BLADE HONER--Book One

In 834 AD, two ageing, high-ranking women were given a splendid ship funeral at Oseberg in the kingdom of Vestfold, Norway. The women were likely connected to a religious cult. DNA-studies have shown that one or both of these women may possibly have had partial origins in eastern Europe and that the youngest woman may have been aged between forty and sixty when she died. As a child, she must have seen the very start of a new era, where the ancient, Heathen and "barbarian" Norse customs of Scandinavia were first challenged by the surrounding world.

We are back at the very dawn of the Viking Age; The age of Charlemagne, Empress Irene and Harun al-Rashid, Ragnar Lóðbrok, King Sígurð Ring and Queen Ása. Most of Scandinavia is Heathen, tribal land, divided into several kingdoms and tribal confederations. The Viking (pirate) Rus have only recently settled in Aldeigjuborg (Staraya Ladoga) by the river Volkhov, and have begun harrying the neighboring lands for slaves and other...