To Green Angel Tower, Volume 1 Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Foreword

  PART ONE - The Waiting Stone

  Chapter 1 - Under Strange Skies

  Chapter 2 - chains of Many Kinds

  Chapter 3 - East of the World

  Chapter 4 - The Silent Child

  Chapter 5 - Wasteland of Dreams

  Chapter 6 - The Sea-Grave

  Chapter 7 - Storm King’s Anvil

  Chapter 8 - Nights of Fire

  Chapter 9 - Pages in an Old Book

  Chapter 10 - Riders of the Dawn

  Chapter 11 - The Road Back

  Chapter 12 - Raven’s Dance

  Chapter 13 - The Nest Builders

  Chapter 14 - Dark Corridors

  Chapter 15 - Lake of Glass

  Chapter 16 - Torches in the Mud

  PART TWO - The Winding Road

  Chapter 17 - Bonfire Night

  Chapter 18 - The Fox’s Bargain

  Chapter 19 - A Broken Smile

  Chapter 20 - Travefers and Messengers

  Chapter 21 - Answered Prayers

  Chapter 22 - Wipers in Stone

  Chapter 23 - The Sounding of the Horn

  Chapter 24 - A Sky Full of Beasts

  Chapter 25 - The Semblance of Heaven

  Chapter 26 - A Gift for the Queen

  Appendix

  “GREEN ANGEL TOWER

  has its mysteries, but even more fascinating is the labyrinth of tunnels, hidden passageways, and corridors hidden under the Hayholt.... It’s one of the most striking constructions since Ghormenghast, and a major part of this triumphant conclusion to a hefty trilogy.”

  —Locus

  “This sprawling, spellbinding conclusion to the trilogy that began with The Dragonbone Chair weaves together a multitude of intricate strands, building to a suitably apocalyptic confrontation between good and evil.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A gripping adventure ... refreshing and invigorating ... ‘To Green Angel Tower’ is a magnificent ending to a superlative high fantasy trilogy.”

  —The Herald

  “A thoroughly enjoyable, well-wrought epic fantasy ... The plot, events, and characters are so tightly connected the pages turn miraculously quickly. Every scene is needed and vivid.”

  —SFRA Review

  DAW BOOKS PRESENTS THE FINEST IN IMAGINATIVE FICTION BY

  TAD WILLIAMS

  TAILCHASER’S SONG

  THE WAR OF THE FLOWERS

  SHADOWMARCH

  SHADOWPLAY

  SHADOWRISE*

  MEMORY, SORROW, AND THORN

  THE DRAGONBONE CHAIR

  STONE OF FAREWELL

  To GREEN ANGEL TOWER

  OTHERLAND

  CITY OF GOLDEN SHADOW

  RIVER OF BLUE FIRE

  MOUNTAIN OF BLACK GLASS

  SEA OF SILVER LIGHT

  *Coming soon from DAW Books

  Dear Readers,

  DAW Books has long been committed to bringing you, the reader, the highest quality books, both editorially and physically. That is why publishing TO GREEN ANGEL TOWER in paperback posed some very difficult challenges. The decision whether to publish this monumentally long book in one or two volumes was neither easy, nor obvious. We the publishers, in consultation with Tad Williams, would have preferred to have been able to bring you the paperback in a single volume, as we did with the hardcover. This, however, did not prove feasible. Had we published TO GREEN ANGEL TOWER in one volume, we would have had to sacrifice our standards of high quality publishing. We were not willing to do that.

  With Tad’s approval and assistance, we have divided this book into two 800+ page paperbacks. This allows us to present you with books that retain a larger type size and a better grade of paper. This gives you, the reader, a product that will be easier to read, and a product that will last.

  You now hold the results of our efforts to bring you a top quality product. We know you will enjoy the book. Look for Part 2 of TO GREEN ANGEL TOWER when it becomes available in your local bookstores this July.

  Sincerely,

  Elizabeth R. Wollheim and

  Sheila E. Gilbert, Publishers

  Copyright © 1993 by Tad Williams.

  All Rights Reserved.

  Maps by Tad Williams.

  For color prints of Michael Whelan paintings,

  please contact:

  Glass Onion Graphics

  P. O. Box 88

  Brookfield, CT 06804

  DAW Book Collectors No. 947.

  DAW Books are distributed by Penguin U. S. A.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious.

  Any resemblance to persons living or dead

  is strictly coincidental.

  First Paperback Printing, April 1994

  eISBN : 978-1-101-14222-6

  DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED

  U. S. PAT OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

  —MARCA REGISTRADA.

  HECHO EN U.S.A.

  S.A.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  This series is dedicated to my mother,

  Barbara Jean Evans,

  who taught me to search for other worlds,

  and to share the things I find in them.

  This final volume, To Green Angel Tower,

  in itself a little world of heartbreak and joy,

  I dedicate to Nancy Deming-Williams,

  with much, much love.

  Author’s Note

  And death shall have no dominion.

  Dead men naked they shall be one

  With the man in the wind and the west moon;

  When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones

  gone

  They shall have stars at elbow and foot;

  Though they go mad they shall be sane,

  Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;

  Though lovers be lost love shall not;

  And death shall have no dominion ...

  —DYLAN THOMAS

  (from “And Death Shall Have No Dominion”)

  Tell all the truth but tell it slant,

  Success in circuit lies,

  Too bright for our infirm delight

  The truth’s superb surprise;

  As lightning to the children eased

  With explanation kind,

  The truth must dazzle gradually

  Or every man be blind.

  —EMILY DICKINSON

  Many people gave me a great deal of help with these books, ranging from suggestions and moral support to crucial logistical aid. Eva Cumming, Nancy Deming-Williams, Arthur Ross Evans, Andrew Harris, Paul Hudspeth, Peter Stampfel, Doug Werner, Michael Whelan, the lovely folks at DAW Books, and all my friends on GEnie® make up only a small (but significant) sampling of those who helped me finish The Story That Ate My Life.

  Particular thanks for assistance on this final volume of the Bloated Epic goes to Mary Frey, who put a bogglesome amount of energy and time into reading and—for lack of a better word—analyzing a monstrous manuscript. She gave me an incredible boost when I really needed it.

  And, of course, the contributions of my editors, Sheila Gilbert and Betsy Wollheim, are incalculable. Caring a lot is their crime, and here at last is their well-deserved punishment.

  To all of the above, and to all the other friends and supporters unmentioned but by no means unremembered, I give my most heartfelt thanks.

  NOTE: There is a cast of characters, a glossary of terms, and a guide to pronunciation at the back of this book.

  Synopsis of The Dragonbone Chair

  For eons the Hayholt belonged to the immortal Sith
i, but they had fled the great castle before the onslaught of Mankind. Men have long ruled this greatest of strong-holds, and the rest of Osten Ard as well. Prester John, High King of all the nations of men, is its most recent master; after an early life of triumph and glory, he has presided over decades of peace from his skeletal throne, the Dragonbone Chair.

  Simon, an awkward fourteen year old, is one of the Hayholt’s scullions. His parents are dead, his only real family the chambermaids and their stern mistress, Rachel the Dragon. When Simon can escape his kitchen-work he steals away to the cluttered chambers of Doctor Morgenes, the castle’s eccentric scholar. When the old man invites Simon to be his apprentice, the youth is overjoyed—until he discovers that Morgenes prefers teaching reading and writing to magic.

  Soon ancient King John will die, so Elias, the older of his two sons, prepares to take the throne. Josua, Elias’ somber brother, nicknamed Lackhand because of a disfiguring wound, argues harshly with the king-to-be about Pryrates, the ill-reputed priest who is one of Elias’ closest advisers. The brothers’ feud is a cloud of foreboding over castle and country.

  Elias’ reign as king starts well, but a drought comes and plague strikes several of the nations of Osten Ard. Soon outlaws roam the roads and people begin to vanish from isolated villages. The order of things is breaking down, and the king’s subjects are losing confidence in his rule, but nothing seems to bother the monarch or his friends. As rumblings of discontent begin to be heard throughout the kingdom, Elias’ brother Josua disappears—to plot rebellion, some say.

  Elias’ misrule upsets many, including Duke Isgrimnur of Rimmersgard and Count Eolair, an emissary from the western country of Hernystir. Even King Elias’ own daughter Miriamele is uneasy, especially about the scarlet-robed Pryrates, her father’s trusted adviser.

  Meanwhile Simon is muddling along as Morgenes’ helper. The two become fast friends despite Simon’s mooncalf nature and the doctor’s refusal to teach him anything resembling magic. During one of his meanderings through the secret byways of the labyrinthine Hayholt, Simon discovers a secret passage and is almost captured there by Pryrates. Eluding the priest, he enters a hidden underground chamber and finds Josua, who is being held captive for use in some terrible ritual planned by Pryrates. Simon fetches Doctor Morgenes and the two of them free Josua and take him to the doctor’s chambers, where Josua is sent to freedom down a tunnel that leads beneath the ancient castle. Then, as Morgenes is sending off messenger birds to mysterious friends, bearing news of what has happened, Pryrates and the king’s guard come to arrest the doctor and Simon. Morgenes is killed fighting Pryrates, but his sacrifice allows Simon to escape into the tunnel.

  Half-maddened, Simon makes his way through the midnight corridors beneath the castle, which contain the ruins of the old Sithi palace. He surfaces in the graveyard beyond the town wall, then is lured by the light of a bonfire. He witnesses a weird scene: Pryrates and King Elias engaged in a ritual with black-robed, white-faced creatures. The pale things give Elias a strange gray sword of disturbing power, named Sorrow. Simon flees.

  Life in the wilderness on the edge of the great forest Aldheorte is miserable, and weeks later Simon is nearly dead from hunger and exhaustion, but still far away from his destination, Josua’s northern keep at Naglimund. Going to a forest cot to beg, he finds a strange being caught in a trap—one of the Sithi, a race thought to be mythical, or at least long-vanished. The cotsman returns, but before he can kill the helpless Sitha, Simon strikes him down. The Sitha, once freed, stops only long enough to fire a white arrow at Simon, then disappears. A new voice tells Simon to take the white arrow, that it is a Sithi gift.

  The dwarfish newcomer is a troll named Binabik, who rides a great gray wolf. He tells Simon he was only passing by, but now he will accompany the boy to Naglimund. Simon and Binabik endure many adventures and strange events on the way to Naglimund: they come to realize that they have fallen afoul of a threat greater than merely a king and his counselor deprived of their prisoner. At last, when they find themselves pursued by unearthly white hounds who wear the brand of Stormspike, a mountain of evil reputation in the far north, they are forced to head for the shelter of Geloë’s forest house, taking with them a pair of travelers they have rescued from the hounds. Geloë, a blunt-spoken forest woman with a reputation as a witch, confers with them and agrees that somehow the ancient Norns, embittered relatives of the Sithi, have become embroiled in the fate of Prester John’s kingdom.

  Pursuers human and otherwise threaten them on their journey to Naglimund. After Binabik is shot with an arrow, Simon and one of the rescued travelers, a servant girl, must struggle on through the forest. They are attacked by a shaggy giant and saved only by the appearance of Josua’s hunting party.

  The prince brings them to Naglimund, where Binabik’s wounds are cared for, and where it is confirmed that Simon has stumbled into a terrifying swirl of events. Elias is coming soon to besiege Josua’s castle. Simon’s serving-girl companion was Princess Miriamele traveling in disguise, fleeing her father, whom she fears has gone mad under Pryrates’ influence. From all over the north and elsewhere, frightened people are flocking to Naglimund and Josua, their last protection against a mad king.

  Then, as the prince and others discuss the coming battle, a strange old Rimmersman named Jarnauga appears in the council’s meeting hall. He is a member of the League of the Scroll, a circle of scholars and initiates of which Morgenes and Binabik’s master were both part, and he brings more grim news. Their enemy, he says, is not just Elias: the king is receiving aid from Ineluki the Storm King, who had once been a prince of the Sithi—but who has been dead for five centuries, and whose bodiless spirit now rules the Norns of Stormspike Mountain, pale relatives of the banished Sithi.

  It was the terrible magic of the gray sword Sorrow that caused Ineluki’s death—that, and mankind’s attack on the Sithi. The League of the Scroll believes that Sorrow has been given to Elias as the first step in some incomprehensible plan of revenge, a plan that will bring the earth beneath the heel of the undead Storm King. The only hope comes from a prophetic poem that seems to suggest that “three swords” might help turn back Ineluki’s powerful magic.

  One of the swords is the Storm King’s Sorrow, already in the hands of their enemy, King Elias. Another is the Rimmersgard blade Minneyar, which was also once at the Hayholt, but whose whereabouts are now unknown. The third is Thorn, black sword of King John’s greatest knight, Sir Camaris. Jarnauga and others think they have traced it to a location in the frozen north. On this slim hope, Josua sends Binabik, Simon, and several soldiers off in search of Thorn, even as Naglimund prepares for siege.

  Others are affected by the growing crisis. Princess Miriamele, frustrated by her uncle Josua’s attempts to protect her, escapes Naglimund in disguise, accompanied by the mysterious monk Cadrach. She hopes to make her way to southern Nabban and plead with her relatives there to aid Josua. Old Duke Isgrimnur, at Josua’s urging, disguises his own very recognizable features and follows after to rescue her. Tiamak, a swamp-dwelling Wrannaman scholar, receives a strange message from his old mentor Morgenes that tells of bad times coming and hints that Tiamak has a part to play. Maegwin, daughter of the king of Hernystir, watches helplessly as her own family and country are drawn into a whirlpool of war by the treachery of High King Elias.

  Simon and Binabik and their company are ambushed by Ingen Jegger, huntsman of Stormspike, and his servants. They are saved only by the reappearance of the Sitha Jiriki, whom Simon had saved from the cotsman’s trap. When he learns of their quest, Jiriki decides to accompany them to Urmsheim Mountain, legendary abode of one of the great dragons, in search of Thorn.

  By the time Simon and the others reach the mountain, King Elias has brought his besieging army to Josua’s castle at Naglimund, and though the first attacks are repulsed, the defenders suffer great losses. At last Elias’ forces seem to retreat and give up the siege, but before the stronghold’s inhabitants can celebrate, a weird
storm appears on the northern horizon, bearing down on Naglimund. The storm is the cloak under which Ineluki’s own horrifying army of Norns and giants travels, and when the Red Hand, the Storm King’s chief servants, throw down Naglimund’s gates, a terrible slaughter begins. Josua and a few others manage to flee the ruin of the castle. Before escaping into the great forest, Prince Josua curses Elias for his conscienceless bargain with the Storm King and swears that he will take their father’s crown back.

  Simon and his companions climb Urmsheim, coming through great dangers to discover the Uduntree, a titanic frozen waterfall. There they find Thorn in a tomblike cave. Before they can take the sword and make their escape, Ingen Jegger appears once more and attacks with his troop of soldiers. The battle awakens Igjarjuk, the white dragon, who has been slumbering for years beneath the ice. Many on both sides are killed. Simon alone is left standing, trapped on the edge of a cliff; as the ice-worm bears down upon him, he lifts Thorn and swings it. The dragon’s scalding black blood spurts over him as he is struck senseless.

  Simon awakens in a cave on the troll mountain of Yiqanuc. Jiriki and Haestan, an Erkynlandish soldier, nurse him to health. Thorn has been rescued from Urmsheim, but Binabik is being held prisoner by his own people, along with Sludig the Rimmersman, under sentence of death. Simon himself has been scarred by the dragon’s blood and a wide swath of his hair has turned white. Jiriki names him “Snowlock” and tells Simon that, for good or for evil, he has been irrevocably marked.