"Stephen Lawhead - Celtic Crusades 02 - The Black Rood" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lawhead Stephen)

'God in heaven!' cried Murdo. 'Is it true?' Gesturing to some of the men, he
said, 'Here, my brother is back from the dead - help me loose him.'
I came forwards along with the abbot and several others, and we untied
my long-lost uncle. He had returned from the Holy Land where he had
lived since the Great Pilgrimage. The eldest of my father's two brothers,
he and the next eldest, Skuli, had joined with Baldwin of Bouillon. In
return for their loyal service they were given lands at Edessa where they
had remained ever since.
When asked what happened to his brothers, Murdo would always say that
they had died chasing their fortunes in the Holy Land. In all the years of
my life till then, I had never known it to be otherwise. How not? There
never came any word from them - never a letter, or even a greeting sent by
way of a returning pilgrim - though opportunities must have been plentiful
enough through the years. That is why Murdo said he had come back from
the dead. In a way, he had; for no one had ever expected to see Torf-Einar
again - either in this world or the next.
But now, here he was: to my eyes, little more than gristle and foul temper,
but alive still. Of his great fortune, however, there was not so much as the
pale glimmer of a silver spoon. The man I saw upon that crude litter had
more in common with the sore-ridden beggars that huddle in the shelter of
the monastery walls at Kirkjuvagr than a lord of Outremer. Even the
lowest swineherd of such a lord would have presented a more impressive
spectacle, I swear.
We untied him and thereby learned the reason he had been carried to shore
on a plank: his legs were a mass of weeping sores. He could not walk.
Indeed, he could barely sit upright. Still, he objected to being bound to his
bed and did not cease his thrashing until the cords were loosed and taken
away.
'After all these years, why return now?' asked Murdo, sitting back on his
heels.
'I have come home to die,' replied Torf-Einar. 'Think you I could abide a
grave in that godforsaken land?'
'The Holy Land godforsaken?' wondered Emlyn, shaking his head in
amazement.
Torf's wizened face clenched like a fist, and he spat. 'Holy Land,' he
sneered. 'The pigsty is more wholesome than that accursed place, and the
snake pit is more friendly.'
'What about your lands?' asked Murdo. 'What about your great fortune?'
'Piss on the land!' growled Torf-Einar. 'Piss on the fortune, too! Let the
heathen have it. Two-faced demon spawn each and every one. A plague on
the swarthy races, I say, and devil take them all.'
He became so agitated that he started thrashing around again. Murdo
quickly said, 'Rest easy now, Torf. You are among kinfolk. Nothing will
harm you here.'
We carried him to the dun, and tried our best to make the old man
comfortable. I call him 'old man' for that was how he appeared to me. In
truth, he was only a few years older than my father. The ravages of a life
of constant warring and, I think, whoring, had carved the very flesh from
him. His skin, blasted dark by the unrelenting Saracen sun, was as cracked
and seamed as weathered leather; his faded hair was little more than a