Forged for Prophecy

Book 2: Forged For Destiny

by Andrew Knighton

Genres: Fantasy action & adventure; Epic Fantasy; Humorous Fantasy

Synopsis

Raul continues exploring his destiny and learns the hard truths about being a leader. 

Release date: August 12, 2025

Publisher: Orbit

Print pages: 432

Sample

Raul ran out of the tree line, sword and shield swinging, his band of rebels following him into the battering rain. A storm was sweeping from the mountains into the foothills, with the sort of wind that sent even goats running for shelter, that blew down fences and chimney stacks, ruined wild nests and farmyard roosts. The storm was at Raul’s back, pushing him faster down the slippery meadow. Its power filled him, sped him on, filled his lungs with laughter that was snatched away on the howling gale.

To his right, a man lost his footing, slipped, slid down the slope, cursing as his sword flew from his hand and his wooden shield slapped against the ground. A passing warrior shouted to the fallen man, but he waved her on, his expression more embarrassed than pained.

The rain hammered like the hard words of an angry lord, but it only made Raul more determined. This weather reminded him of winters in the Winding Vales, of the shutters banging on the old inn while familiar faces huddled by the fire, fields abandoned in favour of warmth and company. That was what he fought for. That made all the loss and pain worthwhile.

To his left, a wolf bounded across the open ground, straight toward the head of a seven-wagon convoy stretched out along a dirt road. A streak of grey fur and bared teeth, larger than any of the other wolves that lived in these woods, the archetypal nightmare of a wild beast. Something to cause alarm and confusion, to distract the convoy’s guards, to give Raul and the rest a few more moments before they were seen. Yasmi was truly giving one of her finest performances.

A horn blew from the lead wagon. From under the other canvas, drivers and guards poked their heads out, all looking toward that sound, toward the wolf, toward the front of the column, away from Raul. The whinnying of the horses and creaking of wheels was barely audible through the storm, but he could see the drivers hauling at the reins, wagons slowing, hooves and wheels slipping in the mud.

Almost there. Raul pushed himself to an extra burst of speed, waving his sword high, urging his companions on.

An archer stood on the board of the front wagon. Raul knew that he didn’t need to worry—it was nearly impossible to make a good shot in this rain, and Yasmi had planned her path to offer the worst possible target. Still, his chest tightened.

Then the flaps at the back of one of the wagons parted and a Dunholmi officer appeared, her blue tabard bearing the king’s white crown heraldry, a silver dagger hanging at her hip. She looked straight at Raul and snatched up a horn.

He hurled himself forward. Her cheeks bulged and a note blasted from the horn, a rich and piercing sound, more confident and compelling than the one blown before.

Too late to stop that, but too late for it to matter. Even as a pair of infantry came tumbling out of the rear wagon, Raul reached them. He let his momentum carry him straight into the nearest one, catching the man between his shield and the corner of the wagon. There was a crunch and a groan, then a crack as Raul’s pommel hit the side of the warrior’s head. As Raul moved on, the blue-clad body slumped into the current of muddy water running down the road.

“For Estis!” Raul bellowed, waving his sword high. Yasmi had been teaching him to project, and his voice carried through the wind and the clang of blades.

“A new moon rises!” some of the rebels yelled in response, but others were too caught up in the fighting, a ragtag band facing the Dunholmi fighting line.

The Dunholmi troops had abandoned the last three wagons and formed up near the middle of the convoy, spears raised like a thorn hedge. The officer was in the middle, sabre in one hand and shield in the other. Raul’s rebels stepped over the bodies of the isolated rear guards, blood running a red streak through the muddy stream of the road, and advanced toward that line. Caught up in the rush of battle, it took Raul a moment to realise that they were waiting for his command.

“Closer together!” he shouted. “I mean, form a shield wall!”

A rebel went down, run through as she advanced. The others drew together, trying to line up their shields, simple wooden boards with Raul’s dagger-pierced moon painted in a startling red. They hesitated as some of the Dunholmi spears rattled against their shields while others lunged high or low, aiming for legs and faces.

Raul stepped up to the line and placed his hand on the shoulder of Helvus, a devoted fighter who a month before had been a farmer and a weaver. The Dunholmi were professional soldiers, warriors paid to guard and to fight, to hold other people down hard and keep a grip on their land; women and men trained for war, who had been taught to form ranks and to stand their ground. Raul’s rebels weren’t soldiers—they had the bare minimum of training and the most basic sorts of weapons, desperation and determination the only things that had pushed them this far. Now that the momentum had faltered, they risked becoming lost.

That was why they needed a leader, a saviour, a chosen one. It was why they needed signs and prophecies. It was why they needed Raul.

He just wished he knew how to lead.

“We can do this.” Raul stepped in next to Helvus, who straightened, holding his shield higher. Other rebels looked at him uncertainly, waiting to see what came next.

Down the road there was howling, horses whinnying in fear, the twang of a bowstring through a brief lull in the wind. The Dunholmi soldiers advanced slightly, thrusting their spears at all angles. Raul channelled the tension from his chest into a sharp swing of his blade, a manoeuvre his father had taught him, to sweep a spear aside. Another spear slammed into his shield as he stepped forward, left a long pale scar as it slid across the wood. Then he was in among the Dunholmi, knocking one down, swinging his sword not to kill but to force an opponent back, opening a gap, making a moment of chaos that the rebels could use.

With a cry, they attacked. The two lines tumbled into each other, their neat imitation of a battlefield descending into something closer to a taproom brawl. Raul pushed his way to the centre of the crowd, batting away spears like they were nothing, focusing on getting to the officer. She was a pale woman with pale hair, muscular beneath her tabard and chainmail, her expression grim. When she saw him coming she raised her sabre, unfazed by his furious stare.

“You’re him, aren’t you?” she said, and Raul’s chest swelled with satisfaction. “The one they’ve been talking about.”

“My name is Raul Warborn,” he said. “Son of Princess Aemiria, heir to the throne of Estis.”

The lies barely caught in his throat anymore. The cause mattered more than the truth. He would make up for his deception once his homeland was free.

“Warborn?” The officer’s laughter was sharp as the blade that twitched toward Raul, probing for a way past his sword and shield. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

Raul blocked her sabre with his shield, then lunged toward her chest, forcing her back. She slid across the wet ground but kept both her balance and her poise. With her off hand, she drew a silver dagger, and raindrops shattered as they hit its charmed edge.

Raul advanced carefully, trying not to let the dagger distract him. He needed to be careful, that thing could cut through his pine shield like a butcher’s blade through fat. But if he paid it too much attention, he might give her an opening with her sabre or a chance to find a better position and then—

A spear lunged from his right, tearing through the canvas cover of a wagon. Raul lurched away from its steel tip, lost his footing, sank to one knee just out of the spear’s reach. Instinctively, he brought his shield up, catching the officer’s sabre as she charged, the momentum of her attack jarring his arm all the way up to the shoulder. She pivoted, her dagger a shining sliver of light against the grey day, arcing toward his neck. But Raul’s blade was moving too, and it was longer; he didn’t have as far to reach. The officer’s eyes went wide as her body’s momentum met the thrust of his blade. There was a popping, grating sound as Drusil’s simple, well-forged steel pierced chainmail, interlinked rings torn open and apart, followed by the wet sound of flesh. The officer gasped, the dagger fell from her hand, and the weight of her body slumped across Raul.

“Fuuuuck,” she groaned as blood streamed down his arm, a hot damp to counter the cold of the rain. Then she tipped sideways and fell into the mud with a splat, taking Raul’s sword with her. There was no dignity in death, but there could be revenge.

The spearman behind him, apparently one of the wagon drivers, leapt through the hole he’d torn in his canvas, lunging at Raul. Raul dodged the first blow, deflected the next one with his shield, and grabbed at the handle of his sword. But the blade was jammed between the officer’s ribs and the remains of her armour, the rain-slicked leather grip slipping through his fingers.

With a wordless cry, the driver drew his spear back, ready to run Raul through. A snarling shape bounded around the wagon and into him, bowling him over. Man and wolf rolled away from Raul, brown and red staining grey fur as Yasmi tore at the driver with her claws. The fresh, clear smell of the rain was fouled by the salt tang of blood and the stink of emptying bowels. Funny how Valens had never mentioned that detail in the stories he told Raul growing up. But then, the ugly truth wouldn’t have served his cause.

Raul grabbed the dead officer’s sabre. Half the soldiers were down and the rest were backing away along the road, abandoning their wagons.

“Helvus!” Raul shouted. “Get up into the middle wagon! Find that pay chest.”

“Yes, Raul,” the farmer shouted back, stowing his axe with a look of relief.

Raul took two careful steps toward Yasmi, who turned to face him with her long face tilted on one side. It was so much like facing a real dog that he reached out a hand as if to pat her, but she pulled her head back with a derisive snort. Raul would have blushed if his cheeks hadn’t been so cold.

“Remember the plan,” he said. “We need a different version of you now. I know you don’t like changing in front of people, but…”

One of Yasmi’s forepaws rose, brushing against the fur behind her ear. The paw kept moving forward, her face came with it, and her whole body twisted as she shifted into human form. In place of the wolf, a young woman crouched with a mask in her hand, strawberry-blond hair bound loosely back, the grey garb of a theatrical shifter plastered to her body with mud and rain.

“You take me to all the nicest places,” she said with a smile that might have become playful if the blood on her hands hadn’t grabbed her attention. She hooked the wolf’s face onto her belt along with her other masks, then brushed her fingers across the cloth at her hips with a look of disgust.

“We still need the ogre,” Raul said.

“Oh, do we?” She arched an eyebrow.

“Please?”

“Since you asked so nicely.” She picked out a warty green mask. “But don’t start thinking that you can give me orders just because everyone else expects it.”

“Is this the time to worry about manners?” Raul prodded one of the bodies with his toe, then immediately felt guilty. Bad enough that people were dying without him treating their remains like debris.

“‘There is no soul so wretched that vexed etiquette cannot make them worse,’” Yasmi recited. “Harnacht, act three of The Prince’s Lament. Though I’m not sure my own manners will survive what’s coming next.”

She pressed the ogre mask to her face and started to transform. Lithe limbs bulged and stretched. Her skin turned green, littered with warts and patches hard as scabs. Her hair became a dark, greasy mop framing a square face with teeth the shape and colour of granite tombstones. Within moments, Yasmi towered over Raul.

“Where?” she slurred in a voice like sludge.

Raul pointed to the middle wagon, where Helvus had slashed through a stretch of canvas and was rolling its remnants back from the wooden frame. Yasmi the ogre stomped over, her gnarled feet throwing up gouts of mud, and ripped away the wood. Her movements were slow and clumsy but had a power that reduced wrist-thick beams to splinters as easily as Raul would pick up a pen.

“I think it’s this one,” Helvus said, tapping a chest with his knife. The chest was oak planks bound in iron, with a padlock the size of a fist. Thick chains were wrapped around it in every direction and to the wagon’s base. If it had belonged to someone from Estis, a charm would have been carved into the wood around the lock, a mountain for endurance perhaps, or a maze on the lock to emphasise its complexity. But while plenty of ordinary Dunholmi used charms, and Raul had found them on some of the soldiers he’d fought, those in charge took a dim view of magic.

As thunder rumbled through the storm, Yasmi grabbed one of the chains in both warty hands and heaved. The links strained against each other, but they held. She clambered onto the wagon and took a firmer hold, one foot braced against the chest.

The rumbling grew louder. Raul jerked his head around to face the noise, and his hand tightened around the sabre as he saw what was coming.

“Cavalry!”

A dozen Dunholmi warriors wearing the white tree on bold blue of Count Alder were riding toward them. Their horses, leaner than a working farm horse but bulging with power, charged over a ridge and along the road, mud spraying from their hooves. The riders leaned forward, long spears couched under their arms, points extended. They galloped without reservation straight toward the convoy, spreading out as they went to become a deadly line of speed and shining steel.

Raul’s heart beat wildly—this wasn’t what was meant to happen. There hadn’t been anything in the omens he’d read this morning. Had he cast them wrong? Had he missed it? Were the signs too weak?

For just a moment, Raul wanted to stand his ground. That was what the heroes did in stories, stood and fought against the odds, and that was how they won. But this wasn’t a story; there were real lives at stake, brave people who had followed him on the promise that he knew what he was doing.

“We’ve got to go!” he shouted.

Most of them didn’t hesitate. Whether out of fear or loyalty, they ran from the wagons, up the slope toward the trees, toward cover that could break up a charge and stop the cavalry crushing them beneath their weight and momentum. But some of them stood their ground, axes raised, shield toward the onrushing enemy. A woman named Katia looked at Raul with disappointment.

“What happened to standing up against the Dunholmi?” she asked. “What happened to needing this gold?”

“None of that does any good if we die here,” Raul said, remembering the fight of another day, bodies sprawled across the flagstones of the palace in Pavuno, faces of friends stilled forever. “We can’t win now, but if we live, then maybe we can win next time.”

Katia glared at him, but her axe started to sag. Others looked doubtfully at the onrushing attack.

“I thought you were meant to be a hero,” she muttered.

Raul raised his voice. “Back to the woods! Everyone, now!”

There was a crack. Yasmi tossed away a broken chain, but the chest, a month’s pay for the occupying troops, was still chained to the wagon. With a roar of frustration, she grabbed it with both hands and heaved, but it wouldn’t come loose.

“Leave it!” Raul shouted. “Come on!”

Yasmi roared again and bared her teeth.

“I said leave it! This isn’t worth dying for.”

Despite those words, Yasmi still didn’t run. He couldn’t leave her, not until he was sure that she had listened and was coming with him, that her own natural obstinacy hadn’t mixed too badly with the stubborn solidity of the ogre.

The cavalry was almost to the convoy already. Half of them split off, trying to intercept Katia and other rebels on the way to the woods, while the rest galloped along the road, straight toward Raul.

With one last disgruntled rumbled, Yasmi’s ogre leapt down from the wagon, which shook at the sudden movement. One warty hand ran up behind her ear, the ogre’s face fell away, and the real Yasmi returned, her other hand already reaching for the wolf mask. Helvus jumped down beside her, eyes wide as he stared at the oncoming riders.

“Come on!” Raul shoved Helvus with his shield and started to run.

The slippery slope was harder going up than down, but they had a cobbler in the camp now, and the studs he’d put on Raul’s boots kept him from going face down in the grass. Helvus ran alongside him, arms swinging, legs rushing in frantic movement, already gasping for breath. After a moment, Yasmi streaked past, grey-furred limbs stretching as she bounded up the slope.

Some of the riders on the road headed for the wagons but three followed the fleeing rebels. Raul and his small group were caught between the riders ahead, who had missed the other rebels heading into the woods, and those behind. The riders at the tree line turned, spear tips gleaming, and a horse whinnied as it pawed the turf.

Yasmi howled. Horses bucked and twisted away as they saw her fearsome form. Some of the riders, more experienced or luckier in their steeds, held them in place, but others were carried in a panicked rush across the meadow.

Raul’s fear was rising as he heard hooves coming from behind, but he wouldn’t let that fear show. Not in front of Helvus and certainly not in front of the enemy. He raised his sword and shield, readying himself for one last desperate fight.

Two riders ahead of them still. Yasmi leapt at them. One rider tried to stab her with his spear, but his horse reared in fear at the wolf, flinging him from the saddle; he landed headfirst, neck at an angle no one could survive. As that horse raced away, Yasmi flung herself at the other, claws raking its side. The rider stabbed, Yasmi swerved, the horse whinnied and slipped across the slope, one leg giving way. Yasmi leapt again, roaring for effect, and the horse’s panicked lurch sent it rolling onto its back, across its rider, with a sickening crunch.

Raul’s heart was hammering and there was an ache in his side. His foot slipped and he twisted as his other foot came down, trying to keep upright, to keep moving. The hooves behind them kept thundering. The trees were close, but the enemy were closer.

He turned, raising his shield. A spear was hurtling toward him, too much power to be stopped, but that wasn’t the only option. He turned the shield to an angle and the spear glanced off it. A swing of his sword made the approaching horse swerve around him.

Then came a sound like a hog being butchered, the wet thud and a squeal of pain. The rider who turned might have missed Raul, but he left his spear behind, right through Helvus’s chest. Blood spurted along the shaft and dribbled from Helvus’s pale lips as he toppled over.

Raul felt the weight of his armour tightening around his chest, armour that Helvus hadn’t had, that wouldn’t have protected him even if he’d worn it. He felt the raindrops on his face, heard the silence where Helvus’s scream had been, and knew that one of them would never feel the rain again.

“Raul, come on!” Yasmi stood beneath the trees, wolf mask in hand, waving him on. More riders were coming, more cautious than these first two but no less deadly. He forced himself to look away from Helvus, to turn and run again up those last few strides, ducking to keep the branches out of his face. He got a dozen strides in, then turned and looked back.

The riders stopped at the edge of the trees. They were better armed than the rebels, better armoured, probably better trained. But they were used to fighting from horseback and there was no riding into woods like these. Some of them argued among themselves. One without a spear stared at Raul, who stared right back at her—her dark eyes bored into him with a stunning hatred. And beyond, Helvus’s life flowed back into the land from which he’d been born.

“Come on.” Yasmi spoke softly as she tugged at Raul’s arm. “The others are waiting for their leader. Unless you want them to wait until more Dunholmi arrive, you need to make your exit.”

“If I’d thought this through better, he’d still be alive,” Raul said. “If I’d paid attention to the sounds sooner. If I’d thought to warn him when—”

“If you keep doing that, you’re going to drive yourself insane.” She laid a hand on his shoulder. There was blood on her fingers, but at least it wasn’t their people’s blood. “You can’t control everything. Helvus knew the risks.”

“I thought I knew the risks! I looked for the signs! I thought we’d only have to deal with the wagon guards. But I must have cast the entrails wrong, and now it’s all on me.”

“That’s the problem, Raul. You’re taking this all on yourself, and you’re expecting too much. You’re going to make mistakes, what matters is that you keep making the world better.”

“Try telling that to Helvus.”

The worst of it was that there was a way he could have done better. With the right tutor, an experienced diviner to teach him and help him, he wouldn’t have missed this. But that meant working with Prisca and he… he just couldn’t. Had he got a man killed by being as stubborn as she was? That thought left him feeling even more sick.

The Dunholmi had finished their discussion. One of them turned to gallop away, flinging up clods of dirt from the waterlogged ground. The others started dismounting.

“I know you don’t feel much like a hero right now,” Yasmi said. “But that’s exactly who the others need to see. So unless you’re planning to give up on this whole mad endeavour…” She paused for a heartbeat, and in that moment her words felt almost like a request, a plea for a different life. Then her expression hardened. “Then you need to get back into character and give them the show they’re after. Remember, today you’re not Raul of High Cross. You’re Raul Warborn, saviour of Estis, King Balbianus reborn, and that man does not have doubts.”

Raul nodded, took a deep breath, rolled his shoulders back into the confident posture she’d taught him.

“One last touch of drama.” Yasmi flicked her fingers, leaving a spatter of blood across his cheek. “Now go lead us home.”

With a stride that left no room for halt or hesitation, Raul headed deeper into the woods. As he approached, some of the rebels watched him warily, while others cheered half-heartedly. They’d lost friends today and they hadn’t got what they’d come for. He was going to have to do a lot better if he wanted to stop this rebellion from falling apart.

Yasmi stalked back and forth across the sunlit clearing, fingers tapping against the masks on her belt. Acting came so naturally to her, she found it difficult to put the technique into words or explain how it worked to someone else. Usually, Tenebrial provided the words for her performances, every last syllable clear and evocative. She could declaim any of a thousand speeches from a hundred plays by heart, but explaining how she gave them was another matter.

“Imagine there’s a pit,” she said, “deep down in your guts. You’re going to draw air down until that pit bulges like a brewer’s belly, and then you’re going to fill every last word with that breath. Understand?”

Raul shifted from one foot to the other, dead oak leaves crunching under his muddy boots. How could someone so tall, his tunic straining at the muscles inside, manage to seem so small?

“I think so,” he said.

“Then try it.”

She settled on a fallen tree trunk, one leg crossed over the other, brass bangles chiming as she laid her hands in her lap and watched him expectantly.

“It’s not easy with you watching,” he said, running a hand through his hair. He managed to look good while looking like he’d come straight from hay baling. The boy was infuriating.

“People are watching you all the time. That’s what this is all about—helping you create a better impression.”

Gods knew he needed it. While she might find him delightful, other people were less easily impressed by an unknown young man claiming the right to run the kingdom. He’d done well enough when Prisca’s plans gave him a structure to work within, but now they were cut loose, relying on Raul’s skills as a leader and orator, and stumbling rural charm wasn’t enough to motivate a full-blown rebellion.

“It’s just…” He looked at the trampled grass around his feet, one hand pressed against the back of his neck. “Performing for you is different.”

Gods preserve her, was he blushing? And was that a treacherous heat creeping up her own cheeks?

Since when had she started acting like a little girl? If she wanted, she could go over to him, make an excuse of tidying that hair, let her hand linger on his cheek on the way down, lean in a little closer. They’d come close before, why not now? Didn’t they deserve some entertainment better than weak beer and peasant songs around a campfire?

But before he’d just been Raul, the innkeeper’s son, a country lad whose biggest responsibility was shovelling shit out of the stables. Now he was Raul, warrior, prophet, the last great hope of a kingdom. More importantly, he was the leading man in the most difficult and most important production she’d ever been a part of. Her mother had told her, before Yasmi was old enough for the lesson, that she should never screw anyone she would share a stage with because it could ruin their chemistry. And right now, the whole kingdom was their stage.

Still, that hair…

She jumped to her feet and clapped her hands together, frightening off a nearby pair of crows.

“Imagine that your audience are squirrels,” she said, waving her arm. “Those ones in the pine over there. Without moving from where you are, you need to give that speech loud enough to move them.”

“The squirrels?” He smiled. She did her best to ignore it. Her fingers found the wolf mask on her belt, and that gave her strength. The wolf would never be flustered, never pause, never back down. She would be as clear and certain as the wolf.

“That’s right, the squirrels. I’ve performed for nobility.” She tapped her chest. “But you…” She prodded him, then took a step back, arms folded. “You need an audience to match your talents. So, squirrels.”

“All right.”

He turned his attention away from her and planted his feet in a steady stance. His chest swelled, his mouth opened wide, and he spoke.

“‘A dagger in the moonlight,’” he proclaimed. One of the squirrels looked around, but the other was busy with an acorn. “‘Not how a king should slide from this world.’” He seemed to swell and his voice grew louder, calling out Balbianus’s final speech from The True and Tragic History. Now both squirrels were looking, tails twitching in agitation. “‘But if my people’s fate hangs on one last slip of my wrist, then let me buy their lives with mine.’”

He punctuated the last words with a fist slammed against his chest. The squirrels leapt off their branch and away, disappearing up the tree.

“I did it!” He turned to her, beaming wide, not the proud monarch anymore but not the hunched and nervous youth either. “See, I can be an actor!”

He swept her up in his arms and swung her around, the two of them laughing. Maybe she wasn’t such a bad teacher, though he’d need a few more lessons to give that speech real punch.

“Not an actor,” she said as he set her down. “An orator, and a prince.”

“Hm.” His expression grew serious, but at least he held her gaze. “You’re right. I need to be more careful what I say.”

She took a step away from him, her back straightening. This was why things were how they were; too much at stake for either of them to let down their defences, or to take time for themselves. And much as she missed the carefree parts of her old life, she’d chosen this. She was doing something that mattered, something real, and she was going to do it well.

“What you did just now, try it next time you’re addressing the troops.”

“Yes, Yasmi.”

“And practice it when you get a chance.”

“Yes, Yasmi.”

“And don’t you keep placating me with ‘yes, Yasmi,’ I’m not your mother.”

The words tasted like dirt before they were even out of her mouth. It had been an instinctive retort, but she of all people should have known better than to use it on him. Nothing could be worse than her loss, but Prisca’s betrayal of her adopted son came close.

“I’m sorry.” She hung her head.

“Don’t be.” He touched her on the chin, and when she looked up there was only sadness in his eyes. “You’re not the one who hurt me.”

“Have you heard from her?”

He shook his head. “If I did, I’d tell you.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Of course I do! You’re my best friend and closest lieutenant.”

“Lieutenant?” She headed for the path back down the valley, and he fell into step beside her, their footsteps and their words falling into a familiar, easy rhythm.

“Would you prefer deputy?” he asked in a playful tone. “Assistant, perhaps?”

“Definitely not assistant. That makes me sound like I clear up after you, and you can deal with your own sweaty shirts.”

“Aide-de-camp?”

“Too fancy.”

“Tr