Background

Godmond is sixteen years old and works for the thane, keeping the kennels, training and caring for his hunting and guard dogs as well as the few horses. Also, during a hunt, he takes part in tracking the quarry.

His immediate family is of the geneatas, raising crops and keeping a small amount of livestock. For as long as he can remember, his father Egric has been a sour and bitter drunkard, taking his hand to Godmond, his mother and his two sisters.

At the age of seven, his mother Tette was able to have him sent safely away to the home of her brother Hengist, the thane's stablemaster. For the first several months of living under his uncle's roof, Godmond slept in the kennels with the newest batch of puppies- there for the first time he found unjudging acceptance from another creature. A widower with no sons of his own, Hengist took to Godmond as if he were his own, although it took him quite some time to coax Godmond out of his withdrawn self.

At first he found Godmond to be distrustful and wary of human contact, however with perseverence and generosity he managed to convince the boy that people were not like his father and could be trusted. Over time he moulded a soft hearted and gentle-spirited boy.

Several years later, his uncle came to him sorrowfully to tell him that his mother had died, and while he was never told why, he somehow convinced himself that it was his father's doing, because of the beatings he had suffered and watched as a child.

About the village, especially amongst those close to his own age, Godmond created a reputation of gullibility for himself.

Anyone who approached him with a smile and treated him kindly, clearly was not like his father and therefore was safe in Godwin's eyes. Although this led him to be the butt of several practical jokes, Hengist's watchful eye and the fact that he worked for the thane, prevented any true malice to find him.

Hengist was not always a stablemaster: in his youth he was in fact a well travelled soldier, who marched with the troops of the cyning himself. He travelled far and wide until he was wounded by a stray arrow to the hip. Though he had few skills, he had earned a reputation amongst the men and was able to secure a position with one of the thanes. Though crippled, he was still able to work with animals and so many in the village respect him for his mind and his stories as well as anything else. Hengist's has been embraced as a part of the village.

Hating his father and seeing the reverence with which others treat his uncle, Godmond has always upheld his uncle as a rolemodel. He seeks to emulate as close as possible, thus has developed into a hard-working and morally upright young man. The only thing that he perceives to be missing from his experience, which his uncle already has, is to travel the world and to learn about the world outside the village surrounds.

Journal