Excerpts
An Excerpt From Brothers of the Wind
Master of the fantasy genre, Tad Williams is back with an action-packed adventure following two brothers whose loyalties are tested as they face a terrible black dragon.
In Tad Williams’s epic fantasy Brothers of the Wind, pride often goes before a fall, but sometimes that prideful fall is so catastrophic that it changes history itself. Among the immortal Sithi of Osten Ard, none are more beloved and admired than the two sons of the ruling family, steady Hakatri and his proud and fiery younger brother Ineluki—Ineluki, who will one day become the undead Storm King. The younger brother makes a bold, terrible oath that he will destroy deadly Hidohebhi, a terrifying monster, but instead drags his brother with him into a disaster that threatens not just their family but all the Sithi—and perhaps all of humankind as well.
For all the water and mud and new-sprouted grass, the valley seemed curiously lifeless. The birds I had not heard the evening before were still absent today, and the crickets had fallen silent. The only noises other than those we made were the occasional jeers of crows or the hissing of mountain cicadas, oblivious to everything except their own short time in the sun.
Though the sun kept rising through the cloudy sky, I never felt warm. The small streams that ran through the valley had flowed together in spots to make great brackish ponds, with the branches of half-submerged trees reaching up through the murky water like the arms of drowning swimmers. The steep hillsides were covered with thick growth, so that what little sound we made did not echo back to us. I could not help feeling like one who trespasses in another’s house by night, hoping only to achieve whatever they came to do and escape before the house’s owner awakes.
Suddenly Ineluki raised a hand. His brother, Yohe, and I all reined up and waited silently. Ineluki extended a finger, pointing to a place some distance ahead of us through the muddy, swampy vale, where two large alders grew on either side of the track of higher ground we were following. At first I could make nothing of his gesture—what was before us looked no different to me than what was behind—but now my master also saw what his brother had seen, and I could tell by his face not to speak. Hakatri climbed down from Frostmane, and I took the charger’s reins from him. Ineluki dismounted too, giving Bronze to Yohe.
“We should have brought hounds,” Ineluki whispered to his brother.
“We are not our cold Hikeda’ya kin,” my master said quietly. “We do not send animals or slaves where we fear to go ourselves.”
As I watched, the two of them made their way forward, crouching low to the ground. Neither one had drawn a weapon, which puzzled me, but as I swung down from my saddle so I could better keep both of my master’s horses calm, I finally saw what Ineluki had spotted. What I had thought only another large tree root or fallen log—a dark, cylindrical shape lying across the earthen track ahead of us—suddenly moved, and I realized it was no root at all but a tail.
The tail was of good size, that was beyond doubt.
It certainly belonged to a drake of some kind, or an unusually large swamp-serpent—but from where I sat it appeared nowhere near as massive as I had feared from the stories the mortals told, and though my heart was beating very fast I felt a little relief. Without being asked, I untied my master’s boar-spear so that it would be ready for him. I followed, still holding Frostmane’s reins, leaving Seafoam waiting, but my master and Ineluki moved more swiftly. They were now some dozen paces ahead of me, creeping slowly but steadily toward the long, dark thing that lay motionless across the track.
As I stood with Frostmane’s reins in one hand and the heavy hunting spear in the other, the moment seemed to hang in the air and burn away in silence like a handful of lit straw. The black tail slid forward until it was almost out of sight: my master and his brother stayed close to it, trying to catch a glimpse of its owner. The rest of the company was strung out behind us along the high track. Then a great rattling sound passed all the way down the row of trees beside us and I heard a sudden shout behind me—a shout of terror. I turned in time to see a dark shape plunge out of the leaning trees and knock one of the Zida’ya hunters to the ground, along with his shrieking horse. The attack happened far faster than I can describe it, and it took me a moment to realize that what had struck the rider down was not just a large beast, a bear or angry boar, but a monstrous head on the end of a monstrously long neck. The rest of the beast still lay hidden behind the tangled trees that lined the path.
My master Hakatri and the others had also turned back at that single, terrible cry. The crashing, rattling sound grew louder as more of the dragon’s serpentine body emerged onto the higher ground of the trackway behind us. The tail had not been overly large, but that was because we had seen only its very tip. The rest of the worm had been lying in the swampy wrack, stretched parallel to the high ground and hidden by the thick brush and trees. We had passed right by its watching head.
The horses reared in terror as the immense black dragon slithered toward them, then they scattered before it like mice, leaping away in all directions. Some of the startled horses immediately charged into the brackish water and foundered; others reared in panic and flung their riders out of their saddles. The worm’s front legs were short and bowed like those of a southern corkindrill, but it moved with surprising speed. The head on the long neck writhed from side to side, striking at everything it could reach like a furious adder. I only saw it in full for a moment, but that first sight of the monster will never leave my memory. The Blackworm had an armored head with a blunt, jagged beak like a turtle’s, though no turtle was ever so huge. Its eyes, what little I could see of them as the head swept by, were golden rings at the center of staring black orbs, and its lusterless black armor ran in parallel rings down the length of its body so that it rippled like an earthworm as it moved.
The moment of stillness had given way to a din I hope never to hear again, shrieks of pain from horses and riders alike, the crash and splinter of falling trees, and the dull, hideous crunch of the monster’s heavy jaws as it bit through armor, flesh, and bone.
From the corner of my eye I saw my master and heard him shout, “My spear! Pamon, my spear!” Although I scarcely knew what I was doing, I pitched it toward him, but I was shouting, “No, my lord! The beast is too big!” even as I threw it. Hakatri did not listen to my warning, but instead ran past me with the spear clutched in both hands and plunged it into the cold-drake’s side. The spearhead sank into the contorting black body, punching in all the way up to the spear’s bronze-bound lugs, but the creature hardly seemed to notice; a moment later a sideways contortion of its long body sent Hakatri flying into the trees.
“Master!” I cried, forgetting even my overwhelming terror of the worm in my fear for him. I dropped Frostmane’s reins and struggled through the broken trees and floating logs, quickly sinking into muddy water up to my hips as I left the track. Behind me rose the cries of the hunting party, but the worm itself remained oddly silent. I took one look back and saw the great, blunt head rise high into the air, shaking into little pieces someone who had once had a name and a history, showering the track with a drizzle of blood, then I turned away in staggering horror, still searching for my master.
I found Hakatri at last, half sunk in a backwater pool, tangled in broken branches. His face was out of the water and he was breathing, but though I shook him I could not summon any movement or sign of life. The noises from behind me were terrible, the ragged screams of the hunting party and the noise of splintering spear shafts and shattering tree trunks combined into a skull-scraping din beyond my ability to describe. I got my arms around Hakatri and pulled him onto a higher bit of land, then slapped and tugged at him in a panicked effort to bring him back to his senses. At last his eyes opened.
“Get up!” I cried. “Get up, Master! The thing will kill us all!”
“My spear,” he said, trying to fix his eyes on me. “I have lost it. Where is my spear . . . ?”
Excerpted from Brothers of the Wind by Tad Williams. Copyright © 2021 by Tad Williams. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
