The Silver Sun

PRAISE FOR THE WRITING OF NANCY SPRINGER

“Wonderful.” —
Fantasy & Science Fiction

“The finest fantasy writer of this or any decade.” —Marion Zimmer Bradley

“Ms. Springer’s work is outstanding in the field.” —Andre Norton

“Nancy Springer writes like a dream.” —
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Nancy Springer’s kind of writing is the kind that makes you want to run out, grab people on the street, and tell them to go find her books immediately and read them, all of them.” —
Arkansas News

“[Nancy Springer is] someone special in the fantasy field.” —Anne McCaffrey

Larque on the Wing
Winner of the James Tiptree, Jr. Award

“Satisfying and illuminating … uproariously funny … an off-the-wall contemporary fantasy that refuses to fit any of the normal boxes.” —
Asimov’s Science Fiction

“Irresistible … charming, eccentric … a winning, precisely rendered foray into magic realism.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“Best known for her traditional fantasy novels, Springer here offers an offbeat contemporary tale that owes much to magical realism. … An engrossing novel about gender and self-formation that should appeal to readers both in and outside the SF/fantasy audience.” —
Publishers Weekly

“Springer’s best book yet … A beautiful/rough/raunchy dose of magic.” —
Locus

Fair Peril

“Rollicking, outrageous … eccentric, charming … Springer has created a hilarious blend of feminism and fantasy in this heartfelt story of the power of a mother’s love.” —
Publishers Weekly

“Witty, whimsical, and enormously appealing.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“A delightful romp of a book … an exuberant and funny feminist fairy tale.” —
Lambda Book Report

“Moving, eloquent … often hilarious, but … beneath the laughter, Springer has utterly serious insights into life, and her own art …
Fair Peril
is modern/timeless storytelling at its best, both enchanting and very down-to-earth. Once again, brava!” —
Locus

Chains of Gold

“Fantasy as its finest.” —
Romantic Times

“[Springer’s] fantastic images are telling, sharp and impressive; her poetic imagination unparalleled.” —Marion Zimmer Bradley

“Nancy Springer is a writer possessed of a uniquely individual vision. The story in
Chains of Gold
is borrowed from no one. It has a small, neat scope rare in a book of this genre, and it is a little jewel.” —
Mansfield News Journal

“Springer writes with depth and subtlety; her characters have failings as well as strengths, and the topography is as vivid as the lands of dreams and nightmares. Cerilla is a worthy heroine, her story richly mythic.” —
Publishers Weekly

The Hex Witch of Seldom

“Springer has turned her considerable talents to contemporary fantasy with a large degree of success.” —
Booklist

“Nimble and quite charming … with lots of appeal.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“I’m not usually a witchcraft and fantasy fan, but I met the author at a convention and started her book to see how she writes. Next thing I knew, it was morning.” —Jerry Pournelle, coauthor of
Footfall

Apocalypse

“This offbeat fantasy’s mixture of liberating eccentricity and small-town prejudice makes for some lively passages.” —
Publishers Weekly

Plumage

“With a touch of Alice Hoffmanesque magic, a colorfully painted avian world and a winning heroine, this is pure fun.” —
Publishers Weekly

“A writer’s writer, an extraordinarily gifted craftsman.” —Jennifer Roberson

Godbond

“A cast of well-drawn characters, a solidly realized imaginary world, and graceful writing.” —
Booklist

Nancy Springer

Based on her earlier novel,

The Book of Suns

Bright shadows of an Otherplace
 

Pass across my sight, deflect
 

The turnings of my days. Above
 

The weaving trees, a tortured face,
 

A burning tower. Beyond the green-flecked
 

Fire, a sword, a dauntless love,
 

A gold-winged steed. What fey embrace
 

Of Otherfolk makes dreams direct
 

My ways? The raven and the dove,
 

The seer and his desire, grace
 

The circling seas and seasons. Chance
 

We shadows also join the dance?
 

— a song of Hervoyel

Book One

THE FOREST

* * *

Chapter One

The Forest was the abode of warlocks, folk said, and goblins, and other creatures even worse. Still, Alan bent his staggering steps toward the Forest, as a desperate man will. Robbers had stripped him of everything—horse, weapons, even his clothing. The peasants could not spare him more than a beggar's crust. But within the Forest wilderness, Alan hoped, he might be able to find something to eat and a covering for his naked body.

He had not reckoned on his own dizzying weakness. The world swam before his eyes, and trees encircled him with a green blur. He sensed movement and angry shouting, but he did not care. Then the sting of a sword-flat across his back jolted him into full awareness.

Alan found himself facing a big, angry captain at the head of a mounted patrol. The next blow of the captain's sword knocked him to the ground. He lay sprawling, with no strength to flee or defend himself. Closing his eyes, Alan braced himself against the punishing blade.

But as suddenly as the blows had begun, they ceased. Alan looked up. What he saw was to remain clear in his memory for as long as he lived.

The burly captain had turned pale with fear. His chin quivered above a glinting blade pressed against his fleshy throat. But more fearsome than the sword's point, Alan thought, was the one who held the sword. He was a youth with the face of a warrior, straight of brow and strong of jaw—but there was more than a warrior's power about him. His eyes were steel gray, and there was some quality in his hard gaze that caused the captain to tremble and flinch, that caused Alan himself to struggle to his feet in hazy alarm. Yet he could not name the fear that he felt.

The gray-eyed youth spoke a few words that Alan could not understand, while his glance flashed with an eerie intensity of will that shocked Alan anew. Though the stranger had not moved, holding his sword to the captain's throat, the horses plunged away from him. The captain's men could not control them. Squealing and shying, they bolted into the Forest with their hapless riders on their backs. The stranger knocked the captain's sword from his limp fingers, slashed his reins and sent his horse careering after the others.

Alan stood watching, swaying with hunger and pain, vaguely thinking that he should leave as well. He did not have the strength to move a step. But the gray-eyed youth seemed to sense his hesitation. Quietly he dismounted from his big, gray horse and walked to face Alan. “My name is Hal,” he said, “and I will befriend you, if I may. Will you come with me?"

Alan was absurdly glad that a choice was offered to him, though he could not have turned away without falling. He nodded and reached out toward the other, shaking with the effort. He could scarcely see. He felt a gentle hand take hold of him, and he gulped burning liquid from a flask. Hal wrapped him in a cloak and helped him into the saddle of his gray steed, then mounted behind. They sped away into the Forest.

“It will not take those ruffians long to come after us,” Hal muttered, and Alan decided he liked the sound of that low voice.

The ride was a haze of pain for Alan. The horse was strong and swift, and the Forest whirled by. Alan barely noticed when they came to a rocky stretch of waste, but he did notice when they entered the Forest again, for his rescuer guided the horse slowly and carefully over the ground. Then they stopped in a dense stand of cover. Before long Alan heard approaching hoofbeats. The captain and his demoralized troop swept past. The big man had found his sword, and his face was as red as his red roan horse.

Hal chuckled, and Alan grinned in spite of his pain. They moved on, more slowly now. Alan lost track of time until at last they stopped and he felt himself lowered to the ground.

He needed another pull from the flask before he was able to sit up and look around. He was by a small spring which flowed into an open forest meadow. The horse was grazing, and Hal knelt, rummaging in the saddlebags. He drew forth strips of bandage, a dark little jug and a rather old hunk of bread. To Alan the bread was a vision of bliss, and he grasped at it with the impatience of a child.

“Eat slowly,” Hal cautioned. His gray eyes were darker now, but sorter, as gentle as they had been hard before.

Alan bit into the precious bread. He scarcely noticed as the blood-stiffened cloak was peeled away from his wounded back. Hal carefully washed the sword stripes, applied ointment from the jug, than laid on pads of cloth. He bandaged these on with strips of cloth around Alan's body and shoulders. Alan was surprised that he could not eat much of the bread, but it did not matter. A blanket was wrapped around him, and he slept

It seemed only a few minutes later that he was awakened by a gentle shaking. But it was after nightfall. A small campfire was crackling nearby, and over it sat a kettle from which issued a delicious aroma of meat.

“Can you sit up?” asked Hal. “Here, lean against this tree.” The blanket served as a pad for Alan's sore shoulders. The fire warmed his bare legs. Hal filled a battered metal dish with stew, and handed it to him, along with a spoon and a cup of water.

Alan spoke with difficulty. “Hal, have you eaten?"

The other shook his head. “After you. There is only the one bowl and spoon."

Alan ate eagerly. The venison, roots and berries seemed to him food fit for a king's board. But he could not eat more than a few mouthfuls.

“I have not yet thanked you for saving my life,” he said as he rested against the tree.

Hal lowered his gray eyes, flushing, genuinely ill at ease. “Never mind that,” he mumbled. There was no hint about him now of the power that had cowed the captain and his armed troops. Alan had never believed in warlocks; it was his hunger-fogged brain, he thought, that had imagined strange words and a stranger glance half a day before. Still, the horses had run away in spite of curbs and cuffs.... What sort of oddity was his new companion, that he could sow such fear with a glance?

“How did you come to be in such a pass?” Hal broke the silence. “Were you robbed?"

“Ay.” Alan was still too weak for much speech.

Hal phrased his next question with diplomacy. In those days, when men could be outlawed for stealing a loaf of bread, it was not wise to pry. “Were you going anywhere in particular when you were robbed?"