"Deborah Doyle - Circle of Magic 02 - The Secret of The Tower" - читать интересную книгу автора (Doyle Debra)

The little group of knights turned their horses' heads away from the road they had been following and
rode into the forest to their left. The knights strapped their shields to their arms and drew their swords,
riding forward as quietly as they could.
The dark, sturdy oak trees surrounded them, and the branches arching overhead cast a deep shade,
making the forest even cooler in the cool day.
Randal shivered a little. I don't like this place, he thought. He turned to his cousin. "Walter-" "What is it?"
- I can't explain. . .
"Nothing," said Randal.
They rode on. Before long, Randal heard noises ahead: raucous shouts and laughter, the ringing note of
an ax biting into a log, the crackling of a bonfire. The knights were at the edge of a sizable encampment,
but still they had not been noticed or challenged.
"Sounds like somebody's having a party," Sir Louis observed in a low voice. "Don't they believe in
keeping watch?"
A few moments later, Randal understood the reason for the lack of sentries. Between the close-set tree
trunks of the deep forest, he saw a clearing full of rough-looking men. Most of them were drinking from a
huge cask that stood near the center of the camp. Some of the men had already fallen asleep on the leafy
ground, and others sat singing and joking around a roaring fire.
Randal spotted three horses tethered on the far side of the clearing. Two stood in the shadows, but
dappled sunlight shone on the third. He recognized it as belonging to one of the merchants who had left
the Basilisk in the clear light of the previous dawn. The horses kept moving about uneasily, made nervous
by something that hung from a tree nearby. At first Randal couldn't make out the details of the hanging
object, but then it twisted in the wind and he saw the thing clearly.
It was the body of the merchants' guard.

III. Night at the Inn
RANDAL TURNED HIS head aside and shut his eyes. Nearby, he heard Sir Guillaume remark, "That
fellow must have given them some trouble," and Sir Reginald grunted in agreement.
Randal opened his eyes again. Now that he knew who to look for, he could see the merchants as well.
The two men lay trussed up on the ground, stripped of their fine clothing and covered with dirt and
blood. A large bandit squatted beside them, poking at them with a knife and watching them wiggle.
"Looks like a couple of captives there," Sir Guillaume went on. "Maybe we can get a reward by saving
them."
Walter spoke for the first time since they'd seen the camp in the clearing. "Reward or no reward, I can't
see any choice but to help them. Reginald, Louis, you two circle around on horseback and make sure
none of the bandits try to flee:" He paused, and then added as an afterthought, "Squire Randal, stay back
and keep my palfrey out of the fighting-she's no warhorse, and might panic. Philip and Guillaume, charge
when I give the word"
The young wizard felt his lack of magic keenly.
He could imagine casting panic among the outlaws with a sudden fireball or a crash of thunder, and
preventing loss of life on either side. Instead, he had to hang back in the shadows while faint rustlings and
jinglings from the underbrush told him that Walter and the other knights were working their way into
position.
Then Walter's deep voice shouted "Charge!" and the knights burst out of the forest into the clearing. The
outlaws sprang to their feet and grabbed their weapons. Most of them had short swords or pole arms,
but a few had nothing more than knives and wooden clubs to use against the five armored and mounted
men.
Sir Philip, still eager for sport and glory, was riding in the forefront of the charge. One of the outlaws
swung a halberd at the knight, taking him in the side. He fell from his horse and went down in the press of
men.
As Randal watched, his cousin Walter swung down from his horse and headed on foot toward the fallen