The Sixth Lost Tale of Mercia: Hastings the Hearth Companion

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“The Lost Tales of Mercia” are ten short stories set in England near the end of the Viking Age. These swashbuckling tales, based heavily on true events, educate and entertain simultaneously. In the Sixth Tale, a royal retainer named Hastings fights for his country and the Golden Cross, but entertains unrealistic notions of how his mistress, Aetheling Aydith, might reward him.Martyn took a steadying breath and peered around the boulder. The dragon appeared in no hurry to devour them, taking its time stretching and folding its leathery wings. It wasn't as big as a longboat as the stories said, but it was still huge – four times the size of a horse, plus the tail, long neck, and a head the size of a coffin. It was beautiful in a chilling sort of way, its skin a scaly rainbow of glittering copper, amber, emerald and bronze, the colors changing in liquid ripples as the fading sunlight swept across its body while it crept toward their feeble hideout.