A deadly vow, p.1
A Deadly Vow, page 1
A DEADLY VOW
THE FATE OF VENGEANCE
J.D. RONAN
Copyright © 2022 by J.D. Ronan
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be produced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photo-copying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
First published in the United States of America in February 2023 by Dark Throne Press LLC
www.jdronanauthor.com
ISBN 979-8-986989-40-2 (ebook)
ISBN 979-8-986989-41-9 (hardback)
ISBN 979-8-986989-42-6 (paperback)
Book cover design by Storywrappers
Character Art by Alice Marie Power
Map by Cartographybird Maps
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Created with Vellum
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Content Warning
Pronunciation Guide
The Realm
In The Beginning
Map
1. Keahi
2. Sabine
3. Keahi
4. Keahi
5. Sabine
6. Sabine
7. Sabine
8. Keahi
9. Sabine
10. Sabine
11. Keahi
12. Sabine
13. Keahi
14. Sabine
15. Sabine
16. Sabine
17. Sabine
18. Sabine
19. Keahi
20. Sabine
21. Sabine
22. Sabine
23. Keahi
24. Sabine
25. Sabine
26. Sabine
27. Keahi
28. Sabine
29. Sabine
30. Sabine
31. Sabine
32. Sabine
33. Keahi
34. Sabine
35. Sabine
36. Sabine
37. Sabine
38. Sabine
39. Keahi
40. Sabine
41. Sabine
42. Sabine
43. Sabine
44. Sabine
45. Sabine
46. Sabine
47. Sabine
48. Sabine
Acknowledgments
CONTENT WARNING
https://www.jdronanauthor.com/contentwarning
To my sister, for all the times I wanted to show you I loved you too, but couldn’t.
I pinky swear it.
PRONUNCIATION GUIDE
POV Characters:
Keahi Aldeer, Prince of the Solstice Kingdom
KIE (RHYMES WITH PIE . . . Sorry) ALL-Dear
Sabine Azterrin, Princess of the Novear Kingdom
Sah-Bean Az-Tehr-In
Character Name List:
Kane (Cane), Drakkon (Drake-ON), Elias Griselda (E-Lie-Us Greh-ZEL-duh), Iahni (E-AH-Nih), Zehra (Zeh-RUH), Ossian (Oh-Sigh-Anne), Emric (Em-Rick), Rhiannon (Rye-uh-Non), Astrea (Ah-Stray-Uh), Eos (Ee-ohs)
Kingdoms:
Solstice
Cellenia (Sel-LIN-E-Uh)
Tellurian (Tell-LUR-E-In)
Novear (No-VARE)
Locations:
Kallhani (Cuh-LAH-Knee)
THE REALM
The Solstice Kingdom: The Sun
Rhiannon
The Celenia Kingdom: The Moon
Selene and Twyla
The Tellurian Kingdom: The Earth
Lycus and Neith
The Novear Kingdom: The Stars
Astrea and Eos
IN THE BEGINNING
The Gods created our kind knowing we would die. It was only for the Gods to be reborn.
For life was an illustration of an illusion we were never meant to fully be a part of.
It was a cataclysmic event that turned dust into stars, an explosion of chaos creating life as we know it.
Just as the universe could be destroyed, it could be reborn again. Stitched together by something that was never meant to exist.
It bloomed from destruction in a harmonious lie, where stars that learned to paint the night began to fade.
The sun and moon who danced with their rise and fall found that all life was at its will, and the earth that had produced life found death at its door.
Slowly knocking, not once, but twice.
1
KEAHI
There was no scar designed to be unfelt, and no burden heavier than the sacred truth I deemed myself unworthy of. I would always be on the opposite end of a knife. An instrument of war which was not my own.
The pieces left of me were unable to be stitched together, unarmed against the icy chill piercing through the seams of my tent. Winter was not within the valleys, but the violent trek across our mountains burrowed a premature cold within our bones. Exhaustion prevailed as we raced to the border of our territory.
After we set our camp, Elias had been working to repair my wounds for hours, to no avail. The strain between his eyes deepened, along with my guilt, because we both knew it was not war creating these wounds.
“Weapons do not heal,” Elias repeated as he did with each line my father appointed the Healer to mend. My skin curated into a book of scars.
No, weapons do not heal.
They become what they have been made for.
A weary sigh left his lips as he patted the edge of the bandage with his fingertips. “I cannot guarantee it will last the length of your travel to the border. Take supplies with you once we part our separate ways.”
“It will,” I said firmly, despite knowing my uncle’s work was futile. “We are almost there.”
His eyes flicked back to me as I hesitated, holding the bunched edge of my black tunic in my palms. I sucked in a breath and slowly lifted it over my wounded torso, attempting to avoid his watchful concern with every sliver of pain I revealed. I wished he would allow me to do the same. My uncle’s words were scarce to me after we departed from the capital.
“Hmm,” he grumbled under his breath.
My wince was not hidden well enough.
There was always a lesson from him, even when he chose to stay silent. So far, he had been uninterested in any conversation dancing around the inevitable.
“How long?” I bit out as I worked on my leathered chest plate. A shallow attempt to hide another huff of pain, letting the weight settle over me.
Elias tugged the end of his white beard, a shadow cast over his face, and a snide remark at the tip of his tongue. “If it is my response you want, I will need to know what you are referring to. If it is your mind in which you would like me to read, then I am grateful to not have the ability.”
“How long are you going to be angry with me?” I shook my head. “My title as Prince does not eliminate my responsibility as General. The Novear Kingdom has closed in on our borders unexpectedly, and I will not allow them to test us for future attacks. Bandages have never stopped me in battle before.”
The movement of the Novear Kingdom’s troops had become erratic, more spontaneous than ever before as we scouted their defenses, hovering over our lines. They were desperate to invade us without proper provisions, even as their numbers doubled in size from the raids. I needed to find out why they had finally chosen to close in on our borders after all these years before it was too late.
“This is different, Prince Keahi. Your father continues to bleed you dry of your magic. The wounds you carry are no longer healing as they once did—something has changed. The power harboring in your veins does not make you invincible.”
I loosened my jaw. “Elias, you have known my father for a long time. If I refuse him now, it will only cause more chaos within our own Kingdom. I cannot object to him in the middle of a war. Especially when there would be no survivors if I start one within our own.”
The tremor in his hands worked into his voice. “I cannot watch you yield yourself to him any longer just because he fears the magic in your veins. Inflating his power with your blood. There is nothing to be gained by the throne of lies he sits on. Your mother would not have wanted this.”
A vested assumption my uncle reminded me of each time we circled back to this conversation. Even if it was his sister’s intentions he claimed to know for her son, Elias could not argue for the dead. My mother was not here to tell me what she would have wanted. I know only what she thought of me before her passing, and it was not much.
“Elias, please.” I bit the inside of my cheek, preparing the lie I hopelessly gave him year after year. “One day, I promise. Maybe. . . it is time to appoint a different Healer in the meantime. . .”
“No.” His eyes wrinkled against the distant thunder. “No more. If your father requests the magic in your veins, Keahi, you must refuse him. Just look at you! Your brother and sister have already told you they will fight by your side if a rebellion unfolds.”
“It is not that simple.” I sighed.
“Do you want to become our enemies? Is that what you want? To destroy everything in our paths for the sake of magic? We both know that is not why you are here, and it is not why you have let your fa ther slice you open like an animal bred for slaughter. Do not let it become what you fight for.”
The wind howled, battering against the silence that ensued. Elias never knew when to give up. I might have heard him say the same of me once, but I had learned it from him. His stone blue eyes searched the rare sight of my bare face. The gold rim around his irises dimmed as he mulled the dark fabric of my mask between his thumbs.
“This was never something that you were meant to endure, even if it has turned into a choice.” He spoke softly. “You cannot hide from yourself forever, Keahi. There are some scars I cannot heal.”
The fold of my tent settled as Elias slipped off into the night.
Releasing a breath, I shamefully slipped my hands underneath my tunic before he could change his mind, quietly sifting between my armor as I tightened the final band—spotted with fresh blood.
The Volkan warrior creed I was sworn into symbolized the resilience of the sun’s flames. Resilience, though, was just another defamation of honor to me, and I was reminded of it each time my father’s knife dipped into my veins. I stared down at the black mask Elias left me to choose, to hide behind, as my father cut me open at his will. Marred before I had the chance to fight for the Kingdom of Solstice, or what was left of the realm before the war began.
There was too much blood on my hands to be hidden by a thin shield of black fabric, and I could not blame it on the war in our realm alone. It served as a second skin as it molded to my face. The hollow slit in the fabric permitted only my eyes to be revealed to others, glowing with my element of fire. I was not hiding behind a mask; I was its willful prisoner.
The portal for our Gods to re-enter our realm and breed new magic be damned—what was lost, was lost. I did not become the General of my father’s army because of the closure of the Veil of Seven. I fought for what was left after the King of Novear destroyed the veil, to conquer a realm that was not entirely his. It was rare for me to believe something was worth saving. My Kingdom, the people of Solstice, could still be saved.
If the Novear Kingdom was brave enough to cross our lines in the coming days, I promised myself to be the one to remind them. The white elm’s bark crackled and lifted warm smoke through the brittle air. I stepped out of my tent, careful to secure the wind-tattered frame in its place. I did not wish to patch it in the middle of the night when rest was already a scarcity.
My boots toed against the edge of the fire’s glow within the center of our camp. Kane, my second in command, did not startle as I drifted beside him. He poured the heat of his magic into the core of the orange flame, solely focused on the warmth.
The Volkan warrior creed, an honor bestowed upon Solstice’s most valiant of sorcerers, did not allow us to see each other’s faces often. Our appearances were hidden beneath black cloaks draped to the earth, strapped in leather harnesses to carry our silver weapons, and a mask we rarely departed from. We learned to sense the smallest shift in each other’s movements because of this, even to our own detriment.
My chin dipped low. “Something on your mind?”
I readied myself as a meager sigh parted his lips. There were few others besides Kane who refused to withhold their honesty toward me. The title I carried did not deter him. I would not wish it any other way. Those who said what they felt were far less dangerous than those who did not.
“Yes, there is something on my mind. Not that you would be inept to hear it,” Kane said as he shuffled his feet into the moss-covered ground.
I stifled the irritation in the back of my throat. “Get on with it. Elias had his turn already.”
“As if you listened to him. Why would I waste my breath?” Kane peered at me over his shoulder and back.
“I was not aware of how much of a busybody you are, clinging to overheard conversations,” I shot back. A bitter hum in Kane’s chest served as a warning to my remark. The campfire glared with revived heat in front of us as his annoyance toward me flared with his magic.
“Though it is your job, isn’t it?” I continued, a smirk forming beneath my mask at his rile. “It is unfortunate that chastising your gifts would be contraindicated, given the circumstance.”
There was very little Kane did not observe compared to most, a useful talent when politics were interwoven with war. The council meetings with my father never proceeded smoothly without him. His talent for persuasion was even more formidable, considering he had coerced me into one of the few friendships I maintained outside of my brother.
“I do not overhear your conversations at my enjoyment, believe me. It is a torture to hear you be so painfully stubborn,” he said sharply. “Stupidly arrogant on top of it, but the two go hand in hand.”
“Is it my pride you think I bow to?” The calm left my insides, blistering with a fever. “Do you think I allow my father to belittle me for the sake of my enjoyment? Push my men beyond their breaking points at every turn because I fear the Novear Kingdom will have us running with our tails between our legs finally? It would seem blatantly obvious that pride is the least of things I feel.”
“Do not make me say it.” Kane fell into a hush. “The only fealty I have sworn to is the Solstice Kingdom. Do not give me the opportunity to slander your father when you know I hold no loyalty to our king. Elias is not the only one who has had to watch you suffer.”
Kane’s words bit beneath my armor, striking exactly where he intended to. His honesty toward me held too few limitations, except for one. Kane was the only sorcerer outside of the royal family who knew of the Solstice King’s secret regarding the source of his power.
“I won’t then.” I swallowed thickly, barely able to produce a sound.
Sweat beaded underneath my hood, and a bizarre ache singed the skin above my heart. My nerves were not as easy to control in front of those I trusted. They lifted the weight I bottled my emotions with, and I felt more than I allowed myself to in private. . . but this feeling was far beyond my control. The wound my father curated from the last draining had not appeared to be infected, but it radiated with stark heat. I stumbled back from the fire. My hand neared the building discomfort in my chest. It had just skimmed the surface as it drove deeper—piercing.
My brows pinched as a slash of torment slammed into my breath, threatening to send me to my knees. I had sustained enough torture over the years to know—something was very wrong.
Kane stilled, sensing my movements. “I should have forced you to rest. You’ve pushed yourself too far this time. Go back to your tent. I will send Elias back in to look at your wounds again. . . Keahi?”
A blinding pain struck the back of my head.
My surroundings fell victim to the magic, pulsing like a drumbeat in my ears, submerging my senses. It roared through my blood, coating my veins, until it synced with my heartbeat. I felt a presence capsize me, forcing me under. My eyes opened in a body that was not my own. At my feet, I stared at a blade slick with blood, dripping down the edge of a knife.
“Is that the best you got?” The window of the soul I looked through growled as vulgar cheers and chants erupted.
I felt her strength splinter underneath, within my chest. An army of soldiers that were not mine surrounded me, snarling between torches lit within a perfect circle.
“Have you grown weak after all these years?” She rasped against the cool boulder she was bound upon. Her vision slowly trailed from the tip of the red knife, and up to the two hands strangling the hilt—and then I finally saw his face. “Finish it!”
“Kane!” I screamed against the magical connection, attempting to dislodge from its grasp. “Elias!”
The knife rose above him with a smile made of venom and promise. Wrath set fire to my blood and chilled my spine. A crown of dark and hollow stars bloomed along his veiny forehead, plastered with long white strands of hair, staring down at the woman who was to be his sacrifice. I did not have to find the King of Novear after all—he summoned me instead through her.
The knife came down.
Their cheers rang louder as the echo of the woman he sank his knife into grew distant and frail. The King of Novear carved her back ruthlessly against the connection, solidifying the link between us that would anchor my soul to hers forever.
