| Axe of Iron-The Settlers is a tale of survival, strife, | | | | Tornit hunters from far to the north venture south |
| love, and the quest for a new home in the face of | | | | to hunt, and the Northmen strike up a friendship with |
| hostile opposition. Conditions of manifest destiny | | | | them. The Tornit tell the newcomers much about the |
| propel a large contingent of Norse Greenlanders from | | | | local area and describe coastal waters far to the |
| relative security into an odyssey of exploration and | | | | south. It is this thought-provoking insight into the |
| settlement out over the unknown waters of the | | | | geography of this new land and the dawning |
| North Atlantic, to a North America of one thousand | | | | realization that the storm god, Njord, seems to have |
| years ago; to a land they called Vinland. The chieftain, | | | | led his people to this place, that cause Halfdan to |
| Halfdan Ingolfsson and his second-in-command, | | | | revise his thinking and propose a new plan to |
| Gudbjartur Einarsson, spend a winter gathering 315 | | | | Gudbjartur and the council of ship's captains: sail south |
| men, women, and children from the two Norse | | | | before choosing where to build their settlement. |
| settlements on the southwestern coast of Greenland. | | | | They make their way to the south along the coast |
| Early in the spring of AD 1008, the company sets sail | | | | of Hudson Bay to a river fjord near the southern |
| aboard six large cargo ships. Five days into the | | | | extremity of present-day James Bay, where they |
| voyage, in the strait between Helluland and | | | | find everything that they sought. Soon the |
| Markland-present day Hudson Strait-a gale holds the | | | | longhouses and palisades of a permanent settlement |
| flotilla in its grip for four long and arduous days. | | | | mark their new home. The Naskapi, a hostile tribe |
| Halfdan decides to seek shelter in a protected bay, | | | | whose land the Northmen have preempted, resent |
| so they can rest, repair the storm damage, and | | | | the intruders. After the rape of two Naskapi women |
| replenish food stores lost in the storm. During the | | | | by renegade Northmen, the trouble between the |
| following weeks, the settlers reap a harvest of fish | | | | factions escalates. Gudbjartur senses the rapes will |
| and game that is the best in living memory. When | | | | somehow determine the survival of the settlement. |
| hunters discover a sheltered fjord, Halfdan orders a | | | | Only later will Halfdan and the others realize how |
| move. | | | | prophetic his misgivings are. |