When his homeland is defeated by a predatory neighbouring kingdom, Eadwine finds himself on the run for his life.
Homeless, penniless and friendless, literally with a price on his head, he must evade his enemies, avenge his brother's murder and rescue his betrothed. Along the way, he will lose his heart to another woman and discover a shattering secret that challenges all the ideals he holds dear.
Ingeld's Daughter is an adventure, a love story, and a stirring tale of rebellion, civil war, the price of justice and the economics of taxation and trade.
Irinya is Ingeld's daughter, rightful heir to the Lordship of Carlundy. Her cousin Radwulf usurped the lordship after her father's death, married her by force to legitimise his weaker claim, and has held her effectively a prisoner for twelve years. When Gyrdan, a stranger on unknown business, escapes from interrogation by Radwulf's guards and takes refuge in her chamber, she conceals him partly out of sympathy and partly out of a desire to thwart Radwulf wherever possible. But, by working together, they find they are able to escape.
Now Irinya is on the run with a stranger she has only just met, whom she dare not trust and whose history and purpose she does not know. She must decide which is the greater danger, Radwulf's soldiers and allies pursuing her, or Gyrdan at her side. Exiled in a strange land, she is determined to oust Radwulf and reclaim her rightful position as Lady of Carlundy. But to do this she must somehow enlist support from the radically different cultures of prosperous Billand and the fiercely independent clans of the Black Hills, and convince the people of Carlundy to fight for her and for a better life.
Her relationship with Gyrdan develops from suspicion into friendship and slowly blossoms into love. But Gyrdan has a dark secret in his past, and when it catches up with them Irinya finds herself in a terrible trap. Her courage and integrity will be crucial if she is to overthrow Radwulf - but will they also force her to order the death of the man she loves?
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Ingeld's Daughter is set in an invented world. It illustrates a society on the cusp of change from medieval feudalism to a more socially mobile, more commerce-based Renaissance-style structure. The three societies in the book, the social and economic influences and the political conflicts are all based on British history from various times and places. The geography is based on British landscapes. The strands of the story I wanted to tell did not all occur together at a single time and place in British history, so rather than twist history to fit the story, I set the story in an invented world.
Some would categorise the book as fantasy because of the invented setting. However, magic and monsters exist only in the minds of some of the characters. They may be no less powerful for that - irrational beliefs have shaped many a cataclysmic change in history - but you'll find no dragons or wizards casting spells, and no titanic struggle between the forces of absolute good and absolute evil.
Read more about the background.