the story progresses, Hild is approached by her cousin Arinbjorn. When he’s supposed to be in training, he leaves to see Hild and asks her to accompany him in their own training. During this time, they are approached by three men. These men put both of them in great danger. But as she sees her cousin struggling, Hild saves Arinbjorn’s life but kills the traitor in the process. Hild suspects that because she saved the king’s son, the murder will be seen as a victory and not treachery. But as her uncle finds out what happened, Hild’s life takes a turn for the worse. The king decides to send her on a journey to a faraway kingdom that has been in a controversy with them for quite some time. She is sent as a peaceweaver to weave peace between the two kingdoms. As she soon finds out, she’s being sent away to marry their king in order to do so. The journey to the Land of the Geats is hard, and there are creatures of legend living in the wood and treachery lurking behind the scenes. Hild faces many choices, choices that could and will affect her life in this kingdom forever. As she arrives in the place she would soon call home, she is not pleasantly surprised at what she sees.
This kingdom is far less extravagant due to an attack of a dragon – the cause of king Beowulf’s death, but that wasn’t her only disappointment. She soon meets the pending king, and he is not at all what she expects. He’s the sixteen year old, Rune, barely fit for the role of a king. Although her first impression of Rune was not what she expected, events turn for the better when she finds him in grave danger and arrives at the scene to help save him. Hild herself turns out to be the unlikely hero, not the damsel in distress that female characters so often are. This turns out to be a great theme in the novel, which is what really surprised me as a
reader. Peaceweaver is a wonderful young adult novel, which could also make a great read for older children and adults. The world building and reveal of the larger picture are beautifully done. Throughout the story, you get to experience Hild growing as a young woman through the journey to a foreign land to marry someone she doesn’t even know. She has great hope for the future, even a hope for romance. Her fears, hopes, and doubts are all believable and understandable for the reader. I loved the building of legend into the world and story. I felt so much a part of the book that I was very sad to see the last page.