Oracle of Life: The Lords' Gambit Series, #1

By Katherine D. Graham

Six fallen lords. Three vengeful goddesses. And one mortal, damned to prophesy for them all.

An Exiled Oracle

Nariah, the Heiress of Ellonai, is dead. An exiled, desert-dwelling Doomsayer is all that remains within the shell of the powerful princess she once was.

A Heretic

She isn't sure which of her visions her people hate more: the one where the three benevolent goddesses they serve have decided to destroy the world, or the vision of six lords falling from the skies to save them.  

The World's Only Hope

Stumbling across the very lords she's been seeing in her visions for years, only Nariah's accursed gift of Sight can aid the lords in their rebellion against the goddesses, and determine the fate of her world before it's turned to ash.

But does she even want to save those who've wronged her?

A whole new take on mythological fantasy awaits in this thrilling dark epic by USA Today Bestselling Author Katherine D. Graham

**This is not a standalone novel, though each book in The Lords' Gambit series follows a different main character. Book two, Monk of Death, is available for pre-order now.**

• Language: English
• Publisher: Katherine D. Graham
• Release date: Jan 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215316320

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Not even the freshest, juiciest tomato in the world was worth dying for. And yet here Nariah was, holding her breath as she let the last periwinkle jeena stone she owned drop from her shaking fingers into a market hag’s wrinkled palm.

The old woman’s milky-white eyes narrowed as they scanned Nariah’s dirt-smudged, sweat-streaked face. If she didn’t know better, Nariah would have sworn that those eyes saw straight through to her very soul.

For a moment, the exiled former heiress worried that she’d made a terrible mistake by stopping in the market after collecting her rations. Her fieldmates had raised eyebrows and whispered when she stepped out of the procession line for the treat, but after ten years of trudging obediently in that single-file line of starving peasants to beg for far less food than she’d earned, today was worth getting something special.

Birthdays were meant to be special, right? Even for heretics?

The old crone behind the produce stall rolled the precious gem between her fingers, then held it up to the sunlight to test its expected halo, if it was genuine. Ten years ago, Nariah’s would have had the woman dragged out and flogged for her insolence. The stone was tiny, barely a pinky fingertip’s circumference, but it would more than pay the price of her entire stall.

Nariah only wanted the tomatoes. She could care less about the prized herbs, sweet fruits, or even the rare potatoes from deep in the Dwarven valleys.

At last, the old woman nodded and beckoned for Nariah’s rucksack. Beautiful tomatoes—one, two, three of them—fell in alongside Nariah’s precious grain portions for the week. Each tomato that fell into the bag lifted her spirits. For the first time in ten years, the yoke tying her to her fate eased to where she could hardly remember it being there. She even smiled. A true smile!

She opened her mouth to thank the woman—only to gag on chamber pot water as it splashed into her face.

Without thinking, Nariah hurled onto the vegetable stand. The hag may have been old, but her right hook brought enough force to send the former heiress down right smack on her rear on the cold cobblestone street. For a moment, the market stilled. All eyes seemed to be on her as Nariah peeled away the thick strands of black hair that had plastered themselves over her face.

She gaped up at the old woman, who bared her teeth in a snarl.

Think ya could trick me ‘cause I’m nearly blind now, do ya? Rounding the stand, the old woman snatched up the rucksack, retrieving Nariah’s prized birthday tomatoes and placing them roughly back in the stand.

T-trick? Nariah stuttered, forcing back more bile as the increasingly bitter taste in her mouth overpowered every other sense. I paid you far more than they were worth!

Leea, this’un givin’ you a hard time?

Nariah’s breath caught in her chest. A guard in plate armor with a yellow and green tartan draped over one shoulder moved into the frozen square. His tartan, a badge of his Royal Guard rank, was clasped with a silver crown. That meant he was in her sister’s patrol—the crown princess was close by.

This here’s that Doomsayer we threw out years ago! Leea, the produce vendor shouted, jabbing a knobby finger in Nariah’s direction. She thought she could use one of the good King’s jeenas to bribe me into assistin’ her!

Without waiting to be asked, the proud vendor presented the stone to the guard, whose jaw clenched when it hit his palm. It was only then that Nariah realized her mistake. Every jeena from before her exile was etched with her father’s face, but her initials—the crown princess’s initials. It never occurred to her that those initials had changed while she lived in the fields, where gems and stones were not used as currency, and only labor had value.

I assure you it was just a misunderstanding! she said, rising and wiping her filth-covered face on her rough-spun sleeve. I didn’t realize it was an old stone. It was a birthday gift.

It was the truth; the stones had been gifted to her father ten years ago to this very day, when he once again fell short on picking his firstborn child a gift. The guard, however, was obviously unconvinced.

I wasn’t serving as a guard at that time, so I cannot confirm nor deny this woman’s identity, he said, pocketing the gem. But know this, Her Royal Highness is only a few buildings away. Perhaps she can confirm this claim?

Nariah snatched up the rucksack that had fallen—significantly emptier—by the stall, and backed away as slowly as she could. Her ears roared as though plunged below river rapids, and her heart’s frantic thumping matched waves of pain in her head.

If they took her to Deborah, everyone in the kingdom would know the truth. The fields she’d snuck into as a worker would hold no shelter for her anymore. Only the desert wastes awaited her, if they even allowed her to live, following her exile.

Are ya callin’ me a liar, boy?! Leea shouted.

The market burst into action then. Not waiting for the guard to give permission, a rotten tomato smacked into the side of Nariah’s head. Then an egg smashed against her shoulder.

Heretic! someone screamed, loosing a volley of rotten grapes one handful at a time as Nariah stumbled away from Leea’s stall.

Hanging her once-noble head low, Nariah trudged through a barrage of rotten produce, eggs, and the contents of more chamber pots. The physical objects hurled at her were embarrassing, but it was the vicious slurs and cruelty of her former subjects that threatened to break her spirit.

Each slur brought back the hurtful words that had left her caretaker’s mouth the day she was banished. The bashing her mother, Queen Storm of the Southern Mountains, gave her when she was disowned.

Get out of here, Doomsayer! a man’s voice boomed from the crowd.

She was trying to do exactly that. The towering wrought-iron gate separating the market from the slums was only a few feet away—a few feet too far.

When she stepped out of line to buy tomatoes, she had not expected to come out wearing their rotten remnants.

Time felt sluggish around her as her mind raced to process what was happening. Sure, she used an old stone, but surely she wasn’t the only one who still had a few lingering around. How else had Leea known who she was?

Nariah’s once ankle-length black hair had long since been chopped to shoulder-length like a commoner’s to help her get around more easily and attract less uninvited attention. Her perfect cinnamon complexion had darkened to a burnt mahogany by a sun as unforgiving as the people who ran her out of her home. Even her accent had changed. Once crisp and clear and light with the jaded innocence of a child who’d never seen the world, it now took on the deepened dialect of the farmers with whom she spent most of her exiled days.

Heiress Nariah Alcon, the most powerful woman in the land after the King, no longer existed. She had died under the unseeing but fearful eyes of a people unwilling to heed her warnings. A homeless farmhand from the south was all that remained in the vestiges of Nariah’s old body.

She had hardly stepped out the gates before they slammed shut behind her, catching the hem of her cloak in the lock. The Royal Guard watched, bemused, from where Leea scolded him and jabbed her finger in his chest. At least Deborah hadn’t been dragged into this. The rejection of her own sister, her only true friend in the world before her exile, being forced into a position of obeying her father or risking exile herself, was more than Nariah could bear to think about.

If you see so much, a gate-guard in a pristine royal-blue uniform jeered at her from the other side, why can’t you see you’re not welcome here?

Drawing a dagger from her cloak, she severed the corner that was trapping her to the gate with a single swing. Flames lingered around the edges of the damaged cloth. It had been only a bit of magic—a parlor trick meant for children—but it worked. The guard grimaced and stood back. The fear in his eyes churned Nariah’s stomach.

If these eyes ignited those they looked upon, Nariah whispered, forcing the guard to lean closer despite his fear if he wished to make out her words, you, wretched soul, would be among the first to burn.

A second spark between her fingers sent the guard full-on running from the gate. Calls for reinforcements echoed down the sandstone streets, but no one dared to aid him. Cursing them under her breath, Nariah turned on her heel and resumed her walk of shame, thankful that at least the barrage of produce had ended.

Unlike the open, sunny streets of the market and middle residential districts of Ellonai’s mountaintop castle town, buildings crowded in together so closely in the lower slums that the streets were constantly cast in shadows, even at midday. Streets were carved into the rockface in a spiraling arc down to the fields, where the least fortunate—the farmhands—slept in tents among their masters’ livestock. The masters themselves lived within the prestigious Castle Shadow residential district—as high as one could go without being of noble birth.

Down in the slums, boney children in scant scraps of clothing ran from the shadows. Skeletal hands scraped at the rotting remnants of food clinging to Nariah’s robes. She tried to shoo them away—not because they bothered her, but because she feared for their health if they consumed such vile and polluted foods.

Here, she bade a tall boy standing behind the others. He wore a yellow kherti scarf around his neck that had a red band of beads dangling over one shoulder—the mark of an orphan guild leader.

Pulling out her entire week’s ration of dried oats, she pressed them into the boy’s hands. His eyes widened at the amount of food, but when his gaze met Nariah’s purple eyes—eyes only the lineage of the goddesses carried—his lips curled into a snarl.

"Chea!" he snapped.

Nariah’s face went cold as she looked for the threat. Chea—a vile reptilian sewer-dwelling species—kidnapped disobedient children, the wives’ tales said. At the young guild master’s single word, the orphans were by his side in a wave. Nariah was only a moment too late to realize that there was no actual chea anywhere to be seen. She grimaced as she added the new slur to her list of injustices.

Keep your poison, Doomsayer.

She jumped as he spat in her face. Stumbling back a step, her foot hit a pile of dung in the road. Chaos ensued. A couple of the children laughed at her misfortune. Another cried out when the young master scattered the precious week’s worth of food into the wind. The older child struck the one who cried out, whispering of the dangers of consuming an unholy gift from the Doomsayer.

If only they knew how much of the town’s food was planted, nurtured, and harvested by that unholy Doomsayer. Nariah chuckled at the irony.

For a moment, the world vanished. Her attention was called upward, to the cloudless blue skies above, then beyond them to the darkness of space and brilliance of stars. Flames ignited within her body, and she felt herself lifted upward, as though someone was dragging her up from the earth with a rope. Panic thudded in her chest. She’d been through this before—too many times to count. She knew the prophecy she was about to see, and braced herself for it.

But her eyes still weren’t prepared for what she saw.

In seconds, the children who’d been leering at her were struck by white-hot flames from above. The sky cracked, the deep blue of space cutting through the clouds and lighter blue like a wound of infinity. Stars fell as orbs of fire, engulfing the city in seconds.

Nariah’s skin bubbled and burst. She cried, but her tears evaporated right out of her eyes, just as the blood from her wounds shifted to crimson smoke. There was no air to scream with as she fell to her knees on sandstone blocks hotter than any furnace. Ashes, white as snow, burst into the sky in billowing clouds as the taller buildings ignited and burned to the ground in only minutes. A few lucky people cowered in natural caverns in the cliffside, but the air shimmered with the steam.

Knowing she should already be dead, or soon would be, Nariah turned her face to the heavens once more.

Three golden chariots descended from the heavens, each bearing a woman of more beauty than Nariah could imagine to be possible. The woman in the centermost chariot bore a smile of gold and auburn hair which literally carried flames without burning away. She grinned directly at Nariah and snapped a vicious whip.

If you follow them, you condemn them all, the woman said with a chuckle. Come, Nariah. Bring us your Sight.

Something cold smashed into Nariah’s face, and she plummeted to the ground. Had she been hanging in the air the whole time? Usually she only thought she was hovering.

Another cold, wet splash to the face brought her mind back to the very much unburned and unhappy world of peasants around her.

Condemn us all, will you, Doomsayer? an old woman with a mouth full of rotting wooden teeth squealed, chunking a chamberpot aside. Apparently even the poor could not let her leave this city in peace.

Get out of here! the Orphan Guildmaster shouted, waving his hand.

Kill her! A man raised a torch. Burn the Doomsayer!

Nods of agreement and enthusiastic shouts rose up all around her in a wave. Nariah shuddered and cowered back on hands and knees, trying to purge her mind of the destruction she just saw. Trying to get her bearings so that she could run.

Take your place among us, Oracle, the flaming-haired woman’s voice drifted into Nariah’s thoughts.

Nariah balked at it. She’d never continued to hear the woman when the vision was over.

Just say the word, and we will rescue you. We’ll bring justice upon those who raised their hands against our Oracle.

Our? Nariah shook her head again. Reaching a building, she clawed her way up the wall to a standing position. The mob was upon her, reaching out for her and dragging her down the street toward the fields.

Not near the houses! the man who’d stirred the mob to murder her yelled. Out in the field! Slaughter her! Bleed her dry!

Hands were everywhere. Even as they carried her, their hands groped her body for non-existent valuables to plunder. One woman brought a pair of scissors to her head, but another smacked them away.

Keep nothing of hers! a reproachful woman barked. It’ll bring a curse on you!

There was less groping then, but Nariah couldn’t keep her feet amid the fever-fueled pace of the crowd. Her feet, though thoroughly wrapped within her sandals, burned and skinned along the sandstones. Flailing, she desperately tried to right herself, to get her feet under her, but every movement was countered with an elbow here, a punch there, occasionally even a kick some limber young one managed to score.

None of the pain rivaled the pain she’d felt in her vision, though. None of it was worth the destruction that would await these poor souls if Nariah entertained what had to be a goddess’s call. Gritting her teeth, Nariah gave in to the whims of the mob, allowing them to drag her along to her death.

The death of an exile would be freedom from isolation, starvation, and endless toil.

The death of an entire civilization was not optional, no matter how much they’d wronged her.

All too soon, and yet after too