Nithing

The Story of Hengest

A nithing – an outcast – is set upon by robbers and nearly killed. But he fights back, joins their band, and eventually earns a place with King Hoc of the Half-Danes. That nithing is Hengest, hero of the Battle of Sonderburh, who rises to become the king’s thegn – until he is drawn into Hoc’s bitter feud with the Frisians, with consequences that will test his courage and loyalty.

This is the first book in the English Dawn Pentalogy, a sweeping saga of the Anglo-Saxon conquest and settlement of 5th-century Britain. Set against the decline of the Roman Empire, Attila the Hun’s rise, Pict and Scottish raids, and the tyrant Vortigern’s usurpation of Britannia, the series builds toward the age of Arthur – culminating in Merlin setting the sword in the stone for the king who is to come.

An omnibus edition, including all five books of the pentalogy, is available.