Outlander Book Club: Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade Chapter 28 breakdown

Lord John Grey heads out with his regiment in Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade Chapter 28. This gives him a lot of time to think about Percy.

Percy has been left behind in the jail. It’s clear the regiment know everything, and there is a lot of gossip going around. However, John is now the only eyewitness to the “crime,” and that could give John a chance to save Percy.

However, it’s not so easy. To save Percy would mean damaging his own career prospects. And it’s not like Hal will allow him to do this.

Breaking down Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade Chapter 28

The regiment is moving out, and they know it will only be days before they meet the French. When some of the regiment start making jokes about Percy, Lord John Grey sends them on meaningless errands to punish them.

John has chance to this. It turns out the only other witness to Percy’s actions is dead. Now John is the only eyewitness, and the courts need an eyewitness to convict on sodomy charges. This means that John will either have to perjure himself and risk his military career, or he will need to allow Percy to rot in a prison cell or face execution. Which one will he do?

John thinks about running off with Percy. This would be fun, but John realizes that he can’t trust Percy. He can’t just run off with someone he doesn’t trust. He starts to think about how much he regrets meeting Percy, but that’s not true. He regrets meeting Jamie, but he does love Percy.

John also realizes that Hal would never allow John to perjure himself or run off. Hal would sooner kill Percy before allowing any of this to happen. Hal has protected John before—and John considers how lucky he has been in not being caught—and Hal will do it again. They are brothers until the end.

Could this chapter be used in a TV adaptation?

This would be a difficult chapter to include in full if there ever was a Lord John Grey series. It’s all internalized. We would need to see this happen in conversation in some way.

We could get a scene between John and Percy as John learns he is the only eyewitness left. This would allow John to run through his thoughts, but it plays with Percy’s emotions too much, and John wouldn’t do that. The other option is for him to talk to Hal about it, but Hal wouldn’t listen to this.

With neither options really being viable, it’s likely that this chapter would be skipped over. We could see the regiment go out, but there’s no need for the full internalization of thoughts.

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