Read Online Oathbreaker: The Knight's Tale by Colin McComb - Free Book Online Page B

last, so when no external threats materialized, they fought against one another in the many internecine battles between Houses great and small.
    This mattered little to the young men and women who sought the slots. The knighthood’s regimen had driven ordinary ambition and emotion from them. They struggled now against one another, a competition among near-equals, for their place in legend. They believed that if they could achieve Elite, their struggles would be against the heroes of the past. For now, though, they trained, they studied, they marched hard miles under the blazing sun and under the torrential mountain rains. They fought in muddy trenches, across fields strewn with mountains of dirt and shreds of metal. They trained with swords and spears, bows and siege engines, and other, more esoteric devices created by the Archmagus and his acolytes. They spent a month alone in the wilderness, living off nothing but their wits.
    Through it all, they were observed by a cadre of Knights Elite, to whom the duty of training this raw flesh would fall. Pelagir’s witness, Lieutenant Caltash, took a special interest in his charge and set him a variety of tests to gauge the boy’s reactions. Caltash liked what he found. He liked it very much indeed.

    At the end of the fourth year, one of ten. This letter went to the Knight Assessors, who oversaw the training and advancement of the young candidates:
By order of the Commander of Knights Assembled,
On this, the third day of the month of the Eagle, of the year Crystal, of the cycle Strength, commonly known as the 581st Clasping Year, let it be known that Pelagir Amons has surpassed our expectations. Let it be known that he has been judged and found worthy. Let him be borne away to Devilsfoot on this night. Let him be delivered to the tower of the Archmagus, where he shall undergo his final excruciations. Let him receive a blood weapon of his choosing. Let him be admitted into the sacred brotherhood of the Knights Elite. Let him give the remaining portion of his life in service to the Empire.

To this I set my seal.


Sir Ellionn Carderas, Commander of the Knights Assembled, Duke of the Eastern Protectorate, Earl of Farassi, Viscount of Hanging Bay, Baron of Suthersford

    The walls of the King’s Forest loomed ahead of him, tall trees planted firmly across hundreds of rolling acres. Pelagir pulled back on the reins and dismounted, sliding from the saddle in a single fluid motion. From his pouch he extracted a flask of milk and set it to the child’s lips. She drank thirstily, burped once, and fell asleep. Pelagir laid a blanket on the ground, set her gently on it, and set about making the modifications to his steed that would help him hide his trail. Inside the wood the King’s Foresters patrolled. If he wasn’t careful, their snares could undo him.
    He bent to his work.

The Forester’s Tale
    Cold steel presses into my throat, and passionless eyes stare into mine. My death is upon me… but I feel no fear. The woods are alive around me. I hear birds call, and the hum of the forest’s insects is a reassuring drone. The afternoon’s rain drips from the leaves, and the setting sun sparkles through the trees like an oaken halo. I am not afraid to die in the woods I love.

    All morning we were on full alert—we, the elite of the King’s Foresters, knew this forest better than our husbands and wives and children, better than we knew each other, better than our most intimate lovers. The forest nurtures us, fills us with joy, breathes new hope into lives dulled by pain, war, suffering. We are renewed here. In the wind’s whispering tracks we hear the health of the river that nourishes the mighty trees. The forest is our home.
    We were alert before Cox summoned us to the lodge with three short blasts on his horn—the breeze broke in strange ways that morning, and the birds screamed their indignation from their high nests: the forest’s peace was broken by an intruder.