English born Alwin is captured by Viking slave traders and becomes a thrall of Leif the Lucky. He proves his worth in many ways and becomes a trusted servant of Leif, even sharing in Leif's dream of finding the mysterious land in the West. Recently, Leif had promised King Olaf that he would convert Eric the Red, but that path is filled with danger as the Christian religion is outlawed by Eric. Just as he is making strides with his mother and Eric the Red, the thrall Alwin crosses Leif in a way that cannot be forgiven and is struck down and thought dead. Alwin's romance with Leif's foster daughter takes shape in that moment, and no one's life will be the same. Told in the style of a Nordic saga and filled with Nordic traditions and stories, as the Vikings, perched on the tipping point of a new way of life, slowly convert to Christianity. "The Anglo-Saxon race was in its boyhood in the days when the Vikings lived. Youth's fresh fire burned in men's blood; the unchastened turbulence of youth prompted their crimes, and their good deeds were inspired by the purity and wholeheartedness and divine simplicity of youth. For every heroic vice, the Vikings laid upon the oppostie scale an heroic virtue . . . And so it was with their choice of religion, when at last the death-day of Odin dawned. Not to the God who forgives, nor to the God who suffered, did they give their fatih; but they made their vows to the God who is the never-dying and the all-powerful Lord fo those who follow Him." From the Foreword