Voice in the Wind

Voice in the Wind is a novel by the American writer Francine Rivers, published in 1993 by Tyndale House and the first book of the Mark of the Lion series.

The book is set in the first century, and its central figure is Hadassah, a young Jewish Christian living in the Roman Empire. When Jerusalem falls to the Roman army in AD 70 her family is killed and she is taken away and sold as a slave. She ends up in the household of the Valerian family, working as personal servant to their daughter Julia, who is rebellious, impulsive and determined to sample everything the city has to offer. Hadassah's situation requires her to keep her beliefs to herself, since being known as a Christian would put her in danger, and much of the novel concerns the difficulty of living according to a faith she cannot admit to having. Marcus, the older son of the Valerian family, falls in love with Hadassah while she is serving his sister, and a captured German tribesman named Atretes is forced to fight as a gladiator elsewhere in the same city.