‘One day a golden-haired warrior came riding to a Saxon village in Mercia, and tossed a penny to a boy… The warrior was called Harold, and the boy was Beornoth: the one Earl Godwin’s heir, the other a lowly thegn’s son.’For Beornoth became a Housecarl — one of that proud band of warriors who swore oaths to guard their King to the death, and who were known as ‘The King’s hounds’. A magnificent picture of Saxon England, follows the fortunes of the finest flower of English warriors, destined to serve their King until the savage hilltop fight known to future generations as the Battle of Hastings.