Synopsis of The Oath Book One of The Druid Chronicles

Book One (The Oath) opens with the arrival of Caelym, a young Druid priest, at the outer walls of the Abbey of Saint Edeth in search of Annwr, the sister of his cult’s chief priestess, who was abducted by a Saxon war band fifteen years earlier and is rumored to be living in the convent.

Weary, wounded, and starving, Caelym is on the verge of collapse when he meets an elderly woman who takes him to her hut. In subsequent chapters it is disclosed that the woman is the Priestess Annwr, that she spent the first years of her enslavement as the nursemaid to Theobold and Alswanda’s orphaned daughter, Aleswina, and that when Aleswina was consigned to the abbey, she brought Annwr with her and arranged for her to have lodging on the convent grounds.

Aleswina is well aware of Annwr’s background and, acting out of devotion to her beloved servant, she hides Caelym in a secret chamber under a shrine in the convent’s garden and nurses him back to health.

Just as Caelym and Annwr are about to leave together, Aleswina learns that her cousin, King Gilberth—a tyrant known for his cruelty and vicious temper, and for having had five wives die under mysterious circumstances—is going to take her from the convent to be his next bride. Terrified, she escapes with Annwr and Caelym. While Annwr, who’s come to love Aleswina as a daughter, wants to keep her with them, Caelym is adamant that a Saxon Christian cannot be admitted into their cult and only agrees to deliver her to another convent.

Besides rescuing Annwr, Caelym also has to find his two sons, Arddwn and Lliem, who have not been heard from since they were sent out of the shrine to be fostered by Benyon, a servant believed to be faithful to Llwddawanden’s priests and priestesses. But Benyon, it turns out, has converted to Christianity, assumed a new identity, and used the treasure trove he stole from the shrine to set himself up as a wealthy landowner ensconced in a heavily fortified manor.

On discovering that the man he entrusted his sons to has made them into slaves, Caelym is ready to break down the door of that manor with his bare hands, but Annwr and Aleswina hold him back. Instead, using subterfuge, Aleswina is able to get inside and trick Benyon into letting the boys go.

Despite Caelym’s gratitude for Aleswina’s rescuing his sons, he continues to refuse Annwr’s demand that they take her back to Llwddawanden. The two continue to argue until, in an emotional confrontation, Caelym reveals that their cult’s previously safe sanctuary has been betrayed, and that instead of returning there, they are embarking upon a perilous and possibly futile attempt to found a new shrine.

Wanting what is best for Aleswina, Annwr agrees to leave her at a remote lodge with an elderly servant who was the princess’s first nursemaid and who promises to see that the princess reaches the safety of a convent beyond the border of Derthwald. In the book’s closing pages, Aleswina is resigned to spending the rest of her life behind convent walls, and Annwr is ready, whatever dangers lie ahead, to rejoin her people.