An Oath Taken (The Oath Trilogy #1) by Diana Cosby

All Sir Nicholas Beringar, the new castellan of Ravenmoor Castle,  wanted to do was restore the holding to its former glory and get the inhabitants to trust in him and leave peaceably. All Lady Elizabet Armstrong, petite Scottish hell-raiser wants to do is save her people who have been taken prisoner in Ravenmoor Castle. When the two meet, it's in a very unexpected way and begins this tale of deception and awakening.

When Lady Elizabet sets out to rob a seemingly weather traveler, she gets more than she bargains for when she discovers that her victim is no victim at all, but the new castellan of the castle where her father, brother and people are being held prisoner, and he is no one to cross. She is mistaken for a lad and in an instant becomes "Thomas", who Sir Nicholas offers a position as his squire.

Thomas/Elizabet appears at Ravenmoor with her beautiful hair shorn and in menswear, Sir Nicholas begins to train his squire. After Nicholas comes to believe that Thomas was abused by men, he takes Thomas under his wing. The only problem there is that he begins to have unconventional feeling for the boy and doesn't know what to do about them.

Elizabet as Thomas, tries her darnedest to live up to the expectations of the squire that Nicholas wants. The inner struggle to help her people but maintain a loyalty to her castellan is eating away at her. The fact that she also has feelings for Nicholas makes the deception of her boyish appearance even more difficult. What will happen when her identity is finally discovered? Will the trust that Nicholas placed in Thomas be destroyed completely when he discovers Thomas is in fact the beautiful troublemaker, Elizabet? Finding all this out is all in the discovery in this tale by Diana Cosby.

An Oath Taken by Diana Cosby, the first tale in her latest Oath Trilogy is a well written in engaging saga. The backdrop of English and Scottish strife along with this very intimate story of rousing emotion between the two main characters, Nicholas and Elizabet. I truly enjoyed this story. I think Ms Cosby's writing only gets better and better. The only point I found to be a tad bothersome was that how Elizabet could be continually mistaken for a boy by Nicholas when in such close quarters with him. I couldn't completely buy into that ease of deception and it probably is why I gave this book a 4 instead of 5 Star review. Aside from that niggling doubt, I really did enjoy this book. Sir Nicholas is a character of such honor and integrity truly attempting to make up for the wrongs done to the people under his protection by the evil castellan who proceeded him. His part of this story cemented my enjoyment of the story as I adore a strong but fair hero and Sir Nicholas is all that and more.

~KIMBERLY~