To Green Angel Tower, Volume 1

by Tad Williams

  “What ... what did the leader look like?” There was strain in Miriamele’s voice.

  “He was very odd.” Tiamak hesitated. He did not know how to address a drylander princess, even one dressed like a man. “He was the only one not dressed as a soldier. Tall and strong-looking, wearing rich drylander’s clothes, but his face was purple with bruises, his eyes red as a boar’s, full of blood. He looked as though his head had been crushed in a crocodile’s jaws. He was missing teeth, as well.”

  Miriamele groaned and slid down from the pallet onto the floor. “Oh, Elysia, save me! It is Aspitis!” Her ragged voice was now entirely given over to desperation. “Cadrach, how could he know where we were going?! Have you betrayed me again?”

  The monk winced, but his words held no anger. “No, my lady. Obviously he got back to shore, and I would guess that he then somehow exchanged messages with his true master.” Cadrach turned toward Isgrimnur. “Pryrates knows this place well, my lord Duke, and Aspitis is his creature.”

  “Aspitis?” Isgrimnur, strapping his sword belt around his broad middle, shook his head in bafflement. “I do not know him, but I gather that he is no friend.”

  “No.” Cadrach looked to Miriamele where she sat on the floor, head in hands. “He is no friend.”

  Isgrimnur made a noise deep in his throat. Tiamak turned to him with a startled look, for the duke sounded like nothing less than an angry bear, but Isgrimnur was only thinking, twisting his fingers in his short beard. “Enemies are at our heels,” he said at last. “Even were we sitting with the Camaris of forty years ago—ah, Lord love him, Miriamele, he was the mightiest man of all—still I would not like the odds. So, then, we must leave ... and leave quickly.”

  “Where can we go?” asked Cadrach.

  “North to Josua.” Isgrimnur turned to Tiamak. “What did you say that time, little man? That if you were traveling with Camaris and me as fugitives, you would find another way?”

  Tiamak felt his throat tighten. “Yes. But it will not be easy.” He felt a chill, as though the cold breath of She Who Waits to Take All Back whispered against his neck. He suddenly did not like the idea of taking these drylander friends into the mazy Wran.

  Miriamele arose. “Josua is alive?”

  “So rumor says, Princess.” Isgrimnur shook his head. “Northeast of the Thrithings, it is claimed. But it may be false hope.”

  “No!” Miriamele’s face, still tearstained, wore a strange look of surety. “I believe it.”

  Cadrach, still leaning in the corner like a neglected house-god, shrugged. “There is nothing wrong with belief, if it is all we can cling to. But what is this other way?” He turned his brooding eyes on the marsh man.

  “Through the Wran.” Tiamak cleared his throat. “It will be nearly impossible for them to follow us, I think. We can make our way north to the outermost part of the Lake Thrithing.”

  “Where we will be trapped on foot in the middle of a hundred leagues of open ground,” said Cadrach grimly.

  “Damn it, man,” Isgrimnur snarled, “what else can we do? Try to make our way through Kwanitupul, past this Aspitis fellow, then across all of hostile Nabban? Look at us! Can you imagine a more unlikely and memorable company? A girl, two monks—one bearded—a childish old giant and a Wrannaman? What choice do we have?”

  The Hernystirman seemed prepared to argue, but after a moment’s hesitation he shrugged once more, drawing back into himself like a tortoise retreating inside its shell. “I suppose there is no choice,” he said quietly.

  “What should we do?” Miriamele’s fear had receded a little. Though still shaken, she seemed bright-eyed and determined. Tiamak could not help admiring her spirit.

  Isgrimnur rubbed his large paws together. “Yes. We must leave, certainly by the time an hour has passed, sooner if we can, so there is no more time to waste. Tiamak, go and watch from the front of the inn. Someone else may give these soldiers better directions than you did, and if they catch us unaware, we are lost. You will be the least likely to be noticed.” He looked around, thinking. “I will put Camaris to work patching the less mangled of those boats in the dooryard. Cadrach, you will help him. Remember, he is simple-witted, but he has been working here for years—he knows what to do and he understands many words, though he does not speak. I will finish gathering up the rest of our things, then I will come help you finish the boat and carry it down to the water.”

  “What about me, Isgrimnur?” Miriamele was actually bouncing from one foot to the other in her need for something to do.

  “Take that shrew of an innkeeper and go down to the kitchens and provision us. Get things that will keep, since we don’t know how long we must go without ...” He paused, snagged by a sudden thought. “Water! Fresh water! Sweet Usires, we are going to the swamps. Get all you can, and I will come help you carry the jugs or whatever you find to put it in. There is a rain barrel in the yard behind the inn—full, I think. Hah! I knew this foul weather would be good for something!” He tugged at his fingers, thinking frantically. “No, Princess, don’t go yet. Tell Charystra she will be paid for everything we take, but don’t dare say a word of where we are going! She would peddle our immortal souls for a bent cintis-piece each. I wish I were the same, but I will pay her for what we take, though it will empty my purse.” The duke took a deep breath. “There! Now go to. And wherever you are, all of you, listen for Tiamak’s call and run to the dooryard if you hear it.”

  He turned and pulled open the door. Charystra was sitting on the top step in a scattering of foodstuffs, her face a mask of confusion. Isgrimnur looked at her for a moment, then stepped over to Miriamele and bent to her ear; Tiamak was close enough to hear his whisper.

  “Don’t let her stray from you,” the duke murmured. “We may have to take her with us, at least far enough away to protect the secret of which way we’ve gone. If she kicks up rough, just shout and I’ll be there in a moment.” He took Miriamele’s elbow and guided her toward Charystra’s seat on the steps.

  “Greetings again, goodwife,” the princess said to her. “My name is Marya. We met downstairs. Come now, let us go to the kitchen and get some food for my friends and me—we have been traveling and we are very hungry.” She leaned down and helped Charystra to her feet, then bent again to retrieve the bread and cheese that had fallen. “See?” she said cheerfully, taking the dumbfounded woman by the arm. “We will be sure to waste nothing, and we will pay for all.”

  They disappeared down the stairs.

  Miriamele found herself working in a sort of haze. She was concentrating so intently on the task at hand that she lost all track of the reasons for what she was doing until she heard Tiamak’s excited cry and his rabbitlike thumping on the roof overhead. Her heart speeding, she snatched up a last handful of wizened onions—Charystra went to few pains to keep her larder well-stocked-and bolted for the dooryard, hurrying the protesting innkeeper along before her.

  “Here, what do you think you’re at?” Charystra complained. “There’s no cause to be treating me this way, whoever you are!”

  “Hush! All will be well.” She wished she believed it.

  As she reached the common room door, she heard Isgrimnur’s heavy footsteps on the stairs. He quickly moved up behind, allowing the balking Charystra no room for escape, and together they pushed through into the dooryard. Camaris and Cadrach were working so intently that they did not look up at the entrance of their comrades. The old knight held a pitch-smeared brush, the monk a strip of heavy sailcloth which he was hacking at with a knife.

  A moment later Tiamak came slithering down from the rafters. “I saw soldiers, not far distant,” he said breathlessly. “They are a thousand paces away, maybe fewer, and they are coming here!”

  “Are they the same ones?” Isgrimnur asked. “Damn me, of course they are! We must go. Is the boat patched?”

  “I would guess that it will keep the water out for a while,” Cadrach said calmly. “If we bring these things with us,” he indicated the pitc
h and sailcloth, “we can do a better and more thorough job when we stop.”

  “If we get a chance to stop at all,” the duke growled. “Very well. Miriamele?”

  “I have stripped the larders. Not that it took much work.”

  Charystra, who had regained a little of her haughtiness, drew herself up. “And what are my guests and I going to eat?” she demanded. “The finest table in Kwanitupul, I’m known for.”

  Isgrimnur’s snort fluttered his whiskers. “It’s not your table that’s the problem, it’s the muck you put on top of it. You’ll be paid, woman—but first you’re going to take a little voyage.”

  “What?” Charystra shrieked. “I’m a God-loving Aedonite woman! What are you going to do with me?”

  The duke grimaced and looked at the others. “I do not like this, but we cannot leave her here. We will put her off somewhere safe—with her money.” He turned to Cadrach. “Take some of that rope and tie her up, will you? And try not to hurt her.”

  The last few preparations were finished to the accompaniment of Charystra’s outraged protests. Tiamak, who seemed quite worried that Isgrimnur might have forgotten some precious items of their baggage, ran upstairs to make certain nothing had been left behind. When he returned, he joined the others in their efforts to move the large boat out through the broad side-door of the yard.

  “Any decent boatyard would have a windlass,” Isgrimnur complained. Sweat was pouring down his face. Miriamele worried that one of the two older men might hurt themselves, but Camaris, for all his years, seemed utterly untroubled by carrying his share of the weight, and Isgrimnur was still a powerful man. Rather, it was Cadrach, wrung out by their misadventures, and slender Tiamak who had the most trouble. Miriamele wanted to help, but did not dare leave bound Charystra alone for a moment for fear she would raise an alarm or fall into the water and drown.

  As they staggered down the ramp to the rear dock, Miriamele was certain she could hear the tramping bootsteps of Aspitis and his minions. The progress of the boat seemed horrifically slow, a blind eight-legged beetle that snagged itself on every narrow turning.

  “Hurry!” she said. Her charge Charystra, understanding nothing but her own plight, moaned.

  At last they reached the water. As they eased the boat over the edge of the floating dock, Cadrach reached down between the benches and lifted out the heavy maul from the pile of tools they had brought for patching the hull, then went back up the ramp toward the inn.

  “What are you doing?” Miriamele shouted. “They’ll be here at any moment!”

  “I know.” Cadrach broke into an uneven trot, the huge hammer cradled against his chest.

  Isgrimnur glowered. “Is the man mad?”

  “I don’t know.” Miriamele urged Charystra toward the boat, which was scraping gently against the side of the dock. When the innkeeper resisted, old Camaris stood up and lifted her down as easily a father might his small daughter, then placed her on the bench beside him. The woman huddled there, a tear snaking down her cheek; Miriamele could not help but feel sorry for her.

  A moment later Cadrach reappeared, pelting down the gangway. He clambered into the boat with the help of the others, then pushed it away from the dock. The nose swung out toward the middle of the canal.

  Miriamele helped the monk squeeze onto the bench. “What were you doing?”

  Cadrach took a moment to catch his breath, then carefully laid the maul back down atop the bundle of sailcloth. “There was another boat. I wanted to make sure that it would take them a lot longer to patch it than we took on this. You can’t chase anyone through Kwanitupul without a boat.”

  “Good man,” said Isgrimnur. “Although I’m sure they will get a boat soon enough.”

  Tiamak pointed. “Look!” A dozen blue-cloaked, helmeted men were passing along the wooden walkway toward Pelippa’s Bowl.

  “First they will knock,” Cadrach said quietly. “Then they will push down the door. Then they will see what we’ve done and start searching for a boat.”

  “So we’d better take advantage of our head start. Row!” Suiting action to word, Isgrimnur bent to his sweep. Camaris also bent, and as their two oar-blades bit at the green water the little boat leaped forward.

  In the stem, Miriamele peered back at the diminishing inn. In the antlike movement of people near the entranceway, she thought she could discern a momentary flash of golden hair. Stricken, she dropped her eyes to the choppy canal and prayed to God’s mother and several saints that she would never have to see Aspitis again.

  “It is only a little farther.” The wall-eyed Rimmersman looked at the palisade of gnarled pine trees as fondly as at a familiar street. “There you can rest and eat.”

  “Thank you, Dypnir,” Isorn said. “That will be good.” He might have said more, but Eolair had caught at his bridle and slowed his horse. Dypnir, who had not seemed to notice, let his own mount carry him a little ahead until he was only a shadow in the forest dusk.

  “Are you sure you can trust this man, Isorn?” the Count of Nad Mullach asked. “If you are not, let us demand some further proof of him now, before we ride into an ambush.”

  Isorn’s wide brow furrowed. “He is of Skoggey. Those folk are loyal to my father.”

  “He says that he is from Skoggey. And they were loyal to your father.” Eolair shook his head, amazed that the son of a duke could have so little craft. Still, he could not help admiring Isom’s kind and open heart.

  Anyone that can keep himself so, in the midst of all this horror, is someone to be treasured, the count thought, but he felt a responsibility for, among other things, his own skin that would not let him be silent, even if it risked offending Duke Isgrimnur’s son.

  Isorn smiled at Eolair’s worry. “He knows the folk he should know. In any case, this is a rather tricksy way to go about ambushing a half-dozen men. Don’t you think that if this fellow was Skali’s we would simply have been fallen upon by a hundred Kaldskrykemen?”

  Eolair frowned. “Not if this fellow is only a scout, and looking to earn his spurs with a clever capture. Enough, then. But I will keep my sword loose in the sheath.”

  The young Rimmersman laughed. “As will I, Count Eolair. You forget, I spent much of my childhood with Einskaldir, Aedon rest him—the most mistrusting man who ever drew breath.”

  The Hernystirman found himself laughing a little, too. Einskaldir’s impatience and quick temper had always seemed more in keeping with the old pagan Rimmersgard whose gods were as volatile as the weather, hard as the Vestivegg Mountains.

  Eolair and Isorn and the four Thrithings-men sent by Hotvig had been traveling together for several weeks now. Hotvig’s men were friendly enough, but the journey through the civilized lands of eastern Erkynland—civilized with houses and fields that bore the marks of cultivation, though at the moment it seemed largely unpopulated—had filled them with a certain unease. More and more, as the trek wore on and the grasslanders found themselves farther each day from the plains of their birth, they became moody and sullen, speaking almost entirely to each other in the guttural Thrithings tongue, sitting up at night around the fire singing the songs of their homeland. As a result, Isorn and Eolair had been thrown back almost entirely on each other’s company.

  To the count’s relief, he had found there was a great deal more to the duke’s yellow-haired bear of a son than was at first apparent. He was brave, there was little doubt of that, but it seemed unlike the courageousness of many brave men Eolair had known, who felt that to be otherwise was to fail somehow in the sight of others. Young Isorn simply seemed to know little fear, and to do the things he did only because they were right and necessary. Not that he was completely nerveless. His shuddersome story about his captivity among the Black Rimmersmen, of the torture he and his fellows had suffered and of the haunting presence of pale-skinned immortal visitors, still affected him so strongly that he found it difficult to tell. Yet Eolair, with his sharp intriguer’s eye, thought that anyone else who had suffered such
an experience would have taken it even more to heart. To Isorn it was a terrible time that was now over, and that was that.

  So, as the little company had passed along the hillsides above eerily empty Hasu Vale and through the fringes of the Aldheorte, wide-skirting the menace of snowbound Erchester and the Hayholt—and also, Eolair could not help recalling, of tall Thisterborg—the Count of Nad Mullach had found himself growing more and more fond of this young Rimmersman, whose love for his father and mother was so firm and uncomplicated, whose love of his people was almost as strong and was virtually inseparable from his feelings for his family. Still, Eolair, tired and bruised by events, sick already of the horrors of war before this most recent one had begun, could not help wondering if he himself had ever been as young as Isorn.

  “Almost there.” Dypnir’s voice brought Eolair’s mind back to the dim forest track.

  “I only hope they have something to drink,” Isorn said, grinning, “and enough of it to share.”

  As Eolair opened his mouth to reply, a new voice cracked through the evening..

  “Hold! Stand where you are!” It was Westerling, spoken with the thickness of Rimmersgard. Isorn and Eolair reined up. Behind them, the four Thrithings-men brought their horses to an effortless halt. Eolair could hear them whispering among themselves.