Through a Brazen Mirror

delia sherman cortney skinner ellen kushner

In a medieval kingdom both like and unlike 13th C. England, a mysterious young man appears at the door of the palace kitchen, seeing to serve the king. In a lonely stone tower, a woman watches the world through her mirror of bronze. The young king mourns the death of his friend in battle and and puts off choosing a bride. A child abandoned on a farmer’s doorstep grows up to be a powerful witch. The lives of these characters intersect and intertwine in strange and fateful ways as the young man rises from cook to steward to chamberlain and the king becomes more dependent upon him as the sorceress turns his country upside-down in her attempts to defy the fate her mirror has shown her.