About the Author
ALAN DEAN FOSTER is the author of more than eighty books, including sixteen New York Times bestsellers. Among his works are Carnivores of Light and Darkness, Into the Thinking Kingdoms, The Dig, and the Spellsinger and Flinx series. A world traveler, Mr. Foster lives in Arizona.
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Please read on for a bonus excerpt from KINGDOMS OF LIGHT
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FAR from the inaccessible canyon that protected the ramparts of the besieged fortress Malostranka, farther still from the ravaging host that was the Horde, deep within the ancient forest of Fasna Wyzel, a small troop of heavily armed men and women was wending its way toward a river. No homes graced its sparkling shores, no neat gardens were set carefully back from its steeply sloping banks. The depths of the Fasna Wyzel were a place of mystery, of robust rumors and ancient tales twice told. People went in, and sometimes came out, but on no account did they linger. The forest was too dark, too dense, too full of hollows and hedges where eyes peeped out at intrepid passers-by and teeth flashed when the sun fell the wrong way.
No fear of the latter now, mused an introspective Captain Slale. Green as it was once, the forest, like the rest of the world, had descended into gloomy grayness thanks to the all-encompassing Mundurucu hex. The birds that still sang in its trees, albeit fitfully and without enthusiasm, were tiny sad balls of dingy fluff. The other creatures who called the Fasna Wyzel home were little better off. Only the squirrels, charcoal to light gray of color before the application of the spell, could now revel in their natural griminess, and they chose not to do so. Since the coming of the Horde, the world was no longer a happy place, and the forest no exception.