Worldbinder
Authors: David Farland
Praise for The Runelords Saga
“[Farland] explores the very nature of virtue and finds disturbing contradictions at the heart of every moral question…. When I reached the end of
The Runelords
, and saw grace arise from a devastating battlefield where too many great hearts lay dead, Farland had earned the tears that came to my eyes. It was not sentiment but epiphany.”
—Orson Scott Card, author of
Empire
,
on
The Runelords
“The suspense is real, the action is nonstop, and the characterizations continue to convince…. [This is] a series that has put Farland on high-fantasy readers’ maps.”
—
Booklist
on
The Lair of Bones
“Sometimes truly terrifying, sometimes impossibly sweet,
The Lair of Bones
is a tale sure to entrance any reader. This is a superb story with deeply empathetic characters.”
—Sara Douglass, author of
The Serpent Bride
“Sure,
Brotherhood
has incredible edge-of-your-seat, nail-biting battle scenes—the finale being an exceptional example—but Gaborn’s struggle to make a decision, and then his facing the consequences, is equally thrilling.
Brotherhood of the Wolf
is a welcome sequel.”
—
Starlog
“The author’s imaginative approach to magic, coupled with a richly detailed fantasy world and a cast of memorable heroes and villains, adds depth and variety to this epic tale of war and valor.”
—
Library Journal
on
Wizardborn
“
Worldbinder
is more character driven and less action intense than the previous books in the Runelords saga…. [It] can stand alone appealing to apocalyptic fantasy fans, but series fans will definitely enjoy Farland’s newest tale.”
—
Alternative Worlds
T
OR
B
OOKS BY
D
AVID
F
ARLAND
The Runelords
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Wizardborn
The Lair of Bones
Sons of the Oak
Worldbinder
The Wyrmling Horde
*
*
forthcoming
WORLDBINDER
D
AVID
F
ARLAND
A TOM DOHERTY ASSOCIATES BOOK
NEW YORK
NOTE
: If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
This is a work of fiction. All the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
WORLDBINDER
Copyright © 2007 by David Farland
All rights reserved.
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
Tor
®
is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
ISBN-13: 978-0-7653-5584-3
ISBN-10: 0-7653-5584-1
First Edition: September 2007
First Mass Market Edition: August 2008
Printed in the United States of America
0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Mary, as always.
With special appreciation to Matt Harrill
for his copious help.
PROLOGUE
Though your heart may burn with righteous desires, your noblest hopes will become fuel to fire despair among mankind.
That which you seek to build will crumble to ash.
War shall follow you all of your days, and though the world may applaud your slaughter, you will come to know that each of your victories is mine.
And thus I seal you, till the end of time….
—
Asgaroth’s curse upon Fallion
The tree riveted Shadoath as she stalked into Castle Coorm. It was no more than a sapling, perhaps eight feet tall, with a dozen branches spreading wide in a perfect umbrella. But the sight of it smote her at even a hundred yards, urging her heart to melt. Every winding branch was perfect. Every crook of every twig seemed to have been preconceived by an artistic genius before being executed. The leaves were darkest green above, a mellow honey beneath, and looked something like an oak. The bark was the rich golden color of ripe wheat, warm and soothing, inviting to the eye.
Shadoath had seen such a tree once before, countless ages ago, on another world.
No, she thought. It can’t be.
But she knew that it was. It wasn’t just how the tree looked. It was how it made her feel. Her eyes wanted to drink it in from the distance. Her arms wanted to embrace it. Her head and shoulders yearned to shelter beneath it. Her lungs ached to breathe the perfumed air that exuded from its leaves. Her eyes longed to lie beneath it and stare up, and dimly she recalled the ancient days, when those leaves emitted a soft golden light during the nights, and those who took pleasure beneath it would
peer up through layers of foliage and try to make out the light of distant stars. The sight of its limbs made her yearn for perfection, to be better than she had ever been, to do more than she had ever done, to
change
for the better.
The tree was dangerous, she knew. Left alive, it would grow and develop, rising up like a mountain, insinuating its branches for miles in every direction. It would silently tug at the minds of men, urge them to become its servants. Left alone, it would do even more. It would silently nurture the souls of men, urging them to become virtuous and perfect.
Every instinct in her shouted, Kill it now! Burn it down!
Only the shock of seeing it stayed her hand.
There were mighty changes going on in Rofehavan. The children born in the past generation were more like Bright Ones from the netherworld than children of the past.
And now the One True Tree had risen again.
She wanted to be sure. She studied the knotty roots coming up from the grass. The tree had been planted in the green at Castle Coorm, in the center of a roundabout. A small rock wall, perhaps four feet tall, surrounded the tree. A fountain rose at the back, water splashing down gray stones from the mouth of a gargoyle. At one time there had been a pleasant rock garden here, rife with flowering vines. A few of them still remained, trumpet flowers of red.
But Shadoath could not look for long. The tree drew her eye, the golden bark rising from the grass, where the small roots were already beginning to splay wide, questing for purchase; the bole of the tree twisting as if in torment; the branches rising up to embrace heaven.
Shadoath stood peering at it, and all weariness seemed to leave her, all of her aches and worries. It was as if she laid aside every care, and an upwelling of hope rose inside her, strange longings.
The tree is my master, and I am its servant, her body told her.
But a voice whispered inside her, the voice of the tree. “You are
my
master; how may I serve you?”
An image of their true relationship formed in her mind. Neither was whole without the other, the tree told her. Neither of us should live alone.
Damn
, she realized, the young tree has already gained consciousness. Left alone, it would become wise and venerable and forbidding.
There was a rustling sound behind her, one of the guards on the castle wall. Across the courtyard, Warlord Hale was stumping down from the tower, lugging his great weight along as fast as he could. She had almost forgotten that he existed, even though he was the one who had sent the urgent message asking what to do about the damned tree.
“So,” a girl asked, “do you like my tree?”
Shadoath shook her head, let her vision clear, and suddenly spotted the young woman there beneath the tree, squatting cross-legged upon a rock. Shadoath had been so captivated that she hadn’t seen the girl, even though she sat in plain sight, as quiet and motionless as a mushroom.
She was some indeterminate age between twelve and sixteen, Shadoath imagined, with hair so pale yellow it was almost white, and eyes as pale as sea foam. Her skin had the greenish cast of one who was Wizardborn, and she wore a robe that looked not to have been woven, but to simply have grown around her as roots that interlocked. It was the pale green of new leaves. She bore a staff of golden wood, hewn from the tree itself.