From Willow Smith and Jess Hendel comes a powerful and groundbreaking historical epic about an
African warrior in the world of the Vikings.Lore legend and history tell us of the Vikings:
warrior-kings on epic journeys of conquest and plunder. But the stories we know are not the
only stories to tell. There is another story one that has been lost to the mists of time: the
saga of the dark queen.That saga begins with Yafeu a defiant yet fiercely compassionate young
warrior who is stolen from her home in the flourishing Ghanaian empire and taken as a slave to
a distant kingdom in the North. There she is thrust into a strange cold world of savage shield
maidens tyrannical rulers and mysterious gods. And there she also finds something unexpected:
a kindred spirit. She comes to serve Freydis a shy princess who couldn't be more different
than the confident and self-possessed Yafeu.But they both want the same thing: to forge their
own fate. Yafeu inspires Freydis to dream of a future greater than the one that the king and
queen have forced upon her. And with the princess at her side Yafeu learns to navigate this
new world and grows increasingly determined to become one of the legendary shield maidens.For
Yafeu may have lost her home but she still knows who she is and she's not afraid to be the
flame that burns a city to the ground so a new world can rise from the ashes. She will alter
the course of history - and become the revolutionary heroine of her own myth.
