The Seventh Tower
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The Seventh Tower is a series of six books written by Garth Nix and is the result of a joint partnership of Scholastic and LucasFilm. It narrates the story of a world where the only civilized human beings live in an enormous castle that rests beneath a veil of darkness. The castle possesses an intricate society with many different levels and corresponding towers; each family belongs to an order represented by color (Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, and Red, in precedence), which defines their level of importance. This is a reference to the arrangement of visible colors in the Electromagnetic Spectrum.
At an early age, each child of the castle undergoes a rite of passage, where he or she must travel to the dimension of Aenir, where fantastic creatures live. The children then return to their own dimension with a shadowguard under their control, which is a lesser and more simple form of the adult Spiritshadow. The shadowguard will serve until the child's 13th Day of Ascension when he or she will choose a proper Spiritshadow.
The series focuses on Tal, from the Chosen (inhabitants of the castle) and Milla, from the Far Raiders clan of the Icecarls (inhabitants of the icy lands below the castle), who together discover that an evil long thought to have vanished once more threatens their world.
[edit] Books from the Seventh Tower series
I. The Fall
With his father missing, his mother gravely ill and himself at the mercy of his cruel aunts and the corpulent Shusin, Tal of the Chosen decides to steal a Sunstone from the Red Tower. An unfortunate accident then sees him cast into the icy world outside the Castle and beneath the Veil, where he meets Milla, a young Icecarl.
II. Castle
Tal returns to the Castle with Milla to retrieve a Sunstone for the Far Raiders clan. But something sinister is afoot in the Castle, and Tal is forced to flee into the spirit world of Aenir.
III. Aenir
Tal and Milla run into trouble in Aenir, forcing them to take Spiritshadows, while they search for the Codex, which contain the sum total of Chosen knowledge.
IV. Above the Veil
After meeting up with the Freefolk (Crow, Clovil, Ferek, Gill and Inkie), Tal and Milla are fall into a cleverly designed trap set by the Freefolk. The trap (a hidden trapdoor in the ground) leads to a water-spider infested waterway. Tal and Milla fight them but Tal gets bitten and falls unconscious. They are saved by Ebbit (Tal's great uncle). After being revived by Ebbit (who has developed a water-spider venom antidote), Ebbitt and Crow inform Tal and Milla that the water-spider waterway was a test to see if they were enemies or not and that Ebbitt was there all along with water-spider repellent and the antidote to their venom. Tal realizes that water-spider venom must be the cause of his mother's illness. After meeting the rest of the Freefolk:
Bennem: Crow's brother who is in a dream-like state after an experience in the Hall of Nightmares.
Jarnil: An old Chosen lecturer who was taken to the Hall of Nightmares and then pronounced dead because he discovered Sushin's secret.
Tal asks Jarnil about what the Codex meant about his father. Jarnil explains that the Veil is powered by seven different Keystones which are placed one in each tower. Each Keystone has a Guardian and it appears that Tal's Father is the Guardian of the Orange Keystone. Milla, Ebbitt, and Jarnil combine their knowledge to deduce that Sushin is planning to destroy the Veil and let the free shadows from Aenir invade. Shortly after, Tal and Crow plan to climb the Red Tower to retrieve the Red Keystone and release the Guardian of the Red Keystone (Lokar, Jarnil's cousin) so they can help defeat Sushin. Meanwhile Milla leaves the Castle to warn the Icecarls of the threat to the veil and the possibility of an invasion before planning to give herself to the Ice.
After climbing the Red Tower, Tal and Crow defeat the Keeper, a free spiritshadow who guards the Tower. At the top, they manage to obtain the Red Keystone but raise the alarm in doing so and have to create a miniature Veil to hide themselves in. Even with the instructions of Lokar (who they can communicate to since she is in the Keystone), Tal accidentally makes the Veil too thick so air doesn't come through. He also manages to weave Adras into the Veil, so Adras is stuck with no light. The Veil is too thick to be destroyed using Sunstone Magic, so Tal, Crow and Adras have to wait until it disintegrates in time. Tal and Crow narrowly escape being suffocated and Adras has turned into a small blob of shadow. Tal helps Adras with some light, so he feels better.
After escaping the tower, Crow hits Tal on the back of his head and steals the Red Keystone. Tal chases him and attack him with Sunstone magic. Tal accidentally uses too much power and ruptures a scalding hot steam pipe and causes the ceiling to cave in around Crow and it seems the Freefolk (including Ebbitt) who had just entered the room. Tal recovers the keystone but 'kills' Crow, his own great uncle and the rest of the Freefolk (excluding Bennem and Jarnil who always stay at the Freefolk's 'Fortress'). Milla meanwhile discovers a crystal fingernail embedded with tiny sunstones, Milla after finding next to the skeleton which Tal and Milla got their sunstones, fastens it on. It turns out that this is a magical weapon and Milla (so intent on warning the Crones) falls into a trance. While in that trance, she is stopped by the Shield Mother Arla. Automatically (and without Milla's intention) the fingernail extends and slays the Shield Mother. Milla continues on her way, unaware of Odris's shouts of warnings and the death of the Shield Mother continues to the Ruin Ship and warns the Crones of the danger. After careful decision, Milla is chosen to lead a war against the Chosen.
V. Into Battle
Milla leads the Icecarls into battle against the Chosen.
VI. The Violet Keystone Tal, Milla and Crow must stop a rogue Spiritshadow from destroying the Veil and leading the creatures of Aenir against the Chosen and Icecarls.
| Novels by Garth Nix | |
|---|---|
| The Keys to the Kingdom: | Mister Monday • Grim Tuesday • Drowned Wednesday • Sir Thursday • Lady Friday • Superior Saturday • Lord Sunday |
| The Old Kingdom series: | Sabriel • Lirael • Abhorsen • Across the Wall: A Tale of the Abhorsen and Other Stories |
| The Seventh Tower: | The Fall • Castle • Aenir • Above the Veil • Into Battle • The Violet Keystone |
| Standalone novels: | The Ragwitch • Shade's Children |
