Octavia Randolph · 2018 · coming-of-age

How the boy became a Viking. The prequel goes back to 847 and the Jutland of Sidroc's boyhood - a discarded child on his father Hrald's farm near Ribe, defined by an ever-growing rivalry with his cousin Toki. Their young uncle Yrling has made his name raiding in far-off Angle-land, and trains his nephews in the ways of the warrior; he also takes Sidroc south to the great market of Haithabu, which is an education of another kind. Then comes the perilous crossing of the North Sea that stands between them and the plunder they seek, the hard fighting through which Sidroc rises to second in command of Yrling's war-band, and the captured Saxon stronghold of Four Stones - where, at the very end, comes the young woman for whom he will one day change his life. It dovetails directly into Book One.

1. 1
   Hrald's farm, Jutland

   The farm near Ribe where Sidroc is raised - a discarded child Fated to become a powerful Jarl. Randolph's Sidroc sheet marks both this farm and Ful's, a short way off. Fate had already guided his father Hrald to the meeting with the woman whose son would help change the face of ninth-century Angle-land. From the first, the rivalry with his cousin Toki shapes everything.

2. 2
   Haithabu

   Hedeby on the Schlei, the greatest market of the Danish world, at the neck of Jutland behind the Danevirke. Yrling brings his nephew here for reasons of his own; Sidroc, awkward about his looks, has his first woman and thanks her afterwards with a practical gift of needles - a small scene that tells you the whole man.

3. 3
   Ribe

   Back north to the North Sea port on Jutland's western shore, where the ships are made ready. Ahead of them lies the crossing that stands between the war-band and the plunder they seek, and Yrling has done it before.

4. 4
   Four Stones

   The perilous crossing, and then the great island of Angle-land: hard fighting, through which Sidroc rises to second in command of the war-band Yrling heads. At the captured Saxon stronghold in Lindisse the prequel closes, on the arrival of a young woman - and Book One opens on the same ground.