"Brotherhood Of The Sword - 04 - A Dark Champion" - читать интересную книгу автора (MacGregor Kinley)

of five. They kept our spirits and hope alive every day as our captors sought to
break us. Without them none of us would ever have made it home.
We would be dead now.
All of us.
It is in their honor that this chanson is written.
The Widowmaker
I met the man the Brotherhood termed the Widowmaker on the first day of my
incarceration. His face had been so misshapen by a beating that he reminded me
of some horrid monster. But it was his eyes that seared me.
Intelligent and sharp, they had seen right through me. He offered me his hand,
as he had done the others who had been taken against their will, and told me
that so long as he breathed, I would be protected.
He meant that.
On the night of our escape from hell, seven men stayed behind to cover our
trail.
The Quinfortis, the Phantom, and the Pagan.
While we boarded a boat for home, the seven of them bravely faced our pursuers,
alone with nothing more than their bare hands to protect them. Even now, years
later, I can still clearly remember the sight of them in the moonlight as they
fought like possessed champions while we ran at their behest.
The Wraith, the Scot, the Widowmaker, the Sorcerer, the Abbot, the Phantom, and
the Pagan. Men who refused to use their God-given names while imprisoned since
they had been reduced to animals forced to fight for bare sustenance.
Men who are bound by their scars and oaths to each other, and by the brand on
their right hand that their enemies had placed there to remind them always of
that time in the past when they were beasts.
But on the night of our escape, they weren't animals. They weren't men nor were
they boys.
They were legends.
The kind of legends whose courage and selflessness should never be forgotten.
I have already told the tale of the Wraith in Midsummer's Knight, about the
blessings that have since come upon Simon of Ravenswood.
It is time now that I write of another.
The Widowmaker who is best known to the world as Lord Stryder, earl of
Blackmoora man of many secrets and strengths.
A man who has fought all his life and who has yet to realize the beauty that can
be found off the battlefield.
And for those of you who are curious, my name, like those of the others, was
hidden during my captivity. The Brotherhood gave me my own special moniker. I
use my Christian name now, but for the purposes of introducing the world to the
heroes I know, you may call me simply the Minstrel. I am a wandering bard, ever
seeking my own peace from the past while I make sure that everyone knows of the
personal sacrifices of the men who made up our company.
And now here begins the official tales of The Brotherhood of the Sword



Chapter 1
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"Test of arms, my bloody arse. They ought to call it the test of incompetent