Skel follows King Harold to battle at Hastings. When the English lose, Skel is taken prisoner along with several hundred other English youths. Skel is most unusual for his great size and strength and becomes the leader of the English slaves. Over the course of his life, he and his companions suffer many indignities under the rule of the Normans, who were really renegade Norsemen. Skel sees his woman married to a brutal Norman under his own eyes. As the years of pain build up, Skel becomes a master stone mason and is later sent on Crusade to Jerusalem as a squire. Because he can write and speak Latin, he is sent to assist with compiling the Domesday Book. Throughout this book, he plans secretly for revenge. When he finally has his revenge, it is at once awesome and suitably brutal. If you have Scottish, Irish or English blood, your people suffered beside men like Skel.
