Praise for THE WIND SINGER
Winner of the Smarties Prize Gold Award and the Blue Peter Book Award
‘This is a truly extraordinary book that will haunt you’
Daily Telegraph
‘Positively surreal imagery, a fast-moving adventure and a cutting satire all in one. An original and striking read’
Melvin Burgess
‘. . . A gripping read . . . A beautifully narrated, warm thriller of a book, full of inventiveness, action and passion’
Guardian
‘A lyrical, evocative and powerful story’
Kate Agnew
‘. . . A truly imaginative, fantastical and distinctive adventure story that grips from the very beginning and absolutely refuses to let go’
Amazon
‘An accesible, rebellious and fast-paced adventure, and, as you would expect from the author of Shadow lands, a heart-wringing celebration of love’
Sunday Times
‘. . . A potent mix of thundering adventure and purposeful fantasy’
Guardian
‘A page-turning quest adventure that crackles off the page’
Books Magazine
‘. . . A story that delves deeper into human nature and relationships’
Bookseller
Books by William Nicholson
The Wind on Fire Trilogy
The Wind Singer Slaves of the Mastery Firesong
The Noble Warriors Trilogy
SeekerJango Noman
For older readers
Rich and Mad
First published in Great Britain 2000
This edition published 2011
by Egmont UK Limited
239 Kensington High Street
London W8 6SA
Text copyright © 2000 William Nicholson
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
ISBN 978 1 4052 3969 1
eBook ISBN 978 1 7803 1210 1
www.egmont.co.uk
www.williamnicholson.co.uk
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,Or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner
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Contents
2 Kestrel makes a horrible friend
5 A warning from the Chief Examiner
8 The Hath family shamed
9 Escape from Aramanth
10 In the salt caves
11 The mudnut harvest
12 A Queen remembers
13 The Hath family punished
14 Return of the old children
15 Prisoners of Ombaraka
16 The wind battle
17 The Hath family fights back
18 Crack-in-the-land
19 Mumpo goes wrong
20 Into the fire
21 The march of the Zars
22 The Hath family broken
23 The Scourge of the Plains
24 The last High Examination
Long ago
At the time the strangers came, the Manth people were still living in the low mat-walled shelters that they had carried with them in their hunting days. The domed huts were clustered around the salt mine that was to become the source of their wealth. This was long before they had built the great city that stands above the salt caverns today. One high summer afternoon, a band of travellers came striding out of the desert plains, and made camp nearby. They wore their hair long and loose, men and women alike, and moved slowly and spoke quietly, when they spoke at all. They traded a little with the Manth, buying bread and meat and salt, paying with small silver ornaments that they themselves had made. They caused no trouble, but their near presence was somehow uncomfortable. Who were they? Where had they come from? Where were they going? Direct questions produced no answers: only a smile, a shrug, a shake of the head.
Then the strangers were seen to be at work, building a tower. Slowly a wooden structure took shape, a platform higher than a man, on which they constructed a second narrower tower, out of timber beams and metal pipes. These pipes were all of different sizes, and bundled together, like the pipes of an organ. At their base, they opened out into a ring of metal horns. At their