The Last Light of the Sun by Guy Gavriel Kay

Kay is an award-winning author of historical/fantasy novels. The Last Light of the Sun is set in medieval England, roughly during the 10th century, when Saxons were struggling to organize themselves to resist repeated raids by Vikings. Kay interweaves the lives of two Erlings (read Norsemen)--Thorkell Einarson and Bern Thorkellson; a Cyngael prince, Alun ab Owyn; Ceinon, high cleric of the Cyngael; and Aeldred, king of the Anglcyn (Saxon English). These characters, some modeled on actual historical figures, all assume a role in countering a vengeance-driven raid by Jormsviking mercenaries on Brynnfell, homestead of a Cyngael earl famed for his victories against the Erlings. Kay brings fantasy into his history of the land and its people, drawing on legends of faerie folk in Anglcyn and Cyngael and of witches on the Erling island of Rabady. He offers insights into the routine violence and hardship in the lives of commoners-- serfs, women and fighters on both sides. Interspersed with the action are soliloquies on the meaning of life and faith. The strength of the Last Light lies in its narrative and the depiction of a grim world now lost to history, but still open to heroic and romantic imaginings.