Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
CHAPTER ONE - Apple and Elderberry
CHAPTER TWO - Holly
CHAPTER THREE - Luck
CHAPTER FOUR - Tar and Tin
CHAPTER FIVE - The Eolian
CHAPTER SIX - Love
CHAPTER SEVEN - Admissions
CHAPTER EIGHT - Questions
CHAPTER NINE - A Civil Tongue
CHAPTER TEN - Being Treasured
CHAPTER ELEVEN - Haven
CHAPTER TWELVE - The Sleeping Mind
CHAPTER THIRTEEN - The Hunt
CHAPTER FOURTEEN - The Hidden City
CHAPTER FIFTEEN - Interesting Fact
CHAPTER SIXTEEN - Unspoken Fear
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - Interlude—Parts
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - Wine and Blood
CHAPTER NINETEEN - Gentlemen and Thieves
CHAPTER TWENTY - The Fickle Wind
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - Piecework
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO - Slipping
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE - Principles
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR - Clinks
CHAPTER TWENTY- FIVE - Wrongful Apprehension
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX - Trust
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN - Pressure
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - Kindling
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE - Stolen
CHAPTER THIRTY - More Than Salt
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE - The Crucible
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO - Blood and Ash
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE - Fire
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR - Baubles
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE - Secrets
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX - All This Knowing
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN - A Piece of Fire
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT - Kernels of Truth
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE - Contradictions
CHAPTER FORTY - Puppet
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE - The Greater Good
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO - Penance
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE - Without Word or Warning
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR - The Catch
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE - Consortation
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX - Interlude—A Bit of Fiddle
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN - Interlude—The Hempen Verse
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT - A Significant Absence
CHAPTER FORTY- NINE - The Ignorant Edema
CHAPTER FIFTY - Chasing the Wind
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE - All Wise Men Fear
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO - A Brief Journey
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE - The Sheer
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR - The Messenger
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE - Grace
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN - A Handful of Iron
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT - Courting
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE - Purpose
CHAPTER SIXTY - Wisdom’s Tool
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE - Deadnettle
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO - Crisis
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE - The Gilded Cage
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR - Flight
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE - A Beautiful Game
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX - Within Easy Reach
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN - Telling Faces
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT - The Cost of a Loaf
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE - Such Madness
CHAPTER SEVENTY - Clinging
CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE - Interlude—The Thrice-locked Chest
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO - Horses
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE - Blood and Ink
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR - Rumors
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE - The Players
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX - Tinder
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN - Pennysworth
CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT - Another Road, Another Forest
CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE - Signs
CHAPTER EIGHTY - Tone
CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE - The Jealous Moon
CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO - Barbarians
CHAPTER EIGHTY-THREE - Lack of Sight
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR - The Edge of the Map
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE - Interlude—Fences
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX - The Broken Road
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SEVEN - The Lethani
CHAPTER EIGHTY-EIGHT - Listening
CHAPTER EIGHTY-NINE - Losing the Light
CHAPTER NINETY - To Sing a Song About
CHAPTER NINETY-ONE - Flame, Thunder, Broken Tree
CHAPTER NINETY-TWO - Taborlin the Great
CHAPTER NINETY-THREE - Mercenaries All
CHAPTER NINETY-FOUR - Over Rock and Root
CHAPTER NINETY-FIVE - Chased
CHAPTER NINETY-SIX - The Fire Itself
CHAPTER NINETY-SEVEN - Blood and Bitter Rue
CHAPTER NINETY-EIGHT - The Lay of Felurian
CHAPTER NINETY-NINE - Magic of a Different Kind
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED - Shaed
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED ONE - Close Enough to Touch
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWO - The Ever-Moving Moon
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THREE - Close Enough to Touch
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FOUR - The Cthaeh
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIVE - Interlude—A Certain Sweetness
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SIX - Returning
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SEVEN - Fire
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED EIGHT - Quick
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED NINE - Barbarians and Madmen
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TEN - Beauty and Branch
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED ELEVEN - A Liar and a Thief
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWELVE - The Hammer
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTEEN - Barbarian Tongue
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FOURTEEN - His Sharp and Single Arrow
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTEEN - Storm and Stone
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SIXTEEN - Height
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEEN - Barbarian Cunning
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEEN - Purpose
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED NINETEEN - Hands
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY - Kindness
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE - When Words Fail
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO - Leaving
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-THREE - The Spinning Leaf
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FOUR - Of Names
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FIVE - Caesura
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-SIX - The First Stone
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-SEVEN - Anger
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-EIGHT - Names
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-NINE - Interlude—Din of Whispering
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY - Wine and Water
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-ONE - Black by Moonlight
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-TWO - The Broken Circle
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-THREE - Dreams
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FOUR - The Road to Levinshir
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FIVE - Homecoming
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SIX - Interlude—Close to Forgetting
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SEVEN - Questions
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-EIGHT - Notes
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-NINE - Lockless
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY - Just Rewards
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-ONE - A Journey to Return
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-TWO - Home
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-THREE - Bloodless
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-FOUR - Sword and Shaed
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-FIVE - Stories
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-SIX - Failures
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-SEVEN - Debts
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-EIGHT - The Stories of Stones
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-NINE - Tangled
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTY - Folly
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIF
TY-ONE - Locks
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-TWO - Elderberry
EPILOGUE
The Kingkiller Chronicle:
Day One: THE NAME OF THE WIND
Day Two: THE WISE MAN’S FEAR
For more about The Kingkiller Chronicle visit www.patrickrothfuss.com
Copyright © 2011 by Patrick Rothfuss
eISBN : 978-1-101-48640-5
All Rights Reserved.
DAW Book Collectors No. 1540.
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To my patient fans, for reading the blog and telling me what they really want is an excellent book, even if it takes a little longer.
To my clever beta readers, for their invaluable help and toleration of my paranoid secrecy.
To my fabulous agent, for keeping the wolves from the door in more ways than one.
To my wise editor, for giving me the time and space to write a book that fills me with pride.
To my loving family, for supporting me and reminding me that leaving the house every once in a while is a good thing.
To my understanding girlfriend, for not leaving me when the stress of endless revision made me frothy and monstrous.
To my sweet baby, for loving his daddy even though I have to go away and write all the time. Even when we’re having a really great time. Even when we’re talking about ducks.
PROLOGUE
A Silence of Three Parts
DAWN WAS COMING. The Waystone Inn lay in silence, and it was a silence of three parts.
The most obvious part was a vast, echoing quiet made by things that were lacking. If there had been a storm, raindrops would have tapped and pattered against the selas vines behind the inn. Thunder would have muttered and rumbled and chased the silence down the road like fallen autumn leaves. If there had been travelers stirring in their rooms they would have stretched and grumbled the silence away like fraying, half-forgotten dreams. If there had been music . . . but no, of course there was no music. In fact there were none of these things, and so the silence remained.
Inside the Waystone a dark-haired man eased the back door closed behind himself. Moving through the perfect dark, he crept through the kitchen, across the taproom, and down the basement stairs. With the ease of long experience, he avoided loose boards that might groan or sigh beneath his weight. Each slow step made only the barest tep against the floor. In doing this he added his small, furtive silence to the larger echoing one. They made an amalgam of sorts, a counterpoint.
The third silence was not an easy thing to notice. If you listened long enough you might begin to feel it in the chill of the window glass and the smooth plaster walls of the innkeeper’s room. It was in the dark chest that lay at the foot of a hard and narrow bed. And it was in the hands of the man who lay there, motionless, watching for the first pale hint of dawn’s coming light.
The man had true-red hair, red as flame. His eyes were dark and distant, and he lay with the resigned air of one who has long ago abandoned any hope of sleep.
The Waystone was his, just as the third silence was his. This was appropriate, as it was the greatest silence of the three, holding the others inside itself. It was deep and wide as autumn’s ending. It was heavy as a great riversmooth stone. It was the patient, cut-flower sound of a man who is waiting to die.
CHAPTER ONE
Apple and Elderberry
BAST SLOUCHED AGAINST THE long stretch of mahogany bar, bored. Looking around the empty room, he sighed and rummaged around until he found a clean linen cloth. Then, with a resigned look, he began to polish a section of the bar.
After a moment Bast leaned forward and squinted at some half-seen speck. He scratched at it and frowned at the oily smudge his finger made. He leaned closer, fogged the bar with his breath, and buffed it briskly. Then he paused, exhaled hard against the wood, and wrote an obscene word in the fog.
Tossing aside the cloth, Bast made his way through the empty tables and chairs to the wide windows of the inn. He stood there for a long moment, looking at the dirt road running through the center of the town.
Bast gave another sigh and began to pace the room. He moved with the casual grace of a dancer and the perfect nonchalance of a cat. But when he ran his hands through his dark hair the gesture was restless. His blue eyes prowled the room endlessly, as if searching for a way out. As if searching for something he hadn’t seen a hundred times before.
But there was nothing new. Empty tables and chairs. Empty stools at the bar. Two huge barrels loomed on the counter behind the bar, one for whiskey, one for beer. Between the barrels stood a vast panoply of bottles: all colors and shapes. Above the bottles hung a sword.
Bast’s eyes fell back onto the bottles. He focused on them for a long, speculative moment, then moved back behind the bar and brought out a heavy clay mug.
Drawing a deep breath, he pointed a finger at the first bottle in the bottom row and began to chant as he counted down the line.
Maple. Maypole.
Catch and carry.
Ash and Ember.
Elderberry.
He finished the chant while pointing at a squat green bottle. He twisted out the cork, took a speculative sip, then made a sour face and shuddered. He quickly set the bottle down and picked up a curving red one instead. He sipped this one as well, rubbed his wet lips together thoughtfully, then nodded and splashed a generous portion into his mug.
He pointed at the next bottle and started counting again:Woolen. Woman.
Moon at night.
Willow. Window.
Candlelight.
This time it was a clear bottle with a pale yellow liquor inside. Bast yanked the cork and added a long pour to the mug without bothering to taste it first. Setting the bottle aside, he picked up the mug and swirled it dramatically before taking a mouthful. He smiled a brilliant smile and flicked the new bottle with his finger, making it chime lightly before he began his singsong chant again:Barrel. Barley.
Stone and stave.
Wind and water—
A floorboard creaked, and Bast looked up, smiling brightly. “Good morning, Reshi.”
The red-haired innkeeper stood at the bottom of the stairs. He brushed his long-fingered hands over the clean apron and full-length sleeves he wore. “Is our guest awake yet?”
Bast shook his head. “Not a rustle or a peep.”
“He’s had a hard couple of days,” Kote said. “It’s probably catching up with him.” He hesitated, then lifted his head and sniffed. “Have you been drinking?” The question was more curious than accusatory.
“No,” Bast said.
The innkeeper raised an eyebrow.
“I’ve been tasting,” Bast said, emphasizing the word. “Tasting comes before drinking.”
“Ah,” the innkeeper said. “So you were getting ready to drink then?”
“Tiny Gods, yes,” Bast said. “To great excess. What the hell else is there to do?” Bast brought his mug up from underneath the bar and looked into it. “I was hoping for elderberry, but I got some sort of melon.” He swirled the mug speculatively. “Plus something spicy.” He took another sip and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. “Cinnamon?” he asked, looking at the ranks of bottles. “Do we even have any more elderberry?”
“It’s in there somewhere,” the innk
eeper said, not bothering to look at the bottles. “Stop a moment and listen, Bast. We need to talk about what you did last night.”
Bast went very still. “What did I do, Reshi?”
“You stopped that creature from the Mael,” Kote said.
“Oh.” Bast relaxed, making a dismissive gesture. “I just slowed it down, Reshi. That’s all.”
Kote shook his head. “You realized it wasn’t just some madman.You tried to warn us. If you hadn’t been so quick on your feet . . .”
Bast frowned. “I wasn’t so quick, Reshi. It got Shep.” He looked down at the well scrubbed floorboards near the bar. “I liked Shep.”
“Everyone else will think the smith’s prentice saved us,” Kote said. “And that’s probably for the best. But I know the truth. If not for you, it would have slaughtered everyone here.”
“Oh Reshi, that’s just not true,” Bast said. “You would have killed it like a chicken. I just got it first.”
The innkeeper shrugged the comment away. “Last night has me thinking,” he said. “Wondering what we could do to make things a bit safer around here. Have you ever heard the ‘White Riders’ Hunt’?”
Bast smiled. “It was our song before it was yours, Reshi.” He drew a breath and sang in a sweet tenor:Rode they horses white as snow.
Silver blade and white horn bow.
Wore they fresh and supple boughs,
Red and green upon their brows.
The innkeeper nodded. “Exactly the verse I was thinking of. Do you think you could take care of it while I get things ready here?”
Bast nodded enthusiastically and practically bolted, pausing by the kitchen door. “You won’t start without me?” he asked anxiously.
“We’ll start as soon as our guest is fed and ready,” Kote said. Then, seeing the expression on his student’s face, he relented a little. “For all that, I imagine you have an hour or two.”