Last year I read for the first time, yes the first time, The Eagle of the Ninth, and I wondered why I had taken so long to read this superb story. My predeliction had always been for Rosemary Sutcliff's books set in later times, my favourite being The Armourer's House and I felt no inclination to read her Roman stories at all.
Well more fool you I hear you cry and you would be right but, as I have said in my earlier post, I do not really regret it as I have now discovered these books when I have the time and leisure to read them and they are simply glorious. I cannot think of another word to describe them. It 
is difficult to say why I love them so much but it is just the joy of the writing. It is total perfection and that is all there is to it. From the minute I opened Dawn Wind I was caught up and breathing and feeling the life and sorrow of Owain until the end when one hopes he has finally found happiness.
At the start of the book Owain is injured after a battle against the invading Saxons and his family are killed. He stumbles across an old couple Priscilla and Priscus who take him in and nurse him back to health. They become fond of him and would like him to make their home with him on their farm as they have no children but Owain feels compelled to leave and seek his people. On the way he meets Regina, a begger girl, all alone in the world and they join forces. When she falls ill and Owain realises he has to find somewhere for her he leaves her with a family who will care for her and offers to become a thrall/Slave if they will look after her. But the family do not need another such and Owain has to leave her and instead joins the household of Beornwulf
"The master of this house says that he does not want another thrall, but the Gods have been good to me; there is a small son in my house and because of that I shall add to the Intake land when home from this wayfaring and because of that there is room in my house for another thrall. Therefore, I have told him I will take you off his hands, for a gold piece, you and the dog together and he will keep his side of the bargain and care for the woman-child"
And thus begins Owain's servitude. As the years pass he becomes a trusted and valued slave and after saving his master from drowning in a wreck which comes ashore, he is given his freedom and he knows he can finally leave and seek Regina. But his plans are thwarted once again when Beornwulf is killed in battle and before dying asks that he stays and looks after his son until he passes his fifteenth year when Owain will be finally free to go. And so he stays.
"he had hardly thought of Regina for years. Long ago it had seemed to him that she must have died and even his memory of her had grown thin and pale so that he could see through it as one sees through a curl of wood smoke. Now, suddenly, he was remembering more vividly that he had ever remembered in his life before, Regina coming towards him, her thin face sparkling with a kind of grave delight, holding out her hands to him with the blue tit cupped between them; the jewel blue of its cap, the blue flash and the whirr of wings as she set it free……from that moment he knew with absolute certainty that even if he never saw her again, Regina was alive and because of that he could go on"
There have been moments in all of the books I have read by Rosemary Sutcliff where she has reduced me to tears and this is no different and the fact that I feel such sorrow at a certain happening in Dawn Wind is proof of the power of her writing.
Slightly Foxed are reprinting the Roman novels and the final two, Sword Song and The Shield Ring are due this coming September and my order is already in. Do take a look at them here. Apart from being such wonderful books and such wonderful editions, the original illustrations are retained. In the Eagle of the Ninth the illustrator was C Walter Hodges, one of my favourite childhood reading illustrators, and in this title it is Charles Keeping.
I said in my review of Eagle of the Ninth that it was a glorious book. So is this one.
Leave a Reply