Constantinople, 1036
With a crew of just under fifty warriors, and a ship provided by the Grand Prince, Harald made his way down the Dneiper River. They negotiated the rapids as Vikings often did, by hauling their vessel across the land and, when the river grew calmer once more, came to the Black Sea in the early summer of Ten Hundred and Thirty-Six.
Pecheneg raiders accounted for half-a-dozen or so of his companions. Before the month of June was out, the remaining crew managed to sail through the Bosphorus unmolested and there they laid anchor and stood speechless, gawping at the wonders before them.
The great city of Constantinople stood, the teardrops of God having fallen like golden rain upon the ground, to create the burnished, glistening capital of the world. Harald"s mouth hung o
