The Finnsburg Encounter

I originally published this novel in 1990 (before Wattpad existed), and the sequel-The Rood and the Torc: The Song of Kristinge, Son of Finn-in 2014. I'm thinking about republishing The Finnsburg Encounter. I've made part I available on Wattpad; comment and let me know when you're ready for part II.

The tale here set forth of Finn and Hildeburh grew out of a small portion of the Old English heroic poem Beowulf. After Beowulf's victory over the monster Grendel, the hero and his brave companions gather together in Heorot, the famous hall of Danish king Hrothgar, to celebrate. In that portion of the poem, often called "The Finnsburg Episode of Beowulf" (lines 1064-1124), Hrothgar's poet sings a song about the famous battle of Finn and Hnaef. The tale is retold in brief by the Beowulf poet-a story within a story, as it were. At the time that Beowulf was composed, that tale of Finn and Hildeburh was probably well-known, and so the Beowulf poet needed only to give a brief summary of the events. Now, however, many centuries later, the full story of these events is long lost. All we know of the tragic tale of Finn is what we read in that small episode of Beowulf, and in a cryptic fragment of another poem which was discovered, transcribed by the scholar George Hickes, and then lost, but which seems to relate closely to the events told by the Beowulf poet.
Here then is given, as recreated in the imagination of the author, a fuller tale of Finn and Hildeburh, and of the events leading up to the fight at Finnsburg. No knowledge of Beowulf is necessary, but those who are familiar with that great poem may enjoy these speculations. In order to give a more realistic, historical flavor to the tale, I have placed the events during a particular period of history, namely the early seventh century.