title: The Flame Bearer (Saxon Tales)
author:  Bernard Cornwell 
description: Another rollicking Saxon tale.... No lit-fic pretensions here: historical fiction rendered, with little expansion, via battles and royal intrigue and portraits of day-to-day life circa 1000 B.C.E. (<i>Kirkus</i>)<br /><br />Vivid, fast-paced.... Treachery and trickery mark the tenth volume in Cornwells always exciting Saxon Tales. (<i>Library Journal</i>)<br /><br />Rousing...will not disappoint. (Margaret Flanagan, <i>Booklist</i>)<br /><br />The final battle is one for the ages, bursting with gory detail and flush with savage death as the wolves of the shield wall smite his enemies. (Lee Scott, <i>Florida Times-Union</i>)<br /><br />As with all his previous books Cornwell grabs your attention right off the bat. His masterful style pulls you right in. (<i>New York Journal of Books</i>)<br /><br />Fascinating.... Blends historic fact with fiction seamlessly. (Glen Seeber, <i>The Oklahoman</i>)<br /><br />The battle description might well be Cornwells best yet, which is saying something. Fans do not want to miss this episode. (Bookloons.com)<br /><br />Bernard Cornwell ranks as the current alpha male of testosterone-enriched historical fiction. Cornwell offers dramatic battle scenes with big swinging swords. There is also treachery, male bonding, plenty of historical nuggets and a skillful examination of the powerful role played by religion in the Dark Ages. (<i>USA Today</i>)<br /><br />The most prolific and successful historical novelist in the world today.... Mr. Cornwell writes as if he has been to ninth-century Wessex and back. . . . Much has changed since the ninth century, but some things, and some feelings, are timeless. (<i>Wall Street Journal</i>)<br /><br />Our hero is Uhtred, a good-hearted lout with a pleasantly sour disposition; hes like a 9th century Han Solo. (<i>Time</i>)
zlib_text: ![](Images/cover00274.jpeg)
  
  Contents
  
  > Prologue
  
  > 1 A Dreadful Row
  
  > 2 The Conqueror Worm
  
  > 3 To the Last Hour
  
  > 4 To Be Wise and Love
  
  > 5 A Heart Divided
  
  > 6 Let Darkness
  
  > 7 Dare to Wish
  
  > 8 That Fire of Fire
  
  > 9 Graven in Metal
  
  10 Like Water upon Sand
  
  11 Fearful of the Night
  
  12 Ghosts on the Road
  
  13 The Mind Has Mountains
  
  14 _Parabatai_
  
  15 Stars, Hide Your Fires
  
  16 The Clockwork Princess
  
  17 Only Noble To Be Good
  
  18 For This Alone
  
  19 To Lie and Burn
  
  20 The Infernal Devices
  
  21 Burning Gold
  
  22 Thunder in the Trumpet
  
  23 Than Any Evil
  
  24 The Measure of Love
  
  Epilogue
  
  A Note on Tessa’s England
  
  Acknowledgments
  
  ![](Images/image00272.jpeg)
  
  > For the Lewis family:  
  >  Melanie, Jonathan, and Helen  
  >  
  >
  
  > ![](Images/image00273.jpeg)
  
  > _I held it truth, with him who sings_  
  >  _To one clear harp in divers tones,_  
  >  _That men may rise on stepping-stones_  
  >  _Of their dead selves to higher things_.
  
  > —Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “In Memoriam A.H.H.”
  
  PROLOGUE
  