. Thirty-Three
  46. Thirty-Four
  47. POSTLUDES
  48. Postlude 1: Lana Vica
  49. Postlude 2: Ludo Vica
  50. Postlude 3: Cainan
  51. Acknowledgments
  52. An excerpt from Heartsworn, Volume II in The Forsworn Oath, available for preorder now!
  53. PART I

As long as he’d served Narcissi, he couldn’t imagine Her doing such a thing. And for what purpose? While Comman Dur was within Her borders, it was no threat to Her. Its guards never roamed deep into the forest, for they were a superstitious lot and rarely left the bounds of the prison.

The sounds of battle drew nearer. Blinking the burning mixture of sweat and dust from his eyes, he crawled on all fours back to the door and was about to flip open the food slot when something hammered the other side. He shrank back, confused, hearing the clink-clank-clink of metal on metal, a sound he only ever heard when a new inmate was brought to this wing of the prison. It was the sound of a key being fumbled into a keyhole.

His keyhole.

“Who…,” he said, trying to understand what was happening and why, but then the owner of the key managed to stab it home, the lock clicking free, and then the door shoved inward, silhouetting a man Cainan had only ever known by his voice and the thin, slot-sized strips of him he could view from his cell.

“Cainan, we need to go now!” Mick said, voice shaking on every word. “Git up an’ hurry, there’s not much—”

Even as Mick failed to complete his sentence, his arm reaching for Cainan to pull him to his feet, a note rang out, high-pitched and melodic, perfectly in tune and not unpleasant to the ears. “No!” he shouted, but it was too late; Mick’s entire body went as rigid as a board, as though he’d become suddenly paralyzed. Another note rang out, then another, the start of an eerie sounding song that raised the small hairs on the back of Cainan’s neck. All he could do was watch in horror as the straightness in Mick’s body gave way to crookedness, as, with a series of snaps, his arms and legs were bent in ways they weren’t supposed to bend, his spine and neck crooking in opposite directions. The man’s lips murmured something unintelligible, blood trickling from his mouth, and then he toppled over, right into Cainan’s arms. As he held the dead man who’d been his only friend in his arms, he finally understood what was happening. For the man hadn’t been touched, not by anything physical like a vine or a branch.

The forest isn’t leading the attack, he knew.

No, Mick wasn’t killed by some random show of Narcissi’s wrath.

He was killed by magic.

It seemed his past had finally caught up with him again. And, as they always were, the results were deadly.

A picture containing caliper, device Description automatically generated

Twenty-five years earlier

Slough, Finfalla

“Where have you been?” Cainan asked. The question wasn’t a demand exactly, but he could hear the edge in his own voice. He hated speaking to Cora this way, but he couldn’t help it—he’d been alive with restless anxiety for the last few hours, and now that she’d returned in the dead of night, alive and, by all outward appearances, unharmed, that fear boiled over into anger.