The love of two young men is forged in their struggle to survive against barbarian invaders.
This classic historical romance is set in the very depths of the Dark Ages, in the northeast of a country not yet known as England. The Romans have recently departed, though fragments of their world still linger on. The native Britons are being pressed back by the barbarian Angles from over the water, as they sail in on the east wind seeking new land to settle. Ronan and Bryn are two young men eager to defend their land against the invaders, but Ronan is a common freeman and Bryn the son of an overweening lord. The social differences divide them at a fundamental level, though each is powerully drawn to the other. Not until the invasion do Ronan and Bryn "find" each other, when Bryn's heritage is stripped away in a single night of battle, and only luck leaves him and Ronan alive in the dawn. As with his FORTUNES OF WAR and WHITE ROSE OF NIGHT, Mel Keegan conjures up an atmospheric tale in which love between men is forged in battles they must fight, hardships they must endure.
