Forsworn

The Forsworn Oath: Volume I

David Estes

Copyright 2024 David Estes

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area- Western Half

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Eastern Half

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Full Map

Important Trigger Warning

Prologue

PART I

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Interlude: The River of Life

PART II

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Interlude: Fallow Fields

PART III

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Interlude: Of Man and Monster

PART IV

Twenty-Six

Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-Nine

Thirty

Thirty-One

Thirty-Two

Thirty-Three

Thirty-Four

POSTLUDES

Postlude 1: Lana Vica

Postlude 2: Ludo Vica

Postlude 3: Cainan

Acknowledgments

An excerpt from Heartsworn, Volume II in The Forsworn Oath, available for preorder now!

PART I

One

Two

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area- Western Half

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Eastern Half

Map of Kingdom of Finfalla and Surrounding Area - Full Map

Important Trigger Warning

I believe it’s important for authors to recognize content in their books that may have a negative or harmful effect (a trigger) on their readers’ mental health. In Forsworn, I’ve identified one possible trigger related to post-partum depression and suicide that I included in the story as I felt it was important to one character’s development, but which may trigger some readers. If you feel you may be one of those readers, you are advised to skip Postlude 1: Lana Vica. I do not believe that skipping this postlude will impact your overall enjoyment and understanding of the series as it unfolds. Thank you for your understanding and support.

David Estes

Prologue

Marchessault, Finfalla

The Nightdawn

As King Artemus Vedran had commanded, he wasn’t called upon until it was all over. Void, he’d waited five long years for this night, this very hour, so he could wait a bit longer. He took ample time to make himself presentable, what with being roused from sleep in the dead of night for the occasion. Still, he couldn’t deny the quickening of his strides and the fluttering of his heart as he approached the room. Would he find the son and heir he’d prayed to the gods for behind the door?

An eerie light, pale and wan, passed through the tall, arched windows on either side of the corridor. Maybe it was closer to morning than he thought? “What hour is it?” he asked one of the guards flanking the hallway.

The guard cleared his throat, surprised at having been addressed by his monarch. “Not an hour past midnight,” he grunted.

King Vedran peered through the pane of glass, frowning. There was no sun to be found. Why would there be at one in the morning? And yet the sky was filled with that strange light, like an echo of the day had remained long after the firmament should’ve darkened to allow for the stars and moons to peek out from their hidden places.

“They’re calling it the Nightdawn, Your Majesty,” the guard said, the same who’d answered his question.

“Who is?” He didn’t turn, his gaze fixed on the unnaturally bright night sky.

“Everyone. Guards, servants, even the priests. Half the city is awake. They’re scared, Majesty.”

“Scared of what?”

“Whatever it means.”

“And what do they think it means?” He finally turned to meet the guard’s gaze, which wavered slightly under the scrutiny of the most powerful man in this part of the world.

“That something is going to happen, Your Majesty. Something bad.”

“What utter rot,” Artemus spat. “Spread the word. Anyone who speaks ill of this so-called Nightdawn shall be tried and found guilty.”

“Guilty of what, Your Majesty?”

“Fearmongering and stupidity. It is an omen, that is for damn sure, but not of ill fortune, for on this night your prince has been born.”

He didn’t wait for the superstitious fool to reply, ignoring the light that swarmed around his feet as he continued toward his destination. He stopped at the door to catch his breath, listening. It wasn’t a king’s place to wait, and yet something made him hesitate before entering the room.

A frown creased his brow. Something felt…off, and this time it wasn’t the Nightdawn or the guard’s talk of bad omens. Shouldn’t he hear crying? Or at least the soft cooing of women comforting a newborn child?

But then he did hear a sound, so out of place amongst the silence that it made the small hairs on his neck stand on end. A sort of groan and scrape of shoes against stone.

He waited no longer, turning the knob and shoving the door open with enough force that it crashed into the inside wall, the sound echoing through his ears. His eyes made quick work of assessing the windowless room, though none of what he saw made a lick of sense. There was the bed his wife, Queen Elwyn, had been confined to for the last few months. But it was empty, the bedclothes in disarray and fouled with brownish fluid.

The royal midwife, who’d had little to do for the last half-decade or so, was scattered on the floor clutching her head and looking rather confused by how she’d ended up there. “Where is he? Where is my son?” the king demanded, advancing a step inside, toward the woman.

The midwife blinked, as though clearing away the fog that had settled over her eyes. “Tomas is in the crib, Y-Your Majesty.” She opened her mouth to say something else, but he cut her off with a raised hand.

The name, more than anything else about the whole nonsensical scene, struck him in the chest. “Tomas? We agreed on Edward for a boy,” he muttered, striding to the small pedestal crib set beside the bed. Peered inside.

The child, Tomas apparently, was swaddled in the blue blanket his wife had stubbornly insisted on producing herself, despite having an entire army of seamstresses at her beck and call. The end result included crooked lines of thread and tufts of cloth sticking out at odd angles, but she’d been so proud when she’d finished and held it up, the pads of her fingers dotted with half-healed wounds where she’d pricked herself with an overzealous needle. Now, the blanket adorned the child like he was a pauper’s son and not the next king of Finfalla. The infant’s eyes were closed, his body as still as stone. It might’ve been the dim lighting cast by the flickering wall sconces, but his cheeks looked too pale, his lips painted a purplish-blue.

“I’m so sorry, Your Majesty. There was nothing more I could do. He was born without a breath of air in his lungs or even a single beat in his heart.”

“What?” Artemus said, his eyes never leaving the child’s face as he scooped him up. “That can’t be right. Any son of mine would be as strong and hale as an entire team of oxen.” Tomas—the king still couldn’t believe the queen had dared to name their son Tomas after they’d agreed on Edward—was as light as a feather, more a bundle of blankets than the skin and bones he was supposed to be.

He shook him slightly. “Wake up,” he commanded.

“It’s called ‘stillborn’, Your Majesty,” the midwife said.

Why was the confounded woman still here?

“Tomas, this is your father, the King of Finfalla. You are my heir, the crown prince to my kingdom. Now you will do as I command. Wake up.”

“He’s gone, Your Majesty. I’m sorry.”

He spun on her then, still cradling Tomas in one arm. “Sorry? You had one job. This is your fault.” He raised a hand to strike her, and she shrank back, raising her arms in a futile attempt to ward off his wrath.

He stopped himself, remembering the question he’d failed to ask at the onset, his entire focus on the birth of the son he was supposed to be celebrating, the continuation of the great and mighty Vedran line. His teeth ground together hard enough to make his jaw ache. Now, he spoke the question through them. “Where is she? Where is the queen?”

The midwife peered around her wall of hands, eyes wide and fearful. “I tried to stop her, but she pushed me over, Your Majesty. I hit my head.”

“Where in the names of the Five Gods did she go?”

“I know not, but she took Edward with her, Your Majesty.”

Artemus froze where he stood. “Edward? Explain your fool mouth before I cut your tongue out.”

“Your other son, Your Majesty. The one who was born healthy and strong. She named him Edward. Magda and Beatty left with her, though I told them she needed to rest. They both did, mother and child. The labor was long and arduous.”

The king’s head was spinning now. She’d birthed two sons? Twins? That would certainly explain why her belly had grown as large as an overripe melon, forcing her into countless weeks of bedrest. “Who are Magda and Beatty?”

“The queen’s lady-in-waiting and wetnurse. They’ve been with her for years, Your Majesty.”

The note of reprimand in the midwife’s tone would normally have set his teeth on edge and drawn a stern rebuke from Artemus, but he was a practical man, and putting this woman in her place was the least of his priorities at present. “Do you expect me to learn the names of every peasant and sycophant in my realm, woman? Find her,” he said.

The midwife stood, curtseyed, and then scurried through the open doorway still clutching her head, which, he only just noticed, was bleeding from a small but rather deep gash. Artemus followed in her wake, unaware of the dead child that was still strung on one arm, as though an extension of his own body. “Guards! Locate the queen immediately!” he barked. “And my son. Find Edward!”

He stopped, surprised when his command went unheeded. Instead, his entourage of guards that lined the corridor stood so still they might’ve been statues, ornaments meant to adorn his palace halls. A strange woman stood between them, bathed in the pale light from the Nightdawn.

Well, “strange” was hardly sufficient a word to describe the figure blocking the way forward. She had the body and face of a woman, but that was where the similarities ended. Instead of hair, she was crested with a complicated nest of vines twisting from her scalp. Rather than nails, her long, slender fingers ended in small, purplish leaves, thick and glossy-looking. Her toes, bare against the stonework, were the same. The long, white dress that ended just above her ankles and trailed behind her, shimmered as though inlaid with tiny crystals. And her face…

Every bit of skin was covered in tiny golden flecks in the shape of leaves, making her cheeks shimmer as though dusted with the stars themselves.

But even all those eccentricities couldn’t hold a candle to her eyes, which captured every bit of the king’s attention. They were completely colorless, as though made from glass. “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “Who are you? Why did you allow her into the palace?” The latter question was for the statue guards, none of whom seemed to hear him, as frozen in place as trees that had taken root not in dirt but in cracks between the stones.

The woman—or whatever she was—laughed, the sound like crystal shards tinkling against one another. “I didn’t exactly give them much of a choice in the matter.”

“You’re a mage.”

“Of sorts, but not like all the ignorant imposters currently running amok throughout your kingdom.”

“I don’t care if you’re the godsdamn Queen of Sonaria, get out of my—”

“Sonaria doesn’t have a queen,” the woman interrupted.

“Get out of my way. I must find my wife and son.”

“They’re already gone.”

“Then I’ll tear the palace to pieces until I find them.”

“You’re not hearing me. They’ve left the palace. For good, I’m afraid. You won’t catch them now. Your wife is a meticulous planner, and she orchestrated her escape well.”

“How do you—”

“Know this? I know many things. My name is Cintra con Narcissi, and I’m here to save your son’s life.” She gestured to the swaddle resting in the crook of his elbow.

Such insolence without so much as a hint of a ‘Your Majesty’ to soften her words would typically fray his already tattered nerves, but now wasn’t the time for insisting on a modicum of the respect due to a man of his royal station. “Then you’ve wasted your time,” he said instead. “Tomas is already dead.”

“Give him to me. Quickly. There is not much time left to undo what has been done.”

“No.”

“Suit yourself, though I’m not sure your rivals will sit idly by while you rest on an empty throne with no heir to warm your seat after you’re gone.”

Artemus knew he should have this woman, this creature, thrown out with a spear pressed to her back. Assuming he even could, given the current state of his guards. In any case, everything about this tortured night caught up to him just then. His shoulders slumped, his arm finally feeling the weight of his dead son. He’d known for a while that his wife hated him, but he never in his most deranged nightmares believed she would go to such extremes to rid herself of his company, going so far as to threaten the tenuous peace their arranged marriage had granted Finfalla and its neighbor to the west. And, truth be told, at this moment he had nothing left to lose. “Wait,” he said.

The woman smiled and held out her arms. He thrust Tomas forward and she took him, maneuvering his small form deftly with the skill of one who’d done it before. Then she raised a small vial of a golden liquid that seemed to be glowing slightly, though he couldn’t ascertain from where she’d drawn it, whether from some hidden pocket or from within the sleeves of her shimmering dress like a magician’s sleight of hand.

Without further delay, she unstoppered the vial with her teeth and spat out the cork. Then she pressed the small container to the child’s mouth, tilting his head back slightly and using one of her leaves to part his lips.

“What is that?” Artemus asked.

“Shh,” she said, dripping the golden liquid onto Tomas’s tongue until the entire vial was drained. Then she eased his lips closed once more. “Here, you take him again. He will need to see the face of his father first.”

“What are you talking abou—”

The question died on his lips, because somewhere in between blinks she’d vanished, though there was no door or window through which she could’ve escaped, and the hallway was too long for her to have traversed its length in so short a time even at a full sprint. The guards gasped, each of them heaving forward as though exhausted, hands pressing to knees.

And then the baby in his arms began to cry.

Queen Elwyn Vedran-Echevaria froze, ears searching the night for the sound she swore she’d just heard. A cry. A baby’s cry.

At first, the sound didn’t repeat itself, the night as silent as a graveyard at midnight. But then:

The cry lit up the silence like a flame chasing away shadows. It was distant, but even a mother who’d never heard her baby’s cry knew it the first time. “Tomas,” she whispered. “How?”

Magda and Beatty, who’d hurried ahead of her, finally seemed to realize their mistress was no longer with them, turning with eyes as wide as saucers. Had they heard the sound too? Or was her grief playing tricks on her?

“We must go, Your Majesty,” Magda said. She was the only person who’d ever dared to speak to her in such a commanding tone, which Elwyn allowed if only because the woman always had her best interests at heart. It didn’t hurt that she was the only Kinkallian that had been allowed to accompany her to Finfalla all those years ago.

“I heard him,” she said, aware of the high-pitched desperation in her voice but not caring. “I heard Tomas.” Her eyes naturally fell to Edward, surprised to find that her son wasn’t sleeping as she expected, his eyes staring up at her. Intent. Watching.

“It’s not him,” Magda said, reaching her side and placing a gentle arm on her shoulder. Elwyn tore her gaze away from Edward to look upon the woman. Her crinkled blue eyes were kind and patient, as they always were. “Must’ve been some other child. Not your son. We all saw him. Tomas wasn’t strong enough. But Edward is. And if you want him to have the life you desire for him, we must go. Now.”

Beatty, her wetnurse, linked her arm with Elwyn’s at the elbow, brown locks of hair spilling from her bonnet and draping between them. “Fer once I agree with the ol’ busybody,” she said with forced cheerfulness, offering a crooked smile. “If ye git tired, lean on us. We can hold ye.”

As they started forward once more, Magda’s torch lighting the path, their footsteps echoed along the tunnel that had been cut centuries ago as an escape route to be used as a last resort in the event of an enemy invasion. This time, no cries chased them.

By the time they reached the boat that had been hidden in the coastal caves, Elwyn thought her bones had turned to mush, each step more faltering than the last, until only the strength of the two women at either side kept her from crumpling. When had she last slept? Yesterday? The day before that?

“There ye are, Majesty,” Beatty said, helping her into the small boat that would be navigated into the River of Painted Foes and then upstream to Drouin. The poleman who awaited them was as pale as a ghost and as grumpy as a bear awakened from hibernation well before spring’s arrival. “Yer late,” he grunted.

The boat tipped precariously as Beatty and her large hips and bosom slid after her. “Ye’ll address her as ‘Your Majesty’ or I’ll see yer head on a pike,” she said.

“I’m not Finfallian, woman,” the man spat. “I don’ answer to king nor queen, an’ I won’ be intimidated. I’ll call her godsdamn bitch if I want to. I’m riskin’ my neck fer her.”

“Ye weaselly lil…,” Beatty said, making an awkward move toward the man that might’ve seen them capsized if Elwyn hadn’t said, “Stop.”

“But he called ye a—”

“It’s fine. The ornery bastard can call me whatever he pleases so long as he fulfills his role in all this. And he’ll do just that if he wants to get paid, won’t you, Captain.”

The man smiled a tobacco-studded smile. “Captain,” he snorted. “Ain’t never been called that. I think I like ye, Yer Majesty. An’ aye, I want me gold. Tis the only king I pledge my fealty to.”

“Which is why we chose you for the job. Magda, come aboard. We’ve lingered far too long already.”

“I’m sorry, Your Majesty. I am honored to have served you all these years, and your mother before that. But I’m afraid I will never see you again. Farewell.”

“What are you talking about? Magda, I command you to board this seaworthy vessel at once!”

It was the only time Elwyn’s handmaiden failed to obey one of her direct commands. Instead, she offered a sad smile, pressed the heel of her shoe to the boat, and shoved it out into the water.

“Magda! Magda!” Elwyn cried.

But the woman was already gone, having slipped into the shadows of the tunnel. “Oh gods,” Elwyn said. “Did you know she was going to do that?”

“No, Your Majesty. I swear I didn’t.” There was no lie in Beatty’s expression. If anything, she looked as shocked as Elwyn felt. “But what’s done is done. Give me Edward and I’ll feed him. His tiny belly must be as empty as a drunkard’s bottle.”

“I want to do it myself,” Elwyn said.

“Nonsense, Majesty. I won’t have yer modesty ogled by this cretin. Give him ’ere and I’ll do my duty.”

“No. I need to do this. I need to do this for my son. For my Edward.” Tears blurred her vision, but she blinked them away before they could fall. She needed to be strong for her son. She could save falling apart for after they’d reached Drouin and were safe behind the palace cliffs in the grand halls she’d once roamed as a child.

“As ye wish, Your Majesty, but if Captain Weasel ’ere so much as offers a stray glance in yer direction, he’ll feed the fish. That’s a promise, it is.”

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