To Green Angel Tower, Volume 1

by Tad Williams

  He stared ruefully at his ragged skin. “I have rowed a little too much, I fear. I am still not strong.”

  Miriamele frowned. “You are mad, Cadrach! You have been in chains for days—what are you doing pulling at oars? You will kill yourself!”

  The monk shook his head. “I did not work at it long, my lady. These wounds on my hands are a tribute to the weakness of my flesh, not the diligence of my labors.”

  “And I have nothing to put on them,” Miriamele fretted, then looked up suddenly. “What time of the day is it?”

  It took the monk a moment to answer the unexpected question. “Why, early evening, Princess. Just after sunset.”

  “And you let me sleep all day! How could you?”

  “You needed to sleep, Lady. You had bad dreams, but I’m sure that you are still much better for ...” Cadrach trailed off, then lifted his curled fingers in a gesture of insufficiency. “In any case, it was best.”

  Miriamele hissed her exasperation. “I will find something for those hands. Perhaps in one of Gan Itai’s packages.” She kept her mouth firm, despite the quiver she felt at the comers when she spoke the Niskie’s name. “Stay there, and do not move those oars an inch if you value your life.”

  “Yes, my lady.”

  Moving gingerly for the comfort of her painful muscles, Miriamele at last turned up the small oilcloth packet of useful articles that Gan Itai had bundled with the water skins and food. It contained the promised fishhooks, as well as a length of strong and curiously dull-colored cord of a type Miriamele had not seen before; there was also a small knife and a sack that contained a collection of tiny jars, none of them bigger than a man’s thumb. Miriamele unstoppered them one by one, sniffing each cautiously.

  “This one’s salt, I think,” she said, “—but what would someone at sea need with salt, when they could get their own by drying water?” She looked to Cadrach, but he only shook his round head. “This one has some yellowish powder in it.” She closed her eyes to take another sniff. “It smells fragrant, but not like something to eat. Hmm.” She opened three more, discovering crushed petals in one, sweet oil in the second, and a pale unguent in the third which made her eyes water when she leaned close.

  “I know that scent,” said Cadrach. “Mockfoil. Good for poultices and such—the staple of a rustic healer’s apothecary.”

  “Then that’s what I was looking for.” Miriamele cut some strips from the nightshirt she still wore underneath her masculine clothing, then rubbed the unguent into some of the strips and bound them firmly around Cadrach’s blistered hands. After she had finished, she wrapped a few bits of dry cloth around the outside to keep the others clean.

  “There. That will help some, anyway.”

  “You are too kind, Lady.” Although his tone was light, Miriamele saw an unexpected glimmer in his eye, as though a tear had blossomed. Embarassed and a little unsure, she did not look too closely.

  The sky, which had long since bled out its brighter colors, was now rapidly going purple-blue. The wind quickened, and Miriamele and Cadrach both drew their cloaks closer about their necks. Miriamele leaned back against the railing of the boat for a long, silent moment, feeling the long craft roll from side to side on the cradling waters.

  “So what do we do now? Where are we? Where are we going?”

  Cadrach was still prodding at the dressings on his hands. “Well, as to where we are at this moment, Lady, I would say we were somewhere between Spenit and Risa Islands, in the middle of the Bay of Firannos. We’re most likely about three leagues off shore—a few days’ rowing, even if we pull oars the day long....”

  “There’s a good thought.” Miriamele crawled forward to the bench Cadrach had occupied and lowered the oars into the water. “Might as well keep moving while we’re talking. Are we facing the right direction?” She laughed sourly. “But how could you say when we probably don’t know where we’re going?”

  “In truth, we should do well as we are headed, Princess. I’ll look again when the stars come out, but the sun was all I needed to know that we are pointing northeast, and that is as fine as we need to be for now. But are you sure you should tire yourself? Perhaps I can manage a little more....”

  “Oh, Cadrach, you with your bleeding hands!? Nonsense.” She dipped the oarblades into the water and pulled, slipping backward on the seat when one of them popped free of the water. “No, don’t show me,” she said quickly. “I learned how when I was little—it’s only that I haven’t done it for a long time.” She scowled in concentration, searching for the half-remembered stroke. “We used to practice on some of the Gleniwent’s small backwaters. My father used to take me.”

  The memory of Elias on a rowing bench before her, laughing as one of the oars floated away across green-scummed water, blew through her. In that snatch of recollection, her father seemed scarcely older than she now was herself—perhaps, she suddenly realized with a kind of startled wonder, he had been in some ways still a boy, for all his manly age. There was no question that the imposing weight of his mighty, fabled, and beloved father had pressed down upon him hard, forcing him to wilder and wilder feats of valor. She remembered her mother fighting back fearful tears at some report of Elias’ battlefield madness, tears that the tale-bringers never understood. It was strange to think about her father this way. Perhaps for all his bravery he had been unsure and afraid—terrified that he would stay a child forever, a son with an undying sire.

  Unsettled, Miriamele tried to sweep the curiously clinging memory from her mind and concentrate instead on finding the ancient rhythm of oars in water.

  “Good, my lady, you do very well.” Cadrach settled back, his bandaged hands and round face pale as mushroom flesh in the swiftly darkening evening. “So, we know where we are—add or subtract a few million buckets of seawater. As to where we are going... well, what say you, Princess? You are the one who rescued me, after all.”

  She suddenly felt the oars heavy as stone in her hands. A fog of purposelessness rolled over her. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I have nowhere to go.”

  Cadrach nodded his head as though he had expected her answer. “Then let me cut you a bit of bread and a cintis-worth of cheese, Lady, and I will tell you what I am thinking.”

  Miriamele did not want to stop rowing, so the monk kindly consented to feed her bites between strokes. His comical look while dodging the backswing of the oars made her laugh; a dry crust stuck in her throat. Cadrach thumped her back, then gave her a swig of water.

  “That is enough, Lady. You must stop for a moment and finish your meal. Then, if you wish, you may start again. It would fly in the face of God’s mercy to escape the kil ... the many dangers we have, then to die of a foolish strangulation.” He watched her critically as she ate. “You are thin, too. A girl your age should be putting meat on her bones. What did you eat on that cursed ship?”

  “What Gan Itai brought me. The last week, I could not bear to sit at the same table with ... that man.” She fought back another wave of despair and instead waved her heel of bread indignantly. “But look at you! You are a skeleton—a fine one to talk!” She forced the lump of cheese he had given her back into his hand. “Eat that.”

  “I wish I had a jug.” Cadrach washed the morsel down with a small swallow of water. “By Aedon’s Golden Hair, a few dribbles of red Perdruin would do wonders.”

  “But you don’t have any,” Miriamele replied, irritated. “There is no wine for ... for a very long way. So do something else instead. Tell me where you think we should go, if you really do have an idea.” She licked her fingers, stretched until her bruised muscles twinged, then reached for the oars. “And tell me anything else you want as well. Distract me.” She slowly resumed her rhythmic pulling.

  For a while, the chop-swish of the blades diving and surfacing was the only sound except for the endless murmuration of the sea.

  “There is a place,” said Cadrach. “It is an inn—a hostel, I suppose—in Kwanitupul.”

 
; “The marsh-city?” Miriamele asked, suspicious. “Why would we want to go there—and if we did, what difference would it make which inn we chose? Is the wine so good?”

  The monk put on a look of injured dignity. “My lady, you wrong me.” His expression became more serious. “No, I suggest it because it may be a place of refuge in these dangerous times—and because it is where Dinivan was going to send you.”

  “Dinivan!” The name was a shock. Miriamele realized that she had not thought about the priest in many days, despite his kindness, despite his terrible death at Pryrates’ hands. “Why on earth would you know what Dinivan wanted to do? And why should it matter now anyway?”

  “How I know what Dinivan wanted is easy enough to explain. I listened at keyholes—and other places. I heard him discuss you with the lector and tell of his plans for you... although he did not inform the lector of all the reasons why.”

  “You did such a thing!?” Miriamele’s outrage was quickly dampened by the memories of doing just such a thing herself. “Oh, never mind. I am beyond surprise. But you must change your ways, Cadrach. Such skulking—it goes with the drinking and lying.”

  “I do not think you know much about wine, my lady,” he said with a wry smile, “so I may not consider you much of a teacher in that study. As for my other flaws—well, ‘necessity beckons, self-interest comes following,’ as they say in Abaingeat. And those flaws may prove the saving of us both, at least from our current situation.”

  “So why did Dinivan plan to send me to this inn?” she asked. “Why not let me stay at the Sancellan Aedonitis, where I would be safe?”

  “As safe as Dinivan and the lector were, my lady?” Despite the harshness, there was real pain in his voice. “You know what happened there—although, the gods be thanked, you were spared seeing it with your poor young eyes. In any case, Dinivan and I had a falling out, but he was a good man and no fool. Too many people in and out of that place, too many folk with too many different needs and wants and problems to solve... and most of all, too many wagging tongues. I swear, they call Aedon’s monument Mother Church, but at the Sancellan she is the most babble-breathed old gossip in the history of the world.”

  “So he planned to send me to some inn in the marshes?”

  “I think so, yes—he spoke in a general way even to the lector, with no naming of names. But I am convinced I have it right because it is a place we all knew. Doctor Morgenes helped its owner to buy it. It is a place closely entangled with the secrets Dinivan and Morgenes and I shared.”

  Miriamele brought the oars to an awkward stop, leaning on the poles as she stared at Cadrach. He gazed back calmly, as though he had said nothing unusual. “My lady?” he asked at last.

  “Doctor Morgenes ... of the Hayholt?”

  “Of course.” He lowered his chin until it seemed to rest on his collarbone. “A great man. A kind, kind man. I loved him, Princess Miriamele. He was like a father to so many of us.”

  Mist was beginning to hover above the surface of the water, pale as cotton wool. Miriamele took a deep breath and shivered. “I don’t understand. How did you know him? Who is ‘us’?”

  The monk let his gaze pass from her face out onto the shrouded sea. “It is a long story, Princess—a very long one. Have you ever heard of something called the League of the Scroll?”

  “Yes! At Naglimund. The old man Jarnauga was part of it.”

  “Jarnauga.” Cadrach sighed. “Another good man, although the gods know, we have had our differences. I hid from him while I was at Josua’s stronghold. How was he?”

  “I liked him,” Miriamele said slowly. “He was one of those people who really listen—but I only talked with him a few times. I wonder what happened to him when Naglimund fell.” She looked sharply at Cadrach. “What does all that have to do with you?”

  “As I said, it is a long tale.”

  Miriamele laughed; it quickly turned into another shiver. “We don’t have much else to do. Tell me.”

  “Let me first find something else to keep you warm.” Cadrach crawled back into the shelter and brought out her monk’s cloak. He draped it around Miriamele’s shoulders and pulled the hood over her short hair. “Now you look like the convent-bound noblewoman you once claimed to be.”

  “Just talk to me—then I won’t notice the cold.”

  “You are still weak, though. I wish you would put the oars down and let me take a turn, or at least lie down under the awning, out of the wind.”

  “Don’t treat me like a little girl, Cadrach.” Although she frowned, she was strangely touched. Was this the same man she had tried to drown—the same man who had tried to sell her into slavery? “You’re not going to touch the oars tonight. When I get too tired, we’ll drop the anchor. Until then, I’ll row slowly. Now talk.”

  The monk waved his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Very well.” He fluffed his own cloak around him, then settled down with his back against a bench and his knees drawn up before him so that he looked up at her from the darkness of the boat’s bottom. The sky had gone almost completely black, and there was just enough moonlight to show his face. “I am afraid that I don’t know where exactly to begin.”

  “At the beginning, of course.” Miriamele raised the oars from the water and slid them back in again. A few drops of spray spattered her face.

  “Ah. Yes.” He thought for a moment. “Well, if I go back to the true beginnings of my story, then perhaps the later parts will be easier to understand—and that way I can also postpone the most shameful tales for a little while longer. It is not a happy story, Miriamele, and it winds through a great deal of shadow... shadow that has now fallen over many people besides a drunken Hernystiri monk.

  “I was born in Crannhyr, you know—when I say I am Cadrach ec-Crannhyr, only the last part is true. I was born Padreic. I have had other names, too, few of them pleasant, but Padreic I was born, and Cadrach I now am, I suppose.

  “I stretch no truth when I say that Crannhyr is one of the strangest cities in all of Osten Ard. It is walled like a great fortress, but it has never been attacked, nor is there anything particularly worth stealing in it. The people of Crannhyr are secretive in a way that even other Hernystiri do not understand. A Crannhyr-man, it is said, would sooner buy everyone at the inn a drink than let even his closest friend into his home—and no one yet has seen a Crannhyr-man buy anyone’s drink but his own. Crannhyr folk are close; that is the best word, I think. They talk in few words—how unlike the rest of the Hernystiri, in whose blood runs poetry!—and they make no show of wealth or luck at all, for fear that the gods will become jealous and take it back. Even the streets are close as conspirators, the buildings leaning so near together in some spots that you have to blow out all your breath before you go in and cannot suck in more air until you come out at the far end.

  “Crannhyr was one of the first cities built by men in Osten Ard, and that age breathes in everything, so that people talk quietly from birth, as though they are afraid that if they speak too loud the old walls will tumble down and expose all their secrets to the light of day. Some people say that the Sithi had a hand in the making of the place, but although we Hernystirmen are never foolish enough to disbelieve in the Sithi—unlike some of our neighbors—I for one do not think the Peaceful Ones had anything to do with Crannhyr. I have seen Sithi ruins, and they are nothing like the cramped and self-protective walls of the city in which I spent my childhood. No, men built it—frightened men, if my eye tells me anything.”

  “But it sounds a terrible place,” Miriamele said. “All that whispering!”

  “Yes, I did not like it much myself.” Cadrach smiled, a tiny gleam in the shadow. “I spent most of my childhood wanting to get away. My mother died when I was young, you see, and my father was a hard, cold man, fitly made for that hard, cold city. He never spoke a word more to me or my brothers and sisters than was necessary, and did not embellish even those words with kindness. He was a coppersmith, and I suppose that hammering at a hot forge al
l day to put food into our mouths showed that he recognized his obligations, so he felt bound to do no more. Most Crannhyri are like that—dour, and scornful of those who are not. I could not wait to make my own way in the world.

  “Strangely, though—and it is often the way—for one so bedeviled by secrets and quietude, I developed a surprising love for old books and ancient learning. Seen through the eyes of the ancients—scholars like Plesinnen Myrmenis and Cuimnhe’s Frethis—even Crannhyr was wonderful and mystical, its secretive ways hiding not just old unpleasantness, but strange wisdoms that freer, less arcane places could not boast. In the Tethtain Library—founded in our city centuries ago by the great Holly King himself—I found the only kindred souls in that entire walled prison, people who, like myself, lived for the lights of earlier days, and who enjoyed running down a bit of lost lore the way some men revel in chasing down a buck deer and putting an arrow in its heart.

  “And that is where I met Morgenes. In those days—and this is almost two score years ago, my young princess—he was still inclined to travel. If there is a man who has seen more than Morgenes, who has been to more places, I have never heard of him. The doctor spent many hours among the scrolls of the Tethtain Library and knew the archives better than even the old priests who watched over them. He saw my interest in matters of history and forgotten lore and took me in hand, guiding me toward useful paths that I would otherwise never have found. When some years had passed, and he saw that my devotion to learning was not a thing to be sloughed off with childhood, he told me of the League of the Scroll, which was formed long ago by Saint Eahlstan Fiskerne, the Hayholt’s Fisher King. Eahlstan inherited Fingil’s castle and his sword Minneyar, but he wanted nothing to do with the Rimmersman’s heritage of destruction—especially the destruction of learning. Eahlstan wanted instead to conserve knowledge that might otherwise vanish into shadow—and to use that knowledge when it seemed necessary.”